The Magic of the Carling Cup

Watched Rovers v West Ham last night, and realised that the best thing about watching the early rounds of cup competitions is the fact that sweary chants can be heard much more clearly at smaller grounds, e.g. Bristol fans at Ashton Gate giving it the "ooooooOOOOOOOOOHHHHH... YOU'RE SHIT aaaaaaaaaaaaah" every time the West Ham keeper took a goal kick.

In separate news, a mate of my brother's girlfriend was at a BBQ over the weekend and John Motson was there. Apparently he was very animated when talking about football, and utterly bored to tears by any other topic of conversation.

Get in!

We are now 6th on google for "Andy Townsend" searches. Well done everyone.

Best chant from first half of Man U - Spurs

... which the Sky Sports director allowed to stay audible for about ten seconds:

(to Tevez)

"You're just a shit Maradona, shit Maradona, shit Mar-a-donnnnna"

Also I kept thinking that Nani reminded me of someone, but I couldn't work it out. It was really bugging me. Then I got it:

It was "Old Gregg".

MOTD and Hansen Update

No Hansen tonight. That "candle wax" injury must be taking longer to heal than expected. Lawro is showing some form, however. He's made an excellent reference to Statler and Waldorf and is wearing the same shirt he wore on Football Focus this lunchtime; a shirt that looks fucking barbershop.

Postcard from France

... where I just saw Jarvis strolling down the beach at St Jean de Luz, avec bebe. J'reckon he's Blades or Wednesday? Probably on record somewhere... just touching on some of the points raised recently: free internet screening of games, what are you, a 15-year-old Cantonese schoolboy? Sky isn't that expensive, kids, and by dodging the Murdoch tax you're also missing out on such choice Sky statistical insights as metres travelled by referee (thanks), and of course, the goal replay where they trace the line of the shot, which is useful if, like me, you are frequently distracted mid-replay by, say, a sparrow alighting on your windowsill, and look back to discover the ball in the net and think "how the fuck did that happen?"... actually you're probably on to a winner there... agreed with stef re: necessity of commentary, enjoyed FRA v SLO with soothing French commentary, no doubt as boring and cliche-riddled as English comm. but could pretend it was thick with allusions to Descartes and Proust... surely L'Equipe is the greatest newspaper in the world? Why no English language equivalent?... fat frank for england

And Hansen is pissed

Unshaven, rambling and slurring his words.

Lawro is wrong

Bernd Schneider did that on purpose.

I'm a bit disappointed with Lawro's anti-German co-commentary.

Oddly, though, I found Motty's chuckle when the England fans were booing the German national anthem endearing.

"F***ing Jonathan Creek, who does he f***ing think he is?"

Excellent interview in the Times today with Big Frank Lampard, possibly the most unfairly maligned footballer in the Premier League.

His no-nonsense, criminally underrated game, reminds me of England's greatest midfielder of the 90s, David Platt.

The Dutch

Further to Marty's guide to watching football for free over the internet, I was watching the Mans City and Utd, and Liverpool vs. Chelsea this afternoon on a Sopcast broadcast of a Dutch sports channel (link from here).

With the exception of a brief period in which the commentary was in English and of a tennis match, the broadcast alternated between having no commentary and having commentary in Dutch. Inspite of the fact that I understood very little of what was being said (I wouldn't say I understood nothing - Dutch is, afterall, just German in a funny voice) the bits with commentary were a lot more enjoyable than those without. Turns out all you really need is the tone of voice acting as a musical score to the action, to get most of the benefits of commentary. I think this revelation - that what's being said is less important than that the tone of voice roughly mirrors the game - goes a long way to explaining the otherwise inexplicable successful careers of a fair few commentators, not to mention "colour men".

How to watch football over the internet for free

There are a few options for the skinflint office-chair football fan. Here's the two I favour:

1) Go to Channelsurfing.net, click the links and watch the games (sometimes with audio from a completely different channel for reasons I haven't worked out). Given that it shows all sports and Major League Baseball is notoriously litigious, I give this site 3 months maximum.

2) If you have a sense of adventure, you can always download Sopcast and watch ESPN Star Sports, which lends the games a false air of the exotic. You can also watch Soccer AM ripoff "Nokia Football Crazy" which is shit.

Any other methods welcome!

Thing I didn't know last week

Martin O'Neill is fascinated with serial killers. He queued to watch the trial of the Yorkshire Ripper, Peter Sutcliffe, and was a regular spectator at the Rose West 'House of Horror' trial.

Weirdo.

Sunderland manager and famed psychopath Roy Keane has put the boot into what he sees as a new generation of under-the-thumb footballers, after several players cut off negotiations with his club over the summer because their Wags vetoed a move to the glorious North East:

"If a player doesn't want to come to Sunderland then all well and good," said the former Manchester United captain and Ireland midfielder. "But if he decides he doesn't want to come because his wife wants to go shopping in London, then it's a sad state of affairs. It's not a football move, it's a lifestyle move. It tells me the player is weak and his wife runs his life."

