Lucky To Get Nil: 2011 Review Of The Year

Like Bowie at the end of the Ziggy Tour; like Frank Sinatra and Elvis in the Vegas years; like Ryan Giggs at any time in the last 3 years, LTGN is considering hanging up its boots and wondering whether it’s just been around too long.

Many say it’s the embodiment of all that’s good about the game, and has been scoring consistently every season. Others say it’s a clapped-out cliché of its former self, easy to ridicule (thanks Udik.) Hopefully somebody somewhere thinks it’s a public service, cheering up the downtrodden City fan. However, many of the nouveau brigade might not understand such gallows humour now we are so wonderful and shiny and successful. Some might say it’s rubbish because it’s not about football. Others might retort that it’s actually much more about football than any conventional set of worthy, statistically-based articles.

Well readers, you decide. Based on your comments at the end of this article, the column will either wind up or gear up for a new year of sexy soaraway Tevez tittle tattle, Toure trashing and Lombardo lampooning.

So what follows are highlights from possibly some of the best creative journalism ever to be written, er, in my house. Enjoy…

January 2011 Good Kompany
“The media has recently been full of talk about who will win the PFA Player Of The Year awards. Scott Parker seems to be the hot favourite. Other suggestions range from the sublime (Gareth Bale and Samir Nasri) to the ridiculous (Nemanja Vidic). But any City fan knows, there is really only one candidate: Mr Vincent Kompany.
Name me any Premiership player that fits the above bill and is more deserving of the PFA accolade than VK. He has even given his name to a cuddly City penguin, which is my girlfriend's favourite possession. He's 'company' for her when we aren't together. Now if you can even trust him to look after your bird when you are away, what more do you need from a guy?”

February 2011 City v Chelsea
“At this point Angelotti brought on Marlon Brando, Mussolini and that gay bloke Niccolo off last year’s X-Factor. Torres, of course, played no further part. This move considerably beefed up the murderous-yet-pathetic quality in the team, and David Luiz was inspired enough to brush his hair into a ponytail. Chelsea clearly meant business.
The kitchen sink, several hundredweight of fish, three large packets of spaghetti, and two cats were all thrown in City’s direction in a frantic last five minutes. Huge lines of spit rained down from the Chelsea stands, as the team, crowd, referee and local Mafiosi all sought to overturn the score. But a series of heroic blocks by Kompany and Lescott (yes!) meant that City hung on for a famous victory, the referee finally giving up on how much additional time he could reasonably add.”

March 2011 City v Kiev (Europa League)
“Last week, a group of English holidaymakers found themselves stranded in the Ukrainian town of Kiev, following their inability to escape from the situation which they had got themselves into. Now Manchester City and Dinamo Kiev met again, at the City of Maine Road Stadium, in an atmosphere charged with expectation. It was a must-win tie. Well, for City it was. They had come back from Kiev with nothing. Kiev, however, had brought along some duty-free Embassy Regal, for the moment when they were able to quite literally Get The Fags Out.”

April 2011 To Die For
“It doesn’t matter how many goals they score, whether they can Cruyff Turn on a sixpence, what their wages are, what drugs they take or even which celebrity they have shagged – there is one quality which endears the faithful to a City player more than any other: the ability to Die For The Shirt.
The latest proud wearer of this particular mantle is of course the magnificent Zaba, he of the horse-like face, the male pattern baldness and the kick-arse attitude. I’d go further: he’s more than equine. I’d go as far as to say he’s like that half-horse-half-man in those old Ray Harryhausen Sinbad movies – the one that usually breaks the giant crocodile’s jaw with his bare hands.  Rip off his boots and there’d be hooves underneath.
One imagines the scene before the game, as Bobby gives the team talk to the hushed and expectant millionaires… “Now-a-lads. We must play well. Play football. Because the other team, they-a-play good football. They have-a good players. This is football….. oh, and if you are crap, I’m bringing Zaba on.” ”

