Gonna Miss the Vital Penalty Later On, You Arsehole!
Sheffield United away in the Carabao Cup 3rd round at Bramall Lane is certainly not the easiest game we could’ve been given at this stage of the tournament. Whilst I fully expect The Blades to rest players because they will be focused on getting back into the Premier League, they still have a squad of players who have performed relatively well at Premier League level not so long ago. Fleck, Baldock, Egan, Hourihane and Bogle are all half decent and then they’ve got a couple they were shit at Premier League level like Rhian Brewster who did, lest we forget, cost them more than Saints have ever paid for a player. They will of course have Ollie McBurnie. How could I forget – oh yeah, I know, I forgot him because he’s a twat. Who remembers in pulling out a ridiculous dive at St Mary’s and injuring his shoulder when he landed. Hilarious.
I am anticipating the debut of our latest signing today which
was the whole £6 million we spent on Lyanco Vojnovic from Torino. All we’ve
seen of him so far is his social media, which has been a mixture of good
wholesome family stuff and mad promoting of the club, which is to be applauded.
He does seem like a real character so I’m really hoping that he is playing
tonight.
In the aftermath of the Manchester City game, there has been
a concerted media campaign about “the foul” in much the same way that there was
when Bruno Fernandes got tackled, which led to the first goal at St Mary’s.
This of course is a big dirty lie because it’s Southampton of course and no one
gives a fuck. I had it said to me on Twitter by a sad bitter United fan,
probably based overseas, that the Walker charge on Adam Armstrong was the same
as the Stephens / Fernandes incident. Yeah, just a couple of major differences,
Jack Stephens got the fucking ball and a decision wasn’t overturned by VAR. We March On.
Our team for today was in the event, surprisingly
predictable. Fraser returned in goal, Valery and Perraud at full-backs with
Lyanco making his debut alongside Salisu. There was a surprise in midfield
where JWP was rested to bring in Diallo. Redmond and Djenepo were on the wings
with Broja and Tella upfront. The Blades rested quite a few. There was no Billy
Sharp or David McGoldrick but Arsehole McBurnie was in the team along with
Brewster, still searching for his first goal.
Away we go and very disjointed. It only took us eight minutes to go behind
with Bogle getting past Perraud far too easily following a throw and his
pull-back went right across to the left hand side where ex-Skate Enda Stevens
was completely unmarked and rammed it into the net giving Forster no chance.
It’s tempting to look at Valery because it’s his man who scored but Valery is
picking up someone else so there is clearly been some sort of communication
issue somewhere but either way, one fucking nil down and a Skate has scored.
Tremendous.
The Lyanco-Salisu centre back pairing doesn’t look too clever
and Ollie Burke gets away down the left before crossing right across the 6 yard
box but thankfully no one is there.
Up the other end through Valery and via Broja, the ball is worked back
to Romeu, who clips it in first time and there to glance a free header into the
net for about 10 yards out is Ibrahima Diallo for his first ever goal against
anybody. Football is a simple game, get good crosses into the box and have
runners arriving from midfield.
Lyanco is having a right battle with Arsehole McBurnie but he
ends up on his arse in one challenge and N’Diaye gets a run at Salisu. Through
the legs he goes with a possible accidental nutmeg but thankfully he shat
himself as Fraser came out and poked it wide.
McBurnie then leaves something on Lyanco as he heads the ball
away, which Lyanco is not terribly happy with and Valery stands up for his man
but McBurnie of course gives him a shove into Lyanco and it all kicks off. A
yellow card for both Lyanco and the Arsehole and level at half time.
The second-half starts with the anonymous Redmond now being
even more anonymous on the bench and JWP has come on and we seem to have
shuffled to a back three with Romeu dropping in between Lyanco and Salisu – the
theory is that as Lyanco’s interpreter, Ori can sort him out a bit. We start
off with a decent move down the left which eventually leads to a shot from
Diallo which Broja catches (literally) in an offside position before rolling it
into the net. That’s not going to count for all sorts of reasons.
A few minutes later, after a good run and cross by Perraud and
a shot from Tella, we win a corner. Tella rolls it short to JWP who gives it
back to him and Tella makes his way towards the penalty area before rolling
across low and Salisu has darted away from his marker to side foot it into the
net. Really good finish from the big man and 2-1 and we really should close this
out now.
Where would be the fun in that though? The lead doesn’t last long as we try and play the ball across the defence with JWP and Romeu being on one wavelength and Lyanco being on a different one altogether. His attempted return pass to JWP is a shocker and presents it to the opposition. A quick cross to the back stick and there is the Arsehole McBurnie and he really can’t miss. Bollocks.
