Watford Boy

Eternally eighteenth

2012-01-22T09:21:00.000-03:00

Despite defeat at home last week and a 3-0 beating at St Andrews yesterday, WFC are still in 18th. With the two teams directly above us losing too, we haven't slid backwards but ground has been made below us with Bristol City and Millwall both notching up victories.Darius Henderson got his second consecutive hat-trick for the Lions at Bansley. I'd have him back.

Lagging behind

2012-01-14T21:55:00.001-03:00

I stuck a tenner on us today, fancying us to beat a Reading side that are up in the playoff positions. The match was live on Sky Sports 2 so I was able to stream it through EPL site (a bit laggy, but ok). The Horns scored first when Cummings stabbed into his own goal but Reading were back in it before half time and looked likely to get the late goal that the commentator started tempting fate about. Their sub came on and sunk us.

The fourth round tie is on the Friday and you have to have been to another game this season to have a chance of getting ONE ticket. Luckily - I suppose - Virgin gave us a month's free ESPN and they are screening it so I'll be watching a second live match on a screen at home this month. It won't be the feed that lags in that match.

Spurs come a-calling

2012-01-10T20:12:00.000-03:00

Watford's unbeaten run came to an end in the first game of the year. They'd beaten Darlington 4-1 at the Vic on NYE (Sordell got 2) but went down 2-0 at Fratton Park a couple of days later. They are currently 18th and have been there and about since October. With the league pretty tight, a winning run could put them right up there but it doesn't look likely (from this armchair, anyway).
On Saturday, the Horns battered Bradford 4-2 in the cup third round and the following day were drawn home again to slightly bigger opposition. Tottenham - flying high in 3rd in the Premiership - come calling on the 28th January and I am hoping to be there for my first game since April. COYH!

Unbeaten in seven

2011-12-27T16:17:00.001-03:00

Watford have not lost since the day of my birthday party when my 'Boro friend John came and delighted in seeing his team triumph 1-0 at home. It had been a mixed handful of games before that, with wins punctuating away defeats in "the most competitive league" in the country (TM). Since then, however, it has been mostly draws that have kept us unbeaten and as a consequence we have hardly moved in terms of relative league position. On Boxing Day we went one up but were held by Cardiff on Malky's first return. Clearly, if we keep this up, we will finish exactly where I predicted. I've still yet to go this season, though. Mediocrity rarely felt so rewarding.

daddy's little star

2011-12-13T18:28:00.001-03:00

Sofa so mediocre

2011-09-11T07:44:00.001-03:00

Sean Dyche's reign did not begin well but a first win of the season yesterday at the Madjeski has added a tint of blue to the stratosphere. Hammered by West Ham in a game I was refused permission by my wife from going to, it took a draw that felt like a point won at home to Birmingham before the international break for The 'Orns to feel like the fates were not against them.

15th, this season, I reckon and I'm not sure I'll get to any of them now the next Watford Boy is here.

All change at the Vic

2011-07-06T15:20:00.001-03:00

The manager's gone to Cardiff, we've sold Danny Graham and more.

The run-in

2011-04-25T14:45:00.000-03:00

I am back in Britain and made the Vic one of my first stop-offs for the Hull match, which we lost 2-1. Since then we have drawn 2-2 at home to Norwich and an Elland Road game finished the same. On Good Friday, captain John Eustace scored after 43 seconds to win the home game against Barnsley and today we lost 4-2 after twice being ahead at Leicester.
Entrenched firmly in mid-table, there is little for Watford to play for when soon-to-be-champions QPR visit next Saturday. I may go but Joss has now established himself at the back of the ground with some friends and the youngest Watford Boy will not be born for three more months. I warned in the last entry that my football blog may be coming to a close. With Joss' evolution that time seems to be upon me.

