Vidic vs Anelka

We rule…

Well folks, it's been a good Tuesday. I woke up this morning and the sun was shining, I went into work then skived off for a while to write a blog on Nicolas Bendtner being shite and then the cherry on top of that day came from the folks over at the Irish Blog Awards. As the old Kurgan saying goes “There can be only one”… (yes, my Highlander obsession is getting out of hand).

Best Sport and Recreation Blog - Sponsored by Boards.ie
- mayogaablog.com
- worldwidecyclesblog.com
- kopblog.com
- oleole.com/blogs/arseblog
- okeydokefootball.blogspot.com ('ave it!)

Later, JJ

“He’s like the security guard on the front gate who considers himself head of the corporation…”

Hey folks,

Okay… it’s a long headline but I don’t get to use enough Red Dwarf quotes in the blog so I thought I’d throw that in. It came to mind when reading Nicolas Bendtner’s quotes yesterday about the fact that he should play “every minute of every match” for Arsenal. In all honesty, forget Ronaldo, forget Joey Barton, forget Robinho or even Antonio Cassano… if there is an example of a delusional footballer with ideas above his station and a shite attitude to accompany it, then it’s Bendtner.

First of all, and let’s just get this out there, he’s a horrific player. Essentially he’s Neill Mellor on a diet; no touch, not very good in the air, at a push you could say he’s not bad on long balls if defenders give him enough space but his home is certainly the lower reaches of the Premier League or one of the weaker European championships. It’s not necessarily all bad then, but it’s the idea that he believes Arsenal are a better side when he plays that is laughable.

Even his own team-mates think he’s shit. Bendtner was of course talking in the wake of Arsenal signing up Andrei Arshavin who, miracle aside, will probably not make too much of a mark for the side in the coming months. He has barely played since November (when the Russian championship finished up), is arriving in a foreign league for the first time ever, and doing so two thirds of the way through the season to boot.

It’ll hardly be easy but even at that it wouldn’t take too much of a stretch of the imagination to see Arsene Wenger plump for him instead of Bendtner in a few weeks’ time as he finally grows weary of the Dane ballooning shots into the corporate boxes. With Eduardo back and with Arsenal fans already wondering why Carlos Vela still stands behind Bendtner in the forward pecking order, this utter fool of a player should be banished back to the reserves soon enough.

Though, thinking about it, could it be that we were wrong about Wenger all these years? Could it be that he’s sacrificed Vela all season because deep down he’s a closet long ball merchant and he’s sees Bendtner as his Tony Cascarino to Adebayor’s Niall Quinn? It’s about the only hope the long Danish streak of piss has of staying in the side I’d say.

Shite, shite player.

Rant over, JJ

Ze Pixie Headed Little Irish are Winning

Howdy folks,

Scanning up and down the tables of the European qualifying groups for the 2010 World Cup it’s hard to ignore the fact that Ireland are currently looking in a healthier position at this stage of proceedings than they have done for some time. Okay, there’s no Andy Reid, alright Stephen Ireland is still absent and the moments of play that we can describe as ‘enterprising’ tend to come along once every 70 minutes.

But… Ireland are getting results and despite some of the negativity which seems to be prevailing around the side from a lot of the press, I think Trapattoni is being unfairly labelled as overly defensive.

Two workmanlike central midfielders are certainly vital to his tried and tested gameplan but this is a side which plays with two wingers and two men up front, something which very few sides have the cajones to do these days. More often than not, sides are employing a one winger system with three central midfield grafters across the line, the winger and furthest central-mid player switching sides every now and then. It’s a system played up and down the Premier League anyway, with some sides (Liverpool, Man City, Everton) benefiting from one or more of these central midfielders having a creative streak.

This is of course where the Irish side falls down in that Whelan and Andrews are incredibly average players, and while Stephen Reid is a little better he’s hardly Pele. Hence the need for two imaginative wingers; indeed should McGeady manage to tame that cruel mistress known as ‘the cross’ within the next year or two he could be one of the better players in his position across Europe, or at the very least a far better option in wide areas than England are blessed with.

Overall, Ireland deserved to win last night even though they relied upon a huge dollop of luck with the penalty. But then again fuck it; we’ve had to deal with years of dodgy deflections going against us, stupid defensive mistakes costing us, inept managerial appointments, Brian (insert spitting noise here) Kerr’s siege mentality and all other manner of factors which served to piss on our qualification hopes.

On the Andy Reid matter, well Mark summed it up well before, while hopefully Stephen Ireland will sign up to give us added guile in the middle and we may even see Darron Gibson grow into a decent player should he get a loan spell next season just in time for the crucial autumn qualifiers.

It’s a lot of wishful thinking I’ll admit, but in short, if that’s a bandwagon passing by I’m jumping on. Roll on two weeks holiday in 2010 in front of the TV drunk as a poet on pay day.

Later, JJ

Crossbar Challenged

Afternoon people,

It’s only in the last two years that I’ve actually begun to like Soccer AM. When I say like though, that doesn’t mean I can actually sit through it. It’s three frickin hours long after all. But instead, now that there’s no chance of seeing Tim Lovejoy’s gimpy visage on the screen each week, the show is a little more accessible and in between the generally inane, often jaw droppingly stupid* interview styles of Helen Chamberlain and Generic Laddish Male beside her (I haven’t the time nor the inclination to memorise the name of whatever chump they have in with Chamberlain), there are some moments on the show which are genuinely decent.

