Diamond Geezers: Bacon saved by Gazza and Sir Les…
This is episode 30, so you have an awful lot of catching up to do…
We’ve got three more Second Division games before our League Cup second-round tie against Charlton. First up, it’s flat-bottom Rochdale, who came up through the playoffs last season – and it shows. They finished fifth in Div 3, and haven’t pulled up a single tree so far, losing all five of their opening games and propping up the table with a goal difference of -9.
I decide it’s a good game to give my fringe players a go, in order to keep everyone happy and rotated for our upcoming fixtures. As such, it’s all change from our last outing; only Pinheiro and Costacurta retain their places in a side that’s very reminiscent of our march to the Third Division title.
There’s something about Rochdale that I don’t like, and mostly it’s Paul Connor. Let’s not forget, Rochdale whacked us 2-0 the last time we played them, and they give me minor heart attacks in the opening minutes. Connor is such a threat that Mad Dog gets booked for wiping him out in the fourth, and by the tenth, they’ve already been around our goal four times – though Hugo has only had to make one intervention, as the rest of Dale’s chances are snuffed out by my excellent defenders.
After that, we put our foot on the gas and start making chances of our own, and good ones at that. Peter Møller makes life miserable for the Dale defenders and hits the target three times, but keeper Neil Edwards – who’s been appalling in his previous couple of games – is suddenly Peter Shilton, putting up a wall that the Great Dane cannot penetrate. We reach the 45th minute and I’m overflowing with frustration as yet another Møller header is parried by Edwards, but what’s this? A wild Alexander Farnerud appears, and he taps home the rebound to give us a warranted half-time lead. Thank goodness for that.
Costacurta and Monk are both on 6s at centre-half and that just won’t do with the dangerous Connor lurking up front, so I make a bold decision. I hook them both and replace them with Richard Gough and Marcel Mahouvé, who I realise is out of position, but is easily the most trustworthy member of my squad when it comes to ending an opponent’s participation in any given game. He’s told to terminate Connor, and we restart for the second period.
The second half starts well. The Great Dane has yet another effort saved, and Mustafa also marauds forwards to hit a stinger into the gloves of Edwards. Connor manages to break our lines once but balloons his shot all the way to Kettering under pressure from Mahouvé. As I’d hoped, that’s Connor’s last appearance in the commentary, and beyond that, we are on top by some margin. Dale worry me through Kieron Durkan’s low drive that clangs off the post, but in the 87th minute, Underwood is tripped in the box by Edwards, the useless referee waves play on, but our superb linesman is flagging furiously. The referee goes over to confer with him…penalty given! Underwood steps up and makes no mistake from the spot, and we run the game out as 2-0 winners.
Bristol City have slipped up at Prenton Park against Tranmere, and for the first time this season, your Rushden and Diamonds are top of the league! In the wake of our rise to the top of the pile, the media take time out to praise Freddie the Fence again, even though he hasn’t played in our last two games. Absence makes the media grow fonder, it would seem, so I make a point of building the praise – as well as going back once again and trying to renegotiate his contract without the looming threat of his £5m release fee. Every time I’ve tried so far he’s rejected my renewed offer, but we’ve won the double and I’ve narrowly missed out on the Nigeria manager’s job since the last time I tried, so I’m certain he’ll be keen to stick around this time.
Next up we travel to The County Ground to meet Swindon Town, who have made an impressive start to the season themselves. They’re up to fifth after impressive wins over QPR and Stockport, and with the worryingly-named Danny Invincible playing in the ten role behind the striker, they look a pretty potent force coming forward. I tell Mahouvé that he’ll be man-marking Invincible for this one, and he smirks back at me. I have a feeling they’ll be calling him Danny Fractures when this one is over.