In Spirit

2011-01-03T21:23:00.001-03:00

I may be 11,358 miles away (or 13 hours ahead) but enjoy the news of Watford's fifth straight win (2-1 at Scunthorpe) and seventh game without defeat. Three wins out of three in December (snow prevented matches) - beating Sven's Leicester 3-2 at home; inflicting QPR's first league defeat of the season (3-1 at Loftus Road); thrashing protion-chasing Cardiff 4-1 at the Vic - have been followed by a 3-0 over Portsmouth before this latest triumph. We are top scorers in the division and now have the prospect of suffering for our success: Burnley are sniffing after our manager and I'm sure there will be bids for top-scorer Danny Graham. As is pointed out with crushing regularity at this time of year, we are "a selling club".

Beer as art

2010-12-31T08:17:00.006-03:00

My twenty four weeks in London were an extension of an on-going period of time-off that began in China, October 2008, and saw me washing down and then writing down the beers I came across. Half of my London goal, then, was to drink as many different beers – and more specifically ales – as I could. My main limitation was not financial, temporal or biological but merely the monotony of choice in many of the pubs I visited. Invariably, in those tied-houses, I would have a half and move on in search of greater diversity.

Variety is limited in the lager world; I supped more than fifty in London and another forty or so in a handful of other countries and – bar the demarcation between wheat and non-wheat ones – would have trouble distinguishing many of them. Not so with British real ales. In the three hundred plus pubs I visited (and with some bottled beers too), I managed just short of 300. Proud as I was of enjoying 107 different beers in 2009, the addition of real ale varieties took me over 400 discrete beers in 2010, a number I can’t see myself surpassing this year.

I list the ales here because, after all, that is what writing them down is about. Before that though, two things. First I recommend Morocco by Daleside brewery as my favourite: spicy and full-bodied. Great in the summer and probably equally suited to the winter. Second, I laid claim during my summer of ale to this being a type of performance art, an observation met with scorn by one of my mates in particular (“Well, he’s a lager drinker,” it was said of him). So, if I cannot be said to be a performance artist for managing 300 pubs and 400 beers in 2010, perhaps we can agree on a simpler term: "p. artist" will do.

Happy New Year all.

