by bigmick » Mon Feb 28, 2005 5:05 pm
Always the way, takes something unbelieveably horrible to put perspective back into focus. Shank's "life and death" quote was great copy but not to be taken literally, it is only a game after all.
On the question of the game, I've been away with the wife and kids all week (in centre parcs of all places) but I did see it in the "sports lounge". There was no sound on and I was surrounded by a bunch of Chelski numpties so these thoughts are original, all my own and not influenced by any TV experts.
1. I didn't think it was a penalty. Not in a million years. We've been robbed a few times this season but not there. Contact yes, foul no. I didn't think it was worthy of debate until I saw that some of the guys on here think it was. Not at all for me.
2. Chelsea were the better side on the day. That's probably because they are a better side. Simple. That said, we played really well I thought but ultimately our inability to keep the ball meant we ran out of legs in the last third of the game.
3. Gerrard continued on his run of indifferent form. However to imply that because of any future plans he didn't try or deliberately conceded an own goal is just plain silly. It's a waste of time even debating the point.
In summary we did well. Rafa did well, we tried our best but just came up short. Final thought, if we'd have had John Terry or a similarly commanding centre half then we probably would have won. Bring on a really top-class player in that position as a number one priority in my view.
"se e in una bottigla ed e bianco, e latte".