polaroids
That's more like it from Gabby's Villa babbies!
Posted on the 25th Sep 2012 in the category sport


This was the game that no-one wanted to watch.

The Man City fans couldn't be bothered and for the first time for a game involving Premier League teams there was not a stream anywhere on the internet. It comes to something when even the internet cant be bothered with a game.

I did not go after avowing never to step foot in the Eastlands after getting drenched seeing us concede seven goals in two matches and then thrown out for having a crafty fag to calm my anger of watching us being destroyed. 

But it appears we were all wrong because football and more importantly the Villa had other ideas. Our team decided we did not have to surrender before or during the game against the billionaires of Manchester. 
Gabby became an asset again, Delph fulfilled his potential and the Zog even scored.  And that is not even mentioning our former captain marvel giving us a bit of charity and scoring a wonderful own goal, it was a bit like when you get your ex some concert tickets two years after running off with her sister.

Balotelli was always going to score first, he always does against us, but it was the re-awakening of Gabby that will excite fans the most.
He is the only striker we have had in decades that scores regularly in big games against the top four and in derbies. But he has gone missing for two years, he needs a hug this fella, but perhaps previous managers have been scared to get close in case he impregnates them.
He has been played as a winger and midfielder, in the hole and almost anywhere but his proper position, hopefully Lambert will realise he is best up front, whether on his own or with a partner. 
Lambert must know getting Gabby back to his best will be like getting a multi-million million pound England striker we can not afford to buy. His pace is still electric and if directed properly can do the job on the pitch as well as he does on the job off the pitch.
Everyone likes a local boy in the team, especially in these days of teams of players from all corners of the world, but Villa being Villa Gabby has obviously come in for grief by our fans but hopefully this will be a turning point for him.
Delph played a blinder too, we need his bite in our midfield and if he can stay injury free it would be great for the club if he becomes the player he could be, after all he was being touted as the next England dynamo when we bought him.
Houllier surrendering before we played Man City in the FA Cup on the telly was one of the worse decisions in our history but Lambert thankfully decided that actually winning a cup is important.
We can not get near the top four of the league, and probably wont for years to come due to the money dominated Premier League, so the two cup competitions are the only chance we have of actually winning something which, after all, is what football should be all about.
This victory is the first landmark win of Lambert's Villa career, every manager needs one and I am delighted Lambert has done it, and our bonkers lime green colours too.
It is just a shame not many people got to see it!   



Don't worry De la Cruz is safe and well and so are the Villa
Posted on the 21st Sep 2012 in the category sport



 

I’ve fallen in love with football again, and by extension Aston Villa Football Club.
Sick to death of moaning fans, the uncompetitive Premier League and the unspeakable truth that my club will never win the league again unless a man with questionable morals buys the club I headed down the Amazon to get away from it all.
But on a boat on South America’s River Napo I remembered why football is the best game on the planet.
Despite the punishing schedule the captain and crew of our ship The Manatee decided to park up next to the jungle to pick up a satellite signal so they could watch the crunch South American World Cup match between Ecuador and Bolivia.
The battle of the high altitude nations proved a barnstormer of the match and though I can’t understand Spanish the commentary made it even more exciting as did the screaming and shouting around me.
After 70 minutes of dominating the game Ecuador won a questionable penalty and my new Ecuadorean friends went bananas, when it was converted the boat rocked more than when a job lot of honeymooners booked out the cabins.
Being a Villa fan it took me less than a minute to tell these hardy sailors that Ulises De La Cruz was still remembered fondly in Birmingham. He was my kind of player, tried his hardest, made mistakes but was also capable of  flashes of brilliance.
One minute he’d look as if he had superglue on his feet as he dribbled past three dazzled players and then the next it was if his boots were made of teak as the ball bounced off his feet into the Witton Lane Stand.
Well Villa fans will be pleased to know he is still playing and is Quito’s Playa de Liga’s midfield general in a side that is pushing the top of the league, what a championship that must be for him to be running the show in the centre of the park.
After watching a scratchy stream of the Swansea game at 7,000 feet up in the Andes I realised the Villa have got another player in the mould of De La Cruz, Daley, Atkinson, Chico Hamilton et al.
Our new striker Benteke will be a joy to watch, he is going to mix the sublime and the ridiculous within minutes and I’m sure some Villa moaners will grumble he is not a gilded genius but I already like the fella. He seemed to miss an open goal one minute and then scored the next. After all who wants a player who has it all and will get nicked by Man Utd or Man City in January to warm their bench.
Nope this Benteke is a great fit. He’s going to be worth the admission fee alone. 
And after getting back into Brum I find all my fellow Villa fans filled with confidence at last. We are two games unbeaten after all. Ronny Concrete Vlaar has been made captain by canny Lambert which is fantastic for the club because he has cult hero written over him as well.
He reminds me of Andrew Fortescue Mullen Gray, he will put his head where angels fear to tread, we’ve been waiting for a club talisman for a while and I think we’ve finally found one.
Then of course there is the news today that Disaster Zone Warnock has been sent to partner Zat Knight in what will have to be one of the worst defences ever in football. 
We travel to Southampton tomorrow, and despite them having the world’s nicest manager, I’d buy double glazing off the fella if he knocked on my door, I hope we go through them like a dose of salts so we can march up the league and prove the relegation worriers wrong.
I’m going for a Lambert Lime Green Lions win, and if we don’t manage it then not to worry, we’ve plenty more games to win.
Up the Villa!   

