CCFC V WEST HAM

BIG MATCH PREVIEW

So a New Year has dawned but nothing much has changed, with a club in crisis playing at the CCS. The big surprise though is it's not us! Tomorrow we welcome the Hammers on the back of a morale-sapping disastrous set of results that has left scribes interrogating the footie lexicon to adequately describe their predicament following a 5-0 'trouncing' by Forest in the FA Cup and their 6-0 'drubbing' at the hands of Man City in the League Cup. Time then to 'concentrate on the league' where a run of one win out of 13 has seen them drop into the relegation zone with Big Sam 'on borrowed time' should the buoyant Bluebirds beat the blubbering bubble-blowers.

Allardyce is of course one of the games more 'colourful' characters - a much travelled manager whose career has seen more hastily abandoned clubs than Tiger Woods in flight from his missus.

The larger-than-life masticating maverick is a controversial character infamous for his starring role in the Panorama expose Undercover: Football's Dirty Secret, during which two agents separately claimed to have paid bungs to Allardyce for arranging transfers. Allardyce's outrage at this libellous slur on his reputation upset him so much that he was quite unable to follow up his threat to take his accusers to court, preferring instead to defend his integrity by poutily refusing to talk to the BBC. From which some people inferred his guilt. As guilty in fact 'as a puppy sitting next to a pile of poo' (Blackadder)

Which brings us to our own young pup, a pedigree pooch, the Norwegian Molde Hound they call 'Ole' whose doe-eyed demeanour belies a steely resolve and a bite worse than his bark, as befitting a man given the moniker 'The Baby-Faced Assassin'.

The opposition are in disarray and although we've had problems of our own in recent weeks these have resulted from circumstances beyond the control of the players who've responded well and can hold their heads high. There's no reason to think that the fans and players won't quickly get behind the new man, notwithstanding the debt owed to his proud predecessor who will always command respect for the dignified way he dealt with the fall-out from Tan's ego-driven idiocy.

Solskjaer has started well, controlling his early exchanges with the press with a disarming affability and an eloquence that would put most premiership managers to shame. This and an unlikely victory at Newcastle in his first game in charge have already endeared him to the fans who sense a wind of change blowing around Sloper Road as we enter a new era with renewed hope.

Ole has been quick to take advantage of Tan the Cantankerous' newly rediscovered largesse, having already secured funding for three names that look like winning lines from the World Scrabble Championship for the Partially Sighted - Magnus Wolf Eikrem, Mama Biram Diouf and in view of recent events the appropriately named Mats Moeller Daehli - a signing bordering on the surreal.

Meanwhile Big Sam has been given the dreaded vote of confidence from the West Ham board which is about as reassuring as a handshake from Albert Pierrepoint. Mind the trap-door Sam.

CCFC 0 v 2 WEST HAM

Today's must-win game was billed as a battle of styles - of two teams fashioned by the personalities of the managers; the young innocents with the choirboy looks, easy on the eye and eager to please versus the gnarled cynical old hacks with all the endearing qualities of a bull mastiff chewing a wasp. The good guys against the bad guys. And the good guys always win. Don't they?

Against all expectation and hope it was the away team that came out of the blocks with real purpose and intent. Within 5 minutes they had Marshall beaten by a low curling cross-cum-shot that evaded everyone to rebound back off the post.

The away fans were purring, prompting the Canton End to taunt them with 'You've only got one song, you've only got one song'. Actually it turns out that they've got at least two in their repertoire. There's the one we all know about - the old musical hall number dating from the 1920's when the tune was used to advertise Pear's Soap. At the time a West Ham player, Billy J 'Bubbles' Murray apparently bore a strong resemblance to the girl on the Pear's poster (It probably doesn't pay to speculate too much on how the lyrics inspired dressing room antics involving 'pretty Bubbles'...)

And the latest addition to the cockney's canon is bizarrely enough the soft boy new romantic Spandau Ballet standard 'Gold' in praise of their co-owner, the tittilator-in-chief, the fornicator's friend David 'Knickerbox Glory' Gold. Gotta hand it them lemon squeezers they do like an ol' ding-dong. Oi!

