Only Joking

Best of the footie jokes doing the rounds

After leaving home to go and play for Spurs, Gareth Bale moved into an apartment block in London, You would think with all the money he earns he'd live somewhere nice but, according to Martin Atkinson "it's a dive".

Newcastle have been asked to find a new shirt sponsor as Virgin don't want to be associated with a team that has been well and truly f***ed.

What time do Aston Villa kick off?
Every 10 minutes

The last 3 Sports Personality of the Years have been won by people who sit down for a living,
Michael Owen is already favourite for 2013.

... and the Fergie / RVP ones

It's a good job that Cameron Jerome didn't score his wonder goal against Man Utd.
Sir Alex Ferguson would have had him arrested for attempted murder.

98 years ago, the Germans and British troops brought a temporary ceasefire to the Great War and had a game of football out in no-man's land.
The fighting resumed when somebody was killed after being hit on the head with the football.

I can't wait to play Footballers Cluedo,
I bet it was Ashley Williams in The Liberty Stadium with The Ball.

Alex Ferguson says that Robin Van Persie could have been killed when Ashley Williams kicked the ball at his head.
Just like the time a fan head butted Eric Cantona's foot.

Sir Alex Ferguson defended his decision to leave Van Persie on the bench for today's match in the rain claiming "The boy could have drowned".

Premier Predictions (Week 21)

These prediction comps have taken over at the moment, so here are next weeks midweek games due to be played on Tuesday and Wednesday.
Next weekend is the FA Cup 3rd round, so sticking with tradition I'm not going to touch those (unless ALL of you want to?).

Tuesday
West Brom v Fulham
Man City v Stoke
Swansea v Aston Villa
Tottenham v Reading
West Ham v Norwich
Wigan v Man Utd
Southampton v Arsenal

Wednesday
Chelsea v QPR
Liverpool v Sunderland
Newcastle v Everton

Merry Christmas Everybody

Premier Predictions (Week 18, 19, 20)

Sorry for the lateness fellas, been a week from hell.
So here's a 3 in 1 post to cover the Christmas periods games as we've all probably got better things to do next week :)
Will hopefully post the new year games next week.

As always just need your predictions before the kick offs, so don't have to do all 3 sets yet if you need some thinking time :)


Week 18 - Dec 22nd/23rd

Wigan v Arsenal
Man City v Reading
Newcastle v QPR
Southampton v Sunderland
Tottenham v Stoke
West Brom v Norwich
West Ham v Everton
Liverpool v Fulham
Swansea v Man Utd
Chelsea v Aston Villa

--------------------------

Week 19 - Dec 26th

Arsenal v West Ham
Everton v Wigan
Fulham v Southampton
Man Utd v Newcastle
Norwich v Chelsea
QPR v West Brom
Reading v Swansea
Sunderland v Man City
Aston Villa v Tottenham
Stoke v Liverpool

--------------------------

Week 20 - Dec 29th/30th

Sunderland v Tottenham
Aston Villa v Wigan
Fulham v Swansea
Man Utd v West Brom
Norwich v Man City
Reading v West Ham
Stoke v Southampton
Arsenal v Newcastle
Everton v Chelsea
QPR v Liverpool

Easy Target

Torres and Chelsea are just too easy to poke fun at so let's piss off some scousers instead :)

 When Brendan Rodgers said he thought Liverpool could finish second I didn't realise he meant in every game.

Don't worry Liverpool fans, I'm sure that when Brendan Rodgers gets the sack Rafa will be available again.


Stewart Downing has said that he has been told by Liverpool that he can leave the club if he wants to, surely a more suitable punishment for his bad form is to let him stay.

Things are finally looking up for Liverpool, a new TV deal has left Brendan Rogers with money to spend in January, live games will now be shown on Comedy Central.

Premier Predictions (Week 17)

Just 9 games this week as Chelsea are off to Japan for the week,
games on Saturday Sunday and Monday.

Newcastle v Man City
Liverpool v Aston Villa
Man Utd v Sunderland
Norwich v Wigan
QPR v Fulham
Stoke v Everton

West Brom v West Ham
Tottenham v Swansea

Reading v Arsenal

Premier Predictions (Week 16)

A bonus game this week and 4 days worth of fixtures to keep the tension going :)

Arsenal v West Brom
Aston Villa v Stoke
Southampton v Reading
Sunderland v Chelsea
Swansea v Norwich
Wigan v QPR

Man City v Man Utd
Everton v Tottenham
West Ham v Liverpool

Fulham v Newcastle

Sunderland v Reading

FA Cup 3rd Round

Man Utd at home ..... Bring it on :)

Accrington Stanley or Oxford U v Sheff Utd

Aldershot v Rotherham or Notts County

Aston Villa v Ipswich

Barnsley v Burnley

Barrow or Macclesfield v Cardiff

Blackburn v Bristol City

Bolton v Sunderland

Brighton v Newcastle

Bury or Southend v Bradford or Brentford

Charlton v Huddersfield

Cheltenham or Hereford v Everton

Crawley v Reading

Crystal Pal v Stoke

Derby v Tranmere

Fulham v Blackpool

Hull v Alfreton or L Orient

Leeds v Birmingham

Leicester v Burton

Lincoln or Mansfield v Liverpool

Luton v Wolves

Man City v Watford

Middlesbro v Harrogate or Hastings

Millwall v Preston

Nottm Forest v Oldham

Peterborough v Norwich

QPR v West Brom

Sheff Wed v MK Dons

Southampton v Chelsea

Swansea v Arsenal

Tottenham v Coventry

West Ham v Man Utd

Wigan v Bournemouth

4 All Premiership games and difficult aways for another 7 means half of them could be missing on 4th round day, at least 4 non leaguer's also guaranteed a spot.

Mitchell Cole R.I.P

Sadly another footballing death, with the news that former West Ham, Grays, Southend and Stevenage player Mitchell Cole has died from heart problems at the age of only 27 :(

Mitchell made a bit of a name for himself in my local area as part of Grays Athletics golden generation with players like Michael Kightly, Freddie Eastwood, Aaron McLean and Gary Hooper.
He signed for Southend in 2005 following Eastwood and had a good first season helping Southend into the Championship but then struggled to hold a place and signed for Stevenage.

Although sharing the Cole name he was actually Joe Cole's brother-in-law partnered with Joe's sister.
Personally I haven't met him but my youngest son knew him quite well from his Southend days.