May 2011 Carlos Who?
“Manchester Evening News classified section, Monday 18 April 2011: ‘Wanted: teacher of English for previously culturally-reluctant Spanish speaking footballer. Must be able to achieve full command of the language in 4 weeks.’ An injured Carlos Tevez has been watching the semi-final on telly, and has suddenly realised that the team CAN do without him after all!
Tevez had previously been luxuriating in the media hype, which had been suggesting for most of the season that City were a one-man team. ‘Why should I learn English? Let’s just cream what I can off the Sheiks and bugger off to Madrid. Did it to Man U – can do it to these,’ he thought to himself. ‘If I fancy playing in front of the back four I’ll do it. If I want to have a barney with Bobby, I’ll do it. The fans love me – I’m untouchable!’
Let’s face it: OK so he’s talisman, god, grafter, etc – but he’s also a moaner and has an undue influence on the mood of the team. When it’s not going for him, he’s sulky and like Rooney in his worst moods, drops far too far back trying to make things happen when he doesn’t have to. His injury would not have happened had he not been faffing around in front of the back four, rather than playing the lone striker role which undoubtedly suits him best. And he certainly shouldn’t be captain. Vinny proved beyond doubt in the United game that he is our natural leader.”

June 2011 Round Carlos’ House
“Brazilian soap operas vie with Spanish and Italian talent shows on the range of TVs dotted around the front room. Groups of Hispanic men sit around smoking spliffs and drinking Tanqueray. Dr Dre's 1992 classic The Chronic plays in the background as the assembled pimps and hoes do their G things. ‘Of course, this is all for show,’ Carlos opines as he shows me into his oak-and-Chesterfield study, where Radio 4 twitters inoffensively in the background. ‘I do enjoy the Today programme with the old tea and crumpets A-M,’ Carlos opines, ‘and the way Tom Sutlciffe captures the cultural Zeitgeist on the Saturday Review, is to me, the quintessential way to unwind on the morning before a game.’ That's new, I think to myself.”

July 2011 Charity Shield Special
“Ladies and gentlemen, I would just like to inform you that despite the fact that we are on an all-time high, with star players joining us like never before; consistency on the field and stability off it; people tipping us the for the league because we’re almost as good as Barcelona – despite all that, you know it’s going to go tits up at some point, ‘cos we are City.
United have had a smooth-as-silk pre-season, in which they’ve mullahed everyone and done all their spending nice and early so they are already a settled team, exuding their usual sick-making cocksure confidence – sometimes from some unlikely sources. God’s sake, when Scholes was a player he never said a word – now you can’t shut him up about how so and so is the best/worst player he has ever seen and everyone except United are shit. You want to ram it down his throat at the earliest opportunity.
And so it was that the teams gathered in the Wemberlee tunnel, scowling at each other in the long-established tradition of bile and venom, which ironically accompanies something called the “Charity” Shield. From the days of the Keegan/Bremner fistfight in the 70s, the game has always been a byword for leg-breaking aggression. And so it was again: Fergie had buffed his face to a previously-unseen shade of purple; Ferdinand performed his usual jumping-up-and-down routine, nutting large holes in the ceiling. Giggs, exhumed for one last time, gurned like the grim reaper at anyone in a blue shirt. For our part, Nige had slide-tackled their physio on the way out of the dressing room, and Vinnie had elbowed the already-punch-drunk Hernandez on the side of the head. Joe Hart simply ran around with his shorts round his ankles as he always does.”

August 2011 Spurs v City
“The rivalry between Arsenal and The Spuds is as nothing to City's loathing of the preening north-east Londoners. This is a team which has humiliated and crushed our ambitions since the dawn of time - well at least since Ricky Villa's often-replayed Wembley tour-de-force. This is a team which routinely hammers us into the ground at their place, and nicks a cheeky victory at ours - last season's win over them at Etihad Road being something of a notable exception.
It was evident for this game that we needed the spirit of Shauny in the 3-4 cup game of 2004 to carry us through. But of course, Shauny had already been bunged into a plastic bin-liner by Kiddo, ready for a midnight transaction pre-31 August in a car park near Bolton.
The ground wasn't quite full at kickoff, as negotiating the debris and threatening youths in hoods on the High Road had proved tricky for some. But football fans being what they are, they had soon polished off the local gangs. (I actually wonder what would have happened if the scheduled games HAD gone ahead on the night of the riots - there'd have been no need for police at all. You might think you're the local Don, but one thing you don't do is try and stop us watching our football...) ”

September 2011 City v Everton
“Like warm bread straight out of the oven. Like a long bath at the end of a long day. Like sleep. Like being in love. Like a good book. Some feelings give you a sense of security, like everything is as it should be and always was: Manchester City (0) 0 - Everton (0) 1 (Cahill, 78).
It was as if the entire north west of England was waiting for the 78th minute - and when Mario, tracking back at that very point in time, dropped his ipad onto a loose ball deflecting it behind for a corner; the very Gods assembled on the horizon waiting for the denouement.
Everton’s latest import from the Russian sub-continent trotted over to take it – cueing mass hysteria from the expectant Liverpudlians. The ball, throwing up tufts of turf, arced into the floodlights in slowmotion, as below it players jostled for position. Hart, following what he assumed to be the line of the ball, came out ready to punch, only to land a perfect right hook to the temple of Clichy. As the hapless Frenchman crumpled to the ground, the ball sailed over Lescott’s head… and on to that of…Cahill.
Many City fans were already exiting the ground by the time the ball billowed the back of the net.”

