To be honest, this is one where I’m just typing to get it over with. I sometimes wonder what it must be like being an actual writer. I think it must be a bit shite sometimes cos you are just pressing keys to fill the space to pay the bills. Them absolute wrong un's that have an opinion everyday in the paper about current affairs can't actually have than many opinions. I only have about 6. That wouldn't get me through a full week... This isn’t paying the bills but it’s become a thing I have to do. For me, not you, cos you don’t not pay me to type this shit for the sake of it but it seems I have to do it to fulfil some kind of obligation I’ve invented in my own head.
Is anyone still reading?
My head is mashed before the game. My soul feels like an old bin bag caught on some barbed wire, shredded and blowing in the breeze. What’s the fucking point of anything? I need this game to be an uplifting experience. Something to set the tone for the week. I’m sure the Mighty will oblige.
I’m a bit tired. Feeling a bit sorry for myself. You may have guessed from the opening bits... The wind buffets the car, the rain runs in rivers down the windscreen. A sudden squall of starlings swirl round a skeletal tree as if in search of the summer that has vanished. It’s all very gothic.
Someone has scrawled graffiti on three consecutive motorways bridges. You’d think the dedication that would require would mean that the individual had some deep and meaningful attachment to an important cause. The text goes from the polite “Keep lef (sic) unless overtaking” to the rather more impolite “Why are you a middle lane moron?” as we pass beneath the trio of bridge spans. Imagine hanging upside down with a spray can in the middle of the night over a live carriageway to write that. The mind boggles.
It boggles (I don't like that word) again when I learn Gary is nowhere to be seen. Please don’t let him be back to Call of Duty with a pack of tinnes on the sunbed for the next 4 months. I’m already too cold to think.
—
The game starts with swirling wind and balls being sliced out of play. It continues thus for a while. Luton look pretty shite. They don’t seem to have any strategy at all. Their only effort for ages comes during the 6 minute applause prompting a weird moment where no one quite knows what to do. Such things put life into perspective. I’m fuming at it but really, what have I got to fume about? Grow up you melt. (that’s me talking to myself. That’s the sort of bonus content you don’t get from Matt Scrafton or that Lancs Live hipster)
Gradually, Pool make sense of the conditions. They create a simply beautiful chess like move. Actually, it’s more like draughts, the ball worked diagonally forwards and backwards until Luton are dizzy and the it’s lifted from wide left to Dujon Sterling who is free at the far post. The ball is half a yard too heavy. Nearly brilliant though.
That’s the story of the next 15 or 20 minutes. We do everything except score. Their keeper summons the spirit of Lev Yashin to keep out a drive from distance from (I think) Wintle. He makes a stunning reaction stop from a flick header by Dale who is about four yards from the goal line. Even when he saves one and turns it into the path of Demi Mitchell the ball is somehow smuggled onto the post.
We are really good (even allowing for the conditions) for that little spell. Keshi looks like a proper no 10. Jerry is all twinkling toes and tricks, full of invention and running. We do everything you’d want us to except score.
Then, just before half time Luton go and score one of those horrific, painful goals that comes against the run of play at the worst moment possible. The ball goes in. They score. It’s fucking freezing and they’ve been absolutely anonymous but here they are wheeling away and celebrating. This is apparently what I’ve chosen to do for fun on a Saturday. Get really cold and watch us concede a sloppy goal to a shite time at the worst possible time.
—
I’m too cold to think tactical thoughts but we don’t have any big strikers or brilliant midfielders on the bench and to be honest, we could have been 2 or 3 to the good so we’ll stick with it for now. He will anyway cos he always does.
—
They make a change. Why do I always feel a bit worried when they change things? We seem very keen to change between games but never seem to take the initiative with them. They seem a bit better. They are quite physical up front and win the ball with a bit more intent than they did in the first half. We start ok too though, Jerry lashing a decent effort that is deflected over the bar and looking like we could get back into it.
We don’t. We just get washed away by the weather. Their second goal comes from a ball that is flung into the box, catches on the swirling wind and falls perfectly at the far post. We look confused. They look delighted.
The game is done. We send on Bowler and then Lavery but it doesn’t really make a whole lot of difference. With a two goal lead, they can just let us play and block everything that comes in. We make quite a few positions, but we look sluggish and the final ball isn’t what it should be. Maybe that’s unfair on the final ball, I’m not sure cos it’s all up the other end, but it feels like we are putting it in quite often but we’ve got no one who, like their big forward who puts Ekpiteta on his arse with a little shrug, who can cause much chaos.
Sonny Carey is the one little bright spark. He comes on and plays a deeper role and is noticeably quicker to move the ball and keen to run with it. One lovely burst where he motors right through the midfield and looks to be through is sadly cut short by a cynical foul at a point where a goal might just have given us a chance.
Luton score again. I’m past noticing. All I can remember is it’s another close range finish. I could look it up, but I can’t be arsed. You don’t get such searing insight from the mainstream media.
This game can fuck off.
—
Bloomfield Road is wind blasted and the gale brings us the sound of Luton celebrating. I’ve been quite uncomplimentary about them but to be fair to them, they took their chances and were quick to understand that we huff and puff but we’re probably not going to blow any houses down and also quick to understand that in the weather induced maelstrom, A big lad who can unsettle a defender who is already trying to deal with the unpredictable flight of the ball is probably a useful thing.
We had a really good spell, but for much of the game we looked a bit ponderous. At one point, I shouted ‘and GO!, for fucks sake!’ in frustration of our wingers appearing to be possessed by the spirit of Ollie ‘check back and maintain possession at all costs’ Turton instead of chancing their arm against the full back. Possession is great, but it felt like a game for just taking a chance and seeing what happened in the chaos to me. As much as Bowler frustrates, he has a go and gets us over halfway or into the box.
If there’s no Gaz, there’s no Goal Machine and we don’t have anyone else who can do what he does. I actually wanted to see us chuck Marvin up front or lump it at Crazy Uncle Richard just for the sheer thrill of it once we were 2 down. We looked basically small and slow in moving the ball. I know I bang on about wor Gaz, but twatting it at Jezza and Shayne in a hurricane was a hopeless ploy.
There was a short period where we did play quickly and with incisiveness but much of the game seemed to be our midfield taking a few extra touches and then playing the pass they might have played 2 seconds earlier anyway or Jimmy and Marv knocking it to Maxwell in a way that looked a bit dicey. To be honest, defensively, we were a bit dicey today. I don’t really want to go through who was to blame for what, but we just didn’t dominate the box like we can.
We weren’t very good apart from a portion of the game when we were. We did a lot of clapping each other and exhorting ourselves but once it had gone, we had no way back. They were very good at taking what fell for them (that’s maybe a bit unfair but they didn’t exactly cut us to ribbons time and time again) and ultimately won comfortably because they managed the game far better. We’ve got a massive squad, but it seems to be made up of about 20 wingers and fullbacks and we really couldn’t find any other way to play other than trying to score the perfect goal on a day that really didn’t seem made for that.
Another day, we’re 2-0 up at half time but this was today and we weren’t. It was cold, wet and shit.
Life goes on. You can follow MCLF on Twitter and Facebook or subscribe directly by email on the homepage
If you appreciate the blog and judge it worth 1p or more, then a donation to one of the causes below which help kids and families in Blackpool would be grand.
utmp
0 comments:
Post a Comment