297 Ales

1. Acorn Old Moor Porter

2. Adnams Bitter

3. Adnams Southwold Stout

4. Adnams Broadside

5. Adnams East Green Carbon Neutral

6. Adnam’s Explorer

7. Adnams Regatta

8. Adnams Ghost Ship

9. Adnam’s Gunhill (good spicy beer)

10. Anglo Dutch Kletsman

11. Arram Dark

12. Badger England’s Gold

13. Badger Fursty Ferret

14. Badger First Gold

15. Badger Golden Champion

16. Badger Golden Glory

17. Badger Original Ale

18. Banks’s UCB

19. Bank Top Dark Mild

20. Barnsley Gold

21. Bass

22. Bateman’s GHA

23. Bateman’s XXXB

24. Bateman Victory Ale

25. Batemans Valiant

26. Bath ales Ginger Hare

27. Bath ales Barnstormer

28. Bath ales Gem

29. Battledown Natural Selection

30. B&T Phantom Thirst

31. Beartown

32. Black Beauty Porter

33. Black Sheep

34. Black Sheep Gold Sheep

35. Boddingtons

36. Brain’s Dark

37. Brains SA

38. Brain’s Monty’s Magic

39. Brains Steam Wagon

40. Brain’s SA Gold

41. Brain’s Merlin’s Oak

42. Brains (Buckley) Reverend James

43. Brakspear EPA

44. Brakspear bitter

45. Brakspear Oxford Gold

46. Brakspear Triple

47. Brew Dog Punk IPA

48. Brooklyn Brewery

49. Burton Bridge Kingsway

50. Bushy’s Piston Brew

51. Butcombe Bitter

52. Cairgorm Black Gold

53. Caffreys

54. Caledonian Autumn Red

55. Caledonian Mellow Yellow

56. Caledonian Edinburgh strong ale

57. Camden Pale Ale

58. Camden Wheat Lager

59. Camden Hells Lager

60. Camden Wheat Beer (?)

61. Cannon Royall Fruiterer’s Mild

62. Castle Rock Harvest Pale

63. Celt Golden Ale

64. Chiltern Ale

65. Clark’s Rams Revenge

66. Coach House Dick Turpin

67. Cottage Champflower

68. Courage Best

69. Cropton dutch wink

70. Dale’s Old Chestnut

71. Daleside Morocco

72. Dark Horse Birdie

73. Dartmoor Best

74. Davenport’s Fury

75. Derventio Emperor’s Whim

76. Deuchars IPA

77. Earl Soham Sir Roger’s Porter

78. Elgood’s Cambridge bitter

79. Elgood’s Strong Bitter

80. Elmwood Good Cheer Beer

81. Everard’s Equinox

82. Everard’s Flourish

83. Everard’s Golden Zest

84. Everards Sunchaser

85. Everards Tiger

86. Falstaff Harpy

87. Felinfoel Double Dragon

88. Flowers Original

89. Fraoch Heather Ale

90. Freewinner Bumble Bee Honey Ale

91. Fuller’s Red fox

92. Fuller’s Discovery

93. Fuller’s ESB

94. Fuller’s London Pride

95. Fuller’s Mr Harry

96. Fuller’s Chiswick

97. Fuller’s Honeydew

98. Fuller’s 1845

99. George Gale Seafarers Ale

100. Golcar Dark Mild

101. Goacher’s Stout

102. Great Newsome Pricky Back Otchan

103. Great Oakley Gobble

104. Green Jack Orange Wheat

105. Greene King Abbots

106. GK Abbott Reserve

107. Greene King Back of the net

108. Greene King Bretwalda

109. Greene King George Inn ale

110. Greene King IPA

111. Greene King LBW

112. Greene King Olde Trip

113. Greene King Phoenix

114. Greene King Royal London

115. Greene King St Edmunds

116. Greene King Sherlock Holmes Ale

117. Greene King Sun Dance

118. Greene King London Glory

119. Guinness Red

120. Guinness

121. Harvey’s Sussex beer

122. Henry’s IPA

123. High House Farm Cyril the Magnificent

124. Hogs Back Tea

125. Holden’s Bottom knocker

126. Holden’s Bitter

127. Hook Norton Haymaker

128. Hop Back Summer Lightning

129. Hydes Ringmaster

130. Hydes Hubble Bubble

131. Ind Coope’s Burton Ale

132. Island Brewery Yachtsman

133. Jennings Cocker Hoop

134. Jennings Golden Host

135. Jennings Sneck Lifter

136. JW Lees Chocaholic

137. Kelburn Red Smiddy

138. Kelham Pale Rider

139. Kelham island Pride of Sheffield

140. Kilkenny Smithwicks

141. Kingstone 1503

142. Leeds Monsoon

143. Lion Stout

144. Loddon Bamboozle

145. Lymestone Stone Cutter

146. Marston’s Brewers Droop

147. Marston’s Double drop

148. Marston’s Old Empire

149. Marston’s Owd Roger

150. Marston’s Oyster Stout

151. Marston’s Pedigree

152. Mauldon’s Mole Trap

153. McMullen Country bitter

154. McMullen IPA

155. McMullen Golden Bitter

156. Meantime London

157. Meanwhile Pale ale

158. Mighty Oak Ale

