Sailortown

The first thing I have to do is thank Bob Piper for furnishing me with a copy of Don Winslows “Savages”. Initially, I thought it was going to be unreadable, seeing as how it starts by introducing us to 3 very cool, very beautiful, very brilliant hepcats, and is written in a strange disjointed style. It didn’t take long though, no  more than a couple of pages, to get drawn in.  It is very sharp, very witty, very pointed and the quirky style works beautifully. It builds up to an insistent, unstoppable rhythm, not dissimilar to some of the work of the genius Ken Bruen or early Pelecanos, before his brow became furrowed. Recommended without reservation,  not to the ma in law though, parts of it are a bit rude.

Driving through these historic valleys on a beautiful, but freezing cold morning yesterday, I heard a report on Obamas decision to reopen trials for Guantanamo. My flabber was gasted, not because of the U turn, but because of the rationale behind it. It seems that Obama was worried that the American public would not be able to stomach normal trials, on American soil, because it would increase the risk of a not guilty verdict. A cynic might suggest that the fear is that it might increase the risk of a fair trial.

The next time anyone discusses a golden age of television, refer them to February 20011. There is so much high quality telly on at the moment I’m struggling to see it all. First, The Killing, on BBC 4 is absolutely riveting and is as good a series as have ever been on the box. And it’s bleeding Danish. 

Next is Broadwalk Empire, which just about lives up to the hype, and even if it didn’t quite live up to the hype, it would still be telly of the highest class. It’s all a little bit caricatured, but it is chock full of really interesting major and minor characters and has a genuinely sharp and funny script. I have had to stop watching it with my 16 year old though, as, at time it is downright fucking saucy.

Then there is Treme. I didn’t have high hopes for this, despite the pedigree of all involved; I thought it would be a bit of a worthy indulgence. There is a bit of that, but it doesn’t overwhelm the thing, and once again,we have interesting, multi layered, flawed characters, sharp and witty dialogue, and nudity. The cherry on the top is an absolutely ace soundtrack 

Not to mention, Raising Hope, The Middle and Modern Family, all of which have genuinely laugh out loud, piss yer pants moments in every episode.

Anyway, enough of all that shit, I have football on my mind. I won’t go on about our cup win, enough has been blogged, tweeted, and liked about that already, but I will point out that our midfield was much readier than usual to take a chance on running forward as the ball was played up to Zigic, than they ever are when Jerome is up front. There could be several reasons for that, but it was good to see nevertheless. Normal service, or lack  of, was resumed on Saturday though, as West Brom, in a most uneighbourly fashion, pissed on our parade. Actually, I don’t want to talk about parades. It might cause me to blush a little.

Curtis Davies made his debut for us, and he made a mistake, and West Brom scored. A lot of Blues fans have become very intolerant of him as a result, which is a bit disappointing, but that isn’t what concerns me. What concerns me is the disparity in tolerance levels between forwards and defenders. If a defender demonstrates a decent enough basic technique throughout a game, but makes one error, he is invariable slaughtered, and the same is true of goalies. One error, and it is the end of the world. Forwards can make bad decisions and show appalling technique all game and are subject to little more than a bit of disgruntled muttering. 

The obvious reason for that is that if a defender makes a mistake and it leads to a goal, there is tangible evidence, cruel evidence of the error, right there on the scoreboard, for all to see. If  a forward makes an error, well, no harm done, just keep plugging away. You don’t know what might have happened if the eejit had been able to control the ball. Or hold on to the ball, or had the awareness to spot a pass, or the ability to pass the ball in the right direction, with a decent weight.

The fact is though, that poor technique and awareness by forwards probably costs more points than poor technique by defenders. It is likely, if not inevitable, that once the poor forward loses control, the attacking team loses impetus, and the defending team regains impetus, putting more pressure on beleaguered defenders and increasingly the likelihood of a costly mistake. 

We cannot know how many more goals would be scored if attackers didn’t make simple cock ups so regularly, but it would probably be significantly more over a season, and I firmly believe that the defence would concede fewer too. All of which is a cack handed plea for Blues fans to show a bit more tolerance to the likes of  ahypothetical defender (let’s call him Curtis), making his debut, and a bit less tolerance to forward, a hypothetical forward (lets call him Cam) who makes basic errors all through the game, week after week, season after season The sort of errors that would not be tolerated if he was playing in defence. A bad defender is never excused on the grounds that he tries hard and is really, really fast.

Shall I mention Arsenal? I must. I don’t like Arsenal. I don’t like the one eyedness of their manager, and I don’t like the cocky arrogance of their players, and I especially don’t like the way that they think that the rest of the world is conspiring against them to commit crimes against beauty. For every challenge that they complain about being made against them, some bright spark can come up with an example of them doing the same, but they don’t believe that others inhabit the same moral plane as them, which makes their misdemeanours more acceptable than others.

I was delighted to see them get beat last night, except they weren’t beat, they were murdered, absolutely mullered. Their response was to turn into a poor mans Stoke. They were dirty and sneaky throughout and displayed an appetite for gamesmanship that’s was shocking to behold in such beautiful, ethical athletes: athletes who would have us believe that the most important thing is playing the game in the correct way. The Corinthian way.

They were getting outplayed and they lost their heads. They became an ill disciplined, incoherent rabble. John Beck would have been proud of them. They should have had a penalty given against them after Messi was clattered in the first half, and their centre half, who seems to live a charmed life, should have been sent off for two bookables. But all they can bleat on about is how unjust van Persie's second booking was. I don’t believe that to be the case, but even so, if he had not behaved like an overgrown child in getting his first booking, it would not have mattered.

Arsenal though, won’t look at the their own part in events, and will simply rail against the injustice of it all (not worrying about the injustices which benefited them, in both legs). It is this petulance that marks them out as failures. Barcelona did not whinge and moan and become emotionally unhinged at the denial of a pen, or at Arsenals persistent fouling, or at their anti football tactics, they simply got on with the job and let their football do the talking. Just like Blues did.

It's a Shame

I'm like a number 11 bus. Wait all month for a post then 2 turn up at once. Used to be a good way to wag school, sitting on the number 11, bored shitless all day. Christ knows what children who didn't enjoy such privileges got up to. Doesn't bear thinking about.

