Upbeat Defeat

Right. Enough. The World Cup has begun with a magnificent flourish. Goals galore, the big players showing up early doors, the right things happening and England just happened to lose their first game against a very decent team. Which is a bugger, yes, but hardly worth getting all snide about.


First things first. The opening ceremony wouldn't have entertained a two-year-old Teletubbies fan. Garbage. Even J-Lo's arse had lost its lustre by the time it reared up out of that bollocksy chocolate orange jobbie at the centre of the stadium. If there were some undecideds amongst the Brazilian populace about whether this whole shebang was money well-spent, I'm sure that opening salvo of third-rate circus skills left 'em in no doubt.


Whether the desperate need for the hosts to get off to a good start permeated through to the Japanese referee's subconscious can only be guessed at. But Fred's ludicrous flop should not have been rewarded and we were left wondering whether the refs might ruin it.


But you know, it's settled down well now. It's a joy to watch. Lots of positive intent, and the utter dismemberment of Spain by Robin Van Persie - there's always a tinge of Sherwood Forest about his name - and the annoying bald sprite that is Arjen Robben was thrilling to behold.


Spain have problems but are not too stupid to sort them out. Iker Casillas - grand servant and all that - looks increasingly like a disorientated assistant gardener whose been given some big gloves to wear but can't remember why. De Gea or Reina need to come in. Bringing Torres on to help was like trying to stop a house fire with some damp toilet tissue. Why is he there?


There have already been some little moments to treasure


Otherwise there haven't been any major shocks save for Costa Rica's tonking of Uruguay. The Uruguayans looked amenably feeble and if England can keep up their attacking menace we should turn 'em over.


Which bring us on to Saturday night and, well, I'm not saying this in a Scottish way, but I thoroughly enjoyed watching England lose. Sterling was a delight, neat and nimble, gliding between players in an almost dare I say it Messi like way. But without the finish as yet. Welbeck had his best hour for England too, and Sturridge looked lively.


As for Rooney, well... give the lad a fecking break, okay. Yes, he's overpaid, and maybe he's overplayed, but the bloke put in a shift wide left to accommodate some Johnnie-come-lately in his favoured position. He also put over a sublime ball for Sturridge's finish and if Lionel Bleedin' Messi or Andres Ini-blinking-esta had knocked that ball across we'd all be cooing like grandmothers at a christening.


I don't actually think it's a big deal whether he plays or not. But he didn't have a bad game. The reason this has become an issue is cos the media feckers need summat to bang on about for five days and this is the best they can do. Leave it.


Let's see how he gets on against Suarez and co and maybe we can stop him pulling his hair out for a week or so. (He is looking a bit thin on top again. I thought them top-weaves were made to last.) Any road, Gerrard hardly had his best ninety minutes in an England shirt and no one's carping about him not starting the next game.


But as the skipper himself said, the last time this lot turned up at a tournament we had all the cutting edge of a space-hopper. This time we look like we might score. These are times to be optimistic not downright hacked off. Gone are the days when Owen Hargreaves and Darius Vassell represent progressive substitutions. Chin up, everyone.


The only genuine downside appears to be expert summariser Phil Neville who was dour enough to make Paul Scholes sound like Graham Norton. I mean I'm sure we all tire of that master of hindsight Andy 'he should've done a bit better there' Townsend. And no one can possibly treasure ninety minutes in the company of football's resident wag Mark Lawrenson, who lost any comedy value he might have had when that 'tache was removed. But PNev was just dull. He was Shaun Ryder on a particularly grim downer.


But what's really twisting my melon on this particular happy Monday is li'l ole Juninho, who, Teesside's sweetheart though he is, doesn't seem to be contributing much at all, bless 'im. It could be a language thing, it could be that he's not the brightest bulb in Brazil, but poor Gary seems to spend much of his time picking up the ends of Juninho's contributions like a tramp scouring ashtrays for fag-ends.


But apart from a bit too much writhing around from players as if someone's set fire to their sleeping bags, it's been a great start.


The beautiful game might just be getting its looks back.

Roll on June 12th!

Look it's been a while but apart from the odd bit of play-off nonsense - meaningless without the Teesside terracists to swell the Wembley throng (and chance would be a fine thing) - the last couple of weeks have just been a waiting game.


Oh I know there's a couple of stories brewing about this n that. There's talk of Southampton FC being broken up and divided amongst Champions League competitors next season. And Manchester United too.


Frank Lampard has finished with Chelsea, which is a huge relief, Nice man, frequently 'orrible team. I've always thought that Lampard was a very, very good one trick pony. The equal of any goalscoring midfielder but without the adaptability of, say, Gerrard or Scholes. In my head there will always be a question mark over his England appearances as I always wanted to use him off the bench if Gerrard was being a bit shit, rather than wedge the two of them in the same place and pray that they could somehow work it out between them.


