The Draw Specialist : Sunderland

Premier Sketch: Dancing, drunks and pie & chips

Rob Carey — Tue, 16 Nov 2010 11:15:00 GMT

The race for the Premier League was blown well and truly open thanks to the performance of the week from Sunderland, who trounced current champions and league leaders Chelsea at Stamford Bridge.

Ghanaian striker Asamoah Gyan looks to be settling in nicely, scoring another goal – his fourth in three games. But his celebration makes Uruguayan Luis Suarez’s World Cup handball look like a humanitarian act, especially if Bolo Zenden tries to join in.

Nedum Onuoha started the rout with a spectacular solo effort silencing the home crowd – but let’s be honest, that’s fairly easy to do at Stamford Bridge: those strategically placed flags aren’t fooling anyone. And just to rub salt in the wounds, the Black Cats’ third and final goal was gifted to Danny Welbeck by celebrity divorcee and respected author Ashley Cole.

Another Ashley fared better at Villa Park, Mr Young scoring a penalty for Aston Villa against Manchester United. Have you ever noticed how a penalty can either be brilliant or rubbish depending on whether or not it hits the back of the net or not?

This wasn’t the greatest of penalties but it had Andy Townsend describing it as “emphatic”. Perhaps Andy breathed in too many fumes in his old Tactics Truck, because if Edwin van der Sar had moved to his right instead of his left, Townsend would have said it was an awful kick at a great height for a keeper.

Talking of penalties, Jermaine Jenas take a bow. Usually, Jermaine is one of those players who leaves fans scratching their heads when he is substituted – not because they can’t believe the manager has decided to bring him off, but because they had no idea he was on the field in the first place.

This weekend the Tottenham midfielder became the latest inductee into the Draw Specialist Hall Of Shame, winning a penalty against Blackburn with a dive resembling a drunk tripping over his own shoelaces. But thankfully justice was done when Roman Pavlyuchenko screwed his kick wide of the post. Don’t you just love it when that happens?

And finally, goal of the week was Bolton’s Johan Elmander turning Wolves defenders inside and out, pirouetting like a ballerina, invoking memories of Wanderers’ icon Frank Worthington’s wonder strike against Ipswich back in the days of muddy pitches, Elvis Presley hairstyles, and steak-and-chips pre-match meals. Elmander’s goal had almost everything: smooth ball control, silky moves and a cool finish. All it was missing was a crafty cigarette at half-time.

Premier Sketch: Chickens, whispering, booze and moustaches

Rob Carey — Tue, 02 Nov 2010 09:40:00 GMT

No prizes for guessing where we begin this week: Old Trafford and Nani’s goal to clinch Manchester United’s win against Spurs. United’s Darren Fletcher admitted to reporters that the Portuguese winger put the ball in the back of the net with a gun held to his head.

“Nani had no choice but to put the ball in the net, what else could he have done?” said Gary Neville’s replacement as spokesperson for the Old Trafford club. But is it too naive for fans of the game to think that he actually could have left the ball alone, shown some respect to his fellow footballers and walked away?

Well, after going down in instalments to win a penalty then pulling the age-old trick of grabbing the ball to force the referee to make a decision, why would anyone expect him respect to come into the equation? Paolo Di Canio would roll over in his grave if he wasn’t still alive and well.

So how about referee Mark Clattenburg and his linesman Simon Beck: can they take any of the blame for this, after their hurried whispering behind their hands like pre-teen girls in the playground? Certainly, a bit of common sense could have easily solved the situation, and maybe saved the ever-respectful Rio Ferdinand from straining his jaw.

Clattenburg: “Are you 100 percent sure the whole ball crossed the line?
Linesman: "Mark, that was last time...”

Now if you still have the game on your TVs, fast-forward to the 88th minute when Nani is about to take a corner; look at the bottom of the screen and you’ll spot Spurs forward Roman Pavlyuchenko for reasons only he knows doing an impression of a chicken.

And it wasn’t just at Old Trafford where poultry impressions were occurring; in the Tyne-Wear derby, Newcastle captain Kevin Nolan took time off from babysitting Andy Carroll to bag himself a hat-trick in the Toon’s 5-1 stuffing of Sunderland. As each goal hit the net Nolan celebrated with a chicken dance of his own. Like you do.

The performance of the week undoubtedly came from Wolverhampton Wanderers, who condemned Manchester City to their second successive defeat. After going a goal down, Wolves gallantly fought back to win 2-1. A very welcome three points for Mick McCarthy’s men, and it’s safe to say this week that the City players won’t be caught on video out on the lash.

And finally, here’s your chance to emulate those wonderful Liverpool sides of the 70s and 80s. Terry McDermott, Graeme Souness, Ian Rush, Bruce Grobbelaar & Co. were almost as famous for the hair on their upper lips as they were for their skills on the pitch. MOVEMBER is here which means even a muzzie with less bum fluff than Gary Neville will still earn you respect from your fellow man; it’s for a brilliant cause.

