The Strutting Cockerel - The Good the Bad and the Ugly

November 2024

If anything is going to test the power of loyalty - its watching the Spurs. Some days I wish I'd picked a Mansfield Town or a Scunthorpe (BTW. home of the the best named 80's Fanzine ever!). But no, I'm here for life, and as witnessed many times in previous seasons, we're getting the Good, Bad and Ugly from our team - almost in equal measures! Can any team be as fickle? I mean 2-0 away to Brighton and cruising - foot off the peddle, rested on our laurels and wham! bam! - the floodgates opened and within 22 minutes we're looking like mugs.

But is there a (shining) light?.....strap yourselves in.

The Pikey's

Disliked opponents and our second most despised Club in London - it must be a location thang, as growing up I always quite liked Wet Spam. More to do with their moronic supporters I'm guessing! So, at home (where we deign to play our best football) 1-0 down to yet another pathetically defended, hopeful foray into our box - we just cannot defend for toffee our lot. However, it did trigger a lighting of the blue touch paper and we all sat back and watched a masterful display for the remainder of the match. Sonny looked like he'd woken up after 6 months hibernation. Udogie was more Dr Jekyll than Mr Hyde, and Deki was like a feral cat on P. Some brilliant movement and we were off - like washing blowing in the wind - all over the place and never still! That's better! You know when you pick the bones off a cooked chicken, this game felt like that (but without all the grease and gristle obvs). Goal contributions from Son, who donned his best dribbling boots on the day, Bissouma who scored from a great team build-up, an own goal (all our pressure) plus Deki's 'in-off' both posts, masked what should have been a 6 or 7-1 tonking. Won't mention the handbags incident towards the end but Kudus had no Kudos - get it? - well he did..... a nice little red card - from the Ref, with love!

THE GOOD

AZ Alkmaar (Europa League)

What can we say about this game. Ahh yes, enter our Shining Light. At last we saw what all the eulogising has been about over Mikey Moore. This commentator has seen snippets and highlights of our prodigy - the next 'one of our own', but never a whole game's worth. Well, to be honest it wasn't a bad game to debut in. We were distinctly underwhelming and always susceptible to the counter, it needed a spark to open up the game and MM provided it. By changing wings at half time, he became worthy of his own highlights reel. I'm not sure of the Neymar comparison by Madders though (I suggest his speed of thought couldn't identify a more realistic description of MM's display, so he plumbed for the first decent player that came into his head, just sayin' eh?) - remember Poch waxing lyrical about Marcus Edwards several seasons ago - and how that comment landed flat on its arse? We need to be a bit careful about pedestals and all that. But he did look good - and what a story it would have been if he'd converted his 'free' header in the first half as well! Another teenager, Bergvall - less influential in the game than MM, won us the pen, the one that Richy wrestled from Maddison - a touch of maturity there from our 'cappy' on the day. 1-0 and pffff it was all over without either side really breaking sweat. It was 3pts under the new system - and we're in the running ladies and gentlemen....

THE UGLY (coz we should have absolutely throttled Alkmaar, but didn't)

Crystal Palace

If I have a soft spot for Brentford in the west of London, I have to admit to having a degree of respect also for Crippled Paralysis in the south. Goes back to a League Cup match in the 80's - Palace vs Millwall at Selhurst. The animals joined our train at London Bridge and had eaten their young alive by the time we reached Norwood Jnct. We were met by 10ft high mounted police - and several hundred infantrymen lining the route to the ground. My mate and I only wanted to go and watch a match as it was an international week - he was based in Oprington (SE London - Kent) and a devout Saints fan - and me, I had a weekend off playing for Swindon. So we arranged to meet in town and take things from there. Once we'd agreed the Palace match was for us - he'd nearly done a round trip to get there - Orpington being just along from Croydon (Palace). For some reason we'd been lumped in with the neanderthals of the east end. Just before kickoff - whilst pointing Percy at the porcelain - a guy I went to college with in Soton, and a Palace fan, saw me and got us in with the Palace fans in the next pig pen. That lot sang their hearts out and bought us drinks whilst exchanging profanities and explaining with gusto what each group would do to the other if they got withing striking distance (something involving mothers and procreating....I think). Palace won 2-1 and we headed back into town for 17 pints of lager and a curry!

Why tell you all that? Well, it was a darn sight more interesting than Spurs performance at Palace on Monday morning! THE (VERY) BAD

Man City (Carabao Cup)

Why can't we play like this every game? OK, so Edison, De Bruyne, Rhodri, Doku/Grealish and Haaland didn't feature (a nervous haha - thanks God!) but we actually put in a decent performance! Hands up who thought we'd do our pack of cards trick or that Werner would score....Yeah, well plop to you! Funny, but we actually defended reasonably well - restricted Citeh to a few crosses and the odd wayward shot - but never to be underestimated there were enough class players in their side to be a threat. Great taken goals from Timo 'the Unfunny' (he's so straight laced!) and Saar - but Deki and Lolo were our best players. Mickey van der Spiderlegs, Cuti and Timo all came off with tweaks or strains - which doesn't bode well for the Villa game, but honestly, we should have had another 2 or 3 goals (what was Richy thinking of at the end there???). Make no bones about it, this was a good performance - especially first half! And Pep's congratulations to Ange at the end was testament to the great man knowing when one of his teams had been beaten by the better side.

So, we've come full circle to THE GOOD again!

To sum up, these last few weeks have been so up and down, even a yo-yo would be confused as to where we're heading. Ange has lost weight - I'm sure of it - either that or his tailor is making suits one size too big! The talk about Amanda Staveley's interest in buying out Danny Boy and ENIC in installments isn't going away. A useful vid on YouTube featuring Keith Wyness, a self titled Football Finance 'expert' and former Everton Director (says it all really!) suggests that AS's pending court appearance and insolvency hearings are all part of cleaning her laundry ready for a Panzer movement on Spurs on behalf of the Qatari's. Thoughts? Ms Staveley always appears a bit 'plastic' to me.....a little bit Lady Penelope only without the personality! - anyone else think so? - She'll need all the plastic she can muster to buy-in to THFC.

Things get no easier in the coming weeks - and I wish we'd banked more League points by now for fear of dropping into that 'also-rans' section of the Premiership. Maybe that's where we deserve to be - maybe we delusional sorts heed to reel our necks in - maybe we should settle for a Cup instead (yeah roight!). Lets see, maybe, maybe, just maybe.....

COYS! Pull your bloody socks up!

Richard