Beef Bagel

Psssst! Hey, you. Red hot rumour from White Hart Lane. Had a chat with Big Man before the game began and the word on the street, well, the turnstyles, is that Calum Davenport’s been sold to West Ham for £3m. My tallest neighbour heard it from a steward. Don’t know how reliable these officials from the Lane are, particularly considering they spend 90 minutes with their backs to the game but this was all before it was announced that Baby Face Gardner was to start and there was no back up centre half on the bench. Seems like we’re ready to make some moves. The question is, who is the replacement going to be?

But we don’t need to talk about that now. It’s not so important. Besides, why skip straight to the love making when foreplay feels so good?

Cardiff, now there was a slap ‘n tickle of game, if ever I saw one. The poor chumps were even blunter than before with perhaps all of one and half shots on target. You wouldn’t know it from their fans, though. Got to hand it to them. Still singing at three nil down, with llareggub to play for. The police had been stacking it about this home nation of tie with the Welsh flags flying high and the memory of trouble at the Lane in the very same fixture many years ago. There was a larger uniformed presence than I’ve ever seen for any group of fans. No derby day can match the rows of balaclava wearing, reflective jacket sporting met squad officers or the teams and teams of pigs on horseback or is that prunes wrapped in bacon? There were piles of manure on the streets. The Cardiff fans must’ve felt right at home.

They even went so far as to leave a whole four blocks empty between the home and away sets of fans. If you eyes have never seen the glory, that’s a good two thousand or so seats and as usual cut right into our hardcore end. The more goals we scored, the less we seemed to sing. There’s just no passion when there’s no challenge either and suddenly, it’s clear why Man U play in the morgue and the scum in the library.

We did sing. Every now and then and by far louder than our visitors but when you hear a constant rendition of ‘Men of Harlech’ for 30 minutes when you’re clearly out of the cup, you have to show a little respect.

‘You’re support is, you’re support is, you’re support is fucking shit,’ sang the Tottenham fans, The Bagel not included. Never has a chant been more wrong.

‘Tottenham’s a library, Tottenham’s a library, Tottenham’s a library, Tottenham’s a library,’ taunted the Cardiff crew to the tune of La donna è mobile (thanks to The Dave for that one). There was only one response and I’m glad what remained of the Park Lane faithful was on the same wavelength is El Bagelerino here.

‘Cardiff’s a shithole, Cardiff’s a shithole, Cardiff’s a shithole, Cardiff’s a shithole,’ we replied to that very same melody but that got me thinking. Tottenham, as a part of London is a shithole, it really is. There is no reason nor could there ever be or would you indeed want one, to ever visit that part of the world except to go to the oasis in that desert, that pearl amongst swine that is the beautiful Tottenham Hotspur Football Club. Actually, there is a half decent bagel outlet somewhere between Seven Sisters and Bruce Grove on the left as you’re going North on the High Road. So, which is worse, Cardiff or Tottenham? I decided to have a look…

…Cardiff has the Millennium Stadium…

…Tottenham has the Lane. I think we all know who wins that one. Retractable roof my arse. 1-0 to the Spurs.

Cardiff has a castle…

so does Tottenham…

…didn’t know that one, huh? Well it’s right there amongst a row of dirty chicken shops. You never stopped to look? It’s called Bruce Castle and it’s in Bruce Grove Park. Tough one this. A Norman castle beats a Tudor one but ours is still in use and besides…

…we’ve got a King to go with it. A goal a piece there. 2-1 to the Spurs but finally…

…we’ve got Robbie Keano and Cardiff’s got nothing like that for one simple reason. There’s only one Keano. So, it’s official by three goals to one, Cardiff is a bigger shithole than Tottenham. A good scoreline, I think you’ll agree but the margin was nothing like as close on the pitch.

Steeeeeed was the man of the evening with the pick of the goals coming from his sweet right boot. An over hit pass was collected with delightful control and the ball smashed into the top corner, right in front of The Bagel’s eyes. But everyone played well and it was just the tonic we needed after Sunday’s doom and gloom. As much as anything I got to know Big Man a little better, with both Little Man and Omar the evening’s absentees. Four times I had to jump for some of the highest high fives I’ve ever had to reach. A gentle giant is our Big Man and a man after the bagel’s own heart.

‘I’m on newsnow every minute of the day,’ he says to me.

‘Yeah, me too and I’ve Sky Sports News as well,’ I agree.

‘Well, you wouldn’t want to miss the breaking news.’ I couldn’t agree more, which brings us back to where we started, the breaking news. Who well we sign to replace the now lost Calum? Curtis Davies is my bet. I can’t believe we’ll sign a full back as a utility defender, ruling Micah Richards and Heinze out, certainly for this purpose anyway and I’m picking up vibrations of a move again to West Ham for Upson. So, there you go. The Bagel’s rational.

As an outside chance, there’s new murmurs of a move for Ricardo Rocha on the cards. According to the Portuguese press, the 28 year old centre half has been in talks with our good selves and could be switching sunny Benfica for life at WHL. So, Rocha, 6′ tall, 12.5 stone, sounds just about big enough to do the job. Here’s his head…

…hmmm, not sure I got that one right, although he would a lot class to jazz nights down at the Lane. Nishe. Somehow this tale feels like another load of bollocks. Probably reported in the The Mirror’s Portuguese sister paper, Theth Mirror. God knows what the score is hear but I’ll bet it’s resolved by the end of today.

Right that’s it. I’m stopping there for now. I’ve just had to delete a paragraph three times as conflicting stories have come in and it seems the Guardian are onto my Davenport exclusive. I’m getting this out there while it’s fresh.

‘She’s a bagel,

Woa, woa, woa,

She’s a bagel,

Talkin’ about my little bagel,

And the bagel is mine.’

The Bagel.

This entry was posted on Thursday, January 18th, 2007 at 2:39 am and is filed under Match Reports, Transfer News. 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.