I can’t keep handing over our money to the FA
Posted in General on 06. Sep, 2010
I can’t keep handing over our money to the FA.”Television evidence was not conclusive, and the Wigan manager, Paul Jewell, maintained that Shearer had been pushing his centre-back Arjan De Zeeuw, anyway. In truth, Souness, who claimed that the use of technology to determine such debates was “only a matter of time”, should be rather more troubled with this modest performance which scarcely merited a point. Not even England’s present and past strikers supreme, Shearer and Michael Owen – whom Wigan tried to sign before he moved to St James’ Park – could disturb an astonishing run of form from Paul Jewell’s men, although Lee Bowyer did strike a post in the first half.As the Wigan manager said after his side’s fifth victory of the season: “We had two England captains playing against us, but we resisted them brilliantly. I can’t remember John [Filan] having to make a decent save.”And so, this Lancashire town where thoughts may otherwise have been on the finale of the oval-ball season, could, at least briefly, watch their team accommodate a 19th-floor apartment in the Premiership prestige block, just beneath the penthouse boys, when most suspected that they would be languishing in the basement by now.”Sing at the rugby, you only sing at the rugby,” the Toon followers had taunted the home supporters in the first half. That lack of respect for their hosts caught in their throats after 10 minutes when Jason Roberts eluded Steven Taylor before striking the base of the near post.Then, five minutes before the break, Damien Francis supplied the incisive pass which offered Roberts the invitation to force what transpired to be the winner past the Newcastle goalkeeper Shay Given.Will Wigan continue to have a head for such heights? Not every team will prove as compliant as Newcastle.
Jewell knows his team face Arsenal, Liverpool, Chelsea and Manchester United before Christmas. “It’s going to be a long, hard winter,” warned the September manager of the month. Souness, meanwhile, attributed an insipid first half from his men in part to international exertions He maintained that they improved after Emre appeared. Perhaps, but the difference was marginal.Athletic don’t score many but are so resolute at the rear they don’t concede many either.
Just five all season, and their inspired summer acquisitions, St?ane Henchoz and De Zeeuw, are primarily responsible for that.Wigan’s afternoon was tainted only by the dismissal of Lee McCulloch in the closing minutes for kicking out at Emre. His manager was rather more concerned about Henri Camara’s reaction after being substituted late on. Evidently displeased, the Senegal player went to walk straight down the tunnel, but Jewell summoned him back “He showed disrespect to his team-mates. I’m disappointed with him,” said Jewell.When these clubs last met 51 years ago, at Springfield Park, Dave Whelan was playing the trombone for Wigan Boys’ Club in the pre-match entertainment.
These days, the Wigan chairman can contentedly trumpet his club’s arrival in the Premiership. How long, though, before his counterpart, Freddy Shepherd, whose team have accumulated just two League victories this season, blows the whistle on Souness?. Were you watching, Sepp Blatter? Not bad for a team who “know they will lose”, don’t you think? But it was not just the Fifa president who was left red-faced after his claim that “an Albion official” had told him that Bryan Robson fields weaker XIs against those such as Arsenal was answered with a stunning riposte. Ars? Wenger was positively puce after young Darren Carter fanfared a courageous comeback with a glorious strike that consigned Arsenal to their third defeat of the season and lifted West Brom from the bottom three.
The visitors might well have been depleted but there were long patches when they hinted at the champions of old and only an inspired Chris Kirkland could be any sort of match for them.No Thierry Henry, Sol Campbell, Ashley Cole, Alexander Hleb or Robin van Persie; this lot were, in hindsight, there for the taking. Nevertheless, with an attack boasting Dennis Bergkamp and Jose Antonio Reyes, not to mention nine other internationals, when the ball began to ping around The Hawthorns like lines on a training chart, it seemed that Philippe Senderos’s opener – walloping in Reyes’s inswinging corner on 17 minutes – would be the mere start of it.And, in truth, when West Brom equalised in the 38th minute, Arsenal should have been three or even four clear.
That they were not owed so much to Kirkland as well as to the right flank providing an outlet for their own forays.It was from there that Martin Albrechtsen took Jonathan Greening’s lead to deliver a crisp cross that Senderos could only ricochet into the middle of the area. Awaiting was Arsenal old boy Kanu swinging that maverick right boot to find Jens Lehmann’s right-hand corner. Still in it; ambition very much alive.Their light seemed to be flickering, however, when Kolo Tour?craped paint in the 55th minute and again when Kirkland dispossessed Bergkamp in the six-yard box. On this form Kirkland could dispossess the Artful Dodger in a phone box. If the England 24-year-old’s gathering of Reyes’s free-kick was elegant then his save off Mathieu Flamini’s right-foot fizzer in the 66th minute was a thing of beauty.Still, it was nothing compared to the veritable Miss World lying in Carter’s vanity box. The £1.5m summer signing from Birmingham said he had plenty to prove and, after coming on in the 68th minute, how he proved it.