I have added the Reducer to my meagre blogroll. The chap hasn't done much yet, but what he has done is rather good, and he is a Blues fan, and, if memory serves correct, an aficionado of Americana, so he's alright by me. Also, over there, there is link to Occupied Country, a brilliant blog, by an admirable mind, I thought the the blog was dead,  but it has been resurrected. In the age of 140 character erudition, it's good to know that there is still room for the wordy dinosaur.

Blues fans are besides themselves, quite rightly at the forthcoming event, but, sad to report, no one else gives a shit, apart from the odd Arsenal fan. I recall when I first moved away from Brum, and described myself as a Blues fan, people would be bewildered. The last time we got to the league cup final, my present gaffer was a newly qualified colleague, who shared my desk, above which hung a Blues calendar. I went on about it, she wasn't interested. It was a bit of a weekend in Cardiff, with some notable and hugely enjoyable rowdiness between Blues and Cardiff fans, all over the town. She noticed that on her skimpily dressed night out, when most of the pubs had been closed early. On Monday, she said, I didn't realise Birmingham were, like, a proper team.

That was 10 years ago. Our last league cup final appearance, so I don't buy this bollocks about it being our biggest game for 50 odd years, it's hype. Our Leyland Daf and Autowindscreen games were just as big, bigger probably, given the context of the time, and our play off win was definitely bigger, as, arguably, was our win against Reading a couple of years ago; not to mention Orient away in 1972. Anyway, if this the only one of that lot to be classed as a major final, our last major final was ten years ago, not 50 odd. The league cup is the league cup.

At this time of  a Friday night I would usually be listening to the reliably brilliant Ralph Maclean, but at times like this, exhilarating times like this, I prefer to listen to stuff I am comfortable with, stuff I can howl along to. I have had Todd Rundgren's One Victory playing a fair bit, and the Lovin Spoonful; it won't be long before I start lending my vocal finesse to the likes of "I Don't Like Spiders and Snakes" and "Pinball". "This Is Pop" is a good yellalong song too. Then there is anything by Nick Lowe or Dave Edmunds. I'm tense and nervous and I can't relax. I think there might be a song there, if only I could figure it out.

Wolves

Bloody hell. You turn your back for 5 minutes and people start rising up against murderous dictators all over the place. I have long believed that you can't beat the motherfucking man, but, it seems, you can. It's all a bit inspiring and a bit scary. The courage of the people rising up against their oppressors is hard to fathom. I might even be inspired to go on a fight the cuts march in Cardiff on Saturday, so long as the nippers game is called off. There's revolutionary zeal for you.

I experienced coach travel for the first time in about 30 years last week. I considered the cost of petrol up to Brum, and parking, and aggravation, and decided that the coach would be a much more relaxing and economical way to travel, so long as I bought a family coach card. I would say never again, but I have to go at least once more to make the coach card pay it's way, I'm stubborn like that.

I had thought that I might take the opportunity of having some nice scoff after the game in Brum, as we had 2 hours to kill. Normally, we drive in, see game and drive out, home for about 7 with a fair wind. So this was a rare opportunity to tarry a bit in the old home town. I hadn't counted on the sheer hungriness of Brummies, the poor, starving bastards. Every noshery had queues down the street, apart from one, which should have told us something. For canteen food it was alright, but unfortunately the clueless chumps did not charge canteen prices. Never again.

The Brummie hordes will travelling en masse to see Blues beat Arsenal in the League Cup final on Sunday. For one year only, this is not a Micky Mouse competition. Unless we lose, which simply won't happen.

I am on a decent run with the reading. I enjoyed James Lee Burkes last one, which was a return to form, despite having some familiar flaws, and would just about recommend. I read Mission Flats by Willam Landay a few years ago, really liked it, then forgot about him. I just read his "The Strangler" which is a hell of a book. Set in Boston in 1963, it is a bit of an epic, a family saga, a crime drama and a political expose. It has all the best bits of the latter-day Pelecanos, without the preaching, and contains the moral ambiguity of Richard Price. It's punch and pacy and contains some brilliant dialogue; it's also witty and erudite. What more could a chump want? I whizzed through it and was pissed off when I finished it.

I'm currently reading The Extermination Club by Jeffrey Moore, and it is a book I am struggling to keep away from. A drug addled rich kid has legged it to a remote part of Canada and saved the life of a strange, precocious and mistrustful teenager. The bad guys are animal hunters. It is a strange, but very readable book, with two immensely engaging, wise cracking main characters, and it is very, very funny. Very moving too. I suspect that by the end I will also have to add the word heartbreaking, but I hope not.

I might recommend William Landay's website while I am it, it is much better than the usual glorified merchandise stand.

Money Shuffle

I wish I could fall out of love with football. Actually, I think I did fall out of love with football years ago, but it’s a habit I can’t quite give up; it’s a relationship I can’t quite walk away from. I am like a beaten dog that runs up to his master every time the door goes, only to once again suffer the disappointment and indignity of a boot up the arse.

Liverpool fans did not want Torres to go, because they love him so, but, go he did, and there was weeping and wailing and burning of shirts. He is a traitor, the worst kind of traitor a dirty foreign bastard traitor. Andy Carroll, who seems like such a lovely young man, left Newcastle to go to Liverpool. The Liverpool fans will never take to him because, clearly, he is a traitor, not as bad as Torres, obviously, because he is English, but a traitor, nonetheless. Similarly, Suaraez is a traitor, Charlie Adam is a failed traitor.

The fans, and some of the managers, show a very warped moral compass, and it is this that irks, rather than the daft fees. We are all entitled to be disappointed when a favourite player leaves………….I was gutted when Jimmy Greenhoff left Blues all those years ago, but it was a lesson learned………….they are all mercenary, they don’t love our club like we do, and even if they do, the club will get rid of them anyway. It was an early, salutary lesson; don’t cry over spilt milk, or you will spend the rest of your miserable life weeping huge buckets. 

Fans no longer seem able to accept that players inevitably move on, and they feel the need to parade their grief like so many Diana morons. They go to the ground, for fucks sake. To the ground! Why? Why do they go the ground? We know why they go to the ground; they go to the ground because Sky parks itself at the ground We then have the unedifying spectacle of seeing some berk of a Sky presenter, no doubt on secondment from an estate agents, talk utter drivel while a load of people with learning difficulties gurn behind him. Of all the crimes that Sky has committed against football, this is surely the greatest…….allowing the unemployable license to cavort all day and all night on our TV screens.

