Angry Fans
This week we’ve got the Irish rugby team’s performances, or lack of them; the upcoming Euro 2008 qualifiers against Germany; more question marks about the quality of Avram Grant’s credentials; debate on whether Mikel Arteta is the best midfielder in Premiership; support for the Benitez rotation policy; McLaren’s woes (vroom, vroom) and more on Spurs’ strikers and their lack of goals.
THE Irish rugby team wouldn't only have needed the Hand of God to knock Argentina out of the World Cup. They would have needed the Trinity in the back row and a naturalised Diego Maradona at hooker to have stood a chance. Desperate.
SO much for all the talk about the rugby team being the best prepared Irish team ever to leave these shores. Of course many would have us believe that the worst prepared Irish team to leave these shores were the footballers that went to the 2002 World Cup. Remember them? They were the only Irish side to play good football at a major tournament. All the top players performed to the best of their ability and they finished every game stronger than the opposition. What ever the rights and wrongs of what happened off the pitch the players delivered on it. Surly we can all now, agree on that.
OUR SHOUT:
Red card to you Anthony for sharing the grief of the rugby boys with this page. Don't you know we've got the Germans to worry about in Dublin in a fortnight in a proper competition?
WHAT'S the best we can hope for when Ireland play Germany in a couple of weeks followed by the game against Cyprus.
OUR SHOUT:
To quote, without apology, the immortal Blackadder: "The Germans are a cruel race; their operas last for six hours and they have no word for fluffy." The best we can hope for is that they have their foot off the Benzine and bump into a Bavarian hen party somewhere along Temple Bar. on Friday evening. They'll be the ones with the hairy armpits. And that's only the women. Can I say that? Yes, I can. And don't get me going about Cyprus — the worst Irish performance in living memory.
SO, the Chelsea players think Avram Grant isn't very good. What's the expression? "Better the Devil you know than the Devil you don't"?
AVRAM Grant has promised us attacking football. Where is it? 4-0 against a second division side isn't compensation. Meanwhile a proper team, Valencia, is waiting tomorrow.
OUR SHOUT:
I think Liam was far too generous to you last week Corky. Straight red for being off message. Repeat after me: "Avram Grant is our permanent manager. We are not looking to appoint anyone else." Get used to it.
THERE'S no better midfielder in the country at the moment than Mikel Arteta. Dominated the game against Middlesbrough. Can hit a penetrating pass; can score goals. Well done David Moyes for holding onto him and using him properly.
OUR SHOUT:
Yellow card for you Blue Nose because I can name three better midfielders at this time — Cesc Fabregas, Yossi Benayoun, and Michael Johnson (where are ya, Gerrard, Essien, and Lampard?) Oh, and the best players of the opening two months of the season has been the Bulgarian, Martin Petrov and the Brazilian Elano. Anyone want to argue with that?
RAFA Benitez has made 57 team changes in his first 11 games of the season. If he goes on at this rate the figure will be approaching 350 by the end of the season.
OUR SHOUT:
Red card for going out on a Lim. He didn't rotate Torres at the weekend, but I'll bet he wish he had after "The Kid's"' toothless performance in the first half. It's one thing scoring three great goals against Reading's second team (since when have Michael Duberry and André Bikey been top drawer defenders?), quite another to consistently hit the net in the Premiership.
UNITED are going to extend Ryan Giggs' contract. That's good, because he has been one of the great players for the past two decades. But why would they think of extending the contracts of Wes Brown (or indeed John O'Shea?)
OUR SHOUT:
I'm with you on Giggs, a consummate professional who, as he showed against Chelsea a fortnight ago, is still capable of delivering the killer ball. And as much as this column despises consensus I am with you on Wes Brown also. He and John O'Shea are never going to be the first choices but, let's face it, they are decent squad players. But have the letter of the week for being a United supporter who is prepared to look at them, warts and all.
IF you want to see what happens when a team goes bad you've only got to look at McLaren and the bitterness between Lewis Hamilton and Fernando Alonso. This should be a warning for football about the dangers of egos getting too large.
OUR SHOUT:
Formula One? Ye gods. That's a first for this column. Have a red card , and a black flag, get your slicks on and slide out of this page.
WELL done for the first editions of Champions covering the Premier League. GAA have had their publication for all the summer so it's good that we can have some craic now. I enjoyed the piece about the impact of global business on football but can you tell that writer to cut down on the Russian book references and cut to the action.
OUR SHOUT:
Ahem (cough); I'll tell him next time I see him. Have a yellow card anyway. Just for getting in touch like.
FOUR strikers — Bent, Keane, Berbatov and Defoe — and barely a league goal between them. Surely this proves that the Tottenham board have got something right in looking for a new manager. Can any Spurs season have started as poorly as this?
OUR SHOUT:
Well, maybe last season perhaps? However, there's clearly something worth worrying about at Tottenham. I'm not a Darren Bent fan, but if you are paying €€20m for a player you are surely going to start him more than twice (unless you're Alex Ferguson and you've signed Anderson, of course). But the things to get anxious about at White Hart Lane are 1) The disappearance of Berbatov's form and confidence and 2) The increasingly erratic behaviour of Martin Jol. If he's not a dead man walking then he does a damn fine impression.
ON TV last week Giancarlo Galavotti, the London correspondent for the Italian newspaper Gazzetta della Sport, said that Arsenal had the best strike force in the Premiership. Do you agree?
OUR SHOUT:
Tried to phone Liam on this one, but he's out of network range in a tapas bar somewhere. So . . . eight games in I think the Italian has it right. Adebayor looks like this season's Drogba; Persie is an immaculate player and Eduardo looks like a highly intelligent purchase. Chelsea's strike force is rubbish; as soon as Liverpool play Torres and Babel consistently the happier Reds will be; United have a combination of forwards looking for a pattern.
HOW can there be talk of Martin Jol being sacked, he has brought that club forward so much in the last 2 years, I fear Spurs might have a Bolton-like backlash if he goes which you would be delighted with Liam, What a gaffer!!!!!
OUR SHOUT:
If I can get Liam to put down the Sangria jar I’ll pass this message on Keith. Meanwhile in the resonant words of Clubber Lange the Spurs boss is “dead meat.”
