Mixing matching and incompetent administrators
So, the BIG question, who should start up front with Jonesy? And the key word is start. It is increasingly clear that the manager sees the substitute bench an important part of the overall game strategy. You can’t have too many striking options. It’s reminiscent of Italy in 2006 who, as opposed to the usual four, took six strikers to Germany in their World Cup squad. In the semi against Germany alone they used five of them….. excellent use of the squad. Different attacking possibilities are an important luxury to enjoy. As long as we aren’t three down and game over before we get the chance to mix and match! Although against West Ham our biggest problem was defensive. It was a dreadful free kick for Collins to give away that led to their goal. Like against Villa, we fell behind and got overran for a while. We equalised with a well worked goal and had the better of the second half but didn’t really do enough for us to be able to say we really deserved to win the game. Four points from the two home games isn’t a bad return though. Newcastle on Sunday and a long overdue clean sheet will be a fine starting point. Reaching the next round of the League Cup would be most welcome too. Come on stoke.
Despite playing the usual vacuous superficial lip service, FIFA have decided that the votes to decide 2018 World Cup hosts must not be influenced in any way by the subject of racism. So what is the point of that campaign they have been running? During the recent Russia v Andorra match the black players were targeted throughout. Wouldn’t the threat of being cast aside in the World Cup bid be a just action and a deterrent? In 2006 Ukranian coach Oleg Blokhin made a grand statement that black players shouldn’t play in Ukranian football at all… yet there he was participating in that inane irrelevant ceremony before his teams quarter final against Italy. If the administrative bodies are serious about eliminating racism from the game they can do it by properly punishing those who display bigotry and making an example of them. The last time England played in Spain the black players were abused throughout the game. An appropriate punishment would have been to make them play their next competitive game behind closed doors. This means everyone would suffer and the knuckle draggers would be forced to consider the consequences of their actions on their fellow supporters. The players would have to play a competitive game in near silence and, most importantly for them, their FA would miss out on a load of money.
Brisbane Roar have existed for five years and for five years they have screamed out for a ruthless finisher. Watching them stumble to a 1-1 draw home to Adelaide on Saturday night (before heading to the pub for our game against the Hammers) was five years in one game. Encouraging play but some dopey defending allows Adelaide in to take the lead. Then Brisbane equalise but despite being on top rarely look like snatching a winner. Five years of nearly but not quite. But most importantly we do have football matches to attend and meet mates before and after etc… the social aspect is crucial, and the bars around the stadium are great!! If the game to survive here it has to be supported. However frustrating it can be!!
Amusingly, Mourinho has already started to fall out with his board at Real Madrid! He wants to manage Portugal temporarily for their forthcoming Euro qualifiers against Denmark and Iceland. Initially he was saying that he’d be alone in Madrid with nothing to do for a week (yeah right!) so what harm could it possibly do? He’s taken a step back now but that little disagreement could be the germ that metamorphosizes into a large damaging virus that infects his reign at the Bernebau. Valencia sit at the top in Spain and after watching them masterfully hold off the energetic Hercules they are deserved league leaders. Barcelona will be relieved to have got their defeat at Hercules out of the system with the win at Atletico Madrid. The only problem is that Messi’s injury has taken attention away from the wonderful goal he scored which in itself took attention away from Pedro’s brilliant diagonal pass to unlock the defence. It was just a pity about the horrible black goal nets….. they weren’t a worthy receptacle for a goal of such skill. Messi’s injury means he’ll have to miss a few games including one against mighty Rubin Kazan in Europe….which takes me onto another subject……..
……The European Cup started last week. OR to give it a more fitting name… The overblown overhyped carnival of too much pointlessness started last week. That competition doesn’t get going until March, and often in March the drama and quality of the knockout football on show serves to demonstrate how futile and irrelevant too many of the matches in the early stages are. There were a few suggestions of romance when Chelsea travelled to MSK Zillna but by the thirty minute mark romance had given way to grim predictable reality. Arsenal were indeed brilliant against Braga but, with all respect, it was Braga. Obviously they some good qualities to be in the competition at all but is that victory a genuine benchmark for anything? Quite simply, that tournament needs a revamp to freshen it up. At the moment it’s lots of clubs playing lots of games with little to spark the imagination. Don’t start me on that Europa league.
Liverpool were well beaten by Man Yoo. The 3-2 scoreline is deceptive. The strange thing is however did Liverpool get back to 2-2? It’s lame at this point to say Berbatov’s second was marvellous but of course it was. To control the ball on the thigh and overhead kick takes rare agility. It’s always aesthetically pleasing to see goals bounce in off the underside off the crossbar too. Elsewhere, it was disgraceful to see Arsene Wenger violently attack the fourth official. It isn’t football when you reduce yourself to vicious intimidation like that. That kind of bare thuggery has no place in the game. He needs to wake up to himself.
The National Football Centre in Burton is delayed again. This saga has dragged on for years now. In 2001 the idea was announced and it was all conceived to follow the lead and success of the French centre at Clairefontaine. Nine years and 25m quid later it is no nearer to completion. This whole ongoing yarn symbolises the FA’s inability to make change. Change that is required to help English players develop into the kind of players capable of sustaining a place amongst the world’s elite. Instead of seeing the importance of such a project it has been allowed to fizzle out and the administrators have dithered and fussed around. But who is seriously surprised by that?