We wouldn’t normally describe Preview Percy as “naïve” but hoping for an honest referee at Anfield? Really? Here’s his look at Saturday’s visit to Brentford…
Next up we visit the Vacuum Cleaner stadium for a 3pm kick-off where our hosts will be Brentford. Gunnersbury station will be closed to both District Line and the Overground on Saturday so if that’s your chosen route, best seek alternative transport.
So Brentford then. They’ve won two and lost three so far this season. They were, perhaps, slightly fortunate to beat Palace 2-1 on the opening day with ref Barrott (of whom more later) giving a free-kick too soon for a foul that didn’t exist to deny Palace a goal.
They then lost 2-0 to the twelve men of Liverpool before returning to winning ways against Southampton, defeating them 3-1 at home. Their next two were away defeats at Man City (2-1) and at Spurs (3-1), all of which has left them in 12th place with 6pts which is two places and points above us.
With Ivan Toney always likely to leave they set about recruitment well in advance. Daisy informs me that the signing of Igor Thiago from Club Brugge was announced many months ago, though the deal only became official on 1 July, £30m being the consensus for the value of the “undisclosed” fee paid by the Bees. Whereupon Thiago put in a bid for the title of season’s unluckiest player, picking up a serious knee injury on his pre-season debut that will keep him out until the new year if not next season.
They spent £27.5m to bring Fabio Carvalho back to West London from Liverpool. The former Fulham winger spent most of last season away from Liverpool on loan firstly at Fizzy Drinks Leipzig and then at Hull. Won’t be too many players with that combination on their CV.
Although Portuguese by birth he grew up in South London, when his parents moved to the UK when he was 11. His youth CV therefore contains a spell at Benfica followed by a spell at Balham FC, a combination even more unlikely than the aforementioned Leipzig/Hull connection.
The Scousers did well out of Brentford this summer. They spent a further £20m on bringing defender Sepp Van Den Berg down to more civilised climes. Van Den Berg, who may or may not be related to the people who used to make Stork Margarine in Purfleet, found his first team opportunities up there limited to the occasional cup game and failed to make a single league appearance in his four years at Anfield and his last four years were spent out on loan at Preston, Schalke and Mainz .He has Dutch caps at both U18 and U21 level but has yet to make the full Netherlands side.
The second Brazilian to arrive was Gustavo Nunes. The £10m signing from Brazilian Serie A side Gremio has yet to make his first team debut for the Bees and at the age of 18 is likely to appear more for whatever they have in place as a youth system over there these days. Though a current back injury will preclude his appearing even at that level.
They will have a number of key players out of action this weekend in addition to Thiago and Nunes. Most prominent amongst these is striker Youane Wissa whose three goals in four this season might have had him in the running for “Danger Man” this week. However an ankle injury will keep him sidelined until the end of November. They have better news about skipper Christian Norgaard however. Whilst a fitness test will be required, he is rated as 75% likely to be available.
Shall we move on to the Wild and Wacky World Of Association Football. And the on-off-on-off-on-off (repeat ad nauseam) sale of Everton took a new twist by being “on” again with the Friedkin Group returning to the (presumably heavily discounted) table We’ll see.
Elsewhere the lousy weather we’ve had of late saw AFC Wimbledon’s ground develop a massive sink hoe at one end, prompting Liverpool to announce, in a statement that nobody believed, that they too have weather-related unstable patches on their ground, prompting their players to stumble and in no way dive.
And so to us and the last couple of damned awful matches. Firstly Chelsea. Simply awful. No leadership, no creativity, no defence. Got what we deserved. However, there is no game that PGMOL can’t make worse – and this was certainly the case here.
At 2-0 down rookie ref Barrott, who is currently sitting on stats suggesting that the number of match-affecting basic errors made is greater than the number of matches officiated, failed to give a penalty. Any doubt that it was a penalty was dispelled when Stuart Atwell – no stranger to the realms of refereeing lunacy – had his VAR reasoning published in the big screen.
You see there was a holding offence but Atwell didn’t think it had been “sustained” enough. Now have a look at Law 12 (Fouls & Misconduct) and see if you can spot the word “sustained”. I’ll save you the bother. It’s not there.
So what we have now is a situation where if a referee makes an error with the laws of the game his mate will rewrite the wording of the law to cover his backside, in the hope that nobody notices. Only we did notice Atwell – another fraudulent act from someone who should have been out of a job many years ago.
Our performance up at Anfield was better perhaps but again you always know you need referees to do a proper job to have any chance up at what is arguably the most corrupt stadium in the country. Three penalties denied and an offside visible to the naked eye, from the moon tells you all you need to know.
If you have any doubts just ask yourself this question: If any of those decisions had been at the other end of the pitch would they have been given? We all know the answer to that. As Lopetegui said – “it’s not the first time we’ve had that issue at that stadium”.
Still, the absence of VAR meant that PGMOL’s Lies Dept didn’t have to make up new and unusual laws of the game in order to come up with excuses for its members. We could all see for ourselves that it was simply a matter of Madley – like so many officials at Anfield – turning up with all the backbone of an anaesthetised jellyfish.
The whole match was set up to favour the hosts right from the rigged draw that guaranteed them a home tie. Now I appreciate that the European teams needed to be kept apart to avoid clashing with the Euro fixture dates. However, there was a very simple way of dealing with that. Simply put the Euro teams into a separate pot and put an unnumbered ball in the main pot.
When that ball comes out, pick a ball out of the Europot. That way each of the Euroteams would get an equal chance of being drawn at home or away. The system employed meant that Liverpool ended up being guaranteed a home tie which, given PGMOL’s ban on neutral refereeing at Anfield, was tantamount to handing them a bye.
On to this weekend and Fullkrug, who was said to be close to a return in midweek, will instead miss out on this weekend. Alvarez will also be missing due to suspension. Other than that it’s a full squad to choose from. Antonio made a pleasing nuisance of himself on Wednesday and may have played his way into the manager’s affections.
This will go one of two ways. The players could simply mope about over the injustices of the past couple of games or they could use them as a means of motivation and get off their backsides and do something about the position they find themselves in. I’m not very confident that that will happen, but I shall base my prediction on that basis nevertheless.
So, more in hope than expectation I shall, be placing the £2 that I was going to send PGMOL as a bribe for their official to simply do his job on an away win. Mr Winstone, could we make it 2-1 to us please?
Enjoy the game!
When Last We Met At The Vacuum Cleaner Ground: Lost 3-2 (premier League November 2023)
Not scored for 14 months? Simply get yourself picked to play against West Ham. That’s what Maupay did to open the scoring in a goal uncannily similar to Liverpool’s equaliser the other night, with the exception of the fraudulent refereeing. Then we started playing. Kudus equalised with an acrobatic volley that was a thing of beauty. Bowen gave us a deserved lead, sticking away the rebound after Kudus had hit the post. There we were coasting and a third would have seen us sitting pretty. So what happened? With the goal at their mercy Antonio and Benrhama somehow contrived to get in each other’s way and put the ball wide when it would have been easier to score. From that point the wheels came off. Mavropanos equalised for them heading under rather than over the bar and Collins completed the win for the hosts.
Referee: Simon Hooper
Simon Hapless as he is known. Look out for him allowing a goal punched in with VAR confirming it was a goal because only one fist was used.
Danger Man: Bryan Mbuemo
Four in five this season.
Percy and Daisy’s Brentford Fact Of The Week
Brentford is the first point at which the tidal Thames was easily fordable by foot. Look nobody said these were going to be interesting alright?!
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