Carling Cup City

By: timmyg | September 23rd, 2009

Eddie Johnson starts! Kagisho Evidence Dikgacoi on the bench! Stoor back from exile! Live audio from Gentleman Jim!

Exclamation Points!

Wow. Really cannot complain about that one. Our reserves (valued at roughly 25 million quid) took ManCity’s first team squad (valued at over 400 million quid) into extra time, at Eastlands.

And Fulham even scored a goal, as much maligned Zoltan Gera rocketed a shot (was it half volley?) into the net. I don’t think I heard Gentleman Jim mention Davies or Seol more than once or twice, but Riise, Greening, and even EJ and KG seemed to play well. Good day.

The only troubling aspect of the match were the two goals let up from set pieces. Last season we hardly gave those up, but so far this year we’ve conceded five. We need to solve that, as it can be a major achilles heel for any team but can easily unravel our strong defensive work.

Speaking of, I think GJ mentioned Smalling’s name several dozen times, and Baird’s a few times as well. Good to know our backups are able and ready, unlike in years past (Stefanovic, Knight, Queudrue, Pearce [at times]).

So we’re out of this (minor) competition. Probably a good thing considering our involvement in Europe, and my suspicion that many more teams want it this year more so than others. Hughes, er, I mean, ManCity need silverware to placate the board. Villa, Everton and Tottenham simply want a trophy. Meanwhile Chelsea may be distracted with the Premier League and Champions League, but Fergie likes to win all the time and Wenger hasn’t won anything for four straight seasons.

And who knows what Rafa is thinking.

Big, big, BIG match on Saturday against Arsenal. And I’ll be able to watch it on tv! Best of both worlds indeed.