West Ham v Chelsea

Hoping and praying for a decent performance today as it's been a few years since we used to expect 3 points against the blues.
Things haven't started well, Andy Carroll is out for a couple of months with a knee injury and Mo Diame has been left on the bench?
Cahill plays in Chelsea's defence instead of their usual weak link Luiz, and Torres despite looking like a fat lump lately usually performs against us.
Also I fear the worst for refereeing decisions with well known Chelsea fan Martin Atkinson in the middle :(

Edit: Half time
Chelsea looking more confident than recently, we are missing Diame but Cole is playing reasonable.
Typically Torres looks more lively than he has in ages and lays on a goal for Mata :(
Atkinson is looking after his boys calling a foul on Collins for leaning on Ivanovic before Nolan scored while missing all the shirt pulling by Chelsea defenders.
Cech comes out of his area and handballs but only gets a booking, when it's a 100% sure it would of been a red card if Jussi had done it.
Hoping for better things in the second half as we really haven't performed yet and I feel Chelsea are there for the taking :)

Edit: Second half:
Cech pushes Nolan in the back so result = foul on Cech?
GOAL!! Cole scores and amazingly we get a reffing decision as it did look like a foul on Ivanovic especially with this ref.
Chelsea are bringing their top diver on so expect a few penalty claims.
GOAL!! Super Mo from a Cole cutback, Carlton is having his best game in ages.
GOAL!! Dreamland :)

3-1 Brilliant second half performance, Mo Diame was awesome, Carlton was brilliant, Jussi and Collins did the business at the other end :)
Only good news for Chelsea fans is that Rafa might be gone by this time tomorrow?? :)

Premier Predictions (Week 15)

Let's do it all again for this weekends matches :)
8 Games on Saturday with 1 on Sunday and 1 Monday.
The big one kicks off at 12:45 on Saturday :D

West Ham v Chelsea
Arsenal v Swansea
Fulham v Tottenham
Liverpool v Southampton
Man City v Everton
QPR v Aston Villa
West Brom v Stoke
Reading v Man Utd

Norwich v Sunderland

Newcastle v Wigan

Dave Sexton R.I.P

Dave Sexton sadly died on Sunday at the age of 82.
He was probably most famous for managing Chelsea to the 1970 FA Cup and 1971 Cup winners cup, and for almost winning the league as manager of QPR.
He had 4 years as manager of Man Utd and managed the England under 21's.

As a player he had his most successful period at West Ham in the early 50's scoring 27 goals in 75 appearances.

A workmate met him during his time at QPR and said "he was a true gent" which seems to be the opinion of most that knew him.

Fantasy Football

Amazingly I'm hoping for a Liverpool win today!! I'm only 3 points behind the leader and hoping to win the £250 weekly prize. So ideally Liverpool to win 3-0 with a Suarez hat trick, Lambert hat trick in a 3-1 win over Newcastle, Aguero and Mata score in a 1-1 draw and Bale gets Tottenham goal in a home defeat by us where the Spuds defenders get an own goal each :D

Good Memories

Back in 1981 in our first season back in the top league after 3 years of 2nd division football our first away game was a midweek trip to Tottenham.
Tottenham had won the FA Cup the previous season and we had just finished one of our best seasons ever winning the 2nd division (only losing 4 games) and only narrowly losing to the cheating scouses in the League cup final replay.
I travelled there in hope of us picking up something but we had been disappointing in our first game drawing at home to Brighton.
As it turned out it was one of the greatest days of my football supporting career as David “Psycho” Cross banged in all 4 goals in a 4-0 away win :)

Time For A Statue?

Premier Predictions (Week 14)

I know week 13's games haven't started yet
but here are the fixtures for next weeks midweek games :)

Tuesday
Sunderland v QPR
Aston Villa v Reading

Wednesday
Chelsea v Fulham
Everton v Arsenal
Southampton v Norwich
Stoke v Newcastle
Swansea v West Brom
Tottenham v Liverpool
Man Utd v West Ham
Wigan v Man City

Soap Opera

Crazy

I know the wages are good, and no matter how crap you are at the job you'll usually walk into another high paid job after you get sacked but you have to feel some sympathy for football managers.

Roberto Di Matteo becomes the latest "hero to zero" despite in only eight months winning the Champions league, the FA Cup and steering Chelsea into 5th place after their poor start last year.
They sit 3rd in the Premiership despite losing Drogba and having Terry, Cole and Lampard missing for a lot of the season.

Ancelotti got lumbered with over £70 million worth of misfiring striker and an erratic centre half because Abramovich wanted them, and AVB and Di Matteo have carried the same burden, but of course it's their fault.


I don't really like Nigel Adkins but can't believe they are talking of dumping him after 2 straight promotions, and Brian McDermott is another who has performed miracles to get Reading to the Premier league and is also being tipped to go soon?
I can't really sympathise with Mark Hughes who must take some of the blame for bringing in so many average and past it players to disrupt any team spirit that QPR had.

Premier Predictions (Week 13)

Here are the games for Saturday and Sunday (week 13),
I will do another post for next weeks midweek games (week 14) later in the week.

Sunderland v West Brom
Everton v Norwich
Man Utd v QPR
Stoke v Fulham
Wigan v Reading
Aston Villa v Arsenal

Swansea v Liverpool
Southampton v Newcastle
Chelsea v Man City
Tottenham v West Ham

Premier Predictions (Week 12)

Here's next weeks games - 8 on Saturday, 1 Sunday and the big game on Monday :)
Quite a few tricky ones to predict (they are all tricky for me).
Pressure is on Paulo :)

Arsenal v Tottenham
Liverpool v Wigan
Man City v Aston Villa
Newcastle v Swansea
QPR v Southampton
Reading v Everton
West Brom v Chelsea
Norwich v Man United

Fulham v Sunderland

West Ham v Stoke

Premier Predictions (Week 11)

All to play for again with this weeks collection, First 7 on Saturday with the rest on Sunday.
European games again this week with Arsenal and Man U on the plane and Chelsea and City facing tough home games.
Europa league on Thursday with Tottenham at home, Newcastle going to Belgium and Liverpool having to travel to Russia (shame Newcastle aren't going there) :)

Arsenal v Fulham
Everton v Sunderland
Reading v Norwich
Southampton v Swansea
Stoke v QPR
Wigan v West Brom
Aston Villa v Man Utd

Man City v Tottenham
Newcastle v West Ham
Chelsea v Liverpool

Old Spice

Sorry to Jamie Gleeson but he looks like an impression of David Beckham in about ten years time, who's been wiped out by Pointy spice and has been living on the street selling the big issue.

Premier Predictions (Week 10)

Here we go with the week 10's
Will someone get their 3rd win or will I actually start playing?
3 Days of competition this week.

Man Utd v Arsenal
Fulham v Everton
Norwich v Stoke
Sunderland v Aston Villa
Swansea v Chelsea
Tottenham v Wigan
West Ham v Man City

QPR v Reading
Liverpool v Newcastle

West Brom v Southampton

The Scouse Derby

Brenda Rogers says Liverpool haven't had any luck with referees this season "We haven't got anything this year, I have got to be honest that is incredible".
David Moyes cleverly reacted by saying "Divers will turn fans away" :)

Speaking as a footy fan for over 40 years I would say Liverpool have had more dodgy decisions go their way than any team I can think of, and Everton seem to have been shafted by officials more than most.
Hopefully the ref won't be swayed by the comments and will ref fairly, but I have my doubts.

Gooner Logic

A few of my friends are Gooners and post a lot of crap on Facebook, it's always fun to watch the up's and downs of being an Arsenal fan.
These are comments from the last few months.

The Team
Worldbeaters, Crap, Best team in the world, A pile of Shite

The Manager
Best manager in the world, He don't know what he is doing, The Greatest, No F***ing idea

The Board
Best in the game, Sack them all, Fully support our team, Get rid of them and bring Dein back.

The Players
Total class, We need players, The best crop yet, No F***ing ideas.

Ex Players
The Greatest, Loyal will never leave, The Best Striker in the world, F***ing Judas, You were always Shite, Better off without you.