159. Milestone (Notts) Shine On

160. Mongozo Banana beer

161. Moorhouse’s Pride of Pendle

162. Moorhouse’s Pendle Witches Brew

163. Mordue Workie Ticket

164. Morland Old Speckled Hen

165. Morland Old Crafty Hen

166. Murphy’s

167. Naylor’s Black and Tan

168. Nelson Core Commander

169. Nethergate Old Growler

170. Nethergate Sweeney Todd

171. Nethergate Three Point Nine

172. Newby Wyke England Expects

173. North Yorkshire Crystal Tips

174. Oakham Ales Last of the Few

175. Oak leaf Hole hearted

176. O’ Hanlon’s Dragon Ale

177. Otley 01

178. Palm Steenhuffel Blond

179. Phoenix Monkeytown mild

180. Pitstop Penelope

181. Porterhouse Brain Blasta

182. Porterhouse Plain Porter

183. Porterhouse Red

184. Porterhouse Oyster Stout

185. Purity UBU

186. Purity Mad goose

187. RCH Pitchfork

188. RCH Old Slug Porter

189. Redemption Pale Ale

190. Ringwood Best Bitter

191. Ringwood Boondoggle

192. Ringwood Old Thumper

193. Rooster’s Bangtail

194. Rudgate Battle axe

195. Rudgate Ruby Mild

196. Ruddles County

197. Salamander Dark Corner

198. Salem Porterhouse

199. Sambrook’s Wandle

200. Sambrook’s Junction

201. Samuel Adams Blonde Ambition

202. Samuel Smiths Taddy Lager

203. Sam Smiths Sovereign

204. Sam Smiths Old Best

205. Ss Taddy porter

206. Samuel Smiths Alpine Lager

207. SS Pure Brewed Lager

208. SS Organic Cherry Beer

209. Sam Smiths Stout

210. SS Oatmeal Stout

211. Sam Smiths Organic wheat beer

212. Samuel Smiths Nut Brown Ale

213. S&N Bulldog

214. S&N Newcastle Brown ALe

215. Sharp’s Cornish coaster

216. Sharp’s Doombar

217. Sharp’s Special

218. Sharp’s Red Ale

219. Shepherd Neame Whitstable Bay

220. Shepherd Neame Spitfire

221. Shepherd Neame Canterbury Jack

222. Shepherd Neame Late Red

223. Shepherd Neame Bishop’s Finger

224. Shepherd Neame Kent’s Best

225. Shepherd Neame Goldings

226. Sierra Nevada

227. Skinner Betty Stogs

228. Skipton Copper Dragon

229. Slater’s Premium

230. Sleeman IPA

231. Soltaire Harvest Moon Ale

232. St Austell Black Friar

233. St Austell Proper Job

234. St Austell Tribute

235. Stonehenge Pigswill

236. An ale called “swift”

237. Tetley’s Cask

238. Tetley’s Midsommer Madness

239. Tetley’s Headless Huntsman

240. Theakston Old Peculier

241. Thornbridge Jaipur

242. Thornbridge Wild Swan

243. Thornbridge Kipling

244. Three Castles, Pewsey Saxon Archer

245. Thwaites Lancaster Bomber

246. Thwaite’s Highwayman

247. Thwaite’s Wainwright

248. Thwaites Original

249. Thwaite’s Strong Brown Ale

250. Timothy Taylor Landlord

251. Tom Wood’s Vanilla Orchid

252. Triple F Autumn Daze

253. Truman’s Runner

254. Tryst Blathen

255. TS A Double Espresso

256. Twickenham Naked Ladies

257. Wadworth Henry’s

258. Warwicks Purity

259. Wells & Young Courage Directors

260. Wells Bombadier

261. Wells Bombadier Burning Gold

262. Wells Banana Bread Beer

263. Wells Waggle Dance

264. Welton’s Heatwave

265. Welton’s Ewell sticks

266. Welton’s Chactonbury

267. Welton’s Magog

268. Welton’s Liquid Lunch

269. Welton’s Same Again

270. Westerham 1965

271. Westerham’s Grasshopper

272. Westerham Special Pale Ale

273. Westgate Back of the net

274. Westgate Gangly Ghoul

275. Winchester Ale

276. Windie Goat Final fling

277. White Moon (????) GB

278. White Horse Bitter

279. White Horse Wayland Smithy

280. Wolf straw dog

281. Woodforde’s Wherry

282. Wood’s Wonderful

283. World Top Mars Magic

284. Worthington’s

285. Wrasslers XXXX Full Stout

286. Wychwood Hobgoblin

287. Wychwood King Goblin (Special Reserve)

288. Young’s Best

289. Youngs Double chocolate stout

290. York England’s Pride

291. York Brewery Centurion’s Ghost Ale

292. Young’s Golden Ale

293. Young’s London Gold

294. Young’s Kew

295. Young’s Light Ale

296. Young’s Ram Rod

297. Youngs Special

London’s Superlative Pubs

2010-12-29T00:57:00.001-03:00

Further to my report of the summer's expedition, I present here my first list of my findings.

