Quotes
Moyesy
says: "It wasn’t good. We didn’t play well and we’ve
got no arguments. West Ham did very well and we didn’t do enough to
earn all the points today. I’m sure they’ll go home the happier of
the two sides. Every point is really important to them, but every
point is important to us as well. We didn’t do as well as we can do,
but we got something from it and that’s important. Realistically,
it’s another team who have failed to score against us and another
team we’ve taken a point from. At least we got a result; there have
been times in the past when we haven’t.”
RAMPANT
WITHDRAWAL SYMPTOMS
By
Mickey Blue Eyes.
Two
more weeks without a match. Glumly, this is my fate until season’s
end: twitchy withdrawal symptoms in extremis. But some things are
much more important. Like, for instance, the glorious news from Widnes
where Texyla and Di finally delivered a seven pounds nine ounce baby
boy, a new Evertonian named Declan. Since this comes after years of
effort the celebrations were ecstatic. It’s probably the only time
I’ve seen Texyla totally bemused. The arrival of a new life is the
greatest sense of wonder of all. I wouldn’t swap my own memories for
anything – for every worry there are ten moments of quiet and profound
exaltation. There are many times when football falls a long way short
on the scale of priorities. This was one of them.
By
comparison missing the ‘Boro match was no chore, also because these
days the north east is a waste of space thanks to their match policing
methods. It wouldn’t be so bad if the bizzies up there didn’t act
like a bunch of uniformed and leathered tooled-up thugs full of resentment
of the world. According to my spies they were once again upto their
disgusting convoy-and-video-cameras, eject-anyone-who-stands-up routine.
If every other police force adopts the same methods the professional
game simply won’t be worth having – and if that day ever arrives this
is one fan who won’t bother giving them my money, home or away. Hopefully
we haven’t come this far to allow that to happen. The point gained
was very welcome even though apparently we should have had three.
Moyesy said so. We believe him. The Moyes miracle continues. Our amazement
is unabated.
The
Worthless Cup final was no antidote either. Like everybody else I
watched it with a sense of expectation, preferably that the Mancs
put one over the pinkies so I could take the piss even more. Alas.
But it was largely disinteresting anyway and I yawned throughout.
Of course it would have been at least a hundred times better had we
been playing and then rightly it would have been renamed the Worthwhile
Cup. You’ve got to have your own rightly biased perspective in these
things.
So
the following Saturday I made the mistake of watching the Old Firm
league game while I was working. Lawksamercy, what a pile of hate-filled-religio-nationalist
poo that match is and always has been. And the footy’s no better.
Misplaced passes, lousy individual abilities, crap movement, dirty
play. You name the skills and both sides didn’t have them. Which was
more then reinforced when the pinks drew with The Bhoys during the
following week. All of which means most English fans are dead set
against the idea of those loons joining our league. Quite right too.
If the Jocks hadn’t spent the last hundred years telling everybody
how much they hate England and English football they might at least
have got to the starting gate. Now they’re trying to have it both
ways. With some luck they’ll end up playing themselves and Bjorngudjsen
Reykavik Seal Clubbers Trawlermen Inc. (props. R. Murdoch PLC &
S. Berlusconi SPA) and nobody else. It doesn’t bear thinking how too
many of their fans would behave at matches here in Blighty, as if
we don’t have enough of our own problems. Anybody who doubts this
need only consult the natives of Blackburn and their experience of
the recent Celtic visit. We don’t need the Old Firm, they need us
for the extra dosh and competition. To hell with them if they can’t
show fair-minded loyalty to the Scottish league.
Just
as I was flushing the Old Firm memory down the loo, along came the
Arsenal V Chelsea cup-tie and restored my better feelings. A wonderfully
raucous match in the best traditions of the FA Cup, it had the lot
– scintillating movement, great skill, goalmouth action, thudding
tackles and plenty of crowd noise without a naziUnion or naziTricolour
flag or any priest/minister-ridden, superstitious religious muck in
sight. Most of all it had monsieur Henry and his irresistible magic.
