I don’t know if you managed to catch MOTD2 on Sunday but after a busy few days I’ve finally been able to claw my way back to the forefront of footballing news in the smug comfort of my BT Vision. Yes, those of you with Sky+ may look down upon me with your Hi-Def box of tricks but I, in turn, scoff at those with just freeview or people who still use a pedal-powered black & white cathode ray tube.
So, I’m still slightly smarting that I opted for the worse of the two games the more I read about our performance on Sunday, although the freezing conditions on my return to Blighty do make me miss the sun and fresh fruit of the Littlest Big Country in the Middle East. Just for your info, I repeated the same trick on the flight back: three bottle of mini-red, seconds of plane food, 95% of a film and then out for the count. Incidentally, can anyone tell me what happens at the end of Transformers? I’m not quite sure the Dreamworks effects department had a 5cm x 5cm screen in mind when they brought the Hasbro classics to life but all the same it passed the time. The only problem was the damn thing just wouldn’t finish and I had to get rid of my processed fluids a good hour after I said to myself, “Just hang on in Bagel, it’ll end in a minute.”
2.55pm GMT+2. I know it’s not kick off yet my senses are naturally most heightened at 3 o’clock on Saturdays and Sundays no matter where I am. Why were dull in Tel Aviv. We’re not playing a whole lot better than when MJ was in charge, we just do so with a little more luck and steadily but surely, more belief. What the hell are we going to dish up today in a game that I wont even see? I wont have a chance to shout at the players, Wigan or Spurs, watching for any change in their play, the insults and advice of a thousand voices still ringing in their ears. I do hate missing a game. I feel powerless to help at the best of times but at two and a half thousand miles away, over 300 metres below sea level, lieing alone on a treatment table in a small room, covered in hot mud and wrapped up like tutankhamun’s human reefer, I think I’ve reached an all time low.
I don’t know how rare it is out here but parking two minutes walk from the stadium last night was a real novelty - exciting it may not have been but then neither was the game.
I think that’s the first time I haven’t wanted a plane to land. All too soon I was woken from my slumber, that would be much better described as unconsciousness, when the pilot’s voice crackled over the p.a. telling us to sit down, buckle up and prepare for a landing that could well have passed me by if he hadn’t flicked on the cabin lights like a bright torch shining in bloodshot, red wine eyes.
Today both The Bagel and the Tottenham Hotspur team will be flying out to Tel Aviv - separately unfortunately, for them. While Spurs have chartered one of Ryan Air’s Twin Otter aircraft with buy it yourself cardboard snacks and seats next to the rear gunner, I shall be traveling in the relative luxury of a British Airways flight, washing down as much free food as possible with mini after mini of red-wine-for-one in front of whatever motion pictures I have at my eyeballs and fingertips. I don’t remember the last time I flew non-budget. It’s amazing how excited you can get about normal economy class.
What a load of wank Match of the Day can be. So I get back late last night from a weekend on the Isle of Skye looking forward to some sort of taste of our trip to ‘Boro and I get barely so much as a nibble. I rarely rely on Gary and his cronies to tell me what happened to the Lilywhites at the weekend but if, like I, you hadn’t managed to see the game live or at least listen to it on the radio, you get absolutely sod all idea of how your team performed. Sure you see the goals but when did that ever tell the story?
…I hope to return to the tune of another win. MOTD has been set to record. I do hope Tottenham are set to stun. By the way, I just noticed a Guardian headlline “Jol slams Comolli signings” . Did Comolli do it on purpose or he is just an arse?
Have a good weekend.
The Bagel.
You are currently browsing the Beef Bagel weblog archives for November, 2007.