:D

Premier Predictions (Week 9)

Here are this weeks games on Saturday and Sunday

Aston Villa v Norwich
Arsenal v QPR
Reading v Fulham
Stoke v Sunderland
Wigan v West Ham
Man City v Swansea

Everton v Liverpool
Newcastle v West Brom
Southampton v Tottenham
Chelsea v Man Utd

Here is the complete table so far with all the useless facts :)

Best Names In Football

My Favourites
Andre Muff, Argelico Fucks, Ars Bandeet, Banana Yaya, Bongo Christ, Brian Pinas, Cerezo Fung A Wing, Cha Bum Kun, Chiqui Arce, Danger Fourpence, Danny Diver, Dean Windass, Dieter Stinka, Dominique Dropsy, Have-a-Look Dube, Hulk, Johan de Kock, Johnny Moustache, Lopez Ufarte, Mario Turdo, Mark De Man, Milan Fukal, Norman Conquest, Quim, Ralf Minge, Stefan Kuntz, Tunji Banjo, Waldo Ponce, Wayne Wanklyn.


The Best Of The Rest
Adigun Salami, Andrei Arshavin, Bernt Haas, Carlos Costly, Charlie Faultless, Clever Muzuva, Creedence Clearwater Couto, Daniel Killer, Danny Invincible, Danny Shittu, David Goodwillie, Dean Brill, Dean Gerken, Devin Del Do, Einar Aas, Emmanuel Panther, Fanny Schamp, Forbes Phillipson-Masters, Fritz Fuchs, Gareth Jelleyman, George Welcome, Gernot Sick, Givemore Manuella, Harry Daft, Jacques Elong Elong, Jean-Jacques Misse-Misse, John Nutter, Joseph Desire Job, Kick van der Vall, Laszlo Kiss, Laughter Chilembe, Limited Chicafa, Mansour Boutabout, Mario Eggimann, Mario Killer, Mario Licka, Marvel Samaneka, Michael Gash, Milko Millman, Modest M'Bami, Pasquale Sensibile, Paul Dickov, Pedro Power, Peter Shirtliff, Peter Trembling, Prince Polley, Rafael Scheidt, Raymond Undi, Razvan Rat, Regi Blinker, Ricardo Virtuoso, Ricky van Wolfswinkel, Roberto Dinamite, Robin Friday, Rod Fanni, Ruben de la Red, Ruud Boffin, Segar Bastard, Steve Death, Surprise Moriri, Two-Boys Gladstone Gamede, Uwe Fuchs, Wolfgang Wolf, Zoltan Kiss.

Wet Wet Wet

So you've got a state of the art stadium with retractable roof, the weather forecast says heavy rain expected, all the games during Euro 2012 that were played here in the summer were played under a closed roof, so what do you do .... Yeah that's right leave it open until the pitch is waterlogged!! "We expected heavy rain but not a downpour" said the Polish official .. classic :)

Premier Predictions (Week 8)

The International break is nearly over so here are this weekends games.

Tottenham v Chelsea
Fulham v Aston Villa
Liverpool v Reading
Man Utd v Stoke
Swansea v Wigan
West Brom v Man City
West Ham v Southampton
Norwich v Arsenal

Sunderland v Newcastle
QPR v Everton

Diver Of The Week

Every week I think I should give a "diver of the week" award.
In recent weeks we've had some quality dives from Wellbeck, Oscar, Suarez, Terry, Bramble, Ivanovic and many others and Ashley Young hasn't even played.

I've just watched MOTD2 and 3 outstanding candidates popped up, Luis Suarez is probably the king of the divers in recent years but I have almost felt sorry for him recently after he should have had 2 penalties recently but his reputation for falling over meant the ref assumed he'd dived.
Today he was back to his old self narrowly winning the most pathetic dive of the week.

1st Luis Suarez, 2nd Gareth Bale, 3rd Mark Schwarzer

Some Pics

Here's a couple of pics a Gooner friend just sent to me :)

Premier Predictions (Week 7)

Just 4 days to pick this weeks predictions.
Will my upturn in fortune take me into a top 4 spot, or will you lot beat me into submission like normal?
Next week is another international week, so 2 weeks bragging rights are at stake.

Man City v Sunderland
Chelsea v Norwich
Swansea v Reading
West Brom v QPR
Wigan v Everton
West Ham v Arsenal

Southampton v Fulham
Liverpool v Stoke
Tottenham v Aston Villa
Newcastle v Man Utd

Champions League

The glamour of the Champions league continues tonight.
Those well known names CFR Cluj-Napoca and FC Nordsjaelland take centre stage :)

Fergie Time

. As requested :)

QPR 1 West Ham 2

Cracking game despite Twattenburg trying to ruin it, 11 bookings (8 to West Ham) and a sending off? even though their were only 3 bad fouls in the game and one of those M'bia's forearm smash on Noble he didn't even give a foul??
Early goal from Jarvis and Vaz Te made it 2 as we dominated the first half.
Taarabt came on and scored a superb goal and Rangers looked like they might get something but Jussi was on top form.
Carroll came on after Cole missed a sitter and finally we saw him teamed up with Jarvis which if they both stay fit could be a dream pairing.

Fantasy Football

I am giving the Fantasy footie a big go this year for the first time in several years, mainly due to being in a works league for the first time in 5 years. Also because it is much cheaper this season.
About 5-6 years ago it cost £6 a team, although if you managed to find a promotion code you could sometimes get them for half price.
This season you got a free team plus it was 12 teams for £14.99 at the start, then 10 for the same price once the season started.

So I've ended up with 35 teams dotted around various leagues :)
3 in the works league, 2 in the Fiso forum, 2 in the Footy challenge league, 1 in the Facebook league, 1 in the Google league, and the remaining 26 set up into my own league.

Having this many teams means a mad rush every match day trying to find out who is injured and likely starting line-ups, and trying to balance the season long 30 transfers limit against short term gains.
The strikers positions have been a bit of a nightmare early on as the obvious picks at the start were probably Rooney, Aguero and Torres as Van Persie was a non playing Arsenal player.
Rooney and Aguero were both injured early on meaning RVP came in with Jelavic, Jelevic didn't do too well and then got injured meaning a switch to Berbatov who has now also got injured costing another transfer to Fletcher. I would have gone back to Jelavic but the early reports were that he wouldn't start :(
Suarez is usually a risky pick as his really good weeks are balanced out by many bad ones, Peter Crouch is a safe option for regular points but rarely has those exceptional weeks, Demba Ba has started well as he did last year but he dropped away badly last season and I have to remember that there is another African Nations cup next year and I've got Toure in most teams.

So far it's been good with all the teams in the top third out of around 250,000 entrants, 6 teams are in the top 1,000 with a best of 52nd, my league is 16th after a high of 12th, and I'm 1st, 2nd and 4th in the Works league :)
Today won't be good as Villa and West Brom players aren't really in my thinking at the moment, and Monday's Hammers v QPR game is only good from a fantasy game point of view if Nolan scores ...a hat-trick :)

R.I.P John Bond

Former Hammer John Bond sadly passed away at the age of 79 today :(
Probably remembered better these days as the manager of Norwich and Man City in the 70's and 80's he had made over 400 appearances for the Hammers in the 50's and 60's.
Part of our 'B' team in the glory years in the mid sixties with Brown, Brabrook, Byrne, Burkett, Boyce, Bovington, Bobby Moore and Brian Dear :)

Premier Predictions (Week 6)

Week number six already, games on Saturday, Sunday and Monday (hope Green plays).

Arsenal v Chelsea
Everton v Southampton
Fulham v Man City
Norwich v Liverpool
Reading v Newcastle
Stoke v Swansea
Sunderland v Wigan
Man Utd v Tottenham

Aston Villa v West Brom

QPR v West Ham

Premier Predictions (Week 5)

After week 4's dramatic ending let's do it all again :)
Saturday and Sunday games only this week, and some hard games to call considering possible European hangovers for many of the teams.