The current Arsenal team are on the way to becoming one of the immortals
thanks to Wenger’s uncanny ability to weld the best aspects of English
and world football. There was a time when the best of Scottish footy
would have been just as good. Pity those days have long gone, maybe
never to return. The draw was a good result for us too. Even better
would be a Chelsea victory in the replay. Anything which piles additional
matches on them might help our run-in and fragile hopes of European
footy next season. Then again, the Bates Motel might just get all
fired up and batter everybody. You can never tell.
And
talk of our own problems brings me to the Dion Dublin-Robbie Savage
incident and the fans reaction in the Birmingham derby match. I can’t
say it surprised me too much since I have been warning for a long
time about the new, strangely aggressive behaviour of too many Midlands
fans. Moreover, there isn’t a genuine fan in this country who doesn’t
know what Savage is – a disgusting piece of ill-intentioned, untalented
garbage. It all coalesced when he typically slyly fouled Dublin, typically
muttered something to him in the scuffle and Dion turned on him and
butted him. That kicked off the fans. No question, Dublin should get
the full weight of the system even though he immediately held a media
conference and apologised to everybody, notably excluding the little
gett who started it all.
On
the other hand if natural justice could operate Savage would end up
in a back-to-front-suit in a haha hotel and never play footy again.
Just a few weeks before, during their win over the pinkies, he had
once again demonstrated what a dog-with-fleas he is. He went straight
over the ball at a pink and when this naturally drew a complaint he
walked away twisting his finger into the side of his head to indicate
it was the victim who was loony. This tells you all you need to know
of his priorities. Meanwhile, in the TV booth, professional Jock and
TV talking head Ally McCoist was saying how this showed Savage’s “qualities”
and his “ability” to get the crowd behind his team. Frankly, fuck
off Ally and grow up. I don’t need you or any other media phoney hype
clerk, ex-player or not, to tell me what constitutes quality and ability
in a player. Savage is a gobshite and we all know it. The sooner he’s
gone from the game the better. And the sooner the guilty Midlands
fans get their heads straightened out the sooner they might restore
their playing fortunes. Yeuk.
Later
still, more Euro yawns enveloped footy TV, possibly excepting Newcastle
in Milan where they got a very creditable draw courtesy of two Shearer
goalmouth meleés, the sort he excels at. The Geordies should
have won really. Roll on the knock out rounds.
What
else happened? Oh yes…………………Toby made a come back in the reserves
against West Brom after he recovered from a right hamstring injury.
So then he goes and pulls a left side hamstring and puts himself out
for the rest of the season.
Which
is probably just as well given his alleged observation that our beloved
city is “shit.” He denied it of course but that won’t stop some frenzied
paranoid Scouser quite rightly trying to decapitate the dope at the
first available opportunity. Before that, he’ll have to dig Toby’s
Aryan arse out of a bucolic neutered existence in the quiet desperation
of suburban Cheshire. You can’t really blame Linderoth for not knowing
virtually every Brit city (including our unloved metropolis) and its
inhabitants are in a parlous state, litter strewn, graffiti-ridden,
choked with tincan cars, carbon monoxide, obese slobs and alcohol
halitosis, surrounded by deadbrained semi-detached suburbs, betrayed
by a dumb lower middle class and besieged by the worst elements of
quasi-Yank “street culture.” And that’s on a good day. Nobody ever
got poor by underestimating the intelligence of your average footy
player or the English middle classes. Which means it wouldn’t even
cross Toby’s mind that the Brit establishment long ago lost any sense
of genuine individual and collective pride, as opposed to mad flag-waving
in lock-step with the Yanks. That’s what happens when you surrender
your family’s life to war-mongering loons like empty-headed Reagan,
Thatcher, Blair and the corrupt Texas Family Bush. No point complaining
to Toby about it, DO something democratic. After all, the hamstrung
Swede is merely a beneficiary of a century of introverted social democracy.