Prem sketch: Excuse him, he's from Pamplona

Rob Carey — Wed, 29 Sep 2010 12:37:00 GMT

Last weekend produced more surprises than most children get on Christmas morning, actually that’s not really saying a whole lot as nowadays as most teenagers already know they’re getting , an Xbox, a Wii and TV. that’s bigger than their parents’ car - that sort of thing.

Saturday’s early afternoon battle of the nouveau riche at The City of Manchester Stadium saw swashbuckling league leaders Chelsea lose their first league game of the season, and once again it was Carlos Tevez breaking the hearts of the travelling fans.

The surprises continued at Emirates Stadium, where West Bromwich Albion shocked Arsenal with a stunning 3-2 victory. When former Gunners’ keeper Jens Lehmann returned to Germany we all figured that the Arsenal goalmouth would lose it’s comedy value, but nothing could be further from the truth; now we have two keepers to keep us entertained in Fabianski and Almunia.

It was the latter, Manuel, who was living up his Fawlty Towers namesake yet again, gifting Albion with their second goal then flapping at their third. It’s strange to think that there was once a campaign to try and get this guy into the England squad…

The biggest surprise of the weekend, however, was at Molineux during Aston Villa’s visit to local neighbours Wolves. It wasn’t Gerard Houllier’s decision to finally take his seat on the Villa bench that raised everyone’s eyebrows but a sight rarer than the Pinta Island tortoise; Emile Heskey powering Villa’s winner past the helpless Wolves keeper Marcus Hahnemann, for his first league goal of the season.

Meanwhile, up at the Reebok stadium, another former Houllier pupil was snatching a point for Manchester United. Michael Owen came off the bench and saved the day with a late equalizer against Bolton. Alex Ferguson must surely be getting worried as his unconvincing defence conceded yet another two goals, with Rio Ferdinand still struggling to put a run of games together.

And talking of struggling, how about Newcastle United’s James Perch? Well it looks like the poor chap might just be out of his depth (no pun intended) in the Premier League. After picking up a yellow card in every appearance this season he earned himself a match ban. On the weekend, with his side drawing 1-1 with Stoke, Perch marked his comeback with a game winning header. Leaping like a salmon, he steered a cross into the back of his own net winning the game for the Potters.

On a positive note, he didn’t get himself booked…

And finally, no surprises at Anfield, Liverpool failed to beat Sunderland, and teenage referee Stuart Attwell found himself in the middle of all sorts of controversy.

Just over a year ago the same two teams witnessed one of the most bizarre goals ever seen in English football; the “Beach ball goal”, this one wasn’t in the same league as that but it was still bizarre.

Only Michael Turner knows whether he was playing the ball back to his keeper for him to take a freekick or punt the ball upfield. But what we do know is that we can be thankful that we’ve been spared a week of hearing analysts comment on Fernando Torres’ “lack of effort” and “poor body language”, as the Liverpool striker sprinted onto the backpass and played Dirk Kuyt in for a first time finish into the net, either that or the Dutchman was trying to trap the ball, it’s hard to tell the difference sometimes.

As you can imagine Sunderland manager wasn’t too pleased with Attwell’s decision to allow the goal; puffing out his chest as his face gradually turned purple, it was hard not to mistake him for, Charlie and the Chocolate factory’s Violet Beauregarde. It’s fair to say the beach ball is now dead and buried.

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Premier sketch: Freaks, bikes and jokers

Rob Carey — Mon, 20 Sep 2010 10:16:00 GMT

We’re seeing an extraordinary amount of freak goals this season, and I don’t mean Peter Crouch is in top form…

Last week Chelsea’s Salomon Kalou benefited from a wicked deflection, and this week it was Cesc Fabregas at the Stadium of Light. Sunderland’s Anton Ferdinand, trying to emulate his brother, dwelled on the ball for way too long before deciding to punt it upfield.

Unfortunately for the Black Cats defender, the ball ricocheted off the ankle of the onrushing Cesc Fabregas and flew all of 40 yard into the net. Minutes later, the Gunners’ playmaker left the game having injured himself while scoring.

It’s unknown whether Arsenal manager Arsene Wenger will be spending the week trying to convince the F.A. that opposition players are now kicking the ball much too hard against his poor little players, but just to rub it in, Wenger had to watch his side give up a late Darren Bent equalizer in the fifth of four added minutes.

People complain there are no longer any characters in the game, and that it’s all a bit too serious; where have all the jokers gone? Well relax, we’ve finally found one. This week the Blackburn Rovers pressroom was converted into a comedy club and a new comedian, Big Sam emerged.

