After England's dismal World Cup showing something surely needs to be done. First things first, the only people who really get passionate about England are English, not Italian. This, as you've probably spotted, means only one thing, Fabio has to go, he doesn't really have the real English feeling to an encounter with the Germans! Whereas I thought this may be a good thing, keeps him calmer, but in hindsight I rather believe an English manager would have fired the team up much better. So to the candidates, Roy Hodgson has to be prised out of the hands of the Scallies for the good of the national team and should be number one choice (I personally cannot believe Pool fans are already slating him saying he's not a big name, he's f***in LMA manager of the year what more do you f***in want!), Martin O'Neill is another for me who should be interviewed and (rather hopefully) Harry Redknapp or even David Moyes. In any case the manager should be English, and just for those smart arses pointing out O'Neill ain't so he's close enough!!
Second, I'll turn my rant on the FA, they need restructuring such that England take importance, not the Premier League (I'll turn on that later!), but they need more coaches etc. to make sure for example they can arrange training weeks for say 40-50 England prospects, maybe 3 or 4 times a year, splitting them into 2 groups of 20-25 at the end to play a separate friendly each. This enables youngsters to come in and play alongside those experienced players, those who have been to the World Cup, and we (or in this case the FA who decide the squad) can view more talents. This is rather than just playing endless pointless friendlies with 2 teams in each half, where nobody really learns anything! This also gets the players together more often and for longer periods so they can gel as a team and the national team really becomes the important thing to all English players.
Time to turn on the biggest contributor to the country's downfall, the money-spinning Premier League. There are so many issues here I'm sure I'll think of some later that I haven't written here! First regards the fact that it's reported as the best league in the world, which is true but for the wrong reasons as it is the World Club League in my eyes. How to put it right??
1) Have the breaks as described above for international breaks.
2) Scrap the League Cup, just a pathetic waste of time, no other country has a second cup and all the Championship, League 1 and League 2 sides have the Johnstone's Paint Trophy to play for.
3) Bring in the following rules regarding home grown players. In my view the Champions League rules should be implemented, like other European leagues, where 6 starting players must be English. Also introduce a rule, similar to that of the Football League for next season, where 13 squad players must be home grown (meaning any foreign player qualifying for British passport doesn't count!) and a maximum squad size, to prevent clubs just presenting first team squad numbers to home grown players who will never play!!! I reckon 25 is a good number.
4) If the worst comes to the worst, reduce to size until the number of games is manageable and players don't become knackered, start most likely with 18.
This we'd soon see would bring more emerging young English players to the top level and ready for the national team, for example I counted 11 out of 44 Champions League starters last season as home players, 25%, very very very poor.
However I think another massive contributor to the misery of World Cup 2010, is that of the media. For example the Sun advert where the England crest is presented with a second star is just far, far too much pressure. For 2014 this sort of stuff has to stop! Then suddenly the Sun slags off the team when they fall.
We should forget Euro 2012 in my opinion, if we do well then that should be taken as an added bonus, and turn our full attention on rebuilding a gelled, hungry England team to take to Brazil in 4 years time.
Wednesday, 30 June 2010
Monday, 28 June 2010
England v Germany
I assume you're well aware of the events of Sunday afternoon, as Fabio handed in his resignation! I don't think I'll say anymore, leave it to my World Cup Review.
However another England Germany duel was played out on the Spanish streets at the 2010 Valencia Grand Prix. Before discussing the race, clearly the most important thing is that Mark Webber walked away completely unhurt from his accident. Ironically an almost mirror image incident occurred in the GP2 sprint race in the morning, when Josef Kral ran over Rodolfo Gonzalez at the end of the next straight along. Obviously the GP2 cars aren't quite as sturdy as their F1 counterparts and as such Josef was rushed to hospital but again I'm very pleased to report he too is absolutely fine.
Before the race, it was refreshing to see some football related banter for Jake Humphrey and Martin Brundle with Sebastian Vettel and Timo Glock respectively, where Timo presented Martin with a German football shirt on the grid.