But good luck to him. A fine pro, and a top bloke from what I hear.


But I'm just itching for the World Cup to start. The TV roster is in place at home. The rules are the same as they are every World Cup. If the footy's on, shut your gob and watch.


I have a ban on the wife uttering the following phrases:


"Not more football!" (You never hear me say 'Not more police drama centring on a dysfunctional cop investigating a child murder' so I see no reason why a reciprocal arrangement can't exist once every four fucking years.)


"But why do you care who wins out of Colombia* or South Korea*?" (*insert random obscure football nations in here)


"Can't you just watch the highlights later?"


"What do you mean, the lads are coming round after closing time?"


"Where's David Beckham/Jose Mourinho/David Ginola?"


"Is this what my license fee is going on?"


"Why's Michael Owen allowed to say anything?" (Oh no, wait, I'm the one who says that.)


There are of course many things she's allowed to say, such as: "I don't think you spend enough time down the Blue Bell these days" or "What do you think about Brazilians?" But generally she understands the situation and stays away, except during the England games when she participates whole-heartedly. But annoyingly. Kind of like Robbie Savage really. But more perceptive. And less peroxide.


What's particularly good about this competition is that our boys haven't got a Joey Barton's chance on Question Time of coming across particularly brilliantly and therefore, much like Joey, I'll be giving them plenty of leeway to be a bit crap here and there as long as they manage to entertain.


The major dilemma for Hodgson - at least this is what the media are talking up in the ansence of anything genuine to discuss - is whether Rooney merits a starting place. Against Peru there was that familiar flat post-season air to him. Come June the lad looks light last night's unfinished lager. In contrast Sterling and Barkley look like they've just come out the fridge.


But as Scholes suggested, would the manager dare to leave Rooney out. I don't see why not, myself. He's not the only source of creativity in the squad and when we've made him the cornerstone of the side, there's been a distinct lack of corners. Let him sit a couple out. I would.


But it is really refreshing to be going to the World Cup with that level of expectation, i.e. nil. Just imagine being Belgian right now. They have a golden generation of talented players who have qualified comfortably against run-of-the-mill teams and haven't played anyone good since losing 3-1 to Germany four years ago.


They've got a brilliant playmaker, Eden Hazard, who's done sod-all in the national team. Yep, that's pretty much how golden generations work in our experience. Sorry my flat-landed friends but this is the sort of story that ends in the last 16 with a disappointing scrappy defeat against a petulant Portugal.


I've also been preparing by going out for some hot and humid training just so I don't underestimate the difficulties our boys face out there in the jungle. I tried doing keepy-uppies in the wife's sister's greenhouse the other day. Knackering, I can tell you. Until I smashed through the glass ceiling. If that's what working women keep complaining about then take a football to work, ladies.


Of course you'll be wanting to know who I'm tipping to lift the old trophy and it's always a tricky one. There a few more imponderables than usual this time.


Will any European team be left come the quarter-finals or will they have dissolved into a pool of their own perspiration by then?


Can Brazil conquer the demons of 1950 and get to win the whole caboodle for the sixth time? Or will some falling masonry from an unbuilt stadium take out Neymar and throw the whole tournament into confusion?


Will an African side make it to the final? And if it's Ivory Coast, will Yaya Toure get enough vehicles from his national football federation to convince him to play in it?


Has Sepp Blatter and his pals already decided who the winner is? You can just picture the FIFA HQ sweepstake where every one of them pulls out the name Argentina and they all celebrate together. And indeed will the football be so festive and freewheeling that we can for a short while forget that not a decision is made by its governing body without someone seeming to be inserting a finger in someone else's pie.


Blatter is still insisting his work is not done. I'm sure there'll be a vote which has all the integrity of a Syrian election and lo and behold the ancient Big Swiss Cheese will still be ballsing up the international game.


Desperate.


Any road, I'll be casting me eye in greater detail over the challengers in the next blog. And what I don't know about Algerian football isn't worth knowing. Then I'll tell you that Brazil win it. Okay?

Arsene's Back (Sort Of)

I saw a programme the other day about wasps and was dead taken by their nests: beautiful, ornate, sturdy-looking but paper-thin. These wasps have built the Arsenal team, I thought to meself.


Well, yes, except occasionally, when cornered, your average wasp'll sting you. And from somewhere Arsenal found enough venom to ward off Hull City on Saturday (dressed as wasps themselves to be fair) and I think everyone, barring fans of Spurs and Hull, breathed a huge sigh of relief for the manager.