The First Irish Pub outside Ireland

Though a particular acquaintance of mine may be so boorish as to propose that more than half of the three hundred pubs I looked in on were different branches of “O’Neills”, pay such nonsense no heed. I endeavoured to circumvent chains of the same name and entered not a single “Slug and Lettuce”, “All Bar One” or “Pitcher and Piano”. It would be remiss of me to fail to concede that I did deign to sup in a single “O’Neills” but compensated for a perceived – and entirely mistaken – tendency to be less than original by stopping by “The Tipperary” on Fleet Street, the site of a pub since 1605 and an Irish one for more than three hundred years. Some nice panelling and mirrors, but why there weren’t Guinness-themed hats on everybody’s head, I still fail to comprehend.

London’s First (and only) Scottish Pub

Remaining with the Celtic theme, “The Rob Roy” near Edgware Road underground station displays a breadth of football memorabilia related to Scottish teams. Though the landlord was a jovial chap, the establishment had no beers of note and little to recommend it or Scottish pubs in general.

The Oldest Riverside Pub

Visible across the Thames from the friends’ house in Rotherhithe where I stayed for half of my time in London, Wapping’s “Prospect of Whitby” is a characterful 490-year-old destination with good ales and a noose hanging on the banks of the river to boot (“Hanging” Judge Jeffries used to drink here). A haunt for artists and writers at various times, its modern claim to celebrity comprises Del Boy’s visit in an episode of OF&H.

London’s Most Beautiful Pub

There may be some competition for this accolade, but I must declare the “Warrington Hotel” in Maida Vale to be my champion. Ornate on a grand scale, if one is to close one’s eyes ever-so-slightly, one could believe one were in a Renaissance Ballroom.

London’s Best Real Ale Pub

The dingy “Bree Louise” in close proximity to Euston train station has been awarded CAMRA’s London Pub of the Year status on more than one occasion but as I was fortuitous enough - when staying in Kentish Town - to live around the corner from “The Pineapple”, I availed myself of its beer festival on consecutive evenings and supped a dozen brews.

London’s Grottiest Pub

Whilst there may be other contenders from the three hundred pubs I visited for “most beautiful” status, “The Globe” on Lisson Grove wins this category peerlessly. Adjectives fail me.

Best Theme Pub

Though full of suits when I visited, “The Sherlock Holmes” on Northumberland Avenue wins in this category for its range of exhibits. My favourite was the Greene King “Shelock Holmes” Ale, though admittedly it tasted suspiciously like the Greene King “George Inn Ale” found in Borough.

Thrice one hundred public houses

2010-12-29T00:52:00.001-03:00

After nineteen months of cultural enrichment travelling the world between late 2008 and mid-2010, I determined to ensure my return to the greatest city in the solar system™ did not result in immediate philistinism. To that end, I revisited a handful of the big galleries and some of the major museums as well as journeying to England’s great centres of learning in my twenty four weeks in the United Kingdom but it was my efforts as regards those smaller institutions of cultivation, the public houses (and the tasting of the beverages within), which may be judged – by others, naturally, for I would not presume to assert thus – to have reached the status of ‘art’.[1]

Ultimately, the one hundred and sixty seven days I remained in England occasioned the visitation of three hundred and fifteen such establishments. Fourteen lay outside the boundaries of Greater London and it is the other three hundred and one which constitute the pool from which I draw the observations and opinions that make up my next log entries. The reputable organisation CAMRA asserts that the capital maintains approximately five thousand seven hundred public houses but other sources count as many as seven thousand. I hope I will be allowed, therefore, to claim that my summer jaunts in the name of art and culture took me to somewhere in the region of five percent of all London pubs.

