As gloating goes, it really was missing the point somewhat. Walking into the office on Wednesday morning, I was rounded on by my West Ham supporting boss (whose team edged past Cheltenham 2-1) and a Gillingham supporting co-worker (whose team didn’t even make the second round), keen to try and rub it in about the League Cup result at Derby. To be honest though, I didn’t mind. It’s the biggest cliché in football that a side can now ‘concentrate on the league’ but the fact of the matter is, that’s exactly what I was thinking.
Listening to the slightly flat sounding commentary on Tuesday, I’d been quite convinced that Uwe had done the right thing with the side he named. It was a chance to test youth and squad players in a cup we had no realistic chance of winning, whilst avoiding any further injury to those likely to start at the weekend.
So why then, 24 hours later, does it suddenly feel rather hollow given it was a team selection I agreed with and a headache of a tournament we don’t need?
To read the rest of this article, season 2013/14 is now available to download onto Kindle, in full. Containing previously unseen content, you can do so here for less than the cost of one matchday programme.
Thanks for reading over the course of the campaign. For now I need to make space on this page for any follow up. The ‘close season’ / World Cup columns continue in full, further on in this site.
BrentfordFC 
I left at half-time. Did I miss much second-half?