eighteensixtyfive

BBC Quotes of the Week

As a Red, I particularly like this one by new Charlton supremo Les Reed:

“Ferenc Puskas might have been the original Andy Reid.”

However, there are a few gems in here, including:

“Scholes walks away a bit gingerly.” (Forest Technical Director David Pleat does some ITV commentary)

“You’d have thought after four games without a win he’d have suffered enough.” (BBC Commentator after Sam Allardyce went to Vegas to watch a Celine Dion concert)

Full article available here.

Posted in General

There’s a shock

Karl-Heinz Rummenigge (chairman of Bryan Munich) is thinking of pulling out of the G14 because “Everybody in the G14 thinks only about themselves … in football it is pure selfishness that rules … there is no communication with Fifa, none with Uefa and there are too few common projects.“

I think we could have all saved him a bit of time and told him that a few years back.

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It’s probably ‘arris’s fault

Pssst. Wanna know a secret? I can tell you how to beat Nottingham Forest. Honest guv. It’s easy. Twenty quid to you matey.

Right … first off, play 4-4-2. That puts your two strikers in the gaps by their back three. Then push your left winger forwards. And get your left-sided central midfielder to push out to the wing as well. That keeps Southall occupied. Don’t worry about Curtis too much. And play as high up the field as possible - that way the midfield four end up playing as extra defenders. And, here’s the clever bit. Timewaste at every opportunity. Nudge, push, shove, kick, elbow them as often as possible. A quick word in their ears about their wives or mothers. And whenever they shove you back, go down like you were shot and make sure that the physio is called on. Anything to break their stride.

If this quick tip results in Forest losing a game, remember it’s probably ‘arris’s fault.

Forest 3 - 1 Millwall

We lined up unchanged in a 3-4-3:

As we took to the field I immediately noticed Cullip striding out purposefully. “Blimey, I wouldn’t mess with him” I thought to myself. Just before kick off the players made a point of going round the team and slapping hands, psyching each other up. And then Millwall came at us. Two chances for them in the first minute. My faith in Cullip proved utterly misplaced as he made a mistake leaving Ben May one-on-one with Smith - and one-nil to them. Cullip had his head in his hands, Smith had no chance. It was probably ‘arris’s fault.

Millwall proceeded to play the game plan outlined above. Lots of little nudges and niggly fouls. Lots of sledging. Tons of time wasting. And I’ve never seen such a miracle worker as their physio. But the key was the doubling up on Southall. With him pegged back, almost as an orthodox defensive right-back we had no outlet for the ball at all. You see - ‘arris - it’s all his fault. The Millwall fans were making a lot of noise, including singing “Super Neil Harris” - resulting in boos from some of our fans. And we were making a lot of mistakes. Step forward Breckin, Curtis, Morgan, Clingan and Perchio. And ‘arris, of course. It was all his fault. Not that we weren’t creating chances - their keeper was busy and I’m sure we hit the post and the bar. But they were creating more chances and carving us apart as they forced errors off our defenders. ‘arris. All because of ‘arris.

At half time I seriously thought we had no way into this match. Millwall had us tactically. We couldn’t seem to raise our game to deal with it - they just kept knocking us out of our stride (and there’s no use asking the referee to help). I reckon it was down to ‘arris.

The second half started with a good chance for us, followed by an equally good one for them. But then their plan changed. Southall was left unmarked. They played lower down the field and managed to stay on their feet. Perchio and Clingan got the opportunity to play as midfielders, not extra centre-halves. And we slowly built up a rhythm. Cullip came off - looking like his hamstring again - replaced by Tyson (Curtis moved to centre-half with Harris “the Witch” moving to left wing-back). Bloody ‘arris - doing Danny’s ham-string again. And then Perch was moved to centre-half, with Curtis back to the left, when Gary Holt replaced Harris. And then we really came into it (see it must have been his fault). Millwall started looking pegged back - much like we were in the first. Tyson, Agogo and Commons seemed to have their defenders scared.

However, the key moment of the match was just about to happen. Agogo, who was working hard for very little reward spotted Grolt taking his tracksuit bottoms off. The Trent End cheered and sang “there’s only one Grant Holt”. And Agogo, realising it was probably him who was coming off, forced a mistake off their defender - ending up one-on-one with the excellently named Lenny Pidgely. One all! Grolt sits back down on the bench. A minute later, a goal mouth scramble and somehow Perchio forces it over the line. Two one and they’re not singing anymore.

Grolt comes on for Commons, making a load of excellent runs (funny how the Trent End never noticed Harris’s runs but when Grolt makes them …) for not much reward. The linesman seems to think that you are offside if you are ever between the defenders and the goalie. We win a corner and Breckin does a perfect Sheringham near-post effort. Three to us and we could have had more. However, as injury time struck, Agogo pulled up with a dodgy hamstring - so we finished the game with ten men. Obviously, this was ‘arris’s fault as well.

Losers
The entire team for being taken apart in the first half by such simple tactics.
Smith - learn to kick the ball at a red shirt!
Cullip - a bad mistake and another injury.
A sizeable number of the fans - this Harris-baiting has to stop. Much as I would rather see Grolt take his place in the side, the fact is Harris is a Red. We pay his wages. Booing him, when he is part of the side that is top of the league is just idiotic. Stop it now.

Winners
Tyson - maybe not capable of playing 90 minutes yet but he makes a real difference to our sharpness up-front.
Grolt - there was a lot of love for Grant Holt at the City Ground today. Let’s hope that there’s a silver lining to Agogo’s misfortune.
The entire team - for taking the time to applaud the fans after the final whistle (lead by Southall and Grolt). We made a lot of noise today and they showed us that they appreciated it.

