Humble Pie

I've been wrong in my forecasts before, but never more wrong than my forecast for last Saturday's away game at Wycombe. Lest we forget I prophesied a 0-0 draw before actually putting my money on a Wycombe win, so I was wrong twice, which takes a special kind of talent. In the event the Glovers rammed my disbelief down my throat with an excellent 4-1 win, only our second victory on the road all season and the second time we've knocked 4 past Wycombe this season - if only we could play them every week.

So a big dollop of humble pie for myself then, and a pleasure it is to eat it, too. Some people might have thought that the win was down to the change of formation to a 4-4-2 and the inspired idea of playing people in their correct positions, but I know better. I don't normally regard myself as particularly superstitious, but clearly the credit for the win must, at least in some small part, be mine. If I had bet on the Glovers you can be certain we would have lost; precedent suggests that I'm now duty-bound to keep on putting my money on the opposition, at least until we lose again. Hopefully this could get expensive for me, never let it be said that I'm not prepared to make a sacrifice or two in the club's best interests.

This Saturday we entertain Gillingham at Huish Park, the only club in division 3 to have a worse away record than ourselves. The Gills are so bad on the road that they are yet to record an away win this season, losing 12 and drawing 3. A win for us would create a gap of 8 points between the teams and would incidentally be the first time the Glovers managed to win two games in a row since last October, when we beat Carlisle and Bristol Rovers. With another home game coming up next Tuesday (16th) against Colchester the possibility exists that we might even win three games on the trot, something we haven't done since last season. Of course Skivo might want to consider what happened to the manager the last time this club won 3 matches in a row, but surely lightening won't strike twice in that regard.

Back to the Gills game, and the bookies make us odds-on favourites for the match at 10/11. I can't remember the last time we were odds-on to win anything. The draw is priced at 12/5 and a Gillingham win at 3/1. My fiver, in accordance with my brand new unwritten rule of always betting on the opposition until we actually lose a game, is going on the away win. Running total: -£8.50p.

Finally, a little bird tells me that we may well be losing one of our Spurs loan players permanently. Can't say any more than that at the moment, but the rumour-mill is also suggesting that a solution to the Arron Davies transfer fiasco might well be found by Saturday as well. The two rumours may well be connected in some way, and I'm sure it doesn't take a rocket scientist to work out what that might mean. More on this if/when it happens....

EDIT - As I was typing the above the news has now broken that Jon Obika has returned to White Hart Lane for good. Arron Davies has subsequently re-joined the club on loan from Brighton, thus getting around the FIFA regulations banning players from playing for more than 2 clubs in the same season. Despite being our top scorer this season Obika was finding first team starts more and more difficult to come by and with the arrival of a seventh loan player would presumably have found even a squad place problematic in future. Looked at in that light the decision to send him back to Spurs makes sense for both the player and us. Good Luck to Jon in the future, it will be fascinating to see how his career develops. Good luck too to Arron - let's hope he can have the same impact on us this time around as he had in his first spell at Huish Park.

Just read: New York by Edward Rutherfurd. Huge (1000+ pages) sweeping novel tracing the history of New York from its origins as an Indian village, through the arrival of the first Dutch and British traders right up until the present day and the tragedy of 9/11. The story follows one family in particular through the generations. It just about did enough to keep my interest and I did eventually finish the book, but it was touch-and-go at times. I'll probably try another of the author's epics now I've read this one (Sarum looks interesting) but I'm not in any great rush.