football rambles

 First in the bank holiday of football was Aston Villa v Fulham on Saturday. It really was a must win game and felt a bit odd with it being a lunchtime kickoff. The game was decided by a Youri Tielemans header from a John Mc Ginn corner in the 12th minute. In truth Villa dominated the first half and Ollie Watkins was a bit wasteful in front of goal, but at least he was getting in the right positions. Matty Cash and Ian Maatsen were good at getting forward on the wings and the midfield battle was being won by McGinn and Tielemans. At halftime, you kind of wondered if Villa would regret not making more of their chances. The second half saw Fulham attacking with more intent, but Villa were more troubled by their own style of defending than the opposition, however it was a bit nerve wracking at times. That said, the best opportunities of this half went to Villa. Watkins should have converted a chance that Rogers set up for him; Torres missed a golden opportunity that a more attacking m...

I  bought these teams in the 1980s from a couple of lads on a market stall who had clearly outgrown the hobby. I can tell that the teams came from 1976 - 1980 due to the boxes that they came in and the fact that they are still clearly hand painted. Sunderland Sunderland achieved promotion in 1976, but despite topping the table for a while they went straight back down. Celtic Celtic were champions of Scotland every year between 1976 and 1982, which is perhaps not that surprising. It was a time when Danny McGrain and Kenny Dalglish were playing for the hoops. The picture below shows Celtic celebrating winning the Scottish FA Cup in 1977. Brazil In the 1978 World Cup there was only ever going to be one winner and the military junta in host nation Argentina were going to make sure that they won it. In the second group stage after a violent 0-0 draw with Argentina, both teams needed a win. A lot has been made of the 0-0 draw played out by Germany and Austria b...

Last time we were in the Aviva Community Stand. For the game against Fulham we were opposite in the Barclay. Here are a few photos from way before the game kicked off.

After 5 years of being in East Anglia and never making the trip to Carrow Road, mainly due to ticket availability and prices I have now been there twice in the last month. The FA Cup offered us the chance to snap up cheap tickets and meant that we would be able to make it to a game at a time of year when the local clubs struggle to get anything put on. The opponents were Fulham and although both teams rang the changes for a game that both probably could have done without there was still a lot of quality on show. The game started off promising enough with the Canaries peppering the Fulham goal with Martin Olsson and David Fox causing Fulham all sorts of problems on the wing, especially the hapless Zverotic who was getting in all sorts of problems. Elmander and Josh Murphy, on his full debut for the club, came close but Norwich weren't causing enough problems in the box. Record signing Ricky Van Wolfswinkel was back in the team after a 3 month lay off and the Canaries will be ho...

On Friday night I was in London for the Happy Mondays and I made a weekend of it with the Fulham v Swansea match coming in between an evening out for Paul's birthday. I haven't actually seen Swansea since they played Fulham in the old division 4, some time in the mid-90s. However, as I am also going to be at the Norwich game in a couple of weeks and am hoping to go to Villa v Swansea at Christmas they could become quite a familiar site. Neither of the teams looked really effective although the game was entertaining enough. Fulham seemed to let Swansea come at them a bit too much and only Scott Parker and Derek Boateng looked interested in stopping them. Up front Berbatov and Bent don't exactly look like the dream team, as having 2 players who have such an adversity to tracking back means that Fulham were effectively down to 9 players when Swansea were on the attack. Swansea seemed to be guilty of messing around with the ball a bit too much when they could have ha...

Mark Hughes and Gary Johnson in the dug outs

Yesterday I went down to Craven Cottage for the FA Cup third round tie between Fulham and Peterborough. The day started off in the usual style of a trip to Fulham with a sampling of over priced beers in the pubs of Hammersmith. I had no idea of what to expect from the result, but I though that a lot of goals could be on the cards Macca had a bet on Danny Murphy being the first goal scorer. The only thing he seemed sure of was that the first goal scorer wouldn't be Diomansy Kamara. At the ground the crowd was a dissapointing 16,000 with over 6,000 coming down from Peterborough for the game. We were sat near a couple of familiar faces with Barry Fry just behind us and the more popular George Boyd in front of us. The game went in favour of the Premier League team and although as usual Tomlin and McCann looked competent in midfield and Mackail-Smith looked capable up front the defence that can look frail in League 1 looked really out of their depth against a Premier League attack. It w...

