Symptom of the Looniverse

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At the K-Po stadium yesterday we are only ten yards away from the Crisptown fans. There is one Crisp fan who is jumping up and down next to his son and going full Monkey Bollocks at the joy of his sides second goal. His hair looks like its been trimmed by a bloke with a club foot and a dodgy hard drive. He is a meme of the gesticulating barm pot. He looks he is a Block paver or a Tarmac Gyppo. It’s cool, I love that shit. All the other Leicester fans look like Central heating engineers. They have just come back from Spain or Cyprus whatever. They are the colour of a decent cup of tea. They are ranting like mad. What’s wrong with them? I suspect they rant because they lack something here…the stadium is weird Lego, the area around the ground is the same, it’s that Reading Identi-kit stadium thing. The decaying cheap infrastructure that surrounds it. It was their first home game of the season. They looked pissed off before they went in.

‘Wanky Wolves hahahahah fucking wankers’

‘Mate your flies are undone’ I shout to him.

‘Hahahaha fucking wankers’

‘Dude your flies are undone zip yourself up’

‘Hahahaha wankers wanderers hahahahah’ He shouted over. His son sat with his chin in his hands looking glum.

At one point Mr Blockpavers dong falls out of his Primark shorts and I shake my head and wonder where those pound coins went that flew over my head occasionally. Obviously Crisptown.

Reading about how Adama Traore is fit fills me with a happiness I find hard to fathom. I’m not that aware of what Traore is. I don’t even think he does. What ideas he found under Tony Pulis would probably beggar belief. These ideas probably involved ‘putting a shift in’ maybe ‘getting stuck in’ and ‘get the fucking ball up to big neck’. Stuff like that. Stuff probably that went down well at West Birmingham Albion. To be fair both Boro and Albion sucked long on the strange wormlike philosophies of Mr Pulis. We see those ideas now playing Barnsley and Preston on cold days as we did. So Adama. What have you got for us mate? Lets have a look at the Crisptown  lot first.

Jamie Vardy, striker, handful, fast. Harry Maguire, massive head, like to put his head on things. Silva, Maddison, Gray…it’s a feast of course. Players with undoubted ability. I can’t mention them in a negative light only to say they are the enemy today. Of course my confidence yesterday, my happiness was tempered. I read about Adama being available as I went to take the dogs out. This made me happy. I was smiling as I walked down to the canalside. There were some baby ducks getting rid of their fluffy feathers and putting on proper size. There was a Dragonfly hovering and doing whatever Dragonflies do. There was a Heron further down fishing. I turned the corner…a pisshead having a shit under the bridge. I caught him in mid bite obviously…I didn’t want to disturb him. I am polite like that. His face in shock, me trying not to look at him but wanting to be polite, ‘Orite mate’ I said. He nodded. As he squeezed. Then I wanted to kick him in the head for being an animal. Me dog growled at him.

Last week against Everton was a thing. I didn’t feel like it was a wake up call about anything. Didn’t we expect this football? Are we not entertained? Did a draw really ‘expose’ any weak links or underfunded positions? Are certain parts of our team a bit under the weather when faced with such football. All fluff and thunder I think. I suspect we have performed admirably in our one game and I am loathe to start making any predictions about anything. Only that we will smash every team in some certain way every game we play until we are sat on top of the Premier league…I keep saying it I know. I’m not going to apologise for it. What’s the point in having a scrap if you think you aren’t going to win?

This Leicester team are just that, another scrap. Albeit with all the fanfare of the telly there and maybe some pyro or dancing girls. It’s still the same shit. At Barnsley last season we had to dig deep and face the abyss of Championship games with all the attractiveness of a canal side shite. We had to dig deep. My writing about that game denigrated the town and their team. I offer no apologies for it, my head was stuck in a lovely land of Portuguese football, fast paced and often beautiful. We had to dig like fuck didn’t we? All those games wrapped into one drink fuelled freezing day in Nowhere land.