Swansea v Everton
Chelsea    v Stoke
Southampton v Aston Villa
West Brom v Reading
West Ham v Sunderland
Wigan v Fulham
       
Liverpool v Man Utd
Newcastle v Norwich
Man City v Arsenal
Tottenham v QPR

World Cup 2014 Day 2

England 1 Ukraine 1
Can't really comment or rate this game as I fell asleep during the first half and woke up just in time to see us get the penalty near the end :(

England v Ukraine

Game 2 kicks off in a few hours as England hope to build on last weeks great start.
Terry and Walcott are injured and have been replaced by Livermore, Lallana and Sterling.
Adam Lallana was a bit of a surprise but the other two proved the old adage that if you're English and play for Liverpool or Tottenham you will play for England.
That said Raheem Sterling does look like he has the makings of a star, he looked the biz last year when he scored 5 goals against my local club Southend in the Youth cup.


Not yet 18 he has 2 kids, plays in the Premier league and has an England call up. Could be a great story or a tragic one, we shall find out soon?

Premier Predictions (Week 4)

Here's this weekends games ... predict away :)

Norwich v West Ham
QPR v Chelsea
Stoke v Man City
Man Utd v Wigan
Arsenal v Southampton
Fulham v West Brom
Aston Villa v Swansea
Sunderland v Liverpool
       
Reading v Tottenham
       
Everton  v Newcastle

World Cup 2014 Day 1

A good start for England with a 5-0 hammering of Moldova :)
They played well but didn't need to be at the top of their game against a really poor side.
Sometimes in these type of games it gets scrappy if you don't score early but we were helped out in the 3rd minute by the Dutch ref giving a penalty for handball which a lot of refs wouldn't have?
Lampard banged it in and it was all plain sailing from then on :)
Lampard scored again and Defoe made it 3-0 at half time.
The second half was pretty dull as we seemed happy to hang on to the 3-0 but after bringing on Walcott and Welbeck we livened up and Milner finished off a great move to make it 4-0, for some reason Milner didn't seem too happy at scoring his first goal for England in 32 games probably realising he was once again lucky to be on the pitch after another poor performance, Baines got the 5th with a massive deflection from his free kick and the only downside was Terry's late injury.
My Ratings - Hart 6, Johnson 7, Baines 8, Lescott 7, Terry 8, Gerrard 4, Milner 5, Lampard 9, Cleverley 8, Oxlade-Chamberlain 8, Defoe 7, Subs - Carrick 5, Walcott 6, Welbeck 6 + England Fans 10

James Collins made sure he was fit for the Hammers next game by getting sent off for Wales against Belgium, they would have struggled with 11 men so no surprise that the Belgians won 2-0.
Northern Ireland were unlucky against Capello's Russia losing 2-0 including a dubious penalty.
The Republic left it very late against Kazakhstan with Keane and Doyle scoring in the last 2 minutes to give them a 2-1 win.
Looking around the other games some of the big names didn't have it easy, Germany only scored 3 against the Faroe Islands, France beat Finland 1-0, Portugal only managed a 2-1 win against Luxembourg, Italy drew with Bulgaria, Norway lost to Iceland.
Bosnia had the best result of the night with an 8-1 away win in Liechtenstein with Man City's Dzeko getting a hat trick.

World Cup 2014

The World cup is here again and we kick off tonight away to Moldova.

The England squad
G - Hart, Butland, Ruddy
D - Terry, Johnson, Lescott, Jagielka, Cahill, Baines, Walker, Bertrand
M - Gerrard, Lampard, Milner, Carrick, Oxlade-Chamberlain, Cleverley
F - Defoe, Walcott, Wellbeck, Sturridge


Injured - Cole, Carroll, Rooney, Young, Jones, Parker
Dropped - Kelly, Henderson, Downing, Green

World Cup Fixtures
07/09/12 A Moldova
11/09/12 H Ukraine
12/10/12 H San Marino
16/10/12 A Poland
22/03/13 A San Marino
26/03/12 A Montenegro
06/09/13 H Moldova
10/09/13 A Ukraine
11/10/13 H Montenegro
15/10/13 H Poland

Friendlies
14/11/12 A Sweden
14/08/12 H Scotland

Redknapped

So Harry boy has gone back to Bournemouth as an advisor!!
didn't realise they were rich enough to need Swiss bank accounts?

Comment

The decision to moderate comments was made so I could weed out the downright nasty stuff that some bloggers get, but so far I've just been inundated with dozens of adverts for short term loans and slimming aids?
This one made me laugh as it was from an American company but seems to have been translated from a foreign language using an online translator -
"The transaction terms are very short for instant loans and ranges at the hands of 10 to thirty one days. 
The very loan provides the actual cash in quick and in easy way without each and every personal treasures. 
Not upfront charges are unquestionably levied from you have" ????

West Ham 3 Fulham 0

Comfortable win against a poor Fulham team, Andy Carroll was causing the Fulham defence problems which left gaps for everyone else.
An early Nolan goal was followed by a Winston Reid header and Matt Taylor banging one in.
The second half was fairly even and Jaaskelainen had the chance to show he's not that bad with a few decent saves.
The Hammers midfield was solid, Nolan catches the eye but Diame was excellent and Noble hardly puts a foot wrong.

Slight worry was injuries to Carroll, James Collins and Demel after Matt Jarvis missed the game through injury, hopefully all will be fit after the International break.
Fulham were poor and even with Berbatov coming on in the second half showed very little.

Going Down?

Poll Result - Just 13 votes in the "who will get relegated" poll, so if you are right this will be the bottom of the table in May.

13 Arsenal
14 Aston Villa
15 West Ham
16 Norwich
17 Southampton
-----------------
18 Reading
19 Wigan
20 QPR

Personally think Wigan and Reading wil survive, but the people have spoken :)

Deadline Day Again

It's that time again when all the clubs go panic buying, despite having 3 months to finalise this seasons teams a lot of managers leave it to the last minute?
So we've got about 5 hours left of hurried medicals and brinkmanship over wages and transfer fees, then interviews with endless foreigners saying "it's always been my dream to play in England".

Chances are that Chelsea won't be doing any last minute deals this year as they should have other things on their mind with their Super cup game against Athletico Madrid, although Colombian striker Falcao might be jumping on the bus home?
So far we've had quite a few deals including Andy Carroll's move to Upton Park on loan which I really didn't think would happen after he dismissed us before.
Berbatov for £4 million!! why didn't we make a bid? also I wonder if we can get Brad Friedel or Rob Green on loan :)

Here are the deadline day deals (I will update this if I remember) :)

