Mistletoe's Musings

I have a lot to say about football which I inflict on you even though the majority of you have no idea what the game is or the attraction. Today's footballers are fabulously well paid, move around between clubs and even countries to fulfill their ambitions of glory. Today is the funeral of one of the giants of the game - Nat Lofthouse of Bolton Wanderers.


He was born the same year as my dad 1925. Here he is talking to another great of that era, Jimmy Armfield.


Like my dad, he was 14 when the Second World War broke out. Like my dad he went down the pit. Lofthouse was a Bevan Boy, men conscripted into the coal mines to keep the coal coming while others went off to war. Unlike my dad he had already signed for Bolton Wanderers and became part of their legend.

He played two FA Cup Finals that passed into legend. In 1953 he was on the losing side against Blackpool in what became known as the Matthews Final when the two Stans, Matthews and Mortensen, won the cup for Blackpool. Lofthouse scored, but the feat was lost in the euphoria of Sir Stanley Matthews winning the FA Cup at the age of 38.



In the 1958 Cup Final, he scored the winner, famously barging Manchester United goalkeeper Harry Gregg into the net in the process. Vic Halom did the same thing in 1973 and the goal was disallowed. Not in the 50s. They won 2 - 0 with Nat scoring both goals against the survivors of the Munich Air Disaster that had decimated the Manchester Utd team 3 months before.


He played centre forward for England between 1950 and 1958, scoring 30 times in 33 games, an unparalleled goals to games ratio. He earned the nickname Lion of Vienna in 1952, scoring his second goal against Austria in spite of being elbowed in the face, tackled from behind and brought down by the goalkeeper.

His funeral is happening now, attended by the great and good of football, members of the Royal Lancaster Regiment who are forming a guard of honour down the street and children from Nat Lofthouse's school where he was discovered as a schoolboy player. His name adorns one of the stands at Reebok Stadium, Bolton Wanderers home ground, and his legend will live on. One of a kind.

It is all blowy and rainy here, more like November than January. Never mind. Mother and I made a successful trip to Tesco. Their wind turbine thingy had been blown down in the car park o_O Quite a feat of destruction. Then she dad and me went out for lunch at the Anchor where we all had our dinners for £6.10 total. This was because I had booked a Christmas lunch that had to be cancelled because of the snow and I had paid a £30 deposit. I am stuffed.

Now that I have done this month's icon challenge I have other catchy up things to do e.g. Do the last round up of Ugly Betty; watch Season 3 of Bones to continue my study of Booth. I haven't actually watched that Season since it aired I think so that will be an interesting exercise. I have watched the first 3 episodes but not the whole season in one fell swoop. Ah a marathon in the dark days of winter. What a treat.

Currently there is footy on the telly. Chris Waddle, former footballer, is the co commentator. He's a Geordie lad and has a few interesting pronunciations. He cannot say penalty, which is unfortunate in a game where penalty kicks can be awarded. He always says pelanty. He he. He also pronounces Arsenal as Arznal. No one else in the world does that. Love him. He pulled no punches when England lost to Germany in the last World Cup and had one of the best radio ranting meltdowns you have ever heard.


Arsenal are currently winning. Athletic Bilbao are on at 7 o'clock, my Spanish team, and Sunderland play Newcastle tomorrow - not on the telly, though both of the other derby games being played tomorrow are; and Manchester Utd's game of course. ):

I am awarding myself a cookie because no one else has earned one. Indeed, there has been a deal of eyelash fluttering and appeals to my better nature which have, frankly, appalled me! Cupcakes have been issued, but really, I am appalled.

Hmmm. I seem to be channelling the perpetrator of the quotation I used yesterday. Here is more of it.

Ah! A life crowded with incident, I see; though perhaps somewhat too exciting for a young girl. I am not myself in favour of premature experiences.

This was spoken by Lady Bracknell in The Importance of Being Earnest. (Oscar Wilde) Tcha! Useless.



For a2zmom 




For melissasjack 

Sunderland went out of the FA Cup today at the first hurdle. Useless bunch, losing to a lower division team. Only 17,538 attended and I can't say I blame the fans for not turning up to watch Notts County. The fact Bruce started with only 5 first team players was a clue where his priorities lie, and mine, this season. We want top 6 so we can be in Europe next season where the real money is. I see Stevenage, a just promoted to League 2 team are beating Newcastle 3 - 1 at the moment with 2 minutes to go. That means all the north east teams are out as Middlesbrough lost to Burton Albion, a non-league team. Hartlepool lost to Watford. Ha ha ha

Liverpool sacked their manager Roy Hodgson today. Disgraceful. He had the job for 6 months having been voted Manager of the Season last year when he guided Fulham to European success. Kenny Dalglish, who all the fans wanted, has taken over as interim manager. In a way I hope Liverpool continue to be pathetic and the fans will get what they deserve: nothing. They hounded out their last two managers and have got someone in charge now who they consider one of their own. Well let's see what he can do with the worst set of players Liverpool have had in many a long year.

Hmmm. That lacks a certain oomph factor. It is certainly a grey day revealing little anyway. I can still see little bits of snow at the edge of the fields, so that in olde wives' terms means more to come. As long as it waits until late next week, I won't mind.

