That Was The Week That Was #3: All Rhodes Lead To Jordan Edition

Monday 13th August 2012

Well, that was the Herbalife World Football Challenge. The game saw a contracted kit clash that gave our new kits black socks purpose and was played on a field with NFL markings. This gave an unfunny WAG the opportunity to shout: “1ST DOWN AND TEN, CELTIC” on numerous occasions in the boozer I was in.

Apologies to all in my company for that.

£1m (or some amount similar) has been transferred into our bank account and the 2 nil defeat wasn’t as bad as we all feared but the whole game bordered on the ludicrous and I’m glad a stopped paying attention.

The team returned from our trip to the states today and it was more like a hospital plane than a charter flight. This week will all be about who’s is fit for our trip to Dingwall. Commons, Stokes, Hooper, Forrest, Brown and McCourt are all in states of disrepair.

Dylan McGeouch was the biggest causality of the game. Anytime you see a neck brace and distressed players you fear the worst. A fractured jaw and six weeks out seems like a lucky escape and not as bad as it could have been. He played well too.

It seems if I was paying attention then I would have seen Kelvin Wilson put in a fantastic performance. I have shouted on this very blog that all CB’s need two seasons before we discard and call them useless.  Kelvins problem is that he believes that he is a player and if he stopped believing and started working at being a player then all bets are off as we would have a defender on our books. He has the attributes to be an important part of our squad.

The in the knows seem to think we are after Jordan Rhodes or David Goodwillie. The former despite having a spectacular season has seen his value drop the more he is watched and the later is either damaged goods or brain damaged.

We should leave the autopsy until we see what happens (which will be nothing, probably).

Tuesday 14th August 2012

My attempt to ignore all transfer gossip until the said player was being presented holding up a superstore scarf, revealing his squad number and looking awkward in front of the press failed miserably today as Jordan Rhodes told the press it was his ‘bhoyhood dream‘ to play for Celtic.

Thank you Mr Rhodes. I may now have to pay attention to the bucket of spew that is a friendly international against The Socceroos and watch you struggle to live off scraps worthy of an alcoholic tramp that Craig Leveins tactics board and selections will surely present you with.

I see Mr Levein has tried to hang on to the chair back of forward thinking by calling up a licensed thug from the banjo dueling backwater and selecting Gary Caldwell as a central midfielder. If no one thought he was a bellend before hand….

Back to normality then, it seems that the club are desperate to punt Ki Sung Yueng and this fiendish ploy has been meet with such universal approval that only a proposal to burn the body of Thatcher in George Square could match it.

Their is two distinct camps when it comes to Ki. Us that see him as a diamond in the slag heap of the SPL and the others who decry him as he not an unclothed savage. Until the SPL embraces a player who wishes to pass the ball instead of kill an opponent or finds running very, very fast a complete waste of energy and would rather let the ball do the work then really the league deserves to choke on it’s bodily waste or a Keith Lasley dismembered limb.

It’s nice that STV have decided to show our Champions League Play Off game  next week. So, nice I tweeted them this.

Wednesday 15th August 2012

As I purchased my ticket for the home leg against Van Helsingborg my attention was drawn to the mutterings of Ex-Ranger player (I know that they are all Ex Rangers players!) Alejandro Bedoya and about how he was going to knock out The Hupes as a favour to all his old Rangers mates.

Pardon my ignorance but I had to Google this oink to find out who he was. I’m sure a few Sevcovians needed to do the same. After the search what I found was an American who looked like one of those non-nondescript actors who ALWAYS get roles in comedies that try and fail to be Porkies. I bet he wears manties, has an Abercrombie & Finch vest top, wears flip flops in shopping centres, owns a pick up, which he takes to the lake were he proceeds to drink lite beer while listening to Kid Rock and sticks his little cock in a pie.

I’m sorry your car got damaged during your stay in Glesga. Maybe it had something to do with you scaring the living daylights out the Rangers coaching staff with your attempts to play Soccerball or a neighbour maybe saw you walking around Buchanan Galleries in a vest top and flip flops.

To continue this Amercania theme here’s a blog from Justshatred.

Thursday 16th August 2012

Well, that was a surprise?

A damn fine game of football under the guise of an International friendly. Gordon Strachan was proved right. Gary Caldwell CAN play as a midfielder and not look like a toddler chasing a balloon. Danny Fox further compounded the mystery of why we sold him in the first place and Shaun Maloney played over an hour without putting himself out for the rest of the season.

All the good work was undone by Levein who was sporting the mole-on-the-dole look. In a self defeating act of stupidity he fielded Ian Black, a defensive midfielder, when his team were 3-1 up, completely undoing his reasoning for picking him in the first place to a chorus of boos.  It caused outrage. I’m unsure why. Ian Black deserves to be booed.

Black is only near the national side as our gene pool of talented players is so small that if he was any other nationality then he would be a full time painter and decorator coupled with a mini cab driver at weekends. A talentless mercenary that the skirt-wearing drink addled numpties who go to such occasions actually showed some taste by booing him.

Enough off no-marks. Will Jordan Rhodes make his mark? A Hartsonesq goal was the highlight of his game. His style is a simple. He wants the ball to shoot at goal. He wants to be in the box to head at goal. He is accomplished at that. Not so much at all other aspects.

A look at the stats from League One last season show that if we were looking to sign the best striker, with the most to his all round game we should be looking at Ched Evans. Off course Ched Evans is a worse human being than Ian Black and is slightly otherwise engaged at the moment.

Rhodes scored an average of 0.87 goals per game, chipped in with 3 assists, 91.42% of his goals came in the box, had a shot accuracy of 55% and scored 8 winning goals.  Evans same vital stats were, 0.81, 12, 86% , 40% & 8. Our own Gary Hooper measures up like this: 0.64, 7, 95%, 55% & 7. Also, remember Stokes chipped in with 10 assists also.

Our style of play means that our front men are more than in the box strikers. While Rhodes is a beast in front of goal we would need to adopt a different style of play to accommodate him. I’m stopping short of mentioning Kris Boydchenko. He is a different option to what we have. He’s over 6 foot and had 9 headed goals last season. Is he that lone front man who we have been looking for? No.

I think the stats point to the answer of the question I asked on Monday. He is over priced for his overall game hence he hasn’t moved. He’s a work in progress and we can’t afford to spend north of £3m on a work in progress.

Them’s the breaks. But I would love to see our coaching staff get their hands on him at the right price.

Friday 17th August 2012

Awoke this morning to the rumour that we had enquired about getting the human giraffe that is Nikola Zigic on loan but we can’t cover his £60,000 a week wages.

Aye. £60,000 a week. The farrand cabbage patch doll that is Lucky Eck certainly took leave of his senses and was b*ggered senseless with a jack hammer to give that lanky piece of p#ss £60,000 a week. Makes his decision to give Paulo Vanoli an EBT look almost sensible.

I looked up the stats for Zigga Zig Zigic and it said “sh*t”, “sh*t” & “sh*t”. Makes Peter Crouch look like Pele.

We travel to Dingwall tomorrow and our injury crisis is so bad that we are being told that Darryl Murphy and Mo Bangura being missing is not a good thing.

Here’s the fact file.

How was your week?