Done Deals
Dimitar Berbatov - Man Utd to Fulham
Maicon - Inter Milan to Man City
Rafael Van der Vaart - Tottenham to Hamburg
Nigel De Jong - Man City to AC Milan
Scott Sinclair - Swansea to Man City
Charlie Adam - Liverpool to Stoke
Andy Carroll - Liverpool to West Ham
Kieran Richardson - Sunderland to Fulham
Danny Rose - Tottenham to Sunderland
Park Chu Young - Arsenal to Celta Vigo
Giovani Dos Santos - Tottenham to Mallorca
Gael Kakuta - Chelsea to Vitesse Arnhem
Maya Yoshida - Venio to Southampton
Jay Spearing - Liverpool to Bolton
Nicklas Bendtner - Arsenal to Juventus
Moussa Dembele - Fulham to Tottenham
Jordan Rhodes - Huddersfield to Blackburn
Bryan Oviedo - FC Copenhagen to Everton
Pablo Hernandez - Valencia to Swansea
Richard Wright - Dole Queue to Man City
Esteban Granero - Real Madrid to QPR
Nicky Maynard - West Ham to Cardiff
Julio Cesar - Inter Milan to QPR
Jordan Bowery - Chesterfield to Aston Villa
Maurice Edu - Rangers to Stoke
Thorgan Hazard - Chelsea to Zulte Waregem
Hugo Lloris - Lyon to Tottenham
Stephane Mbia - Marseille to QPR
Michael Essien - Chelsea to Real Madrid
Yossi Benayoun - Chelsea to West Ham
Stefan Savic - Man City to Fiorentina
Matija Nastasic - Fiorentina to Man City
Javi Garcia - Benfica to Man City
Roque Santa Cruz - Man City to Malaga
Gaston Ramirez - Bologna to Southampton
Joey Barton - QPR to Marseille
Clint Dempsey - Fulham to Tottenham
Christian Benteke - Genk to Aston Villa
Steven N'Zonzi - Blackburn to Stoke
Ashkan Dejagah - Wolfsburg to Fulham
Ashley Westwood - Crewe to Aston Villa
Goran Popov - Dynamo Kiev to West Brom
Matthew Kennedy - Kilmarnock to Everton
Cody Cropper - America? to Southampton

Possibles
Kenwyne Jones - Stoke to Marseille
Michael Owen - Man Utd to Anywhere??

Gutted about Dempsey, gone for only £6 million and to Tottenham just to make it worse :(
We end up with Benny back after 5 years away, not sure where he fits anymore but a useful back up :)

Europa League Draw

Group A - Liverpool, Udinese, Young Boys, Anzhi Makhachkala
Group B - Athletico Madrid, Hapoel Tel Aviv, Plzen, Académica
Group C - Marseille, Fenerbahce, Borussia Monchengladbach, AEL Limassol
Group D - Newcastle, Bordeaux, Club Bruges, Maritimo
Group E - VFB Stuttgart, FC Copenhagen, Steaua Bucharest, Molde
Group F - PSV Eindhoven, Napoli, Dnipro, AIK Solna
Group G - Sporting Lisbon, FC Basel, Genk, Videoton Fehervar
Group H - Inter Milan, Rubin Kazan, Partizan Belgrade, Neftchi
Group I - Lyon, Athletic Bilbao, Sparta Prague, Hapoel Kiryat Shmona
Group J - Tottenham, Panathinaikos, Lazio, NK Maribor
Group K - Bayer Leverkusen, Metalist Kharkiv, Rosenborg, Rapid Vienna
Group L - FC Twente, Hannover 96, Levante, Helsingborgs

Champions League Draw

Champions League Draw

Group A - Paris St Germain, FC Porto, Dynamo Kiev, Dinamo Zagreb
Group B - Arsenal, Schalke 04, Olympiakos, Montpellier
Group C - AC Milan, Zenit St Petersburg, Anderlecht, Malaga
Group D - Real Madrid, Man City, Ajax, Borussia Dortmund
Group E - Chelsea, Juventus, Shakhtar Donetsk, FC Nordsjaelland
Group F - Bayern Munich, Valencia, Lille, Bate Borisov
Group G - Barcelona, Celtic, Benfica, Spartak Moscow
Group H - Man Utd, Sporting Braga, Galatasaray, CFR Cluj

Tough draw for Man City with the champions of England, Spain, Germany and Holland all drawn together!!
Celtic get Barcelona and 2 other hard teams.
The others look to have easier groups Man Utd and Arsenal should be really happy.
Chelsea have got Juventus and Shakhtar but should be good enough to go through.

Fantasy Football

Due to being back in a works league for the first time in 5 years, I'm into Fantasy Football big time this year.
The fact that the price has dropped also helped :)
It used to be £6 a team but this season it was 12 teams for £14.99, the top prize has dropped from £50,000 down to £30,000 but I wasn't going to win that anyway.

Currently in the top 50 overall which considering there are 238,000 teams isn't too bad, and my superleague is in the top 20.

Sadly this will be as good as it gets as I went big time with Chelsea player due to the extra game, my top team has 7 Chelsea players who won't be adding any points this week :(
All I can hope for is that all the games get postponed this weekend for some reason?

Also tried my hand at Sun dream team for the first time ever, but not doing so well at that, it seems to be more luck than skill as you have to pick 11 at the start and can't change them till their imaginary transfer window.
So if you're stuck with Aguero, Rooney and Terry who are all injured like me you're screwed :(

Premier Predictions (Week 3)

Just nine games this weekend, due to Chelsea going to Monaco on Friday to play Athletico Madrid for the European "Super" cup.

West Ham will need to win against much improved Fulham to show they are capable of competing in this division.
Everton have looked good so far but face a test against another much improved team West Brom.
AVB will be under pressure again if the Spuds don't beat Norwich.
Swansea will have the chance to go top if they beat big spending Sunderland, and if they play as well as they already have this season they should manage it.
Man City are due a big result and owe QPR for last season's near nightmare.
On Sunday 0-0 specialists Arsenal go to Anfield looking for another 0-0
Man Utd go to Southampton hopefully with a kit they can see :)
.. and finally Newcastle take on this seasons worst team so far Villa.

West Ham v Fulham
West Brom v Everton
Tottenham v Norwich
Wigan v Stoke
Swansea v Sunderland
Man City v QPR
       
Liverpool v Arsenal
Southampton v Man Utd
Newcastle v Aston Villa

Rangers v Rangers

People have been saying for years that Rangers and Celtic should be playing in the English league, well today Rangers got the chance of playing a league game across the border.
Berwick are the only English club in the Scottish league and they certainly didn't roll over today, holding the Gers to a 1-1 draw.
Not sure what the future holds for Rangers, they have not made a good start to this league and the remaining players are starting to leave and despite the massive support it is going to be hard to attract anyone to play in the fourth tier of Scottish football.
I'm trying hard not to be happy about Rangers problems as I've never been a fan of theirs.
I have various Scottish relatives who are big Celtic and Aberdeen fans who both hate Rangers with a passion, but personally I always liked Dundee United?

Welcome

Great to see that Matt Jarvis has finally signed :)
 It is the first signing we have made in several years that I've been excited about, I've actually heard of him, he's not past it and from what I've seen he could be the first tricky left winger who can beat people we have seen at Upton Park since the days of Alan Devonshire.
£10.75 million is a lot of cash for West Ham but when you consider Chelsea have blown over £80 million this season already, and we were prepared to pay £17 million for the pony tail maybe it's really good business.

Unlikely

Bye Sam

Quite sad to see little Sam leave before he had a real chance to shine.
He started brightly for us last season with 5 goals in his first 6 starts and looked like a player in the Tony Cottee mould, but injury and being played out of position meant he made only another 5 starts plus a collection of late substitute appearances.
He scored in the opening 3 friendlies this season but didn't get any more chances.

Good luck for the future Sam Baldock

Premier Predictions (Week 2)

I know week one hasn't quite finished, but here's the week 2 games.
At least this set are played over just 2 days :)
Good luck all.

