First Charlie Sheen, Now Sir Clive....
(Didn't work when you were our coach did it?)
Hopefully Saints do not have a hangover from Cardiff which just leaves me with one from one too many beers the night before. My mood if not my head is helped by the scorching sun which to the amusement of my fellow Kingslanders, is right in the faces of Nicola Cortese and all those in the posh seats in the Itchen Stand. As I had a hangover, my Dad was a bit worried about me chewing out the Chuckle Brothers but he was saved as the whiny one wasn’t present which meant the moronic one wouldn’t be as irritating as he had no one he knew to listen to his unfunny shit.
Nigel has realised that Saints lose when Dean Hammond doesn’t play and so he’s recalled in place of Schneiderlin and there is one enforced change with Connolly out injured and being replaced with Steve de Ridder, getting his first League start. Watford feature a striker called Marvin Sordell who we were rumoured to be interested in a while back. We didn’t sign him and so not signing the player that no one had heard of was used as something to moan about as the transfer window closed.
As the game kicks off it’s obvious that Nigel has been reading this blog and taking notice as de Ridder is on the wing and the Gulyman is up front with Sir Rickie. It is Watford who have the first chance however as Hogg manages to find about 3 square acres of uninhabited space near the penalty spot and when the ball arrives he luckily played an airshot and fell on his arse. The ball comes back to him though and his snap shot is too close to Davis who swallows it up. Hogg was on loan at the Skates last year but no one gives a shit really and he doesn’t get booed, just sniggered at. No doubt that Watford are the better side at the moment and nearly take the lead as Hooiveld and then Fonte fail to clear and Garner’s lob is just low enough for Davis to flip over the bar.
Watford have a big ugly bloke at the back who looks a bit like that Nikolai Valuev, the Russian 7 foot boxer monster who David Haye beat. A ball chipped forward finds Valuev trying to get signals from his brain to his feet and he presents Sir Rickie with the ball who sends de Ridder away on the right. De Ridder carried it forward and chipped it to the back post where Sir Rickie went up with 2 defenders and everyone ended up in a heap on the floor. The ref took a second and awarded us a penalty for handball. TV replays confirm nothing obvious so you have to say we’re a bit lucky here. It’s another penalty against Watford but isn’t it nice not have McGoldrick on the pens… Sir Rickie, bang, 1-0.
It’s nearly 2-0 five minutes later as the Gulyman found himself on the wing and fires in a low cross which Sir Rickie steps over and the onrushing Lallana smashes against angle of post and bar and it rebounds about 30 yards back up the pitch. Bit of a shame that as it would have been a spectacular goal.
Corky succeeds with his second attempt at getting into the referees book and gives away a free kick which Watford make a complete farce of. Straight off the training ground indeed. Watford are proving to be stubborn opponents but are not seriously threatening to equalize and so we arrive at half time at 1-0.
There have obviously been words spoken at half time as we come flying out the traps with much more urgency. There has been some tinkering with the formation with a front three which seems to have de Ridder and Sir Rickie on the wings with the Gulyman up the middle but the movement of the three of them is giving Valuev some brain ache. Frazer Richardson is having another field day on the wing evoking memories of Ivan Golac on the rampage and he gets to the line before standing up a great cross to the back stick where Sir Rickie is clumsily taken out in mid air by Mariappa who then sits on him for good measure, not even complaining about the decision. Groundhog day, bang 2-0 and “we are top of the league” chant the Northam and who can blame them.
Ten minutes later and it’s personnel and formation change again as de Ridder is replaced with Bald Psycho who gets put in a much more advanced midfield position than usual. It’s one way traffic at this point with Chappers showing up well in midfield but it’s Adam Lallana who creates goal number 3 by teeing up The Gulyman who passed it into the far corner. If he was any more laid back about that finish, he’d have been smoking a spliff on a deckchair on a beach in Rio. Great goal.
It’s looking like the score could be anything by now as Watford are chasing shadows and then they make my day by bringing on Chris Iwelumpo who is to football what Steve Cotterill is to football management. Sir Rickie nearly completes his second successive home hat-trick when he smashed a shot into the side netting from 25 yards. We do have a slight scare when Lallana plays Fox into the brown stuff with a poor pas but Fox doesn’t help himself by gifting the ball to a forward when he should have hoofed it into the crowd, called Adam a rude name at got back and defended. The Watford forward cut in and fired at the near post but Kelvin was Super again and made a decent save.
Morgan is on for Corky to ensure he doesn’t get sent off and it’s the Chappers show for a while as he fastens onto a Sir Rickie flick from a Hooiveld cultured hoof forward and crashes a left footed volley back off the far post in another yeahhhhh-ooh-sit-down moment. It’s Frazer Golac’s turn next as he runs the full length of the pitch before not knowing what to do and hammering in a shot which Gilmartin beat away. Chappers is at it again a minute later as Lallana slips in a cross from the left and Chappers sticks out a leg and diverts it goalwards but it hits Gilmartin’s foot and bounces clear.
Five minutes to go and Lee Holmes is on for Lallana and his first League action of the season, looking determined to put the ‘impact’ into ‘impact player’ which he duly does, cutting in off the right wing and firing in left footed from the edge of the box. To be honest, the keeper made a bollocks of it as it flew underneath him but a popular goal for a guy who deserves a bit of a break. 4-0
And that was that and a record number of consecutive home league wins which now stands at a very high number which I can’t remember or be bothered to look up. We were a bit ropey in the first half and got the break with the first penalty but in the second half we were pretty close to brilliant and it was great to watch. I said this last week I think but the strength from the bench is quite something with Chappers and Holmes being excellent when they came on. Also today we coped with the absence of Connolly and the Gulyman put in a decent shift up front. It would be nice though to have Lee Barnard fit so we didn't have to mess the established team around in order to cover one player missing. Danny Fox had his best game so far for Saints and it's good for the defence to get a clean sheet and in the main look pretty solid.
We’re at another international break and we are top of the league by 2 clear points as everyone beneath us seemed to get it wrong again. Middlesbrough are second and are undefeated but they seem to draw 0-0 every week which must be great to watch. In other Championship news, Sunday saw Forest lose again and Schteve McLaren resigned with the usual bellyaching about not signing players blah blah blah. How about coaching the players you have you muppet. It’s also worth noting at this point that we are 13 points ahead of the Skates which gives you a nice warm feeling.
Nigel was buzzing after the game with the quality of the second half performance and he has every right to be. I’m not sure when 10 games became the point that you judged how good your start was (probably some bollocks that Alan Hansen said on Match of the Day) but Nigel seems very keen on it. It’s worth remembering though that we have 36 games to go which seems like a hell of a lot.
See you 10 days, Derby away is up next followed by a real test to the winning run at home, West Ham and their owners, the Dildo Boys, trying desperately to get into the Premiership so they will maybe half fill their virtually free new stadium next year.
Let’s go watch some rugby. Swing Lowe, Swing Rupert Lowe etc… ha ha!
Another cracking write-up; I enjoyed it almost as much as the match!
ReplyDeleteLike you, I was also surprised to see the ref giving the handball free kick. However - if you look at the Watford photo gallery on Saints website, one of the photos shows it very clearly. Well done that man in black!!