Or really more, where do they come from? We're staring down the barrel of a gun currently as our run of form has taken a dive from what looked like an early season slip up to an almost full blown catastrophe. Luckily for us the other teams around us, are, well frankly, shit. To stay up this season may be a case of being less shit than those around you. But where are we going to pick up points from, and what is going to stop me from committing suicide before the season ends? Lets look at the remaining fixtures and allude to what could be...
Key: Must Win No Chance Possible Result
Sat Dec 20: vs. Chelsea
Sat Dec 26: vs. Portsmouth
Mon Dec 28: @ Tottenham
Sat Jan 09: vs. Wolverhampton
Sat Jan 16: @ Aston Villa
Tue Jan 26: @ Portsmouth
Sat Jan 30: vs. Blackburn Rovers
Sat Feb 06: @ Burnley
Tue Feb 09: vs. Birmingham City
Sat Feb 20: vs. Hull City
Sat Feb 27: @ Manchester United
Sat Mar 06: vs. Bolton Wanderers
Sat Mar 13: @ Chelsea
Sat Mar 20: @ Arsenal
Sat Mar 27: vs. Stoke City
Sat Apr 03: @ Everton
Sat Apr 10: vs. Sunderland
Sat Apr 17: @ Liverpool
Sat Apr 24: vs. Wigan Athletic
Sat May 01: @ Fulham
Sun May 09: vs. Manchester City
There are 8 must win games in the selections that I have made, I do not assume all will come true, but every single one of these must be played like it is our cup final for the year. Each of these teams is beatable, and only 2 of the games are away - Portsmouth, and Burnley (if there's ever to winnable away games you'd assume it's those). Winning all of these would almost certainly guarantee our safety with a grand total of 44 points (if we go down on that we beat our old record by 2). All of the blue games must also be seen as games that we get a result from, nick a point or possibly three here or there in these and we'll either offset the red games that we lose/draw, or improve our overall league position. And hell if we gets some points from the pinks too we'll be laughing.
The point I am trying to make is that the season is far from over, but we do need to act fast, at the very least starting at the pompey game (which I'll be at so they better fucking win), and Upton Park has to be a fortress for the rest of the year. So come one and come all, players stick your bloody fingers out, Managers don't be afraid to give them the hairdryer, and supporters let's turn Upton Park back into the fortress of old that it used to be, and make it truly uncomfortable for the away team to play there. No more whinging, let's get down to business.
16 December, 2009
30 July, 2009
Grin And Beer It
Thank you Lynn Fucking Sweet for asking the question that has now driven the whole media into a frenzy over the Crowley-Gates ordeal. Thank you for asking a question so off topic that it drives me mad. In the middle of Q&A over health care you have managed to distract an entire nation's worth of media on to possibly one of the most mundane and over-hyped "news events" possibly witnessed. The fact that people are now complaining about what beer the President will drink is all down to you, you bitch, thanks a lot.
My anger is because there is just so much more going on in the world than having to worry about a white cop and a black professor. Was it a legitimate question? Sure, why not, what question isn't? But it was so off topic, and there are so many better examples of poor race relations that you could have pointed to. In fact, on the same day a black ambulance driver was choked out by a white cop because he didn't yield his vehicle to him during an emergency response - you want to talk about race relations in this country? That's probably a more appropriate situation than a well-to-do Harvard professor breaking in to his own house being arrested for refusing to comply with a white policeman. But no, some nobody from the south won't generate media orgasms like a well known Harvard professor and a police officer that gave CPR to the Boston Celtics' Reggie Lewis, will they? Oh God the controversy makes my bowels move.
Well done Obama too, Mr. I don't know all of the facts but I'll take a side. I mean c'mon, the story had barely broken, the police report wasn't even written yet, nor was the accused's testimony out, but using sound judgement that I just plucked from my arsehole I can predict what actually took place. Poor judgement on your behalf sir, should have kept schtum.
I'm not taking a side in this at all, the moral for me is don't be an ass to the police, don't send a racially loaded email to the Boston Globe, and don't assume things are necessarily about race. Either way now we're forced to listen to what beer all these idiots will have to drink at this "beer summit" - for fuck's sake Crowley should order a Guinness and Gates a White Russian, lets all hold hands again.
My anger is because there is just so much more going on in the world than having to worry about a white cop and a black professor. Was it a legitimate question? Sure, why not, what question isn't? But it was so off topic, and there are so many better examples of poor race relations that you could have pointed to. In fact, on the same day a black ambulance driver was choked out by a white cop because he didn't yield his vehicle to him during an emergency response - you want to talk about race relations in this country? That's probably a more appropriate situation than a well-to-do Harvard professor breaking in to his own house being arrested for refusing to comply with a white policeman. But no, some nobody from the south won't generate media orgasms like a well known Harvard professor and a police officer that gave CPR to the Boston Celtics' Reggie Lewis, will they? Oh God the controversy makes my bowels move.
Well done Obama too, Mr. I don't know all of the facts but I'll take a side. I mean c'mon, the story had barely broken, the police report wasn't even written yet, nor was the accused's testimony out, but using sound judgement that I just plucked from my arsehole I can predict what actually took place. Poor judgement on your behalf sir, should have kept schtum.
