They're Back... the Twats!
Fergie Lite is in town tonight with his Peterborough side who arrive at SMS, just a few places off of the playoff positions, having had a decent start to the season. They had an excellent attacking side last year but one of the players who was a pain for us was Craig Mackail-Smith who has moved on to Brighton. Little fat Lee Tomlin who converted the last minute penalty against us in the 4-4 draw last year is missing through suspension, leaving only George Boyd from last year’s strike force. Peterborough are the sort of side I would usually want to do well but then there’s their manager who talked such complete bollocks after the 4-4 game that it’s hard to look past that.
One thing for sure is that he doesn’t like Chappers who I reckon is due a goal tonight. Saints have been taking plaudits since the Middlesbrough demolition but there is no point in beating Middlesbrough and West Ham and the like if you’re not going to produce in the games you really should win, like this one.
Nigel made three changes from Saturday with Fox, Cork and Butters rested with Dan Harding, Morgan Schneiderlin and Frazer Richardson coming in. We had a shambolic minutes silence for All Saints Day as when the ref blew the whistle to start it, a lot of people thought it was the end and started to applaud, so it became a minutes applause which tests your clapping stamina and gives you Repetitive Strain Injury.
We and Chappers started where we left off against Middlesbrough as Bald Psycho won a corner following a determined run and from Harding’s delivery, Jose Fonte headed wide. Peterborough looked right at it for the first 10 minutes with Boyd in midfield pulling the strings. We on the other hand looked a bit disjointed but it all turned round on the quarter hour as Frazer fed a ball into the Gulyman from the right wing and the Brazilian maestro laid it off first time for the onrushing Chappers to sidefoot past Paul Jones (not that Paul Jones) from 6 yards whilst everyone wondered if it was offside. Chappers celebrated in fine fashion and it could only have been better if he’d done it right in front of the Peterborough dug out.
The fog was immediately lifted and Saints went for the throat and tightened the grip two minutes later after a foul on the Gulyman. Sir Rickie once more shaped to hammer it before playing it into Lallana who turned it first time to the Gulyman who scuffed it across goal to where big Jos was waiting. Always deadly from 3 yards with an open goal, he duly converted to make it 2-0 and floodgates, please.
Peterborough responded through Frecklington aiming a two footed tackle at the Gulyman which earned him a yellow card when on another day with another ref, could have been a straight red. Saints were pummelling them now with Sir Rickie nearly making it 3-0 with a right footed blast from the left which Jones shoved round the far post.
One definition of madness is to do the same thing over again and to expect a different result. Well, Frecklington tested that theory with a two footed tackle on Schneiderlin which wasn’t quite as bad as the first one but a yellow card was inevitable and off he went, idiot.
Possibly rattled by sending someone off, there was then some very strange refereeing when Morgan got fouled and the free kick was clearly given to Peterborough as indicated by the ref pointing in their direction. Whilst I was moaning at the crap decision, Deano took the free kick quickly and then the ref indicated ‘play on’. I can only assume that he meant to give the decision to us in the first place and just pointed the wrong way.
Peterborough retreated in a effort to get to half time without conceding again and sadly, our passing was not great and not quick enough. We were doing a lot of sideways and backwards and for the first time in a while, there was some aimless punting forwards, especially from the full backs where Harding and Richardson were competing for the ‘dodgy performance’ award. Dan seemed reluctant to move into the space in front of him and Frazer seemed to be playing a game whereby he got to where the ball was a second ago. Morgan was trying to hit Hollywood balls from just in front of the defenders and Lallana and Chappers watched a few balls fly harmlessly over their heads and out for throw-ins. Adam’s efforts to have an impact on the match were being impeded by wearing roller skates instead of football boots and each twisting and turning manoeuvre was usually ended by him falling over.
Half time and it’s time for some more child torture as irritating bald bloke tries to get a 9 year old to hit the cross bar from 20 yards when he can only actually kick the ball about half of that. Confounding my scepticism, some kid managed to do it though he does look a little bit older. As we line up for the start of the second half, Steve de Ridder is on for the Gulyman and we’ve gone 4-5-1 with Chappers infield and de Ridder and Lallana on the wings.
