The Big Fish

It has been hilarious listening to the radio the last couple of days hearing England fans complaining about how rubbish they are, and how McClaren should be sacked and Lampard dropped and Rooney too and.. and... and....

All that wailing drowned out the sad cries of Wales supporters, who lost 1-0 to Ireland. Not that terrible sounding, but Welsh people are not renowned for their optimistic viewpoint, so no surprise to hear a lot of moaning people coming back from Dublin. On the other hand, as a friend pointed out, this is the first time in living memory that Cardiff City would in all likelihood beat Wales in an imaginary game. Obviously Cardiff would get Ledley and Parry back, but then Wales do have Bellamy and Giggs. Not a lot else though. Simon Davies? No?

Anyway, both Wales and England are taking on the Big Fish this week, with Wales at home to San Marino (not much call for tickets I hear) and England away to Andorra. Andorra are rated 163rd in the world according to FIFA. A quick background check into Andorra's form tells me that they have actually won two games since their inception in 1996, beating Belarus 2-0 in 2000, and Albania 2-0 in 2002. More recently (October 2006) they lost 7-0 to Croatia.

Wales' opponents, San Marino, are ranked 196th (it makes you wonder who all those nations are between 163 and 196 -England? Wales?) and their team was established 6 years earlier than the Andorran team in 1990. Their best ever victory (only victory actually, but who's quibbling?) was a 1-0 win over Liechenstein in 2004. More recently, last September they lost to Germany 13-0. Interestingly, Liechenstein are ranked one place higher than Andorra, and their best ever victory was against Luxembourg - a magnificent 4-0 away victory in 2004. On to Luxembourg: they are ranked in between San Marino and Andorra at 178. Their biggest victory was in 1948 when they thrashed Afghanistan 6-0. You can see where I'm going with this, can't you: Afghanistan are ranked just behand Luxembourg at 179, and their biggest win was in 2003 against the well known nation of Kyrgyzstan when they won 2-1. Bloody hell, fancy having to make up a country just to win. Anyway, following the trail it turns out Kyrgyzstan is a real country and they are almost a proper team, being ranked 145. Fantastically their biggest ever win was against the Maldives in 1997, thrashing them 6-0. The Maldives, however, spit on the likes of Andorra with their lofty ranking of 158, and their best ever win was against (I love this) Mongolia, who they absolutely hammered 12-0 in 2003. Really. 12-0. Mind you you should note their 17-0 defeat to Iran in 1997.

Anyway, on to Mongolia - we're back down to 184, and a cracking 5-0 against Guam in 2003. (Honestly I am not making these up). We're reaching low, low levels here, with Guam ranked down at 199 in the FIFA rankings. But don't think this is the end, no no. Before moving on we should note Guam's biggest ever defeat which was when they lost 21-0 to North Korea in 2003, but the game I wouldn't have minded seeing was the Guam victory over Pohnpei (no I don't know who they are either) in 1998 where they won 16-1. Really. 16-1. A team SO MUCH WORSE than 199th in the world Guam they lost 16-1. So let's find out about Pohnpei: It turns out to be one of the four federated states of Micronesia (honestly - look on the right) and their team is not affiliated to FIFA. They have never won a game, although in 2001 they did celebrate a 1-1 draw at home to Yap (another of the Micronesian islands), and (as Wikipedia says - where else did you think I was getting this stuff?) some say they are the worst football team in the world. City have just signed their striker. Warren Feaney.

And there are no easy games in football, as they say. Except for the Scots, who play Italy tomorrow. Piece of cake.

"Sorry Steve, with Chops out you're the one we're relying on for goals"

The pressures of the promotion chase is clearly getting to the players, as this picture of Steve Thompson shows. Thompson is one of those strikers that everyone refers to as "hard-working" except when they are called "bustling". What this means is that they run around a lot ineffectually, scoring very few goals for someone in their position. Alan Lee used to hold this role for Cardiff but has since moved on to Ipswich where he has somehow transformed himself into that other rare breed of forwards - a goal scorer.