I'm not taking a side in this at all, the moral for me is don't be an ass to the police, don't send a racially loaded email to the Boston Globe, and don't assume things are necessarily about race. Either way now we're forced to listen to what beer all these idiots will have to drink at this "beer summit" - for fuck's sake Crowley should order a Guinness and Gates a White Russian, lets all hold hands again.
17 June, 2009
A Post From A Year Ago I Just Found...Call Me Lazy: From Moscow, With Tough Love
So as I sit here, on a lazy Sunday in Arlington, I think to myself “What should I listen to?” and I just so happen to have a feeling that it should probably be Radiohead – so track one on Kid A gets the green light, and myself and Thom Yorke bond through the medium of song – Everything in its Right Place.
And indeed it seems as though things are returning to their right places, the Ruskis are getting in a bit of a huff and puff over Georgia, maybe they just really like peaches, and the Chinese Olympic cloak has been falling with accusations of faking fireworks (they invented them, surely they should be allowed to fake them if they want to), and lip synching performances unmatched since Milli-Vanilli’s last world tour. So what do we make of all of this?
Well the Chinese, as we all can agree upon, don’t exactly have the most forthright government – did anyone actually expect them to look like angels with no sign of authoritarian coercion in the midst? And so are we really surprised that the fireworks were fake, the girl couldn’t sing, and that some of their gymnasts were given fake documents to make them qualify to compete? Not at all I say, because surely Chairman Mao would have loved to have seen the spectacle on a 62” HD TV, so all is good.
The unfortunate thing, is that while the Chinese government has been funding this Hollywood-esque masquerade, millions of your average citizen are living in extreme poverty. But that’s the problem when communism meets the need for PR, let’s just put a big smile on and pretend everything here is good. In fact, most governments do this, but the fact that communism is all a bit utopian, it seems more cringe worthy. More money was spent on that opening ceremony than what will be put towards education, or even relief efforts, all for the sake of trying to make the west positive on China – I personally would certainly have cast a blind eye on an ever growing list of Human Rights infractions all because one thousand Chinese people can simultaneously bang drums in the dark with glowsticks; don’t know about you.
Drums gives me a nice transition to the “Russian Federation” who seem intent on banging their war drum in Georgia, where the hapless Saakashvili is in all kinds of trouble. Saakashvili, not content with running a semi-successful democracy decided he’d punch above his weight, and decided to test King, Czar, Chairman, Chess-master, whatever Putin by shooting a couple of bullets in South Ossetia – a place that until last week nobody this side of Kiev had ever even heard of before. The result, as we all know, was a very efficient bitch slap by the Ruskis, and a pseudo-world-crisis. “Oh no, what should we do, the commies are back”. Yes they are, but really they were there the whole time, we just decided to ignore them for about the last 15 years, while we all had wet dreams about the fact that Poland and the former Bloc nations were buying our cars (shame really as the aerodynamically challenged Lada was a brilliant little motor) and familiarizing themselves with Microsoft Office.
Russia is back then, and it won’t be too long until Russians begin to be touted as fat men stroking bald cats in James Bond films. This was all on the cards though, Russia has been posturing for the last couple of years. In the last two years alone the RAF has had to scramble jets at least three times off of the northern coast of Scotland to ward away Russian bombers, within the last few months the Russians were playing war games with themselves off of the Iberian peninsula, and we all remember the laughable planting of the Russian flag under the North Pole by their Navy. Yes, their waning world influence, it has been decided, is to be no longer, and now we must all deal with it.
But this is all a result of the Russian psyche, and traditionally always has been. Throughout the years the Russians have always treated world affairs as a game of chess, and in that game they’ve always felt like they’re behind by at least both of their bishops and possibly a rook. The Mongols ran rampant there centuries ago, as too did Napoleon for a little while until he lost his blanket, the Swedes had a crack at them in the Great Northern War, and of course we exploded an atomic bomb on an island off of their coastline around 1945 – the pattern here is that the West is a threat to Russian sovereignty and freedom to drink vodka at will – and this notion has really driven contemporary Russian foreign policy – there goes another rook, lets use Eastern Europe as a buffer zone, oh shit we lost a pawn lets stick some missiles in Cuba, in fact the majority of our pieces are now joining the EU and NATO lets show them what we can do if they step too far out of line by ruffling some feathers in Georgia.
And so the old Russia, that we know and love, is noticed again, making their stock go up, and everyone around the Kremlin is happy again and can pat each other on the back for a job well done.
