@dave-marshall I’m probably being a little dim, but I can’t figure out what your M.O.T. signature refers to.
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I’m guessing Tykes features 
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Sorry, Gavin,
I was assuming that everyone would have been familiar with our cringeworthy club anthem from the '70s.
You must remember when it became quite the thing for clubs to encourage (misguidedly!), a group of players to gather round a microphone and belt out the latest choon which had been scribbled down on a fag packet?
Anyway, “Marching On Together” was only the “B” side of the worldwide top ten smash hit, “Leeds United”, so you may be forgiven for not having come across it.
It’s become something of a pre-match ritual for the song to be sung by the fans, and for the M.O.T. acronym to be added as a signing off flourish, as a demonstration of allegiance to The Mighty Whites.
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Oscar Winning Antipodean Actor Russell Crowe (Huge Leeds fan) uses it pretty regularly on his social media. …although never in character. A missed opportunity I feel - I can well imagine him bellowing it out across the Colosseum in Gladiator.
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Now there’s a cutting room floor scene I’d have paid good money to see! 
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Doubt the Premier League could produce the kind of drama we saw during Wrexham v Eastleigh tonight. Two teams on great runs. Two teams with some history. An obvious but predictable selection error from the home team could use e seen the game over by half time. Eastleigh ought to have been out of sight. The second half was quite extraordinary.
I think the final tally was 8 yellow cards and 3 reds. 4 goals and the 10 men of Wrexham holding on for a draw. Doesn’t really tell the story. Each team had a player booked for simulations. Ours decked the player who he alleged brought him down but the ref nodded it. Instead our centre half got a second yellow for basically falling over himself and making no contact with anyone bar himself. That ignored the whole shebang.
Their player refused to hand over the ball for our throw in next to the dug outs. Our manager challenged said player. It quickly got physical. Their assistant manager waded in. All outfield players, subs and management teams joined in. Technically most people in the stadium joined in. I especially loved our squad players leaping seats to flail a few fists. No-one stepped in to calm it down. Several players of bithcoliyrs were thrown to the ground. Fists flew. In the end the official checkered out and only red carded our manager and their assistant. The players thus took it into their own hands for the last 20 minutes and 8 minutes of extra time. Feisty would maybe describe it.
The 10 men never looked like 10; scored an unlikely equaliser and played like they wanted the win. We’re in 4th. We may yet run out of games but our next t games are against 8th, 7th, 6th, 5th and 3rd. It’s going to be an extraordinary finish. I seriously wouldn’t want to put money on who is going to win it.
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Arsene Wenger almost shoved Alan Pardew once!
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“Almost”
Dean Keates definitely “took” their player tonight. 4th official couldn’t get out and be a coward like his colleagues and consequently “took one for the team” sotosprsk. Best second half I’ve seen in years.
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What drama! …yes - would never happen in the Premier League - and that’s not necessarily a good thing! …there’s a lot to be said for watching football where the skill level is lower, but the commitment level higher - let’s face it, that’s what elite football was in the 70s, 80s and 90s, and that’s when it was at its best as a spectator sport.
From what you’ve said, I would be happy with simply surviving to the end of the season!
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As good as all the blood and guts lower division football is give me a more skillful game any day.
I’ve had the pleasure of seeing Henry, Bergkamp, Ronaldo, De Brune , Salah, Ozil Alexis Sanchez etc, etc all in the flesh and prefer that skill level.
Just wonderful. It sounds like old-school footie.
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It’s an interesting one. There are lots of myths in football and this is one of them.
There isn’t really as big a gap in skill as the myth makers would have you believe. Much of it is about whether that skill is allowed to prosper and whether you get a break. Up to Championship level you get more and more space to play. EPL is a different game now. The threat of physical contact isn’t really there. Even the high press doesn’t involve basic things like a shoulder barge or even tackling. A lot of presses simply succeed because of proximity and being able to seize on a momentary loss of control.
Are there journeymen? Absolutely. Tell me that isn’t the case at every level though. All that most EPL fans see if the lower levels are cup games where different qualities come to the fore.
