If last weekend were a TV show, it would be the Jolly Boys Outing episode of Only Fools & Horses. It doesn’t get much better, it’s virtually impossible to improve on it. We won, City lost, Arsenal lost, Everton lost in hilarious circumstances (basically the scene when the coach blows up), Villa lost and neither United or Chelsea won. As a great man once said, “lovely jubbly”.
I’ll start with City because I don’t usually talk about them. I’ll make an exception this time as they’ve grabbed my attention by losing three games in a week, all in different competitions. They’re wobbling like they’ve been sat next to the coach driver inhaling the fumes from Del’s dodgy radio. They’ve got injuries but it feels like it’s more than just that. That cloud hanging over them with all the charges might finally be having an impact. There’s a lot of uncertainty there as not only does it look like Guardiola is off at the end of the season, they don’t even know what league they’re likely to be playing in as right now everything is on the table.
Will that effect the players? Who knows. Maybe they don’t care. Maybe they’re in denial about the crimes committed by their club. But maybe it’s there in the background, being spoken about in the players canteen when they’re having breakfast. Players don’t like uncertainty and City have had such a long unbroken run of success that what’s happening to them now must be jarring. It’s not just because of these three defeats, it’s how they’ve played for much of the season. Some of their wins have been by the seat of their pants. They’re got away with murder but this week it caught up with them.
Maybe it is just the injuries though. You can’t rule that out as defensively they’ve been decimated recently and against Bournemouth they wheeled Walker, Akanji and Ake out when clearly none of them were fit. Walker in particular was an absolute shambles, he looked so confused he may as well have been wandering around in a “Kiss me quick, squeeze me slow” hat muttering about how he’s “lost his dolphin”. Much as I enjoy ripping on Walker and pointing out how over-rated he is, even I will admit that this horror show was obviously a result of him not being fit. They had to play him though as they’re running out of bodies.
They went to Portugal in midweek and were slapped around like the “Great Raymondo” in his flat, but they had a kid making his debut at centre back so do we put that defeat down to the injuries or something else? I really, really hope it’s something else because that’s much harder to come back from. This feels like a pivotal time in the season because if they fall too far behind they might start to feel sorry for themselves, and their next three games are Brighton away, Spurs at home (their bogey team) and then they come to Anfield.
Of course there is also the impending verdict on their cheating which might completely rule them out of it regardless. Any kind of points deduction this season and they’re fucked, because they’ve got a big enough job on their hands even without it. They often have some sketchy results at this stage of the season but it definitely does feel different this time, because they just don’t look right. You know how you know City aren’t right? They’re playing Matheus Nunes, who usually only gets on the pitch in the League Cup.
Hand on heart, I wasn’t at all surprised they dropped points at Bournemouth. They barely beat Southampton and Wolves and they should have been hammered by Fulham, so Bournemouth away is not a fixture you want if things aren’t going particularly well. You get Bournemouth when you’re not firing on all cylinders and you’re in trouble as they’re a right fucking handful with those attacking players they have. It’s not just my boy Semenyo either, they’ve got a lot of quick, direct, skilful forwards who can cause problems.
Ederson made a brilliant double save to deny Semenyo and Kluivert as Bournemouth aggressively pressed City and repeatedly forced them into errors early on. Ederson could nothing to stop Semenyo firing in the opener though after great play on the left by Kerkez (who we’ve been linked with this week). Kerkez then made a goal saving block at the other end to deny Foden.
Ederson then denied Evanilsen as Bournemouth continued to threaten, but the keeper was beaten by Evanilsen soon after and again it was down to brilliant work by Kerkez on the left, who delivered an absolute peach of a ball on the run that was begging to be converted.
You know what would be the most satisfying thing if City get the book thrown at them? It wouldn’t be us getting the titles we deserve. It wouldn’t even be the joy I’d take from seeing all their players leave rather than play in the fourth tier or something like that. It would be the pain and misery felt by that absolute cunt Noel Gallagher. When Bournemouth’s second went in the camera went immediately to him in the crowd. Even before they showed Guardiola they showed him. Why? I don’t get why this mouthy little cunt gets so much attention. Why do the media assume that people care about his opinions? He was actually on co-commentary in midweek!! Can you believe that? Co-commentary.
So yeah, if City end up in the mud the best thing about it will be not having to see or hear from this cunt ever again. I think I hate him more than I hate anybody else in this country right now. Even more than I hate Keir Starmer and all the other Tories. Fuck Noel Gallagher all the way to hell. Fuck his brother too, although he’s nowhere near as bad.
Tavenier then hit the post and Smith blazed the rebound over the empty net. That would have been huge as there was no way City were coming back from that. When it’s only two you always have a chance because if you get one it sparks panic and that’s what happened as Gvardiol headed in with nine minutes left and Bournemouth then had to just button down the hatches and hold on, which they just about did.
Doku brought a good save out of Travers (cue another crowd shot of that little prick) and Haaland was also denied by the keeper and then post as City threw everything at them. I thought that was a clear foul by Haaland but that’s never going to get given when Abu Dhabi’s pet ref Michael Oliver has the whistle. Not even that bent cunt could save City this time though. Interestingly there wasn’t any sort of contentious decision that he could have made to help them out. No penalty appeals at either end, no possible red cards or anything like that, so the cunt was powerless. Not sure his bosses will see it that way though. His envelope might be light this month, although he did disallow a perfectly good goal against City Group owned Girona in midweek so maybe he’ll be ok.
Bournemouth’s celebrations might have seemed a little over the top and Arsenal-like for a league win in November, but prior to this game they had picked up precisely ZERO points against City, so this was a big deal for them. Fair play, their manager is sound, they play good football and have lots of exciting players. And I can’t believe I’m saying this, but I’m going to have to give Richard Hughes some credit here as most of those exciting players came in on his watch. He signed Semenyo, Ouattara, Kluivert, Kerkez and others so yeah, I’ll reluctantly give him credit. Now sort those fucking contracts out you smug looking twat.
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