I do feel a lot of this is our fault, what did we do to Russia in the post-Soviet era? Not much to be honest, but there was certainly a sense of a fallen giant and we all jumped on that bandwagon and treated them as if they had no chance of recovery, and made the best for ourselves while leaving many of them to rot. Very little investment was put in to Russia compared to the other ex-Soviet states, Europe let Poland et al come and sit at the dinner table whilst leaving their Russian neighbour a text message stating that they’d have to take a rain check “something has come up.” America was more focused on countering the EU’s gaining economic strength by hashing together NAFTA just so salmonella tomatoes (climbing up the Eiffel Tower) would be a couple of cents cheaper. It still amazes me that Starbucks, which can be found on almost every street corner in the world and possibly Mars only opened up shop in Moscow last year (mushroom sandwiches and all) – and while much of a stagnant economy can be put on the KGB-led government’s shoulders, you have to wonder why a Russian Marshall plan was never thought of – surely the best thing at the time would have been to clamp down Russian friendship and mutual cooperation – they have a UN veto vote for God’s sake! And whilst it’s all fine and well that Russians now wear Levi’s jeans, and Paul McCartney can make his settlement money back by doing a couple of gigs in Red Square, I feel that we missed out on a big opportunity to change the Russian mindset towards the West. And so now we’re going to have to deal not only with posturing, but Russian action, and yes it could come down to another cold war scenario, with the millions of Russian youth turning their attention from intimidating Gary Kasparov to finally purging the Chechens and letting the world know that Russia has influence and brevity.
Expect the press to have a couple of 10 second sound bites that they’ve taken out of context to prove the latter. Expect Fox to hate Russia, expect CNN to try and defend Russia, and expect no one to say that nobody is righteous in this whole cluster-fuck of a situation, and that in fact we’re all to blame.
Regardless, this scenario will only get increasingly more interesting, the press will make it out as if we’re all going to start throwing rocks at each other, but deals will be cut in smokey rooms and we’ll all go back to the status quo shortly and start hashing up game theory matrices to demonstrate Putin’s options and decide whether or not to invest in LukOil. It may be the status quo of the 80’s but nevertheless, status quo is good, and besides, the Cold War was the safest time in history to live in.
I don’t know if there’s a point to much of what I just said, maybe it is just commentary/opinion. And I’m still listening to Radiohead, and will aptly end now whilst listening to the track No Surprises.
And indeed it seems as though things are returning to their right places, the Ruskis are getting in a bit of a huff and puff over Georgia, maybe they just really like peaches, and the Chinese Olympic cloak has been falling with accusations of faking fireworks (they invented them, surely they should be allowed to fake them if they want to), and lip synching performances unmatched since Milli-Vanilli’s last world tour. So what do we make of all of this?
Well the Chinese, as we all can agree upon, don’t exactly have the most forthright government – did anyone actually expect them to look like angels with no sign of authoritarian coercion in the midst? And so are we really surprised that the fireworks were fake, the girl couldn’t sing, and that some of their gymnasts were given fake documents to make them qualify to compete? Not at all I say, because surely Chairman Mao would have loved to have seen the spectacle on a 62” HD TV, so all is good.
The unfortunate thing, is that while the Chinese government has been funding this Hollywood-esque masquerade, millions of your average citizen are living in extreme poverty. But that’s the problem when communism meets the need for PR, let’s just put a big smile on and pretend everything here is good. In fact, most governments do this, but the fact that communism is all a bit utopian, it seems more cringe worthy. More money was spent on that opening ceremony than what will be put towards education, or even relief efforts, all for the sake of trying to make the west positive on China – I personally would certainly have cast a blind eye on an ever growing list of Human Rights infractions all because one thousand Chinese people can simultaneously bang drums in the dark with glowsticks; don’t know about you.
Drums gives me a nice transition to the “Russian Federation” who seem intent on banging their war drum in Georgia, where the hapless Saakashvili is in all kinds of trouble. Saakashvili, not content with running a semi-successful democracy decided he’d punch above his weight, and decided to test King, Czar, Chairman, Chess-master, whatever Putin by shooting a couple of bullets in South Ossetia – a place that until last week nobody this side of Kiev had ever even heard of before. The result, as we all know, was a very efficient bitch slap by the Ruskis, and a pseudo-world-crisis. “Oh no, what should we do, the commies are back”. Yes they are, but really they were there the whole time, we just decided to ignore them for about the last 15 years, while we all had wet dreams about the fact that Poland and the former Bloc nations were buying our cars (shame really as the aerodynamically challenged Lada was a brilliant little motor) and familiarizing themselves with Microsoft Office.
Russia is back then, and it won’t be too long until Russians begin to be touted as fat men stroking bald cats in James Bond films. This was all on the cards though, Russia has been posturing for the last couple of years. In the last two years alone the RAF has had to scramble jets at least three times off of the northern coast of Scotland to ward away Russian bombers, within the last few months the Russians were playing war games with themselves off of the Iberian peninsula, and we all remember the laughable planting of the Russian flag under the North Pole by their Navy. Yes, their waning world influence, it has been decided, is to be no longer, and now we must all deal with it.
But this is all a result of the Russian psyche, and traditionally always has been. Throughout the years the Russians have always treated world affairs as a game of chess, and in that game they’ve always felt like they’re behind by at least both of their bishops and possibly a rook. The Mongols ran rampant there centuries ago, as too did Napoleon for a little while until he lost his blanket, the Swedes had a crack at them in the Great Northern War, and of course we exploded an atomic bomb on an island off of their coastline around 1945 – the pattern here is that the West is a threat to Russian sovereignty and freedom to drink vodka at will – and this notion has really driven contemporary Russian foreign policy – there goes another rook, lets use Eastern Europe as a buffer zone, oh shit we lost a pawn lets stick some missiles in Cuba, in fact the majority of our pieces are now joining the EU and NATO lets show them what we can do if they step too far out of line by ruffling some feathers in Georgia.