The first half was a stop-start affair that struggled to gain any momentum after the ten minute delay for the injury to the Hammers' Guy Demel who was to spend the night in hospital following a suspected broken elbow after falling awkwardly when shoving Fraizer Campbell to the ground in what looked to me like a clear penalty shout. (Limited sympathies then...)

The first hint of any quality was a mazy run by Odemwingie after 25 minutes which came to nothing. Noone threatened occasionally but the deep-set Hammers' defence stood firm. The nearest we came to a breakthrough was Kim's deflected shot which hit the underside of the bar and bounced on, but not over, the line. I've worn out the rewind button on my digibox and after a couple of glasses of wine at some point past midnight last night I can confirm that it definitely looked over the line to me.

On 42 minutes (which represented little more than half an hour of play) Carlton Cole anticipated a cross from the right catching T-C cold to blast past Marshall from close range. For all his industry and commitment our French right back has been guilty of stupefiant naivete at times this season which has cost us dear.

Our first half performance was strangely flat. We had plenty of possession but lacked any initiative around the box, sending passes laterally and losing ground when in good positions. Kim, Noone, Whiitingham, Odemwingie, Campbell are all similar in stature and temperament. We were missing someone capable of dictating play in dangerous positions. Enter Bellamy.

The Tremorfa Terrier took to the field for the second half, replacing the ineffective Odemwingie whose contributions to date have been incommensurate with expectations and reputation and I'll be surprised if he's not marked down in the new manager's January Sales catalogue. Bellamy dictated play immediately and typically galvanised those around him, going close himself with a free kick and creating the sort of incisive runs that had been absent previously.

It was turning into one of those games where we weren't quite getting the rub of the green. All the critical moments - goal line incidents, penalty shouts, offside calls, contentious challenges, were resolved in the opposition's favour. The stats show that the 63% possession yielded 19 shots, 7 on target, each one finding the goalkeeper's midriff. The clearest opportunity fell to Campbell whose instinctive shot from the six yard box was aimed at the 10% of the goal that Adrian had covered.

Solskjaer made some enterprising substitutions, bringing on new boy Wolff Eikrem for El Pitbull in order to comply with the Premier League's quota of only one feral beast per team, and then replacing Hudson with Cornelius, leaving just three at the back.

It looked as though Lady Luck had belatedly turned up, flustered, apologetic and brandishing a red card when the unlucky Tomkins was given his marching orders with about ten minutes left but this allowed the opposition to reinforce their defence, drop deeper in midfield and indulge in the dark arts of groin-grabbing, dead-legging, ankle-stomping, calf-scraping and time-wasting so beloved of the Bungmeister General. It was no real surprise - but a sickening blow all the same - when they broke out of defence on 90 minutes to seal their victory.

This time next week we'll be completing the double against Man City at the City of Manchester Stadium. By then Etihad Airways will have replaced their Airbus A380s with a fleet of pigs. We follow that with a visit to Old Trafford. By the end of the month I imagine we will have consolidated our position in the drop-zone. An achievement of sorts.

After the game we went to see the film Gravity in which Sandra Bullock and George Clooney are cut loose from base and drift off into deep space. SPOILER ALERT!! Bullock manages to survive against the odds. Clooney doesn't. If there's a cute analogy it must be Bullock's.

CCFC 2 v 2 SUNDERLAND

OK, before we start let's recall how we got into this mess and draw a line under the crisis to date. So that we can move bravely forward, confident that the next one will be just around the corner...

