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Real Betis (a)
As usual, I'm depending on Paul to produce the full match report, here's
just a few of my own observations.
Seville itself - pleasant enough city, about 25c when we landed, orange
trees lining the roads, why oh why do English fans abroad insist on getting
absolutely slaughtered in the nearest English (or in this case Irish) pub?
Tickets were widley available on the day, friends who'd travelled
independently got them from their hotel receptionist, others got them from
the ground.
We had to report back to the coaches at 5.30pm local, our coach set off for
the ground at about 6.25, we were outside the ground by 6.35, 3 hours to
kick-off.
A few silly people stood complaining about being herded into the stadium so
early and a couple of them got a slap round the head from the Nationals for
their trouble. The bit about 'no refreshments' was crap, there was water,
soft drinks and lager available inside (albeit 'Kaliber', most of the
drinkers taking about 3 rounds to work out it wasn't having the desired
effect). Not to put too fine a point on it, if sticking English fans inside
the ground 3 hours before kick-off with no alcohol is what it takes then so
be it. The hot dogs looked like they'd been made from bits hacked off the
losers at the local bull ring.
The stadium itself? Picture Stamford Bridge before the redevelopment but no
track, 3 tier West Stand, single tier East stand, North and South terraces
- we had the East half the North (behind the goal in which all the goals
were scored, that's what I call value for money).
Some Chelsea (David Dryer tour?) were in the East Stand next to us, kept
apart from the Betis fans by a sturdy line of bog roll.
Eventually some lights were turned on so people could actually see the shit
etc they were wading through in the toilets.
The Betis fans seemed to be OK on the whole, very effective the way they
wrapped their scarves round their fists and swung them round and round,
must have strong wrists though :) Brief flurry of cans and (plastic)
bottles when Flo scored, no serious pelting.
Overall, a fantastic game, great atmosphere, I felt we were lucky not to
concede to one of Jarni's free-kicks, or even corners, Alfonso looked
pretty useful despite wearing what looked like trainers, in fact most of
their team had a first touch that would embarrass the average Premiership
player (and a few England ones).
Of our team, no-one had a poor game, although Eddie is definitely nowhere
near his best and Stevie's distribution is woeful. Lan kept us in it but
that's what he's paid to do and his kicking is a lot better than Dimmi's
has been of late, Mad Frank was mostly to blame for diving in and allowing
the Betis player to cross for their goal, (and Bert partly for not closing
him down quick enough), as for Zola, it was definitely a penalty, we saw
the push and could not believe the booking, and how did Hughes not stick
that 2nd half chance away? Oh, and Vialli's policy of rotating the forwards
and giving Flo a chance this time seemed to work quite well.
As for the second leg? Effectively they've got to come to the Bridge and
score 2 which they look well capable of doing, hopefully we'll score more.
Bolton
After the midweek farce in Tromso, back to the bread and butter stuff, a trip to the
bottom of the table team, 3 vital points required if we're tomaintain our momentum to the
top of the table with Bolton yet to win a
league match in their new stadium.
Well, with 8 first team mebers out through suspension, injury or International duty, we
make do with what we've got. But can anyone explain how Nicholls can even keep Morris out
of the team, let alone Gullit? The
lord moves in mysterious ways...
As for the match itself, well I'm not able to do a Mason-esque blow-by-blow account.
Suffice to say in the first half Bolton had a few chances, all of which went high or wide
and we had a few chances, all of which went straight to the keeper (or high or wide). Our
midfield looked totally lightweight, the ball being pushed around to little or no effect.
Nicholls missed a great chance when he just had to lift the ball over their keeper
and Frank Sinclair returned to the good old days when he steamed down the right flank,
beat two Bolton players, took the ball to the line, looked up and picked out his man with
a pinpoint cross. Unfortunately, it wasn't the man on the back post, nor the man on the
near post, it was some guy in the tenth row of the stand behind the goal.
Well, it was patently obvious what we needed in the second half but still Gullit stayed on
the bench. OK, so we the had the ball almost continuously for the first 30 minutes or so
as Petrescu chipped the keeper and the goal, Flo headed wide, Hughes got tangled up with
Flo and neither got a shot in, chance after chance sat up and went begging. Then, somehow,
Bolton had the ball down the other end, Beardsley found Sellars on the edge of the area
who in turn found Holdsworth in acres of space 8 yards out, cunningly being ignored by
both LeBeouf and Myers on the basis that he was bound to hoof the ball wide or over.
Unfortunately he totally mishit his shot and it curled past De Goey and into the net.
At last Gullit took the pitch, unfortunately too little to late. We still managed to miss
at least another 3 chances, including Petrescu hammering a shot goal-bound only for it to
hit the protrate Hughes and loop over the bar. There then followed some even more farcical
moments, with the defence awol Beardsley was through running onto a long ball so De Goey
sprinted from his area and put in a clearing header straight to the feet of Beardsley (all
of 2 yards away) who passed to Blake who in turn, from maybe 25 yards out and with an
empty goal in front of him, put the ball high and wide. This was almost topped a few
minutes later when Petrescu and Newton ran into one another, leaving the ball to run free
to a Bolton player.
LeBeouf was adequate, maybe Myers wasn't too bad although one of them must take the blame
for Bolton's goal. Newton was back to his worst, wasting possession and not doing much to
win it back, Clarke and Sinclair took about 60 minutes to work out they weren't still
playing on snow, Babarayo never tried to take his man on, he just played the ball back
inside every time, Petrescu and Hughes missed chances that Furlong would have scored, Flo
played OK, Nicholls was crap except his corners (who can forget the sight of Frank
Sinclair rising like a salmon to get a thumping header to one of Nicholls' 2nd half
corners, straight back to Nicholls) and Gullit looked good but barely got into the game.
Managerially, I feel he's now got it wrong twice in a row - Hughes and Flo should have
started at Tromso and certainly Gullit should have been on no later than the start of the
2nd half yesterday. Oh, and De Goey was a big, flappy nightmare [(c) dk]
including one moment I missed but others spotted when he rose to claim a cross and the
ball was yards behind him. Blinded by the snow, presumably.
To top matters, the journey back to London took longer than the return from Tromso,
although it was alleviated by a lengthy discussion about the funniest moments from Chelsea
matches through the ages. Most of them came from this one.
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