Post by animallittle on Sept 4, 2008 14:04:02 GMT 1
The one thing we had learned from this baptism of fire season in the Premiership was that no matter what sort of lead you held it was never ever enough,we seemed to invent different ways to lose football games at this level,in November we had Leeds Utd well and truly on the rack at Oakwell,on a dark rainy afternoon we footballed them to death,build up a 2-0 lead,created chance after chance and yet still managed to lose 3-2 to a last minute goal,we despaired at times,but the difference was pretty simple really,every team in this league had players that could hurt you,mistakes were punished and they never ever stopped working and running,the fitness was something else.
Man Utd had all 11 players on the park with those attributes,and when the second half kicked off we were well and truly under the cosh,we could not get the ball off them and were camped in our own half while they passed the ball to themselfs almost it seemed at will,within 10 minutes of the re-start Sheringham reduced the deficit and we all expected an avalanche to follow such was United's superiority.
Except someone forgot to tell our 21 year old reserve defender Scott Jones,he was only in the side because of injuries to De Zeauw and Chris Morgan and had only made a handful of appearance's in his career thus far,when we won a corner around the 60 minute mark it was greeted with a bit of relief and an opportunity to release the pressure,Redders bent it over from the left hand side and steaming in and timing his run to perfection young Jones planted the header firmly past Schmeichel and restored the 2 goal advantage,it was one of those magic moments that only this great game can deliver,he ran towards us took his shirt off and celebrated like only a 21 year old lad from Barnsley could who was lucky enough to play for his home town club,we were ecstatic and i dont think i have ever celebrated a goal quite like that one before or since .......it was pure magic.
But this is Man Utd we are playing and they really threw the kitchen sink at us now,we were hanging on by a thread,making tackles,blocking shots with every part of the body,clearing balls of the line and we were defending deeper and deeper by the minute,with 10 to go Cole swiveled in the box and fired low and hard into the bottom left hand corner .......absolute quality and the deficit reduced to 3-2.
This was one hell of a cup tie and the millions at home watching on TV must have been lapping it up too,David and Goliath fighting it out with David just about holding on,in the remaining few minutes i lost count of the number of chances United missed and i guess the luck was with us that night,and when the final whistle went we could hardly believe it,i noticed 3 or 4 of the United players, Beckham included, slumped to the ground with the dissapointment and if you think they are not bothered about the FA cup anymore in these days of Champions League ect .......think again ....because they were hurting bad......Fergie included.
And so were Marshy and Sandy when we caught up with them in our local afterwards,they shook all our hands and we all had a good drink,too early for the piss-taking yet ...plenty of time for that when the dust settled but you could tell they were hurting and to lose to us was just about the worse case scenario for them,Sandy admitted to me sometime afterwards that he did not sleep for a few nights after that because he knew the amount of stick he was going to get..........love it !!!
Man Utd had all 11 players on the park with those attributes,and when the second half kicked off we were well and truly under the cosh,we could not get the ball off them and were camped in our own half while they passed the ball to themselfs almost it seemed at will,within 10 minutes of the re-start Sheringham reduced the deficit and we all expected an avalanche to follow such was United's superiority.
Except someone forgot to tell our 21 year old reserve defender Scott Jones,he was only in the side because of injuries to De Zeauw and Chris Morgan and had only made a handful of appearance's in his career thus far,when we won a corner around the 60 minute mark it was greeted with a bit of relief and an opportunity to release the pressure,Redders bent it over from the left hand side and steaming in and timing his run to perfection young Jones planted the header firmly past Schmeichel and restored the 2 goal advantage,it was one of those magic moments that only this great game can deliver,he ran towards us took his shirt off and celebrated like only a 21 year old lad from Barnsley could who was lucky enough to play for his home town club,we were ecstatic and i dont think i have ever celebrated a goal quite like that one before or since .......it was pure magic.
But this is Man Utd we are playing and they really threw the kitchen sink at us now,we were hanging on by a thread,making tackles,blocking shots with every part of the body,clearing balls of the line and we were defending deeper and deeper by the minute,with 10 to go Cole swiveled in the box and fired low and hard into the bottom left hand corner .......absolute quality and the deficit reduced to 3-2.
This was one hell of a cup tie and the millions at home watching on TV must have been lapping it up too,David and Goliath fighting it out with David just about holding on,in the remaining few minutes i lost count of the number of chances United missed and i guess the luck was with us that night,and when the final whistle went we could hardly believe it,i noticed 3 or 4 of the United players, Beckham included, slumped to the ground with the dissapointment and if you think they are not bothered about the FA cup anymore in these days of Champions League ect .......think again ....because they were hurting bad......Fergie included.
And so were Marshy and Sandy when we caught up with them in our local afterwards,they shook all our hands and we all had a good drink,too early for the piss-taking yet ...plenty of time for that when the dust settled but you could tell they were hurting and to lose to us was just about the worse case scenario for them,Sandy admitted to me sometime afterwards that he did not sleep for a few nights after that because he knew the amount of stick he was going to get..........love it !!!