Yesterday I went on what seems to be my annual trip to Fulham's Craven Cottage to see Fulham take on Wigan. I think I may have been banned from Villa games down there by Scott, so the most neutral of games was probably seen as a good idea (by him). That said, it was a sell out crowd mainly because Fulham charged a very resonable fiver for the game. The game itself was a bit one sided with Fulham's Clint Dempsey scoring both of Fulham's goals in the first half. Predictably he was named as man of the match by most of the Sunday newspapers, but I think that Baird, Salcido and Dembele were also as impressive if not more so. Andy Johnson, who many thought would have to retire after a horrific injury earlier in the year, also came on late in the match and added to the Fulham forward line. In general not a bad game, but a bit one sided. The picture shows Fulham's Zoltan Gera tackling Wigan's Hugo Rodallega.

Well a great day was had on Saturday even if it wasn't the most exciting game of the season. The game started off quietly enough (well at Craven Cottage would you expect it to start any other way?) with both teams looking like teams who were severley lacking in form - funny that. However, it was Villa who looked the stronger team and Collins and inparticularly Richard Dunne looked capable of coping with anything that Zamora et al could throw at them. The break through finally came on 40 minutes when a cross from Petrov found Gabby Agbonlahor in space and he headed home clinically to make it 1-0. Four minutes later just before half time Gabby doubled the scoring with a superb individual effort after a pass from Carlos Cuellar had picked him out in space. The second half saw Villa passing the ball around nicely with Fulham not really ever looking like breaking down the Villa defence. Fulham did get the ball in the back of the net in the closing stages of the game, but David Elm was o...

Well I've been away for ages and that's basically been because I've had a bigger football drought than when it was the off season. A bout of bad weather and having to work a few Saturdays has meant that tomorrow's game between Fulham and Villa is the first game of the New Year that I will be at. My first trips to the old Craven Cottage were in the 1994-5 season when I saw them beat Hartlepool 1-0 and draw 1-1 with Hereford. I don't remember which order the games were in, but I was isiting Scott in London and talked him out of going to Chelsea v Forest on the day and inadvertntly turned him into a Fulham fan. After that season I was abroad up until last season, but I went to few games there and at Loftus Road when they were groundsharing with QPR on the times when I came over to visit. Last season I was at the game where they beat Villa 3-1. I won't be hoping for a repeat of that result tomorrow. The win against Villa last season coincided with Villa blowing the...

Not as good as the one below the got deleted, and the music is particularly annoying on it. It sounds like some crap those tools off Top Gear would listen to, apart from anything else Villa lost so I'm wondering why I am persevering with this.

Fulham v Aston Villa

Yesterday saw Villa take on Fulham at Craven Cottage, so I had a day out with Scott which took in the various sites of Hammersmith pubs, unfortunately that's as cultural as it got. We started off early on just outside Hammersmith station and then made our way to the ground along the Thames. We were supposedly sitting in the neutral stand, but it was a mass of claret and blue and the fans created a great atmosphere, at least before the game and for the first half. I had gone not expecting a win for Villa who are 5th despite having terrible form over the last couple of months, needless to say Villa didn't manage the win. Danny Murphy put Fulham ahead from the spot on 6 minutes after some poor defending and Ashley young equalised for Villa on 14 minutes. Villa and Fulham seemed eavenly matched for most of the first half, but it has to be said the long season seems to have taken it out on Ashley Young and Gabby Agbonalahor. Stylian Petrov didn't have a particularly good game in...