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May Review

bob fleming

By bob fleming
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bob fleming World Cup

bob fleming

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May. The End Game.

“Never cast a clout until May is out” they reckon. Which apparently means; don’t go out without a coat until after May because of the unpredictable weather. I jut used to presume that you were more likely to get a punch in the face on June 1st.

Anyway, the next eight days would decide our season. Will we be off to Europe next year? Will it be via the InterTonto? Will I get to a game (or two)? More importantly can we win another game in Europe? And even more importantly than that, after April, can we win another game this season?

Saturday 29 April - The race for 6th: - 

                      PLD PTS GD 
6th Rovers           35  54  +4
7th Newcastle        36  54  +4
8th Bolton           35  52  +8
9th Wigan            36  51  -4

Charlton Athletic 0 - Blackburn Rovers 2. OK, we’ve had a good season. We’re a hard team to face but we are beatable. Alan Curbishley resigned just before the kick off. That’s how far we’ve come this season. I don’t remember any managers resigning in 1994/95 when they had to play us. Managers, established Premier League Managers at that, retire rather than have to face us. It’s all credit to Mark Hughes in my book.

Before the kick off we were all thinking, “Oh great he’s resigned this’ll be one last effort for the man”, then afterwards some of us were saying “We won only ‘cause he’d resigned and they were shell shocked”. Well make your bloody minds up will you? In truth Charlton’s form had been awful for the last few games and they had several players missing. Half man / half gonk, Tugay returned and made a massive difference in our midfield, we ran the show.

Steven Reid opened the scoring with a header on 42 minutes and then the Welsh Weasel forced a second when Chris Powell put through his own net from 70 yards.

Great stuff from Rovers in testing / easy circumstances. 6th spot was definitely on.

Elsewhere, the football world is left reeling as founder members of the G14 and the English equivalent of Real Madrid are relegated. How was this allowed to happen? I for one feel cheated and the Premiership will not be the same next year without the weekly (or should that be weakly?) comments from “Big Clubs” many spokespeople. If it’s not Gold it’s Brady, if it’s not Brady it’s Sullivan, if it’s not Sullivan, it’s Elephant Man. A veritable conveyor belt of unpleasant and annoying people.

Good riddance. Do us all a favour, don’t rush back.

Tuesday 2 May - The revenge of the sixth: -

6th Rovers      36  57  +6
7th Newcastle   37  55  +4
8th Bolton      36  52  +7

Blackburn Rovers 1 - Roman Abramovich’s Chelsea 0. Well, what can you say? Well for my point of view not a lot that hasn’t already been said on brfcs.com. One of the greatest nights at Ewood for ages, with scenes reminiscent of VE Day (who can forget the celebrations all those years ago when we went two nil up against the Germans in 1945?)

Steven Reid netted his second goal in as many games when he breathed heavily on a Robbie Savage free kick just before half time. Apart from some of the Chelsea players falling over clumsily in the second half in a pathetic attempt to win a penalty that was all that was needed to see off the most expensively assembled array of footballers English football has ever seen.

Events took a bizarre twist after the match as Jose Mourinho, who must have still been drunk from celebrating their premier title win at the weekend, actually gave us some praise. It just didn’t feel right.

What else happened that week? Well the Welsh Weasel was named ‘Player of the Season’ and Steven Reid’s goal away at Wigan was named ‘Goal of the Season’. Quite right too in my book. There were other awards such as the ‘Quickest Booking’ of the season, ‘Stupidest Haircut’ of the season and the ‘Least Appearances from an Italian Centre Half on at least £1 Million a Season’ of the season award, but I don’t think you’re bothered about those.

Meanwhile, Mark Hughes and all his back room team (Eddie and Jim) all signed new contracts that will keep them at Rovers until the summer of 2009!! Great news! Is there a clause though? Again no one has a clue. Perhaps we could have a pointless debate?

Sunday 7 May - The race for sixth: -

5th Arsenal    37  64  +35
6th Rovers     37  60  +7
7th Newcastle  37  55  +4

Looking at the table going into the final game of the season most of us had quite frankly become a little complacent about qualifying for the UEFA Cup. Not me. Oh no. As we’re all aware, and many like to constantly remind us, you can take nothing for granted in football and Rovers always make things difficult for themselves, always do things the hard way and ultimately let us down (Let's face it, apart from the two cup wins, two promotions and the Champions of England thing it’s almost certainly been one let down after another over the last twenty years).

So going into the Manchester City game I was surprised the vast majority of fans thought we’d already done it. I was extremely nervous and was just waiting for the 22 player fight, the pitch invasion or an unsavoury “incident” involving Roarina and Ken Beamish that would see us have 10 points deducted by the FA.

Hey! But what do I know? None of us those things happened! We’d done it and qualified for Europe again!

We rounded things off with a comfortable win. Johnny Slippers with the first after "England’s Number 1", (if I wasn’t English that would be really funny, stay fit Robinson) David James dropped a cross at his feet. He couldn’t miss and didn’t. Then in the second half big Shefki doubled our lead with his eighth goal of the season, not a bad return. You’ve just got to like the fella. Conscious that we’re in danger of not topping the “Bully Boy League” Tugay decided to get himself sent off with a poor challenge that the City player completely over reacted too, rolling around on the floor like a big girly rolling thing.

