This weekend marked the 50th anniversary of the very first “Match of the Day” and the BBC commemorated the occasion with a special episode on Friday night. The first person to speak was Ryan Giggs, which was fitting given that he made his United debut on that very show back in 1964.
Motson was there too, well he would be wouldn’t he, I mean there’s no show without Punch is there? Bizarrely, he was wearing a ‘stars and stripes’ tie. Is it too much to hope that he’s going to live in the States and commentate on the MLS or something? He can’t possibly be worse than their commentators, surely?
Then Piers Morgan came on, followed by Rio Ferdinand and Mourinho so yeah I’d seen enough now and switched off. I mean Piers fucking Morgan?? What's the matter BBC, was Simon Cowell too busy?
Anyway, the big game on Saturday was at the Pit where Arsenal were looking for revenge after getting dicked there last season. Defeat that day put their top four spot in serious jeopardy as Everton went above them with only a few games left to play. It didn’t matter in the end of course, my boy Jason Puncheon opened a can of whoop-ass at Goodison and then they lubed up for City and gave up any top four ambitions they had. Nevertheless, Arsenal will have wanted to set the record straight after that humiliation.
Yet they went there and fell into exactly the same tactical trap as last year and Everton went 2-0 up by half time, courtesy of goals by Coleman and Naismith, who as I said last week is rapidly cementing that place as the league’s 'best shit player'.
The flip side of that coin is Jack Wilshere, who has to be one of the leading candidates for the 'shittest good player'. He has so much talent but delivers so little. All he does is try and play little one twos in tight areas or run straight into people and then snarl at the ref when he doesn’t get a decision. Rodgers would straighten him right out, but unfortunately for the little chav scrote he won’t ever get the chance to be mentored by ‘Brendao’.
Neither will Sanchez and he’s a complete fucking idiot for choosing Arsenal over us. He’s perfect for how he play, he would have slotted in seamlessly and would have had the time of his life playing for Rodgers, but now he’s about to become this year’s Ozil. Wenger had started him as a lone striker and he was completely ineffective before getting the hook at half time. Don’t know if he was injured or if he had to be back home to pick up his missus from Harrods, but either way he didn’t show up for the second half. Fortunately for Arsenal, neither did Everton.
Giroud missed three great chances after replacing Sanchez and the Blues were ripping the piss out of him. The Frenchman had the last laugh though when he equalised in the last minute as Jagielka misjudged the flight of a cross. Ramsay had earlier scored for the third game in a row, he’s a class act and must have a real shot at being runner up to Super Mario for player of the year this season.
Were Arsenal that good in the closing stages or were Everton that bad? Neither I'd say. It was probably just a case of panic setting in with the Blues when it dawned on them that Arsenal not picking up any points might be the difference between the Gunners finishing above us or not.
Remember that #thingstimhowardcouldsave nonsense the Americans started after he had a half decent game in the world cup? I guess you can scratch ‘shots from Arsenal and Leicester players’ from the list anyway.
Speaking of Everton keepers, the greatest one they’ve ever had was on Talksport this week ripping into Balotelli, saying he’s “never seen him have a good game”. I quite like Big Nev to be honest, he’s always worth listening to but any credibility his views on Mad Mario may have carried were blown out the water when he also said he thinks Everton can win the title this year.
“What really gets on my nerves is everyone is going on about the title being between [the likes of] Chelsea, Manchester United, Liverpool, Man United. No, there are a couple of other teams out there that could win the league and we are one of them.” I want some of whatever he’s drinking. What’s that you say? It’s turps he found in a bin? Ok maybe I’ll pass.
Barry Davies was back on Match of the Day for Palace’s game with West Ham. I always associate his voice with great Liverpool goals and occasions so there was something comforting about having him back. Can we not just swap him for Motson?
It was a bad day for Palace and it capped a terrible week really. They were on the verge of appointing Malky Mackay as boss only for Vincent Tan to blow the whole thing to shit and leave them back at square one. Tan may be as mad as a box of Balotelli’s, but it turns out he wasn’t the bad guy after all.
As for Palace, they need to stop fucking about and just appoint Tim facking Sherwood, the slaaags.
Zarate gave the Hammers the lead and then, incredibly, Downing added a second. When I see him do that I can’t help wonder how he doesn’t manage to get seven or eight goals a season instead of the usual none or one. He’s got a good shot on him so there’s no excuse for him being so Aaron Lennon-like. Mind you, Palace were so bad they even let Carlton Cole score. Chamakh had given them some hope at 2-0 but Cole’s strike finished them off.
I heard Fat Sam on Talksport afterwards, he was asked whether he’d changed West Ham’s style after all the criticism he got last season, and he responded “I’d like to tell you how I’ve made this big change but the truth is I haven’t. We’ve always played this way, but now we’ve got goalscorers”. Eh? He can’t mean Stewy or Carlton Cole surely? He’s been on the same sauce as Southall I think.
Chelsea beat Leicester 3-0 but they were crap until the second half and had David Nugent not shit himself when clean through it may have been a different story. The daft Everton supporting turd was looking to the linesman to see if he was onside instead of concentrating on what he was doing, and he allowed Courtois to make a save. I’d fine any player a week’s wages for that. And two week’s wages if it was against those horrible twats.