Now to the on track action, where Sebastian, Lewis Hamilton and Fernando Alonso (how dare he intervene on the rivals big day!) were all going for it in the opening stages and a potentially good, clean race looked likely to unfold. OH how wrong was I!!!! The safety car is clearly the talking point of this race, where I have to say in my view the blame has to lie at Mark's door. Heikki was defending his position, and as the Red Bull is miles faster than the Lotus then why Mark needed to follow Heikki's move to the left for that extra bit of slipstream baffles me, as he would have had the position wrapped up by staying put on the inside!
This safety car had many knock on effects, too many for me to even mention, but the main one obviously involves Lewis and Fernando. Now where to start tackling this, Lewis clearly from the replay overtook the safety car so is penalised, so everything's fine, well no! Firstly, I don't really understand why what Lewis did was dangerous, as had he not hesitated he would have crossed the safety car line before the safety car, it comes down to having to draw the line somewhere I guess. Secondly, had he remained behind the safety car then he would have been back in 8th place, or whatever was one place ahead of Fernando, at the restart, so at risk in England of causing uproar (although just consider if the positions were reversed), Fernando has a very valid point. Ferrari always have to blow things out of position however, and to call the race 'manipulated' is absolute rubbish! Whilst the stewards did nothing wrong and followed the procedure for dealing out punishments, the fact remains, like Spa 2008, for Lewis to lose nothing from the drive through clearly means the punishment is not befitting of the crime. Perhaps the penalties that can be dished out need to be revised, and once again 2010 throws up another example of how the rules aren't right........
What made a refreshing change, was that by handing out 5 second penalties to all those speeding during their safety car inlaps was to me a fair penalty, in the fact that by looking at the laptimes against the 'delta' (target) time, on average these drivers were about 5 seconds faster.
Another congratulations must be given to Kamui Kobayashi for an excellent drive in a highly ridiculed Sauber car and he was easily able to keep Jenson Button at bay, whilst overtaking Fernando, just to make him feel better!, and Sebastien Buemi at the end for 7th place.
It seems the football was on everyone's mind though as amusingly both Sebastian and Jenson were glued to a screen out of shot at the side during the press conference!!
So it was Germany's day, and after 24 years it seems Diego Armando Maradona will be supported by England fans, whilst fittingly the F1 season moves on to Silverstone.
However another England Germany duel was played out on the Spanish streets at the 2010 Valencia Grand Prix. Before discussing the race, clearly the most important thing is that Mark Webber walked away completely unhurt from his accident. Ironically an almost mirror image incident occurred in the GP2 sprint race in the morning, when Josef Kral ran over Rodolfo Gonzalez at the end of the next straight along. Obviously the GP2 cars aren't quite as sturdy as their F1 counterparts and as such Josef was rushed to hospital but again I'm very pleased to report he too is absolutely fine.
Before the race, it was refreshing to see some football related banter for Jake Humphrey and Martin Brundle with Sebastian Vettel and Timo Glock respectively, where Timo presented Martin with a German football shirt on the grid.
Now to the on track action, where Sebastian, Lewis Hamilton and Fernando Alonso (how dare he intervene on the rivals big day!) were all going for it in the opening stages and a potentially good, clean race looked likely to unfold. OH how wrong was I!!!! The safety car is clearly the talking point of this race, where I have to say in my view the blame has to lie at Mark's door. Heikki was defending his position, and as the Red Bull is miles faster than the Lotus then why Mark needed to follow Heikki's move to the left for that extra bit of slipstream baffles me, as he would have had the position wrapped up by staying put on the inside!
This safety car had many knock on effects, too many for me to even mention, but the main one obviously involves Lewis and Fernando. Now where to start tackling this, Lewis clearly from the replay overtook the safety car so is penalised, so everything's fine, well no! Firstly, I don't really understand why what Lewis did was dangerous, as had he not hesitated he would have crossed the safety car line before the safety car, it comes down to having to draw the line somewhere I guess. Secondly, had he remained behind the safety car then he would have been back in 8th place, or whatever was one place ahead of Fernando, at the restart, so at risk in England of causing uproar (although just consider if the positions were reversed), Fernando has a very valid point. Ferrari always have to blow things out of position however, and to call the race 'manipulated' is absolute rubbish! Whilst the stewards did nothing wrong and followed the procedure for dealing out punishments, the fact remains, like Spa 2008, for Lewis to lose nothing from the drive through clearly means the punishment is not befitting of the crime. Perhaps the penalties that can be dished out need to be revised, and once again 2010 throws up another example of how the rules aren't right........
