One is when I watch the news and see something about a terrible tragedy that could have been avoided and people in power talk about “learning the lessons,” another is just about anything David Cameron says.
But in football there are a few too. “Giving 110%” gets right on my wick. When Jamie Redknapp misuses “literally” repeatedly I reserve the right to shout at my tele, but to those you can add “must win game.”
There are two sorts of games that are “must win” – one is a knockout cup game, the other is a game you have to win to stay up/get promoted, whatever. NO other game is a must win.
The first time this terrible phrase reared its ugly head in the recent past was when we played Middlesborough in 2009. A mate walked past me on the way in and wittered that we had to win the game, and got quite irate when I said “there’s nine games after this.” Of course we won the match – and stayed up easily.
The words “must win game” were being used again last night after our latest capitulation, Blackburn, apparently is by turns a must win. A game we simply have to win, a game we can’t lose….whichever variation you choose. And its all wrong. Its no such thing.
To those people I say this: We have 26 games left this season. 25 of which are after the Blackburn game – lets not put too much pressure on the match.
Clearly it’s a very important fixture, to say anything else would be a stupid and crass thing to say. The run we are on is a disgrace, and I will be totally honest, TP, right now doesn’t strike me as a man who knows what to do to get us out of the mess we are in. Its almost like, “well plan A hasn’t worked, lets try Plan A again.”
And in many respects, that is probably why Saturday has extra importance attached to it. I genuinely believe that if that fourth goal of QPR’s had gone in then the fans would have turned on the team for the first time in recent memory and the manager would have had to run the gauntlet too, for the first time since that Plymouth game (which we won) back in 2007.
I used to run a proper Stoke Website then and on that, after that game, I wrote a massive and passionate column about how TP should be sacked, and in which I dared him to prove me wrong. And boy, did he do that! Which goes to prove two things 1) Sacking TP would have been the stupidest thing this club ever did and 2) I know nothing.
But there was a real feeling yesterday of a seething undercurrent – indeed, to borrow a theory off my brother, only the display of Referee Mike Jones saved the team being booed off yesterday and I will admit now to booing them off at Bolton.
So taken in that respect Blackburn is a very, very big game. With our away form we won’t beat Everton, Wolves or Man City and with our confidence being so low we will do well to get a lot out of Spurs at home – and those after Blackburn are the next four games.
There are a lot of things wrong right now – I wrote that on my first ever post on this blog and we had only lost one game – but TP must be given the time to sort it out.
I didn’t want him appointed in 2002, I didn’t want him appointed in 2006 and there have been three occasions since when I have called for his sacking. One after the Forest debacle in 03, one after we got beat by Derby in 05 and brought Chris Clark on to change things and finally after the aforementioned Plymouth game – and I will not make the mistake a fourth time.
We are in trouble, and make no mistake we are in relegation battle, but we will get out of it – with Pulis at the helm – irrespective of whether we beat Blackburn in that “must win game” next Saturday.
* the blog title is the opening line of Bon Jovi's "Keep The Faith"
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