Stuart Attwell, Oskar Buur & A Banished Hoodoo

That’s it. The dream is over. Yes, we’re still top and yes we’ll be in the Premier League next season. Nonetheless, it is somewhat disappointing that we can’t match Reading’s record points haul anymore. I say that because I do believe that we are one of if not the greatest side ever to play in the Championship yet we can’t get the point tally to show that. Such is life, I suppose.

I Would Have Snapped Your Arm Off

Right, we were actually blessed with some action this time which was a bonus after the ball ache of international football the week before. Due to me being a perfectionist of sorts, if you’d offered four points for Middlesbrough away and Hull at home, I would’ve snapped your arm off. However, if you had offered me four points after our mighty win on Teesside, I would have looked at you like you were some sort of lunatic.

That’s what we ended up with. That comes across that I’m a tad disappointed and it shouldn’t really, but, when you take into consideration that Hull sit third bottom of the away table and had only won two out of thirteen going into the game last night, it is a bit of a wounder. We’ll come onto that shortly, first, we shall look at the events of Good Friday.

It all makes sense why it’s called Good Friday now. I did wonder just that when I was doing some work for the Indian Super League website (shameless plug incoming) here. Our result at Middlesbrough was the first time we’d won there in donkey’s years (note to self, look at where that originates from) and boy oh boy did we make it difficult for ourselves. We went in at halftime 2-0 up and in all honesty, we were cruising. While I am 99.9% sure this didn’t happen, I love a good bit of speculation; in the changing room during the interval, Nuno must’ve said, let’s see how difficult we can make it for ourselves and still win. No problem the lads said.

Still In Disarray Regarding The Costa Incident

What kicked it all off was nothing short of a joke in itself. Stuart Attwell was the referee, just so you’ve got some idea what level of twat we’re dealing with. Helder Costa was clean through on goal and had ex-Wolf George Friend on his heels (literally), Friend clipped him and Costa went sprawling to the ground. He was last man, it was a red card and that should have been that. But, no. Mr Attwell had other ideas, the moron. Surely if it was adjudged that Costa wasn’t clipped, he should’ve been booked for diving, shouldn’t he? Not in Stuart’s eyes. I’ll repeat myself, twat.

Not long had past at all when Doherty got booked for a challenge that very much warranted a yellow, after that, Neves came in late and gave away a free-kick on the edge of the box and was given a second yellow card. What made this even more surprising was that I and many others hadn’t seen him get booked. Apparently, he had, for reacting not too kindly to the Costa decision. Good on ya lad.

Doherty got a second yellow about fifteen minutes later so we had to play the last twenty minutes or so with nine men. I’ll say this once and once only. We were the dog’s bollocks. It wasn’t the prettiest performance by a long shot, but it was one of champions. CHAMPIONS. More on that shortly.

When We Turn It On, We Are Very, Very Good

Our goals in the Boro game were exquisite. Our first, began when Neves eloquently spread a ball out wide, Costa forced a save out of Randolph, the ball eventually ended up with Douglas who played it to Costa with his weak foot and Helder finished first time. No drama, 1-0.

Up until that point, the smoggies had the better of us without doing an awful lot with the ball. Long throws were their main source of attack, no second guesses required when it comes to their manager. In case you need a clue, it rhymes with Pony Tulis. If you haven’t got it now, then I really do give up.

Our second came for Douglas’ other wand of a leg as he whipped a fizzing ball in from the left which was put away at the back post by Costa’s countryman, Cavaleiro. So there you have what happened at the Riverside. Yeah, Boro got one back in stoppage time, but fuck them, who cares?

Yesterday we faced the Tigers of Hull who are one of those teams that I couldn’t give a monkey’s if they fell off the face of the earth. Makes a change from me hating everyone. By Nuno’s own admission, it wasn’t a good result or good performance, so let’s not dwell on this, eh? Jota put us one up from the spot, they scored twice then Oskar Buur scored on his league debut to make it 2-2. Not a bad evening’s work for the young Dane. Douglas once more the provider…

No Further Questions, Your Honour

On Friday, we’ve got Cardiff away. Unlike Hull, Cardiff are one of those sides I do have feelings towards. I can confirm that those feelings are that of the ill-nature because I despise the Welsh bastards. Don’t get me wrong, I’m not one of these knobheads who will sing England songs all game against them because that’s just daft, nevertheless, I’m not fond of them at all. Last week, I touched on what happened the last time I went to Middlesbrough, I could do that about Cardiff, although, my lawyer has advised me against it, so we’ll give that a miss for today. Maybe some other time.

If we beat Cardiff, we’ve won the league and it’s a done deal. Of course, things can change after that, on the other hand, the gap will be nine points and even with their game in hand, they aren’t catching us with only five games left. Not a chance.

To summarise, we were good on Friday, shite yesterday, Stuart Attwell is a twat and if we win Friday, we’ve won the league. That’s all for now.

Until the next time.