Saturday
Swansea v West Ham
Sunderland v Reading
Aston Villa v Everton
Tottenham v West Brom
Southampton v Wigan
Norwich v QPR
Man Utd v Fulham
Chelsea v Newcastle

Sunday
Stoke v Arsenal
Liverpool v Man City

RIP Sid Waddell

Should have posted this last week :(
Sadly Sid Waddell died last week from bowel cancer aged 72.
We all remember Sid for his brilliant darts commentaries which breathed life into the old pub game and made it must watch TV at the time, I should say that my collection of sporting trophies are mainly for darts so I love the game.
Sid himself had a pretty impressive CV away from darts, although he was a miners son from the North East he went to Cambridge University and had TV presenting, writing and production credits before his switch to Darts.

Footie fans should also remember he wrote the great 80's kids show Jossy's Giants :)

.

Champions League

Woo hoo we're in the Champions league spot :)
Stop the season now as I don't think it can get any better :D

Season 2012/13

Less than 2 hours to go till another Premier league season kicks off :)
The title race should be between the big 3 of Man City, Man United and Chelsea with Van Persie's transfer probably meaning Arsenal drop into the second group chasing the 4th place with Tottenham, Everton and maybe Newcastle.
AVB has the chance to show what all the fuss was about when he went to Chelsea last season, although he will probably have to do it without Modric, but the money will come in useful.
If Liverpool have the quality and can embrace the Rogers way they could have a decent season, but if they lose a couple he could be under pressure from the unrealistic ambitions of their fans and owners.

At the bottom it's a complete lottery, the poll currently has Wigan and Reading for the drop but I'm not so sure? Brian McDermott is a very likeable manager who will get the best out of a good Reading team and Martinez's Wigan looked very good at the end of last season.
Chris Hughton is a really good manager and might keep Norwich from suffering "2nd season syndrome", Brian Laudrup is highly rated and could lessen the blow of Brenda Rogers departure.
Martin Jol of Fulham has signed a few good players which might lessen the blow of probably losing their star player Dempsey.
Stoke should have a better season without having the European games which cost them last year.
I think West Brom could struggle without Roy Hodgson and I really don't rate Steve Clarke, QPR despite a number of good signings still don't have a settled team and I reckon they will have another season of fighting for their lives.
I really hate to say that the Hammers will be fighting relegation but unless we take advantage of the reasonably easy start to the season and manage to pick up at least 2-3 quality players before the end of the transfer window it could be a tough season.
Looking at this years teams any 3 of around 12 could be in the relegation places at the end of the season?

My predictions for the season -
1st Man Utd,  2nd Man City, 3rd  Chelsea, 4th Arsenal
Relegated - West Brom, QPR, Southampton

Removal Van

So Sad

Aaah it's so sad when a love affair ends.
All my Arsenal friends were declaring their undying love of Robin Van Persie last season and wanting his babies, and telling me he will always be Arsenal and would never go to another English club.
But today all I'm getting is "he was always shit" and "money grabbing bastard, hope he breaks both legs" ??

It looks like he is on his way to Old Trafford which probably guarantees Man Utd of Champions league football because Arsenal can't be considered a threat anymore.
Not sure if the often injured Dutchman can strike up a good partnership with Rooney, if he does then it should be enough to overtake City?

Arsenal now have a couple of weeks to find a world class striker prepared to play for them as all the current strikers are unlikely to score as many goals as RVP managed on his own.

Premier Predictions (Week 1)

Here we go, the all new Premier League prediction competition 2012/2013.
Same rules as before - 3 points for a correct score, 1 point for a correct result with the wrong score.
Please copy and paste the games with your predicted scores into the comments below.
All welcome just remember to leave your name.

Saturday
Arsenal v Sunderland
Fulham v Norwich
QPR v Swansea
Reading v Stoke
West Brom v Liverpool
West Ham v Aston Villa
Newcastle v Tottenham

Sunday
Wigan v Chelsea
Man City v Southampton

Monday
Everton v Man Utd

Wednesday
Chelsea v Reading

Longy has won the last two so we need some serious competition this season :) For some reason we start with 11 games this week as Chelsea and Reading have an extra game this week? So it's a chance for big spending Chelsea to lead the pack for a few weeks until the others catch up the games.

Olympics

Well it's all over and like many others could not believe how well it all went. I was going to do a long post about it but I just thought I would list the best bits for me :)
Highs - The Opening Ceremony, James Bond, The Arctic Monkeys, The Rowing, Bradley Wiggins, Laura Trott, The indoor cycling GB teams, Nicola Adams, Mo Farah x 2, Jessica Ennis, David Rudisha, Usain Bolt x 3, Ben Ainslie's Rant
Lows - Paul McCartney

Nearly There

The Olympics is finishing tomorrow and the footie season kicks off with the Charity Shield which has been moved to Villa Park.
The latest version of the League cup (capital one) started today and Sheffield United were kicked out by Burton!!
Rangers started life in Scotland's lowest league with a draw away to Peterhead.
Typically England have arranged a friendly 3 days before the Premier league kicks off meaning some of my Fantasy league players will get injured before kick off.

The Olympic footie was won by Mexico who beat Brazil 2-1, the womens version was won by the Americans who beat Japan 2-1 thanks to a blind ref.

.... and here's another Terry scene stealer from Twitter :)

Nearly Time For Footie Again

Sorry for the lack of posts, not too much going on football wise apart from the Olympics and I've been occupied getting myself a new job.
But the new Premier league season is closing in, the Scottish league started today and the Europa league is underway so it's time to get posting again.

The men's Olympic team play South Korea tonight for a place in the semi's, the women crashed out in the quarter finals after looking impressive in their group.
So good luck to Stuart Pearce's team tonight, if they win they will probably play Brazil who are the form team so far.
The fancied Spaniards were knocked out without even scoring a goal in their group?

West ham have so far signed 7 players - 3 Goalies, 2 Ex-Hammers, and 2 Africans one with a dodgy knee and one with a dodgy heart .. so no worries there.
Southend's Bilel Mohsni (who I've posted about before) has been on trial with the Hammers and a 150k bid has been turned down by Southend, I think I would prefer him to stay at Southend but when he has the right head on he can be a match winner possibly at the highest level but if Big Sam was thinking of signing him as a back up defender I wouldn't bother.

Transfers In (Premier league)
Chelsea have been the big spenders so far spending 4 times as much as Arsenal, Tottenham and Man Utd who also parted with some serious cash.
Mega rich Man City haven't signed anyone yet but I'm sure some big name will be there before the opening day.
West Ham, Reading and QPR have all signed 7 players so far on the cheap.

