Whitey Grandad

It is a poor league but unfortunately the teams above us all cannot lose every match. No matter how poor they are they will win some games.

That's why they're called bangers.

Thanks. Any game of football is worth watching. Jackie Charlton said that if his brother Bobby was driving past a local park game on a Sunday morning he would have to stop and watch.

Indeed it was quite an experience. Strangely enough because of the distance and the noise there was none of the normal interaction between the crowd and the events on the pitch. Even when "we" scored there was no sudden roar. Entry was by facial recognition. I booked the ticket through the hotel and before the game is was sent an email through which I had to upload my passport or ID. Then I went through a process of using my phone to upload a picture of me. Somehow it worked OK.

I don't know if anyone is interested but I am in Buenos Aires at the moment and went yesterday evening to see River Plate play their neighbours Tigre at the Estadio Monumental. This stadium is also used for their national games and for visiting rock concerts. It's their version of Wembley. It's a horseshoe shape and I was up in the 'Centenario Media' in the centre of the horseshoe behind the goal. It holds 85,000. Fabulous atmosphere with almost constant chanting. It's a shame that I didn't know the words. Both sides played 4-3-3 but Tigre were a lot sharper and quicker and scored first after 5 minutes. River Plate were defensively poor with lots of holes and followed the fashion of leaving acres of space for the opposition wingers to exploit. Their ball control was poor and despites some slick interplay there were a lot of misplaced passes. Tigre were simply too quick for them and three more goals followed. Even at 4-0 down the home fans never stopped chanting despite being reduced to ten men by a high boot and were rewarded, if that's the right word, in the final minutes with a goal scored from outside the penalty area with a well-placed shot just inside the left hand post of an unsighted goalkeeper. An interesting experience and I would have liked to have stopped to sample the barbecues after the game. Quite a change from burger vans. Some on here will admire the home shirts with their red sash. 20260207_215542.mp4 20260207_214943.mp4 20260207_201058.mp4

Armstrong was ok and we have the goals to show for it. Five at the back was a bigger factor.

Exactly. "sixth" is not one particular team but the best of every team below fifth at that point of the season. We would have to outplay every one of the teams above us. Not completely impossible but not likely to happen.

We've been playing five at the back.

My Evri courier tried to deliver to a commercial address on an industrial estate. Today. On a Saturday.

That's ok. The playoffs are not until the end of the season..

Per player.

Where's that facepalm emoji when you need it ?

😄 He actually died later in a house just across the road which you can also visit. He was too big for the bed so they had to lie him across it diagonally

I've got the set of DVDs and I must have watched the complete series several times. At each viewing I learn something new. I engineered a visit to Gettysburg a few years ago and on the same trip called in at Harper's Ferry and Antietam. I always find that visiting a battlefield gives a much better understanding of a battle. We also visited Ford's Theatre [sic] where Lincoln's box is preserved as it was.

Sometimes families get homesick. Completely understandable. I'll always be grateful to him for Wembley and I'll never forget his few words at the celebration at St. Mary's after we all got back: "I'm in no fit state to say anything but... what a f***ing season! "