I had no idea about Fulham's comeback last night. I don't have ESPN, never watch the Europa UEFA Cup Winners Fairs Super Anglo-Italian Cup and assumed they would play well, as they normally do, but full short against Juventus. Plus, I was busy watching Desperate Housewives andGleeon SkyPlus. So it was only a few moments ago when I went online after a morning of looking for compost that I found out what had happened. 4-1. Amazing.
It's funny how my emotions towards the Cottagers (and what kind of a nickname is that, anyway?Seriously) have changed over the years. I didn't like them when they were at this level because we could never score against them, and we had that annoying game at their place where Rob Steiner got sent off. Then at times under Coleman they were reasonably likeable, especially when Saha hit his stride. But then they got boring and should have been relegated at least once. I dislike any team who has Lawrie Sanchez and hisI'm-quite-intelligent-you-see specsas manager.
But then they appointed Roy Hodgson. Roy, or 'Woy', if you think speech impediments are hilarious, was very harshly treated a number of years back by the press. He did really well coaching abroad and then took on Blackburn. Because they spent tons of cash and had Shearer up front they won the league and people expected something similar from Roy. This is Blackburn we're talking about. They're barely bigger than us. He didn't do too well, but even though he spent £5m on Christian Dailly he was still dismissed with too much haste and, while other managers were given chances elsewhere, Roy was dismissed as an idiot or something. When he came back to Fulham, loads of people consigned them to relegation.
And look what he's done: built a great defence, made a star out of Clint Dempsey and dragged Bobby Zamora -Bobby Zamora- to the edge of the England squad. We live in a world where fans watch players once or twice, decide against them and say: "he's shit, get rid" (at the moment, Priskin and Hill are good examples). What good coaches do, though, is work on these players and turn them into something better, something more effective. It can take time, but it can also be worth it.
I look at Fulham with envy now. They used to call us The Bitters I think, possibly still do, but you can see why we might be bitter. Their sugar daddy came in, and has only got two appointments wrong: Ray Wilkins at the start, which was swiftly rectified with Keegan, and then Sanchez. Look at what our various sugar daddies have done. Stewart Houston! Paul fucking Hart! Laugh all you like at Fayed, but he's made wise decisions and he's backed them up. Now he has a great manager who's happy at the club and is achieving great things. How stupid does media darling Harry Redknapp look now after his piss-taking of the Europa League last season? Spurs could have had nights like Fulham's, but they didn't because, frankly, Redknapp hasn't got the balls for it.
So, good for Fulham. It's what we should be aiming for. Maybe one day we might even play against them as equals again, which would be nice.
We at least seem to be making a start, anyway. Assuming we don't self-destruct after the defeat in the week, we'll stay up now and probably finish around 12th-14th again. But next season will be different. Generally, Warnock's sides make the play-offs and it's almost guaranteed that he'll have a better squad to play with than at any time in his career next season.
Tomorrow we have another example of a club being run in the right way. When you lose a really successful manager it's often difficult to find an effective replacement to fill that massive gap. But they replaced Martinez with Sousa. His start was bloody diabolical, and I even heard a rumour in September that he was on his last legs, but he's ground it out. People say they're boring and don't score many goals, but his options have been limited. It's like when he was with us, we didn't score many goals but it's tough when Dexter is out of form or out on loan, leaving you with a 20-year-old from Italy and a load of injured forwards. Under the circumstances he did well. He was, at least, building. It would have been interesting to see what he'd have done with Super Jay and Taraabt and a fit Buzsaky.
With 9 or 10 games left the table is finally stretching out. Forest have lost their way quite badly and West Brom and Newcastle are streaking away and will take the top two places, as our new friend ShearersBoots might like to point out. By the way, is he not welcome on Newcastle message boards? It's a bit weird him hanging around all the time.A bit stalky, even. I bet Lloydy's already Facebook buddies with him. Forest, Leicester and Swansea look nailed on for play-off spots, with the fourth one still up for grabs. That's some achievement by Sousa, you have to say.
It's especially amazing when you realise that we've scored more goals at home than they have in all their home and away games this season. Still, they're brilliant for Championship Fantasy Football: I've loaded my defence with two Swans defenders and their goalie, De Vries. Kerching. Just 14 goals conceded in 18 away games this season means we can be pretty sure that tomorrow will not be a cracker. In fact, there has only been more than 3 goals in a Swans game twice this season. How exciting. At this stage, for us, all we have to cling on to is the hope of entertainment. Thanks, Swansea.
Match Prediction
Stewpeas is out suspended for the heinous crime of sticking a leg out when the Reading goalie kicked the ball, so decisions need to be made. There are two ways of doing this - Connolly will move to centre back, then either Ledge goes to right back with Buz coming into central midfield, or Ramage to right back with Ledge staying in the centre. The second one is the likely one, but with little to play for and Swansea being so good defensively and not much of a forward threat, it would be nice to see us to go for the former idea. Andrea Orlandi could be back for them, but John Charles is likely to miss out with backache. Should be a dull game enlivened by Sousa's obvious dislike of Warnock (although who can blame him after Claude Davis almost killed Di Carmine last season without punishment), but don't expect goals. Hoops 0 Swans 0.
