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Not blaming him but I would have liked him to have been nearer to his goal line in the circumstances. Trust me, as a keeper you do NOT liked to be done like that !
I genuinely don’t understand the logic in that statement.
Half the key to being a keeper is narrowing the angles for the opposition to shoot at. If Robles had, for instance, been stood on his line then Remy would have had a far bigger target area to shoot at & Robles would have had a far bigger area to defend – by coming off his line he gave Remy a smaller target area & a smaller area for himself to cover. He was just beaten by an extremely accurate shot.If I was going to be really picky I’d possibly say that his positioning was too close (angle wise) to his near post which meant that even though he’d narrowed the angle he gave himself just that little too much to cover on his far side & Remy was able to pick his spot to perfection. At a push (& I guess this is what you might be saying) by coming out at the moment he did Robles made Remy’s mind up to hit his shot their & then whereas if he’d stayed on his line remy might have been tempted to carry the ball just that little bit further which could have allowed the covering defender to get a tackle in on attempt to push him out wide
But that (IMO) is being really picky coz it was a quality strikeGot a few:
1) Coventry away (3rd round 1991ish) – the first “big result” I saw as a full fledged Latic. I was behind the goal so not able to take part in the pitch invasion but I do remember still celebrating the goal before I realised the full time whistle had long since been blown. Got diddled in the replay with a perfectly good goal ruled out, although so did they, & then Donny Page put a 2 yard tap in so far over the bar that it ended up in the Springfield’s car park
2) Hull City (quarter final 1987) – first ever Latics game. Don’t remember much from the game to be honest other than that it was 3-0, Latics had the worst programme cover I’d ever seen & 2 old geezers kept talking to me & being from the posh end of the Borough I couldn’t understand a word they said to me all game
3) Altrincham away (1994 or 1995) – a really poor Latics side got deservedly beaten. Remember their keeper giving the crowd back as much stick as he was getting. MOTD showed it & Alan Hansen reckoned Mark Leonard was the spit of Lothar Mattheus
4) Blackpool away (1996) – remember teh roar going up in the Pagefield when this was pulled out of the bag for the 1st round. Bearing in mind Latics average attendance at the time was probably around 2500, everybody seemed to be there. Wigan North Western was packed for the 10am train & Latics fans seemed to be everywhere in Blackpool. Bother in town before the game, bother in the ground as Latics fans were in the home end coz the away end sold out, bother in the car park straight after the game & remember going in 1 pub afterwards that had been smashed to smithereens. Getting back en-masse into Wigan after the game, the “Ee Ai, Ee Ai, Ee Ai O” starting up & all the pubs doors slamming shut. Very close game that stands out for 2 reasons: 1) there being a bit of handbags in the 1st half on the edge of Latics box & Gary Brabin taking off his boot & launching it (& connecting with) the head of John Pinder (I think). ref missed it & he got away scott free & 2) the best tackle I’ve ever seen – Kevin Sharp to keep us in the game late on. Oh & the pitch was absolutely covered in sandJames McArthur’s at Stoke was pretty good – from the start of the play, through some slick build up play, to the finish with the outside of his boot
The Club Wembley seats were always going to be pretty much empty as they are for all but the “big” games
That bit holds 16,000 so knock the capacity down to 76,000Millwall & Latics got 62k so 14k are left to God knows who – in all likelihood the max attendance even if both clubs sold out was only ever going to be just over 60,000 anyway as it’s hardly a game to drag in the neutrals or persuade the hoity toitty’s to shimmy on down Wembley Way
Not that that’s stop the media having a dig – if it was anyone other than latics the focus would be on cost, kick off times etc.. As it’s Latics involved we all know what the focus will be
I wasn’t born for the 1st one & I wasn’t a Latics supporter for the 2nd one so I’m only goign off the last 4
For me it’s a toss up between the Wrexham away to qualify for the Auto Windscreens & Arsenal away for the Carling Cup