It’s an entertaining rant that had me nodding along in agreement – until I reached the end and thought, how much would someone have to pay me to live in Sunderland, a city of 180,000 people and no cinema, and get shouted at by Roy Keane all day?

John Sadler in the Guardian today, with a mildly diverting article about the dumbing down of football punditry.

What is the way forward for improving TV football punditry? My suggestions:

1. Being a former player is not enough.

I think a vaguely successful managerial career should be a minimum requirement, if you are supposed to be explaining tactics and formations. I would also accept ten years of experience as a football journalist - the best football punditry around at the moment is Jimmy Hill's Football Supplement, shown on Sky, which is just four hacks sitting around reading the sports pages and debating football, with Jimmy interrupting randomly like a senile uncle.

2. Tell me something I don't know

There's no point in pundits telling me that the defending has been sluggish, or that the finishing has been poor. I know this, I'm watching the fucking game. Instead, show me something that I can't necessarily see for myself, because my understanding of football is limited. How the tactics have changed across the half/game; how the players are using space; what impact the formations are having on the flow of play - stuff that is obvious to the sophisticated observer, but not to the casual fan. Gordon Strachan used to do this to great effect on MOTD2, and Andy Grey is decent with his chalkboard - but this type of analysis shouldn't be parceled off into discrete packages ("Strachan's View"), it should be the meat and veg of all football punditry. Explain the game, don't just summarise the obvious.

Jumpers for goalposts

Paul Wilson has a post on the Guardian footie blog lamenting, with an apparently straight face, the decline of the 3pm kickoff, as if Sky Sports had only come into existence this season. I, for one, am all for loads of Sunday football, as it effectively makes MOTD2 the prime highlights show, and I like Chiles much more than Lineker, and am far more likely to be at home at 10pm on a Sunday than 10pm on a Saturday.

Yet more Lawro

Further to this post, I note Liverpool actually did win 2-1.

Unlucky Al.

Still doesn't change the fact he's an irritating scouse cheat...

Chris Dillow has an interesting post entitled Martin O'Neill and Objective Reality, which I won't summarise here. Just read it you lazy fuckers.

Two things Match of the Day didn't tell you about this game:

1) Benitez's new beard is excellent, lending his face that much needed "edge" that wins championships.

2) Martin O'Neill is turning into Craig Finn of The Hold Steady.

Why did David Pleat Leave Spurs?

In my previous post I mentioned Pleat's spell at Spurs in the mid-80s. But why was he forced to leave?

That's right! He was cautioned for kerb-crawling! Three times!

Wonder why Clive didn't bring this up more? And why was this no barrier to the ITV commentary booth, when saying a word off-air you can read on 4,120,000 webpages, not to mention hear in countless songs and films, is beyond the pale?

Let's go!

A promising venture, particularly as I'm Chelsea and therefore the target of 90% of the cant-stream. My first effort here will simply recycle a post published elsewhere, for a hopefully wider audience.

Things to look out for in 2007/8:

1. A commentator saying something along the lines of "Well he claims to sleep 14 hours a day... Essien was certainly caught napping there"

2. A back-page columnist making the point that, while injuries were a valid excuse for Chelsea to stumble last season, they're somehow not an excuse this season, even though they clearly are.

3. A completely bullshit story suggesting that Beckham is desperately trying to leave the LA Galaxy and is in talks with a Premiership club

4. A columnist arguing, as if it weren't completely obvious, that Eriksson is actually a really good manager after Man City win a few on the trot

5. Any commentator somehow alluding to Kieran Richardson's twat cousin BB Charley

Also hello; also Lawro

Hello. I will also be contributing to this blog. But I, on the other hand, like Lawro and think he's the best colour man in British sport.

See? There's already creative tension on here.

Hello; Lawro

Marty has invited me to contribute - thanks Marty - which is kind of him, as I watch almost no football nowadays. Not supporting any particular team, I look to analysts to notice the things I don't, to enlarge the experience with their perception. This almost never happens with football on British television.

Particularly offensive is Mark "Lawro" Lawrenson. What's that you say, Lawro? 2-1 to Liverpool? Of course you do.

Willkommen, bienvenue, welcome!

Hello and welcome to my new pet project that may die in a few weeks, or be the hottest internet shit, like, EVAR!!1

To kick things off, let's have a look at what Pleaty's predictions are for next season, courtesy of The Guardian's "The Season" preview.

He says:

1) Chelsea
2) Liverpool
3) Manchester United
4) Arsenal
=) Tottenham

Fuck the heck!? Man U offload gash like Richardson and Smith, and replace them with proven quality such as Hargreaves and Tevez, not to mention Nani and Anderson, and gnome-face thinks they'll drop two places?

He also thinks Arsenal and Spurs will finish exactly level, the cowardly bet hedger. You're paid to make predictions! Make them!

It's footballing idiocy such as this that meant, despite hanging up his manager's coat in 2004, he never won more games than he lost at every club he "managed" since Spurs in 86-87. The nob.