October 2011 Derby Special
“You’ve seen the 4-0s, the 5-1s etc, right? You’ve seen our goal difference. But if you actually go to games you’ll know that every week we miss at least half a dozen chances which a Salford Schoolgirl would struggle to fluff. I can think of about 20 Balotelli and Dzeko chances off the top of my head. Of course the biggest culprit – He Who Can Not Be Named For Legal Reasons But He Only Refused To Warm Up Not Go On – has missed about 93 chances in the last year, including regular penalty howlers. 
We score about 1/10th of the actual chances we create – and when we get in front we get the slippers on. No chance of any 8-1s or 9-2s for us – we’ve fallen back asleep after 3 or 4. Either that or we get into sub-Arsenal/Barcelona fannying about mode where we need to play 187 passes before actually penetrating the penalty area. And when we do fashion one of these chances, someone inevitably goes for a Hollywood finish which they utterly screw up. You score goals with your foot or head, don't you - not some obscure tendon halfway between the foot arch and toenail with your back to goal!!???  Honestly, you see a few of these live and you want to throw yourself off the stand.  We’ll never be able to murder teams like United do, because we haven’t got that very same kamikaze streak which Fergie talks about. In this sense, kamikaze = good.”

November 2011 City v Newcastle
“Do you remember this game last year? It was surely one of the year’s most significant political moments. The world was still under real and present danger from a triumvirate of despotic jihadist dictators, bent on the destruction of our very civilisation – two of whom, Bin Laden and Gaddafi, we eventually smoked. However, the third and arguably most evil of the evildoers remains very much at large: Nigel De Jong.
For it is he who unleashed a firestorm of vitriol and outrage by his tackle on the then-intact Hatem Ben Arfa.  The media went truly mad for about a month regurgitating, rehashing and exaggerating the case: we were told that Newcastle were lodging a formal complaint with the Football Association. Meanwhile, the entire world heaped opprobrium on our undeserving midfielder.
Undeserving? Yes. Did you know that Martin Atkinson, the ref on the day, confirmed he had seen the tackle and did not believe it merited even a yellow card?? I sit in East Stand 107 and was about 30 yards away from the incident, which was directly facing me. Not a single Newcastle player complained at the time and the ref didn’t even immediately stop the game. There was no outcry until the media made one.
But in those days City weren’t a ‘big’ club. If I was Nige I’d have considered packing in a game which is so outrageously unjust. But he didn’t, and lined up for the Barclays how’dyoudo like everyone else. As he passed down the line, braving the kicks, rabbit punches and raspberries from the Newcastle players, the City crowd’s anger grew. We collectively willed him to have a brilliant game and shove it down their throats.”

December 2011 City v Bayern
“In an amazing interview this week, Diamond David Silva told the world we could actually win the CL!!! You’ve got to love the microscopic playmaker’s optimism. Do you share it? Half-arsed performances against Napoli and Villareal at home; a decent performance against the Iberians away and disasters in Naples and Munchen. There’s a double-dip recession on. People are hocking themselves to the nines to afford Christmas – and against the background of all this, we have to sit in sub-zero temperatures to watch our beloved team try and turn around an impossible deficit against the almost God-like opposition, from a society so much more secure, solid and settled than ours. 
Then - take the stories emanating out of Italy, in which every Wizard, Gypsy and Warlock of Naples and Valencia will join together in cosmic fluence to well and truly nobble the other result. It’s a hiding to nothing if ever there was one. I’d stay at home if I were you. Watch Corrie and have a curry – that is if you can afford one. Who wants to put themselves through that punishment???
But. Ask yourself: is Silva really a raving loony or something we haven’t seen round these parts for a very long while: a player with genuine love and belief in our cause, who will give his all for it. He has more belief than we do! He loves this team as much as we do!!! Make sure he’s on the top of your Christmas tree. Give this man your most unbelievable support and together we can turn this around.”

Happy Christmas everyone!

(…Oh, and we’re playing West Brom on Boxing Day.)