Beef Bagel

I don’t know if it was he 36 hours rest, our loss in the UEFA Cup, the horrific scenes in Sevilla or the fact that playing Chelsea away this season is just a case of been there done that. Whatever the answer, there was certainly a rather large shadow of who gives a fuck over yesterday’s game against Chelsea.

Alex Fergusson seemed to be the most interested party in this fixture that I could barely be bothered to watch. With the real drama on hold until Thursday, our biggest guns rested and the fact that no one has taken three points off Chelsea at the Bridge since the dawn of time, this game just edged it as the most pointless of the season.

I sat in the Hope and Anchor in Brixton nursing my hangover and orange juice and lemonade, waiting 90 minutes for Chelsea to put the two goals past us that they were undoubtedly going to do. In the end, of course, it turned out to be one and a rather annoying one at that from a rather anoying player but then even if it hadn’t gone in, it would have just been a case of Mourinho bringing on increasingly expensive players until one either put it in the net of bullied the ref into giving a penalty or free kick close enough for Lamplard to deflect in.

Chelsea deserved to win. We didn’t really try and why should we? This was the game to lose. Rest the squad and concentrate on the other fixtures in hand. You could even see that MJ himself wasn’t exactly too fussed at the outcome to the point where he sent Chris Hughton out for some post match interview practice instead. We all just had bigger fish to fry.

The only thing that really annoyed me about this fixture was in the words of the Chewing Gum Machine in the build up with his thinly veiled whinge at Chelsea having the edge over his United:

“I am just surprised Spurs have allowed it to happen. If they lose — and lose out on a European place because of it — I don’t imagine they will be very happy.

“It is the Tottenham supporters I feel sorry for. They have travelled to see them play in Seville and now their team is asked to play again so quickly.”

Fine be annoyed that your team’s rivals have an edge but don’t you dare for a second pretend that you give a shit about us. Firstly, if we don’t’ get into Europe it wont be because we “drop” three points away at Chelsea and secondly, where was your concern for the Tottenham fans when we were being beaten over the head by the Spanish riot police or in fact, when we didn’t get into Europe through a different injustice, namely Pedro Mendes’ goal that never was? Just keep your stupid red face out of it and concentrate on winning your own games or losing them to Portsmouth. The decision is yours Fergie.

The only interesting part of the match yesterday was the last twenty minutes or so as player by player we subbed on a more dangerous team. It was good to see Taarabt get a decent run out and although far from the finished article, he definitely added a certain edge that the previous 70 minutes had lacked.

It was a little worrying to hear of the knee injury to Lee and having to see a not particularly convincing Chimbonda at left back. He was fine defensively but there was just no service in attack. We need to come up with something better come Thursday and for the rest of the Premiership campaign for that matter. We’ve got a good run in but by no means a walk over. We’ll have to maintain our form if we’re to get what we want. Particularly with Everton, Bolton and now Portsmouth right in the game. This is no time to fall so close to the finish line.

So few bagels and such little time.

The Bagel.

This entry was posted on Sunday, April 8th, 2007 at 2:48 pm and is filed under Bagel News, Match Reports. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.