After initial misgivings I’ve even begun to like Tubes; maybe I haven’t seen the gag often enough to be sick of it but moments such as this with Ian Brown are pretty funny in a hungover-on-a-Saturday-morning kind of way. Skill Skool is also very decent (oh and the Soccerette thing has its merits obviously…) but chatting with a mate the other week we were both struck by how completely hypnotic the whole Crossbar Challenge phenomenon is.

Just how is it that a load of professional footballers kicking a ball from the halfway line in an attempt to hit the bar can be so entertaining? Maybe I am as stupid as many of my teachers thought but frankly I’ve watched about 50 of these and still I want more. Is anyone else as dumb as me? It’s been going on for five years now so obviously there are others out there.

Anyway, here’s some more, and some more… and some more. Idiotic? Yes. Entertainment for the dumbed-down generation? Absolutely.

Later, JJ

*Interview style example:

Generic Laddish Male to Ray Winstone: “Is it true you’d sacrifice all your roles just to get an England cap?” Winstone: "Eh... 'course yeah."

Seriously, how many levels of stupid is this fucking question? Good luck on the shopping channel chief.

Big Phil gone…

Heya folks,

Well, didn’t see that coming, okay they’ve played shite of late and only got one point against the rest of the ‘big four’, but seriously… out of the blue (no pun intended) or what?

Who should replace him? Is it the right decision? How the hell is Avram Grant being linked with the position? These question marks and more…

Later, JJ

The weekend innit

Alright folks,

Well it’s time for a few shoddy predictions from myself followed by plenty of guffaws once the final scores come in.

Man City v Middlesbrough: Hobinho, as it’s pronounced in Brazil, may not like getting his shins kicked by Boro’s youngsters but as the away side can’t score it’s most likely that City will pull through for a 1-0 here.

Blackburn v Aston Villa: Fat Sam’s men to get stuffed at home. 1-3.

Chelsea v Hull City: Peter Cech is, in every respect, looking more like Cartman in the Special Olympics each day. Expect him to conceded one maybe but Chelsea should get this out of the way in the first half. 3-1.

Everton v Bolton: Everton should be tired after the trudging win midweek against Pool and Bolton are superb on the road which is pretty logical as they have less of their own fans slagging them off relentlessly for 90 minutes. Which is nice. I’ll go for 1-1.

Sunderland v Stoke City: Awful, awful, and lots more awful. 1-0 and it’ll be a scrappy goal as well.

West Brom v Newcastle: Insomnia gone and Kinnear pondering a new deal, and what with West Brom being marginally better than shite of late (only marginally mind) they might just fancy this. Bad teams with confidence usually bugger things up though so in short I think Newcastle will get three points here. 1-2.

Wigan v Fulham: Meh… 1-1

Tottenham v Arsenal: My Robbie Keane thoughts are below so I’ll stick to a general prediction here of plenty of goals and some horrific defending. A notch down on the last one, I’ll go 3-3.

West Ham v Man Utd: I want it to be 1-0, and at half time it might be but by the time 90 minutes creeps around it will be 1-4. Oh, and Ronaldo to come good in this game as he has to at some point this year.

Elsewhere, before I predict Liverpool and Portsmouth, we haven’t given our two cents worth on Robbie Keane as yet at ODF. To be honest, as a Pool fan, my feelings on the whole matter have gone up and down for most of this week. Sheer disbelief was for starters when he wasn’t on the bench against Chelsea, absolute disgust then followed as it became clear that for quite some time Rafa had been putting a personal vendetta with the club’s hierarchy above success for the side (how else can you explain Keane’s non appearances against the likes of Hull or Stoke, along with a shabby cameo at Wigan and numerous others before).

It’s a type of arrogance which led to the end of Houllier I thought when Keane’s departure became official. Then Xabi Alonso snapped me out of comparisons with Oul Ged today when he reminded all of us of just how bad a side Pool were before Rafa came along, how meek they were in Europe and how utterly toothless they were against the sides around them (except for Man United bizarrely, something which Rafa only put to rest this season). Houllier actually had around about as much money to spend as Benitez and did so with continued stupidity. Think of the side Rafa inherited and compare it to the team which someone else would take over should Benitez jump or be pushed before next season. Three words: Traore or Skrtel?

Basically, all sides have come out of this week the worse for wear. Keane bottled it by not staying the full season, Benitez meanwhile is fooling no one with the beaten wife act (‘oh they forced him upon me’), and then there’s Rick Parry whose reputation surely took one final hammer blow before a hoped-for resignation in the summer. It’s a sorry mess which will unfortunately only serve to make United’s inevitable title victory all the sweeter for those at the Theatre of Prawns.

As for this weekend, some commentators, including the generally superb Dion Fanning, have suggested that it’s Rafa’s dream to play without Gerrard and of course he now has the chance.

The side that will line up against Pompey will (with the exception of Carragher whose career he turned around) be a Benitez team through and through. Hard working, often uninspired, perhaps now we’ll see just whether or not his ideas about the game are sound or has he just been lucky to have Gerrard to save him so often. My only hope is that at the very least he lets Ryan Babel off the leash alongside Torres and gives the fans some hope that something out of the ordinary might happen. Being that Pompey are shite and I want to go into the weekend feeling slightly happy, I’ll say two nil to the ‘Pool.

Have a good one folks, JJ