And so the old Russia, that we know and love, is noticed again, making their stock go up, and everyone around the Kremlin is happy again and can pat each other on the back for a job well done.
I do feel a lot of this is our fault, what did we do to Russia in the post-Soviet era? Not much to be honest, but there was certainly a sense of a fallen giant and we all jumped on that bandwagon and treated them as if they had no chance of recovery, and made the best for ourselves while leaving many of them to rot. Very little investment was put in to Russia compared to the other ex-Soviet states, Europe let Poland et al come and sit at the dinner table whilst leaving their Russian neighbour a text message stating that they’d have to take a rain check “something has come up.” America was more focused on countering the EU’s gaining economic strength by hashing together NAFTA just so salmonella tomatoes (climbing up the Eiffel Tower) would be a couple of cents cheaper. It still amazes me that Starbucks, which can be found on almost every street corner in the world and possibly Mars only opened up shop in Moscow last year (mushroom sandwiches and all) – and while much of a stagnant economy can be put on the KGB-led government’s shoulders, you have to wonder why a Russian Marshall plan was never thought of – surely the best thing at the time would have been to clamp down Russian friendship and mutual cooperation – they have a UN veto vote for God’s sake! And whilst it’s all fine and well that Russians now wear Levi’s jeans, and Paul McCartney can make his settlement money back by doing a couple of gigs in Red Square, I feel that we missed out on a big opportunity to change the Russian mindset towards the West. And so now we’re going to have to deal not only with posturing, but Russian action, and yes it could come down to another cold war scenario, with the millions of Russian youth turning their attention from intimidating Gary Kasparov to finally purging the Chechens and letting the world know that Russia has influence and brevity.
Expect the press to have a couple of 10 second sound bites that they’ve taken out of context to prove the latter. Expect Fox to hate Russia, expect CNN to try and defend Russia, and expect no one to say that nobody is righteous in this whole cluster-fuck of a situation, and that in fact we’re all to blame.
Regardless, this scenario will only get increasingly more interesting, the press will make it out as if we’re all going to start throwing rocks at each other, but deals will be cut in smokey rooms and we’ll all go back to the status quo shortly and start hashing up game theory matrices to demonstrate Putin’s options and decide whether or not to invest in LukOil. It may be the status quo of the 80’s but nevertheless, status quo is good, and besides, the Cold War was the safest time in history to live in.
I don’t know if there’s a point to much of what I just said, maybe it is just commentary/opinion. And I’m still listening to Radiohead, and will aptly end now whilst listening to the track No Surprises.
BRICs and Mortar
According to the Times Brazil, Russia, India, and China (BRIC) have just formed an alliance that is based on economical and political policies that will be used to take away total power in the world system from the United States.
The article explains that;
...The first summit of heads of state of the BRIC countries — Brazil, Russia, India and China — ended with a declaration calling for a “multipolar world order”, diplomatic code for a rejection of America’s position as the sole global superpower...
...The declaration also satisfied a key Kremlin demand by calling for a “more diversified international monetary system”. President Medvedev is seeking to break the dominance of the US dollar in financial markets as the world’s leading reserve currency. He favours the establishment of more regional reserve currencies, including the Russian rouble and the Chinese yuan, to prevent economic shocks. Mr Medvedev said: “The existing set of reserve currencies, including the US dollar, have failed to perform their functions."...
Extraordinary, but extremely hard to accomplish, and a little unrealistic. For starters China has billions of US dollars owed to them which they are using as securities for their own currency. The value of the Yuan would plunge with the decline of the value of the dollar.
Brazil is regionally challenged due to it's geographic relativity to the US as well as having the majority of it's neighbours and trading partners being so tied in to the US economy. Plus, where is all that surplus coffee they started making going to go?
Russia is a mess in their "democracy," the Ruble is worth next to nothing, the leadership and high profile businessmen over there consist of mostly ex-KGB warlords and higher-ups from the old guard. This move for them is more about world status than actual effects.
And India is a country whose educated workforce (think phone banks, IT Tech support, debt collection calls) and uneducated workforce (think tea and rice production, clothing and apparel, and now Range Rover) is so tied in to the US/UK economic system that it would be murderous for them to try and change that balance.
Let's not even start talking about Russia's idea of "regional reserve currencies" either...did all of these world leaders forget to bring a map with them to this conference? Hint, and I'll be nice and whisper it, Russia, India, and China are right fucking next to each other, wonder if that could cause a dispute?!
I'm not too sure that I want to go into this too much more as it's all a bit over the top, and I really don't see it hashing out into anything productive. If anything it will increase trade relations between these countries, but as for political and economic dominance it will do very little, and if it does start to make an impact you'll be sure to see either trade barriers/tariffs against these countries rise, and/or a further closening between the US, EU, and British Commonwealth (with or without India on board). I wonder what Orwell would have made of that?!