The typical example given in recent years is Vardy. He’s a poor example. Having watched non-league for more than a decade now I’d say I see at least two players every game who are at the same level or higher but they simply won’t get the opportunity. There are players playing at league one level right now who are easily EPL players but again they won’t get the chance. We have Kwame Thomas. England under 21 player playing at non-league level. At our level he’s forced to rely on strength and height more than he would in the EPL but when he’s been given or created space his skill level stopped a fair few fans dead.
Bear in mind that whilst I highlighted the drama of last night that’s because it was so unusual. I’ve been watching a far higher quality of actual football for weeks now and it’s been a joy. We’ve scored goals in the last six weeks that would comfortably make goal of the month and we’re hardly alone.
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Great football too. Great 20 yard screamer from Eastleigh. Lovely team goal abd a sublime low cross from us to make it 2-2. Proper EPL level simulation from both teams too but you have to love an after match interview where the manager denies he was head butted and says the ref told him he was sent off for delaying his own teams throw in when we were 1-2 down.
The video clearly shows the Eastleigh player had the ball and our manager was trying to get it back. Their social media training has gone too far.
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Football is alive and kicking in England, Wales and Scotland – if you ignore the EPL!
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I didn’t say their was a lack of skill in the lower divisions what I said was that I preferred to watch skill full football rather than the mass brawl you described.
My brother is a season ticket holder at Brighton and Hove Albion and had two season tickets for a few seasons whilst they where still in the Championship and I went up there a lot and watched a fair bit of very entertaining football was it any better or worse than the PL? No.
A friend of mine had a son at Arsenal from the age of 10 until he was 19 and I’ve watched a fair bit of academy football too and have seen hundreds of boys, fantastic players whose names you’ll never know and who will never make it.
Every time I watch my team it’s exciting and emotional for me, it’s a joy, it’s gut wrenching and at times so tense I can hardly watch because it’s my team and I have an emotional attachment to them going back four decades my team just happens to be in the PL if they where relegated to division one I’d go through the same set of emotions every time I watched them.
Interesting comments about football outside the premiership.
Pep Guardiola recently said the team he enjoys watching is Norwich City.
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Football would be infinitely improved if they brought in a Bricklayer rule. A bit like limiting the number of foreign players - but doing it based on skill level.
So for every Dennis Bergkamp, you have to have a player who used to be a bricklayer.
Tongue in cheek obviously - but the most enjoyable football I’ve seen has been in matchups like this.
I remember going to Elland Road back in the day to see Leeds against Southampton - and seeing a young Harry Kewell (mercurial talent) literally turning Francis Benali (Bricklayer) inside out for 90 minutes - WONDERFUL Entertainment. Especially as Mathew Le Tissier (Mercurial Talent) was doing exactly the same to Nigel Worthington (bricklayer) down the other wing.
I know Benali is a bit of a folk hero in Southampton - and I can only think that this is because he was so resolutely awful. But that fact really leant itself to top quality entertainment.
Joking apart - and it goes back to the point I was making earlier in the thread, and a counterintuitive one - footballers today are too good. Its the ultra professionalism that has sucked the life out of the game.
The bricklayer rule - trust me - it’d save football. You heard it here first.
It’ll be very interesting to see if the approach is any different next year. Buendia and Cantwell staying key - but they’ll also need to strengthen. Do you think they are as good this season as they were last time they were running away with the Champinship title?
I don’t disagree with you. Last night is not what I would ordinarily want to see or watch but as a one off drama it provided something clearly missing from EPL level in terms of sheer variation.
I had one of my fave days out in the FA Cup a few years back when my lot drew that very Brighton team. The first game and the replay had everything but overall you’d have been hard pushed to pick out who the non league team was.
I too love watching players who can do stuff that takes your breath away but I’m sort of with @MattCray in the sense that teams and games who are full of nothing but skill are usually less entertaining than the full range of things available from other levels of football.
Cynical as it sounds the commitment of the EPL to “entertainment” above all else has become predictable even when it appears unpredictable. I always remember watching City score their late winner to win their first modern era title and the excitement from the fans, players and commentators never completely removed the voice in my head saying “that was scripted/fixed”. If I’d seen the same game one or more levels below that’s not a thought which would have occurred let alone stuck.
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