Sadly, it has been reported in the venerable Times of London that British public houses are becoming defunct at the rate of fifty two per week. For that reason it is appropriate before listing to mourn a paragon of ale houses, the “Black Horse” in Fitzrovia which served an impressive range (it was a Nicholson’s pub) when I visited on twentieth June but which will quench travellers’ thirst no more.

[1] For a final decision regarding this, please see also my entry on beers drunk in 2010.

Round up and away

2010-11-13T07:23:00.001-03:00

After a dismal home performance against Scunthorpe, which we lost 2-0, it was even harder to convince myself to return to Vicarage Road on my birthday and final whole day in the UK for another year or so. Truth is though that this Watford Boy lost his passion for the matches a while before we left in 2008 and the sole reason for my continued attendance is a bit of time with my nephew.

Nevertheless, with the Hornets involved in a “thrilling” 3-2 away defeat (Portsmouth) and having beaten Ipswich at home in a game I did not get to (rain and broken bike stopped play), I was able to put aside the mauling at Derby and hope for a timely gift from the Golden Boys in the match against Nottingham Forest.

Jordan Mutch provided one after three minutes and my optimism held out another quarter of an hour before the Reds equalised. Another dull game finished all square but at least it was not as excruciating as the previous home match. A second “thrilling” 3-2 defeat (at Selhurst Park) since then has seen us slide into thirteenth and though the number may not bode well, most fans would take that as a final position, given a choice.

Eight hours ahead of GMT as I now am, many of the scores for the rest of the season will be looked up after a night’s sleep. This blog has become less a football diary and more a travel journal. Until the younger Watford Boy takes over the match reports, it will remain so. In the meantime, I cross my fingers for today’s trip to Turf Moor and hope for the fans’ sake that we can win a thriller again.

Sweet Dreams are made of (most of ) this

2010-09-29T20:32:00.001-03:00

Starting a fortnight ago (2-0 at Bristol City), Watford won three games on the trot, including our biggest ever away victory (at Millwall's Den, 6-1) and then a 3-1 home defeat of Middlesbrough, Danny Graham latching on to a poor back pass to score after 17 seconds and give Hanna a great start to her first ever football game.

Last night, though, we were 3-0 down to Swansea (with Brendan Rodgers "Short, greedy bastard, you're just a...", Liam led) with three-quarters of the game gone and there seemed no way back as they outpassed us and outplayed us in the middle. Out of nothing, a Troy Deeney goal sparked a remarkable comeback from the 'Orns, that saw us score a second and have a 95th minute equaliser disallowed.

Though I have not been blogging much about the team's fortunes since my return I have been going and since we are in a very respectable 4th place after 9 matches, many fans feel that pre-season predictions of relegation were misplaced. Who am I to disagree?

You make your own meaning to life...

2010-09-23T05:13:00.007-03:00

The best years of her life | Fond memories of blindfolded prisoners « Dimi’s notes

2010-08-16T21:47:00.000-03:00

The best years of her life | Fond memories of blindfolded prisoners « Dimi’s notes

Top of the league

2010-08-06T21:25:00.001-03:00

The season's first league game saw promotion hopefuls Norwich City host can-we-stay-up Watford and get spanked. The BBC may be reporting the first quarter of the game as dominated by the home team, but since the Horns were 2-0 up after 24 minutes, I have trouble concurring. Watching in a Marylebone pub with no volume except the banter of the Millwall fans behind me, I had to supply enough atmosphere for half a pub to care. Danny Graham helped, with two well-taken goals, but I thought John Eustace's 14th minute chest-and-half-volley effort was better, not least because he knew it made up for an earlier miss. Told to calm down after Adrian Marriappa should have put us 3-1 up during a Canaries spell of domination, I enjoyed milking our unexpected victory. Next Saturday, Adrian Boothroyd brings his Coventry side to the Vic and I go to my first Watford game for almost two years. It may not quite be like watching (in) Brazil, but I'm excited.

