Blues lined up playing 4-3-3 with Dunn up front, Clapham, Kilkenny and Clemence in midfield and Tebily partnering Lazaridis at the back. Great to see so many of the walking wounded back in action, just when we need the first team squad beefing up, ready for the critical few weeks that lie ahead. Everton lined up 4-5-1 with young striker Victor Anichebe given the thankless and futile task of battling alone against Tebily and Oji.
You can always tell when one of the Big Clubs comes to town for a reserve game because they bring a TV cameraman with them. Everton are no exception – their cameraman was up in the stand, filming away, doubtless for his footage to be included on some club pay website somewhere. Everton ARE a big club, before you dare argue with me - they won the FA Cup in 1984, just before Coventry and Wimbledon and the League Championship in 1987, just after Villa but just before Blackburn, so stuff you!
Cameras at reserve games, though. It has to be said this is good stuff. Blues reserves don’t even get hot water in the showers or a spoon for their halftime cuppasoup.
No Brucie watch tonight – him and Bertschin spent the first half up in the Royal Box. Bertschin came down to the touchline at half time but I was unable to hear any of the pearls of wisdom he may have imparted. I didn’t see Brucie up close, but by way of consolation, I did see Kevin Francis, lorry driver and one-time Blues legend. Respect, Big Kev!
None of the Blues players were wearing their sockatyes, which came as a great disappointment to your humble narrator. Everton made up for this, though, because they seem to have changed their kit sponsor again. I like Everton’s sponsors – none of your JVC or Vodafone for them, they always choose some obscure Asian company who no-one’s ever heard of. At the moment, it’s some organisation called ‘Chang’ who, as you will no doubt be aware, are a leading Korean dog food manufacturer. They’ll do for me.
Oh yes, the football. Forgot about that. Blues were very much in the ascendancy, as you’d expect given the line-ups. It was impressive to see how Blues midfield 3 were dominating the Everton 5, albeit with occasional support from Dunn dropping back and Lazaridis moving up. As always with any Blues team, though, the finishing was shocking and chances went begging every few minutes. Allow me to illustrate this with a short sample list of events:
26 minutes – Dunn breaks down the left, plays a lovely ball across to Kuqi who blazes over the crossbar from eight yards out.
29 minutes – Dunn wins a header in the box and knocks the ball across to Clapham who hits a right(!) footed shot wide from ten yards out.
30 minutes – Dunn tries his luck with a snap volley from 30 yards out which drifts over harmlessly
35 minutes – Dunn takes the ball past two men on the right, chips the stranded keeper who sees the ball land on the roof of the net.
38 minutes – Dunn and Kilkenny combine to set Nick Wright through on goal but Wright lacks composure and his shot is saved by the Everton keeper, John Ruddy.
Now, the observant reader will have spotted a trend here. Done it yet? The clue is in the question. He was having a good comeback game and the Everton defenders couldn’t get a foot on him. Let’s hope and pray he stays fit for the remainder of the season – we’ll be in the UEFA Cup! Well, maybe we’ll finish seventeenth. I’d settle for either.
A mention here for two more Everton players. The goalie, Ruddy, is a laugh. He’s always shouting instructions to his defenders and, indeed, he has a very big gob, at one point he even drowned out the sound of a very noisy jet on the runway at nearby Birmingham Airport. I like that in a goalie. One the downside, though, he has an alarming tendency to spill, well, everything, which scares the you-know-what out of every team mate in the vicinity. Quite a few of Blues’ many chances came from crosses he’d dropped or shots he’d fumbled. Now, Mayor (regular poster on many a Blues Message Board, who some of you will know) informs me that this kid has actually played for the Everton first team. Can’t see it myself. The other player worthy of note is a tricky and determined little right winger called John Paul Kissock. He’s a good little player, but suffers from the unfortunate fact that he’s a dead ringer for Frodo Baggins. Tiny bloke, with little short legs and a mop of unruly dark hair. I’d love to see if he has furry feet. Hmmm, come to think of it, in the right light David Moyes is not unlike Gollum. I must research this more fully, when time permits.
Towards the end of the first half, we were treated to our Tebily Moment. The Great Man dwelt on the ball too long, got robbed and Anichebe went through on goal. Tebs showed tremendous pace and determination to get back goalside of Anichebe, brush him aside and regain possession of the ball. Blues goalie Legdzins, looking relieved came out to take the inevitable backpass and hoof it upfield. Stupid boy. Tebs, of course, dribbles the ball around Legdzins and then all the way across his own six yard line, with a posse of two or three young Everton players bouncing off him in his wake. He calmly passes the ball out to right back Chris Cottrill who hoofs it upfield. Not easy to hoof the ball upfield when your shorts are full of poo.
Half time 0-0. No Bovril because I was chatting with the aforementioned Mayor and also with Niebeski, another regular poster on many a Blues Message board. Mayor was disappointed that I didn’t partake of a belly buster burger, but Ms. Freely had cooked me a great plate of goat cheese and mushroom pasta parcels in home made mushroom sauce just before leaving home and so I could barely stand, let alone manage a belly buster.
The second half of the game was very much the same as the first, with Blues creating and wasting shedloads of decent scoring opportunities, the ball flying over the roof of the stand time after time. A few more sample excerpts:
67 minutes – Dunn takes the ball past three men, beats the keeper but his shot is cleared off the line.
70 minutes – Ollie Allen replaces Dunn (tactical) and almost immediately gets put through by Kilkenny but sees his shot kicked off the line
72 minutes – Kilkenny puts Nick Wright through but his shot is kicked off the line
85 minutes – a cracking drive from Kilkenny goes just wide
86 minutes – a corner is driven low across the edge of the penalty area, Kilkenny swivels on the shot but scoops it over the bar.
88 minutes – Allen chips the keeper but disappointingly his shot goes over the bar. Even more disappointingly to those of us taking notes, his shot fails to go over the stand.
Everton, as you will have gathered, have astutely adopted the tactic of always keeping at least three players on the line to kick the ball away when Ruddy has missed it
Finally, in the 90th minute, the inevitable happens. As is always the case in these kind of games, the team who’s been under the cosh for the entire game break away. Normally, they win with some kind of tragic deflection, but this time the Everton player (I think it was a substitute – Elder?) pokes his shot wide with Blues’ defence all over the shop.
Ref blows the whistle and we all go home.
Blues: Legzdins, Cotterill, Lazaridis, Oji (Hall, 69), Tebily, Clapham, Kilkenny, Clemence, Kuqi, Dunn (Allen, 56), Wright.
Everton: Ruddy, Wynne, Molyneux, Boyle, Wright, Harris, Seargent, Phelan, Anichebe (Elder, 57), Hopkins, Kissock.