For Wrexham, we filled the away end & the atmosphere was bouncing all night – helped by a very early goal from Simon Haworth (scored down the far end, but all the players ran up to the away end to celebrate & the ref allowed Wrexham to re-start as all the Latics players were in their own half. The last one from Haworth was one of them screamers that he was capable of pulling out of the bag & was down in front of us. I’d snapped all my ankle ligaments celebrating a Paul Rogers equaliser a couple of weeks before at home to Gillingham & momentarily forget I was only on one foot when the first went in – I can still feel the pain now!!!I say the Arsenal game for different reasons as I never thought we had a chance – didn’t go as it was midweek & I worked in a school that didn’t allow leave during term-time. So watched it in the Black Horse up Tyldesley with my future wife & a Latics mate. The emotions were up & down that night as we gave away a pen, saved it, had 3 penalty appeals turned down (2 were so nailed on that I’m still not sure how they weren’t given) & then Arsenal pressure told as they went ahead on aggregate in extra time. It looked like Latics had just run out of steam with seconds remaining – my mate got up for a slash as he “can’t stand watchin them gits celebrate at full time”, I had a face on & was just about to snap at the lady for coming out with the “it’s only a game & they’ve played well” line, when the ball got punted forward by Kavanagh. I leapt up shouting, my arm getting tugged to sit down by my girlfriend coz I was “embarrassing”, bit of grunting & growning as Scharner & Roberts seemed to get the ball stuck under their feet & finally knocking numerous tables & stools over, screaming as it hit the back of the net. Closely followed by my mate coming legging it from the direction of the bogs, tryna do up his zip & with a fresh pish stain on his keks. I remember getting some shots in at full time & then the rest of the evening is a bit of a haze.
Had the mother of all hangovers in work the next dayIf, God forbid, we lose against Millwall, I will have no sympathy whatsoever for anyone who has chosen not to go the semi because they are saving themselves for Wembley – whatever the reason.
Very harsh of you Mr Griff[/quote]
When the Millwall team get carried along to a shock victory on the wave of their vociferous support, those Wigan fans that chose not to go to the semi to support their team best not complain[/quote]
Whilst sympathy might be too much I can certainly understand those who have taken the gamble on Latics getting to the final because they cannot afford 2 Wembley trips in under a month
For a family of 4 you’re looking at a minimum of £100 for your tickets + another £60ish to go down in your car plus upwards of £30 to cover food & drink plus any souvenirs the kids might badger you into getting. You aint gonna get much change out of £200 & if Latics do make it to the final you can look at at least £250 or thereabouts. Many people don’t have £450 they for out to watch 2 football matches
Okay not everyone who won’t be going is in a family fo 4 but the same principles apply no matter how many of you are goingWould I have sympathy? A little bit possibly. Do I understand? Yep completely[/quote]
I can’t really afford both and I certainly can’t justify it. However, my wife, who hates football and hates me going to football even more, looked at me in disbelief when I mentioned the possibility of NOT going to both games – assuming there will be a “both” games.
I accept the bit about the families, but the vast majority of people who go to watch Wigan regularly do not do so as a family of 4.
Anyway, i will be there, as will my normal match-going crowd, so I don’t really give a flyer if anyone else goes or not.[/quote]
I agree with all of that but it is still a dear do whether you’re a single bloke or from a Latics watching family. Just coz I’m pushing the boat out a bit beyond what is probably sensible (especially IF we get to the final as well) doesn’t mean I’m gonna slag off someone who doesn’t
And the reaction from my wife (who also hates football & hates me going to football even more & the less said about my refereeing the better) was identical to your’s when I also suggested possibly giving the semi-final a miss. But not everyone’s wives are as great as ours!!! :blink: :blink: (must remember to show her this post later!!)
If, God forbid, we lose against Millwall, I will have no sympathy whatsoever for anyone who has chosen not to go the semi because they are saving themselves for Wembley – whatever the reason.
