Maple Lions

After round 26 of the EPL, there are some stories overlooked by the pundits. Among them are the amazing performances of newly promoted sides West Ham United and Wigan Athletic.

The Hammers have returned to historic form and are firmly esconced in a dramatically transforming London footie scene, marked by Spurs on the cusp of returning to Europe and Millwall sliding from an FA Cup final to crashing out of the Championship. BTW try to catch “Green Street” if you can. Yes, it’s about the Hammers’ hoolies but it’s still remarkable entertainment.

But the Cinderella story of English football has to be the Latics. Has anyone seriously analyzed how Dave Whelan pulled off a decade-long plan to take a side into the Premiership? Wigan only entered the Football League in 1978. In this season they have held their own admirably against all comers, only losing to the top four in hotly contested matches with narrow margins. Now they look forward to battling Man U for the League Cup and may have a UEFA Cup slot slide their way. This saga needs to be sung!

Paul Canniff

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Claudio Ranieri says he is interested in the manager’s slot at Newcastle United.

Something tells me that Freddy Shepherd’s idea of a winning management style isn’t inspired by the way David Bowman rearranged the memory modules of the HAL 9000.

The Magpies deserve better.  Hold out, Geordies!

Paul Canniff 

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Two-thirds of the way into the season, budding statistician and Arsenal manager Arsene Wenger concludes that a finish in the top two of the EPL is now mathematically impossible for his team.

Paul Canniff

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Despite reports to the contrary, the Daily Mail claims that Martin O’Neill is foregoing the lure of St. James’ for a slamdunk into the England manager’s seat. And the FA claims they are in no rush to pick Sven’s successor.

Meanwhile, a horde of EPL managers pile onto the rumour scrum.

Paul Canniff

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We’ve never seen Arsene Wenger wear a beret or tuck a baguette under his arm at the touchline. Now apparently alacrity and efficiency are prized Gallic virtues.

But he does produce a vintage whine.

Paul Canniff

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With Nigel Martyn still injured and Richard Wright having gone and bashed himself up again, Everton started 3rd string ‘keeper Iain Turner, his first League start, in today’s match at Goodison against Rovers. I didn’t see the replay, but it was an apparently innocuous back-pass header from Stubbsy that forced Turner to handle the ball outside the box and earn Everton’s first straight red of the campaign. Off after 9 minutes!

On comes 19 year old Scotsman John Ruddy to replace the 22 year old Turner (with another Scot, striker James McFadden, making way); Ruddy made some key saves during the rest of the game. After 32 minutes, following a Robbie Savage foul, a beautiful Mikel Arteta free kick met James Beattie’s header to put Everton ahead and on the way to another one of their patented 1-0 wins. Beattie received a standing ovation when he came off later in the game in response to his winning goal and tireless work. It took a year, but the guy has started to find his groove. Also nice to see Lee Carsley make another late appearance as he works his way back from injury.

Everton have now climbed their way into the top ten, and could stay there depending on the outcome of Sunday’s match between City and Charlton.

Mike Campbell

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Middlesbrough 3, Chelsea 0. The Boro scored their first goal less than two minutes in.

Hopefully, Canniff doesn’t have access to rat poison, a gas oven or any sharp objects today. Meanwhile, the news is much better for Newcastle supporters - two wins in two matches since the mercifully short-lived Souness era ended. Things couldn’t possibly get any worse for the Mags than they were a few weeks ago, and that leaves only one way to go. (If we beat Championship club Southampton next week, we’re in the FA Cup quarter-final.)

Damian P.

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At the World Cup, English fans won’t be allowed to make fun of that little tiff they had with Germany 60-odd years ago:

Don’t mention the war. In fact, don’t imitate or make insulting reference to the war either, a German police official has warned English fans planning to attend the soccer World Cup in this summer.

“England fans should be aware that the Nazi salute and provocative behavior like goose-stepping in public will be punished,” Thursday’s Sun tabloid, Britain’s biggest-selling daily newspaper, quoted Gerhard Hauptmannl, the Nuremberg police chief, as saying.

England plays Trinidad and Tobago in Nuremberg in a first-round World Cup match on June 15. The city is particularly sensitive to any reference to World War II, having been the scene of some notorious Nazi party rallies in the 1930s.

[…]

…Hauptmannl warned that officers would be on the alert for a variety of offenses. “We are cooperating with British police to look for any provocative behavior in the city which might lead to violence.

“Racist abuse of black people by England fans will also be taken very seriously… My officers will have the power to remove offensive fans from the situation. They can then be held for up to two weeks without charge or charged under a fast-track system and fined or jailed the next day. Either way, we have the power to deal with troublemakers and we will not hesistate to use it.”

I’d be more worried about racist abuse from the Spanish fans, myself. As for the Germans, if we can’t make fun of the Hitler thing, there’s still their obsession with another terrifying historical figure whose last name begins with “H”.

Damian P.

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Not that we expected an Everton win over Chelsea in the FA Cup (although they did make Jose sweat through to a tie breaker), but losing their keeper at the outset didn’t help the Toffees in their 4-1 loss. Third-stringer Iain Turner apparently did well to keep things at four goals, but I’m sure Everton would have been better off with Wright in there (please come back soon Nigel!).

It seems Everton keeper Richard Wright required another sign saying “Please Read All Goalmouth Signs“. Wright was warming up in his goalmouth and injured himself by falling over a fairly large red sign that read “Not In Use: Please Practice in the Temporary Goalmouth”.

Toffeeweb.com profiles the former England international:

Richard thrives on regular action and appears to be a confidence player. At Arsenal, he’d been mainly in reserve, apart from the cup games, and on his Everton debut against Spurs, Wright failed to keep a clean sheet, setting some alarm bells ringing by making some worrying errors. Indeed, his propensity for the odd howler increasingly detracted from his ability to regularly pull off stunning saves.

Unfortunately for him, knee injury problems that led to surgery in early 2003 — not helped by a freak domestic accident when he fell out his loft in the summer and separated his shoulder — sidelined him again at the beginning of the 2003/04 campaign, prompting David Moyes to sign Nigel Martyn as cover on transfer deadline day.

Hmm, maybe the FA should have put up a “No Homers” sign in the goalmouth instead.

Mike Campbell

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The Daily Tely’s Henry Winter reports that former Hoops gaffer Martin O’Neill is the current favourite to replace Sven. Hiddink and Curbs are still in the race, but inexplicably Stuart Pearce’s name keeps popping up. Pearce has performed remarkably in his first command heading up City but managing England would be quite the toss into the deep end of the pool.

Big Sam is apparently taking knocks for a spat with a Beeb Five Live journo. Can you imagine how these chatterers would react facing Cloughie or the inimitable Bill Shankley?! Please!

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