Stoke 2-0 Fulham
And so much for that.
In order of seriousness:
Moussa Dembele was stretchered off
Mark Schwarzer has a bad case of the yips
We are out of the Coca-Cola cup
Discuss.
Picture courtesy of Getty Images (and found by Leggers on TiFF)
Attacking away from home – tactics
One of the issues with the Roy years was the steadfast refusal to ‘give it some’ away from home. The point can be summarised with the following diagrams: Here we see the ‘double stalemate’, something of a Hodgson goal when we met big teams away from home. The idea here is to ensure that both...
Blackburn 1-1 Fulham
Another day, another point. These games are notoriously tricky, so while we all hope the away day hoodoo might be banished, a draw’s a good result. There is a but though: Blackburn’s goal came when our old friend El Hadj Diouf blocked/tripped/screened Mark Schwarzer on a free-kick, allowing Christopher Samba’s header to bobble gently over...
Wise words
“So I think it’s time for certain fans to decide if they are fans of the album, or the artist” - DJ Shadow Seriously though, have we got a better team than Liverpool? Schwarzer v Reina Baird v Johnson Hangeland v Carragher Hughes v Skrtel Salcido v Konchesky Duff v Cole Etuhu v Poulsen Murphy...
You learn something every day…
As part of my top secret and very thrilling current project I’ve been reading some of the old FIFA Technical Reports that come out after each World Cup. Many new things have been learned, not least the way that holding midfielders were described. In England, the report (I think it might be 1990’s report) says,...
A cat
After all the Wolves angst, here isLulu, next door’s cat.
Lulu pops round every so often. On Saturday she was acting strangely, then decided to get into a bag.
It’s the simple things in life.
Hypocrisy?
Despite all the hand-wringing from the weekend, I actually quite enjoy the dark side of football. For my latest project I’m watching a load of old games. Today’s is Italy v Argentina from the 1982 World Cup. This was a belter, with lenient refereeing and fouls galore. Great fun. Diego Maradona v Claudio Gentile was...
Murphy’s law
If we strip away the angst it’s fairly clear that we dominated the match yesterday. And we dominated the match because Danny Murphy was running the show. He was too good for the Wolves midfield (who despite their aggressive tactics, couldn’t get close to him), and managed to keep the Gera/Davies/Dembele whirlwind going for most...
Fulham 2-1 Wolverhampton Wanderers
If you’re going to sell your soul it had better be worth it. Wolves got nothing, deserved less, and hopefully will have much to ponder on what we must hope is a long, slow journey home. If your entire game plan can be summed up by the words ‘persistent fouling’ then something’s missing. There was...
Dickson Etuhu gets a new contract
Hurray! I remember when he first signed. There was uproar. Etuhu himself wasn’t too happy about this, his facebook status updates suggesting that he felt a bit… maligned. I actually messaged him once (by way of encouragement) and he wrote back quite quickly saying that we had nothing to worry about, and that as soon...
Brian McBride
Top man.
Top player. Those goals look better and better.
The deep end (in which the author goes swimming and thinks he’s Rannulph Fiennes)
I’ve heard Australian cricket commentators use a brilliant phrase for a certain type of batsman, a player who takes risks, who reasons that while the odds may be against him, the rewards (and the fun) are high. The Australian commentators say “he’s not going to die wondering” about a player like this. This is a...