The article explains that;
...The first summit of heads of state of the BRIC countries — Brazil, Russia, India and China — ended with a declaration calling for a “multipolar world order”, diplomatic code for a rejection of America’s position as the sole global superpower...
...The declaration also satisfied a key Kremlin demand by calling for a “more diversified international monetary system”. President Medvedev is seeking to break the dominance of the US dollar in financial markets as the world’s leading reserve currency. He favours the establishment of more regional reserve currencies, including the Russian rouble and the Chinese yuan, to prevent economic shocks. Mr Medvedev said: “The existing set of reserve currencies, including the US dollar, have failed to perform their functions."...
Extraordinary, but extremely hard to accomplish, and a little unrealistic. For starters China has billions of US dollars owed to them which they are using as securities for their own currency. The value of the Yuan would plunge with the decline of the value of the dollar.
Brazil is regionally challenged due to it's geographic relativity to the US as well as having the majority of it's neighbours and trading partners being so tied in to the US economy. Plus, where is all that surplus coffee they started making going to go?
Russia is a mess in their "democracy," the Ruble is worth next to nothing, the leadership and high profile businessmen over there consist of mostly ex-KGB warlords and higher-ups from the old guard. This move for them is more about world status than actual effects.
And India is a country whose educated workforce (think phone banks, IT Tech support, debt collection calls) and uneducated workforce (think tea and rice production, clothing and apparel, and now Range Rover) is so tied in to the US/UK economic system that it would be murderous for them to try and change that balance.
Let's not even start talking about Russia's idea of "regional reserve currencies" either...did all of these world leaders forget to bring a map with them to this conference? Hint, and I'll be nice and whisper it, Russia, India, and China are right fucking next to each other, wonder if that could cause a dispute?!
I'm not too sure that I want to go into this too much more as it's all a bit over the top, and I really don't see it hashing out into anything productive. If anything it will increase trade relations between these countries, but as for political and economic dominance it will do very little, and if it does start to make an impact you'll be sure to see either trade barriers/tariffs against these countries rise, and/or a further closening between the US, EU, and British Commonwealth (with or without India on board). I wonder what Orwell would have made of that?!
11 May, 2009
Blame The Pool Fan Who Laughed When Di Michele Fell Over For This
I'm angry, and rightfully so, the loss against Liverpool this weekend was one to stirr the emotions. we put in a good display, and pretty much matched them in all parts of the field - the problem every game is that we are playing with 9 men versus 11, the last resort inclusion of Di Michele and Tristan up front for lack of better options is killing us, and I swoon at the thought of a return of Carlton Cole next week.
I sat down the pub on Saturday amongst the throng of Johnny-come-lately Liverpool supporters...ones who had probably not left the States let alone go and see their team play live. I of course was the lone claret and blue wearer and arrived to some sneers at my local. It irks me that the top 4 get such strong support, I can't really blame them, everybody would like their team to be successful, but there's a certain arrogance about just "picking" a team - it never would have worked for me, my team was handed to me, it came with the blood line, it came with deepest lows of regular disappointment, but with the ecstatic highs of when you do pick up that win. It comes with a sense of belonging and community, you walk around any English town and see a West Ham shirt, you can give a nod to that fella, he'll know you're nodding because he's in a Hammers shirt, not because you possibly went to school with him. The same can't be said about many other teams. The top 4 are homogeneous, the same, they're just a badge, a brand, a franchise, these teams could fill 80,000 seat stadiums anywhere in the world - we don't have that sort of pull, nor would I want it. I'm saying all of this because I wasn't impressed by the Pool fans at the pub on Saturday, no sense of fair play, and annoying chants of "Nando, Nando" for the lady-boy Torres - I just want them to feel my pain for once...go a couple of weeks without a win, be involved in a relegation scrap, have an injury list that looks more like your first team selection sheet, have fuck all money to spend on transfers, rely on an academy to bring through youngsters that comprise half of your squad, have problems securing a sponsor because your previous one has gone bust, have a chairman who is 300m quid in debt, just have something that tests the character, and if you think that coming second in the league is that test then you're having a laugh - the fact of the matter is if you follow a top four team you celebrate more wins in one season than about two thirds of the rest of the supporters in this league celebrate in two seasons...I suppose I'm just angry because this lot just took themselves too seriously, and in my eyes if you win the majority of the time but have no humility you are obviously a twat.
Vs. Liverpool
I'm not doing player reports this week, too much to say and not enough time.
Who impressed?
Noble - controlled the game, good passing, positive attitude
Tompkins - Torres rarely got a decent shot off
Green - great PK save, unlucky it rebounded back towards goal, some other excellent saves too
Mediocre?
LBM - had the beating of Skkkrrrtlll all day but lost his head as per usual
Just Bad, downright bad?
Di Michele - no confidence in front of goal, how many sitters has he missed? PS you didn't need to try and round the keeper to score, you could have placed it bottom right, he wasn't the quickest off his line.
Tristan - not a shadow on the player he was years ago. His touch is still there, but he has no pace, poor positioning, and has only scored this season when he has less than 3 steps to take...any more than that and someone's tackled him.