Very harsh of you Mr Griff[/quote]
When the Millwall team get carried along to a shock victory on the wave of their vociferous support, those Wigan fans that chose not to go to the semi to support their team best not complain[/quote]
Whilst sympathy might be too much I can certainly understand those who have taken the gamble on Latics getting to the final because they cannot afford 2 Wembley trips in under a month
For a family of 4 you’re looking at a minimum of £100 for your tickets + another £60ish to go down in your car plus upwards of £30 to cover food & drink plus any souvenirs the kids might badger you into getting. You aint gonna get much change out of £200 & if Latics do make it to the final you can look at at least £250 or thereabouts. Many people don’t have £450 they for out to watch 2 football matches
Okay not everyone who won’t be going is in a family fo 4 but the same principles apply no matter how many of you are goingWould I have sympathy? A little bit possibly. Do I understand? Yep completely
it’s more than our lodgers 6.5k they took to their semi last year, and that was only 1 hour away :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol:
we cant really argue about attendances if we fail to get a good number for wembley, the rugby usually nearly sell out dont they in finals ?[/quote]
Not really but it is difficult to tell coz of the culture round challenge cup finals.
It’s always been treated as the big day out for the sport & a chance for them there Northerners to have a day in the sun watching rugby!! As a result the 2 clubs in the final don’t get the bulk tickets that the football clubs do for their finals/semi-finals. The tickets are on sale for yonks & you’ll find every tom, dick & harry from every club in attendance – I know a lad who’s a Leigh fan & a group of them go every year despite the fact that Leigh haven’t been near the final for the best part of 40 years
Similarly plenty of Wigan RL fans will have bought a ticket for the final long before they know whether their club is likely to get there
I do remember however when the final was at Murrayfield that Wigan RL got 12k tickets & they sent 6k of em backMe… knickers in twist??? Never ;)I’m going to bow out now the numbered points are out but the last I will say on the subject is you don’t seem to rate McCulloch or Ellington going off our talks so thank flip you were not manager or we wouldn’t be where we are today!
I would say Rodallega to throw a spanner in the works.
He is probably not the most overrated player in terms of Latics fans perception but thanks to a few snazzy match of the day goals everyone outside the club thought he was a world beater.
If truth be told the closer he got to the goal the worse his finishing would be.
Underrated? Jordi Gomez – I can see where the frustrations come from but he can score or create a goal out of nothing.
The numbered points are for ease of reference coz I can’t do the mini-quotes with my own comments underneath & then another mini-quote etc..!!!
And you misunderstand what I’ve said about both McCulloch & Ellington. McCulloch became a vital cog in what we achieved under Jewell but I think he was over-rated by many in comparison to what he contributed & compared to some other players
Same with Ellington. I’ve never said I didn’t rate him. Now he did score a f**k ton of goals for us but he was good for those 2 levels & to me Roberts was always the better player of the pairing. What I take issue with with Ellington is people saying he would have been a great success in teh top flight if he’d stayed with us & I just don’t think he would have ever cut it at the top level – with anyone. People talk as if he used to bang them in at a consistant rate & he didn’t. Look at his stats & they used to come in gluts. If he scored his confidence was sky high & he would go on a roll. if he missed a sitter or went a game or 2 without scoring you could visibly see his confidence drain & in some of those dry periods he could look downright awful. I’ve said people have let time cloud their judgement on him & its true coz I can remember coming away from a game at Stockport where he’d fluffed a 1 on 1 with the keeper with the score at 1-0 & Latics drew 1-1 & he was getting slated during & after the game by loads of people. I came away from a home game once where a group of people squared up to each other going over the Dougie bridge near the ground coz one group was slagging him off. And lets not forget that his form drastically dipped towards the back end of the championship season & people were blaming it on anything from his conversion to Islam to a bust up with Roberts or a combination of the 2, and Paul Jewell dropped him for a couple of games in the run in. He was great for us but he wasn’t the super duper best striker ever to play for us (I judge that not only on what they achieve at Latics but what they go on to achieve after leaving) & his career since pretty much proves that. So to summarise he was a great signing, a great player for us but I don’t think he’s the best striker we’ve ever had, I don’t even think he was the best striker in that team & I don’t think he’d have been a success in the top flight with any teamI can see what you’re saying about Rodallega as he was never as good as the media seemed to make him out to be – had to laugh at the comments in the summer from pundits saying that we’d struggle this season without him when he’d managed a total of 1 heavily deflected goal last season
But I would always have like to have seen him playing in a more conventional 2 up front system. Call Bobby’s system what you want but it does have a lone striker – I understand that the other 2 are asked to play up front when attacking but they’re not strikers. Anyway whatever you want to call ot, Rodallega didn’t have the attributes to play the role & at times you could see his frustration & his head dropping. Doesn’t explain some of the sitters from a yard out that he used to miss thoughAnd I’ll agree on Gomez too. I don’t think he’s the greatest player in the world but nor is he anywhere near as bad as some people make out
I’ve just remembered another over-rated play in my eyes – Paul Rogers. Bloody hell I thought he was garbage but loads of people used to rave about him
You never fail to get me to bite at an argument with you despite my best attempts not to.Its was 14 league goals actually.