There seems to be a bit of an assumption that the game is done at this point as Saints pass it amongst themselves and Peterborough employ the 4-5-0 formation and no matter how hard we try, they are not coming to get the ball. The Northam amuse themselves by chanting “Steeeeeeeeeeve” every time the ball goes near de Ridder and this is quickly extended to other players. It’s funny for a bit but in the end it adds to the “taking the piss” atmosphere that has descended onto the proceedings.
We manage to get the ball in the net as Sir Rickie bundles in a Lallana cross but there is a foul on the keeper. Again, the ref didn’t really signal it clearly and I thought for a bit, that he was pointing to the centre spot having given the goal. Both full backs were pushing into the spaces now and we were pressurising well when we didn’t have the ball resulting in de Ridder nicking the ball off of their left back and eventually setting up Sir Rickie with a sitter. He hit it and we waited for the net to bulge but it hit the foot of the keeper who had dived the wrong way and pinged off to safety.
And then it started....”Why deeee do daaaaaaaat ?”, “Dere winning everyfiiiiiiing”. Oh yes, the Chuckle Brothers were back. Half an hour without a goal and they’re back. I imagine it’s what it’s like when you are told by a doctor that the horrible disease that you had has returned. You know, you had the disease and you got rid of it, all the open running sores had gone and you’d just got to the stage when you thought it had gone forever and you had the odd moment when it didn’t even cross your mind anymore. Another sub with Connolly on for Lallana and the moronic totally unfunny one pipes up with “It’s David Noccolly, Noccally is coming on”. I have one of those woolly hats on and I’ve pulled it over my ears and eyes and am counting to 10. I’m in my quiet place where it is calm. It works which is just as well as the alternative is to turn round and SHUT THE FUCK UP.
We have another chance when de Ridder sends a volley flying just wide and then Peterborough got into our half with their one forward taking on Big Jos for pace. He may be a big unit but he looks quite quick when he gets going and the perfectly timed man-and-ball sliding tackle at the end completed the job nicely. Big Jos does his job again with quarter of an hour to go and heads the ball clear only to find our midfielders absent and Boyd picks it up and has time to weight a decent pass through for Sinclair to run onto and score easily. Ooh, bugger, 2-1.
Chappers tees up de Ridder for a well shit volley which flies just wide before Jack Cork is summoned from the bench to replace Chappers who is taken off so Fergie Lite can give him a standing ovation. Corky starts well on the left, calmly keeping hold of the ball and manages to break forward to get on the end of a de Ridder pass and smash in a fierce goalbound shot which hits a defender and flies over the bar. All is calm as we mess about in the corner for a bit and play out the 4 additional minutes with no real alarm.
Though we struggled a bit to get over the line in this game, it’s ended up being a brilliant evening as West Ham drew 0-0 at home with Bristol City, meaning that we’re 5 points clear again. At a guess, Britol City had a centre back that headed away all the hoofs upfield. No matter how poorly we played, I bet West Ham would have taken a scrappy 2-1 win. We had a few too many poorish individual performances tonight but I think the sending off changed the game in a negative way for us in that we’d have won by more if they’d had 11. With 11 men and 2-0 down they’d have come forward to try and get back in it and left a load of space – as it was they played 4-5-0 and we couldn’t play through them. It reminded me of those shocking matches we played at home in League 1 when Pardew was manager where teams would come for a 0-0 and we would cluelessly fail to break them down. Anyhow, can’t be greedy...
Peterborough for their part did well after the idiot got sent off and I think that Fergie Lite’s approach was the right one as it would have done no one any good to have got humped 6-0 or something. They didn’t really deserve their goal but when it came, it made it more interesting and it did open my ears to the savage amount of moaning, just itching to be let out by my fellow Kingslanders. Fergie Lite praised us for being top of the league and then ruined it by saying that we tried to get his player sent off. Listen pal, you wanna be mad with someone, try Frecklington who could have got a straight red for the first tackle then managed to do the same again having been booked. He deserved to go, end of. Shut up you knob.
We have one more game before the international break and it’s a decent opportunity to show that we can win away from home when we take on Coventry at the Ricoh Arena. It’s the start of a run of 4 away games against teams in the bottom 6 with Bristol City, Doncaster and of course, our friendly rivals The Skates (where I know that the form book could potentially go right out the window). For the Cov match I expect to see Corky and Danny Fox restored to starting duties and hopefully Adam Lallana will have the right studs in his boots. As my Dad used to say to me 30 years ago... you can’t play football when you’re on your arse.
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