Tag Archives: Liverpool

Altered Priorities Ahead of Leeds’ Cup Date at Newcastle – by Rob Atkinson

Posted on 25/09/2013 | 10 comments

Sometimes, I appear to be bang to rights on a charge frequently leveled at me by friend and foe alike: namely that I hate Man U more than I love Leeds United. This evening’s Capital One Cup fixtures would be a case in point; an occasion when I would have to hold my hands up and say: Yes – my priorities are altered tonight. Given a choice between Leeds progressing and the Pride of Devon getting stuffed by the Scousers at the Theatre of Hollow Myths, then I’d have to go for the latter. I know that is base treachery and quite the opposite of the way in which I should behave – but I’m too long in the tooth and perhaps too cynical to look at things through those old, stardusty, yellow white and blue-tinted specs I used to wear. So fine – tie me up and burn me for a heretic – but I’ll be watching Man U v Liverpool tonight, and screeching for a Reds victory (the real Reds, not the plastic variety). I may even forget there’s a game going on at St James Park, Newcastle.

Disgusting, the average, bone-headed, blinkered fanatic will bellow at me. Leeds first, last and foremost. Well, I can see that point of view, but you have to be a little bit pragmatic too. Sure, it would be nice to progress in this Cup. I have a very good friend who supports the Toon, and I just know he’ll give me hell if they beat us. Despite his protestations that he’s not bothered about the result and indeed that he’s jaded with all things Newcastle right now, I can tell he’s nervous about this tie. He knows he’ll have the bragging rights if the Toon prevail, even though that’s the way it really should pan out, given the relative strengths of the two squads. Equally he knows that I’ll make his life a misery if Leeds happen to win. And that would be nice. But I won’t despair if we lose – we have bigger fish to fry, after all.

Look at last season in the League Cup. Joy unconfined when we beat two Premier League clubs at Elland Road. The bunting hung out and street parties as we celebrated a home tie against old foes Chelsea. Ecstasy as we led 1-0 at half time – and then the sky fell in and we got murdered 5-1. When you’re at the current level of Leeds, the happiest of Cup runs ends in tears. Bradford City know that harsh lesson even better than we do.

With Cup competitions, the best attitude is to expect the worst and welcome any better than that with open arms – but there’s no point getting too upset about it, whatever happens. Since I’ve been a Leeds fan, I’ve seen us lose in every cup competition we’ve entered, every season, for 38 years. You get used to the incessant disappointment, and the pain becomes more of a numbness. Every now and then though, you reach a semi-final and the pain of defeat is more acute. Twice we even reached a final; they were the unkindest cuts of all.

The Germans have a word for the way I feel about nights like tonight. Schadenfreude. For those who don’t know, it means taking delight in the misfortunes of others. Every now and then, Man U serve me up a big, tasty dollop of Schadenfreude and I’m a happy man – quite as happy as I am with the occasional victories of Leeds United. The lads from Salford were kind enough to oblige me in this way on Sunday as they meekly got murdered by their more illustrious neighbours City from over the boundary in Manchester itself. Joy abounded in our house; we didn’t kill the fatted calf, but we did lash out on a celebratory takeaway. On January 3rd 2010 I got both sides of the bargain – humiliating defeat for Man U as well as an unlikely win for little old third-tier Leeds as the latter visited the former and won 1-0, dispatching the favourites from the FA Cup. A whole herd of fatted calves wouldn’t have done justice to that occasion.

My career as a football fan hasn’t had too many positive highlights – that’s just the way the cookie crumbles; if you’re going to follow your local team instead of glory-hunting like those sad, inadequate Man U fans with their deeply compensatory behaviour recalling the teachings of Sigmund Freud – then you’re going to spend most of your time dealing with disappointment. It’s the nature of the beast. How much better then, to have a fall-back position, psychologically speaking. That’s what I have. Every time Leeds let me down, I have a second chance of happiness that weekend or midweek. Often, of course, I am let down again. I happen to despise the most undeservedly successful team of the era, so disappointment is often my portion there too – I am usually denied my helping of Schadenfreude. But when it comes around – oh boy, do I relish it. Through the thin and thinner of being a Leeds fan, it’s been those delightful occasions of Man U misery and despair that, frequently have kept me happy and ready for more. Otherwise I suspect I’d have given up on football long ago, much as other aging former enthusiasts have. There is a limit, after all.