Arsenal - Giroud, Podolski
Aston Villa - Vlaar, Lowton, El Ahmadi, Holman
Chelsea - Oscar, E Hazard, T Hazard, Marin
Everton - Pienaar, Naismith
Fulham - Rodallega, Riether, Petric
Liverpool - Borini
Man City - Nobody?
Man United - Powell, Kagawa
Newcastle - Good, Bigirimana, Amalfitano
Norwich - Turner, Snodgrass, Butterfield, Whittaker
QPR - Hoilett, Park, Fabio, Green, Johnson, Nelsen, Diakite
Reading - Gunter, Mariappa, Shorey, Sweeney, McCleary, Guthrie, Pogrebnyak
Southampton - Gazzaniga, Clyne, Davis, Rodriguez
Stoke - Ness
Sunderland - Cuellar
Swansea - Michu, Chico, de Guzman
Tottenham - Vertonghen, Sigurdsson
West Brom - Yacob, El Ghanassy, Foster
West Ham - Collins, Spiegel, Maiga, McCartney, Jaaskelainen, Diame, Henderson
Wigan - Ramis, Fyvie

The rest -
Robin Van Persie should he stay or should he go?
Rangers relegated to the Scottish division 3!!
Choc-ices and 99's? well it is summer :)

Oh and thanks for all the kind words from those companies who spam the hell out Bloggers :)

Oh and another poll open for a month, who's going down this season .. please don't all choose West Ham :)

The Olympics

Less than 3 weeks to go before the start of the Olympics.
I have to admit I've been sick of hearing about it for years as everyone has been using it as an excuse to screw us.
The local road system has been in chaos for over a year due to major roadworks "for the Olympics" and it won't be finished in time!
The local airport has been expanded despite protests "for the Olympics" meaning bloody great big Easy Jets screw up my TV reception every time they go over.
I am not allowed to take holidays at work "during the Olympics" because of the odd chance we might get some extra work because of it? and it seems nearly every dodgy decision taken over the last few years usally gets followed by "for the Olympics" :(

I will watch the 100 metres final and a few other highlight shows but don't really care about the rest, but good luck to all our athletes anyway.

As far as the football goes Britain have a good record when they have played, they won the first 3 they played in (1900,1908,1912) and a 4th place and 2 quarter finals from the other six, but haven't been involved since 1960.
Here's the British squad - 13 English, 5 Welsh, no Scots or Northern Irish and no Beckham.
Nice for Ryan Giggs to finally get to a major international tournament and it will be good to see players like Sinclair, Cleverley and Sturridge playing international football.

J Butland (Birmingham) 19, J Steele (Middlesbrough) 21

R Bertrand (Chelsea) 22, C Dawson (West Brom) 22, M Richards (Man City) 24,
S Caulker (Tottenham) 20, N Taylor (Swansea) 23, J Tomkins (West Ham) 23

T Cleverley (Man Utd) 22, J Cork (Southampton) 23, J Allen (Swansea) 22,
R Giggs (Man Utd) 38, A Ramsey (Arsenal) 21, D Rose (Tottenham) 22, S Sinclair (Swansea) 23

M Sordell (Bolton) 21, D Sturridge (Chelsea) 22, C Bellamy (Liverpool) 32

Ever since I first saw the Olympic logo this is what has popped into my mind :)

Olympic Champions From Upton Park

I was just doing some reading about the Olympic football and stumbled on something I reckon (as an avid Hammer) I really should have known?
In 1900 Great Britain were represented by Upton Park FC who won the competition beating French side Club Français de Paris 4-0 in the final.
There was only 3 teams in the tournament which devalues it a bit, the other side was a Belgium XI which included a Frenchman, an Englishman and a Dutch player :)

Upton Park FC who played at West Ham Park aren't related to West Ham United who play at Upton Park despite the obvious links!!
The current West Ham team were still called Thames Ironworks and played at Canning town, the teams did share a few players but Upton Park were a strictly amateur club.
They were formed in 1866 and played in the very first FA Cup competition and reached the quarter finals 4 times.
Their glory moment came in 1900 when they were asked to represent Britain and won gold, and as it was 30 years before the World cup started could probably claim to be world champions :)
The team also supplied 4 England internationals (3 footballers and a cricketer!!).
Sadly they dissolved in 1911, although the name lives on for the obvious reason and in the Channel Islands where the annual play-off between the Jersey and Guernsey champions is named the Upton park trophy because of the clubs frequent visits to the islands.

Prize Time

Here you go Biopunk :)

Prediction Competition

Congrats to Biopunk for winning the Euro championship prediction competition :)

All I can offer as a prize is some football related music or pictures of your choice (if I have or can find them).

Premier League predictions back around mid August .... all welcome :)

Saving The Best Till Last

Well Spain certainly proved me wrong tonight, in most of their other games in this tournament they seem to have been content with a lot of possession without much of an end product.
But straight from the off they seem determined to kill off Italy having more shots on goal in the first 15 minutes than they managed in the whole game against Portugal.
Italy found their feet in the next 20 minutes and looked like making a game of it but as soon as Jordie Alba put Spain two up with a really good breakaway goal the game was over.

Italy had some bad luck with Chiellini's early injury and Cassano still not fit enough to play the entire game so he went off at half time, then Motta was brought on and within minutes had pulled a hamstring leaving Italy with ten men for the last half hour.
But Italy looked tired from the beginning and just couldn't cope with Spain this time after looking really good in their first meeting a few weeks back.
Spain brought Torres on and it was just a matter of time before they scored again, Torres scored and laid on a goal for late sub Mata to finish it.

Useless fact - Despite 10 of the 14 players being used by Spain being from Barcelona and Real Madrid, the 4 goals were scored by the 3 English based players and Alba who I think is still a Valencia player although he will sign for Barcelona after this tournament.

Bogey Team

The Germans have never beaten the Italians in a major finals and that record continued tonight.
Another quality performance from the Italians putting the highly rated Germans to the sword, a performance which makes England's effort look slightly better because John Terry and Lescott surely wouldn't have made it so easy for Super Mario score his two unchallenged goals.
Balotelli looked very good mainly because the Germans didn't frustrate him like we did, although they did make it slightly harder for Pirlo but forgot that the Italians have other players capable of quality passing.

Joachim Loew must have scoffed more than his usual amount of bogies trying to figure out what he could do, he replaced the frontmen at half time but it didn't really make a difference as one thing the Italians were always good at was defending.

Looking forward to Sunday where hopefully the Italians can turn it on again and beat the dull Spaniards.

Old Codgers

West Ham seem to have been linked with a selection of slightly past it superstars recently, but I do like the current rumour that Alessanro Del Piero might consider a switch to the premier league with us.
I had only just told my missus that her favourite foreign player had recently retired and wouldn't be coming on for Italy tonight, and then I read that he didn't want to retire yet :)
Although she's a Hammers fan like me she owns a Juventus shirt with Del Piero's name on the back, so just maybe it will have a new lease of life :)

Disgrace

He might have a dodgy barnet, some dubious tattoo's and be a bit past it but so what?
David Beckham has done so much for the British Olympic organisation with the bid and publicising it around the world since we were chosen.
All he asked was that he be part of the British football team as one of the 3 overage players, instead Stuart Pearce has gone for the equally old Ryan Giggs, dodgy kneed Craig Bellamy and Micah Richards?
I don't think we have a hope whatever team we choose as most of the other nations are used to this competition and build squads especially for it, so Beckham's inclusion won't really make much difference.

So as far as I'm concerned even if he only performed a ceremonial kick off and was substituted straight after he should have been in the squad, I think he has earned the right :)

Here's Hoping?

Probably the day I made the Italians my second favourite international team.
Still gives me goosebumps :)

Deja Vu

Oh well the dream is over in the usual way as even the Italians manage to beat us on penalties :(
I think after years of us getting knocked out of major championships on penalties I am getting used to this!! the first time in 1990 I was devastated and felt the same way in 96, 98, 2004 but by 2006 it was getting obvious we would blow it and tonight it just seemed inevitable.

