Gutted

Charlton 1 Bolton Wanderers 0



I first encountered the word 'gutted' when I was about 7, reading a local newspaper report (7-year olds were more advanced in those days) of a fire at a warehouse somewhere along the Leeds and Liverpool Canal; the warehouse was gutted, the report, er... reported.

Although I had never seen the word before, and did not, either, make the connection with the gutting of fish, not something that went on much in the Forest of Bowland, it was quite clear to me that the word meant that the warehouse would not be storing anything in the foreseeable future, and quite possibly never again. These days of course the word, still in use for fire-destroyed buildings, and still the past tense of the verb 'to gut', is more often than not found in the mouths of football people after they have been sent off, bitten, denied a penalty, or, as in this case, when they have just lost.

For, boys and girls, it is not I, your Charlton-loving Jonathan Blake, who is gutted, not at all. Charlton's match against Bolton, dull though it apparently was, did have one bright spot, the Jimmy Floyd Hasselbaink-assisted goal by Marcus Bent (above), and Charlton are through to the next round of the League Cup, when they visit Chesterfield. It was Big Sam Allardyce on this occasion who claimed to be gutted, and quite possibly his referee chums Lee Mason and Mike Halsey were, too.

And on Monday evening our quiz team had beaten off a late challenge from the Old Farts to stand firm and win by 124 points to 122. The OFs didn't say they were gutted exactly, but one of them, encountered three days later in a Madrid night spot, still sounded rather as if he was.

Anyway that's it for now; short and sweet, as Charlton matches are happening so thick and fast I can hardly keep up.

Kick off at Newcastle was five minutes ago.