If you want to blame anybody, blame it on Ingmar Bergman. Ol’ Misery
Guts was always a fully paid up member of the Melledrew Tendency,
Sverige branch. And, look, don’t start banging on about the Swedish
suicide rate like some ranting-righty reactionary in Dallas or Godalming
– go check the figures.
But
I digress.
So
the match versus the Yammers arrived on the first anniversary of the
arrival of Moyesy. You still have to pinch yourself after checking
the league table and the turnaround in our playing fortunes. It has
been nothing less than wonderful, everything to do with talent and
application and a dash of good luck thrown in. But you don’t get to
this stage of the season and into fourth place by mere chance. The
table never lies, not ever. It didn’t lie when we were struggling
to avoid relegation either. Still, it’s impossible to avoid wondering
what might have happened had we lost to Fulham in his first match
instead of winning via Beloved Lard Arse’s 27 seconds goal. Those
of us who were there won’t forget Unsy’s goal screaming home like
a heat-seeking missile. What would have happened if the ball hadn’t
“stood up” just before he hit it…………………? On such things does footy
turn – as we are all wont to recall, probably tiresomely, Kevin Brock’s
back pass three hundred years ago.
Intriguingly,
a midweek newspaper interview with Moyesy had him saying that a commencement
courtesy visit with Smiffy had elicited the opinion the team was “under-performing.”
Since subsequent events seem to confirm this view, it raises all kinds
of interesting if peripheral questions. Why wouldn’t they play for
Smiffy and Knox? How has Moyesy managed to get The Gravedigger playing
better (NOTE: this is a strictly relative observation) and the team
formation performing to deadly affect for at least half of every game?
How did he see that a right side defensive combo of Slaphead-Tony
would be so successful, and thereby propel said Tony into such terrific
form? What has he said and done with Unsy that has him reborn and
delivering such marvellous long left touchline passes as the one to
The Duke which set up the equaliser against Southampton? And so on.
We
know by now – or at least those of us who pay attention do – that
his approach is an indefinable fusion of new athletics science and
old fashioned determinism. For all The People’s Club populist tarradiddle
and the solid Glasgow working-class accent, this is a guy who almost
designs his teams like an architect. Others engineer, Moyesy architects.
There is a profound, instinctive difference. Quite rightly, he has
been single minded in his managership approach since before he gave
up playing. I suspect you don’t fuck with Moyesy, even with his slight
physique. Blomqvist found this out and was gone with the first breath
of fresh air through an open door. So did The ‘Digger when he was
substituted during our hapless display in the cup tie at Shrewsbury.
When asked why the substitution, Moyesy simply said, “He wasn’t good
enough.” Which is another great thing about him. Generally you don’t
feel that he’ll bullshit you. When The Duke got sent off at Birmingham
he said, “I’m not going to say I didn’t see it,” before engaging the
issue, and “I’m not going to tell him to change his game.” Simple
common sense statements these, and a million kilometres from the evasive,
squirming crap you get from virtually every other manager in similar
circumstances. And even further from the dispiriting “disappointed”
mantra from Smiffy.
By
a lightning strike, David Moyes is exactly what we needed if we were
to start the long haul out of adversity. Due credit to those who took
a chance and selected him. Also due credit to the man himself. It
must have looked like something of a gamble to him too. If he failed
– and he still could, as he has acknowledged – it would leave a mark
on his CV and, more importantly, on his self esteem. The thing is,
not only has he stopped the ship leaking he has made it seaworthy
long before we had a right to think he would. All in all, at this
stage, there’s something warmth-generating about his arrival, the
necessary mutual dependence of family. For people like me it is also
a bit of a welcome throw back to the roots of the game, away from
the disgusting corporate approach adopted during the last decade.
It can be that visceral with Moyesy around. Long may it continue.
