Old Git gives us his view on last night's reserve match against Tottenham.

TOWN RESERVES 2-1 TOTTENHAM HOTSPUR RESERVES
by OldGit@ReservesIsBack*

* I've had gout. That's what comes of too literal an interpretation of the phrase, 'any port in a storm.' Though there hasn't literally been a storm. Just some literal port. And some literal beer. So, no storms and only partly port...oh, get on with it.

TEAMS: James Pullen; Naylor (yes), Brown, Veno; Richards, Westlake, T Miller(c), Ambrose, Erdem Artun; Reuser and George (yes)

Subs: Bloomfield for Artun (51), Abbadabba for Reuser (75), Logan for George (81)

SPURS: lots of fancy Dans, many of them English; it wasn't Arsenal.

SCORERS: Ambrose (1), Thatcher for Spurs (7), Miller (16)

Yes, Bab-Bam was on the right side of a three-man defence last night, and he was far better than John McGreal was on Saturday. However, Bam could have been up against a real wing-back. Like Mauricio Taricco.

I love Mauricio Taricco in a way that Ulrika could understand, as she understand footballer-love.

Triko's parting was a collymore-esque slapping for us all, and we have not adequately replaced the man now puzzlingly known as 'Tano' (you look on www.spurs.co.uk.) I inadvertently registered (as oldgit@postmaster.co.uk if you too want to hustle or harrass me) with a 'Tano' shrine site and now receive almost daily updates on his mundane but, of course, very very very very rich, life and times. I notice, in Tony Garnett's 1,000 All-time Great Town Players, that Rod Belfitt is now an Allied Dunbar personal financial adviser in Doncaster ('Get Out Of This Town' is presumably his only advice.) In other words, Rod's struggling. Mick Lambert now wields a drinks sack-barrow for a living. Ted Phillips laid cables. 'Tano' will return home to a half share in The Pampas and I don't begrudge him that but what about Darren Ambrose? Will he be the first of a new generation for whom this current contract will be the best he ever signs? In 10 years time will we be using the The Dazzling Cab Co or "Bent and 'Brose For Your Wedding Photose"?

Mauricio played for Spurs last night, coming back from straining an 'abductor muscle in his groin' (what can I say?) and he was...well, I wanted to say bloody great but some players, out of position, are out of water and Mauricio is one such. He played midfield floater and was no more use than a one such in your toilet. Umm, that's not really where I wanted that allusion to go. He should have had a wrestle with Bammy.

Taricco was a real Ipswich lad, wasn't he? He was one of us, unable to speak proper Eenglish. He hated Norwich and Sheffield United. The only rare moments of pleasure in his life came from beating Scum; otherwise he looked, and was, grumpy, as we saw last night when he was booked for showing no remorse for a 50/50 with Artun who was injured. He's exactly like all oldgits.

Exactly, of course, like Church Man, a columnist in the East Anglian who rips off my persona. What a cheek, should I blame ex-TWTD Steve 'Midnight' Mellen for encouraging such arguably illegal action? I must say that I have been discouraged by their blatant 'lifting' of my ideas. I went to school with the editor of the EADT so perhaps he is the thief of my 'intellectual property' as literary creation is rather pretentiously named. Discouraged, as it feels as if there are too many oldgits, now, ploughing the same furrow, Church Man with the silver spoon in his gob.

There, that's off my chest. I'll struggle on, reluctantly forcing a few more thousand words on you, today. But it's given me heartburn.

Time has run out for Bam. It's too late to begin a career as a Wayne Brown impersonator, particularly when your knees are scrambled and you walk like John Wayne. Yes, Naylor was up against Sir Les, but the latter was a patched up old warhorse - literally patched, with a bandaged wrist, playing Les Patterson, bumbling and spewing chances like, well, Naylor. Remember, Oslo's own, Steffen Iversen, is ahead of tabloid favourite Les, in the Spurs pecking order (Is there ever scandal in the 'Oslo Exposer'? "For me," says Oslo's world famous footballer Iversen, "it's puffin or nuthin.")