Small sports update. Sunderland now have two more injured players. David Meyler who just came back from a serious injury before Christmas, tore a knee ligament and is out for the season again. Poor lad. That will be over a year he has missed. At least he's young but he's such a good player with Henderson it limits our resources. Then Danny Welbeck tore his hamstring and that is usually a month to recover. So we now have around 10 first team players unavailable: You're only allowed 25 players plus youth team nowadays so we can barely get a bench out. At least it is the cup on Saturday. Bruce may wash his hands of that with all these injuries. We don't want our resources stretched any further.

Out: Turner, Welbeck, Meyler, Mensah, Cattermole, Onuoha, Campbell, and Zenden suspended after two yellow cards last night. All of them are starters or first alternate if someone is injured. I hope it doesn't scupper our best season in 10 years. We have had to shuffle all of the defence and we still have 11 clean sheets out of 22 games played. That is only equalld by Manchester City. It's better than Manchester Utd. and they are top!

The other news today is that Paul Collingwood is retiring from Test cricket from tomorrow, the last day of the Ashes series. It's a good way to go out and the best time as he has had a disappointing go with the bat this series. He is an excellent fielder though and that will be hard to replace. Also as a part time bowler it's nice that the last ball he bowled took the wicket of Michael Hussey who had been a thorn in England's side this series.






Now I'm sure you're all aware, because I tell you every time I post about him, that Paul was a pupil at the school where I worked and I knew him and his brother very well. In fact, the last time he was in school to do a bit of coaching, he recognised me and spoke. (I'm such a fangirl). So this feels like the end of an era as he is the last of the famous people who went to our school. Let's hope the Sports College status pays off in the future, because we were just an ordinary comprehensive when he attended. My friend Trevor, who I used to go to the football matches with, taught him the GCSE years and so he has got a pass in GCSE English should he need it.

David Gower was very complimentary about how well Paul spoke this morning when Nasser Hussein interviewd him and it was a really good honest self assessment of what he had achieved in his Test career including his short comings. He was never a fluent batsman and most of his innings were built on graft and determination. His best was a memorable 206 in Adelaide in the last Ashes tour when England were whitewashed 5 - 0. It was definitely the stand out moment in that terrible series. He has also taken some magnificent catches including one of many one handed leaps to get Ricky Ponting in the last test. Here are 3 examples to show the skill.






Good luck Paul, and I look forward to you turning out more for Durham this season. He might get to a few Sunderland matches too. He is a fan.

He he. The referee is English. Yes, Howard Webb, who is a fair referee, has followed up his appearance in the European Champions League Final by being granted the World Cup final on Sunday. He has issued no red cards nor given any penalties in the three games he has officiated in South Africa. Fly the flag Howard.

Meanwhile Lorik Cana, Sunderland's captain, has gone to Galatasaray in a shock move to Turkey. He says he has done it for European Champions League football and to be nearer his family (he is Albanian). I wasn't expecting that. He is a no nonsense midfielder who saw plenty of yellow cards last season. He'll be a miss, We have signed an Argentinian, an Egyptian and a Paraguayan so far and reintroduced a collar on the new home kit. Don't like collars; they chafe.

I make no apology for that assessment. Today, we have seen the longest game in tennis history come to an end two days after it started, no rain delays; Slovakia have knocked the World Champions out of the World Cup at the group stage and Paraguay made it too top of the group.

Isner (US) beat Mahut (France 6-4 3-6 6-7 7-6 70-68 in a 1st round match. The last set lasted over 8 hours. Amazing tennis.

Meanwhile, Italy lost 3-2 to Slovakia in the 97 minute game that Howard Webb refereed. Paraguay played a goalless draw and New Zealand became one of those never lost but didn't get through World Cup teams.

Good grief! England are World Champions at something. Led by our boy Paul Collingwood, England have beaten Australia to win the T20 Cricket in Barbados. Hammered them. Beat them out of sight. Annihilated them by 7 wickets with 3 overs to spare. Deserved it. Totally dominated every other team. Strategy was good, bowling was good, fielding was good. We were good.

Thank you.

Not a nice day. Woke at some ungodly hour to hear thunder rumbling followed by lashings of hail. So I got up at 7 o'clock which meant I was in time to see England deliver the coup de grace to South Africa, beating them by an innings and 90 odd runs. Very good.

Hail continued, but I had to go to the shops for New Year's feast supplies. As it was just hail I thought the roads would be OK. Boy was that a mistake. I managed to get.  up two hills but when I turned the corner to approach the third, I could see a line of traffic. Deciding discretion was the better part of valour, I turned round and slid home. I tried again 2 hours later with more success except Morrisons did not have any ducks, my bird of choice for the turning of the year, so I had to make do with a giant chicken. Humph.

That means it was a good job we went out for lunch yesterday. Such a good meal that we have decided to go to that venue again instead of the Italian. The menu is so huge I can't do it justice. Even the snacks were massive and very tasty. Excellent.

Now, the subject line refers to Bolton, who have sacked their manager, and Portsmouth, who have been served with some sort of winding up notice by HM Revenue and Customs. This may be to do with their inability to pay their players on time twice in the past few months. Success is at such a premium these days that club chairmen have little patience: the club that has lost the fewest games this season sacked their manager because they had played too many draws. Madness.

I shall gloat . My Fantasy Football team are top of their league on 74 points after today's matches. If it's anything like last year this will not last so I shall be full of myself while I can. They are called  Broken Biscuits because they're all my favourites and you used to be able to get a bagful at the shop cheap. My lads have a bagful of points!

As anticipated the Ryder cup is too close to call with all games started so far cancelling each other out. It may come down to the last two pairings which for us feature Westwood and Harrington. Nail-biting stuff.