On The Piss

Chelsea 2    Manchester United 1

There. One match down and one to go. Mr. Chelsea did the talking ahead of this epic tilt at Stamford Bridge. And David Luiz and Frank Lampard did the rest. Luiz with a beautiful 10 yard tap-in off Michael Essien’s cross via Ivanovic at the 54 minute mark to level it after Rooney had lumbered one in from 25 yards at the 30th minute to give Man U a 0-1 halftime lead.  And speedy Frank Lampard with a penalty kick at the 79th minute to seal the deal. No goals yet for Torres, but his presence on the pitch is making a difference in ways that aren’t showing up yet on the scorecard ((except for the final score ofcourse)). Lampard’s goal was the result of a penalty on Chris Smalling’s block of Yuri Zhirkov in the area, but to hear it from Sir Alex Ferguson, it was Head Referee Mike Atkinson who should be credited with the assist, and naught Zhirkov.

Sir Alex raised  his usually holy hell about Atkinson, accusing him of intentional bias and all that dross. Sir Alex has got to stop talking about refs like he’s on the piss….if he were an NFL head coach, Roger Goodell would’ve had him serving a few games suspension and making a sizable donation to an NFL Charity. And Sir Alex has to count his many blessings that he’s a Premier League gaffer and not in NASCAR. His remarks would have unquestionably brought down the wrath of the Triad of Brian France, Mike Helton and Ryan Pemberton raining down upon him….and a quisling violation of Actions Detrimental To Stock Car Auto Racing would be the least of his worries. Helton and the boys would have at the very least put him on probation for the rest of the season if they didn’t suspend him….but in any case, his team would have been docked points. And given the severity of Sir Alex’s accusations, it would be a sever points hit….25, 30 points let’s say…and now Man U is at the lower reaches of the table…teetering just above the relegation zone.

Meanwhile United followed up this clash of the titans with a miserable 3-1 beatdown at the hands of Liverpool. And United’s rather ho-hum season, as if a sheet of beige had been laid over a sheet of pastel red, started to teeter on the brink of Chelseaesque despair. One could only hope.  But they did return home to rise up and topple Arsene Wenger’s Squad of Ballerinas by 2-0 which left the Arsenal gaffer whinging and bemoaning the general state of affairs regarding officials and other related dross. Now unlike Sir Alex, when Wenger goes on the piss, it’s a more dignified piss…assuming one accepts the assumption that the French are inherently more dignified.

To be honest, both Arsenal and Man U are in disarray…Arsenal more obviously so. Both United and Arsenal have been tops of the table more so by default owing to Chelsea’s long Grim and Seemingly Endless Bad Moment. United’s season long mediocrity (by THEIR standards, mind you) might cost them the title. I said might. Chelsea can and will make it very close…a lot closer than thing looked a few short weeks ago. Arsenal, however is definitely on the piss, and not in a good way.

Actually, all three of them have been on the piss for most of the season. So let’s join them now, shall we? Off to the boozer we go.

 

Sir Alex Ferguson just called me. He told me: “Sod Off You Dopey Wanker!”

I rarely, if ever, offer much in the way of vignettes from my personal life since I’ve been resolute in not allowing the facts to get in the way of the truth. But I must mention here that my wife and I just acquired new cell phones a week ago last Saturday. We upgraded to LG Optimus Android phones. Finally, at last, I have a phone that is smarter than me. I mention this because last Sunday, a week ago as I type this on my Virtual Adler J-5 Typewriter, I was sitting here in my office and playing an online Airline Simulation Game, and suddenly my phone started CHEERING! It was like a crowd at a Football Game. That kind of cheering. It startled me. And I thought,  “What the hell…I don’t think I set that as my notification ring tone.”  Then I checked the notifications.

Dirk Kuyt had opened the scoring against Man U at the 34 minute mark. “Well I’ll be damned,” I thought. “So THAT’s what my EPL Android app does.”  I set the phone down and went back to my Airline game.

Five minutes late the phone starts cheering again. It was Dirk Kuyt again, popping another bullet into the heart of Man U at the 39 minute mark. “Wow!! This is great!!” Both the goal and the app.

At the 65 minute mark of the match, the phone started cheering again. And guess what….it was Dirk Kuyt nailing down the hat-trick. And when the phone cheered again a bit later, I thought “What the bloody hell….did he do it AGAIN?” But..nah…it was Chicharita squeaking  a consolation goal past Pepe Reina in garbage time.