The Premier league will be just like that, but sparkly. Like the Wizard of Oz tinkling away at his magical contraptions before the curtain is swept aside and we see Jamie Vardy working the pedals and pumps until he notices we are watching him. Yes, this game will be like that. Dig in Wolves but dig with beauty. Play our game and this Leicester team will take notice quickly. Let the nerves flutter away lads, it’s really day two of the campaign. Still early, but at least we know a little about the place. It can be very tough and scary. But if you pretend you have been there a while you can get from place to place quite easily.

Will Traore play? I hope so. I wish to see him doing his ‘thing’. Physical yes and fast, but I suspect there is something, some space in his head that wants to be filled with an idea or two. That he wishes to become his own man with his own ideas I suppose. I watched his football on YouTube for an hour last night, where he liked to move and run, how he made use of space, how he twisted and turned. It was beautiful and at times scary too. So in my minds eye I substituted his team mates on those videos for our players. I try to see in my own mind something of Nunos mind, why Traore was bought, how he would fit.

Traore can shield that ball. He has that Low Centre of Gravity that Nuno likes, the ability to protect and nurture the ball until players have arrived in his wake…now will Traore have players already there? We move fast, unlike Boro. We will have heads going mad for that ball Adama holds up, keeping the JAMS at bay. I don’t want to hear about how his ‘final product’ is lacking. I don’t want to hear how ‘physical’ he is or how he is a ‘beast’. I don’t like it. If being overly developed muscle wise is some sort of memetic pre requisite for how a footballer performs then I’m not interested. I want to know how he reacts to Nuno. I think that big hole in his heart that Pulis and Villa have ripped out will be filled up with understanding and love maybe. Probably some great ideas too. You can’t tell me that Nuno hasn’t watched Adama with that forensic eye. I see Nuno and his team sitting watching him in a dark room, discussing his movements, how they can squeeze a little more out of that move, this idea or that pass. In Portuguese of course…fast paced chat with plenty of hand movements and drama, arguments. Can they add to his game? He wouldn’t be here otherwise. Will this be your day Adama Traore? Are you going to be our new talisman like er…… Sako? Maybe?

Of course all these quasi philosophical bollocks are OK in the scheme of great wins away. We should have been three goals up in the first half. We should have been more clinical, we should have had more aggression. Blah. I wasn’t even pissed off I will be honest. Even the bloke with his little dong flopping around while he denigrated our Town didn’t bother me too much. We were still happy I think. Pissed off yeah but happy. What a great load of football that was really. We scored a lovely header. Doherty, bloody hell. Skimmed off the top of his head. I bet Patricio is thinking what the fuck is happening all his players having a bang at the wrong goal. Second one for them is a deflection off Conor. Shit happens when you are faced with attacks like that from a lively but weird team like Leicester. That boy Maddison eh?

I didn’t like Bennet being targeted straight away but little incisive attacks where his pace or lack of it was EXPOSED? I dunno, maybe he was a bit off the pace when he has some ten stone whippy young player throwing shapes you could never hope to deal with. But I think he did do OK of course. This was another day of learning for our team. Another day in School maybe. Learning and assimilating. But learning what? We hit the post that many times we should have uprooted the fucking thing. I bet their groundsman this morning is shovelling some Compo down the holes as I type this. Thundercunt shots from Moutinho and Jimmy. Chances squandered. We were at times fucking lovely on the ball. It looked bloody effortless at times, like we wanted to be there. I looked to my left at all our fans, we were two nil down mate but there they were singing their hearts out, shouting, getting involved. I look to my right at the Crisptown fans. They looked sad. But they were winning. What the hell was their problem? They should be ecstatic. There is an illness within Leicester I don’t understand. Something is up. Someone throws a Clapper at us. Oooh you’re hard.

Of course it’s always a thing when their chances and half chances are converted and ours are not. This was a game where the cogs and gears of the Wolves Looniverse have decided to get a bit of grit in them. We were maybe half a second away from full on domination in terms of winning the second ball. Maybe an inch or two away from a three goal lead in the first half. I watch Nuno for a few minutes pacing the technical area. Looking at him is like staring at a three bar electric fire. Premier League eh, fucking hell. But is it that whole Premier League experience? We looked like we deserved to be there, we looked like we weren’t really the new boys, the fresh meat. We did not look out of place, we did not look like strangers in this landscape.