Which  brings me on to Nicky Campbell. I rarely listen to him, but some times, if I have been listening to the football the night before, I hear him by accident. I have a problem with 5live generally, it seems to be dumbing down at  a rate of knots and with it’s endless trails for its own programmes and the moronic beats which accompany them, it is like listening to a commercial station,

Anyway, at some early morning hour yesterday he was interviewing a protester from Tahrir square. This would have been soon after a day and night of violence, during which peaceful protesters were attacked consistently by a small army of thugs, no doubt assembled form the desperate and decaying state apparatus. Shots had been fired. People had been killed. The people in the square have shown remarkable courage. Campbell goaded the woman. He was desperately trying to get  her to admit to a liking for extreme Islamism. 

Now, I know nothing about Egypt, apart from what I have read this week. All that I have read indicates that Egypt is fairly secular and that the religious elements in the country don’t tend to be of the extreme variety. No doubt there are extremists, but in the circumstances, that hardly seem to be the point. Campbell was being a prize prick and doing what he is best at, petty, childish, point scoring. The story in Egypt is the scale of the uprising, the peaceful uprising, not militant Islam.  

What happens next in Egypt is an important issue, and it is legitimate to discuss it. It is even legitimate for Campbell to discuss it, but not with a woman who was clearly distressed and frightened, having endured a night of extreme terror and violence. Imagine being in that square, all night, in the dark, no home comforts, no toilet, no food, no possibility of sleep; rocks and petrol bombs raining down for hour after hour, shots having been fired. Imagine experiencing that, and imagine that the BBC asks you to come on the air and tell your story, and you have to put up with the idiot Campbell giving a masterclass in how to be a snide wanker. 

The new James Lee Burke. I am persisting, and I think it is better than some of his recent efforts, and, as ever, by God, he keeps you turning the pages, but, Jesus, I am having an increasingly hard time tolerating his overblown prose. He seems to be knocking out a book every year; I think he should take a couple of years off, recharge his batteries, then come back and knock us all out.

Blues have West Ham again on Sunday. Should be a laugh. I predict that we will moida da bums.

Don't Take No Notice

It's been an interesting couple of weeks for the Blues, and I am delighted to point out that I said, after the Villa game, that we were showing signs of improvement. I was right, everyone else was wrong. A pulsating night against West Ham saw us through to the Carling cup and a somewhat soporific afternoon saw us safely through to the next round of the FA Cup, where we will play Sheffield Wednesday. It's all been a pleasant diversion, but the proper business starts again on Wednesday and I am intrigued.

There were people who were thrilled when Eck named a 4-4-2 for West Ham but I wasn't, because I couldn't see where the midfield creativity was. I predicted lots of aimless chasing and I was right, and we conceded, which meant we had to score 3. Gulp. When do we ever score 2, never mind 3? (yes, I know, Millwall, but that doesn't count). I doubt if I was alone in believing that the game was up. But the game wasn't up.

Eck changed it at half time bringing Zigic on for Derbyshire. I continued to disapprove, still believing that we needed more creativity in midfield but the change worked. There are some who say Zigic changed the game and there is truth in that, but he didn't change it on his own. The midfield were much more involved and involved higher up the pitch. In short, we took the game to them, and we won. The crowd roared. You don't get much roaring down the Blues, and, even allowing for the fact it was a semi final, it was the committed, attacking performance that got the crowd going. We need more of it. I hope and pray that Eck doesn't go back in his shell, but I suspect he will.

It's been a good window for Blues, with Bentley and Martins joining. I have no thoughts either way on Curtis Davies. Zigic has shown that despite all the opprobrium heaped upon his head, he is a class act . Bentley has already shown what a truly exciting player he is, and in turn he seems to have invigorated the much maligned Hleb. Martins we don't know about yet. He clearly had something a bit different and special once, hopefully he still has it. If Eck picks all 4 of these, we will stay up comfortably, but I am convinced that he will remain  more concerned with what the opposition might do to us, rather than what we can do to them. It's all good though, never a dull moment.

I started the new James Lee Burke earlier, he had put me in a bad mood before I got to the end of page 2. Why can he not give his characters normal names? I have had a bit of a bad run with books, and ended up reading a Grisham and a Turow for the first time. Last time too. Those blokes just don't know when to shut up. I have the new Nesbo, but I can't bring myself to read it, I want to save it and savour it. Mind you, it has had some duff reviews. It would be nice to be on the sick for a few days. Too sick to work but not too sick to get stuck into a book. The house to myself. Peace. Quiet. Whatever that is.

There are redundancies at my old place of work, announced in a very uncaring and unprofessional way, apparently. It's a shocker anyway, but the bigger shock is that they seem to be getting rid of the more experienced social workers. Another area, not unadjacent to here has cut pay. None of us are safe. We are little more than paper tissues, to be tossed aside, at the whim of some fat faced berk in a shiny arsed suit. Already, we are told that we should think ourselves lucky, we have no cause to complain, just think, we could end up down the road, like the others. The subtext being, obviously, "shut the fuck up".

As usual, Unison has played a motherfucking blinder. I was being facetious there.

Twitter,  a repository of the instant and inane thoughts of chumps like me, who think that the world is desperate to hear their half arsed opinions, but it comes into its own at momentous times like this when the heroic people of Egypt are rising up and helping us put the goings on down St Andrews into a bit of perspective.

Make Me Smile

It’s been an eventful few weeks for the Blues. We had a good result against Blackpool, in which we played fast attacking football, until we took the lead, at which point we took our collective feet off their collective throat, and allowed them back in. Still, we won and we played well. The players demonstrated that they can attack, if given licence to do so.

I thought at the time, this will never catch on, because we were a bit leaky. I surmised that Eck would be more alarmed by the chances that Blackpool created than thrilled by the chances we created. And I might have been right.

We went to Milwall for the cup and bugger me scored 4 goals, something I never thought possible with our current manager. I didn’t see any of this game, but apparently we were not all that good, but, job done, and Derbyshire, who looked impressive against Blackpool scored two, surely a good sign, especially as we seem to be having a bit of trouble getting even mediocre strikers to sign for us.

