Assault

Me and Anne went to the UEFA cup game along with 21,841 others...It was a good game and the depleted crowd really got behind them. The team player really well in the first half but Bucharest where never in danger (apart from when Ferguson went ape and attacked one of their players).

We won the game 1-0 but after Bucharest had whethered the first half storm (when, to be fair, we could have been 3-0 up) they were never in danger. Two minutes from the end as the game trickled towards it's conclusion one of their players tried to cripple Mikel Arteta leaving him unconcious & convulsing on the floor. It was quite upsetting, the other players were waving frantically to the bench and the player lay there writhing. The Gwladys sang his name as he was stretchered off (I always remember Tommy Gravesen waving to us as he was stretchered off the pitch in a neck brace).



A sad way to end our abortive European adventure. I am not too gutted though. The players played well, Cahill looked more energetic, Valente and Ferrari look like they can do well for us and besides which the UEFA cup is shite. If UEFA aren't going to bother with it (no sponsors, no money, no hype, no coverage) then why should we.

COYB!

Google Earth

Google Earth

One of the coolest things ever...especially now you can share you placemarks with the world. Great idea.

Rock bottom

We are bottom of the premiership after another 1-0 defeat this time to Wigan...it's is getting very worrying 'cause we just cannot score goals and look like getting hit by a sucker punch each & every week.
McFadden played up front this week and for the first time in ages the ball seemed to stick. The midfield had balance which is better than we've been able to say for a while. Cahill, Osman and Davies seemed pretty anonymous...Whenever McFadden had the ball there was no following up. If we can get ourselves a goal you feel things would swing round. We had one dissallowed this week.

Hopefully the fightback will start soon. Hopefully.

The only thing to fear...

I am alarmed how quick everything has turned bleak for the blues. It just feels so grim...we are only 5 games in, okay we've only got 3 points but every blue I talk to is in thorough depression. I think the Villareal game has left everyone pretty deflated. Interestingly enough Everton only got 6 points from the corresponding fixtures last year. Let's hope things aren't heading towards crisis. We shall not be moved. The People's Club will abide and prevail (hopefully).

Moyes confesses to 'lowest ebb'

Moyes confesses to 'lowest ebb'

Jesus that was hard to take......I've never seen Everton get so thoroughly humiliated. We were in control in the first half but we were rotten in th 2nd. How does this happen?

The midfield were nowhere....it's worrying. There seems to be a malaise descended on the club since the Villareal game. Arsenal away next......

Open-top bus celebration for England heroes - England - ECB

Open-top bus celebration for England heroes - England - ECB

That was one of THE great sporting contests....I don't think we can doubt that now. One day to bat and the ashes were ours...but yet again those Aussies came back at us and at 126-5 it looked like we'd choked and snatched defeat from the jaws of victory...Kevin Pietersen took the field facing Glenn McGrath on a hatrick...he had is wobbles but his knock of 158 was astounding. Under that sort of pressure he hit 7 sixes and 15 fours. Fantastic

If - Rudyard Kipling

If you can keep your head when all about you
Are losing theirs and blaming it on you;
If you can trust yourself when all men doubt you,
But make allowance for their doubting too;
If you can wait and not be tired by waiting,
Or, being lied about, don't deal in lies,
Or, being hated, don't give way to hating,
And yet don't look too good, nor talk too wise;

If you can dream - and not make dreams your master;
If you can think - and not make thoughts your aim;
If you can meet with triumph and disaster
And treat those two imposters just the same;
If you can bear to hear the truth you've spoken
Twisted by knaves to make a trap for fools,
Or watch the things you gave your life to broken,
And stoop and build 'em up with wornout tools;

If you can make one heap of all your winnings
And risk it on one turn of pitch-and-toss,
And lose, and start again at your beginnings
And never breath a word about your loss;
If you can force your heart and nerve and sinew
To serve your turn long after they are gone,
And so hold on when there is nothing in you
Except the Will which says to them: "Hold on";

If you can talk with crowds and keep your virtue,
Or walk with kings - nor lose the common touch;
If neither foes nor loving friends can hurt you;
If all men count with you, but none too much;
If you can fill the unforgiving minute
With sixty seconds' worth of distance run -
Yours is the Earth and everything that's in it,
And - which is more - you'll be a Man my son!

