By Myles Palmer
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BLACKBURN were so dour at Anfield last night.
It’s a rather grim prospect : a game against Blackburn on Saturday and another in the FA Cup semi-final.
They are a workmanlike team of bruisers who play defensive football.
Even Everton have more flair. With Okacha, Bolton have more flair.
Andy Todd is a bruiser who didn’t make it under Souness but Mark Hughes rates him.
Mokoena plays in the anchor role.
He is the bruiser who crocked Robben with one of the worst tackles of the season.
It might have been clumsiness, rather than malice. But to hurt somebody that much by accident is almost as reprehensible as hurting them deliberately.
Stephen Reid is a bruiser with a powerful shot.
Right flanker Brett Emerson has disappointed me. I thought the Australian would be an exciting Premiership player and a goalscorer.
Yes, strikers Stead and Pedersen are lively and dangerous. And Dickov is a fireball, as we know.
So Blackburn’s strikers are useful.
But the rest of the team is dull and the service to the strikers is minimal .
They are a low-scoring team who create a lot of low-scoring games.
Last night’s 0-0 at Liverpool was their fifth clean sheet in the last six games.
After 10 minutes, I thought, Liverpool must beat this lot!
After 25 minutes, I still figured : Liverpool MUST beat this lot !
At half-time I switched off.
Baros, Morientes and Luis Garcia did not combine well enough to break Blackburn down.
They had to improvise everything. They all had to turn with the ball and make a pass.
If Arsenal defend stupidly at Blackburn, they will lose.
If they play normally, they’ll win.
Why?
Because Arsenal fly in formation like the Red Arrows. Their choreography is far superior to Liverpool’s.
OVERALL, it’s been a dreary week. Often is after the Champions League.Everything goes flat.
Dreary game at Anfield, dreary Budget, dreary Michael Jackson trial – and my best friend’s gone to South By South West. I love Austin but I’ve never been to SXSW. (Annual music business conference where hundreds of bands play in dozens of clubs).
ITS A WARM March day but Spring does not come to the Palmer family till Sophie wakes up.
Last year our beloved tortoise woke up on March 17th.
I’m gonna go downstairs now and pick up the shed key on its tartan ribbon and go out the back door and across the patio and down the four steps to the lawn and I’m gonna open the shed door and find out if she has woken up and started crawling about among the bikes and skateboards.
After hibernation a tortoise cannot eat for a week.
I’ll give her a saucer of tepid water and talk to her.
We talk a lot.
That’s the title of my next book : Conversations With Sophie.
I’ll tell her that Arsenal are out of the Champions League.
I’m sure she has woken up.
She knows it’s March 17th.