West Ham next and all was woe. Back to the cautious, ultra defensive style that has served us so poorly all season. Eck even joked about it beforehand. We lost 2-1, which was lucky, because it could have been worse; they created  thousands of chances. We did actually improve at the start of the second half and had them shitting themselves. Same players, but they played further up the pitch, with a bit more urgency. As I have been saying forever, these players can do it, if allowed to do it.

We had the Villa yesterday. It’s a shame we didn’t win, but I seem to be in a bit of a minority in thinking that it was hugely encouraging performance. We started with Hleb and Bentley in midfield. Only one striker, Derbyshire, who I prefer to Jerome, but Bentley and Hleb in midfield. That is 2 skilful, attacking players in our midfield.

Bentley made a difference. He looked like he was enjoying himself for a start and always looked to move it forward. He also seemed to bring out something in Hleb, who looked up for it. The truth is, we still didn’t create much, certainly not in terms of clear cut chances, but Hleb and Bentley were brilliant at relieving pressure. It was great to see Blues players take delivery of the ball calmly and  assess their options calmly; it was great to see Blues players looking comfortable on the ball and passing it to someone wearing the same coloured shirt, rather than just shifting it on, straight to an opponent.  

So long as they stay fit, they should improve. Their own fitness levels should improve and their awareness of each other and the rest of the team should improve. With a fair wind and good coaching, the whole team will develop a rhythm, with Bently as conductor and Ferguson as orchestra leader and Hleb as chief violinist. 

If Eck persists with Derbyshire up front (which I very much doubt) he will improve too. Already he has shown greater awareness and touch than Jerome. He doesn’t have the same muscular presence or speed, but that is irrelevant. For all his pace, power and work ethic, Jerome neither scores many, nor creates many. We have piano players in the team now, as well as piano shifters, Derbyshire is better equipped to apply the coup de grace than Jerome, and it would be a betrayal of the talent of Hleb and Bentley to persist with the willing, but limited Jerome.

There are those who are willing to forgive Jerome his limitations, and will point out that he still young, still learning and the team is not set up to make the best of his assets. They will point out that Derbyshire has missed at least two good chances in recent weeks, but I think they are missing the point. Derbyshire is also young, the same age as Jerome in fact, but hasn’t benefited from an extending run in a settles team in the same way that Jerome has, and I am convinced that he has more awareness and footballing nous than Jerome ever will.

He has missed chances, yes, but all strikers miss chances, and the salient point is that he has been in a position to miss ‘em, and overall, he is a much more comforting presence as a footballer. The goals he has scored have been good goals, the goals of an instinctive scorer,  and he has also been aware enough to provide chances for Jerome to miss. Jerome will chase lost causes down to the corner flag………..all well and good, but, ultimately pointless. Jerome has demonstrated over a long period of time that he can’t quite cut the mustard; Derbyshire has shown in a short period of time that he has something about him, and he deserves an extended run to show what he can do

Apothecary

The Low Anthem - Apothecary - A Take Away Show from La Blogotheque on Vimeo.


At the risk of sounding a bit shrill, Blues were horrible tonight. There will be those who will say we competed quite well in the first half and that if we hadn't been victims of some very bad refereeing, the whole dynamic of the game may have been different, and they would probably be right, but we would still have been horrible, because, lets face it, we are horrible. To an extent, being horrible is OK, and it can be hilarious when you are beating Chelsea, but I have had enough of it.

Regardless of the ref, we would never have won that game. As Steve Forbert sings, you cannot win, if you do not play, and we do not play. We attempt to stop the opposition playing, but we don't really play ourselves. This is not just about today, this is us. Every week, whoever the opponent is. For me, our style is barely tolerable even when we don't lose, but finding ourselves in the drop zone, has put me in a bad mood. This shitty style clearly isn't working, so why persist with it?

Eck said something the other day about Barcelona and Arsenal and the way they pass and retain possession and alluded to the fact that we cannot expect to emulate that style with the players we have. It is obvious that he does not trust our players to do anything other than fight like dogs. We only ever commit men forward after we have conceded. We play a percentage game of harrying and pressing the opposition into mistakes or fouls, we play for territory. It's like watching fucking rugby. Punt it upfield and try and win the second phase

As Steve Forbert also sang, it doesn't have to be this way. Other teams with limited players show this on a weekly basis. Blackpool take the game to the opposition, and, my oh my, they score goals. Bolton have been transformed by Owen Coyle and are much more pleasing on the eye than they once were. Both teams are comfortably ahead of us in the table.  Mainz are a team of extremely hard working artisans, but are very direct when they have the ball and are doing brilliantly in Germany. I refuse to believe that our players are incapable of attacking with a bit more purpose.

We are in a situation where we are playing unlovely football, losing games and have been travelling with Plummet Airlines to the foot of the table. Eck speaks highly of the team spirit and the work ethic, but it takes more than that. He has to have more confidence in them, he has to let the off the leash a bit. Playing 5 defensive midfielders is humiliating. If he doesn't trust the regulars, he should try others. Hleb isn't getting a start, Michel had disappeared off the face of the earth, Zigic can't get a start, Derbyshire may as well turn up in pyjamas, because he sure as shit isn't going to get anywhere near the pitch, Phillips is only ever allowed 10 minutes or less.

The sad fact is that the players are failing, the defence isn't as good as it is cracked up to be (look at the stats for goals conceded from set pieces if you don't believe me) the midfield cannot create chances, nor hang on to the ball to relieve pressure and our main striker couldn't score in a barrel of fannies. Yet players that Eck has bought, presumably having done his famous due diligence, can't get a game. It is baffling.

The window is open, we need to bring some talent in, but, if Eck doesn't play the new guys, or if he doesn't  change our mind set, it won't matter who he brings in, because we will be fucked.

Slippin and Slidin

How chuffed I am to see England retain the ashes, on Australian soil, with 1 game still go. Magnificent. But the media are at it again. James Lawton in the Independent has said that the performance was close to perfection, not just cricket perfection, but sporting perfection. Old Lawton is paid to write about sport, and he does it well, he sees loads, it's his job to see loads, but, come on, perfection? It was a brilliant performance, against a demoralised team made up of fragile prima donnas (1 or 2 apart). A brilliant performance, but not a perfect performance. Cricket is too subtle and beguiling a game anyway to be perfect.