'Tottingham' (as another Argentinian, the long-forgotten Oswaldo Ardiles used to call them - remember him with Mario Kempes, when big hair flowed like Niagra? (I said Niagra, you oldgits, not viagra. Concentrate). Actually, Spurs had a flowing mane chappy; who was it? Little bloke, blondie...Paul Miles..Rock Piles, fell over a lot...no, it's gone; no, I'm just trying for his name, not humour; all this reminiscence isn't getting in the way, is it?) any which way, Tottingham tottered onto t' pitch wit' team of titanic titans....well, a bevvy of big names, anyway. It was probably the most expensive line-up that I've ever seen at FPR for a Reserves match.

That's if anyone is worth any money any more. I doubt Sergei Rebrov would fetch quite the £11M he cost, for example. He was okay, willing, on a par last night with his oppo, Wayne Brown, who was being put under t' microscope by a raft of scouts (Sounds like something on Blue Peter, doesn't it?) And Wayne is on a 'free' (Umm, if he's being fought over by three Fourth Division clubs--Gillingham, Wimbledon and Watford - doesn't that push the fee up at all, then? They're First Division ?! T' hell, boy). Is it uncool to even ask, say, an insulting £80k - Four Firemen, as it's known down at t' station. Sorry, I've been thinking in t' northern accent, this pas' paragraff. I'll stop now).

Lars Hirschfeld--you thought you could name all the Spurs goalies, didn't you?--is the Craig Forrest of his day, Canada's Number One; Ben Thatcher, Chris Perry, Stephen Clemence, Liverpool's Number One's Son; Sir Leslie Ferdinand, Ser Gei Rebrov, Danny Blanchflower all turned out. They must have needed a raft of stretch limos to ferry all those egos out from t' Smoke. (Alright, not Danny. It was Greavesie. Alright, it wasn't. All dead now. He's not? Well, what was all that 'Drink Has Been My Downfall' stuff, then? It's like bankrupt clubs : they never actually die).

Some of their players were so important, they had entourage.

The Spurs Reserves record this season, even with Chivers and Mackay playing, is: Won 3, Drawn 4 and lost 2, and six of those nine matches have been at home. Town Reserves have lost 5 and won 3, no draws, but have only had two home matches (neither of which I was able to view, though my hundred-year-old father reported one of those for you, and I did offer you two pre-season Reserves Reports, the first time I have been known to attend PRE-season Reserves matches. How rich life can be).

But our titans were rolled out tonight, men you thought had been sold, like Martijn Reuser, whose (admittedly quirky) spelling Tony Garnettt has forgotten. And doesn't Roosta roll? In fairness, he didn't look too...yes he did.. chubba,chubba,chubba. Remember him saying, after he had, in his words, 'scored the winner at Wembley' (or did he merely score the goal that came on top of the winner, perhaps I'm splitting hairs, like his barber, though I preferred his aubergine colouring to his present hairstyle, which was last seen on Michael Portillo) that Town was a very useful stepping stone in his career? Town fans will go to their graves swearing that The Dutch International was a great player. The truth is that, like the late, unlamented Amir Karic, he could/can hit the ball hard but neither man had/has any natural athleticism or all-round footballing talent, which is why they flicker, or is it flatter, to deceive.

No, not to deliberately deceive--Marytin's a Mate and plays to the full extent of his personality but it disappoints me when a player like fellow Dutchie, Nabil Abidallah, who is a 'real' footballer, fizzles out (No, I'm not Dutch. Reuser an' him. I'm making this as easy as I can). I'm delighted that Joe Royle says that he wants to put 'the new K Dyer', Nabil, under the spotlight; no doubt Joe has been amazed by the tiny dwarf's skills in training and wonders why he isn't in the team. The clue, Joe, is that Nabil is not just a dwarf, he's a tiny dwarf, almost too small to be seen by the naked eye. You need to put him under the microscope, like Wayney And The Scouts And Brownies.