What made a refreshing change, was that by handing out 5 second penalties to all those speeding during their safety car inlaps was to me a fair penalty, in the fact that by looking at the laptimes against the 'delta' (target) time, on average these drivers were about 5 seconds faster.
Another congratulations must be given to Kamui Kobayashi for an excellent drive in a highly ridiculed Sauber car and he was easily able to keep Jenson Button at bay, whilst overtaking Fernando, just to make him feel better!, and Sebastien Buemi at the end for 7th place.
It seems the football was on everyone's mind though as amusingly both Sebastian and Jenson were glued to a screen out of shot at the side during the press conference!!
So it was Germany's day, and after 24 years it seems Diego Armando Maradona will be supported by England fans, whilst fittingly the F1 season moves on to Silverstone.
Monday, 14 June 2010
Canada 2010
As per many expected then McLaren maxed themselves in Montreal with a well played strategy that seemingly utilised poor Red Bull tactics. The gamble taken by Red Bull in qualifying was to risk there being no safety car at the start, which of course worked for them, to enable them to start on the harder, more durable tyre. This was all playing nicely when after the pitstops for those gambling on a safety car, Sebastian Vettel and Mark Webber lead the field.
This was however the big mistake, perhaps Christian Horner, the Red Bull boss, was enjoying the race a little too much, and after all who can blame him it would have had even Bernie salivating for more (I use rather toned down language to that during the excitement itself, not really publishable). This was to not spot for far too many laps that those who had got the soft tyre phase out the way were actually lapping far faster and left me, a Red Bull fan, rather tearing my hair out!
All of Christian, Sebastian and Mark claimed after the race the midfield, the likes of Rubens Barrichello, Nico Hulkenburg, Adrian Sutil etc, jumped out of the way of the front guys, although I believe this to be a cover up, and a rather pathetic one at that!! All that was left for Sebastian to be happy about was taunting Mark over the Socceroos dismal display and all us English writing off the Germans to our peril........once again.
The race then just ran rather processional at the front give for a few tenths here and there. Apart of course from both using backmarkers to pass Fernando Alonso, who was justifiably bugged in the post-race press conference, particularly with the move by Jenson, believing he could have won the race. I have plenty of thoughts on Fernando as to all his mistakes this year, Spanish media pressure to win the title etc, but that's another issue. So well done to Lewis and Jenson and this 5 horse title race is hotting up nicely.
The main action I believe revolved around a certain Herr Schumacher, who due to escaping penalty means next time someone has a go at me on a racetrack I shall reply, 'Well I only learn from the best!' His driving with Robert Kubica, Felipe Massa and to an extent both Force India's as well was even from a generous point of view very bad and if I was Emerson Fittipaldi, the ex-driver steward, I'd have awarded a 10-place grid drop for Valencia at least. Not his best qualifying either with 13th not exactly the reason he returned to Formula 1. I think this could be a one-off for Schumi so watch this space!
Lastly on the action itself, is to, painfully for me to say being a fan of Vitaly Petrov, congratulate Lotus on beating an established rival. This, as a Petrov fan, I must point out was due to Petrov having not only to replace his front wing due to his spin at the start, but getting 2 drive throughs and still being right on Heikki Kovalainen's tail come the final reckoning. So this praise is a little premature, but still they nearly got Kamui Kobayashi in qualifying and Heikki is seemingly enjoying being a little more removed from the media spotlight and is thriving.
One final thought regards Mark Webber's gearbox change, was it really necessary, or a cheeky move by Red Bull to get their favoured young German anther place forward? As much as Christian Horner denied it after the race, he's clearly never going to admit it, and it certainly looks highly suspicious to me.
Roll on Valencia!!