It’s all change for us. I’m not happy with Costacurta and Monk’s performances in the last game so there’s no question that Gough and Risp return to the side. Sir Les and Javan seem to be my best forward combination, and I love the presence of Gazza in CM – he’s registered an assist in all three of the games he’s played so far and has 85% passing accuracy. Kalvenes has a slight training injury so Underwood keeps his place, and out we go. I shake hands with Roy Evans and reach for my dugout drinks cabinet, only to remember we’re away from home and I haven’t got one. If we win the league this season I’ll have to get it on wheels.
I really could have done with a stiff measure here, because it’s a rough affair. The first 25 minutes are horrendous from our point of view – it’s all Swindon, and we’re hardly able to escape our own third. Invincible obviously isn’t just a name as he continually evades Mahouvé, first smashing a shot that Hugo can only parry and Hewlett mops up to give the hosts the lead, and then a moment later, James Coppinger crosses low from the right and Invincible tucks it away for 2-0.
We are all over the place defensively and unable to get any sort of footing in the game, and I’m concerned. I notice that their right-back is on a 9 due to winning every tackle and header that comes his way, so I quickly hit Tactics and tell my players to give the ball to Mike Duff and focus our attacks down their left instead. It works – after that, we finally get our first sighter on goal through Paul Gascoigne, and then Duff collects a pass from Mahouvé, charges down the right and pops a lovely ball into the path of Sir Les who strikes home furiously to reduce our arrears. There’s still 15 minutes until half time and now we’re all over Swindon. Javan and Ferdinand both miss the target from great positions, and when they do manage to keep the ball under the bar, Bart Griemink is there to tip it over.
At half-time, I remove the anonymous Brandon for Farnerud and give the players a bloody good hairdryering. We must be better in the second half – and after another dreadful start, we are back on top. Duff is everywhere, and Farnerud is keen to make an impression after coming on. He eventually breaks through the Swindon midfield and hits a stinger that Griemink pushes away yet again – but this time, Gazza has wobbled forward, and he lashes home his first goal for the mighty Diamonds! It’s 2-2, and with half an hour left, I put Møller on for the ineffective Javan, and he elbows his way right into the firing line. It’s one monster against another as Griemink persistently keeps the Great Dane out, saving twice from point-blank headers. Gazza puts a swirling free kick on target that Griemink also turns around the post, and despite all our huffing and puffing, we can’t do anything else to change the scores and the game finishes 2-2.
I’m quite disappointed. Our failure to show up in the first 25 minutes has killed us – hauling back a two-goal deficit away from home is not something we’re going to be able to do as much this season, and while I’m okay with a point, if we could just be tighter at the back, we’d be narrowly winning a game like this, not drawing. We can no longer rely on scoring our way to victory, since most Second Division sides seem to have a version of Gandalf the Grey in goal. Utter bastard Griemink gets man of the match, and I pop into Oddbins to get myself a nice bottle of something for the ride home.
Post-match I learn that Møller will be out for three weeks with – you guessed it – a groin strain. It hasn’t come at a great time. We’re misfiring a bit up front, apart from Javan’s occasional hat-trick, and now we’ve lost the Great Dane a day after I’ve let sulky Ronaldo go back to Madeira to look at himself in the mirror for a couple of weeks. Not in the introspective sense – I mean literally. Hopefully his reflection will cheer him up, the moany sod.
To make myself feel a bit better, I check out my Player Search list to see how popular we are with global mega-forwards who I might be able to create a media circus around to distract everyone from the fact that we’re not playing that well. It’s surprising news – there are some household names that, should I be able to negotiate embarrassingly derisory fees and contracts for, would apparently be happy to move to Northamptonshire. And who can blame them? Irthlingborough is the new Cheshire, the number one destination for superstar footballers and their families. The local property developers are licking their chops as I submit paltry £1m bids for Freddie Kanouté, Chris Sutton, John Hartson, Sebastien Abreu, Martijn Reuser and Güiza, but I fax them to let them know not to get too excited. The chances of any of their clubs being stupid enough to part with them for that sort of money is very unlikely. A swift click of Continue later, and every bid is rejected and declared ‘totally unacceptable’. Oh well. It was worth a try.