And yes I consider that a f**k ton for as you say a left winger who cost approx 700K.
Any more than that and you have a serious player on your hands.
Plus I think its finally time for you to take your 1980’s 4-4-2 glasses off before you come down with a full blown case of Alex Mcleish syndrome.
He never was a left winger he linked up as a third striker as does the likes of Young for Man U.
No Tylders all the players dont fit into your little Championship Manager boxes.
While you’ve got me on one – it said further up here somewhere about N’Zogbia not being good at defending or crossing a ball…. someone needs to tell the majority of strikers in the PL they are going about this sh*t the wrong way!!!
And for the love of god what are you papping on about being worse than the Chimbonda transfer. That is for all intensive purposes utter bollox.
There you go I hope you are happy my arse has been seen and I am taking my toys home.
My, my, you have got your knickers in a twist haven’t you?? ;)
1) The cockneylatic stats archive shows him getting 13 goals that season (Forest – H, Millwall – H, Derby – A, Crewe – H, , Stoke – A, PNE – H, Gillingham – H, Sheff Utd – A, Watford – H, BHA – A, Forest – A, PNE – A, Reading – H). Unless I’m missing one that I just can’t see despite having looked at it God knows how many times then blame their incorrect stats!! ;)
2) Like I said that was 1 season out of 6. He didn’t get more than 6 in any other season albeit 2 were in the top flight
3) I refer to him as a left winger as that is how Paul Jewell referred to him numerous times in interviews & it’s also where Lee McCulloch referred to himself playing several times too. You’d best have a word with them & tell em they were wrong
4) What has N’Zogbia got to do with my opinion that I felt Lee McCulloch was over-rated?? :blink: :blink:
5) Chimbonda’s sin was to hand in a transfer request, still in his kit, in the changing room straight after the game. Not the nicest thing a player has ever done but I never saw it as the great crime of the century. Not sure what difference it would have made had he waited till the next day but there you go. Lee McCulloch handed in a transfer request whilst Latics were in the middle of a relegation battle months after signing a new contract citing “family reasons” & didn’t feel that the club & manager who had helped make him into a club his boyhood hero’s wanted were worth repaying by him staying to help us get out of the relegation mess & then him leaving in the summer. By his own admission he kicked up “a hell of a stink” to try & force the club to sell him and that his performances suffered as a result.
Do i think all that is worse that what Chimbonda did? Yes I doI couldn’t for the life of me understand why he was rated so highly by so many.
The f**k ton of goals he scored in our promotion season would be a start.[/quote]
The “f**k ton” of goals?? His contribution was invaluable no doubt, but is 13 a “f**k ton” of goals at that level?? Certainly not close to Roberts & Ellington that season.
Plus that was 1 season out of the 6 & a bit seasons he was at Latics. In the others he never got more than 6.
