Category: Football
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Another fantastic penalty save from Bayindir and Zirkzee sensibly chose to shoot to win the game with the final kick.
1-1 at full-time*.
The two managers presumably threw cups and plates around in their half-time team talks and both teams came out into the second half looking determined to make a game of it.
Bruno scored a fantastic goal on the counter-attack to put United ahead and everything was going to plan. It was the United of old.
For some reason Dalot then decided to try to break his opponents legs and duly received a second yellow card and took an early bath.
For some reason United’s reserve goalkeeper Bayindir decided to play as erratically as United’s first choice goalkeeper and weakly punched a cross he might have caught into the path of an opponent in his own penalty area and Arsenal equalised with a deflection off the hapless de Ligt.
Then the fun really started.
Maguire put his arm out to stop his opponent who was in the process of dancing past him. Fair enough he went down like he’d been hit by a left hook - even my wife laughed at how pathetic it was. The ref rightly awarded a penalty and Maguire led a group rendition of “Handbags at Dawn”. A couple of players went down as if they’d been headbutted, but they soon got up again when they heard everyone laughing at them.
There was another dramatic turn as Arsenal were about to take the lead when Bayindir produced a miraculous save from the penalty.
Raheem Sterling looked on with some seriously impressive sideburns.
There was lots of end to end stuff after that but I missed most of it making big kid’s tea.
*Extra time will now be played.
0-0 at The Emirates at halftime in the FA Cup.
For some reason Arsenal are dressed as Leeds in the 1970s. United are dressed as United in the 1968 European Cup Final. They’re playing with a golden ball in memory of David Beckham.
United’s Harry Maguire produced the most memorable moment of the first half as he nutmegged himself while delicately backheeling an assist for Martinelli to score for Arsenal.
For some reason the goal was disallowed for offside.
Kobbie Mainoo hasn’t scored for United since he scored in United’s win in the final last year, and he hasn’t scored today either.
2-2 in the end after an exciting second half of end-to-end football. United played like a team transformed in confidence and belief. They scored first, and didn’t wilt completely after Liverpool equalised and then went ahead after a VAR penalty decision (technically correct, blah, blah, blah) over-ruled the ref’s “clear and obvious error” in waving play on. They grabbed an equaliser themselves and should have won it at the death, but Zirkzee (probably lacking in confidence after being subbed in the first half against Newcastle) chose to pass to Maguire rather than shoot. Maguire shinned it over the bar.
0-0 at halftime. United looking solid with a narrow four in midfield in front of a back five. Same eleven that won at City. Hojlund missed a good chance just before the break. Not sure they can keep this up for the full ninety minutes, though.
Wolves match report
We watched Wallace and Gromit this afternoon, which everyone enjoyed, little kid was particularly excited.
After that, despite protests from the kids, I watched United at lowly Wolves. I’d been convinced beforehand that this was a game the new Portuguese manager must surely win. At half-time it was 0-0 and I thought it was hard to see either team scoring (or not conceding).
Within a couple of minutes of the restart Bruno stupidly got himself sent off for fouling the Wolves right back in the Wolves’ half. Needless, and it left the ten men looking bereft without their leader, talisman, only creative outlet and most likely goal threat.
Wolves soon capitalised and deservedly went ahead. I thought United looked a little better when Casemiro and Eriksen replaced the ineffectual Mainoo and Ugarte in central midfield late on, but even then United looked like they did under Ten Hag - lost.
Yes, we can see what the new manager is trying to do. 3-4-2-1. But it doesn’t work, for whatever reasons. And like Ten Hag, he has no Plan B. Can he have lost the dressing room already? He seems to have alienated Rashford and Casemiro, and while both have their faults, both could be important players, too. Their replacements are worse.
Wolves scored a second with virtually the last kick of the game, and their new Portuguese manager recorded his second win in two games playing 3-4-2-1.
In my opinion, United should be playing a counter-attacking 4-3-3 and playing to our strengths (fast wingers), which would secure our perennial weakness (central midfield), and protect our defence. Instead we’re playing a new system, which no one seems to understand and that seems to play to no one’s strengths.
Of course, maybe we just need more patience and in another ten games it will all look different. Or we could be looking over our shoulders at the bottom three.
I vote for David Coote to replace Gary Lineker.
COPD
Last week I received confirmation of a diagnosis of chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) based on results of spirometry tests back in August (it took that long for my GP surgery to get the results from the test centre, and only after my own intervention after their repeated failures).
My GP helpfully seemed very keen to blame my twenty-odd year history of smoking.
I first smoked at about age 20. My parents were smokers (wasn’t everyone back then?). I was never a heavy smoker. The most I ever smoked was ten a day. It’s also true I smoked a number of other substances that didn’t come with filters. And then there was some vaping. I suspect that might have been the worst of the lot, but who knows? I haven’t smoked for ten years.
In my childhood, I remember several episodes of severe shortness of breath, e.g., when running around the sports field at primary school I collapsed gasping for breath, and unable to continue. I was never diagnosed with asthma. I was told to get up and stop being so weak.
As I got older, whenever the football season started, I could never get through a full game. I put it down to lack of fitness and stamina at the time, but whatever it was, the symptom was breathlessness. I was told to get fit and sent off on cross-country runs.
I had regular episodes of shortness of breath throughout young adulthood that were not triggered by exercise (I’d more or less given up by then, helped by a dodgy ankle). I thought it might be hayfever or a dust allergy.
Fourteen years ago, I needed a thoracotomy on my right lung after a chest infection went wrong. I developed pleurisy, a collapsed lung and an empyema. In the post-op, my surgeon said my lung was “as good as new”.
In the years before covid, I had frequent chest infections requiring antibiotics and time off work to recover. Then and now, I wonder if that was triggered by the Southall Gasworks remediation and air pollution?
I now see that studies show that exposure to volatile organic compounds (including benzene, naphthalene and toluene) is related to COPD.
The good news is that I had no symptoms of COPD, so it’s been diagnosed at an early stage. I’ve started with my new inhaler, and my wife reports that I’ve stopped snoring.