Hmmmn
Rant over, move on, two games left in the season. Fulham's surprise win at Villa was an interesting one, and seems to have put the dampers on any possible European qualification for the Irons, especially if they carry that form forwards. I will however be very pleased if we can relegate Middlesborough on the last day of the season, and put one of the most boring teams in the history of the sport into the dark crevices of The Championship. Spurs too picked up a needed point against Everton, and now we find ourselves 2 places back from the grail of 7th place with Everton and Boro' to play. Everton is a tough one to predict, we should match up fairly well, and they have little left to play for as they are sitting all cushdy in 6th with no one able to catch them up, and of course the unpredictable ability to score 3 goals on us in the course of 10 minutes as demonstrated earlier in the season. This game will however determine our focus going in to the final game, if 7th is still to play for we should come out all guns blazing against Boro. If not we could see a final slide down the rankings with a loss to Boro on the final day...it's never easy to play sides at the bottom this time of year, and if we're not up for it then they could easily do one over on us.
Much to look forward to then, and the last two weeks should be interesting, although anything is more interesting than last year's finish in 10th.
As I was wrapping this up I've just noticed the barcodes have beaten Boro'...thank you West Ham for having a good season, the bottom is terribly close this year, and the last two games will be a dogfight from 13th place down...glad we're nowhere near involved in that!
I sat down the pub on Saturday amongst the throng of Johnny-come-lately Liverpool supporters...ones who had probably not left the States let alone go and see their team play live. I of course was the lone claret and blue wearer and arrived to some sneers at my local. It irks me that the top 4 get such strong support, I can't really blame them, everybody would like their team to be successful, but there's a certain arrogance about just "picking" a team - it never would have worked for me, my team was handed to me, it came with the blood line, it came with deepest lows of regular disappointment, but with the ecstatic highs of when you do pick up that win. It comes with a sense of belonging and community, you walk around any English town and see a West Ham shirt, you can give a nod to that fella, he'll know you're nodding because he's in a Hammers shirt, not because you possibly went to school with him. The same can't be said about many other teams. The top 4 are homogeneous, the same, they're just a badge, a brand, a franchise, these teams could fill 80,000 seat stadiums anywhere in the world - we don't have that sort of pull, nor would I want it. I'm saying all of this because I wasn't impressed by the Pool fans at the pub on Saturday, no sense of fair play, and annoying chants of "Nando, Nando" for the lady-boy Torres - I just want them to feel my pain for once...go a couple of weeks without a win, be involved in a relegation scrap, have an injury list that looks more like your first team selection sheet, have fuck all money to spend on transfers, rely on an academy to bring through youngsters that comprise half of your squad, have problems securing a sponsor because your previous one has gone bust, have a chairman who is 300m quid in debt, just have something that tests the character, and if you think that coming second in the league is that test then you're having a laugh - the fact of the matter is if you follow a top four team you celebrate more wins in one season than about two thirds of the rest of the supporters in this league celebrate in two seasons...I suppose I'm just angry because this lot just took themselves too seriously, and in my eyes if you win the majority of the time but have no humility you are obviously a twat.
Vs. Liverpool
I'm not doing player reports this week, too much to say and not enough time.
Who impressed?
Noble - controlled the game, good passing, positive attitude
Tompkins - Torres rarely got a decent shot off
Green - great PK save, unlucky it rebounded back towards goal, some other excellent saves too
Mediocre?
LBM - had the beating of Skkkrrrtlll all day but lost his head as per usual
Just Bad, downright bad?
Di Michele - no confidence in front of goal, how many sitters has he missed? PS you didn't need to try and round the keeper to score, you could have placed it bottom right, he wasn't the quickest off his line.
Tristan - not a shadow on the player he was years ago. His touch is still there, but he has no pace, poor positioning, and has only scored this season when he has less than 3 steps to take...any more than that and someone's tackled him.
Hmmmn
Rant over, move on, two games left in the season. Fulham's surprise win at Villa was an interesting one, and seems to have put the dampers on any possible European qualification for the Irons, especially if they carry that form forwards. I will however be very pleased if we can relegate Middlesborough on the last day of the season, and put one of the most boring teams in the history of the sport into the dark crevices of The Championship. Spurs too picked up a needed point against Everton, and now we find ourselves 2 places back from the grail of 7th place with Everton and Boro' to play. Everton is a tough one to predict, we should match up fairly well, and they have little left to play for as they are sitting all cushdy in 6th with no one able to catch them up, and of course the unpredictable ability to score 3 goals on us in the course of 10 minutes as demonstrated earlier in the season. This game will however determine our focus going in to the final game, if 7th is still to play for we should come out all guns blazing against Boro. If not we could see a final slide down the rankings with a loss to Boro on the final day...it's never easy to play sides at the bottom this time of year, and if we're not up for it then they could easily do one over on us.
Much to look forward to then, and the last two weeks should be interesting, although anything is more interesting than last year's finish in 10th.
As I was wrapping this up I've just noticed the barcodes have beaten Boro'...thank you West Ham for having a good season, the bottom is terribly close this year, and the last two games will be a dogfight from 13th place down...glad we're nowhere near involved in that!