Why is Stonehenge not a henge?

2010-08-01T18:52:00.000-03:00

Because its bank lies inside its ditch, as you can see in this picture.

UK Hung Parliament: a bit like sex, really

2010-05-10T21:31:00.005-03:00

Nobody can know how much influence Lord Mandelson´s pre-election quip had on potential Liberal Democrat voters who did not want Etoryinans in power.

“if you flirt with Nick Clegg in these crucial Labour-Tory marginals, then you’re likely to wake up the next morning with David Cameron” he said.
“And let me assure you, that is a night you would come to regret. You would wake up thinking something had gone horribly wrong in your life.”

However, Nick seemed not to have paid heed and said he fancied David a bit more. The resulting political speed-dating made it clear that Gordon can not now qualify for the grand finale of “Date or dump: who rules?”. If Nick is indeed “being wooed” by both parties as CNN report, then New Labour has offered to sweeten the morning after by removing Brown´s face from the pillow.

David Miliband, go on down!

Imagining Electoral Reform

2010-05-02T04:33:00.002-03:00

I start a six-day trek to the Tayrona (or Kogi) culture´s “lost city” here in north Colombia today, which means returning when the results of the UK General Election are finally decided. Or rather, when the results of the 150 or so marginal seats are decided. The outcome in each of the other 500 constituencies is already a foregone conclusion.

The introduction of TV debates seems to have been the main catalyst for the increased popularity of Nick Clegg and hence the party he leads, the Liberal Democrats. This in turn means that a hung parliament is being discussed as a real possibility. Pessimistic in this regard, I fear that the Etoryians will get a working majority and see out a term (low expectations means anything else will be doubly delicious).

Despite the apparently increasing willingness of the electorate to use tactical voting to be more effective in our first-past-the-post system, I do not believe 2010 will be a watershed. Nevertheless, I am hoping the system will come close enough to breaking point in its disproportional representation of the defeated parties that binding promises will be made by politicians heeding the anger of disenfranchised voters.

You may say I´m a dreamer, but I´m not the only one.

Survival of the just-fit-enough

2010-04-27T23:39:00.001-03:00

Watford romped past Reading 3-0 on Saturday to ensure Championship survival in what every fan hopes was their nadir season. Danny Graham scored either side of a Heidar Helgusson left-footer. The Sheffield Wednesday v Crystal Palace match this Saturday will decide which of those two drops with Peterborough and Plymouth. Watford´s result at Coventry will be irrelevant for both teams.

As the manager and local paper have emphasised over and over, "survival" was all we hoped for this season as the mismanagement of the funds from an-always-going-to-be-one season in the Premiership with which this blog began left us worse off than if we had never won the single most lucrative game in world football. How the fuck does that work? Ask Graham Simpson.

Colleagues of mine who shared Friday drinks from the few years before I left London will know that I am an arrogant pedant who is too keen on the invitation “Wanna bet on it?”. My favourite win until recently was against a Russian friend who told us that she had been to the Kazakhstani capital. I won a couple of quid telling her that she hadn´t.

Watford´s guarantee of Championship football in 2010-11 along with a poor season for Oldham in League 1 means that I have won a two-and-a-half-year old wager with Luke that the Latics would (not) be in a higher league positon than the Hornets on 7th December 2010. I was sweating on it for a while but – good sport that he is – I received a congratulatory message from him following our victory.

Oh, and a hundred pounds is not to be sneezed at by someone who hasn´t had a full time job for two years.

It was all yellow...

2010-04-10T20:43:00.004-03:00

I may have been at South America´s largest market (Otavalo, Ecuador) but despite the multi-hued blankets, belts, bags, bracelets and bowls, my mind was focussed on just one colour.