This was however the big mistake, perhaps Christian Horner, the Red Bull boss, was enjoying the race a little too much, and after all who can blame him it would have had even Bernie salivating for more (I use rather toned down language to that during the excitement itself, not really publishable). This was to not spot for far too many laps that those who had got the soft tyre phase out the way were actually lapping far faster and left me, a Red Bull fan, rather tearing my hair out!
All of Christian, Sebastian and Mark claimed after the race the midfield, the likes of Rubens Barrichello, Nico Hulkenburg, Adrian Sutil etc, jumped out of the way of the front guys, although I believe this to be a cover up, and a rather pathetic one at that!! All that was left for Sebastian to be happy about was taunting Mark over the Socceroos dismal display and all us English writing off the Germans to our peril........once again.
The race then just ran rather processional at the front give for a few tenths here and there. Apart of course from both using backmarkers to pass Fernando Alonso, who was justifiably bugged in the post-race press conference, particularly with the move by Jenson, believing he could have won the race. I have plenty of thoughts on Fernando as to all his mistakes this year, Spanish media pressure to win the title etc, but that's another issue. So well done to Lewis and Jenson and this 5 horse title race is hotting up nicely.
The main action I believe revolved around a certain Herr Schumacher, who due to escaping penalty means next time someone has a go at me on a racetrack I shall reply, 'Well I only learn from the best!' His driving with Robert Kubica, Felipe Massa and to an extent both Force India's as well was even from a generous point of view very bad and if I was Emerson Fittipaldi, the ex-driver steward, I'd have awarded a 10-place grid drop for Valencia at least. Not his best qualifying either with 13th not exactly the reason he returned to Formula 1. I think this could be a one-off for Schumi so watch this space!
Lastly on the action itself, is to, painfully for me to say being a fan of Vitaly Petrov, congratulate Lotus on beating an established rival. This, as a Petrov fan, I must point out was due to Petrov having not only to replace his front wing due to his spin at the start, but getting 2 drive throughs and still being right on Heikki Kovalainen's tail come the final reckoning. So this praise is a little premature, but still they nearly got Kamui Kobayashi in qualifying and Heikki is seemingly enjoying being a little more removed from the media spotlight and is thriving.
One final thought regards Mark Webber's gearbox change, was it really necessary, or a cheeky move by Red Bull to get their favoured young German anther place forward? As much as Christian Horner denied it after the race, he's clearly never going to admit it, and it certainly looks highly suspicious to me.
Roll on Valencia!!
Thursday, 10 June 2010
World Cup Preview
Well it's that time of 4 years again, and for 1 month only all men become gruesomely boring fat slobs, and probably some women too!! I too am looking forward to seeing how we (England!!) get on this time.
What most baffled me, is that everyone raves after the draw at how easy our draw is, 'Oh we've only got Algeria, my granny could beat them by herself'. Typical then that one slip up from Herr Deutschland, in what is admittedly a tricky group, would leave us to dream of finally winning a penalty shootout, only to be agonisingly let down as Emile Heskey tries to head his penalty in whilst Peter Crouch takes his from the wrong end. Luckily though John Terry won't be a candidate, goodness knows what he might try to do with his!
Supposing we do all this well, and reach the last 8. Then the opposition is potentially Argentina or France, which should worry us as both seem to think it's acceptable to field an outfield goalkeeper. Perhaps Fabio could be well prepared for this scenario and consider some Marco Materazzi style abuse training or given Diego Maradona's management record an 'unfortunate' injury to Leo Messi will probably mean a member in the crowd will get a special day to remember.
Anyways, battering on to the semis, we're on a roll, and potential fixtures include Brazil, Holland or even Italy. Now I don't know about you but I'm starting to think this marvellously easy draw isn't quite as such. Granted to win the World Cup one needs to beat the world, and clearly in Steven Gerrard we've got just the right player to do that, but an easy draw would clearly have pitched us against the likes of Liechtenstein, Andorra and Nepal for instance!
Relating to Steven Gerrard I suggest the invention of a World Punchup Cup, the English team, captained by Joey Barton, would be guaranteed winners, which on second thoughts is probably why such a trophy doesn't exist, no hospital could cope with the demands of such an occasion!