The phone cheered 6 more times that morning, as Tottenham snatched a 3-3 draw from the jaws of victory up at Molineux against the Wolves.

My phone will do this all the time now. I can be driving down a road somewhere in SW Wisconsin and my telephone will deliver a bright little dispatch from the beautiful game. The thought of that pleases me to no end.

I will note, however that there is about a 2-5 minute delay between the actual goal being scored and my notification. I was watching Chelsea beat up on Blackpool this past Monday at the Grumpy Troll and John Terry opened the scoring at the 20 minute mark and about 2 minutes later my phone started to cheer. It was nice to hear even though I was watching the game live on ESPN2. Lampard scored a nice penalty kick at the 60 minute mark and knocked one home at the 63rd minute. A minute later the phone cheered for the penalty goal. And five minutes later, for Lampard’s second of his brace. Regrettably, the phone also cheered when Blackpool’s Jason Puncheon scored at the 86 minute mark. It made me wish the phone would have booed instead of cheered.

But I suppose that level of intelligence is a bit too much to ask for. A pisser like me should be grateful for whatever bounties that our modern technology has to offer.

 

Guess who’s currently 4th in the Nationwide Series points standings?

It’s almost a pity, really, that now that Danica Patrick is coming off the best finish by a female driver in any major NASCAR series event and finds herself in 4th place heading into Bristol next Saturday, that this nice run of form, albeit early in the season, is not going to last. And not because she’s not capable of staying in 4th, but because she will off to pursue the one IRL victory every driver dreams of…winning the Indianapolis 500. The IRL season will cut this nice run of form in twain for awhile ((assuming Bristol doesn’t do it to her)). Johnny Benson has been coaching Danica this season and whatever he’s been telling her seems to be working.

I would love to see Danica win Bristol almost as much as I’d like to see her finally win the Indy 500. Fuck yeh that would be awesome!! But as I said, just as she seems to be getting into the swing of things, she will be gone for the summer…off to her newly realigned Andretti Autosports team. Open testing is now on at Barber Motorsports Park. And the opening race at St. Petersburg is a mere two weeks away.

 

The grass is always greener….

Well…unless you’re Mario Balotelli, ofcourse, who is allergic to grass, allegedly. He had to go off at the 57 minute mark in Manchester City’s recent UEFA Europa League tilt with Dynamo Kyiv. His face was swollen, supposedly. So off he went at the 57 minute mark of City’s gaping maw of a 2-0 defeat. I don’t even need read the daily transfer gossip to know that City would love to flog this asshat off on someone over the summer. Allergic to GRASS?? What the fuck, Mario….what the hell have you been playing on all these years? Hippie lettuce?? Let me think….ahah!! Spartak Moskva!! There ya go. They play on artificial turf at Olimpiyskiy Stadion Luzhniki. Welcome to Russia, asshat!

Transfer rumour gossip is right up my alley. I can go on a pisser and bang out 500 words of hallucinogenic nonsense about a Tevez/Messi reunion just around the corner, with Jermain Defoe filling the void. Or, let’s see, José Mourino is preparing a £100 million bid for Didier Drogba that even Roman Abromovich can’t refuse. Yeh, thatmakes as much sense as the one today where Sir Alex is so pissed at Wayne Rooney that after all that soap opera nonsense earlier this season, he’s eager to sell him over the summer…and too bloody bad that the LA Galaxy don’t have to coin to spring for THAT….Donovan to Rooney….GOOOOAAAAAAAALLLLLLL!! Fuck yeh, let’s pop another top and keep on pissing.

Kaka looks to be bound for Chelsea as a future replacement for Lampard. If nothing else, Chelsea will be less ugly-looking next season. Arsenal can’t have a corner on the pretty boy market yes? They could ofcourse, reduce the pretty-boy factor by a ha’penny by outbidding Barca for Gareth Bale. Might as focking well. There’s plenty of silly money to throw around. Why not go grab Ibrahimovic too, while yer at it?

And with my last sip of beer (in the can that’s currently in front of me) allow me to relay what a little canary just told me….a certain International soccer manager is poised to throw ALL the the Englishmen off his squad and replace them with Americans if they don’t beat Wales at Millenium Stadium in Cardiff the March 26th.

