Tag Archive | sports

Arsenal Versus Hull: How Do You Like Them Apples?

Anyone who knows me knows of my interest in obsession, addictive behaviour and the curiously exaggerated importance we attach to football. Anyone who reads Positively Arsenal (you for instance) is an example of the most successful evolutionary outcome the world has ever seen. Intelligent beyond the imagination of our ancient ancestors, dangerous and powerful by […]

Arsenal Versus Paris St Germain: No Good Deed Goes Unpunished

What is the greatest of all human qualities? Charity? Self sacrifice for the greater good? Giving with no expectation of personal gain? I suspect these and variants thereof would figure pretty highly on everybody’s list. How about humility, modesty and a humble willingness to allow one’s good deeds to increase anonymously the water in the […]

Arsenal Versus Southampton : Bogeys In The Long Grass

I’m having terrible trouble getting going this season. After a prolonged summer break recovering from the effects of the interminable internationals I crept from the long grass, blinking in the light of day, just in time to preview a routine victory against Watford. I was then immediately given the bum’s rush and booted back into […]

Arsenal Versus Watford – All Past Is Prologue

I usually start a new season brimming with a blend of optimism and ludicrous over confidence. I assume we’ll win every game, a delusion I maintain right up until the first dropped points when I cheerfully downgrade my expectations to an unbeaten season. After the first defeat I shrug and assume we’ll just win every […]

Arsenal Versus Sunderland: From The Mouths Of Babes

Cormac and I enjoy wide ranging conversations on our evening dog walks. He’s nineteen now and in common with most chaps in their late teens is a wealth of fascinating knowledge and dubious facts. Spending his life at the hi-tech coal face of information technology and being a ‘stuff’ magnet he has learned and read […]

Arsenal Versus West Brom: As You Like It

I’ve always known I was special. If I wasn’t I would probably only have suspected it rather than being so certain. This way of seeing oneself in the world is in all likelihood a common ignis fatuus – I very much doubt I’m the only one so thoroughly deluded. There are occasions however when my […]

Arsenal Versus Palace: Springtime Cannibalism

With Aston Villa’s relegation now confirmed there is a whiff of the end of term about the place. The last rites have been read to Bolton and Dagenham & Redbridge and people are anointing probable winners in each of the divisions except for the fourth where Northampton are already champions. Mrs Black is making noises […]

Arsenal Versus Barcelona : Oh No! They Killed Nigel

I grew up listening to the Archers. No, that’s understating it. I probably heard Barwick Green while I was still in the womb. My mother, you see, is a lifelong devotee. The radio has always been an important part of my life from Listen With Mother (which I did, both ante and post natal) through […]

Arsenal Versus Watford: Candles In The Wind

What a weekend this could turn into. Shotta said he experienced the kind of disturbance in his waters which set off a rumbling in his tail bone causing him to wonder if the stars might align in our favour in one giant, glorious three day festival of sporting joy. Could Rafa sprinkle magic onto the […]

Arsenal Versus Hull : Happy Valley

I have, since escaping school at the first available opportunity, travelled a wide and colourfully varied career path. I’ve been a civil servant, a builder’s labourer, a steeplejack, an interior designer and a security guard. That is to name but a few of my interesting and ultimately short lived attempts at finding the ideal method […]