The chap who decided not to get his haircut until Tuesday’s opponents win five in a row has done nothing original. Ten years ago Preview Percy announced he would start growing a beard as soon as a TV pundit called Jamie said something interesting or intelligent.
Thanks to Messrs Carragher and Redknapp, our correspondent remains clean-shaven to this day. Here’s the oldun’s look at Tuesday night’s visit of Manchester United...
Next up we return to home turf where we will host Manchester United. Kick-off on Tuesday night is at 8:15pm so a late pass may be required from your significant other for the evening.
So Surrey’s favourites, then. Their season has improved significantly since they hit on the idea of having a former Hammer at the helm in the shape of Michael Carrick whose playing career shone at the Boleyn before he found himself plying his trade in reduced circumstances at both White Hart Lane and Theatre Of Tacky Marketing Slogans. Carrick was poached from Middlesbrough who are doing well in the Championship at the moment.
When they finally got round to appointing Carrick after the world’s longest sacking, they’d won just the one of their last six, a period which saw them go out of the Cup 2-1 at home to Brighton. Since Carrick’s arrival they have won four on the trot, beating an out of sorts Man City 3-0 in Salford, Arsenal 3-2 at the library, Fulham 3-2 at home and, somewhat amusingly Tottenham 2-0, also at home.
As I have said many a time. No matter how bad things get with us we can always console ourselves with the fact that we aren’t Tottenham, whose skipper spent the earlier part of last week slagging off the club before getting himself sent off on the half-hour on Saturday, earning himself an extended ban in the process, this not having been his first red card of the season. All of that has left them in 4th place with 44 points from 25 games.
It’s been another quiet week for Daisy, as they spent not a penny during the winter window. There are a couple of potential contributory factors to this state of affairs in this case. Firstly there’s the managerial situation. Much of the first half of January was spent trying to get rid of Amorim. The resulting pay-off will have cost them a few bob with the notoriously tight part-owners Ineos probably realising that sacking a few long-serving tea ladies was unlikely to cover the full bill.
Then there was the managerial situation itself. Carrick, it should be remembered, has been appointed only until the end of the season (though on current form few would bet against him getting the job on a permanent basis). Ineos probably felt that if they were going to hand a transfer kitty over to a manager they’d prefer to be sure that he was going be there for more than a few months.
Either way the only real activity came through the exit door as a few fringe players were offloaded and the out on loan list was in the twenties, putting one in mind of those days where Chelsea went through a spell where their side hustle was having a stockpile players who had little chance of making the first XI who appeared to have been signed purely to make a few bob in loaning them out.
On the injury front, at the time of writing they have three on the sick. Mount, who has an unspecified “knock” is likely to be another week from fitness, which is also the prognosis for De Ligt. Dorgu, who hobbled off with what looked like a hamstring problem the other week, is likely to be a few more weeks.
Let’s move on then, shall we, to our Weekly Look at the Wild and Wacky World of Association Football. And it is our good selves who head up the first of this week’s stories. It seems that a number of supporters have received bans for having touched a banner suggesting that it might be about time for the owners to sell.
The official line is that it was not the sentiment of the banner that caused the bans; it was, in fact, the fact that the banners were too long and thus contravened health and safety regulations. As arguments go it was about as convincing as Father Ted’s “That Money Was Just Resting In My Account” explanation.
From a cursory look at the footage there’s an argument to say that some of the people in the vicinity of the banner might well have merely touched the thing, keeping it away from their heads so they could maintain a view. Surely that in itself would be the safe thing to do? I was going to speculate as to whether similar sanctions would have applied to anyone carrying similar-sized banner inscribed “You’re doing a wonderful job” but then I realised what a stupid question that was.
Elsewhere, we had “squirrel stopped play” as Hull lost at home to Bristol City, prompting wildlife experts everywhere to beat a path to Humberside having previously been unaware that squirrels could survive such conditions.
And then there was all the shenanigans at Anfield where the pundits went into apoplexy over the last goal that never was. So much hand-wringing over a decision that was technically correct yet not a word about the dive that led to the free-kick for Liverpool’s goal. Probably the 2,000th time they’ve scored direct from a free-kick that should never have been awarded. Still much better to fill column inches over something that the ref actually got right for once.
And so to us. Well that was fairly comfy in the end. We seem to be quite adept at getting a decent start and so it was on Saturday. There were a few surprises in the starting line-up, with Pablo benched for Wilson, Axel D coming in for the suspended Todibo and, perhaps most surprisingly, Hermansen came in for Areola. In the end he acquitted himself well. Good debut too for Axel D and Summerville is turning into the player we thought we’d signed in the first place.
Team news is a bit sketchy. During his press conference the manager stated that we would be without one or two players for this one but he wouldn’t be drawn on who. Obviously Todibo and Fabianski are absent but I suspect he didn’t mean them. This makes the prediction a bit tricky.
Yes they have won their last four but, despite the commentary claiming their win against Tottenham showed that they could do it against “quality opposition” (yes, really) all I saw at the weekend was them struggling to break down a team determined to shoot themselves in the foot.
I’m in optimistic mode and if PGMOL can be persuaded to send a neutral referee to handle the match, and we can get as near as damn it a first XI out on the pitch I think we can do something here. So the £2.50 that was going on Daisy’s Valentine’s Day present will be going on a repeat of last season’s 2-1 win, thus making that so-called Oxford-born Spanish resident “Superfan” wait another few weeks for his bloody haircut, and enabling me to spend even more than £2.50 on Daisy’s present.
Enjoy the game!
When last we met at the Olympic: Won 2-1 (Premier League October 2024)
We were terrible in the first half which was notable for miss of the season from Dalot, though he looked well offside. All the goals came in the second half. Current form man Summerville popped up at the far post to prod home after a scuffed shot from Ings fell his way. Casimero equalised after a spot of head tennis. Ings went down after a challenge from De Ligt got all of his shin and none of the ball, though it took VAR to correct the referee’s initial error. Bowen converted the spot-kick to give us all three points.
Referee: Simon Hooper
Bald referees are always a bad sign. Was in charge at Brighton when he decided that none of the three offences that were committed when scoring the late equaliser counted.
Danger Man: Brian Mbuemo
I don’t actually rate him that highly but he is in a decent spell of form
Percy and Daisy’s Amazing Man Utd Fact Of The Week Type Thing
Kingston Upon Thames, the spiritual home of the Manchester United supporter, is the home to Clatten Bridge, which is the oldest bridge in London.
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