So tonight, I have two shots at happiness and satisfaction – and due to the preferences of the TV companies in these matters I shall be concentrating on the negative side of things, hoping for more Man U misery, cheering on Liverpool as they aim to knock the Gloryhunters out. If it happens, I will be happy, whatever has happened up in Newcastle. And if Leeds happen to have pulled off a surprise against the Mighty Barcodes I shall of course be happier still. But you have to take your satisfaction where you can, and if Man U lose tonight, they’re OUT. If Leeds win, we’ll simply postpone our own demise in the competition, but it’ll surely come sooner or later. So good luck to both my teams tonight, but if I have to pin my colours onto one particular champion, it’ll be the Reds of Liverpool as the enter the lists looking to cheer us all up by ending the Capital Cup involvement of Man U.

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Posted in Football, Humour, Leeds United, Life, Sport, Television

Tagged Capital One Cup, Football, Leeds United, Liverpool, Manchester United, Newcastle United, rivalry, Schadenfreude, soccer

Moyes Fluffing His Fergie-Lite Lines as the Mask Drops – by Rob Atkinson

Posted on 23/09/2013 | 4 comments

It sounded odd at the time. Leading up to the start of his first season at the Theatre of Hollow Myths, David Moyes chose to abandon his previous upright, downright, straightforward no-nonsense Evertonian demeanour and go for a good old-fashioned Fergie whinge with the requisite helpings of paranoia and self-righteousness. “They’re conspiring against us,” he grizzled, bitterly. “Three tough games against title contenders in the first five league outings. It’s no’ fair.” It was straight out of the Taggart Manual, from Chapter One: “Build a Siege Mentality”. The thing is, however tried and trusted the lines are, you need the right kind of actor to convey them. Now that the Old Ham had gone off, could the relatively green Moyes carry on with the same old act? Was it even such a good idea to try?

Whatever the whys and wherefores, the gambit appears to have blown up in the fledgling Man U manager’s face. Yesterday’s humbling against Mancunian giants City was not only a salutary lesson on the field. It also raised serious questions about the new man’s deportment off it. On the face of it, the Moyes Whinge, as it has come to be called, looks in retrospect like a timely warning. Of the three fixtures he was complaining about, the Pride of Devon have lost both away matches, at Liverpool and City, and gained a somewhat lucky point in a dour home struggle against Chelsea. But the fact is that the fixtures are simply that: fixtures. There’s a clue in the name, and while Sky may tamper slightly for TV requirements, the basic framework for the season is carved in stone. To complain about them at the time Moyes chose to complain, and in the terms, moreover, he chose to employ in making that complaint, showed more weakness than foresight, more lack of confidence in himself and his team than lack of faith in the authorities. What message was sent out by the manager to his troops as they prepared for combat? Would they have been inspired by their leader’s belief in them? Or would they, instead, have had a subliminal fear implanted of facing three formidable teams early in the season? Were they, in short, afraid?

A hindsight version of the Moyes Whinge emerged this morning on the radio. He referred again to the perceived unfairness of the fixtures arrangement. As an exponent of psyching his team up and psyching opponents out, Fergie was tiresome, he was tedious, he was annoying and detestable in the eyes of his enemies. But it clearly worked more often than not in the bunker that was Man U’s dressing room. Moyes, by contrast, seemed to have waved a white flag and called for stretcher-bearers before a shot had been fired. Certain of his players, van Persie for one, are already emitting rumbles of discontent. You can imagine them asking themselves: who would we rather have as our leader as we enter the trenches? The margins between victory and defeat are incredibly fine, one iota of backsliding by the historically dominant force, one iota of improvement in the fortunes of his enemies (the football term for “iota”, interestingly, is “Özil”) – and the tables can be well and truly turned.