We were just as good as these doughnuts. Maguire, England International, fresh from the world cup looked decidedly average as our attacks cut him up again and again. Reg Vardy, England Striker. Average. Gray, average. Crisptown was full of average shit. But two goals up. They ride their luck these teams. It is a symptom of Premier quality games where chances have to be taken, have to be smashed into nets. We are learning that for sure. I see our team still being too beautiful. We are far too smart for our own good sometimes. Far too pretty too. I suspect that our philosophy was laid bare for Leicester when they decided on 51 minutes and two goals up that they had to start time wasting. Wasting time? You are a Premier league side for fucks sake. Have you no self respect? The ball rattles out of play and one of their players goes to collect, he drops the ball and kicks it further away from himself, he dawdles, he slinks to collect and moves twenty yards up the touchline away from the original position where the ball left the field of play. Jesus Christ. Crisptown.

Traore comes on and immediately I see spacetime warped around him as his presence if one of intense gravity. Jesus Christ he’s massive isn’t he? Even the air sweats when he is around and I enjoy his cameo where he throws Leicester players around like the free t-shirts the ground staff were throwing into the crowd at halftime. He was beautiful, I love his kind of football, in your face stoical shapes, shrugging off the JAMS. But what was this game crying out for? Ryan Giles.

Can I maybe throw that suggestion forward with my lack of knowledge? Maybe. I could see Giles throwing some of those shapes down the side for sure. I think Matt Doherty is ready for a rest…I see Giles playing these funky rhythms with Traore. This is what I see in the future. Vardy has been sent off for a tackle on Doherty. I wave to Jamie as he leaves the field of play. He walks off slowly. Jesus Christ what are these Gonks?

Again we were not disgraced but the chances we shook off are just tweaks. Just little bits of fine tuning and maybe Lady luck has to smile on us a little bit. A Crisptown fan says ‘Wolves are the best team we have seen down here for a while’. That’s good to know. We always need that critical non Wolves view to put everything in focus to give an unemotional view of the day. I always say we played brilliant even if we played crap. But that’s the way I look at things. Always positive, always looking for that sliver of light in the blackness of the Looniverse. This whole Fosun-Nuno-Wolves thing is still a baby of sorts. It’s still finding it’s feet and clicking into place. Some of these players are still finding their feet, sussing out what the whole thing is. We have to be very patient with this particular seedling of ideas, be gentle and look softly at what is going on. I mean, when it does finally click then we are going to start to shithouse results too. Maybe the ball will fall more kindly to us and that second ball will be easier to get to. Maybe our toe poked shots towards goal will go in like theirs, the lucky bastards.

Me and Horace are waxing lyrical going back to the car. We are Yam Yamming like fuck talking about the game and every now and then he shouts at the Old Bill about something or other. But we are talking, sharing ideas and views of the game excitedly and with passion. I look around us and we are surrounded by Leicester fans who are quiet and sombre and I don’t really understand it until this morning. You see their chances to grow and develop as a team have gone, they tread water here in the Premier league. We on the other hand are finding the whole thing vastly more interesting than them I think. We have a young beautiful team who are learning the ropes fast, who are starting to rumble into life too. When we do start to mesh and to get our groove on. You’d better fucking watch out mate.

4 thoughts on “Symptom of the Looniverse

  1. I love the honesty of your writing, Micheal, I’m 3500 miles away from the South Bank and miss it every day.
    I just turned 63 so I’ve been around the block with the Wolves, ‘60’s-‘80’s different shithole grounds, still shitholes though.
    Thank you for keeping me in the loop Mate. Appreciate your great efforts, oh and a wonderful book.
    FWAW

  2. Love your writings me mon the word “wordsmith” was surely invented with you in mind…Hoofin’ great read, keep up the good work. 🔶⚫️

  3. still enjoy your hunter s Thompson type of viewpoint,,,,just hope the stay in the first division doesn’t turn ugly for you like it did for stoke,enjoy the ride.