29 April, 2009
Christ My Life Is Busy
I suppose your life is busy too, but then again I'm not reading your opinions of West Ham (unless you're on my blogroll on the left), so yes, deal with it. Not that my posts of doubtful pessimism could possibly have been missed by anyone bar Martin Lawrence at the BBC, who's uncanny ability to continuously predict West Ham to lose week in week out would have us in League Two in 3 years. He tops my pessimism.
Anyway I digress.
Since my last post not too much has changed, we're still challenging for Europe, and our injury list is still growing with the recent inclusions of Spector, Collins, Parker, and Kovac (until last weekend). I have a bad feeling that all of the backroom staff are due a good dose of swine flu to boot. Surely though porky Ashton would be more fitting - any excuse to play under 1 season's amount of games in 3 years - I tell ya, you just can't buy good help nowadays.
Let's all pray that the porcine predicament isn't within breathing distance of our simian manager Zola, who has truly done brilliantly with his first year in charge, and absolutetly deserves his new four year contract and a bonus banana. Clarke too deserves credit, especially at the back where his influence is noticeable both at West Ham and at any Chelsea team that is without John Terry. Clarke, no doubt, is our best signing in seasons.
That's all for now people, just a couple of lines to let you know I'm alive (however much I may wish otherwise post Radiohead listenings). Roll on Stoke this weekend, I say we come away 2-1 victors, they have nothing much left to play for sitting fairly comfortable in midtable, they'll be looking for a draw - hopefully we'll be taking the win. Di Michele to miss more than he scores.
Anyway I digress.
Since my last post not too much has changed, we're still challenging for Europe, and our injury list is still growing with the recent inclusions of Spector, Collins, Parker, and Kovac (until last weekend). I have a bad feeling that all of the backroom staff are due a good dose of swine flu to boot. Surely though porky Ashton would be more fitting - any excuse to play under 1 season's amount of games in 3 years - I tell ya, you just can't buy good help nowadays.
Let's all pray that the porcine predicament isn't within breathing distance of our simian manager Zola, who has truly done brilliantly with his first year in charge, and absolutetly deserves his new four year contract and a bonus banana. Clarke too deserves credit, especially at the back where his influence is noticeable both at West Ham and at any Chelsea team that is without John Terry. Clarke, no doubt, is our best signing in seasons.
That's all for now people, just a couple of lines to let you know I'm alive (however much I may wish otherwise post Radiohead listenings). Roll on Stoke this weekend, I say we come away 2-1 victors, they have nothing much left to play for sitting fairly comfortable in midtable, they'll be looking for a draw - hopefully we'll be taking the win. Di Michele to miss more than he scores.
12 March, 2009
I Thought I Was Back
Just as I thought things were going to lighten up a bit, well eer, they didn't. Subsequently I've managed to miss our last two games, which is a shame, because they've nicely provided us with two wins, a great position in the table, and a candidate for goal of the season...
The last game I watched, in fact, was a horrible horrible affair - namely losing to Bolton. As you will presumably agree it was tragic; we outplayed them for 87 of the 90 minutes, and yet again just couldn't finish in the final third - I should be used to this by now.
Anyway, the past is the past, and I can't bear to think of that game anymore so on to our next opponents... West Brom.
Brom haven't won in 8, yes that's 8 games, their last recorded victory was back on the 17th of January against our cup friends Middlesbrough, where they suprisingly managed to score 3 goals and concede none at all! Since then they've let in a massive 17 goals in 6 league games, and registered only 5 goals themselves. No surprise then that they are all but dead at the bottom of the league with a -29 goal difference and only 22 points.
Still though, being a West Ham supporter will always leave you with a bit of doubt lurking in the back of your head, and with the recent inclusion of Collison and Behrami to our WWII sized injury list one can't help but think this fixture has potential to upset (we did lose to them in September remember).
But let's not jump off the hope train yet, Savio has been impressing, and i would be surprised if he doesn't get the nod on Monday to replace Collison on the left, and I see no other option than to put in plumber/electrician/all around utility guy Jonathon Spector at right wing. Personally I wouldn't be opposed to chucking in a kid from the academy, but Spector has done alright when needed, and he does have the experiance to step in and play a good level of football without any training wheels.
I'll be optimistic, probably because I haven't listened to radiohead today, and go for a home win, 2-0, one from each of our strikers.
The last game I watched, in fact, was a horrible horrible affair - namely losing to Bolton. As you will presumably agree it was tragic; we outplayed them for 87 of the 90 minutes, and yet again just couldn't finish in the final third - I should be used to this by now.
Anyway, the past is the past, and I can't bear to think of that game anymore so on to our next opponents... West Brom.
Brom haven't won in 8, yes that's 8 games, their last recorded victory was back on the 17th of January against our cup friends Middlesbrough, where they suprisingly managed to score 3 goals and concede none at all! Since then they've let in a massive 17 goals in 6 league games, and registered only 5 goals themselves. No surprise then that they are all but dead at the bottom of the league with a -29 goal difference and only 22 points.
Still though, being a West Ham supporter will always leave you with a bit of doubt lurking in the back of your head, and with the recent inclusion of Collison and Behrami to our WWII sized injury list one can't help but think this fixture has potential to upset (we did lose to them in September remember).
