Tottenham Win, Arsenal Lose. Opening Weekend Round-up

Alan’s 2013-14 Season Diary No. 1
Palace 1 Spurs 1

I think you’d agree, three points and a clean sheet is a pretty satisfactory start. It leaves us in what I call equal first, although the official tables counting goal difference have us equal fifth (that’s changed to 9th with Monday night’s result).
Logan got a match report out straight after the game. Here are some of my impressions as I jotted them down during the game.

“Palace warming up before the game” [Photo: Alan Hill]Defoe on our bench, Kevin Phillips on theirs. This could be significant if as I suspect it’s tight later on. First 10 minutess – Spurs generally looking composed. Palace closing us down quickly, making the odd break into our half.

Dobby the house elf [Photo: Alan Hill]Dobbie involved in a fair amount of possession for Crystal Palace around the edge of our box.
Danny Rose strong and probing on the left.
It’s a good atmosphere. The Palace fans are loud. From the Tottenham fans, I definitely hear the “Yids” chant and “We are Tottenham, we’ll sing what we want”. Too right.
Just as we were getting a touch of the crabs (sideways, sideways, Walker slots an incisive ball forward to Lennon.
Moxey doing a good job on Walker but he doesn’t give up, keeps coming back for more.
30 mins. Chadli cuts in from left, shoots, corner to Spurs.
Cross from Sigurdsson, just too long for Soldado.
31 mins. Walker’s perseverance pays off as he “does” Moxey all ends up – cross cleared though.
Jedinak whacks Soldado’s ankle from behind on halfway line. Ouch! Brilliant shot from edge of area by Sigurdsson, tipped over the bar. Then Danny Rose slips in the area just as he’s through.
39 mins Ball bounces of Soldado’s thigh into the arms of the goalie.
41 mins Palace break out, nice lay off followed by a dive but the ref doesn’t fall for it.
Last move of first half – Lennon crosses onto Chadli’s head –over the bar.

You don’t need a blow by blow account of the 2nd half. More of the same really. After a few minutes, we got the break we needed with a penalty. The otherwise solid Dean Moxey spread his arms to handle Aaron Lennon’s cross from the right, like the Heron spreading its wings taking off from the roof opposite before diving into my neighbour’s fishpond. The ball travelled at least 6 feet before he pushed it into touch. Typically, in his after match whinge, Ian Holloway complained about the decision, saying the ball had only travelled “half a yard” and the decision would not have been given if the ball had been on the other foot (hand surely?) and Palace had been playing away. That should earn him a nice censure from the disciplinary committee. It’s a shame he can’t learn to bite his lip because it detracts from his astute in-game management. His triple substitution caused us real problems and Michael Phillips very nearly rescued the game for Palace, just as I had feared before the game started.

Monday
Scott Parker has signed for Fulham after all. At the weekend Harry Redknapp was at his most persuasive in trying to influence him to go to QPR. He suggested that playing for a club that was likely to spend the season struggling in the Premiership was not as rewarding as leading the QPR challenge at the top of the Championship. He said that Paul Merson’s best ever season was the one he spent helping Portsmouth to promotion. Hmm. Nice try Harry. All the best Scott, you gave us some much needed steel when we needed it. I hope we are not going to suffer for losing that commitment. Sock it to Arsenal on Saturday.

Willian [Photo: Alan Hill]Sky news says we have moved ahead of Liverpool in the fight to sign Willian for £30 million. He must be something really special; I don’t know where he finds the time to play football, what with all that rapping and TV appearances.  It’s fantastic to see all these quality players coming to Spurs. I just hope the club are confident of where the money is coming from (although it seems pretty obvious). The new stadium is necessary but it is a financial millstone. We need to ensure we don’t do a Leeds.

Other clubs
Man U and Everton
The ideal start for David Moyes at Man U but he must be biting is tongue at hearing all the pundits saying how Everton are already playing more attractive football under Roberto Mancini, particularly given that they gave away the lead to only draw with Norwich, much as Wigan used to. Everybody loved the way Wigan attacked but their weakness at the back got them relegated eventually. Whether that was the managerial tactics or the quality of the players will be proved when we see where Everton, with better players, end up this season. In the meantime, Moyes can only (if he is sensible enough not to bite) hope to continue his good start in Fergie’s shoes.

Arsenal

Arsene Wenger – a proud man. [Photo: Alan Hill]I never thought I’d see the day. The Arsenal supporters club has issued a statement to say that Arsene Wenger’s contract should not be renewed. Mark my words, now he has seen that, he won’t stay anyway. He’ll feel stabbed in the back. He is a proud man and has his own values. I think for the first time he will be regretting turning down the offers he had to jump ship. The club is really airing its dirty linen in public now, with former major shareholder Lady Nina Bracewell Smith tweeting that she deeply regretted selling her shares to Kroenke, that the board paid £3 million for a recommendation to sell out to him and that they should bring back David Dein. She soon removed the tweets but not before Sky broadcast them to the world!

Newcastle
Monday night – If Alain Depardieu didn’t already have enough problems at Newcastle with his French Foreign Legion, he has certainly got them now. Gutierrez off with a hamstring injury, Cisse off the pace and easily robbed by Company to set up City’s second goal and Taylor sent off for a forearm smash on the stroke of half time. Wonga seem to be an appropriate sponsor for Newcastle because the manager is going to need more than 4,000% interest from his players if he is to overcome these setbacks.

Season Ticket Saga
My season ticket stadium access card arrived on Saturday, so I’m over the moon. It looks like I’m going to be able to get there with the help of a friend for the Norwich game on 14 September. First time at White Hart Lane for years, regular attendance interrupted by business, then illness. I just know I’m going to have a lump in my throat and will want to sing out “Hello, hello, Alan is back, Alan is back.”

Things had already changed a great deal from when I was a regular in the ‘70s and ‘80s by the time I was attending occasionally as a guest of my nephew earlier this decade. He sits amongst the season ticket holders in the Upper West Stand and they were noticeably more genteel and quieter than the years when I used to stand amongst the seething mass in behind the goal at the Paxton Road end. I’m a real old fashioned supporter and was always one to yell out a wisecrack or advice for the referee, or trying and occasionally managing to get a chant going.

I think the season ticket holders in the upper West Stand found me a bit of an amusing curiosity, like a throwback to another age. There were raised eyebrows at first amongst the few surrounding rows but they were soon joining in. Now things have moved on again. In the old days, swearing, especially at the referee was acceptable almost expected, part of the atmosphere. “Who’s the b******d in the black”, For F***s sake”, were commonplace. It was simple use of industrial English though, not the kind of vile organised chants you sometimes hear now from certain sections of some clubs. That needs to be addressed but unfortunately the sledgehammer approach also seems to be driving some of the working class banter out of the game. So I’ll have to be careful in the new sanitised atmosphere, especially now I’m going to be right down in the front row.  A yelled joke that amused 100 people in the middle of the crowd that couldn’t be heard by anyone in an official capacity is one thing, an unguarded comment picked up by the opposing bench, the linesman or the 4th official could be something else. Just imagine the shame and embarrassment of being ejected for bad language after waiting over 20 years to get a guaranteed seat…Probably just as well I don’t have the energy to do much yelling these days.

I signed up for Stub Hub which seems to work a treat. I was able to sell on the Swansea seats that I can’t attend for in a matter of hours, so it doesn’t look like I’ll be too much out of pocket. More about Stub Hub in a later blog.