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DID everyone have a nice, relaxing Easter break then, yeah? No work on the Friday or the Monday? Some quality time spent with the family? No possibility of a looming General Election that looks set to plunge the country even deeper into the far-right hellscape it has progressively been turning into over the past decade? Oh, hang on…

Erm, yeah, it’s safe to say this Springtime hasn’t quite gotten off to the most promising of starts, what with the jarg weather and the impending doom which will once again have a negative effect on the lives of vulnerable people. I suppose it’s a good job them bloody Reds keep doing the business every weekend then, isn’t it?

It was a great day at West Brom on Sunday, spurred on by the fact that the Reds produced an incredibly resilient performance in difficult circumstances, defended excellently and looked dangerous going forward. Couple the manner of the display with the three points and you’ve got yourself a very encouraging outcome.

Let’s hope the solid run of form continues because, to be honest, if the Reds finish fifth in May and David Dimbleby declares a Tory landslide at 10PM on June 8, then it might better just ending things once and for all.

Pitching In On The Joyous Runaround

Brighton and Hove Albion were all but promoted to the Premier League last weekend courtesy of a win over Wigan Athletic, after years of financial uncertainty and near-misses in the Championship title race.

As has become customary in the lower leagues every time a team achieves even a modicum of success, thousands of home supporters descended onto the pitch following the full-time whistle and celebrated deliriously:

https://twitter.com/JohnDavies350/status/854013512238202885

I’m torn over pitch invasions, to be honest. At face value, they’re adrenaline-fuelled manifestations of pure collective joy — like being at a house party where everybody is buzzed to the exact same level and the song currently playing is everybody in the building’s favourite piece of music ever recorded.

On the other hand, it’s all a bit small-time isn’t it? You don’t see Champions League winners being mobbed by fans on the pitch after a penalty shoot-out. It’s always fans of teams from places you’re not quite sure exist, like Gillingham, and you get the feeling that that nothing else interesting has ever happened in these small towns, and so this is everybody’s one chance to doing something rebellious, to take a risk, before returning to their inane workaday existences and living off that one time they got on the pitch because their club secured a sixth-place finish before being knocked out in the League Two Play-Off Semi-Final.

So if/when the Reds next win the league and everyone jumps straight on the Anfield turf, I’m not sure if I’ll be front-and-centre trying to neck Phil Coutinho, or bolting out the ground as quickly as possible bemoaning the gang of try-hards running round with their tops off.

Still, get on this lad with MS having the time of his life crowd-surfing in a wheelchair. This is great:

https://twitter.com/One_Mikky/status/854012630050189314

Nice to see a man with a disability enjoying himself before the Tories take all his money away and declare him fit to work, anyway.

Lowering The Tone

Oh, Tony. Tony, Tony, Tony. I gave you a chance. I thought it might work out. It could have helped your career. But you’ve fucked it within a week.

Yes, a mere seven days after his appointment as manager of Granada CF, Tony Adams has lost his only game in charge, and made an absolute tit of himself on the internet. Here he is orchestrating his first training session.

https://twitter.com/FootyAwayDayVid/status/853189926271188993

Now, if anybody could tell me what in the name of all that’s holy big Tone is trying to explain to his group of footballers here, then I’d love to know. It’s not only stupid but completely nonsensical. Not a single one of those movements and gyrations means a thing. None of them. I swear at one point he’s just doing jazz hands for effect. It’s like he’s doing the Cha Cha Slide. None of this will help Granada learn how to toss it into the mixer for the big man, thus it is completely pointless.

https://twitter.com/ToggerReport/status/852111075952734208

And it seems Adams is getting the gang back together for one last job while he’s at it, too. Because nobody knows how to stave-off relegation in La Liga like two ageing ex-Premier League players who have had no discernible success whatsoever in top-level football for almost a decade. Reo-Coker and Richardson must have been absolutely fucking astounded when they took the call from their respective agents saying they had one last shot at the bigtime. Shame they’ve both always been absolutely crap.

I don’t half feel sorry for Granada supporters, y’know. Their club is an international laughing stock, they’re 100 per cent without doubt going to be relegated, and they can’t even manage to do so with a bit of dignity in tact.

So, it seems like Adams’ stay in Andalusia will be a short one. Means he’ll be back home in good ol’ Blighty before the start of the war with Spain over Gibraltar, I suppose.

Mice And Queasy

https://twitter.com/FourFourTweet/status/854012595094904833

Fuck. That.

I wouldn’t really say I have a proper, legitimate phobia of anything, really. I mean, I don’t like snakes, but the thought of them doesn’t particularly strike fear into me. I’m not fond of the dark or heights, but I can deal with them. There is of course the crushing fear of dying alone, unloved, disappointing friends and family, and feeling like life has been wasted; but let’s be honest, who doesn’t feel that?

Rats, though. Rats get me. They’re all hairy and dirty and they carry diseases and they bite and they can jump dead, dead high in the air as well. So if I’d have been on the pitch during the Copenhagen derby, I’d have been making my way down the tunnel quicker than Harry Kewell in a cup final (waheyyyyy).

Yes, apparently supporters of Brondby (be arsed figuring out how to do that weird O with the squiggle in the middle) lobbed dead rats at FC Kobenhavn’s Ludwig Augustinsson in a Danish Superliga derby match. Quite how they’ve procured the deceased rodents I’m not sure. Is it viable to go into a pet shop and say, “Good day shopkeep, I’d like to purchase a selection of your finest dead rats, please. Don’t you worry yourself about what I need for them for”? I just don’t know.

I’m also not entirely sure what the purpose of the whole enterprise is. Is it a specific form of rivalry-based protest? Is it just a particularly madcap way of putting the opposition off? Is it designed to give Ludwig Augustinsson rabies? God knows.

It’s a definite step up from the socks getting launched around at Goodison a few years back, at least.

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