• May 2010: Vincent Tan joins the Cardiff board as Peter Ridsdale moves on, with Dato Chan Tien Ghee appointed as chairman.
• June 2011: The club appoint Malky Mackay as manager, with Dave Jones sacked after a play-off semi-final defeat.
• May 2012: Tan then opts to change the club's shirts from blue to red, claiming the move is to drum up interest in the Far East where red is seen as a strong colour which brings good luck.
• September 2012: Tan replaces the club's chief executive, Alan Whiteley, with known associate Simon Lim.
• April 2013: Mackay takes Cardiff to the Championship title, winning promotion to the Premier League.
• August 2013: Tan tells Mackay, in no uncertain terms, to make good of the £35m he spent in the transfer window.
• October 2013: Mackay's trusted head of recruitment, Iain Moody, is replaced by unknown 23-year-old Alisher Apsalyamov, a friend of Tan's family.
• 16 December: Two days after a win over West Brom - after which Mackay said he wanted three players in the January window - Lim releases a statement on behalf of Tan which berates Mackay for his comments and tells him he will get "not a single penny" in the winter window.
• 19 December: Mackay is told in a letter from Tan, sent via email, that he must resign or be sacked.
• 21 December: Mackay says after his team's 3-1 defeat at Liverpool that he will not resign.
• 22 December: Dalman says in a club statement that Mackay will remain in charge for the "foreseeable future" and that he aims to facilitate talks between Mackay and Tan.
• 26 December: Cardiff City fans protest against the ownership of Vincent Tan before their 3-0 defeat by Southampton - Mackay's final game in charge.

• 28 December: Victory at the halfway point of the season with 20 points in the bag, OR
• 28 December: A morale-sapping failure against the bottom team confirms us as a club in crisis.

After 83 minutes it was the former but after the morale-sapping finale it's now very much the latter. How did that happen??

We started so well and played with a belief and confidence that the fans had no right to expect and had chances to score in the 5 minutes played before we took the lead. With Noone attacking down the right flank, Mutch and Kim pushing forward and a Sunderland defence completely on the back foot it was a rare example this season of us turning dominance into something tangible when Mutch forced the ball home via a deflection. 1-0.

Up in the directors' box Vincent Tan danced a jig to which the fans responded with a chant of 'That's for Malky, that's for Malky' putting the scoundrel firmly in his place.

There were a few anti-Tan, pro-Malky banners around the place and it's apparent that for the time being anyway the backlash has seen the traditionalists firmly in control of the club colours as the tyranny of the red has been pushed to the margins.

In an action that would have been fully endorsed by the Ministry of People's Security in North Korea or communist controlled East Germany's Stasi Secret Police the largest banner was chased around the family stand by Tan's uniformed goons as they moved in to quell any dissent. Their Keystone Cops incompetency as they chased down the heretics drew some of the biggest cheers of the afternoon.

Back on the pitch it took the opposition 30 minutes to have a shot on target as the impressive Ki - on loan from Swansea Town - drew a diving save from Marshall which he parried into the path of U.S. striker Dozy, sorry, Jozy Altidore who fumbled the ball past the post, drawing unfavourable comparisons with our own former American profligate striker, the fabled Eddie Johnson.

The first half drew to a close with the home side fully in control and continuing to carve out opportunities against a fairly demoralised Sunderland team who only two days previously had ended Everton's 12 month unbeaten home run. Things were going just swimmingly in Tan's post-Malky Year Zero winter wonderland.

During the interval I took the opportunity to browse for some end of year bargains and found some interesting DVDs in Mark Kermode's Bluebirds in Crisis Top 10 Films of All Time:

1. Vincent Tan: The Edge of Reason

2. The Agony & The Ecstasy

3. The Assassination of Malky Mackay By The Coward Vincent Tan

4. Bring Me The Head of Vincent Tan

5. Vincent Tan: Despicable Me

6. Dirty Rotten Scoundrel

7. Something's Gotta Give

8. Fear And Loathing In Sloper Road

9. There's Something About Vincent

10. How The Vince Stole Christmas

The start of the second half was a pretty scrappy affair with neither side settling. On the hour, shortly after temporary boss Kerslake was seen to pass around a piece of paper with written instructions, we doubled our lead. Mutch collected the ball on the edge of the box, skipped past a couple of defenders and fed the ball through to Campbell to slot home. 2-0. Just the buffer we needed to face the remaining 30 minutes with confidence.

The Black Cats responded positively. They'd brought on the experienced Steven Fletcher for Borini following the Italian striker's apparent collapse at half time and looked more of a potent threat going forward but we looked comfortable. We brought on Cowie and Gunnarsson for the tiring Kim and Noone, and surprisingly with 10 minutes to go Cornelius, ostensibly an out-and-out striker (although the evidence for that is fairly thin) when the object surely was to close the game down.

