Beef Bagel

Bagels and gentlemen, this represents the last of the mid-night posts. Yes, this is my last night shift. New job and new sleep patterns as of Monday - at bloody last - and naturally a whole new Beef Bagel routine. Not sure how all the timing’s going happen. I’ve a feeling I’m actually expected to work at work in this next position, so I’ve been playing as much poker and as many internet games as possible this evening between Cheshire Cat grins and insulting all the people I’ve disliked over this last four months. Yes, I think we can safely say The Bagel has burnt his bridges.

Ok, I know what you’re saying to yourselves; I know, you don’t have to tell me. I can feel it in the sweat of your mouse clicking fingers. The question you’re asking is “How long before he mentions it? It’s got to be first on his list of transfer rumours,” and you’re right, of course it is. I know it’s a little on the hopeful side but yes, I’ve read the stories and I’m just as excited as you are. Ladies and gentlemen we may be getting rid of Younes Kaboul this summer.

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It’s just after 2am and I’m still rammed with salt beef. If you opened my mouth you could probably see the pinky ends of the meat fibres poking up in front of my soft palate. I nearly choked on a piece as I sat munching on my third mustard-laden sandwich. “Oh my God,” I thought for a second gasping through beef juice bubbles, “what a way for The Bagel to check out. I’m about to die a comedy death!” Fortunately, it was more my over-developed sense of the dramatic than a life-threatening incident of meat inhalation.

So here I am, alive, full and ready to discuss the details of a few of the strikers tipped to pick up where Sergei Bent and the Little Yiddo haven’t and didn’t quite take off. The name on everyone’s lips this week is Sevilla from Brasilia, Luis Fabiano. He’s actually from Campinas, nowhere near Brasilia but it also sounds nowhere near as good. Luis Fabiano Clemente, as his full name goes, is in his footballing peak at 27 years old and has picked up a healthy strike rate in his two years at Sevilla with a goal every other game. He’s 6′ tall and makes a strong enough target at over 13 stone. Here’s his head…

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Here I am. I do enjoy a long weekend and this one has been so deliciously long. Took the night off work on Thursday and went down to the dogs at Walthamstow Stadium - lost around 20 quid but picked - spent a night on the lash with Oog on Friday, but I’ll leave him to tell you more about that, and it was down to serious or semi-serious business on Saturday, and as matter of fact, Sunday with a spot of footy.

So, Pompey, eh? Nicely done is the way to sum up that encounter. They came, offered very little and missing half their squad who can blame them? I’m sure many of you caught it on Sky but if you didn’t it was a fairly dry affair until around the 70th minute when Juande played his hand and went what appears to be three at the back by bringing on Sergei Bent (fast trying to shed his new name) and Jamie O for tired looking combo of Safety First Michael Dawson and the beleaguered Little Aaron. It worked, we won, here it is…

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Well bugger me blue with a fish fork. That, my friends, was a game of football.

I had to make the quickest of turnarounds at the Bakery after my interview; out of my suit and into my Tottenham best with the shock horror that I’m wearing my “lucky” away pants which I’d given up on a long time ago. With no time for superstitions and pangs in my belly, I slap some butter and good layer of Marmite onto some granary bread with an evil eye on the cold slices still poking out of toaster where I forgot by breakfast this morning. Come to think of it the fuckers are still there.

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Ok, this is getting ridiculous. Not satisfied with doing my own work or simply playing flash games all night while I’m supposed labouring for some company on a temp basis, me and the rest on the graveyard shift have taken to playing poker. Now, I’m not talking about the online variety, I’m talking about six of us sitting around a board room table with a green baize cloth, two decks of ex-casino cards and a case of chips. I wouldn’t mind but I keep going out heads up with the better hand. I long for the time I’m back onto days but bugger me, I’ll never have it this easy again. Getting paid to lose at poker.

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Now, I would add my comments to the end of the last post but seeing as I was about to write this one, I didn’t want the conversation to be lost forever. I had a little read of that Joe Lewis article as well. Thankfully, it’s not as much as an issue as Ki Ki would like us to believe and of course being a banker up in his 11th Floor investment tower, I’m sure he knows that.

Bear Stearns, which sounds more like the droppings of a large North American mammal than a bank, and it’s crash probably has greater ramifications to the world economy as a whole than it does to the pockets of Joe Lewis or, more importantly, Tottenham Hotspurs. Thankfully our club works independently of The Billionaire Bomber’s cash and would only have to be sold if he found himself on the street and according to a club spokesman:

“He’s probably still sitting on the best part of £2 billion worth of assets.”

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To say there’s little to gain from today’s game would be an understatement. There’s a five point gap in front of us and a five point gap behind us and unless we win and West Ham not only lose but also get points deducted for masquerading as a proper football club, we ain’t goin’ nowhere.

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Storms on both sides of the sea made missing breakfast for an early start a blessing in disguise for the turbulent, Alton Towers-esque journey to Amsterdam. Once on terra firma with settled stomachs we grabbed lunch and took in some of the city highlights (art galleries rather than red light district – honestly!) before heading to the train for PSV. Met a few Ajax supporters also coming along to the game, seemed a good bunch.

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With much written about Juande’s proposed summer clear-out and the message to the players that the rest of this season is important in shaping the team, I thought we could have a little fun today. Let’s each be Ramos, just for Juande. Get it?

Anyway, what I’d like you to do for our collective amusement and to chip away at the hours until the weekend is put the Tottenham squad into three separate category according as whether or not they should be sold: Untouchable, Wouldn’t Lose Any Sleep and Dust. You’ve no need to write explanations unless you wish but just remember to keep a very pensive face so that everyone in your office thinks you’re doing proper work. Here’s mine:

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One kick away. It’s not Chimbondabond’s miss that sits in my head but JJ’s. To say I new he’d be the one would unfair. I thought that every time a player in white placed the ball on the spot, even for Dimitar the Great. One kick away. If he’d just put his foot through it, buried it, even a keeper’s arm wouldn’t have been enough to stop it.

He’s a sensitive lad, JJ, and I don’t want it sitting on his mind. He’s turned a corner in recent months and I don’t want a thing like that to ruin his temperament and good work. I hope it wont. Fortunately, it’s Bonders who’ll be blamed with his scuffed effort. Fortunate because he’ll probably leave us in the summer anyway. Fortunate, because he’s mentally strong enough, apathetic enough to deal with it. One kick away.

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