My mate Rufus is featured in The Telegraph's Ashes 4th day montage...he was dressed as a Raj era redcoat escorting someone dressed as a convict...he is immensely proud.

Freddie Flintoff has been off the beer all summer in preperation for this series and by the looks of him he played catch-up last night. He was battered having not stopped celebrating since close of play yesterday. Bless him, he mumbled and stumbled his way through the day's events with a goofy drunken smile on his his face whilst Vaughan, KP and the others looked fresh as daisies (Apparently KP ran Fred a close second). My fave quotes about it all are thus

"It's 6.15am, there are empty bottles of champagne and beer glasses everywhere, it's a scene of almost total destruction and in the middle of the empties... Andrew Flintoff, he's been up all night and has just started again...."

Our survey says :

The final day

Too nervous to post anything :

There's a breathless hush in the close to-night
Ten to make and the match to win
A bumping pitch and a blinding light,
An hour to play, and the last man in.
And it's not for the sake of a ribboned coat.
Or the selfish hope of a season's fame,
But his captain's hand on his shoulder smote
"Play up! Play up! And play the game!"

5th Test: England v Australia at The Oval, 8-12 Sep 2005

5th Test: England v Australia at The Oval, 8-12 Sep 2005

Yesterday was Australia's day...or to be more accurate Shane Warne. It'd be churlish not to doff your hat to him. England were motoring along until he got the ball then wickets started falling with alarming regularity. Straus and Flintoff put on a great stand but we collapsed late on leaving the old enemy with the upper hand. Pray for resiliance and rain.

There goes nothing....Here goes nothing

Good God last night was crippling...England got beaten off the park by Northern Ireland! Ultster!! ULSTER!!! and not even all of Ulster!!!!!! God knows how bad it would have been if they'd have had Counties Cavan, Monaghan and Donegal too! We were clueless from start to finish. There was no will to win from England, no pride...they had it in spades, they out-worked us and smothered from the first whistle to the last...for them it was simply a matter of taking their chance when it came.

Something rotten in the England football camp...

The England cricket camp has a big problem going into the deciding test...one of best bowlers is out, he had the choice of going like-for-like and slotting James Anderson into the side or augmenting the batting line-up with solid all-rounder Paul Collingwood. Both decisions have their merits but in the end we went with the latter.

30 minutes from now it all begins....COME ON ENGLAND.

Travels and returns

My bro got back from his year a-backapacking at the weekend...nice to have him back safe and sound altohugh I feel sorry for him 'cause I remember how much fun it was whilst travelling.

If I won the lottery I'd do that for the rest of my days...it was so much fun, utterly carefree and above all unbelievably interesting.

He's currently lording it over us 'cause he went to 19 countries to our 12...it's great having him back 'cause there's been no-one to argue/debate with whilst he's been away...we have it down to a fine art. I figure I have the better of him on this 'cause we went to India on our trip (which was a totally different world) and he bottled out of it...also we got to go Rarotonga which truly was paradise. He makes some very good pionts about going to see Machu Pichu and the Nazca lines and getting all the way down to Tiera del Fuego....the debate will run and run.

SB

Katrina

Funny how things happening half a world away suddenly seem so close. My old pen-pal Aimee lost everything in Hurricane Katrina, virtually all her posessions gone overnight...her folks lost all that plus their home. They are all okay though, when you look at the poor bastards down in New Orleans.

Some really nice people I met on the way to and from Lourdes popped up on the news as their son, daughter-in-law and grandson were trapped in the middle of the aftermath...as it turns out they were in the Superdome and are safe and sound too thank God.

The aftermath is something to debate...It's easy to lash out in anger after a crisis but you have to ask questions about how the aftermath was allowed to descend into such a shocking mess.

Sleater-Kinney

The Official Website of Sleater-Kinney

Went to see Sleater-Kinney in Manchester last night...they are ace. The support band (the pippettes) were AWFUL (3 girls doing a Grease/The Go-Gos inspired set that seem to revolve primarily around synchronised hand movements).

It was a relief when SK came on. Janet is a superb drummer...she also played mouth organ whilst drumming away (and has been known to play guitar whilst drumming too). Top stuff.