What a great day out but what an awful football match.For various reasons I have 'retired' from away games and so Wigan was my second away game of the season, and like Bolton it is nearer my home than home Leeds games.For anyone who, for whatever reason do not go to games the order is like this - teletext, radio, TV, home games, away games, away games in Europe. Just being in a different town makes all the difference. Me and my son were on the train from Victoria, 2 mates coming from Leeds via Piccadilly and 2 others from Settle via Lancaster. Mobile phones have taken all the guesswork out of it ( we used to come out of station and unless there was an obvious pub outside it was 'turn right and first pub on the right - it worked) Anyway we came out of our station turned right and went to first pub on the right - the Clarence - only £2,20p for bitter and it was a mixture of Leeds fans and locals. Bloke came in and sold his mate a rabbit in a plastic bag ! This was at 10.30 am and we all met up, had a few beers in there and had a wander via a few pubs down to the ground.Team news was Beradi in place of Cooper at left back, Taylor staying further forward and 2 up front, Sharp keeping his place but Morison also getting the nod with Byram being injured. We missed the Whelan speech - could just hear something as we queued to get in. The first half was a real non event - Ok our season is all but over, but they must have thought that a win today gives them a fighting chance. We played like this was the case but they also did so the first 45 had all the passion and commitment of a friendly. It was poor fare for the 50000 Leeds fans who had made the trip. Neither side had a shot or chance worthy of the name, the only incident was when Sharp was clearly pushed over in the box. Foul to us I thought and then 'wow its inside the box, a pen'. The ref (who gave Sharp nothing all game) did not see it that way and nothing was given. I cannot recall anything else that happenedSecond half and early on a great move ended with the ball coming to Mowatt in the middle of the area - give it Morison I yelled, since Morison was to his right unmarked and a good ball would have given him an open goal - Mowatt chose to shoot with his right foot and buried it , the ball hit with pace and precision and hit the back of the net. We all went wildAll we needed to do from then on in, keep the ball and see it out. However for some reason, just as on Wednesday we forgot how to play. All our passes went astray and we looked dreadful, They seemed to wake up and for the next 15minutes we were really up against it. Silvestri made really good save, they had a procession of corners and two or three times the ball flashed across our 6yd box but luckily for us no-one was there to tap it in. After this flurry the game petered out and we looked like we would hold on. Morison went down and lay on the floor in our box for a minute which led to an unbelievable 7 minutes of injury time.Both Morison and Sharp went off in a double sub with Cani and Antenucci coming on. Cani did nothing to make me want to keep him, Antenucci did bits and pieces to show he has been unlucky to be dropped. So with the fans singing 'going down' 'we'll see you again' etc the clock ticked over and after 97 minutes the ref blew for full time. A deserved win, sort of, but 2 bad teams in a poor game, We went for a pint afterwards and agreed that away games are great (Charlton here we come, hopefully)We are safe now and we need to see out these last 10 games with a view to next season. I think Redfearns record is good and did stick up for him but not one of my mates thought he is the man to take us up !Dave _______________________________________________ Leedslist mailing list Info and options: http://mailman.greennet.org.uk/mailman/listinfo/leedslist To unsubscribe, email [email protected]
John 'Grampa' Sykes Rest In Peace old lad 28th Oct 1938 - 12 Nov 2013 MARCHING ON TOGETHER