Back to the point of such pitiful opposition, Brazil with the likes of Kaka, Robinho and Champions League winning goalkeeper Julio Cesar are clearly no match for Ledley King, Emile Heskey and god forbid to forget David James! One positive could be drawing Italy, where Marcelo Lippi has seemingly forgotten the sport involved here is football, with the 11 players he picks needing motorised scooters and polo mallets, whilst training camp conversation covers topics such as the invention of the television or the war.
But despite all this could little old blightly reach the big day?? Well in my view we have to, so Chelsea fans can learn what having Didier Drogba as an opposition is really all about, or even the even bigger arse Cristiano Ronaldo. What we all know, is Wayne Rooney's been secretly awaiting this moment for 4 years to really get stuck into Ronaldo's pants, read this how you will it'll say more about your mind than mine!
The second thing I find baffling, is how the pundits have counted out the likes of New Zealand, Honduras and North Korea. Never has there been such an ardent message to FIFA to reduce the number of participants. Take New Zealand who, with striker Rory Fallon of League 1 Plymouth Argyle, clearly have the golden boot sown up, hatrick a game. Saying that I think I'd become quite a rich man if I put a squiddly on that, and when you do just remember you heard (well read I suppose) it here first!
So who do I think are going to win this overhyped trophy I hear you ask? Well amongst many pundits only 2 real candidates come to the fore, Brazil, as discussed, and of course Spain. What more could one possibly want in ones squad than the likes of Xavi, Andres Iniesta, David Villa, Fernando Torres, Carles Puyol to name but a few. I suggest some balls, they always seem to languish when the going gets serious and yes they won the Euros, but we weren't in it so clearly they didn't face a real test! I feel their winning ways are more to do with the opposition getting lost in Vicente Del Bosque's moustache. Fabio, being the boss he is will clearly have spotted that, so no need to panic, provided of course Maradona isn't in goal in our expected penalty shootout. Personally I've plumped with Brazil all along, and I'm going to stick by it.
Well the intrigue only need last a few hours longer before the action gets underway. Unfortunately they have to force us to hold our horses for a little longer when we witness hords of dancing girls probably with pom-poms or streams of coloured paper running round some pathetic statue with no idea why they're doing it. Whilst I admit it can be entertaining, when one of them falls over or misses a well rehearsed penalty, sign Diana Ross up Fabio, just let the football start and the shootout misery begin..........
What most baffled me, is that everyone raves after the draw at how easy our draw is, 'Oh we've only got Algeria, my granny could beat them by herself'. Typical then that one slip up from Herr Deutschland, in what is admittedly a tricky group, would leave us to dream of finally winning a penalty shootout, only to be agonisingly let down as Emile Heskey tries to head his penalty in whilst Peter Crouch takes his from the wrong end. Luckily though John Terry won't be a candidate, goodness knows what he might try to do with his!
Supposing we do all this well, and reach the last 8. Then the opposition is potentially Argentina or France, which should worry us as both seem to think it's acceptable to field an outfield goalkeeper. Perhaps Fabio could be well prepared for this scenario and consider some Marco Materazzi style abuse training or given Diego Maradona's management record an 'unfortunate' injury to Leo Messi will probably mean a member in the crowd will get a special day to remember.
Anyways, battering on to the semis, we're on a roll, and potential fixtures include Brazil, Holland or even Italy. Now I don't know about you but I'm starting to think this marvellously easy draw isn't quite as such. Granted to win the World Cup one needs to beat the world, and clearly in Steven Gerrard we've got just the right player to do that, but an easy draw would clearly have pitched us against the likes of Liechtenstein, Andorra and Nepal for instance!
Relating to Steven Gerrard I suggest the invention of a World Punchup Cup, the English team, captained by Joey Barton, would be guaranteed winners, which on second thoughts is probably why such a trophy doesn't exist, no hospital could cope with the demands of such an occasion!
Back to the point of such pitiful opposition, Brazil with the likes of Kaka, Robinho and Champions League winning goalkeeper Julio Cesar are clearly no match for Ledley King, Emile Heskey and god forbid to forget David James! One positive could be drawing Italy, where Marcelo Lippi has seemingly forgotten the sport involved here is football, with the 11 players he picks needing motorised scooters and polo mallets, whilst training camp conversation covers topics such as the invention of the television or the war.