Never has a manager celebrated with such fatigue. You got the impression, even as the tie came off (you flirt, Arsene!) and his squad lobbed him up and down as his furrowed face dripped with champagne, that he just wanted to go indoors and read a nice book.


He won't say it but I'm pretty sure defeat in the Cup Final would've seen Wenger chuck it all in. Who wouldn't have. Every time questions have been asked this season about his side in the big games they've been swept away in the first half-hour. So it seemed on Saturday.


Two scruffy old goals from set-pieces - the Gunners' Achilles heel. The way they deal with crosses in boxes suggests not one of them wouldn't spoil their ballot papers. (Which is a roundabout way of saying 'Vote!' on Thursday).


Steve Bruce's boy nearly made it three - and young Alex put himself about manfully to refute claims of nepotism amongst cynical viewers (me included) - and Arsenal looked for all the world like they were going to ship another couple of the game was up before it began.


Santi Cazorla - with the aid of leaden-footed keeping by Mr McGregor - got Arsenal back in to the game. Cazorla was nearer to his best than we've seen recently, although I sometimes wonder why he doesn't go down a couple of sizes in the shorts department. In them keks he looks for all the world like Casper in 'Kes'.


After that, Hull got increasingly tired of running around after the Gooners tippy-tappying midfielders and the equaliser was all too inevitable.


Even then the Wenger boys made very heavy weather of it, although the winner fitted the properly clichéd bill by being 'worthy of winning any trophy. Aaron Ramsey was brilliant all season and his form going into these last few games makes his absence mid-season all the harder to take for you Gooners.


So the wait is over, the open-top bus can plod through the streets of Highbury and the gaffer gets three more years to prove that this is a 'turning-point' for the club.


Well now... here's the thing... This is the first season in my memory where the Arsene-Wipers were drowned out by the Arsene-kickers - and I'm talking Gooners here, not the rest of us. The neutrals have always verged on supporting Wenger cos he introduced some top -notch footy to this country, and this ongoing trophylessness was a story all of its own. We liked Moyes for the same reason , although short-sighted folk like Sir Alex Ferguson couldn't spot that.


Yes, the naysayers at the Emirates were in near full cry as Wenger's 1000th game saw his team panned 6-nothing by the most goal-shy Chelsea team in a generation. And what has the le vieux professeur done to change things? Nowt.


How did he alter the course of the Cup Final. He played two up front, which meant bringing on the great galumpher Sanogo - who seems to be doing his best to make everyone at the club really miss Gervinho (and the words 'miss' and 'Gervinho' are mutually inclusive.)


That hardly made a difference and so extra time saw the gaffer replace two fiddly-diddly midfielders with two more fiddly-diddly midfielders... Wilshere and Rosicky undoubtedly made a difference, but more through fresh legs than a change of policy.


It became clear what Wenger needs if he is going to change things around in terms of the Premier League and Champions League:


1. No more midfielders, especially the lazy ones. Mesut Ozil celebrated happily with the others but the clenching of his fist was the most work the bloke did all match. Wenger's got away with playing Arteta in a holding role but he's nowhere need the defensive ballast that Flamini was early doors.


2. A striker who can run around a bit, unlike Giroud, who is a French Teddy Sheringham, all brain and no pace. Walcott will help but if these repeat qualifications for the Champs League are worth anything they ought to be worth getting a fleet-footed and proven goalscorer on the books.


3. Sagna needs replacing and Jenkinson isn't the answer. So a right-back, then. And Vermaelen - ludicrously given the job of lifting the Cup after doing eff-all but sit down - surely there are some traditions we can keep hold of? - isn't half the player he was two years ago so they'll need a top centre-half to fill in.


The signs are that he'll have oodles of cash to splash if he wants it, but it's not Wenger's way to spend for the sake of spending. We'll see.


Maybe he'll look over the sea towards Diego Simeone and think that spending big isn't always the answer. What Simeone has done there is close to miraculous. He has a wage bill the size of Fulham's so I'm told.


Everything is down to hard work and playing for each other, he reckons. He readily resorts to that oft-mocked label that the Atletico play with a 'working-class' spirit which only enamours them to every plebeian football fan across the world whose team struggles on against the twin obstacles of lack of quality and lack of pure, naked cash.


They're not too easy on the eye but easier than a re-Mourinho-ed Chelsea whose budget dwarfs Atletico's. Even without their star turns Costa and Turan they came back form a goal down against the increasingly ticky-tacky Barca. I hope they turn Real over too. Frankly it'll give us all a boost.


Vamos Cholo!


And well done Arsenal too. Now sort yourselves out and you could even win the League. Ahem.