Reading (a) – The ACN Review

Biggest Positive

You know how the story goes. You wake up every morning of the pandemic, with the radio host shouting “Rise and shine campers! Don’t forget your booties because it’s cold out there!” and listen to I Got You Babe by Sonny and Cher and then embark on the same day at home over and over and over and over again. Then you settle down to the football and Emi is bossing it again. Pukki is scoring again. Max Aarons is playing like Dani Alves again. We win 2-1 again. And we’re top of the league.

Again.

Midweek Whinge

Nope. No whinge. With the Covid gloom lifting somewhat from me today, I am not embarking on any negative thoughts. Move along.

Farke Watch

Ever seen that famous Laurel and Hardy clip from Way Out West, where they sing The Trail of the Lonesome Pine and Ollie hits Stan on the head with a giant mallet which causes him to sing soprano? Well I thought something similar might have scrambled Farke’s mind when I saw him make half time substitutions. Gosh, I remember the days when one of his few dropped stitches was making substitutions too late and now here we are, making subs as early as bloody half time to change games back into our favour before things get out of hand. We’re through the looking glass here people.

Moment of the Match

Goals, penalty decisions, hitting the bar blah blah blah. The real moment of the match was of course Michael McGovern pulling off a worldie to keep out Michael Olise’s thunderbolt of a free kick to, quite literally, save the three points. It pisses me off when people say “you’d expect the keeper to save that” as, you have to remember, that goalkeepers spend their entire careers as footballers being something completely different to a footballer (by using their hands) and also being a footballer (by, these days, having to use your feet). It’s a hard job. So let’s give them some more credit. Hooray for goalkeepers. And hooray for back-up goalkeepers pulling off spectacular saves to ensure Norwich win football matches.

Random Star

After the above statement you’re all expecting me to say Michael McGovern right? Right? Well yeah I probably should actually. Everyone was excellent in their own way (even the few of you who made the odd error, how can I stay mad at you?), but here you go Micky here’s your random star trophy. Everyone was shitting bricks about Krul being injured and you’ve gone above and beyond the call of duty, managing 13 points from 6 games, all despite taking a load of flack in the process.

If you could be on the bench on Saturday though, that would be grand.

Summary

Lucky old Norwich eh? Winning by the odd deflected goal, the odd dodgy penalty, odd lucky last minute goal, lucky to have the best squad in the Championship and lucky that it is (supposedly – according to many) injury free. Lucky Norwich. The worst and most lucky team to ever be three clear at the top of the second tier while having an entire 11 man first XI squad plus several substitutes out injured at once. Lucky this season to be ranked number 1 in passes, number 1 in passing accuracy, number 1 in possession, number 1 in % of short passes, number 1 in amount of shots and number 1 in touches in the opposite box. Funny old, shit and lucky Norwich City eh?

Fuck ‘em. HMS Piss the League is steaming around the Cape of Good Hope as we speak. All aboard!