In three weeks, Watford have lost two six-pointers (at Hillsborough and home to Palace) and drawn our other three games: two home points against Boro and Brom, one brought back from Deepdale. Three points in five is relegation form so today´s Vic victory against second-bottom Plymouth only brings temporary relief (whilst sealing Argyle´s fate). Our three main companions in the fight against ending twenty-second in the Championship (the two mentioned first, and Scunthorpe) all lost today. QPR, by beating Palace, are now probably safe on 51 points, barring some significant form-breaking results.

The bottom looks like this:

Team	Pld	GD	Pts	Fixtures
Watford	42	-10	48	QPR (a) Leicester (a) Reading (h) Coventry (a)
Scunthorpe	42	-24	47	Bristol C (h) Reading (h) Donc (a) Forest (h)
Crystal Palace	43	-3	46	Derby (a) West Brom (h) Sheffield Wed (a)
Sheffield Wed	43	-19	45	Sheffield United (h) Cardiff (a) Palace (h)
Plymouth	43	-19	41
Peterborough	43	-28	31

Watford have three away games in their final four matches while Scunthorpe have three home ones out of four. Cystal Palace and Sheffield Wednesday each only have three matches left, with Palace travelling twice and Wednesday once. Palace are only where they are because of a 10-point administration deduction but it is already clear that the final relegation position will only be decided on the final day, when they travel to Sheffield. I am not going to make a prediction. I just hope my fingernails hold out. How do the words go? “For you I bleed myself dry”...

Libertadora del Libertador

2010-03-26T17:32:00.007-03:00

Though it is said that you learn something new every day, most of my knowledge about the liberation of South America from Spanish colonial rule has been obtained by a sort of osmotic process over a year: statues and street names, obelisks and museums, artworks galore. I am at the point where I could recognise a silhouette of Sucre or the back of Bolivar (though the portraits of the latter by Julio Blanco (a good link to which I cannot find) were something different).

Before noticing a museum two days ago (behind the Monastery of Santa Catlina, where she was raised after her mother died a month after giving birth), the name of Doña Manuela Sáenz meant nothing to me, however. No feminist will be surprised to hear that the woman Bolivar called the “liberator of the liberator” (she is said to have saved her lover´s life on three occasions) had been airbrushed from history until recently.

The tour round the museum (again, “no photos”, again, a lenient guide) was more of an attempt to insert her into the liberation story than a genuine reflection on her life (I had learned more from Wikipedia last night) but most of her belongings had been burned when she died a pauper´s death in Paita, Peru. We were told she was a brave woman, fearless: unfortunately there is little left to illustrate her heroism.

Bloody Quito

2010-03-24T13:26:00.004-03:00

We had been warned that the Quito school of religious art tended towards the gory. Yesterday, we were guided around the Monastery of Santa Catalina, whose nun "inmates" have only one hour per day to talk to each other or watch TV, and saw some particularly macabre examples.
There was the image of sheep drinking the blood of Christ from a trough as it poured from his wounds. Additionally, we were shown a painting of Christ skinless after flagellation, imaginatively called "Christ´s spine". I guess after seeing pictures such as these, even the nuns count their blessings.

¡Phew!

2010-03-18T14:46:00.003-03:00

After a run of five without a win, which included the humiliation of giving soon-to-be-relegated Peterborough their first away win of the season (and the double over us since I last wrote about the Horns), Watford beat Ipswich at Vicarage Road on Tuesday to relieve a little of the fear of relegation that has deepened since I may have counted chickens at the end of 2009.

My nephew Joss will only have seen us win three times in 2010 (all home Tuesday night games, against Bristol City and Sheffield United too) but I haven´t had a text report from him now for ages. I think he needs some nagging. It also looks less likely that I will be back in the UK to shout on the Golden Boys before the end of the season.

Instead, I intend to compensate by going to see a match in Quito on Easter Sunday when the present league leaders from this beautiful colonial city take on second-placed Barcelona (de Guyaquil), who I will be supporting because their kit is the same colours as Watford´s (they have quite a name, too).