There is a chance to win it in the last five minutes. Che Adams has come on as a sub and is getting a huge amount of stick from the Blades fans because he left Sheffield United about six years ago, which seems kind of pathetic but he produces one of those Che Adams misses that you cannot quite get your head around as Perraud gets down the left and puts over a wonderful curling cross and Adams meets it 5 yards out gets a good connection and smashes it towards the goal but the goalkeeper Foderingham somehow throws himself across and claws it out. Great save but how the fuck has he not scored that?
There is one last chance to win it as Broja goes barrelling away down the right hand side leaving a trail of players in his wake before getting his head up and playing a lovely ball across to where the sliding Adams can’t get a touch and Shefford United get away with it again.
Straight to penalties it is then. It’s hardly England in the Euros Final but tense nonetheless. No one wants to lose to a team with Arsehole McBurnie in it.
JWP – well we know what side it’s going…. top corner, good luck saving that! 1-0
Norwood – you realise just how big Forster is in this scenario…. Goal, he’s properly hit that and a good pen but Forster has got fairly close to it. 1-1
Che Adams (Booooooooo! Booooooooo! – why are we booing Dad? It’s what we do son, Boooooo!) – Goal, ssssshhhhh! 2-1
Brewster – This has got to be a chance, his confidence must be lower than McBurnie’s IQ, here he comes, oooooh, dance steps, that always works…. SAVED! To be fair, he’s hit that well and it’s a great save by the big man. 2-1 Advantage Saints. Has Brewster actually scored for Sheffield United yet – even in training? Fancy doing the wanky stutter steps, which worked so well in the Euros for England. Anyone want to do that thing where you divide Brewster’s transfer fee by the number of goals he’s scored and work out how much each goal cost. You can’t because dividing by fucking zero is a bit of a hard thing to do.
Back to the pens - Armando Broja is next, hmmmm, not over confident as he’s not had a great game… and off a short run up he absolutely lamps it to the goalkeepers right but to be fair, Foderingham takes off and pulls off and equally impressive saved to the one that Fraser just pulled off – Balls, 2-1, one miss each.
Osborne – everyone has gone keepers right so far…. creams it down the middle and Fraser is going to his right again, 2-2
Diallo – I have confidence in the man…. off a short run…. casually sidefoots it past the keeper to the left. Lovely pen, 3-2
Arsehole McBurney - Miss it you big fucking shit house, miss it, then start a fight with yourself you twat….. bang, keepers left, SAVED Fraser, fuck you McBurnie. 3-2 and Match Point and it’s your fault.
I can’t think who’s going to be next…. Perraud?... Romeu – ok then. Tonight’s captain strolls up and…. casually sends the keeper the wrong way to put us through to the last 16. Get in!!!
Well we certainly made unnecessarily hard work of that but if we’d closed it out for a 2-1 win, we wouldn’t have got to see Arsehole McBurnie missing the kick that sent his team out of the League Cup, so putting ourselves through a penalty shootout was well worth it in the end.
The main talking point for us that I was always going to be the performance of the Lyanco and how he settled in. To be fair, he had a bit of a shocker at times but as Ralph has said, it is always going to take time with him being new to the country, not speaking the language and Sheffield United are about as far removed from the football he is used to that anyone could be. Give him time. There are plenty of players around who have not had great debuts but have become consistent performers. Jan Bednarek is a good example of someone who joined for a similar sort of fee and look like he didn’t have a clue for his first four or five games.
Talking of our central defenders, it was revealed by Ralph after the game that Jack Stephens will be out for about 12 weeks with a knee injury which is not great news. It’s desperately unlucky for Jack who had gone from 4th choice last season to being a first team regular and it does mean that Lyanco is now the first choice replacement so he might not have as much time as Ralph would like to adapt to English football. There is of course also the option of promoting Dynel Simeu from the B team and I imagine that will happen.
It was nice for Fraser Forster to have a moment in the Sun. He is certainly the best goalkeeper we’ve got when it comes to saving penalties so that worked out well today. Another interesting performance today was Ibrahima Diallo who played slightly further forward at various points of the game especially in the second half. It was good for him to prove to himself that he can be a gold threat as well. From what I saw I was slightly disappointed with Armando Broja who needs to work on his consistency because for about 80 minutes of this game, he seemed very static.
There is a certain irony that the only job that Harry Redknapp is suitable for in football these days is drawing balls out of a sack, bearing in mind but he looks like a ball sack. I know it’s not Harry‘s fault but we didn’t have long to wait to find out who we were playing once the draw had commenced and we were in the first game drawn out and got fucking Chelsea away from home. Well, bollocks!. Let’s enjoy tonight’s excitement and bring on the Wolves on Sunday.
No comments:
Post a Comment