You also get to see stuff others don't see, with my personal meaningless highlight being a Matty Blinkhorn hatrick in the pissing rain sometime long ago in the tinpot cup before the internet remembered everything for you. When people say 'Blinkhorn wasn't that great' I say 'ah, but you weren't in the crowd of 2,345 (or whatever) for the night he was' and feel a pathetic sense of exclusivity, like I achieved something by going to a not very popular football game cos I had nowt better to do.
Tonight my wish list is simple. I'm not one for big demands. I'd like to see: A Richard Keogh goal. That's basically it. I gave him a load of shite the other day, like being a blogger makes you some kind of special entity, able to pass judgement on stuff. It doesn't. It just makes you a wordy cunt writing about someone's misfortune and I hope crazy Uncle Richard shoves my cocky twat writing right down my gobby throat.
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Pool start well and put a bit of pressure on. These lot look a bit League 1. Remember League 1? Ha! What a tinpot league. We're *Championship* now. It doesn't matter that we haven't actually won in that division yet and this lot were almost as good as us last year and are in red hot form, being promoted obviously gives us an automatic ability to beat teams we were bricking it a bit about playing last year when we arguably had even better players.
Carey goes on a run up the middle, he lays it off to John-Jules who cuts it back and Lavery finishes with ease. We're a glorious football team and infinitely superior than this lower league shower of shite. I might go home now. I don't want to get bored when we're winning 23-0. I stay though, cos the north is in good voice and I fucking love it when chants overlay each other and there's depth to the noise.
It's all going very well.
It's all going very well.
Sunderland equalise. Because of course they do. There's hesitancy in defense. A ball slid down the middle to Aiden O'Brien who has enough space to pitch a caravan, erect an awning, put out a nice blanket on the grass and he makes no mistake under no pressure from anyone but the keeper. Hmmm. I don't know who was at fault but something didn't work then.
Carey is linking things quite well. Antwi looks a little off the pace but one lovely chase back and an an almost defense splitting pass give a bit of hope. CJ looks frankly lost. His best work of the half is defensive.
Keogh is Keogh. I applaud him tackling someone with aplomb. Positive reinforcement. Hopefully he'll get into the habit. Like them dogs and the bell.
Grettarson's delivery from the back is at times superb. Cross field passes onto a sixpence. We've missed that player who can switch it with ease. We've got him back.
We've got some slick play in midfield but struggle to break through that often until a sweeping move that ends with a Carey low shot saved. Sunderland keep threatening on the counter, hinting that they'll do what they did for their goal but they don't.
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What to say? It's 1-1 and I've said it above.
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Let's talk about CJ. Someone says he's not interested. I'm not sure. He's not CJ though. I consider the horrific possibility that he's lost faith in his explosive pace since his injury. There's an absolutely classic moment for him, a diagonal ball, all he has to do is turn on the afterburners and race away but he looks so, well, normal, as he chases it down, gets beaten to it by the full back and trudges away. Where is CJ Hamilton and who is this imposter?
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What to say? It's 1-1 and I've said it above.
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Let's talk about CJ. Someone says he's not interested. I'm not sure. He's not CJ though. I consider the horrific possibility that he's lost faith in his explosive pace since his injury. There's an absolutely classic moment for him, a diagonal ball, all he has to do is turn on the afterburners and race away but he looks so, well, normal, as he chases it down, gets beaten to it by the full back and trudges away. Where is CJ Hamilton and who is this imposter?
Crazy Uncle Richard is running up the pitch. He does this. He also gets lost at garden centres on days out and sometimes sleepwalks out onto the fire escape at away games. He plays it to Sonny. He shimmers and wriggles and shoots over the top. I like the fact he will have a shot.
I might write a children's book called 'Dan The Unlucky Viking' about a talented warrior for whom stuff just goes wrong involving slapstick injury. His boat sinks, his sword falls in half, that type of thing. None of it will be his fault. Sunderland get a corner when the ball hits him in face. From the corner the ball goes in and out and then in again, someone has a shot, Gretterson throws himself at it and it ends up in the goal. Deflation.
Embleton and the giant Ross Stewart comes on. Unlucky Dan does his best human crash test dummy impression as the giant knocks him over then tramples on him. I worry about Gretarsson. He's proper class but he just seems so breakable. He's not totally broken though this time. He gets up, dusts off the the stud marks, reattaches a few limbs and carries on.
I don't normally talk about the ref that much cos without being a boring cunt, they get stuff wrong and it happens but this lad is shite. John Jules gets clattered. Nothing. Someone gets battered in our half as they try to break. Sunderland get a free kick. Keogh wins a header from a corner, they get a free kick. It goes that way all night.
Shirtless Jerry, Bowler and Keshi are all on by now. Jerry's first contribution is magnificent, robbing the fullback, leaving him on the floor, dancing in the box to make an angle and cracking a near post effort in. Lovely. He motions to the north stand and the north obliges.
Bowler is brilliant in his cameo. He tears down the right, he whips the ball in, he hares all the way through the defense and just runs out of steam. He picks it up and play in Jerry with the most superb lofted ball, up in the air and curling down gloriously like a chip to the green that rolls round to the flag.
Keogh keeps winning headers for corners. First he head it down and it bounces up over the top. Then he nods it on but no one can claim it. Then he whistles one a bit wide. C'mon...
Bowler wins the ball, he's marauding again, he's standing up his full back, he lays it off, John Jules controls, turns, glides it across goal and there is Bowler to slam it home. Yes!
So, penalties then... or a winner! Corner, header, Keogh! No... Sunderland come again, ball through. Offside. It's fine. O Brien takes it on anyway and tucks it home, but we're going to be taunting them. Aren't we? Where's the flag. C'mon. Put the flag up! Why is the flag not up?... For fuck's sake. It's a goal. I'm not even counting it. It's 2-2. Surely? Everyone stands about and looks baffled.
We kick off. There's one last header from Keogh from one last corner and a Yates effort that's wide and flagged offside anyway, just to piss us off. And it's done. We're out. They're through.
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It was an engaging game. I always enjoy a cup game relocation to the north and it nearly had a cracking climax on a balmy evening. We wus robbed etc.
We lacked midfield presence and again, I wasn't convinced by James. He's tidy enough but he's neither a physical presence not a creative player. He got forward a bit more than I'd seen him before and it felt like he wasn't really the right player to have doing that either. I'm not sure really what he is. I think that's the point, he's a bit of an odd job man. He might be a great left wing back to be fair to him but I think he's just here to plug gaps and be cover here and there right now and didn't have the impact you'd hope in an inexperienced midfield (youth, plus the fake CJ)
Carey on the other hand looked promising again. He's not finished but he looked good enough for me to wonder what he's look like if the rest of our midfielders were fit and playing alongside him. We still don't have a right back. Garbutt got forward well enough, but Casey, whilst putting in some decent challenges wasn't offering much in terms of interplay and attacking. Why would he? He's a centre half and with a malfunctioning CJ on the flank as well, it really meant we were one sided.
Anyway, we probably owed them a win after the two games last year where we got six points through 'spirit' and 'battling' and 'fucking unbelievable saves by Maxwell' (i.e we were a touch lucky) and it doesn't really matter. It does a bit though and whatever you tell yourself, once your there and the noise is going, the tackles are flying in and you're called the referee a fucking cheating twat, you want to win that game. What we did see, was Josh Bowler on fire for a bit, Jerry looking revved up, John-Jules continues to set things up and maybe people will accept he's not Ellis Simms and that's ok... but it's not a win. Can't win em all tho. We'll just have to win the FA Cup. It's better anyway.
Onward.
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