smithdown

The poor lad’s expression when he comes on as well does not give you confidence that he knows why he’s being sent on either. He goes into a sort of space on the leftish side of midfield and stands there. He’s like a table footballer just on the halfway line neither defensive or attacking. Go there for three minutes and don’t move. Great.

Still been our best forward. He was worth all the ones we put on the pitch last night combined. He WOULD have had a shot. He WOULD have played someone in. Maybe not hat tricks of goals and assists but we would have had a shot at goal in each half. Gakpo, Wirtz, Ekiteke, Isak, Szobo… None. The rest too. They know he’s still our best player. Even like this. He should have played centre forward. Different game then as we are guaranteed someone who at least wants to wriggle free.

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Usually only scores at home though doesn’t he? Iwobi probably with a good hit into the roof of the net at the near post.

It does get so boring that you begin to concentrate on one player at a time to try to work out what he’s meant to be doing. You can only do that when it’s boring. Usually you’re looking at several players at once or just appreciating the whole shape and set up. With Slot it’s inevitable that five minutes of Wirtz or Isak or Ekiteke has the air turned blue.

Someone should ask him what he thinks of the long throw routines so far, the ones that brought whistles and boos from around the ground. A progress report where he talks us through each one and what the plan was and what should have happened instead of it being comfortably headed out. Not very good at them are we?

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‘Yah the big concern is if Fulham play in a way that isn’t let’s say nice if I can say this -“ *now boarding KLM flight FU 0-3* “ - sorry guys, you can fill in the rest yourselves’

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As if they aren’t in bulk as they write all that s***

He was overjoyed with two nil. The most exciting bit was seeing if we could go a whole four minutes of injury time without conceding again and we did although it was probably a penalty at the end but that’s ok.

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Again though, he could be amongst the top scorers in the WC. He would have score more for any other team. Everton would be above us if they had him.

Match fitness.

We were discussing last night whether watching the derby and the mancs is a feasible option. I think in years to come I’d rather say ‘nah didn’t see it’. Very much in the balance.

Yeah who is dressing this f***er cos all he needed last night was turn-ups and a pair of feckin Air-Wear and he could have been C18

Nyoni was excellent though. He looked around himself several times. Did not touch the ball though but why should he? Probably added a bit to his value though as he has now played in a European Cup quarter final.

You were talking your usual chippy s***e about Istanbul and Barcelona Yeah it’s all ‘I told them not to concede but they did’

I’m just going to count off the goals we concede for the remainder of the season. I estimate another 18 to go. My guess is we will score 4.

Hey Joe, where you goin' with that ball in your hand? Hey Joe, I said, where you goin' with that ball in your hand? Oh I'm goin' down to shoot it at Virgil You know we haven’t trained for anything else, yeah I'm goin' down to shoot it at Virgil He’s at the near post messin' 'round and that’s our big plan Huh, and that ain't too cool Hey Joe, I heard one of them just headed it out? And we are now three nil down? Hey Joe, I heard they went on a counter attack And passed it around on the ground Yeah Yes, they did, I saw them Virg and Ibou were on their way back from messin' 'round Yes, they did, they shot I threw them the ball and they shot and now we are three nil down Alright Throw it one more time again, baby Yeah Oh, frig it Alright Hey, Joe Where you gonna run to now? Where you gonna run to? Hey Joe, I said Where you gonna run to now? Where you, where you gonna go? Well, dig I'm goin' to get me a towel And try and throw it better that way Alright I'm goin' to B&M for a towel in the buy one get one free Ain't no target man gonna He ain't gonna score no goals from me You better believe right now I gotta go now Hey, Joe You better run on down to take it Goodbye, everybody, ow Hey, hey, Joe, run on down to take it

With a throw in to Big Virg of course!!! Ok we we have tried it now lots and lots of times and the three tonight, two were headed straight back out and one we got a lucky corner. Cobs was waving his rattle round and round with excitement and yelling ‘all over them here Arne lad!’ as Joe the Throw wasted as much time as possible.

Even if we weren’t going to win it, it was going to be a massive event with Messi in town. Even the Evertonians in work knew it was going to be massive. Was like the circus come to town.

He looked overawed and if he had any instructions, he forgot them. Wasn’t marked at all again.

They’re kidding themselves about the atmosphere but there’s no point saying it’s the manager who will inspire us is it

Cobs never. His bottle went.