 For the first half hour of this game it wasn't looking too bad for us, it was a far more open game than anyone could have guessed, the Italians hit the post early on and Johnson and Wellbeck missed good chances for us.
But for the next 90 minutes it was nearly all Italy and only wasteful shooting from Balotelli and co kept us in it.
John Terry was a wall and Johnson and Lescott also blocked nearly everything thrown at them, Pirlo was controlling everything and even former Hammer Alessandro Diamanti came on and looked good.
Somehow we got to penalties and after Montolivo put it wide there was a hope we could finally win a shoot out, after all the Italians are usually worse than us at penalties but then Ashley Young blasted it against the crossbar and Ashley Cole's tame shot was saved leaving Diamanti to win it.

My Ratings -
Hart 8, Johnson 9, Cole 7, Terry 9, Lescott 8
Parker 8, Gerrard 7, Young 3, Milner 6
Rooney 6, Wellbeck 6
Subs - Walcott 7, Carroll 8, Henderson 6

I didn't change my score for Ashley Young because of the penalty, he was shit all night and for most of the tournament it was just a shame he didn't get a run in the penalty area where he could have used his greatest skill (but we probably would have missed the penalty anyway).

I wish the Italians well against the Germans (as my money has been on them from the start) and reckon they might give the Germans some problems, and as for Spain v Ronaldo it should be the Spanish but you never know?

England showed better as a team this tournament and at times showed they can pass the ball around with the best, but it's obvious we need to find some creative midfielders from somewhere?
Gerrard looked better without Lampard in his way, but sadly his best days are over.
Parker showed he is a better holding midfielder than the overrated Gareth Barry but isn't getting any younger.
Oxlade-Chamberlain looks promising and may be part of a brighter future.
Walcott is hit and miss, six years of inconsistency doesn't look like ending.
Ashley Young seems to have gone back to his Villa days when he could only turn it on against inferior teams and was anonymous against the good sides.
Milner is average, he'll do a job but is never going to win matches single handed.
Henderson who knows? hasn't showed much since his Sunderland days but might get better.
Wilshere was looking good before his injury so hopefully he can come back.

Roll on Brazil 2014!!

Please

Suddenly the expectation levels seem to have risen way above what they should be, I've quite enjoyed it so far putting one over on all the doubters I know and work with.
Now England flags are being flown everywhere and people that were telling me 2 weeks ago we wouldn't make it out of the group are now saying we are going to win the whole thing.

I must admit I am not at all confident today we have played well against Sweden despite the goals we conceded, we were ok against the Ukraine who are an average side but were over defensive against what has turned out to be a piss poor French side, and now we are coming up against the big boys who could find us out?
I will be wearing my lucky England shirt and foregoing the haircut I badly need in the hope it adds some small bit of luck for tonight.

If we get through I actually feel more confident of overcoming the Germans who although looking the best team in the tournament struggled against the Danes who play a bit like England.
So come on England, let's pray for a Balotelli meltdown and some more dodgy decisions in our favour, and keep this dream going :)

Bye Greeny

Bye Robert Green :(
Sad to see him go as he's rarely let us down over the years.
Obviously money was the main reason but after serving us well maybe he did deserve a big pay day and it's a shame the Hammers board couldn't come to an agreement with him.
He has said the right things in his interview so hopefully he will get a decent reception when QPR come to Upton Park and we can commiserate after each goal goes in :)

Job Done

Not much to get excited about in our final group game, the Ukrainians had a lot of the play but rarely looked like scoring, England just about did enough to win with Rooney taking the headlines, he should have given us a half time lead but missed an easy header, but he made up for it by getting to Gerrard's low cross after the goalie fumbled.
Ukraine were unlucky in the second half when John Terry cleared the ball which had just about crossed the line, the goal line official managed to miss it even though he was only about 6 yards away? although ITV claimed that there was an offside in the build up so maybe justice was done?
Now we have Italy on Sunday and if we manage to win that it looks like the Germans in the semi's which obviously brings back bad memories, I still think Spain was the easier game?

My Ratings -
Hart 6, Johnson 7, Cole 7, Terry 7, Lescott 7
Parker 8, Gerrard 9, Young 7, Milner 7
Rooney 7, Wellbeck 6
Subs - Walcott 5, Carroll 5, Oxlade-Chamberlain 4

Euro 2012 Predictions - Part 2

Here's the second part, so new predictions please :)
We'll make it the final score before penalties, so including extra time if needed.
(bonus point for correct penalty score) :)

Biopunk 17 Lee 14 Gobshyte 11 Longy 0

Czech Rep v Portugal
Germany v Greece
Spain v France
England v Italy

*****************
Edit - Semi Finals
Current scores - Biopunk 20 Lee 17 Gobshyte 15 Longy 2

Portugal v Spain
Germany v Italy

UEFArghh!!

I know Bendtner's underpants were a horrible colour and really should have only been worn by Irish players but EUFA have managed to outdo FIFA with their latest decision.
Dodgy underpants = £80k fine and a ban.
Racist chanting and abuse = £64k.
That's really going to deter them isn't it ... just don't wear a sponsored swastika!!

England Expects

That day is here again :)

The expectation level is rising and a few of those doubters I know have said to me that England won't finish bottom (because it can't happen Dumbo's).
A draw will be enough to see us through to a match against Spain (which after seeing them last night looks the best option).
A win might be enough to take us top but only if we win by a goal more than the French, or the French lose or draw.
To complicate things only a win for Ukraine will send them through so there can be no settling for a draw if the French are getting stuffed.

I have pre-booked the semi-final dates off, so you could say I am in my usual state of over optimism :)
Gonna be gutted if I've used valuable holidays to sit at home watching Portugal v Spain :(

So come on England make us proud, let's win something before I'm too old to jump up and down :)

Holland Dozy Holland

For about 15 minutes it looked like Holland would easily beat Portugal and possibly qualify for the next round if the other result went their way, then for some reason it all went wrong?

Ronaldo was certainly in the mood and had one of his best games for Portugal, but the Dutch just seemed to fall apart and were lucky only to lose 2-1, the Germans did their bit in the other match and must be favourites now.

As for the Dutch Huntelaar is supposed to be a top quality striker but I've never seen it when I have seen him play before, and tonight all he did was stop Van Persie playing in his normal position which meant he was innefective as well. Van Der Vaart played pretty well and scored a good goal but a lot of the other big names just didn't play and the defence were being ripped apart by Ronaldo and Nani at will.
So Holland join Russia, Poland and Denmark out of the competition, I feel sorry for Denmark who played well in all 3 games which you can't say about the Dutch.

The first 2 quarter finals will be - Czech Rep v Portugal and Germany v Greece

A Greek Tragedy

Obvious title :)
After the first games what odds would you have got on the Greeks and Czechs qualifying from Group A??
The Greeks amazingly beat the highly fancied Russians which just makes you remember 2004 where they kept scraping through each round all the way to the title.
Poland probably confirmed their FIFA ranking by making the Czechs look good?

Whoever qualifies from Group B must expect a semi-final place as neither the Czechs or Greeks should progress against  those higher quality teams.
Group B itself could go any way with the Germans not certain of qualifying despite 2 wins and Holland still in with a chance despite 2 losses!!
The Germans have looked the best team in the tournament so far but nothing is certain.

* I am impressed that the Excel Euro 2012 spreadsheet I downloaded recently has dealt with "head to head records" meaning I won't have to fiddle with it like in previous tournaments when they have sent the wrong team through :)
But I will reserve judgement until tonight, if Denmark and Portugal win it gets really confusing with all of them on 6 points and they have all won against one of the others so not sure what the next deciding factor is? hopefully it's just goal difference.