While
we’re on about managers, and while we’re playing West ‘am, you just
can’t help thinking about much missed ‘Arry Redknapp. And then breaking
into a broad grin. Yes, I’m quite ready to concede his reputation
is at about the same level as Venables’ but, well, you know, he provides
the sort of fascination you get when you watch one of those rascally
back-of-van salesmen in Great Homer Street Market. I don’t underestimate
for one second the damage to the game done by the likes of ‘Arry et
al – it’s just their method of getting through life which intrigues
me, how they cauterise their conscience and then merge it with the
vital business of winning a footy match. While the present economic
muck is flying around we might as well have some humour to ease the
impact. This week, I found ‘Arry’s dug out antics a good deal more
fascinating than the first half of Pompey V Norwich. There he was,
blinking, head twitching side to side, as the miserable talentless
excuse for a match unfolded. Beside him, his assistant, Ol’ Pig Farmer
Jim Smith, glared out from behind his eczema-ridden (it’s even worse
than Fergy’s at OT) gob. It was like watching two yokels try to copy
Newman and Redford in “The Sting.” They must have kicked the living
shits out of everybody in the dressing room because the game went
crazy and finished 3-2 to Pompey, bodies, blood and snot everywhere.
Only ‘Arry, I tell you, only ‘Arry.
Matchday,
Blue Kipper assembled in St. Francis de Sales where Jogger promptly
set up shop to collect dosh for Blue Kipper Night tickets. By the
time he left he was stuffed with enough cash to open a bank. I carefully
watched Jogger’s sales pitch and quickly came to the conclusion he
could sell a Barratt semi-detached to an Eskimo near the Arctic Circle.
Lard and Kipper arrived with silent, tight-faced extreme hangovers
– not a sport I recommend. When you’re not hung over yourself it’s
dead funny watching someone else negotiate tables and noise in case
the slightest jar causes a precipitation. Stingray took full advantage
with the old chestnut, “Did yer ‘ear that one about the fella who
threw up over a cat and then said, ‘Fucked if I remember eatin’ THAT.’
“ At which Lard turned the colour of boiled shite and disappeared
into the lav. I couldn’t join him because I was too busy chewing hysterically
at the edge of the table. Also present were Fred(notared) Junior,
Fred Senior and Lee (Fred Junior Junior) and The Editor, the latter
to plan tactics before getting off to conduct the pre-match quiz with
Sower. It was all going on, and for once in advance of a three o’clock
kick off. Casual optimism everywhere.
More
Moyes weather, bright sunshine, mid temperature, and a slight wind
with a noticeable chill factor. Perfect again. Packed full house.
Unexpectedly,
Sandro not playing, Tony back in his place. Um. Personally, I don’t
think this is a better combination than Carsley-Hibbert. Stevie’s
a lousy defender and Tony isn’t yet at the point where he can manage
things on his own. But what do I know compared to Moyesy? Macca was
back too.
For
them, Les Ferdinand. Oh shit.
We
kicked into the Street End in the first half and the match promptly
subsided into a scrappy, infuriating mess of mediocrity from which
– for once – it didn’t recover. I suppose we were long overdue one
of these, though that didn’t ease the boredom much. The only thing
which got us through the first half was the expectation of a much
better second half. We threw all three subs (SuperKev, The Duke and
Li Tie) on just after half time. It upped the pace and created more
chances but it was all unconvincing and staccato.
In
view of rumours and the boredom of a crap game I kept an eye on Joe
Cole, a player I have long admired but felt was delivering well below
his obvious abilities. He had a good first half but didn’t shape too
well in the second when the balance of the game shifted. He’s class,
though, never better demonstrated than when he wriggled through a
couple of tackles at the Street End and got in a cross for one of
their few threatening moments. Moyesy would probably make him a much
better and more effective player if we could afford to buy him. Which
we can’t. Dunno what it is about Joe, he has all the natural ability
in the world, and then fails at crucial moments. If the Yammers go
down – and it wouldn’t be surprise on this evidence – then he’s surely
likely to move on into a better team. Where, perforce, I will be extremely
surprised if he doesn’t realise his full potential. But only with
the right manager.