I hope the media calms down a bit, we don't want these players being eaten up by their own hype. It wasn't long ago that we could not imagine an England team without Flintoff and Jones (Simon, not Geraint). Well, now we have a better team, let's just let the team be. Much has been made of the stout, no nonsense virtues of Breslan. The day he turns up with a fake tan, an elaborate tattoo, and a remodelled haircut, is the day that the decline starts. It is not insignificant that the form of Bell has improved since he lost the boy band haircut.

That video up there, it's Steve Earles nipper and he is touring next month. Small venues, cheap tickets.

Spare Me

Blues returned after the midwinter break to earn a point against Manchester Utd and upset Alex Ferguson.  The game showed the best and worst of Blues. The best was our obduracy and fighting spirit, the innate bloody mindedness of players who will not accept that they are beaten until the final whistle goes. The worst, 2 distinct spells apart, was our complete disinterest in threatening the oppositions goal.

We started pretty well, very solid, very tough, without showing any inclination to make acquaintance with van der Saar, then had a period where we took the game to them a bit more but without offering any real threat. Manchester dominated the second half,  probably because we allowed them to and it wasn't until they scored that we started attacking with any intent.

McLeish has a bit of a blind spot here. He says that we create chances but don't put them away. Sorry, Eck, but we create very few chances and we are expecting Jerome to have a strike rate comparable to Gerd Muller or Paolo Rossi if we are expecting him to knock in many of the very few chances that fall his way, our problem is that we don't create enough chances. Our midfield is not quick enough to support the front one, or, frequently, the front 0, as we tend  to have every single player back to defend set pieces. This tendency does not discourage the defenders from booting the ball up the pitch though, to no one.

The fact is, we are capable of passing it, we are capable of putting the opposition under pressure and we are capable of creating chances. We show it every time we go behind. Eck should stop blaming the strikers for their poor conversion rate and instruct the team to play with a more positive intent. We slipped into the bottom 2 yesterday before hauling ourselves out; snatching last minute equalisers will not get us up the table.

There is a huge rumour that Robbie Keane will be coming to us when the transfer window opens. This is good news. However if he has to feed on the kind of scraps that the current strikers have to sustain themselves with,  he will be looking very skinny by the seasons end. I think Eck has seem the light though, and we will all be enjoying a goal feast in the coming months.

Country Dumb

By Christ it's been snowy. I don't like it, 2 days is OK but then it just becomes irritating. Played havoc with the sporting weekend too, although rugby clubs didn't seem to have the same trouble as football clubs in getting games on. I watched a bit of the Leicester v Ipswich match, which was played in a white out, it was hilarious. I'm sure that in the 60's and 70's far more games would have been played in the conditions. It's not political correctness gone mad that has caused the change, it is a culture of litigious freeloaders gone mad. Councils and clubs are scared that some dope will fall and break his arse bone and sue 'em.

A couple of weeks ago I mentioned the Ashes. It was the end of the first day and England were struggling and I made some disparaging comments. England then decided to make me look stupid by dominating the rest of that game and the next game. I read articles seriously asking if this was the best England team ever or the worst Australian team ever. This England team is not even English, so it s a moot point anyway. Besides, I don't look so foolish now, after the worst bowler in the world destroyed the best batting line up in the world. Once upon a time, I am sure, people would reflect before making stupid statements. I blame 24 hour news channels and bloggers.

Talking of stupid, I came across this splendid correspondence between a disgruntled fan and the board of the Cleveland Browns. I hope it is true, because it is brilliant.

There is a piece on Blues in this mornings Guardian which is depressingly accurate. It doesn't say much more than I have been saying for months, but reading it, it just sort of hits home how fucking awful we are. There are those who will say that so long as we stay with the elite none of it matters, but I beg to differ. Epic defensive goalkeeping displays like the one against Chelsea are all well and good, but I don't want to see that every week and I don't want to spend 120ish quid every fortnight to watch a team that is proud to finish a match having had no shots on target. There is a balance and we are extremely out of whack.

I remember many years ago going to a match between Crewe and Reading. Reading were flying high at the time but playing shit football, Crewe had a reputation for playing the beautiful game. Reading won. I remember in the boozer afterwards that Reading and Crewe fans were having a furious debate, with Crewe fans saying that they didn't care where they were in the league, they would not want to watch that shit week in, week out. The Reading fans just gloated. I'm with the Crewe fans. I don't go to watch the likes of Gerrard and Fabregas display their silky skills; that is not what I pay for, I pay to go and support the Blues, and supporting the Blues has become a very unappealing pastime.

So Saint Vince has had his comeuppance. From Francis of Assisi to Rasputin in one easy stride. I still keep reading and hearing that he is an accomplished political operator and is the conscience of the coalition. I don't believe it. He didn't have much of a conscience when he was employed by Shell, he hasn't shown much of a conscience in the coalition and it wasn't very accomplished to blurt out all that shit to 2 women he didn't know. I think he fell victim to his own vanity. A lot of these lib dems look a bit out of their depth: being responsible for making tough decisions is very different to sitting on the fence, trying to be all things to all men.

Metafiletr still come up with good stuff, like this fantastic photo essay on Hells Angels

Sweet Talk Sweet Talk

I am a bit disgruntled with modern life. Whenever a comic has gifts with it, always cheap, nasty tat, they put the price up. That's not my idea of a gift.  Here you are, have a gift, now you owe me 3 quid, for the gift. Shysters. It never happened with Whizzer and Chips.

I keep hearing about the Arsenal game at the weekend. The big news is that it will be Ryan Shawcross' first game against the charmless bastards since THAT tackle. Fuck me, what has the world come to? A player was tackled in a rough, tough, mans sport and got injured, it happens all the time, always has, always will, yet when it happens to an Arsenal player, we have to keep hearing about it for years and years after………if you don't believe me, ask Martin Taylor. The media, and Arsenal, are killing the fucking game; as Ricky Hatton was fond of saying……."it ain't a tickling contest".

There is a threat of snow, which means that there will be no bread or bananas to be had for days to come. Big society, my arse. I was foiled in my attempts to panic buy yesterday and I was foiled again today. If the snow comes, we will starve. Mind you, I managed to get hold of 2 sledges today, so the snow will undoubtedly pass us by. I was a very popular man as I walked through Ebbw Vale with my sledges, practically the whole population approached to ask where I had nabbed them from. If I liked the look of 'em I told 'em. I was a bit worried I might get mugged.