But let's not jump off the hope train yet, Savio has been impressing, and i would be surprised if he doesn't get the nod on Monday to replace Collison on the left, and I see no other option than to put in plumber/electrician/all around utility guy Jonathon Spector at right wing. Personally I wouldn't be opposed to chucking in a kid from the academy, but Spector has done alright when needed, and he does have the experiance to step in and play a good level of football without any training wheels.
I'll be optimistic, probably because I haven't listened to radiohead today, and go for a home win, 2-0, one from each of our strikers.
17 February, 2009
I'm Back (again)
As tides of change swept through the fair city of Washington DC this last month and a half or so, similar occurences seem to be underway at West Ham. There's a bright sense of optimism amongst us West Ham fans at the moment, and it's almost contagious. The Zola and Clarke system has finally come to fruition with a string of good results, and a very good showing against Man United that was only undone by 97 year veteran Ryan Giggs. Note to all pundits, please stop telling me that Giggs "takes care of himself," the image has stopped me from sleeping.
But yeah, things look on the up. Carlton has been scoring and was subsequently called up to the England squad, Di Michele has been slightly more trust-worthy with the ball (although he's knackered after not having his half time siesta), Neil is on a diet and has opted for throwing pork pies at attacking players in order to put them off instead of casually eating the pies as the likes of Ronaldo flit past him, and Scott "the torso" Parker is playing his best football in years and should be floating around the fringe of the England set up.
All is well, and we're in good stead at this part of the season to
a) not get relegated
b) hopefully finish in the top half
c) finish above Spurs
and
d) have eyes on Europe through the FA Cup
The FA Cup, I think, is probably as big of a priority this year as the league. Obviously we need to secure the points to stay up, but it does look like there are at least 3 teams that are going to perform worse than us, and so I'm quite comfortable we'll all be watching MoTD next year. Our road to the final of the FA Cup however is only three games away, and we already know two of the three opposition - 'Boro and Everton - both very winnable games (in fact Di Michele should have single handedly beaten 'Boro last weekend). After that will almost definitely be one of the powerhouses - Manc U, Chelscum, or Le Arse - but as a one off game we could certainly pull it off, as we could in the cup final. It almost seems like fate to think that in two of our recent visits to the final we had to go through 'Boro in one, and Everton in the other. Here's to hope.
In other events we face Bolton this weekend which in a perfect world will see the silky passing of the West Ham players undermine the Boltoners, but will most likely end up being a rather boring affair that will cause me a lot of spelling mistakes in the post match round up - unless of course they decide to play British players, like they last did in 1989 when they won the Sherpa Van Trophy (it's all true, I swear). On the up side Wanderers, or Journeymen as they should be called, sport an excellent goal difference of -10, and so even our likely combination of Di Michele and Go Diego Go Tristan should be able to muster up at least a couple of near misses.
Our away record of late has been decent, so I'll take a 1-0 win for us from a Collisson thunder strike. Bolton will come away from this one with every single player in their squad still yet to score - or at least that's what Sky Sports thinks...
More after the game, sorry it's been a while, and COYI!!!
But yeah, things look on the up. Carlton has been scoring and was subsequently called up to the England squad, Di Michele has been slightly more trust-worthy with the ball (although he's knackered after not having his half time siesta), Neil is on a diet and has opted for throwing pork pies at attacking players in order to put them off instead of casually eating the pies as the likes of Ronaldo flit past him, and Scott "the torso" Parker is playing his best football in years and should be floating around the fringe of the England set up.
All is well, and we're in good stead at this part of the season to
a) not get relegated
b) hopefully finish in the top half
c) finish above Spurs
and
d) have eyes on Europe through the FA Cup
The FA Cup, I think, is probably as big of a priority this year as the league. Obviously we need to secure the points to stay up, but it does look like there are at least 3 teams that are going to perform worse than us, and so I'm quite comfortable we'll all be watching MoTD next year. Our road to the final of the FA Cup however is only three games away, and we already know two of the three opposition - 'Boro and Everton - both very winnable games (in fact Di Michele should have single handedly beaten 'Boro last weekend). After that will almost definitely be one of the powerhouses - Manc U, Chelscum, or Le Arse - but as a one off game we could certainly pull it off, as we could in the cup final. It almost seems like fate to think that in two of our recent visits to the final we had to go through 'Boro in one, and Everton in the other. Here's to hope.
In other events we face Bolton this weekend which in a perfect world will see the silky passing of the West Ham players undermine the Boltoners, but will most likely end up being a rather boring affair that will cause me a lot of spelling mistakes in the post match round up - unless of course they decide to play British players, like they last did in 1989 when they won the Sherpa Van Trophy (it's all true, I swear). On the up side Wanderers, or Journeymen as they should be called, sport an excellent goal difference of -10, and so even our likely combination of Di Michele and Go Diego Go Tristan should be able to muster up at least a couple of near misses.
Our away record of late has been decent, so I'll take a 1-0 win for us from a Collisson thunder strike. Bolton will come away from this one with every single player in their squad still yet to score - or at least that's what Sky Sports thinks...
More after the game, sorry it's been a while, and COYI!!!
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