We welcome Luton Town to Nene Park next in another game against one of the top sides in the division. They came up with us last season from Div 3, and have acquitted themselves superbly at the start of this term, lying 8th after four wins from their opening seven games. Legendary Celtic keeper Jonathan Gould is one of their star players, so my knackered strikeforce could be in for a long afternoon, while their other two top lads are strikers Carl Griffiths and Liam George. I’m a bit concerned about this one, but the comforting roar of the Peter De Banke Terrace calms me.
I get out my tactical magnetic whiteboard and show the players my changes for this game. Luton play a 4-4-2, which is helpful for us, and I tell my full-backs I want more adventure from them down the sides. We aren’t getting near opposing boxes often enough in wide areas and I want more. There’s some tiredness from our efforts against the Robins, so I’m forced to make a few changes. I’ll try Javan and Renner up top together in what I’m praying could be our long-term strike partnership. Costacurta replaces the tiring Gough, and the same goes for Pflipsen’s return in place of Gazza. I also drop Bubb for Farnerud after the latter has impressed from the bench, and Underwood continues to play at left-back, as Christian Kalvenes has now been nursing “a few days” of a wrist injury for almost a week and a half. I smell a rat, but don’t disclose it to my players – we just need to focus on remaining unbeaten. Bristol City have supplanted us at the top of the league after our draw, and I want my lead back.
We make a good start but it’s only ten minutes before I’m reaching for the dugout drinks cabinet. My pre-match fears that Jonathan Gould would be impenetrable seem to be coming true as he denies, in order, Brandon, Farnerud, Mahouvé and Renner in the first 20 minutes. Gould is a one-man team, as the rest of Luton’s side are creating nothing at all – and eventually, thankfully, our pressure tells. Farnerud charges forward as Pflipsen is tackled, the ball runs loose, and my second-favourite Swede drives past the Luton defenders and shoots across Gould to score. The commentary notes that Gould is caught ‘out of position’, which is a surprise – but the concession wakes up Luton. They start to come at us, and the second part of the half is all them. They put six shots on target that Pinheiro has to be calm and alert to keep out, but we’ve had a warning shot across our bow. We go in 1-0 up at the break, but wobbling.
I note from the stats that despite their six shots on target, they’ve only played two key passes – indicating that their two strikers, who have had all their efforts, are simply having blinding individual games. To try to counteract them, I swap Risp and Costacurta around so they can mark different strikers in the second half in the hope that, in the confusion, Luton’s front men will forget what they’re doing and stop trying to score. I stay in the changing room after the players have gone back out and take a long swig of the cheap whisky I got in Swindon. This season is a bit more stressful than I wanted.
The second half is a similar story, particularly with Gould. Having gotten over his error, he is now putting on a standard Other Team’s Goalie performance and saving absolutely everything we throw at him. He makes miraculous second-half saves from Javan, Renner, Mahouvé and Farnerud, and after a while I let go of the idea that we might score again and simply pray that we can keep it tight at the other end. And, despite a couple of efforts from substitute striker Andy Baird, it has to be said that the change-around of my centre halves seems to have made a difference. The Hatters forward guns are out of bullets, and despite Gould’s remarkable second half performance, we do eventually see this game out with a narrow 1-0 win. My goodness. This season is not for the faint of heart.
Post-game, there’s good news – this slender victory, combined with Bristol City going down 2-0 to Peterborough United, means we return to the summit of Division Two after eight games. There’s more quality in this league than I anticipated and I’m really happy that we’re balancing unsteadily at the top of the ladder. We’re not playing *too* badly, but we are shaky. It wouldn’t have taken much for us to have lost or drawn any of our last few games. There is much to consider, especially since my strikers have barely contributed to our goal tally in the last three matches. The temptation to do a dozen jelly shots with my PA and blow all my remaining money on Sebastian Abreu has never been stronger. Susan – could you come in here please?
Mike Paul – buy him a coffee, give him some sponsorship, do what you can…