But despite all this could little old blightly reach the big day?? Well in my view we have to, so Chelsea fans can learn what having Didier Drogba as an opposition is really all about, or even the even bigger arse Cristiano Ronaldo. What we all know, is Wayne Rooney's been secretly awaiting this moment for 4 years to really get stuck into Ronaldo's pants, read this how you will it'll say more about your mind than mine!
The second thing I find baffling, is how the pundits have counted out the likes of New Zealand, Honduras and North Korea. Never has there been such an ardent message to FIFA to reduce the number of participants. Take New Zealand who, with striker Rory Fallon of League 1 Plymouth Argyle, clearly have the golden boot sown up, hatrick a game. Saying that I think I'd become quite a rich man if I put a squiddly on that, and when you do just remember you heard (well read I suppose) it here first!
So who do I think are going to win this overhyped trophy I hear you ask? Well amongst many pundits only 2 real candidates come to the fore, Brazil, as discussed, and of course Spain. What more could one possibly want in ones squad than the likes of Xavi, Andres Iniesta, David Villa, Fernando Torres, Carles Puyol to name but a few. I suggest some balls, they always seem to languish when the going gets serious and yes they won the Euros, but we weren't in it so clearly they didn't face a real test! I feel their winning ways are more to do with the opposition getting lost in Vicente Del Bosque's moustache. Fabio, being the boss he is will clearly have spotted that, so no need to panic, provided of course Maradona isn't in goal in our expected penalty shootout. Personally I've plumped with Brazil all along, and I'm going to stick by it.
Well the intrigue only need last a few hours longer before the action gets underway. Unfortunately they have to force us to hold our horses for a little longer when we witness hords of dancing girls probably with pom-poms or streams of coloured paper running round some pathetic statue with no idea why they're doing it. Whilst I admit it can be entertaining, when one of them falls over or misses a well rehearsed penalty, sign Diana Ross up Fabio, just let the football start and the shootout misery begin..........
Wednesday, 9 June 2010
A Football Season Review
And what an excellent season it was.......in the end!!!
For those of you who don't know I'm a rather keen follower of Dagenham and Redbridge FC, so this season will stand out in my memory for an extremely long time, all the way to my grave in fact.
I remember early on in the season in August, watching us thrash Shrewsbury 5-0, a fantastic day, and the atmosphere at the club despite it being very early doors, everyone believing perhaps the unthinkable was thinkable, a pub team from essex up in league 1!!
We managed to stay top of the table for a fair distance, whilst I was able to visit many away grounds due to my university location, which included at the time exciting trips to places like Macclesfield on a cold Saturday in November, I guarantee right now you're wishing you were there too. Everything went downhill the day I went all the way to Dagenham for our top of the table clash with Rochdale, only to feel disgruntled not just at the scoreline, but overhearing the Dale fans in the crowd walking back to the station saying 'they were bloody crap' etc. You might have guessed funnily enough, Dale are now not amongst my favoured outfits.
After losing that game, we went to pieces for quite an alarming number of fixtures, and then came the return trip to Wales....sorry I meant Shrewsbury! The match was nothing entertaining, the banter with the Shrews fans though got quite heated, for those not in the know there's little love loss between us, including many entertaining chants of 'You fat bastard', all completely relevant I might add!
Following on from that came an eventful trip to Bury in March, where I ran close to being stabbed (probably!!) when asked by a tough looking guy from about 5 inches at Manchester Piccadilly, 'Is this the Bury train,' in the scousest of scouse accents. This lead to a moment of silence when I was frantically hoping he didn't think I was deliberately ignoring him, get pissed off and utilise any item of weaponary he most likely had in his possession! I eventually made Gigg Lane you'll be pleased to here (otherwise of course I couldn't tell the tale!), unlike most Daggers fans it has to be said, a classic turnout of about 30, and those who didn't missed an incredibly entertaining game despite it finishing 0-0.