"I'm not suited to Bolton or Blackburn, I would be more suited to Inter Milan or Real Madrid” said Sam with a straight face as giggles eminated from the back of the packed room. Giggles turned to raucous laughter as Sam followed it up with this hilarious one liner, “It wouldn't be a problem to me to go and manage those clubs because I would win the double or the league every time. “

Big Sam now had the crowd eating out of his hand and he hit them with his final rib-tickler, “Give me Manchester United or Chelsea and I would do the same, it wouldn't be a problem, thanks very much you’ve been a great audience.”

No one was laughing at Goodison Park however; it must be tough being an Everton fan, one week your team doggedly claws back a two goal deficit against Manchester United, then roll over at home to newly promoted Newcastle the next.

If it’s any consolation, they may have witnessed the emergence of a real talent in Newcastle’s Hatem Ben Arfa. The cockney sounding Frenchman scored a wonder goal on his full Newcastle debut and dazzled the Goodison crowd with some sublime skill.

Ben Arfa’s left foot has already been labelled “cultured” by the football community; does anyone out there know of anyone with a cultured right foot? Why is it that right feet don’t get the same credit? Apparently Even Zidane didn’t have one!

The big game of the weekend was at rainy Old Trafford, and saw Manchester United’s Dimitar Berbatov stealing the show from two goal Steven Gerrard with a hat trick.

Berbatov is in fantastic form right now and if it continues then there’s every chance he’ll actually manage to contribute more goals to United’s cause than the their opponents.

His second goal was a real goal of the season contender; after controlling the ball with his back to goal he then pulled off a “bicycle kick” leaving Pepe Reina rooted to the spot. Berbatov then wheeled away after giving United a 2-0 lead.

However, some less than sturdy defending by the home side saw them give away a two goal lead for the second game in a row. John O’Shea can count himself a tad lucky after only receiving a yellow card when denying Fernando Torres a goal scoring opportunity, and Liverpool fans will argue that it was O’Shea who crossed the ball onto Berbatov’s head for the winner five minutes later, but as David Beckham’s favourite quote goes,” Erm that’s football, sorry I mean soccer.”

And finally here’s some more good news for Manchester United fans, it seems that Portugeese winger Nani has made a miraculous recovery from what looked like about 10 different life threatening injuries following a moderately tough challenge from Liverpool’s Christian Poulsen…

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The backheeling, egg-boiling Premier Review

Rob Carey — Tue, 06 Apr 2010 15:00:00 GMT

So Chelsea claimed pole position at the weekend, beating Manchester United 2-1 at Old Trafford in controversial style.

Didier Drogba’s second half strike was clearly offside prompting Old Trafford boss Sir Alex Ferguson to comment: "What I can't understand is the linesman's directly in front of it. He has no-one near him and he gets it wrong a game of that magnitude, you really need quality officials and we didn't get them today. It was a poor, poor performance."

Or maybe he was remarking on his own side’s goal which came off the arm of United’s striker Federico Macheda, but somehow I doubt it.

Let’s not forget Chelsea’s opening goal though, a wonderful effort from Joe Cole, who cheekily backheeled a Florent Malouda cross past Edwin van der Sar giving the Blues first blood after an opening 20 minutes which were tighter than Cole’s own shorts. Well maybe not that tight.

But we must have sympathy for Fergie (stop laughing at the back). Chelsea’s winning goal was miles offside, and it’s difficult to see how the assistant failed to make the call.

How will his girlfriends take him seriously when he brings out the faithful salt and pepper to explain the offside rule? Then again, he is an assistant, surely he doesn’t have a girlfriend.

The battle for fourth place is really hotting up, and to quote Alan Partridge: “It’s hotter than Debbie Harry, in cammy knickers, spoon feeding chicken vindaloo to Pan’s people, that’s half as hot as it is!”

Tottenham slipped up as did Liverpool, but Villa and Man City kept their dreams alive with wins over Bolton and Burnley respectively.

Game of the week was at Sunderland’s Stadium of Light, where the home side fully deserved their 3-1 win over Spurs, but didn’t half make hard work of it.

Darren Bent did his World Cup chances no harm, scoring two goals, and adding to his already impressive tally of 23 goals this season. He’s really beginning to look like an England player, but worryingly only because he failed to score from two penalty kicks.

Then again, calling them missed penalties doesn’t really give Spurs’ keeper Hurelio Gomes credit; the Brazilian brilliantly saved both spot-kicks, keeping his team in the game before Bolo Zenden wellied in an absolute beauty to put the game beyond Spurs, and putting the Black Cats top of the Alternative Premier League.

Meanwhile, Manchester City took full advantage of the slip-ups of Spurs and Liverpool and did it in style, with a 6-1 battering of Burnley at Turf Moor. They surely must be favourites now to get knocked out of the Champions league qualification rounds next season.

Spare a thought for poor Burnley manager Brian Laws, who saw his side go 4-0 down within the amount of time it takes to prepare, cook, and eat a hard boiled egg.

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