 



Spain are great but leave Greatest of all All Time title to Brazil 1970 please.
Posted on the 1st Sep 2012 in the category sport



So this all-conquering Spanish team are the greatest of all time, Alan Shearer said they are so it must be true.

But really? The greatest of all time, that means they would be better than the Brazil team that won the World Cup in 1970.

A Brazilian team that is still the by-word for pure footballing joy 40 years after they played with such style and beauty.

For many watching on TV that Brazil was football in colour for the first time but even seeing them now you can see their talent shining through.

Which team would you pay to watch? This Spanish team or those Brazilians?

Obviously not right now because half of them are probably dead but you get my drift.

So many analysts say the Spanish would play that Brazilian team off the park because of fitness, technical ability and modern tactics.

I'm not one to play around with the space time continuum hence comparing the past with the present is often futile but are humans are really born with more skill in one generation than another?

If that Brazilian team had been around today they obviously would have benefited from all the new health regimes and Lucozade products on offer now.

However, whatever time frame the two teams would play in Pele and Jairzinho would still be the best players on the pitch by a country mile.

Of course football is about winning, but it is also about entertainment and that hope of seeing something jaw-droppingly brilliant.

That Brazilian team were not afraid to try the outrageous, two of Pele's finest moments in that World Cup were misses.

He tried the punt from the halfway line against the Czechs and then his unbelievable dummy of the Uruguay goal keeper, he didn't score with either but it didn't seem to matter.

Could you imagine one of Spanish players doing either of those audacious moves, even in the group stages or a friendly, nope they would play a ten yard diagonal pass, again.

It's like comparing a brand new BMW to a vintage Ferrari. Of course the new BMW has traction control, air conditioner and an Ipod fondler unlike the older car, but some things just have a bit of magic about them despite being technically inferior.

On Sunday night the hyperbole went out of control, Alan Hansen started it of with "you just run out of superlatives about this team."

Well when you've only got "brilliant" and "unbelievable" in your vocabulary that's going to happen Alan.

The Spanish are a great team but not the best ever, yet these days the pundits cannot bare for anything to be just "good" it has to be mindblowing.

They try and make us feel lucky to be alive to have been able to watch what just happened on the football pitch.

Compare Spain's World Cup victory to Brazil's and there is no contest

But in reality, the Euro final was not a great final, it was a no contest because the Italians were knackered and then went down to ten men just as they were trying to get back into the game.

Compare Spain's World Cup victory to Brazil's and there is no contest, Pele's men won every game of that World Cup and scored 19 goals in the process, a feat never repeated.

And don't forget that Brazil team scored one of the greatest goals ever scored when they beat one of the finest Italian sides ever (all 11 of them) in the final.

Eight of their players touched the ball in a move which started by their own box.

When Clodoaldo picked it up he dazzled four Italians, then passed to Rivelino who passed it down the wing to Jairzinho who zipped inside and gave the ball to Pele.

Then as Cantona said Pele produced the most beautiful lay off in the history of the game to a freight train coming out of camera shot who drives it into the corner of the net.

How many school children and grown men have tried to emulate Carlos Alberto's diagonal master blaster?

Leave all this greatest of all time lark alone please

There are still windows, gates and fences being broken across the world due to footballers trying to nail that technique.

I'm not knocking the Spanish, of course they are the best team in the world now but leave all this greatest of all time lark alone please.

I bet they are even embarrassed by it.

When were they last involved in a truly great game?

They are the kings of the clean sheet and one nil win, an unstoppable footballing machine.

This Spanish team is like a beautiful woman who is crap in bed, after spending two hours in their company you come away feeling disappointed because you know it could have been better.

And of course, you also know she has an even better sister in Barcelona.

Where as just a quickie on YouTube watching the 1970 Brazilian team is life-affirming, joyous and gives you a glimpse of everything that football could and should be.

Go on just try it and you'll see what I mean, you'll get a warm glow.

 




 

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