Regardless, Hughes should now walk away with the May Manager of The Month Award.

The players wore next season’s home shirts and as many experts predicted we’re going to wear Blue and White halves again. A good decision in my view. Some crucial questions; Are they halved or are they quartered? And perhaps more importantly will there be a DVD? Do they do DVD’s? Will they start doing mini kits in the “club” shop again? Will they ever know when they’re getting new stock in? Will I get conformation or a “thank you” for renewing my season ticket? When’s the new home shirt out? When’s the away shirt out? Where’s Todd? When does mega flop Sealdinho’s contract run out? Does anyone know what I’m on about?

Elsewhere on this day the original “big club” Tottenham Hotspurts, missed out on 4th place and qualification for the Champions League because they came down with the ten bob bits. I’ll just get my violin out again.

Well, what a season that was. All credit to all the players and staff. A phenomenal performance. Can we do as well next year? Well “hopefully” is the ultimate answer. Of course it’ll be harder and the squad will be put under even more pressure due to the amount of games we’ll have to play (they’ll be two in Europe don’t forget).

Who knows what will happen? If Boro can get to the UEFA Cup Final and get beat 4-0 then why not us? Let’s not forget on our day we’re more than capable of getting beat by anybody.

Can we break through into the Top 4 in the Premier League? I don’t know, we’ve come a very long way in a very short space of time, let’s just celebrate that. Hopefully Hughesy will be able to add to his squad as he’d like and take us to the next level. I know one thing though, if we score as many great goals and win as many games as in 2005/06 then we’ll be very happy fans. I just hope more people get down to the games and back the club.

So that’s it. No more football until middle / late July when Rovers will no doubt start their pre season friendlies. It’s a long time to go without.

However ‘cause I’m good to you guys I’ve been looking on tinterweb and discovered that the following games are on!! The FA Cup Final - tomorrow, Liverpool v West Ham (I’ve got 1600 spares tickets if anyone’s interested) The Champions League Final - Arsenal v Barcelona May 17, England 'B' v Belarus Thurs 25 May, England v Hungary Tues 30 May and England v Jamaica Sat 3 June.

Not only that, and hardly anyone’s mentioned it, but there’s also something on called the '2006 FIFA World Cup'. It's on in Germany and apparently there’s 64 matches on TV between June 9th and July 9th.

Other than that though there’s almost no football on whatsoever. Something should be done. It’s a national scandal. I’m not sure whose to blame so I’ll blame Sven Goran Eriksson.

That’s yer lot for this season sportsfans. Have a great summer, keep taking the tablets.

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ihtd Uefa Europa League

ihtd

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Bob your reviews keep getting better and better.

Are you going to to do one for June/early July especially for the World Cup in the sub-forum?

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bob fleming World Cup

bob fleming

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Are you going to to do one for June/early July especially for the World Cup in the sub-forum?

407201[/snapback]

No, I'm going to give that a miss and wait until next season for all things Rovers.

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ihtd Uefa Europa League

ihtd

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Ok then Bob, fair play to you then, as your reviews thus far have been superb. Keep it up for next season.

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kiwi Unibond League

kiwi

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Congratulations on a great season. A reasonably prominent New Zealand sports broadcaster came out recently on the national sports radio channel and claimed that Ryan Nelsen was overated. I'm not sure what provoked this as he and Blackburn Rovers get very little media attention over here. We don't get many Rovers games on the TV here so I'm interested in the views of Rovers fans in England.

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den

den

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Many thanks Bob.

Glad to hear everyone enjoyed it. I hope we get more next season, your columns are a breath of fresh air and give the site a bit of - sometimes - much needed stress relief.

Thanks for taking the time Bob, it's much appreciated.

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USABlue World Cup

USABlue

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Many thanks Bob.

Glad to hear everyone enjoyed it. I hope we get more next season, your columns are a breath of fresh air and give the site a bit of - sometimes - much needed stress relief.

Thanks for taking the time Bob, it's much appreciated.

407486[/snapback]

Great stuff Bob. Are they keeping you on for next season, I hope so, good lighthearted look at things good chuckles. Thanks.

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bob fleming World Cup

bob fleming

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Are they keeping you on for next season

407495[/snapback]

I was going to sit down with den at the end of the season but after messing him around for a bit I'm going to hold on until after the World Cup and keep my options option. If I'm honest I'm hoping for a multi-million pound deal from www.rovers.co.uk but if that doesn't happen (mainly because Grooby's a bit tight) I've always got brfcs.com to fall back on.

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ippy Unibond League

ippy

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If it’s not Gold it’s Brady, if it’s not Brady it’s Sullivan, if it’s not Sullivan, it’s Elephant Man. A veritable conveyor belt of unpleasant and annoying people.

Now I've gone and spluttered coffee down me trews.

Sheer class.

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