I Leave home at 9am on Sunday morning, get to Blackburn at 12.30 for 3pm kick off. Find usual pub far busier than usual neccessetating different car park further away from ground. Go to pub for drink and first half of United game, take 25minutes to get served and then find they have no beer left and only cans of Carling. Go to game. Watch the usual bollocks from North Western, Anti-Footballing pricks, and an ever so predictable inept referee. Begin to contemplate victory, watch Jens chuck one in.
Go home. Get stuck in car park for an hour. Listen to Alan Green and the rest of the Liverpool mafia go mental on 5live. Get held up before M6. Get home at 11pm. Watch Match of the Day 2 coverage of the game. 11.06pm lament the sheer laziness and shitness of the Match of the Day 2 coverage. Go to bed. That was my Sunday how was yours?
Yea so it was not my favourite away trip of all time, in fact at times on the journey home i would have swapped it for one of the many Bolton defeats over the years if it meant i would have got home quicker. Seriously it really is a fucking mess on the motorways as soon as a bit of rain comes down. However in fairness the game was positive for us in quite a few respects. We didn’t concede first, we didn’t have a man sent off when it looked like we probably we would. We defended quite well, apart from a couple of incidents but that was after Gallas had been taken off. As has been mentioned elsewhere we faced up to the physical battering of attempted GBH.
No matter what the Bastard love child of Ferguson and Mourinho says Blackburn did not ‘dominate’ the game. As 59% of possession suggests we were more than comfortable most of the time. Cescs temperament was good, Flamini battled hard in an unrewarding role and with each passing game reminds me more of the Grimster. He works hard, tackles hard and if there’s any trouble he will be there sticking up for our boys. He’s never going to be a first 11 man but for me he should be on the bench every game. He offers utility for a start and his knack of getting in goal scoring positions and getting down to business makes him a more useful sub than Denilson or Diaby, who would both offer more from the start of a game.
Theo was poor. I’ll let him off, i always do. But it’s getting to the time when it would be nice to see him do the simple things well, when 2 on 1 away from home with your team mate in the middle of the penalty area, please find him don’t just fire it aimlessly into no mans land, neither a shot nor a cross. It is irritating and is the sort of thing that costs us. Just as bad a mistake in many ways as Jens’ because it basically cost us a goal. As for Jens well what can be said, that hasn’t already. I came on this site in May and said i hoped he would go quietly into the ether an Arsenal hero, an Invincible and a mainstay of the Champions League run in 2006. But he got the extra year on his contract and so far that hasn’t been a wild success. He’s only cost us 2 points so far, many people want to see him dropped. I for one would be inclined to give him one more chance because he can pull off saves that Almunia can’t, however one more howler and i’m afraid that’s it because our defence is vulnerable at the best of times and we can’t afford to chuck goals in.
Hleb was ineffective on the wings which is pretty predictable. A winger is still first priority for us, and i’ll be pretty noised off if we don’t get one. Similarly is Senderos has his usual run of poor form while deputising for Gallas i won’t be too impressed to see Djourou turning out for Birmingham. Senderos defended OK yesterday but his distribution was woeful and indirectly helped them get their goal when he gave the ball away unneccessarily when attempting a simple pass to Sagna which went out of play. Not good enough. All in all though, the defence was solid the central midfield reduced Savage to throwing himself to the floor every 5 seconds and Eduardo, if playing in a game with an actual referee and not an automated whistle, would have shown he offers us something interesting up front. I’d be tempted to play him on the wing next week and give Bendtner a game because he’s looked good every time he’s come on either in pre-season or in the couple of league games. Against Man City we will need to score first, so the first 20 minutes is going to be crucial.
If we are 1-0 down with 20 minutes to go then panic, because Big Micah looks pretty good this year…