Tension mounts - one day to go, people! The pre-season Ibizan tournament and friendlies showed some promising signs for the season ahead. Post tournament, we had a disappointing 2-1 over Kendal and our new manager did not hold back in his criticism of this result. The reports of the subsequent friendlies that I didn't attend weren't brilliant, either! There is always a balance to be sought between criticising performances and not demoralising the players publicly. So far, the Big Mac seems to be getting it about right. And so we come to the friendlies I did attend - Sunderland and Workington Reds.
Slumberland, 2006-07-29 15:00
Ahead of the game, Big Mac stated that he would be putting out the team he expected to start the League campaign with. We played a 4-3-3 formation and broadly speaking I was happy with the performance. Losing 3-0 flattered Sunderland, but they deserved the win, being more fluent around the penalty area.
OK, the negatives:
Strikers. Solid and looking good, but Gall will have to watch the Red Mist - he lunged into a couple of tackles mindlessly.
Midfield. Billy struggled in his lone central midfield role, just as he did at times last year. If we are to play this formation, we need a better central midfielder.
Defence. Not much to fault here, other than they occasionally gave the Sunderlands players too much time and space outside the penalty area.
Goalkeeper A good game, but he did seem to flap at the second goal.
This was the first home match following a summer investment on ground facilities and a new playing surface, and the ground looked good. The large Sunderland support were allowed some space in the East Stand, and the overall atmosphere was good.
Wukkinton Reds, 2006-08-01 19:00
Strangely this was my first ever Reds-Blues game. My family are traditionally Reds supporters, but when I was old enough to go to games there was no-one at home to take me to the Reds games. Instead, my Blue cousins started taking me to Brunton Park. Although this isn't perhaps the greatest rivalry in soccer, it can still be intense. My Uncle Bob and my Brother Bob are particularly Red. Some Reds fans still blame Carlisle for their non-league status following the vote when they came last in Tier 4. Personally, I support any Cumbrian team, with a preference for Carlisle United, then Workington Reds in soccer. There were four of us from work (see picture right) and my Brother Bob joined us between his bar duties.
The game itself was absorbing and Reds ran out deserved 3-1 winners. With Carlisle again putting out a youth and reserve packed team, Reds fans had a right to feel deprived of the oppotunity to truly test themselves against the local top dog.
I ventured into the CUFConline message board for the first time recently, initially under CumbrianSeparatists and then as my normal Kynson pseudonym. As I mentioned last month, I feel it is time for Cumbria to have its own flag, and so I decided to design one of my own (see the pictures on this page) and some prompting from work colleagues led me to announcing my suggestion on the message board. Many people on the message board do not show their real identity, but I believe that you shouldn't say something that you're not willing to publicly stand by. Hence I use Kynson everywhere. However, please note that not all Kynsons are me - I discovered a few years ago that Kynson is also a Chinese name!
The Dark Side
At the Sunderland game, there were the usual few who seemed more intent on goading the opposition fans than actually watching the match. It also appeared that a post-match fight had been pre-arranged, because when we got into the city centre there were running battles. Pathetic. I was really hoping that soccer had seen the last of this behaviour. On the message board there was one report of how this violence even continued at the hospital as staff tried to treat the injured. Idiots.
Whilst I accept the physiological effects which football violence can produce to entice people into repetitive behaviour, we are evolved enough (surely!) to allow ourselves to deduce that it is totally stupid and illogical to be behaving in this way. In other words - Grow up!!
On Sunday 2006-07-30, UKTV History ran a series of documentaries about The History of Football. These included the darker side of the game - from wars to propaganda, and of course hooliganism. Also it covered how the Football Association was founded and how it originally started to agree Rules, including the split in codes with Rugby School. This is well worth watching if you see it in the schedules.
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