Posted in General

Grant stays

The official line, as dictated by CC.

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Diving players

I don’t for one minute think that any players will be sacked for repeated conning of the referee, but I do like the Torquay chairman’s initiative.

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Fight Fight Fight!

This seems to explain the rumours of a training ground bust-up.

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Too many strikers …

Looks like we have accepted a bid for Grant Holt.

I know we have far too many strikers but this one is pretty strange. Grolt is top scorer. He is obviously talented. He (last couple of games notwithstanding) has shown he is prepared to fight for a place. But the biggest question of all is why sell him to Bristol City? Our League One rivals, one of the few teams to stretch us and with a decent finisher they could have had three points off us. Step forward Grant Holt.

The speculation about this move has been growing for some time. Rumours have been doing the rounds about a training ground bust-up with CC. And far be it from me to pretend to know anything about what’s happening behind the scenes at the club, but if this move does go through (and the linked story is sourced by TeamTalk, which doesn’t have the greatest track record) then Colinwood’s got some serious questions to answer.

UPDATE: This thread suggests that he has decided to stay and he has played for the reserves. However, there’s not often smoke without fire and this level of speculation certainly suggests that Grolt is on his way out.

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It’s the economy, stupid!

Nottingham Forest 2 - 0 Brentford.

There are some defenders, centre-halves in particular, that have a real economy of movement. Just leave a foot in to put the attacker off, a slight nudge in the back, head it clear, push the attacker out wide. Once the job’s done, organise the back line and get back to work. John Terry has it, Colin Cooper did it, I can’t remember if Calderwood did or not. But his Forest side certainly does.

We lined up in the now familiar 3-4-3 formation (with Nathan Tyson making an unexpected appearance on the bench):

Never have I seen such a one-sided forty-five minutes of football as the first half. The chant “Easy, Easy” was written for this game. We controlled the game, playing short passes between our players. Every time Brentford tried an attack, we simply snuffed out the threat. Morgan and Breckin started ‘Beckinbauering’ upfield. Clingan repeated his midfield general show, starting everything and closing them down. The only downside was Agogo - he was being marked out of the game, often with three men on him. But, the upside was that this left space for the other attackers. And this space paid dividends when we won a free kick from about twenty-five yards out. ‘Commons, top right’ said the bloke in front of me. ‘Southall, top left’ thought I. In fact, scuffed and trickle in bottom left was the outcome. But a goal is a goal. A bit later, another free kick in much the same position. ‘Commons, top left’ said the bloke in front of me. ‘Southall, top right’, thinking it must be this time. But no, scuffed and trickle in bottom left. Again.

And this is where the economy kicked in. As far as Forest were concerned, it was job done at half time. So we didn’t bother playing the second half. Brentford had most of the possession but still couldn’t do anything with it. The ground fell silent, the game was dull. The highlights were chants of ‘David Platt, what a wanker’, boos for Neil Harris (not from me but from a not-insignificant proportion of the Trent End) and a bat getting utterly confused and spending at least twenty minutes swooping over the players heads. Then, just as the bat managed to clear the gap between Trent End and Main Stand, Tyson came on for Agogo - boos for Agogo coming off, although he looked knackered and frustrated, massive cheers for Tyson coming on. The great thing to see is that he lost none of his pace. At one point he was running up the left wing, the defender caught up with him (’ha! think you can outrun me’ you could see him thinking). So Nathan just stepped up a gear and left him for dead. And the skill was on show as well, step overs, back-heels and a fantastic reverse over the shoulder lob-type-thing to keep the ball in play. To try and liven things up (it was still pretty dull) Colinwood took off Harris (cheers) and Commons, replacing them with Lester and Grolt. It didn’t really make any difference to the entertainment value.

Full time, an utterly dull second half but job done. Rish questioned later what would happen if we played for ninety minutes. I’m sure that, as far as Colinwood was concerned, we did. Why waste energy on scoring a third when you are two goals up? Why concentrate on keeping possession when they don’t look like scoring? Just because it’s not great to watch, just because we didn’t rip them apart doesn’t mean we didn’t play for ninety minutes. One of the blokes behind me said “how come we don’t have the killer instinct any more - we never seem to score four or five” - well I don’t ever remember us having a killer instinct; sitting back and soaking up the pressure has been our way for about thirty years. So I suppose Colinwood is in good company.

Lastly, a quick mention for Leroy Rosenior. Listening to the Fulham game on my drive down I was thinking their full-back sounds familiar - it turns out it’s Leroy’s son. Rosenior Senior (sheesh) said that his players showed spirit today - well I don’t know what else has been happening there but that was a worrying performance (not as worrying as if you were a Leeds fan, but worrying nonetheless). I don’t know if Rosenior is not up to the job or whether Mad Dog Allen was simply one of those managers who made players better than they actually are (a la Clough and O’Neill). I’m hoping it’s the latter as, from his interviews, Leroy comes across as a nice guy.

Losers:
Smith - his kicking was atrocious today.
Winners:
Clingan - Man of the Match again.
Cullip - another game, another clean sheet.
Commons - the same goal twice.
Agogo - tireless work for no reward.
Tyson - the fastest thing since Vance ‘Chunky’ Warner.

Posted in General

Nice one Randy

I don’t know what the attendance was last night but Randy Lerner is making sure that the same doesn’t happen to Villa.

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