Once the end of the season drew close, 3 games to go, we'd hauled ourselves back into playoff contention and a trip to sunny(!) Morecambe was the order of the day. So I got a train at some ludicrous hour of the morning, about 9, all the way and even went out onto the beach for a walk, I maintain one can't visit a seaside town without doing so! A good fish and chips for lunch again seemed the order of the day, seens as Morecambe is a fishing port. The match was pretty poor lets not beat about the bush, well for us, they thoroughly deserved to win, but it was probably a blessing in disguise, you'll see why shortly!
Following a win the next Saturday at home to Hereford we just needed to beat already relegated Darlington to make the playoffs (Y)!! For me though, another train at about half 4 in the morning to get there, ok I exaggerate slightly, but with the time I had to see the sights of Darlo I was rather impressed. Great turnout from the Daggers boys, about 500 of us there with our beachballs (no doubt bought in Morecambe!), but unfortunately the wind kept blowing them out of our section, epic disappointment. The game went good, Jon Nurse opened the scoring after about half an hour, cue pandemonium in the stands with much hugging and random screaming and the very sporting Darlo fans stayed to congratulate us and our players at the end on our achievements.
So we're in the playoffs, and who do we get to play, why it's our wife Morecambe, luckily for us though we popped in 6 of the best at home to make playoff history and then went all the way to Wembley with a 2-1 loss away. Not much to say here, except the Morecambe fans are a very sporting bunch and all Daggers are now honourary Morecambe supporters from now on, and I apparently made in onto SkySports, but haven't managed to see it......:(
Eventually, the big day comes, amid much excitement from the fans, I reckon the number of posts on the forum multiplied by about a thousand times the week leading up. The day for me didn't start well, upon changing trains to get to Wembley Stadium I ended up on a train that didn't stop as the damn departure board obviously had changed before a late train left the platform. So I ended up having to jump on the first train out of London, to most likely avoid being given the Death penalty for ticket evasion, and ended up passing straight through Wembley Stadium the other way! Eventually I got to the pub where clearly Wembley days is their profit maker, with hundreds of Daggers fans there enjoying rather reasonable weather, for a change. Once 3 o'clock came the match got underway, and to avoid writing this blog entry from now till Christmas, if you're interested just go watch the highlights they'll be somewhere. Anyway we won 3-2, and now we are in league 1!!!!
As many have said it's an amazing achievement for a club with so little money, culminating possibly in the erection of a brand spanking new 10,000 stand! This just leaves me to say that John Still is manager of the decade, stand and salute Sir John.
For those of you who don't know I'm a rather keen follower of Dagenham and Redbridge FC, so this season will stand out in my memory for an extremely long time, all the way to my grave in fact.
I remember early on in the season in August, watching us thrash Shrewsbury 5-0, a fantastic day, and the atmosphere at the club despite it being very early doors, everyone believing perhaps the unthinkable was thinkable, a pub team from essex up in league 1!!
We managed to stay top of the table for a fair distance, whilst I was able to visit many away grounds due to my university location, which included at the time exciting trips to places like Macclesfield on a cold Saturday in November, I guarantee right now you're wishing you were there too. Everything went downhill the day I went all the way to Dagenham for our top of the table clash with Rochdale, only to feel disgruntled not just at the scoreline, but overhearing the Dale fans in the crowd walking back to the station saying 'they were bloody crap' etc. You might have guessed funnily enough, Dale are now not amongst my favoured outfits.
After losing that game, we went to pieces for quite an alarming number of fixtures, and then came the return trip to Wales....sorry I meant Shrewsbury! The match was nothing entertaining, the banter with the Shrews fans though got quite heated, for those not in the know there's little love loss between us, including many entertaining chants of 'You fat bastard', all completely relevant I might add!
Following on from that came an eventful trip to Bury in March, where I ran close to being stabbed (probably!!) when asked by a tough looking guy from about 5 inches at Manchester Piccadilly, 'Is this the Bury train,' in the scousest of scouse accents. This lead to a moment of silence when I was frantically hoping he didn't think I was deliberately ignoring him, get pissed off and utilise any item of weaponary he most likely had in his possession! I eventually made Gigg Lane you'll be pleased to here (otherwise of course I couldn't tell the tale!), unlike most Daggers fans it has to be said, a classic turnout of about 30, and those who didn't missed an incredibly entertaining game despite it finishing 0-0.