Preview
I had no idea about Fulham's comeback last night. I don't have ESPN, never watch the Europa UEFA Cup Winners Fairs Super Anglo-Italian Cup and assumed they would play well, as they normally do, but full short against Juventus. Plus, I was busy watching Desperate Housewives and Glee on SkyPlus. So it was only a few moments ago when I went online after a morning of looking for compost that I found out what had happened. 4-1. Amazing.
It's funny how my emotions towards the Cottagers (and what kind of a nickname is that, anyway? Seriously) have changed over the years. I didn't like them when they were at this level because we could never score against them, and we had that annoying game at their place where Rob Steiner got sent off. Then at times under Coleman they were reasonably likeable, especially when Saha hit his stride. But then they got boring and should have been relegated at least once. I dislike any team who has Lawrie Sanchez and his I'm-quite-intelligent-you-see specs as manager.
But then they appointed Roy Hodgson. Roy, or 'Woy', if you think speech impediments are hilarious, was very harshly treated a number of years back by the press. He did really well coaching abroad and then took on Blackburn. Because they spent tons of cash and had Shearer up front they won the league and people expected something similar from Roy. This is Blackburn we're talking about. They're barely bigger than us. He didn't do too well, but even though he spent £5m on Christian Dailly he was still dismissed with too much haste and, while other managers were given chances elsewhere, Roy was dismissed as an idiot or something. When he came back to Fulham, loads of people consigned them to relegation.
And look what he's done: built a great defence, made a star out of Clint Dempsey and dragged Bobby Zamora - Bobby Zamora - to the edge of the England squad. We live in a world where fans watch players once or twice, decide against them and say: "he's shit, get rid" (at the moment, Priskin and Hill are good examples). What good coaches do, though, is work on these players and turn them into something better, something more effective. It can take time, but it can also be worth it.
I look at Fulham with envy now. They used to call us The Bitters I think, possibly still do, but you can see why we might be bitter. Their sugar daddy came in, and has only got two appointments wrong: Ray Wilkins at the start, which was swiftly rectified with Keegan, and then Sanchez. Look at what our various sugar daddies have done. Stewart Houston! Paul fucking Hart! Laugh all you like at Fayed, but he's made wise decisions and he's backed them up. Now he has a great manager who's happy at the club and is achieving great things. How stupid does media darling Harry Redknapp look now after his piss-taking of the Europa League last season? Spurs could have had nights like Fulham's, but they didn't because, frankly, Redknapp hasn't got the balls for it.
So, good for Fulham. It's what we should be aiming for. Maybe one day we might even play against them as equals again, which would be nice.
We at least seem to be making a start, anyway. Assuming we don't self-destruct after the defeat in the week, we'll stay up now and probably finish around 12th-14th again. But next season will be different. Generally, Warnock's sides make the play-offs and it's almost guaranteed that he'll have a better squad to play with than at any time in his career next season.
Tomorrow we have another example of a club being run in the right way. When you lose a really successful manager it's often difficult to find an effective replacement to fill that massive gap. But they replaced Martinez with Sousa. His start was bloody diabolical, and I even heard a rumour in September that he was on his last legs, but he's ground it out. People say they're boring and don't score many goals, but his options have been limited. It's like when he was with us, we didn't score many goals but it's tough when Dexter is out of form or out on loan, leaving you with a 20-year-old from Italy and a load of injured forwards. Under the circumstances he did well. He was, at least, building. It would have been interesting to see what he'd have done with Super Jay and Taraabt and a fit Buzsaky.
With 9 or 10 games left the table is finally stretching out. Forest have lost their way quite badly and West Brom and Newcastle are streaking away and will take the top two places, as our new friend ShearersBoots might like to point out. By the way, is he not welcome on Newcastle message boards? It's a bit weird him hanging around all the time. A bit stalky, even. I bet Lloydy's already Facebook buddies with him. Forest, Leicester and Swansea look nailed on for play-off spots, with the fourth one still up for grabs. That's some achievement by Sousa, you have to say.
It's especially amazing when you realise that we've scored more goals at home than they have in all their home and away games this season. Still, they're brilliant for Championship Fantasy Football: I've loaded my defence with two Swans defenders and their goalie, De Vries. Kerching. Just 14 goals conceded in 18 away games this season means we can be pretty sure that tomorrow will not be a cracker. In fact, there has only been more than 3 goals in a Swans game twice this season. How exciting. At this stage, for us, all we have to cling on to is the hope of entertainment. Thanks, Swansea.
Match Prediction
Stewpeas is out suspended for the heinous crime of sticking a leg out when the Reading goalie kicked the ball, so decisions need to be made. There are two ways of doing this - Connolly will move to centre back, then either Ledge goes to right back with Buz coming into central midfield, or Ramage to right back with Ledge staying in the centre. The second one is the likely one, but with little to play for and Swansea being so good defensively and not much of a forward threat, it would be nice to see us to go for the former idea. Andrea Orlandi could be back for them, but John Charles is likely to miss out with backache. Should be a dull game enlivened by Sousa's obvious dislike of Warnock (although who can blame him after Claude Davis almost killed Di Carmine last season without punishment), but don't expect goals. Hoops 0 Swans 0.
Preview Haiku
I did love Sousa
The hair, the accent, the eyes
I'm feeling wistful