Lacked pace, regularly used to drift into the middle, regularly used to seem to forget to track his man back, didn’t have the skills to create much for his team mates to score from & even the manager who got teh best out of him said on numerous occasions that “for all the will in the world he isn’t a left winger”
So like I said, not denying he was an important player for Latics on their rise up the leagues & even once we got to the top flight (they all were), just that IMO for his all round contribution I feel he was over-rated by teh Latics faithfulI also thought the manner in which he openly admitted trying to force Latics to sell him was disgusting & (again IMO) worse than what Chimbonda did but that’s another debate altogether :evil: :evil:
Over-rated – In the past: Lee McCulloch. In the present: James McCarthy
Under-rated – In the past: Phil Hughes. In the present: James McArthurDid I see someone mention Ray Woods as over-rated & that he only had 1 decent game???? I must have been watching a different Ray Woods then coz in that season where he’d overcome his injury problems Ray Woods was the main reason we looked so good going forward & was the reason why Don Page suddenly started banging goals in. I don’t think it was any coincidence that when he left Latics form dipped & Don Page’s goals dried up – think the CockneyLatic mag at the time described the sale as “taking away Don Page’s right leg”
[insert standard disagreement opening for Tyldsley here]
You’re calling Super Lee and James McCarthy overated and then picking at someone elses choice?
Glass houses and all that ![/quote]
I’m beginning to think McCulloch borrowed Tyldesley’s lawnmower and never gave it back to him. He’s certainly not his biggest fan.[/quote]If he’d asked I’d have only told him to eff off!! ;)
I should point out that when putting forward my choices I haven’t picked players who I thought were our worst. I’ve seen Peron & Jenkinson mentioned & I’ve yet to meet any latics fan who even rated em let alone over-rated them!!! ;)
So with McCulloch. By no means the worst player I’ve ever seen turn out for us, but I couldn’t for the life of me understand why he was rated so highly by so many.
With McCarthy – he’s a good player for us who does a good steady job but I’m not saying Latics fans rave about him. This is more a case of I can’t understand why the media rate him so highly & why it’s rumoured that he’s on the radar of a number of “big clubs”But Ray Woods for the 4-5 months period was superb & I suspect that he was on the radar of a few clubs (including Coventry) before he tore em a new one in the FA Cup & the same with Peter Atherton who they also tried to sign. I doubt whoever Coventry’s manager was at the time (Terry Butcher??) made a move to sign em both based on the 2 cup games alone
Over-rated – In the past: Lee McCulloch. In the present: James McCarthy
Under-rated – In the past: Phil Hughes. In the present: James McArthurDid I see someone mention Ray Woods as over-rated & that he only had 1 decent game???? I must have been watching a different Ray Woods then coz in that season where he’d overcome his injury problems Ray Woods was the main reason we looked so good going forward & was the reason why Don Page suddenly started banging goals in. I don’t think it was any coincidence that when he left Latics form dipped & Don Page’s goals dried up – think the CockneyLatic mag at the time described the sale as “taking away Don Page’s right leg”
Depending on which steward you spoke to this morning Latics had sold between 13,800-15,000 tickets before the ticket office opened up this morning
Make that 13,801-15,001. Just bought mine :) .Now off to Aer Lingus.[/quote]
was there anyone queeing ?[/quote]
When me & my mates got there at 6am, no there wasn’t and to be honest there wasn’t really any sort of queue till about 8am. By the time the ticket office opened up at just gone 9am the queue was up to the entrance to the Marquee.
The senior steward said they’d been expecting similar numbers than they’d had the previous SundayAnd before anyone takes the pish that i got there at 6 ;) I only did so coz we needed a group of tickets altogether, none of us could get down during the week & it wouldn’t have been possible to get the group together over the phone or online. Plus my wife was readying up the rusty razor for use on my knackers if I wasn’t back for a set time for the family do!!
EDIT – and for those complaining that the late buyers are getting better seats, they must have changed how they’re selling em if it was restricted last Sunday coz we were told we could have them anywhere we wanted other than block 111 which was sold out. You told em which block you wanted, the price you wanted & whereabouts within the block you wanted em & some lad went scurrying off into the back & dug out ones closest to where you’d asked for. Which I have to say he did pretty well at as we got block 113 & about 40 rows up