Once the end of the season drew close, 3 games to go, we'd hauled ourselves back into playoff contention and a trip to sunny(!) Morecambe was the order of the day. So I got a train at some ludicrous hour of the morning, about 9, all the way and even went out onto the beach for a walk, I maintain one can't visit a seaside town without doing so! A good fish and chips for lunch again seemed the order of the day, seens as Morecambe is a fishing port. The match was pretty poor lets not beat about the bush, well for us, they thoroughly deserved to win, but it was probably a blessing in disguise, you'll see why shortly!
Following a win the next Saturday at home to Hereford we just needed to beat already relegated Darlington to make the playoffs (Y)!! For me though, another train at about half 4 in the morning to get there, ok I exaggerate slightly, but with the time I had to see the sights of Darlo I was rather impressed. Great turnout from the Daggers boys, about 500 of us there with our beachballs (no doubt bought in Morecambe!), but unfortunately the wind kept blowing them out of our section, epic disappointment. The game went good, Jon Nurse opened the scoring after about half an hour, cue pandemonium in the stands with much hugging and random screaming and the very sporting Darlo fans stayed to congratulate us and our players at the end on our achievements.
So we're in the playoffs, and who do we get to play, why it's our wife Morecambe, luckily for us though we popped in 6 of the best at home to make playoff history and then went all the way to Wembley with a 2-1 loss away. Not much to say here, except the Morecambe fans are a very sporting bunch and all Daggers are now honourary Morecambe supporters from now on, and I apparently made in onto SkySports, but haven't managed to see it......:(
Eventually, the big day comes, amid much excitement from the fans, I reckon the number of posts on the forum multiplied by about a thousand times the week leading up. The day for me didn't start well, upon changing trains to get to Wembley Stadium I ended up on a train that didn't stop as the damn departure board obviously had changed before a late train left the platform. So I ended up having to jump on the first train out of London, to most likely avoid being given the Death penalty for ticket evasion, and ended up passing straight through Wembley Stadium the other way! Eventually I got to the pub where clearly Wembley days is their profit maker, with hundreds of Daggers fans there enjoying rather reasonable weather, for a change. Once 3 o'clock came the match got underway, and to avoid writing this blog entry from now till Christmas, if you're interested just go watch the highlights they'll be somewhere. Anyway we won 3-2, and now we are in league 1!!!!
As many have said it's an amazing achievement for a club with so little money, culminating possibly in the erection of a brand spanking new 10,000 stand! This just leaves me to say that John Still is manager of the decade, stand and salute Sir John.
Plenty To Talk About
Firstly if you're reading this, then welcome to my amazing blog....well the one post of it! But everything must start somewhere, even time. Obviously where time started is a hugely complicated question, so we won't go into that!!
As the title of this post suggests, there's plenty going on, for instance I've heard on the grapevine there's quite an important football trophy up for grabs........so I decided I wanted to make everyone fully aware of what I think, cause I know you want to know! Well face the facts you wouldn't be reading this now if you didn't would you??
Secondly to that, I wanted the chance to appear different from those people who when asked what they've been doing, the answer comes, 'I've been on Facebook' or 'I've been lying on the sofa watching endless repeats of Top Gear on Dave, infact when it finished I watched it again on Dave +1'.
I hope you will find this blog an enjoyable read, I'm certainly looking forward to raving about my thoughts.
As the title of this post suggests, there's plenty going on, for instance I've heard on the grapevine there's quite an important football trophy up for grabs........so I decided I wanted to make everyone fully aware of what I think, cause I know you want to know! Well face the facts you wouldn't be reading this now if you didn't would you??
Secondly to that, I wanted the chance to appear different from those people who when asked what they've been doing, the answer comes, 'I've been on Facebook' or 'I've been lying on the sofa watching endless repeats of Top Gear on Dave, infact when it finished I watched it again on Dave +1'.
I hope you will find this blog an enjoyable read, I'm certainly looking forward to raving about my thoughts.
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