Thursday, October 30, 2008

Bend It Like Bentley!

Although we are only in October, the 'Goal of the Season' competition was effectively 'WON' last night by Tottenham midfielder David Bentley.

His glorious 35 yard long range dipping volley in the stunning 4-4 draw with Arsenal was arguably one of the 'greatest goals of its type' ever witnessed in the modern day era!

I know there are still about 6 months of the season remaining, but it is hard to imagine witnessing an equally good or an even better individual goal again this season........but we shall have to wait and see!

I can only think of two possible goals in recent times that might be considered on a par with Bentley's.
Firstly Matt Taylor's long range strike for Pompey v. Everton in 2006.Link

......and secondly Thierry Henry's volley against Man.Utd in 2000.Link


If you haven't already seen David Bentley's goal then watch it here now and all the goals in a quite extraordinary eight goal thriller!
Link


Mr.Bentley.......take a bow!

Friday, October 24, 2008

Cock-Sure !



The meaning of the adjective 'cocksure' - marked by excessive confidence; 'an arrogant and cocksure materialist'; 'so overconfident and impudent as to speak to the queen'; 'the less he knows the more positive he gets.'

It is rather ironic that this is one of those terms the origin of which we are far from cock-sure about. One point of certainty - it is old. Robert Whittinton, mentions it as early as 1520 in his grammatical tract Vulgaria:

'I haue knowen a man or nowe that thought him selfe cocke sure of his intent.'

Tottering Cockerels reel your necks in........I know it's not clever or original to bring up the current plight of 'The Spuds,' but what gives me the hump is all those fans of North London's 2nd Club, be it on radio phone-ins, on messageboards, on blogs, pub gossip & so on, but they think they are untouchable, 'to good to go down' not unlike teams of the ilk of Leeds & Forest in years gone by.
Your hear the rumblings of discontent for sure, but none of them seem to believe it could happen. Why ever not?

Here are some of the most stone cold simplistic observations as to why 'Spuds' fans' should indeed worry & why IT IS possible for the 'Spuds' to go down:

Results so far: P8, W0, D2, L6. These include defeats to Boro’, Sunderland, Hull & Stoke (no disrespect to the afore mentioned Clubs) but not quite the Premier Leagues’ heavyweights.

Lack of Premier League points: 2 from 24 (a points win ratio of just over 8%) & only 5 goals scored.
36 points were required last season to stay up, (Spurs finished in 11th position last season with 46 points). So in theory Spurs need another 34 from 30 games. However this season it looks like it will be a closer battle to stay up with more points required than last year to secure safety.
IF we say 38 points to be on the safe side then Spurs need another 36 points from 30 games which means a win ratio for a struggling side of 40% - 12 wins from their 30 remaining games.

The Manager: Juande Ramos – good overseas managerial record BUT NO previous experience in Premier League management. A jolly foreigner with arguably no interest in the spoken language & as a result only a token grasp of the native language of this country. Doubts about his tactical nous at this level are also doing the rounds.

Current Players speaking out publicly (rightly or wrongly) stating some home truths, namely David Bentley the expensive recent acquisition from Blackburn (& currently a shadow of his former playing self) called his own team sh*t & the experienced Jonathan Woodgate saying his Spurs team-mates 'need a good kick up the a*se.......and the way we are playing we deserve to be at the bottom.'

The Defence: 'Coco the Clown' alias Heurelho Gomez between the sticks & one clean sheet from their opening 8 matches says it all. A total lack of confidence is apparent in defence. May as well hire a behavioural therapist as a defensive coach.

Discipline: – or should that read indiscipline - 3 red cards in the last two matches......not down to bad refereeing, just insubordination: Premier League Statistics – 2 sent-off & 15 bookings in 8 games, 3 sent-off & 30 bookings in ALL competitions! Hardly subservient behaviour

Forthcoming Fixtures: – In the league Bolton, Arsenal & Liverpool next - a very tricky 4th round Carling Cup tie on the 12th November also against Liverpool & in danger of going out of the UEFA Cup at the group stage, with awkward ties still to play against Russian & Croatian opposition.

The Boardroom: The sacking of manager Martin Jol a year ago was the first of many big mistakes, a knee-jerk reaction to a generally disruptive working environment involving player unrest, an incoherent transfer policy, poor decision making at all levels & questionable on-field tactics.
Now Jol is at the helm of Hamburg & they currently sit proudly at the top of the German Bundesliga.
Damien Comolli, Tottenham’s Director of Football, deals with the transfer policy at Spurs & must be held accountable to a strategy which involved selling two seasoned and respected international strikers so near to the end of the transfer deadline, without first ensuring that appropriate signings had been made to fill the void. This was totally irrational & preposterous behaviour.