On 83 minutes Fletcher managed to lose Turner inside the 6 yard box to reduce the deficit and cause panic amongst the previously indifferent home crowd. Now, spurred on by a jubilant away contingent, Sunderland took the game to the City as we sat back unable to stem the flow.

The fourth official's board showed an inconceivable 5 minutes of extra time; the anxiety on and off the pitch was palpable. With just 40 seconds remaining we looked to have soaked up the pressure when the ball fell to the feet of T-C who instead of blasting the ball halfway down Sloper Road scuffed a clearance back to the opposition. A desperate last-ditch shot from Colback deflected off Caulker's boot and over Marshall to the despair of the wretched broken Bluebirds.

It was the cruellest and unlikeliest of denouements to the latest episode of the soap opera being played out in CF11. The plot is so far-fetched, the script so fanciful, that surely the time has come for the final whistle to be replaced by the theme tune to East Enders.

It's getting late so I think I'll just pop over to Melbourne to see if our heroes in white can lift the winter blues. Ah...

Best wishes for a prosperous and angst-free 2014.

CCFC V SUNDERLAND BIG MATCH PREVIEW

So, the good guy lost.

And confirmation comes this morning that the lunatics have assumed control of the asylum with the emboldened Sam Hammam feeling able to pitch for the position of Lucifer's representative by stating  with a chilling resolve that 'It is now high time that Vincent Tan takes control of all aspects of the club...there is one word here - 'control'

Hammam is looking poised to become Tan's propaganda chief - the Joseph Goebbels to his Adolf Hitler; or more accurately the Comical Ali to his Saddam Hussein. We can look forward to months of spin and denial if recent outpourings are any guide.

Hammam's response to universal criticism of Tan in the world's media: 'These cowards have no morals. They have no shame about lying. Do not believe them. They only deserve to be hit with shoes'

The 0-3 defeat to Southampton has been subject to the new regime's revisionism and the official line is now: 'Their forces capitulated. The battle was very fierce but God made us victorious.'

Looking forward to today's visitors Hammam said: 'We will slaughter them. We will welcome them with bullets and shoes'.

 Disgruntled fans have referred to the two as 'Muppets'. They might have a point.

Hammam and Tan

Bert and Earnie

            

 

                                                   

And so the search for Malky's successor continues. In a small field of realistic contenders for the club's new manager, current odds are:

OLE GUNNAR SOLSKJAER             1-Squillions

VINCENT TAN                                      10-1

DAVE BASSETT                                  12-1

MIKE BASSETT                                    15-1

BERTIE BASSETT                                15-1

BIG BIRD                                                25-1      

Match Report to follow...

CCFC v SOUTHAMPTON

It's been another interesting week in the life of a Bluebird. We've all got our own views about the recent turn of events and under normal circumstances we might turn to the pages of The Echo (obviously out of force of habit rather than for reasons of journalistic plausibility and insight) to catch up with events and inform our viewpoint. But this week as 5 Live's Jon Champion said on Saturday 'everybody wants to talk about Cardiff City'. Like a bad-boy Hollywood or reality TV celeb we have become the go-to slow news day page filler.

Vincent Tan's entirely self-inflicted domestic difficulties have made headlines around the world and given rise to some lurid speculation and some sensational claims. Here's a sample:

JOHANNESBURG TIMES: Tutu To Chair Tan Mackay Truth And Reconciliation Committee

BOSTON GLOBE: Sensational New Eye-witness Claim - I Saw Tan On Grassy Knoll

DAILY EXPRESS: Diana CCTV Tapes Prove Tan Was In Tunnel

THE SUN: Vincent Tan Ate Freddie Starr's Hamster

DAILY SPORT: Lord Lucan Discovered Living In Vincent Tan's Moustache

MUSLIM NEWS: Mackay Image Discovered In Kiwi Fruit

CATHOLIC HERALD: Malky Is Mother Theresa Love Child

FASHION WEEKLY: Stella McCartney To Unveil Vincent Tan Spring Collection

...and finally an interesting but clearly rhetorical question from THE INDEPENDENT: Is Cardiff City's Vincent Tan The Worst Club Owner In The History Of Football? Erm, tricky one...!