Last night, Reuser had the spotlight for 75 minutes and thought he shone more brightly than it. To huge applause (I have to admit)(alright, he played well for someone coming back from injury) he waddled off like a duck in sand. Nabil had the final 15 minute scrap of light and immediately mucked up a promising break with Finidi George but then did manage a couple of sparkles...but I'm already thinking about, and getting angry with, George, and it might as well have been Burley. But he wasn't subbed until less than 10 minutes from the end, when he was 'injured'. He was replaced by a man in The David Johnson Memorial Shorts (which, even in that tiny period, still rucked up around his abductor muscle).

Reuser and George - famous throughout much of Suffolk - were our strikers, Ferdinand and Rebrov theirs. But we won.

Darren Ambrose is fabulous and proved it within seconds of kick-off, there, I've mentioned it only 150 lines into the piece. Westlake, who was a tidy contributor to Town's 5-man midfield, was fouled and Ambrose's lazy free-kick curler entered the goal top right, then rumbled all the way around the back of the net to churn out the cobwebs. 1-0.

Pullen, sparing Marshall's blushes, was in goal and, like Marshall, shouts a good game. After 4 mins, he merely parried a shot by someone called Marney. 3 mins later, he conceded a goal from a free-kick by Ben Thatcher which flew past his left hand. Let him go on loan to Peterborough, then. Brown had whacked Jonathon Blondel, Belgium's famous young player (which is why you haven't heard of him) but he was outstanding, multi-fouled, dainty, energetic, Ambrosesque. 1-1.

A nifty move followed, involving Westlake, Miller - Tommy, skipper in succession to Justin Miller who is on loan at Orient who, I notice, went out of t' Cup to Margate on Tuesday : how YOU doin', Justin - -and 17-year-old Matt Richards (on the left with his dad, Mark Venus).

The match then ended, bar the 74 minutes of shouting (mostly by Wayne and Pullen). Veno to Reuser, super flick to George, corner: Ambrose, George far post, Tommy Miller in the middle: firm shot under Hirschfeld. 2-1.

A huge Reserves crowd of 1,896 hummed with excitement and body smells, under a black sky and their cheap, worn, baggy, blue, bulging, badged, battered blousons. Persistent drizzle gleamed under the full blare of the floodlights. It seems a bit naughty to have to use all the lights just for a Reserves match. There were 75,000 in the San Siro on Tuesday but that's just a big concrete pit; Deportivo La Coruna's ground is the same size as ours and ours looks grand, except perhaps for the control room complex which looks rather diddy.

The temperature in the first half was a sweaty 10 degrees Centipede, which is 50 proper ones, but declined to Three Degrees, as has my musical taste which was once so carefully honed. Young folk enjoy 'heavier' tunes than I do now, which is why everyone I knock about with at t' match has to stand in appalled silence, like Ozzy Osbourne in thinking mode, both before t' game and at half-time whilst the 'improved' PA thunders on with Coldplay. Can't the West Stand listen to nice 'lift music' whilst you young things in NS receive Coldplay or the Kittens, if the sound system is so 'advanced' ? Or you can wear your ear-phones, like you do anyway. And no more 'Hunt Rob Chandler', health and safety warnings or birthday greetings.. let's take the risk, whilst I get on and, in an otherwise stony silence, give everyone around me my rambling half-time opinions whilst a little moisture gathers around the end of my snout, as last night. Doesn't that sound more fun? (Miller actually went off to have his nose wiped. He did. You weren't there.)

Nowt else happened.

THE END
copyright MMII oldgit@reserves
oldgit@reserves and oldgit@res.com.eu are registered trade marks

--oldgit is sponsored by mauricio.com, "Let's Hear It For Latin Hair", only available as a gel, only suits greasy hair;
--oldgit swears by 'Gazza's Gout Creme'-only to be taken orally.
--oldgit apologies for not being able to post this last night.

Photo: Action Images

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