A member of the Tottenham Supporters' Trust recently cast his view across of the Clubs' current predicament when he said of the goings on. 'The people who run the club are obsessed by making money and they seem to think that volume, in terms of player transfer activity, adds up to quality. It isn't. Football has become obsessed with money and Tottenham are an arch example of that'

Players In/Out: Strikers – proven Premier League goalscorers Robbie Keane & Dimitar Berbatov sold (albeit for big bucks) to Liverpool & Man U respectively, only to be replaced by two inexperienced Premier League strikers in the shape of Roman Pavlyuchenko & youngster Fraizer Campbell.
To emphasise the point, top scorer this season is Darren Bent with 3 goals in the league.
For the next highest scorer see the column marked 'own goals.'


I for one firmly believe firing Ramos would be the worst possible solution.

Tottering Cock-Spur the trap door looms large!

Ramos to be next Premier League boss to leave/be sacked: Betting suspended.
Spurs to be relegated: 7/2.

Odds supplied courtesy of Coral bookmakers as at 16:45 on 24/10/08.

Wednesday, October 15, 2008

Spitting Image

Man-ure & Ing-er-land Footy Star
...........and The Pub Landlord of ' The No Obvious Syrup Inn '

Friday, October 10, 2008

Lohan Behold Me !

LINDSAY MORGAN LOHAN was born in Long Island, New York, on July 2, 1986. Born of Italian/Irish parents and a straight 'A' student, she builds her life around work & her family.

Lohan is an actress, singer & tabloid celebrity. She has starred in critically acclaimed movies, such as 'Mean Girls', 'The Parent Trap' and 'Freaky Friday,' & in 2004 she released an album, 'Speak.'














Lohan may be young, but in the Entertainment Industry, she's already a bankable commodity. At 5 feet 5 inches tall, this green-eyed actress has a reputation for possessing 'spirited talent.'






Lohan being the 'hot chick' that she is, has dated enough men to fill several football teams, & has crashed more cars than you will ever get to own in your entire life. In the latest twist to Lohan's love life, she has given up men for DJ Samantha Ronson.











Assets: A girlish charm that's hard to resist, large pert breasts.

Vices: Sex, drugs, alcohol, shopping and car crashes.






Wednesday, October 08, 2008

Twenty20 only 50/50 !

An aberrant look into the world of cricket!

ENGLAND's lucrative Stanford Super Series Twenty20 clash is in doubt after the West Indies Cricket Board were left red-faced yesterday, following a High Court arbitration hearing in London found in favour of team sponsors Digicel, the telecommunications company, and against the WICB.

The root of the dispute has been the claim by Digicel, that they have the branding rights for 'the game' between the Stanford Super Stars XI and England, under the terms of their sponsorship contract with the WICB (which they extended until 2012 in July).

However Digicel claim they were frozen out when Texan billionaire Sir Allen Stanford set up his big-money series, which included a multi-million dollar challenge match for each of the next five years.

Digicel's stance has caused issue with the match organisers, Stanford 20/20, who would rather find their own sponsors for the match.

As a result of yesterday’s ruling The WICB will now have to withdraw its sanction for the lucrative match in Antigua on the 1st November, and Stanford and the WICB are now expected to be locked in talks with Digicel in a bid to reach a compromise.

This could mean the game going ahead without any centrally contracted West Indies players, such as Shivnarine Chanderpaul, Chris Gayle and Ramnaresh Sarwan, thus making a mockery of the event or it being called off altogether.

The match, inspired by cricket fan Stanford, will conclude a 'Super Series' of games throughout the week involving English Twenty20 champions Middlesex and Trinidad & Tobago.

The winning team will take home $20 million dollars in prize money, making each player a dollar millionaire overnight!

Stanford believes the dispute is an 'unwanted distraction' & the game would still go ahead, however WICB officials have yet to comment on the outcome of yesterday's High Court hearing.

Yesterday’s ruling was also a blow to the England and Wales Cricket Board, who are hoping the Stanford Series goes ahead as they hope the prize money will prevent its players from being tempted by the lucrative Indian Premier League

Wednesday, October 01, 2008