I don't really like Julie Burchill all that much, she's a bit too shouty and a bit too knee jerky for my liking, like a female Richard Littlejohn, but she can write like a bastard and stick the boot in like a Richard Allen character, and both qualities are evident as she tears into posh bufoon Charlie Gilmour and his oafish ilk.

Whenever I see David Cameron at Prime Ministers Question time, I think, well, he's insouciant, then I think, fuck me Dave, this is no time for insouciance.

Set 'Em Free

Wolverhampton Wanderers 0 Birmingham City Woeful. That’s all I have to say on the matter, except that I hope the players have been instructed to go to their rooms for a long, hard think.

The kettling debate continues. It tickles me to see people on football message boards vigorously defending the actions the police took against the great unwashed. Many of them would be the same people who rage against the machine when the rights of football fans are infringed, or when kick off time are changed in the name of good public order, or potentially difficult matches are designated bubble matches

I recognise that it is difficult for the police. I am a man of peace and have no sympathy at all for those protesters who wish to engage in violence, but I wonder how many of them actually wish to be violent. I don’t know, but I suspect that it is a small group, and I suspect that they have a bit of previous, some of them may not even be in education at all, but attach to themselves to any demonstration in order to pursue their hobby of acting like complete pricks. The police are pretty adept at isolating troublemakers at the football these days, I am sure that the skills utilised by officers in football intelligence are transferable, why not get some of those brainiacs involved to try and limit the potential that the worst among us have to act the goat.

This is a huge dilemma for democracy. We all have the right to air our views and we have the right to dissent. We should be allowed to gather in our thousands, if enough of us feel strongly enough, but we should also be responsible enough to gather in our thousands peacefully.

No one voted for this poxy coalition, but this poxy coalition is what we have. This is what our electoral system has served us up, and we have to live with it, which doesn’t mean that we should sit back meekly and accept everything that is thrown at us. We have a right make those who are increasing hardship for millions of people feel uncomfortable.

The current presenting issue is tuition fees, but over the coming years there will be many others. The problem is, that many people will look at police tactics, and wonder if they really want to run the risk of being whacked about the head, or charged by a horse, and whacked about the head, or corralled somewhere he doesn't want to be for hours, unable to even enjoy a shit, and many people will choose to stay at home. Kettling is an awful tactic. It imprisons people against their will and most of those ketteld will be innocent of any crime and will not be offering any threat to public order or the stability of the nation. Democracy loses

Those who wish to take to the streets, probably thousands upon thousands of people, should do so in a benign and good humoured way, otherwise the message they are trying to get across will be diluted and all protesters will be lumped in with the great unwashed. Our hegemonic media will gleefully focus on the bad shit. Organisers of marches and protests should work intelligently with the police to stop protests becoming hijacked, but the police also have to work intelligently with protest organisers to ensure that measures put in place are not too draconian.

Mikey Delgado puts it better.

Enough of that bollocks. I finished the Alan Warner, and, while it was a bit of a struggle, I would actually recommend it. The blurb talks of his brilliant imagination, and he surely does have a brilliant imagination, although he does have the posh English girl slipping into a Scottish brogue from time to time. It is impossible not to warm to all of his characters in the end, even the grotesque, vulnerable Manda. This is not my usual crime fiction, this is literary fiction which focuses on working class women, and does so with a dispassionate, yet warm and humorous eye. It doesn't romanticise and it doesn't demonise, and in British fiction, it is a hugely refreshing change not to be reading about the existential crisis of some upper middle class berk.

So, I dived into Nesbo's Snowman. God, it was a comfort. I have barely started but  I feel right at home in it and I know I am going to be pissed off when I finish it. I shall have to ration myself. Have I mentioned KO Dahl on here? He is another brilliant Scandinavian, as good as Nesbo, but he only seems to have had two books translated. This is a crime against the genre loving British public, and needs to be adressed.

Annie, Lets Not Wait

As a general rule, I support the police. I work with some chaps who do terrible things and the police frequently get involved and they are always quite sensible about it. They are a bit like us, I suppose, they have seen, and know about shit that really doesn't bear contemplating, so they are not given to over reacting. Also, I see 'em at the Blues, and, less frequently at demo's, and they show fucking remarkable restraint. The public ain't nice. The public at football matches ain't nice at all. They will spit at, kick at and verbally abuse the police, and yet the constables stand there, stoic. I admire them, hugely.

But. By God, they really are agents of the state. They will take any provocation from football fans and Saturday night drunks, but gather in large numbers for a political cause, and it will be whack a mole time. Talking of drunks, I am drunk now, and one should not blog drunk. I have loads of really erudite observations on all this shit though. Won't post 'em tomorrow, local derby on……..too emotive. Come back around Wednesday. It will be brilliant.

I'm still struggling to find a book that agrees with me. I'm persevering with Alan Warners "The Stars in the Bright Sky", but it's a struggle. I've had Jo Nesbo's Snowman sitting by the bed since the summer, but I've been saving it for desperate times. I think desperate times are upon us. The Mrs thinks I'm a nutter for saving up books like that, she just gets stuck in and devours 'em, straight away. I'm a bit fed up with the marketing of Nesbo. Having been reading him for a couple of  years I don't want people thinking I've only picked him up because, apparently, he is the new Larsson. He is miles better than Larsson for a start.

This whole Julian Assange, Wikileaks, Operation Payback episode is starting to read like a Larsson novel. I can't help but have an image of some huge, fat, hairy bastard with no social skills, sitting in some basement  manipulating everything. 3 massive cheers for whoever is behind Operation Payback.

Johan Hari's article on wikileaks in this mornings Independent was brilliant, and is well worth reading, and sharing.

There was also a very good article by the reliably indignant Robert Fisk on the influence of Qatar,

I was listening to some tory berk on the radio this morning, going on about Big Society and how we should all be out in the snow, being neighbourly, helping each other out, and gritting the roads ourselves. He said, helpfully, that he believed that some councils even provide boxes of grit, so that we could do just that. Something struck me. I wondered what kind of community he lives in, and if he has a neighbour within a hundred yards, because around here, big society kicks in and everyone is out, shovelling, being jovial, and we are not a neighbourly bunch. I don't include the git who helps himself to barrow loads of grit from the only grit box. I just assume he is a tory.

