Gary gets a cap, may be better than Dawson. Elmander’s ‘contract’, Jlloyds ‘return’, Everton’s ‘game’.
Afternoon to you. Apologies for those who are regular for not being here yesterday. This was due to a trip back to the smoke and a two hour crawl around the car park that is the M25. The sooner that this move gets sorted out, the better for everyone. Especially my wallet.
Kudos to Gary Cahill for finally getting his second cap on Wednesday after coming on for Michael Dawson and performing well for his thirty minutes. I got into a bit of a head to head with @andrewgillbanks on Twitter at the time, about who was better, Cahill or Dawson. Now, normally, it is Cahill all the way, but I don’t think anyone can deny that Cahill hasn’t exactly been setting the world alight this season. Since Christmas it has picked up a little, but that can be married with the fact that Zat Knight has regressed, thereby making Cahill look better. So, at the time we were talking, I would have put Dawson ahead of Cahill for a starting place for the national team.
Then, Denmark scored. So, now, it is obviously Cahill who is the better player. Funny how things like that happen. If he can bring into the Bolton team what he brought on Wednesday, a steady head, good placement and crisp passing, then we shouldn’t have too much to worry about defensively. Except for Zat Knight. Swing and roundabouts, ladies and gentlemen.
After my rant on Wednesday about Johan Elmander and his contract, he a) did this and b) it transpired that he had said a little bit more than had been previously reported.
“I have had conversations with the manager and he thinks I do a good job and have the right attitude in the game…….They had a chance to do something earlier and I do my job on the pitch. It might be a little bit cocky but I have been dealing with speculation since I was 16 or 17, so it doesn`t mean anything to me. Now I focus on what I know and do not let anything else get in the way.”
Thinking that someone does a good job on the pitch and being held over a barrel are two separate things. The club opened talks with Elmander’s representatives early on in the season and were almost instantly rebuffed. He then said that he would wait until the end of the season before making a decision.
As for doing his job on the pitch, which is scoring goals if I remember correctly, then he certainly seems to be living in the past. And this means that it seems that he is only focusing on what he knows when he plays for his country.
This all makes me feel very confused, and I’ve got a masters degree so I like to think that not much gets past me. If he wants to stay, why is he saying that he has no obligation to the club. If he doesn’t want to stay, then why is pointing fingers at the club, who offered him a contract that he turned down. And if he thinks that we are going to take him seriously, then why has he stopped scoring goals at exactly the same time that we need him to score more.
And if the manager likes what he does, why did he plonk him on the right wing last weekend and put Danny Sturridge up front.
As they say on Dragons Den, I’m out.
Speaking of being out, Jlloyd Samuel has ‘warned’ Bolton fans not to forget about him. The man who had already put his house up for sale, has been out of action for ten months with a rugby type thigh injury. It says here.
I like it when papers use a word that the players haven’t actually used. Remember a couple of years ago when Paul Robinson ‘reassured’ us that his loan deal was only for tax purposes, and that the transfer would be made permanent at the end of the loan? No matter how well he is now playing, this was not the type of reassurance that we wanted. Now, Jlloyd has ‘warned’ us not to write him off. Why? What’s he going to do? Hold us all up at gunpoint with a bomb strapped to his chest if we don’t? Hold us down and tickle us with a feather until we submit? Get his mum on us?
Samuel was unlucky to be supplanted by Robinson, after doing little wrong other than be bought by Little Sam and playing in the same position as Megson’s pet. Marcos Alonso can play in the same position and it seems that he is the back up for the position. Ricardo Gardner can also play in the same position, if and when he returns, so there seems to be little future at the club for Jlloyd. Shame and all, but maybe he and Elmander can move en masse to the north-east as Elmander isn’t the first Bolton player that the Toon have been interested in this year.
After all this, there is a game on Sunday against Everton. We all remember that happy day in Cardiff when we left Preston and David Moyes in Division One, but few thought that Moyes would remain at Deepdale long, and so it proved. The job that he has done at Goodison is akin to the one that Big Sam did with us, but he has continued on and, whenever he leaves as he surely must do eventually, will leave a legacy of a more long term nature than Allardyce did.
As for the game on Sunday, it seems likely that both Louis Saha will be missing, on top of Jack Rodwell. Not physically on top you understand. That will just exacerbate their respective injuries. Saha is in good form, so we’ll have one less thing to worry about. Tim Cahill is back from the Asian Cup, so we’ll have one more thing to worry about. He started on the bench in their last game against Blackpool, in much the same way Lee did for us at Spurs. You would expect both to start on Sunday.
But that is for the Everton preview, warts, Phil Neville and all, tomorrow. I’m off to wash the car.
Until tomorrow.