Having spent most of my working life scraping a living in the sales industry I have met, over the years, my fair share of blindly optimistic people. It helps, apparently, to think that something will go well even when, to the unbiased observer, it obviously will not.
I have nothing against optimism and positive mental attitude but, as with most things, there is a time and a place. (more…)
PRE-MATCH
This is it! This is the “must win” game that will mean that Louis van Gaal is really quite a good manager and didn’t mean to lose all those games. Alternatively, it is the “must win” game that will spell the end for Louis, meaning that he was never really very good and should have gone directly from Holland to the Algarve, giving Manchester a very wide berth in the process.
Which will it be? As I mentioned in an earlier post, I think he is going whatever the score, win or lose. The only remaining item on the agenda is how he departs. Does he jump or does he get pushed? We will see.
The team he has picked for this game saw recalls for Schweinsteiger, Schneiderlin and Darmian giving a massive vote of no-confidence to three of the team who played against Stoke, (in fairness he could have given a massive vote of no-confidence to all of them after that game). He then proceeded to pick his top scorer out wide and the one who can’t score to save his life at centre forward. His tinpot logic also sees Ashley Young as a left winger but a right wing back, meaning that Matteo Darmian, who is a right full back, played on the left. No wonder van Gaal can’t work out what is going wrong!
From what I could see there was no reason why any of these players had to be played much out of position but, that’s van Gaal for you. (more…)
This was going to be titled, ‘England and the Meaningless Friendlies, (part III).’
As anybody who follows these inane waffles will know, I have already written and published the first two parts, which question the value of these games.
However, this was not a meaningless friendly. This was one of the most meaningful friendlies played in a very long time.
It was a friendly football match that actually meant something for all the wrong reasons. It was right that it was played. Any act designed to terrorise, kill and maim people is sick enough in its own right but, to then cede more to the perpetrators by cancelling a sporting event which had been planned for a while, somehow makes it even worse, if that is at all possible. (more…)