There is reason to assume he is a tory, as, it turns out that the rich are unempathetic and selfish:  the poorest 3rd donate more of their cash as a proportion of income than the richest third. It comes as no surprise to me. All this talk of Big Society smells to me of people who do not really participate in society, people who are pretty much excluded from society, by reason of wealth.  They don't realise that the little people go around helping each other out and empathising with each other all the time. If your view of the world is filtered by the scaremongering prism of the Daily Mail, you might not realise that.

It looks as if Alan Pardew will be the new Newcastle manager. He must be mad if he takes it; the fans have made it clear that they don't want him and it can only end in tears. Look what happened to Gary Megson at Bolton and Sam Allarydyce and Ruud Gullitt at Newcsatle. Pardew will not be allowed a single error of judgement before the fans turn against him, and then the press will all pile on. I predict that the reign of Pardew will be nasty, brutish and short.

Driving home a bit earlier, the starlit sky was stunningly beautiful, and the crescent moon, which was hanging as low as teenagers trousers, seemed to be smirking, cheekily. I decided that I would blip it. Can't find it. It's there somewhere, because it is still a beautiful starlit night, but I can't see the moon anywhere, it must be so low that it has dipped below a house or a hill. Is it a bleeding portent of something?

The government has been wheeling its big guns out all day to talk about tuition fees. I can stomach it from the tories, but not from Nick Clegg. Even the odious Nick Robinson had him wriggling about in an interview somewhere or other. He is like a whirling dervish with his vaccilations. He says that it isn't fair that those who don't go to university should subsidise those who do, but those who do go pay back plenty and we all benefit in many ways. I wonder how much we all subsidised Cleggs education and when he is going to pay us back?

Where Dreams Go To Die

John Grant | Where Dreams Go To Die | A Take Away Show from La Blogotheque on Vimeo.
">John Grant | Where Dreams Go To Die | A Take Away Show from La Blogotheque on Vimeo.



Well. That was a dainty dish to set before the swine last Wednesday, wasn't it? Enough has been said now, the world doesn't need my contribution, but I will point out, because few others seem able to do so, that as far as hooliganism went, Blues fans were innocent: it was evil Villa fans who threw flares, broke up and hurled seats, smashed up toilets so that they could enjoy the perverse pleasure of wading about ankle deep in each others piss, and who broke through a door separating the fans in the Railway End  (it will always be the Railway End to me) so that could attack Blues fans. Sore losers.

It was a relief and a pleasure to see us go a goal down early on against Spurs, it meant we had to play a bit, and we did play a bit, at times, and played well. Some Blues fans are now eulogising Zigic because he had a half decent game. It is a typically bi polar response. He wasn't as bad as everyone said last week and he wasn't as good as everyone is saying this week. He looks OK and if he continues to learn how to handle himself in what must be a pretty alien environment, he could turn out to be a bit of a bargain. I have high hopes for Beausejour as well, another player who isn't as bad as everyone has made out; I think it is pointless asking him to be a warrior though, just give him the ball and encourage him to take the others buggers on, see what happens.

Not a bad week then, for the Blues, with points gained against good teams and knocking Villa out of the cup, and a definite improvement has been shown over the last 5 or 6 games, but we need some wins, we need daylight between us and the rest, we need to be a bit more pro active and a bit less reactive. Once we decided to have a go against Spurs we caused them plenty of problems; Eck has to find a way of balancing our defensive solidity with a bit of wit and elan.

There was a good piece the other day on the Zonal Marking site, all about wingers who play centrally. If Eck really doesn't want to play 4-4-2, we have the players who can play in that sort of hybrid winger / inside forward role……Helb, for one, but I also think Fahey and Gardner could have some potential there, and it would go some way to solving the problem of linking up between the defence and the attack.

There was a bit of a brouhaha over the world cup vote last week. I can't say I was bothered, one way or the other, but the outraged responses of the media and many of the fans has been amusing, and it now appears that Boris Johnson has withdrawn an offer of hospitality to genial old Sepp. Very classy that, very dignified, very stiff upper lip.

John Pilger has written a brilliant piece in the New Statesman on Vietnam

Get Your War On is back, in rude health.

Sea of Tears

If the connoisseurs had been salivating at the prospect of Fulham V Birmingham City, they would now be disappointed. It wasn't a bad game, but the game was not characterised by the silky skills of the participants (Hleb apart).Blues looked quite lively in the first half, as did Fulham, actually, but, Fulham looked very vulnerable every time Blues attacked with malign intent……. and there's the rub; Blues were not malign enough, often enough.

Blues took the lead after some fucking superb, high class work by Hleb who put Larrsson in to score. YES!!!! was my first thought. My second  thought was, shit, we are going to close up the shop now, and invite them to try and burgle us. The obduracy of our defence is rightly lauded, maybe I'm a philistine, but I prefer to watch the beautiful game. This was an occasion when Blues could have given us a treat, Fulham were there for the taking, but no, onto the back foot we went. The mantra seems to be "what we have, we hold"

Fulham looked much livelier in the second half, but only because we allowed them to. Whereas we were passing the ball forward in the first half, we resorted to lumping it aimlessly up the field, or in the general direction of Cameron Jerome, which has the same effect as an aimless punt up the field, as the ball immediately comes back. And there we were: a practice game, attack v defence. Until we got burgled.

From there on we huffed, they puffed, but no one blew the house down. It was a fair result in the end and a point for us, away from home, is not to be sniffed at. I am convinced though, that with a bit more ambition, a bit more heart and effort in going forward,  we would have scored more. Mind you, we were much more adventurous than last week, doubling the number of shots we had on target. Still, we have gone above the Villa, and that will do nicely. Very nicely.

The England cricket team sailed off to the antipodes with the expectation that they would murder an Australian team which is in disarray. The players were full of it, ex coaches were full of it, the media was full of it, social media was full of it. Even the Aussies waded in. 3 days in, Australia are, predictably, murdering us.

I shouldn't like boxing, but I do and I will be searching for a stream of the Froch fight later on (I don't like it enough to actually pay for it!) Meanwhile, here is a brilliant report of the Pacquiao v Margarito ruckus

God: a divine North Korea

Transcript of the Blair  / Hitchens ding dong.