Our
midfield of Stevie-Gemmo-The Gravedigger-Nace was ineffectual yet
again. Good interpassing was next to non-existent. Plenty of good
tackles and even an occasional tricky dribble from The ‘Digger. Sadly,
it got us almost nowhere. Needless to say, yet again nothing got through
to The Rad and Macca. Probably this provoked Moyesy into making his
wholesale substitutions.
We
had about six good chances in the second half. You had the feeling
that if we got one, a hatful would follow. Nevertheless it was all
a bit strange, not to say strained. As usual it was brought about
by almost ignoring the midfield and playing it over them. Unfortunately,
Roeder seems to be the first one to twig The Rad’s wide runs and how
the ball gets delivered to him. I can’t recall him collecting any
of these throughout the match.
Still,
we kept going. Stubbsy bulleted a header just wide of the left stick,
their ‘keeper made a tremendous save from The Rad, The Duke had two
narrow misses, Stevie made a hash of a terrific right side run, Li
Tie swung haplessly at two chances on the edge of the box, and right
at the death their ‘keeper saved well, low down right, when The Gravedigger
had a brainstorm and smacked one in from outside the box.
Fortunately
Sir Les got subbed to an audible sigh of relief. It was punctuated
near me by a heartfelt, “An’ I ‘ope we never see YOU again, yer cunt!”
No offence, Les. You know what he meant and you know we all agree
with him. I’d like to say it’s been nice knowing you but I’d only
be lying. You’ve been a pain in the arse for far too long.
So
where does this goalless draw leave us? In my view, still well in
with a shout for fourth place, though realistically, given our fixtures
run-in, it would be an achievement of mesmeric proportions. I expect
us to finish sixth or seventh. This time of the season is when the
chickens really do come home to roost. I think it likely the midfield
shortcomings will be decisive. Unless of course they get mad enough
to get focussed and show people like me we’re talking through our
arses. This is something I would welcome.
Consider
this, too: what if we get to the final match against the Mancs and
the championship and fourth place depends on it? Interesting, yes?
I
love this game.
As
we trailed out of the ground I looked fondly at the variety of kids
who are still attracted to The Beautiful Game. I thought too about
a family get together the previous night, of our youngest member all
wide brown eyes, giggling and innocent and who burrows into you like
a little passionate bunny rabbit. Out in Iraq and Kuwait there will
be millions of families doing the same thing with the same feelings
– I know, I lived there for years and had the pleasure of their company
and friendship, still do in fact. None of them want war, none of them
– like us – want to lose their kids to a mass-murder assault by the
Yanks and the Brits. It will make no difference whatever to the cold
liquid circulating through the veins of appointed president Bush,
the poodle Blair and their ilk, let alone to the stone where their
heart should be and the vacuum between their ears. They will look
at their own kids and it won’t even cross their minds, anymore than
it would Saddam Hussein’s, that they will be killing young people
almost identical to their own. For the invaders, the only things of
consequence are the process and the gains. It is shameful, inhuman
and criminal behaviour of the worst sort. I want no part of it. Nor
does at least one Kuwaiti family, great friends of mine, whose young
daughter was part of the resistance during the Iraqi invasion, who
was captured and almost executed. She more than anyone is anti-war
in extremis, and she has a better rationale than most.
I
support our soldiers. I support them so much I want them OUT and HOME
and SAFE. I don’t want them killing innocents in a needless war concocted
to suit a few loonies in the USA and here in Blighty.
Not
in my name. Not ever.
Team
News
David
Moyes has said there will be changes this week. We think there will
be a recall for Joey Yobo, & a start for Leon Osman. (27/12/02)
Moyesy
said :
Jogger's
eleven to start: Wright, Pistone, Yobo, Stubbs, Naysmith, Watson,
Li Tie, Gravesen, Osman, Campbell, Radzinski.
,
Gemmill , Naysmith