It may also be that Moyes’ emergence from the comfort zone of Goodison into the fishbowl glare of the Theatre of Hollow Myths has been particularly ill-timed. The gene-pool at the top of the Premier League appears to have expanded dramatically over the summer. Arsenal have improved by probably more than just one Özil. Tottenham seem to have contrived to have lost a golden nugget and replaced it with the equivalent weight in gold-dust, and to have improved in the process. Chelsea have wound the clock back to the reign of the Special One, and you just know he will weave his magic again whilst laughing sardonically at his carping critics in the media, embittered journalists all of whose significant others are unanimous in fancying Jose. Liverpool have looked “at it” again, despite a dip in the last two games. Everton are unbeaten, with a new style and belief under Martinez. The whole landscape at the top of the game has a new and, from the Man U point of view, dangerously unfamiliar look about it.

Maybe one craggy and purple-faced individual in particular foresaw this sea-change, and perhaps this explains the abruptness of his departure from the hot-seat in Salford. There must, after all, be a significant danger that the still debt-ridden Evil Empire will finish outside of the top six this season, favourable ref decisions notwithstanding; and on that subject – what on earth happened to Howard Webb in the Derby? He failed utterly to live up to his Man U Player of the Season form, and must now be worried about his place in the team. Moyes has a lot on his plate, and – sallow-faced and bug-eyed compared to the smug, well-fed, puce sleekness of his tyrannical predecessor – he frankly does not look as though he has the appetite for it.

The noisy neighbours across the border in Manchester will be well aware, as they leap and cavort in celebration in the sullen faces of Manchester’s Red minority, of the problems that are stacking up for the hapless current incumbent of Salford Towers. But those happy fans will care not one jot, as is the case with thousands of other equally happy fans the country over, outside of Devon and Cornwall. They can see golden horizons ahead, and a game reinvigorated by true competition across a well-matched group of clubs vying for the ultimate prize. If Man U do end up outside in the cold, there will be millions who feel it’s a reckoning that’s arrived not a minute too soon.

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Posted in Football, Humour, Leeds United, Life, Sport, Uncategorized

Tagged Arsenal, Champions League, Chelsea, derbies, Everton, Ferguson, Football, Liverpool, Manchester City, Manchester United, money, Moyes, Premier League, rivalry, Tottenham Hotspur

Can Liverpool’s Suarez “Do a Cantona” on Comeback Against Man U? – by Rob Atkinson

Posted on 17/09/2013 | Leave a comment

Sic ’em, Suarez!

There was a feeling of inevitability all those years ago when Eric Cantona, enfant terrible and martial arts amateur extraordinaire, returned from his lengthy FA-imposed ban for being the true incarnation of “The Shit Who Hit The Fan”, to face the old enemies of Man U. Liverpool were the visitors, before an expectant crowd of Devon day-trippers at the Theatre of Hollow Myths. The script was written, and although the scousers aimed to poop Eric’s party by taking the lead, the man from Marseilles had the last laugh, ensuring a draw for his side with – you’ve guessed it – a penalty.

All of that was a long, long time ago – but these old rivals have memories like elephants (and backsides to match, for many of them). So Cantona’s ban, comeback and celebratory strike will not have been forgotten by fans of either side. Even though the personnel will be almost entirely different, give or take a superannuated Ryan Giggs, there will be many who might wonder if that old script might not be taken out and dusted off. Man U host Liverpool in the League Cup next week. Suarez is available for the first time since being banned for biting without due care and attention. He’d love to take a chunk out of Man U’s season – wouldn’t he just. Could it really, actually happen?

Think of it: Suarez is the man that the Man U faithful love to hate after his run-in with their own less-than-likable Patrice Evra – and the subsequent Handshakegate Scandal. All very petty and handbags of course, as matters relating to bruised Man U egos tend to be. But these things matter when you have a close rivalry based on mutual antipathy between Merseyside and, erm, most of the South of England. Can Suarez, like Cantona so many years before, make his long-awaited comeback from durance vile, in the media glare – and, again like Cantona, stuff it up a hated enemy?

There would be such a neat reciprocity about it, if it actually came to pass. How funny, how satisfactory it would be. Cantona made his mark at the Liverpool fans’ end of the Theatre of Hollow Myths – could Suarez possibly end up laughing in the faces of the Stretford End?

I have a great respect for football omens and fate in general. It’s tempting to look up the odds against Liverpool to win 2-1, Suarez to score at any time. Anything above 10-1 might just tempt me to have a punt on that. Come on, Liverpool!!