Bilbao that is. At the moment, giving ManU a real pasting - so many shots on goal, but still only 1 goal scored.
I remember seeing Bilbao play at the Valley a few years ago (think it was Dowie's season) and they played beautiful football winning 1-0 (Thomas missed a pen) Was amazed at the time that they only sign players from the Basque region
Yeah im a goal keeper, but yeah, De Gea has had a blinder today, did not deserve to concede 3 goals tonight
What a game! De Gea on absolutely top form tonight, but truth be told, Bilbao could have won that by a hatful. Fine refereeing display, too - lot of good advantage played.
Final Score 2-3. Athletic were hugely impressive, a total credit to football - one of the things i like about them was there was no timewasting , they just continued to push forward, trying to score more goals. A very impressive team. SOme years ago, i took my son who was then 8 on a football trip to France that his club in Footscray were involved in - it involved some 20 French kids teams, 1 from England (his team) and 1 from germany. When we arrived at the small town in Central France, one of the things i noticed was that the French kids were all training ACROSS the pitch with small 5-a-side type goals, and were all heavily doing training WITH the ball. When we got back to England, some 2 months later, there was a petition that my sons club were getting everyone to sign in order to STOP a ENglish FA directive forcing Kids below 14 to train and play across the pitch a la (sorry for pun) the French way - the thinking being the petition being , we have always played this way, we like playing with big goals and full length of pitch. Naturally, i refused to sign, and articulated my reasons why - and there were 1 or 2 other parents who refused also, but the majority signed. The reason i bring this up on this thread is that tonight, Athletic have proved that continental football and especially Spanish football is STREETS/MOTORWAYS ahead of anything we dish up in this country right now - and the main reason for this i believe is the blinkered way the kids are coached and to a certain degree any skill is coached out of them in favour of being able to boot the ball the furthest. I also went to Charlton v Sunderland FA Youth cup game a few seasons ago, and sat behind the Sunderland coach, who i believe was Kevin Ball, and, to be honest, i was hugely embarassed with Ball's comments and actions and (non) coaching skills - he was literally a cross between Harry Bassett and Albert Steptoe (ask your Dad)- and i did wonder how he could ever have got that job.
Tewkes, what was that about the free-kick against Evra for not having his boot on? - did you get that?
Strictly speaking, only having one boot on is counted as 'being improperly dressed', but the law says that play need not be stopped unless the player has left the pitch to get the boot back on, returned to the pitch without permission and gets booked for it - the decision is then an indirect free kick. I remember Killer scoring one of his hat-trick against Hull City carrying his boot (!) so I'm not sure what point the referee was making tonight.
Me and my mate were talking about Killer on Tuesday night reminiscing, the question being ... aside from scoring goals what do he do? my response was... nothing, but he sure knew where the goal was. For the youngsters out there .. Killer = Derek Hales, one of, if not the deadliest finisher the club has ever had - would have left BWP to shame this season - would have probably scored 5 against Stevenage the other week.
Just saying.... any true supporter of Charlton would know who that is.... youngster or not.... I think I've known of him since the age of 5...probably because my Dad would go on about him...
What happened to that massive flag of Hales that we used to pass round before kick off a couple of years ago?
