Harshly Ruled Offside

Liverpool 0 Charlton 0


This result, I have to say, did rather surprise me. I found, as Saturday wore on and I contemplated the pile of exams waiting to be marked (and many of them are still waiting) that I was being convinced by the bookies' adverts which flash up all over Livescore, offering odds for games in play, or those taking place later on. Charlton were 7-1 against to win while Liverpool were quite a lot of odds on to do so before the ruddy game had even kicked off. Even the draw was something like 4-1. I swallowed this whole, and also reflected that Liverpool would be seeking revenge for that 0-2 defeat in SE7 not so long ago. Charlton were going to lose. Definitely.

In the end I decided to go for a long walk in the rain, and buy some groceries. I obviously wasn't going to settle to the marking, and I didn't want to watch Liverpool's goal tally mount up on screen, either. There was of course the option of going to the pub, where the game would be showing, but it would be full of Liverpool supporters, both the entrenched and the fairweather variety, and anyway I had spent both Thursday night (quiz night, my team won, though we weren't all playing - report later in the week) and Friday night (listening to two Irish mates rehearsing a sketch for Paddy's Night at the end of next week) in the pub and was only too aware that the pub means drink, and drink means relative incapacity the next day.

So I splashed through the streets of districts 28015 and 28004, buying oriental pickle and lemons and onions, and got back home about a quarter of an hour after the time the game would have ended. I left my umbrella to drip in the bathtub, laid the shopping bags on the kitchen floor and went through to the computer and logged on to Livescore, and there it was: 0-0. A really pleasant surprise.

Of course I looked for reports, and as usual it was the BBC that I read first; don't know why I bother. The BBC pointed out that Robbie Fowler had got the ball in the net towards the end, but that Cisse had been 'harshly' ruled offside.

It transpired, after I had read other reports, that Cisse in fact was offside, as opposed to 'harshly ruled offside'. As I said last week, the BBC just cannot admit that Charlton ever achieve anything at all without the help of conniving referees. Chance would be a fine thing.

And this was the third 0-0 draw in a row, or 'on the bounce' as the sainted Alan Curbishley is wont to remark. I had planned to call this whole posting On the Bounce, but cannot in the end remember what it used to mean, though I am pretty sure it was a term in poker or three-card brag, and did not have quite the same meaning. Maybe one of you can enlighten me. Anyway, bounce or not, it was another unexpected point, which is all to the good.

On a closing note, my friend and fellow-blogger Frankie Valley has permanently dropped the Let's Kick Lawro Out of Football logo which he designed, so I have now removed it too. As Frankie said, the guy simply isn't going to go away, and maybe it is time, as I mentioned last week, to start a new campaign with a different logo. I still like my idea of getting rid of Newcastle United. And Blackburn Rovers. And Real Ma... Well, perhaps not. I'll think of something to decorate the top right hand corner with, but not till I've marked these perishing exams.