To be fair to Thommo (or "The Thommohawk" as he likes to be known as - stop laughing at the back there) he really DOES work very hard, and unlike Lee wins a lot of balls in the air, which he even manages to head in the right direction. And if the alternatives are Byrne, Campbell or Redan then Thompson it has to be. Not sure about Green though, he looks a pretty good prospect - running fast, winning balls in the air, taking players on and all that stuff. I'm sure someone at Cardiff will soon knock all that out of him - or we'll sell him. As for our other two forgotten forwards, Ferretti and Glombard, clearly DJ has decided they are a waste of space. Glombard I saw at Norwich and he was hopeless, but I have never seen Ferretti play. Rumours have it that DJ thinks he is a bit of a wuss. Despite all these forwards, the story is that DJ is trying to sign Feaney from Luton, who is another "hard-working striker" in the mold of Thompson. Has any team ever had so many strikers that were not good enough to play?

Bay City Rollers

Could this look ever come back?

This comes from the story that the Rollers are suing their old record label who owe them millions of pounds. Their excuse is, apparantly they "didn't know who to pay". Come on! It's Eric, Woody, Derek, thingy and the other one. We all know that. Altogether now: "You got to give a little love, take a little love, be prepared to forsake a little love.."

How terrifying is it that I remember any of these lyrics? I wasn't even living in the country at the time.

House

Our house is on the market. The good news is that it is worth more than we expected. Estate Agents are beating our door down to sell it. There are not enough houses on the market, we are told, so it's a sellers' market at the moment, despite the fact everyone keeps telling us the market is about to collapse. It is looking like we are selling at exactly the right time: which is unusual for us, given our past history. Now the fun is tidying up, getting rid of old stuff, dealing with estate agents..... Aaargh!

Derby, Commentary and SuperTed

Yesterday we went to Derby. I am supposed to write this game up but am suffering from a lack of will. May do it tomorrow, along with my bit about how shit the on line service has become. I have been involved in an email exchange with the people who run the Cardiff City website - some people called Premium TV, because they have now 'upgraded' the site so that they have security protected the videos they show. This has also affected the online commentary, and it now means that no one can listen to the commentary unless they have an up to date PC - as opposed to a Mac (like I use). Of course they are losing pennies on people watching highlights on YouTube (except there aren't any on there), and of course they will lose £££ because of people like me cancelling their subscription and asking for their money back. Ironically Cardiff won an award recently for their website. I think they should give it back.

It makes absolutely no sense, except for Microsoft who make a fortune out opf this, and the people who sold them the new security system. Cardiff lose people listening to them, piss off their own supporters and gain precisely nothing.

The fact that they actually don't have to link the commentary to the video service (who cares about the videos anyway?) hasn't occurred to them.

Anyway, apart from the awfulness of yesterday's match, we had a nice trip out, and it was nice to meet Mike Young, of Superted and other cartoons fame. I'll paste in a superted picture above here - except he's probably copyrighted them all and will sue me!

Anyway see more here (Mike's website) and here(kabillion.com). Cartoooooooooooooooooons.

Stop Lottery Money being spent on Olympics

Go to this http://petitions.pm.gov.uk/Defend-funding to sign a petition against lottery money all being blown on the Olympics instead of the voluntary sector. I wish they would just get rid of the Olympics altogether - I don't mean just in the UK, I mean everywhere. What a complete waste of time and money. Unlike football, obviously.

Mind you, our prime minister is not exactly renowned for his listening skills, is he? Remember the couple of million marching against the war in Iraq?

Privacy

Privacy, originally uploaded by Gary Socrates.

I was training today at West Norbury Library (as you do). This was the Gents toilet. Fortunately I only needed a pee, but - call me fussy if you like - I don't think the yellow and black tape gives much privacy.

Thinking about it I am glad there wasn't anyone using it when I took the photo.

St David's Day