I'm struggling to find a decent book to read. I've tried the new Jonathan Coe and couldn't get on with it, A John Connolly which had promise but failed to keep the promise and not one, but two Alan Fursts, which were both horrible. I have just started Haileys War, but have no great hopes for it. It is freezing cold out there; one of life's pleasures is to be in the warm, snug as a bug, immersed in a book. I am fed up. It seems like a waste of a beautiful winter.

Hungover

Blues 1 Chelsea 0. I know Chelsea had screwed up at home to Sunderland the week before so there isn’t quite the shock there that there might have been, but this is still a hell of a result for Blues. It is also a hilarious result. Throughout the game, Chelsea had more shots than any other team have managed in any prem game this season. Blues had one shot on target. And won. We did what we do well, defended for our lives without ever really looking to add to our lead, and, due to a combination of utter brilliance by Ben Foster and good luck, we prevailed.

I’ve said before that we are capable of defending stoutly against even the best teams. We don’t find it so easy to score goals against the lesser teams though, which could become a problem. I read that we are creating chances this season but are not putting them away. I don’t really buy that, our mindset is a cautious one, and we don’t go for it until we have too. We do create chances then, but panic has set in, I wonder if our strikers (I’m looking at you Cameron) would have calmer heads if we played on the front foot a bit more consistently.

Ed Milliband returned to work today after his paternity leave. Finally, the opposition will have some consistent leadership. Given the free ride that this bastard coalition has had since the election, I would have quite liked Ed to have taken a shorter break. It is as if he starting all over again now. Of course, it could be that he is a zen socialist. I like the sound of that. I don’t know what it is, but I like the sound of it.

Being slightly less than svelte myself, I was interested in an article by Johan Hari this morning, all about how he lost some weight, with the help of a personal trainer, which isn’t an option available to all of us. It tells us nothing new, except that Hari is surprisingly funny, and he makes some pertinent points about physical education in schools at the end of it, points that I have made myself in the past, so I obviously agree with them.

My youngest came home from school the other day clutching some kind of mission statement, which stated the schools commitment to an overtly Christian value base. I suppose that’s preferable to an overtly fascist value base, but it dismays me, all the same. We have a school at the end of our road which has the reputation of being the best primary in town, but it is a church school. We didn’t want the nippers to have an overtly Christian education so sent them to an ordinary LEA school, further away, and with no reputation at all. The oldest two have now moved on but youngest is still there. I’m sure they have had God shoved down their throats much more than would have been the case at the church school. Mind you, it seems to be compulsory to own a huge four wheel drive vehicle at the church school, so we wouldn’t have fulfilled the eligibility criteria anyway.

Farewell Sorrow

It was a bit of a non event at Eastlands today. Blues put on a performance reminiscent of last years invincibles and held Manchester City at bay for a valuable point. Not that they took much holding off. I said yesterday that Manchester City are profoundly unimpressive and their performance today has done nothing to change that view.

The cognoscenti, typically, are hailing one of the great defensive performances of all time. It was a good, solid defensive performance, against a poor team, who offered little attacking threat, so I wouldn't go overboard, just yet. We are very capable of nullifying the threat of even very good teams, that's what we did last year. The test is at the other end, where we create little and put away hardly any of the few chances we do create. Defending well is all well and good, an away point is all well and good, and I am very happy with it, but the flaws which have left us at the wrong end of the table are still there. We need some wins.

Also, we should not let the euphoria of a well earned point blind us to the fact that, once again, Cameron Jerome, made completely  the wrong decision and even then screwed up his execution, when we were very well placed to score. It would be irrational to pretend that a 0-0 has transformed our season. But I'm happy!

A grim Tuesday night for Blues saw them play like half wits and go 2 down to Stoke before coming back to 2-2 and finally lose 3-2. The cognoscenti are unhappy, they think we are too negative and lack pace. No shit, Sherlock. Some of us have been saying that for the last two and a bit seasons. Not that I would be so crass as to say "I told you so".

We have the profoundly unimpressive Manchester City tomorrow. A comfortable 3 points for us, I think.

I'm as prone to hype as the next man. When the Haye v Harrison fight was announced I was filled with a massive indifference. Now I can hardly wait.

Johan Hari on blistering form, laying into young Nick Clegg: the man who cleared a space in his swanky new ministerial offices and staged a bonfire of his principles. Remember when Portillo was beaten? Remember that elation? Imagine that times 100. That's how I will feel when the good citizens of Sheffield deliver their verdict on him at the next election. All assuming that the outcome is the one I want, of course!

A man on Twitter, a man I wouldn't know if he walked up and punched me on the nose, keeps recommending that I listen to music he likes, and I'm glad he does, because he likes some brilliant stuff. I doubt that I would ever have heard of Hayes Carll or Kendel Carson without his recommendations and they are both, fucking ace. It does beg the question though, what are American parents on when they name their children? If you like Caitlin Rose you will definitely like Kendel, and if you don't know Caitlin Rose, you are depriving yourself.

Hayes Carll 

Kendel Carson

Caitlin Rose

I'm reading Serpentine, by Tom Morton. I've seen it in the library loads of times without being tempted, mainly because he is best known as an afternoon DJ on Radio Scotland. I couldn't see how a DJ could be any good and assumed it was just some vanity project. I was wrong. The book is utter nonsense and is as implausible as they come, but by God, it's a page turner. Funny in parts too. Bit risky as well. And cheeky. I think he is probably a bit of a card.

Watching the nipper train tonight, another Dad said, I didn't know Charlie was left footed, I said he isn't. The man was gobsmacked as Charlie is more comfortable with his left than most of the others are with their right. That's my boy. Genuinely two footed players are as rare as rocking horse shit………I hope he remembers his old dad when he is raking in the millions. You never know, if he keeps it up he might even be as good as me, one day.

Dixie Chicken

My prediction was awry. The immutable law did not kick in, although it threatened to, We were pretty shit though. Of course, seeing your team come back from 2 goals down makes your heart swell with pride; then you remember that you were playing the team who are bottom of the league, and that you looked second best for most of the game, and the heart becomes a little less swollen. The game showed up the beauty and absurdity of it all though, with 2 very poor teams somehow managing to contrive an excellent finish.

Following yesterdays mumbling about art and protest, Bob Piper has alerted us all to this.

Danny Baker is poorly. His mate has written a rather beautiful appreciation. Remember, without Baker, we would never have been able to enjoy the unique wit, wisdom and insight of David Mellor of a Saturday tea time. We have a lot to be grateful for.