October 2013 – Mrben09

With West Ham last game being the magnificent win against Spurs at the Lane, most WHU fans ay the ground had already decided that we already had our name on the 2015 Champions League already. We were unbeatable, and didn’t need strikers and could score at will. And we had this weeks current English wonderkid, Ravel Morrison.

Talking of which, this kid has had a couple of good games and scored some goals. He is also only now delivering on his promise that started at Man U all those years ago. Lets not get carried away just yet. Unlike the Sky Cameras, who decided to chase him around the pitch while he was warming up prior to the match. Surely the pitch is the workplace until the game is over ?

Anyway, Man City stood in front of this assault on Europe. We lined up much like against Spurs, leaving two strikers out of our pool of 2 fit / able strikers on the bench. Welcome back Carlton. As regular readers know, this for me , is some sort of religious resurrection :). City had no Zabeleta or Kompany at the back, which was encouraging.

The game was underway at a high pace, and the scene was being set. David Silva running the show and WHU chasing shadows. We needed to get the ball and that was proving hard to do. We did we had a couple of forays into the City half but that was about that. On 16 mins a great dummy by Negrero left Aguero free to open the scoring for City. West Ham tried to respond but our 6 man midfield were struggling to get involved, which probably tells you which way the game was going. Come half time there had been a few flashes of light, through Morrison and Ratz, and I was happy with one nil.

My happiness was put out 5 minutes into the second half, when a Silva free kick found Aguero’s head for the second. Poor defending all round allowed one of the smallest players on the pitch score his first headed goal in the Prem.

All of a sudden WHU woke up, and our midfield started to fire, with Noble mugging off Yaya Toure a couple of times, which cheered me up no end. Just before the hour mark, RVT fires in an overhead kick past Hart after a nice dink in from Morrison. Upton Park goes wild and not just because CC is warming up ! We then push on and on and City start to falter and make mistakes. This is on like Donkey Kong. But it wasn’t to be, Demel got injured and had to leave for O’Brien, and it upset the balance a little. The knock on effect was we run out of puff, and still Sam left the strikers on the bench. This is where the issue was in reality. At 65 he replaced RVT with Jarvis, when maybe Petric or Cole and the long ball may of been the better option of getting a draw. On the same point, I am no RVT fan but no way should he have come off at any point yesterday. City smelt the fatigue and Silva scored an absolute cracker to finish the game off on 80 minutes.

So what happens next. Well Sam has got Carroll back soon, he has a fit CC and Petric, and therefore we need to change this ridiculous formation. For most of yesterday Diame and Morrison were playing up front and it helped neither. Back to the young lad, he played OK yesterday and in the second half passed the ball around really well, which is something he needs to do.

MOTM: Jussi played well, as did Tomkins and Ratz (after a dodgy start). But David Silva was just unplayable yesterday, and therefore gets my vote.

After an unbeaten qualifying campaign and littered with too many draws, Roy Hodgson’s England need to win their remaining two games to secure qualification to next years World Cup. Both are at home, and the right results are possible, but first up were Montenegro, who England have had four previous tussles, all ending in a point a piece.

The weather was shocking and travel was not much better with an hour delay at Ebbsfleet. The tube trip went a little old skool when a north south divide looked to kick off on a packed train.

So a lot later than expected we took our seats and i was quite pleased to see Hodgson had picked a remarkably attacking formation with Rooney, Wellbeck and Sturridge all starting. Also starting was Tottenham’s current flavour of the month, Andros Townsend in front of his team mate Kyle Walker. Joe hart was in goal following the worst run of his career, cementing the manager’s faith in his no.1.

The initial play was pretty cagey with England getting the odd chance and as usual at Wembley this set the tone for the rest of the half. Just before half time, England had their best chance when Wellbeck tried his usual reverse back heel to no effect. He needs to cut that out of his game.

The second half started better with Rooney getting on the end of a Wellbeck shot that deflected into his path. England pushed on post this and got their second when a Wellbeck shot was deflected towards goal from its initial route by a defender to register an OG. OG is actually the 3rd highest scorer for England these days, just 2 goals behind Gary Lineker! England looked comfortable and the subs started with Lamps coming off for Carrick. Then the away team scored and you could feel the tension. We knew the Ukraine had already beaten Poland, and so another draw would not be enough. The clouds dispersed when debutant Townsend smashed in a cracking low 20 yarder to open his account. This ended the game as a contest and the icing on the cake was when Sturridge won and scored a penalty just after the 90.

The scoreline did not reflect the game, and England will need to step up in the middle of the park next year in Brazil if present. However the bold attacking formation was a massive positive as was the selection of Townsend (if only because Walcott and Lennon are injured). Let keep that up for Poland, and moving forwards as a more pressing team. This should not remove Ricky Lambert and Andy Carroll from the frame though, as sometime you really do need just to lump it.

MOTM : Townsend. Looked completely comfortable on this stage. Tore up the wing like he did last week against WHU (thought i wouldn’t mention it? LOL).