http://www.independent.co.uk/sport/football/news-and-comment/is-cardiff-citys-vincent-tan-the-worst-club-owner-in-the-history-of-football-9019743.html

CCFC 0 v 3 SOUTHAMPTON

We arrived at the ground to the news that hundreds had answered the call to protest before the game and it was clear that the predominant colour in the ground was blue. In fact the only red on display was the deep crimson of rage and embarrassment in the director's box. Tan himself appeared to be flanked by a number of heavies as he took his seat to a rousing chorus of 'Don't Sack Mackay' followed by more direct and less subtle tunes as the Canton End vented its collective spleen.

The line-up didn't include Gary Medal who presumably picked up an injury in Saturday's defeat at Liverpool which left the midfield ominously lightweight. Plenty had been calling for Cornelius to be given a chance ahead of Odemwingie up front but Malky kept faith with the 4-4-2 / 4-4-1-1 arrangement with Campbell spearheading the attack.

Southampton played five across the middle and this was to prove decisive as they immediately took control playing a neat, efficient short passing game, retaining possession with ease and dominating an unimaginative and disorganised City midfield.

Against the run of play (as we soccer journos like to say) the first real chance of the game fell to the home team as Whittingham ghosted into the box to meet a penetrating cross from Noone but failed to make full contact from 6 yards with just the keeper to beat. An early goal would surely have helped to instil some belief and reinvigorated the team after days of morale-sapping speculation off the pitch. It wasn't to be.

On 14 minutes the impressive Lallana skipped past a completely out of sorts Taylor - who was playing like he'd reacted to the off field distractions by taking refuge in a very well stocked pantry - to cross to the rampaging Rodriguez who slotted the ball past Marshall. 0-1.

Worse was quickly to follow as the Saints doubled their lead when Rodriguez again lost his man at the far post to volley home Lambert's through ball and make it 0-2 after 20 minutes.

We were now playing with all the belief and expectation of a turkey on Christmas Eve staring fearfully at a pound of sprouts. If the sainted opposition had any lingering doubts whether they'd been naughty or nice, these were settled on 27 minutes when Lambert was gifted a third.

The implausible man in the red tunic left his seat in the director's box knowing that his day's work was done, presumably to offer some seasonal cheer to a hard-up out of work manager.

As half time approached Southampton had a 10 minute period of virtually 100% possession, each successful pass being welcomed by their fans like it was a wholly expected but nonetheless much appreciated gift-wrapped new pair of socks. The teams left the pitch to the sound of wild cheering from one corner of the ground and disgruntled seasonal jeer and humbugging elsewhere.

The big screens reminded us of our duty to continue to go out and buy stuff when what we really needed was a good old Ali half-time soundtrack to serve as an antidote and put our troubles in perspective. He might have chosen from any of the following:

Malaysian Idiot - Green Day

Sweet Mean Vincent - Ian Dury

Tan Strung Up In Blue - Bob Dylan

Tan On The Run - Wings

The Fool On Leckwith Hill - The Beatles

The Boulevard De Nantes Of Broken Dreams - Green Day

What Have We Done to Deserve This? - Pet Shop Boys

The second half was all about containment which the opposition managed with consummate ease. With the honourable exceptions of Noone and the tireless Campbell (the victim of a number of woeful decisions from the official running the line on our side - flagged on one occasion for being hauled down by a defender!) we were about as threatening as a Canton End taunt. Cornelius was given an extended run out and looked every inch a quality Sunday morning pub team reserve, but it's not for me to condemn him at this point - the coming weeks will allow him ample opportunity to do that for himself.

BREAKING NEWS...BREAKING NEWS...BREAKING NEWS...

In a statement straight from the North Korean Guide to News Management the Official Website has announced 'The Board of Directors have today relieved Malky Mackay of his duties'. What a heart-warming magnanimous gesture.

'Hey That's No Way To Say Goodbye' - Leonard Cohen.