 

Tiger Woods can’t trust women. (picture not related)

As I bang this out, Tiger is tied for 13th at Doral, 6 strokes back of Hunter Mahan, Matt Kuchar, and Dustin Johnson. Tiger has one hole to go. And once again, he’s mid-table, upper mid-table and out of the running. Get used to some new household names. Tiger might win one eventually, but not the way things have been going. As I probably mentioned on these pages some time ago, he has to change is his basic character in order for things to get better and right. Until he does that, Matt Kuchar and Y.E.Yang and Nick Watney will see him in their rearview mirrors, but only 6 car lengths back and no closer. Tiger is doomed to become the Bolton or Sunderland of the golf world…a decent upper mid-table finisher, but no better. Now that’s not bad money….you can make a VERY good living finishing 10-20th in every tournament you enter.

But it’s not the greatness at the sport we’ve come to expect from Tiger Woods. And until Tiger adjusts the core of his very soul, and gets a comfortable balance with the world, we won’t see him atop the leaderboard anytime soon.

And that bit about him not trusting women enough to go out on dates? It’s true. And bloody ironic if you ask me. But that’s his lookout, not mine. Me, I’m off to the boozer.

 

Arsene Wenger sobs as he watches a pirated broadcast of today”s ManCity/Reading FA Cup tilt on his laptop.

The heroic run of Reading ended today in a 1-0 defeat at City of Manchester Stadium. Micah Richards slapped home the winner at the 74 minute mark. And City moves on to meet their arch-rival Manchester United in the semi-final at Wembley. I’m not a big fan of the snood-wearing poofters at City, but if they’re playing ManU, I’m all in. Hell, I’ll even cheer if that asshat Mario Balotelli scores a goal or three. City hasn’t been setting the word aflame either lately, so it comes down to who brings the most piss to the party. Odds are that ManU will carve out a clumsy 1-0, 2-1 win of sorts….a win that counts on the scoreboard but is no victory by any stretch. Then again, it might be the other way around if City gets an early tally…Mancini will park the bus in front of Joe Hart and hope for the best. No doubt, a sad and terrible penalty shoot0ut awaits us after extra time. Honestly, and I’m not just saying it because it’s my two favourite teams, but it’s a shame that both Norwich City and Chelsea got boosted from the FA Cup since a Canaries/Blues FA Cup final would be a fabulous thing to watch. The 3rd Manchester Derby of the season?? I’m not figuring on this to fabulous.

It’s teams like Reading that make things fabulous. Unlike the snood-weraing poofters they faced today, Reading plays with a passion and belief that far exceeds their talent. And because of that, even in defeat they are to be applauded and celebrated. They gave everything they had and much more. MUCH more. Reading has been playing this season under a veil a sadness. 16 months ago, their star player,  Chris Armstrong, was diagnosed with multiple sclerosis. He’s played on, suffering through the misery of the disease that was ravaging him….willing himself to play, and helping his team get to where they got today…a quarterfinal FA tilt with Manchester City.

Chris Armstrong did not play today. You won’t see his name on the game report. But win or lose, Chris got them there and was with them every minute of the game. He wasn’t in the game because he retired from football last Monday at the age of 28 at what would be considered the peak of a promising career. The disease had gotten to him and he’s couldn’t play anymore. But his character and spirit is what creates greatness in sports…and there are a LOT of Premier League players, even some from teams that I like, who could learn a thing or three about how to live their life from the way Chris Armstrong live his over the last 16 months.

Now I’m not a Reading fan, mind you….and when they played Norwich City this season, I was rooting against them. They drew Norwich 3-3 at home, and lost to my Canaries 2-1 at Carrow Road. But after their brave run through the FA Cup this season, I’m going to be pulling for Reading to do well ((but not against Norwich)).

 

Another 2500 words down the drain….

Well that’s about it, I think…I mean, I could go careening off on some football rant about how I’ve forgotten to mention much of anything significant about 5th place Tottenham and their domination of AC Milan in the Champions League. I’m sure I could find another obscure tale of sportsmanship from the League 2…or Conference North, where AFC Telford United trots over to Hyde FC for a bit of footie tomorrow. And…I have hardly mentioned anything about Europe…SURELY I could drive home a point or three about WHY Borussia Dortmund rules the Bundesliga this season like some dominatrix in a Berlin nightclub in a Christopher Isherwood novel?  Actually no, scratch that….I don’t know and neither does anyone else. It’s mystery to one and all. Maybe it’s the beer. But maybe not….if it were I would be playing for them and scoring a hat-trick every match.

So NOW that’s about it. Unless I think I something else. And I hope you pray to God that I don’t. Until next time them.