Drogba came on to a hero’s welcome, and I can’t lie, seeing Abramovich with his dopy grin and demented performing seal clapping routine caused me to completely lose my shit and say some things I’m not proud of. I immediately fast forwarded to the next game for the sake of my blood pressure. I might be doing that a lot this year.
That next game was Swansea’s 1-0 win over Burnley courtesy of a Nathan Dyer strike. After the ease of last week’s victory at Old Trafford this was a timely reminder to the Swans that there are much more difficult fixtures ahead for them. You can’t face United every week lads.
There were loads of empty seats at St Mary’s as Southampton were held to a goalless draw by West Brom. Understandable I guess, the fans must be seriously disillusioned with the ownership after the summer they’ve had, but it’d be a real shame if it all fell apart down there. The Baggies should have won the game as they had the better chances and Southampton looked seriously devoid of ideas and failed to hit the heights they did against us last week.
There were loads of empty seats at Villa Park too, which again is completely understandable as you have to be pretty fucking mental to pay to watch Aston Villa these days. If I was unfortunate enough to be a Villa fan I’d have chosen a new sport by now. It’s nothing to do with being a fair weather fan; if I were a Leeds or Portsmouth fan I’d still be going the game despite the up and down nature of their recent existence. It’s just that Villa are so fucking pointless aren’t they? They exist. That’s all they do.
Newcastle had the better of this one but couldn’t find the breakthrough and ended up with ten men when Williamson was harshly given a second yellow card. That Cabella jabroni had a great chance to score early on but just fell over and rolled his shot harmlessly wide, the chump.
The only entertainment in this one came on the touchline. Pardew produced a moment of… well I don’t even know what to call it actually, as he tried to get one of his players to smile. It looked like he was playing charades, and trying to act out “don’t worry, be happy”. Here’s the clip, if you haven’t seen it already you’ll love this.
Pardew is great. Not as great as he thinks he is, obviously, but imagine how dull Newcastle would be if he wasn’t there? Not as dull as Villa, but still, they’d be pretty dull.
Not to be outdone, Villa assistant boss Roy Keane then went mental at a decision and hurled a water bottle that bounced up and hit Paul Lambert in the nuts. I expect Lambert’s reaction was something along the lines of “Who the fuck threw tha…. *sees Keane glowering with those dead eyes and scary bushy grey beard*… errr sorry Roy, never meant to get in your way there, carry on.”
Villa have had two clean sheets to start the season and Newcastle haven’t scored yet. Not sure what I’m more surprised about there.
Onto Sunday and ‘Arry’s return to White Hart Lane wasn’t a happy one as his QPR side were dismantled by Spurs.
Forget the 4-0 scoreline though, the thing that leapt out at me from this is that Kaboul is not only first choice but he’s now their captain! Kinell.
And how the hell did QPR manage to persuade Isla to join them from Juve? Oh yeah, I forgot.. ££££££ They look just the same as they did last time they were in the top flight to me. Loads of big names on big money, but complete dogshit. A totally disorganised, disinterested mess.
That Tony Fernandez fella must be wondering what he’s doing wrong, he’s making money available and man for man they’re better than a lot of teams in this league, but no matter what he does they always seem to be terrible. They needed to fluke their way to promotion via an undeserved playoff victory despite having a bigger wage bill than Champions League finalists and La Liga champions Atletico Madrid.
Also on Sunday, Stoke needed a late equaliser to secure a point against ten man Hull. Bruce was once again furious with the ref, it seems to be a weekly occurrence that even going back to last season. This was a bit embarrassing though, it was a disputed throw in that he was kicking off about this time. Not an incorrect penalty decision or a wrongly disallowed goal, a fucking throw in.
Yes, it was a bad call, but it was a double ricochet and they’re not always easy to spot. Total over-reaction from Bruce, he should be looking at why his defenders couldn’t deal with a bread and butter ball into the box after the throw in was taken instead of blaming the officials.
Hull are signing Michael Dawson apparently. Sounds about right, they’re always there to give a good home to any players Spurs don’t want. Bruce must be rubbing his hands together at the moment given the list of players Pocchettino reportedly wants shut of.
Last and least this weekend, United finally got some points on the board.. well one anyway.. by battling to a plucky draw at Sunderland. Mata even gave them a shock lead but Rodwell quickly equalised and that’s how it remained. David Moyes won at Sunderland last season. Just sayin’ like.
Staying with United, and Danny Welbeck has been linked with Spurs and Arsenal this week. Van Gaal responded by saying that he’d prefer if Welbeck was playing for a club not competing for a Champions League place. So I guess that means he’s staying put, especially as the only other interested party appears to be Hull, and United “don’t want to sell to a rival”.
United are also said to be close to signing Angel Di Maria for £65m. Their house has rising damp, dodgy foundations and they’ve got no sofa or TV, and what’s their solution? “Hey let’s build a new swimming pool for the back yard!!!”. Thick bastards.
Dave
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