Who sanctioned this? And more shirt news

So distracted had I been by Rio Ferdinand’s Roger Moore tribute show yesterday that I forgot to mention the other salient Brentford and World Cup news from Sunday. Firstly, Gary Lineker’s awkward ‘reveal’ of the trailer for the new series of Doctor Who was the straw that finally pushed me to ITV.

Don’t get me wrong, I like a quick spin in the Tardis but the almost embarrassed segue from half time analysis in a, supposedly advert free show, killed the mood of the game stone dead whilst, at the same time, setting my more geekish tendencies into an elevated state of nerdery.

It was an unnecessary distraction that just pushed me to the light channel. If we were going to get adverts and hideous monsters, then I may aswell just go for the full Adrian Chiles experience.

From Rio Ferdinand’s jacket to this….

 

From a Brentford perspective, there were also more snippets of shirt news lurking out there in cyberspace – a preview much more welcome than a face full of daleks. A quick trawl of twitter will help you locate these but I’m very pleased to hear that the castle badge will return in some form on merchandise in the club shop.

More importantly, it seems the club are looking at one part of the 125th anniversary celebrations being a game with some commemorative wording added to the badge on our new shirt. With the potential for some of these to be on sale, too, I can already hear Mrs. Bruzon hiding my wallet .

It did also get me thinking about what is the correct protocol for this sort of commemorative wording? Around the club badge in a circular pattern or horizontally – whether underneath it or more centrally?

Commemorative wording – generally spells tears

My own preference is for the horizontal – under the club badge. I’m not an owl and so, bereft of the ability to rotate my head through 360 degrees (or whatever it is they can do) struggle to read the circular text.

Does it matter? Probably not. I’ll still buy one if the possibility arises but I just know what I prefer – whatever the rules are on this sort of thing.

‘Celebrating like they’d won the FA Cup…..’ (The story of Brentford’s 2013/14 promotion campaign, amongst other football related chatter) – is now available as a digital book. Featuring the best of the not so bad columns from last season, and some new content, you can download it here for your kindle / digital device.

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Rio? Roger? Changes at Griffin Park?

Is Rio Ferdinand swapping Manchester United for a new role at Easyjet? Or perhaps a Royal Navy commander? Given the commentary on social media last night, he might even have found time to fly Brentford back from the Florida training camp.

The World Cup ended with a win for Germany and the BBC panelist attracting as much interest in his suit as his punditry. Twitter was awash with comments about one of the most talked about bits of fashion since Liverpool rocked the ‘Man from Del Monte’ look at the 1996 FA Cup final.

These are all over the internet now (my own effort below) with, surprisingly, former England captain Michael Vaughan being amongst the chief protagonists.

Flying home from Rio?

However, despite all the gentle ribbing pointed at Rio he’s actually in great company. It is universally accepted that Roger Moore is, hands down, the best man to ever fill the role of James Bond. Indeed, much of the classic Moonraker saw 007 based in Rio de Janeiro where, of course, last night’s final took place.

As such, it was some what fitting that the best of the observations about Ferdinand’s jacket was not an airline related gag but one that showed what esteemed company he is in. Nobody can carry off a safari suit/blazer/polo neck like Roger and so the mantra must have been, “If you can’t beat them, join them”.

The name’s Ferdinand. Rio Ferdinand

Back in TW8, a stroll past Griffin Park at the weekend revealed two things.

Firstly, we remain none the wiser as to who the roof sponsor will be on the New Road. A peek through the gap in the fence by the ticket office reveals this to be still covered in undercoat. Despite our proximity to Heathrow, there’s been no sign of Rio up a ladder with a few tins of the budget airline’s trademark orange paint.

And then looking into the turnstile, there is a mysterious object lurking under a clubshop plastic bag. The same thing appears in each one and so I can only presume this is the much anticipated ‘electronic ticketing system’.

What’s under the bag?

 

Not quite up there on the ’shirt’ reveal but when things are this quiet, I’ll clutch at any straw of Brentford related news.

Roll on the pre-season friendlies. Please.

‘Celebrating like they’d won the FA Cup…..’ (The story of Brentford’s 2013/14 promotion campaign, amongst other football related chatter) – is now available as a digital book. Featuring the best of the not so bad columns from last season, and some new content, you can download it here for your kindle / digital device.

Was this the worst performance ever? Come on England.

Not the football team. I thought England did really well against Italy in their opening World Cup game last night and, to be fair, were unfortunate to come away without at least a point. Indeed, there was enough from Roy’s boys in the opening 15 minutes to excite more than the whole of the ‘no show’ in South Africa 2010 put together.

In a tournament that has been all about goals, goals, goals the England – Italy game delivered more and was anything but the dour, cautious 0-0 this numpty predicted. Ok, we lost but we played well in doing so. With the emphasis being very much about England on the front foot rather than camped in the defensive third, I’m anything but downbeat about our chances of progress.

My disdain is more for Phil Neville. The BBC really have dropped the ball in their team selection at the World Cup. The likes of Lineker, Shearer and Henry are still street ahead of anything ITV have to offer but are they taking it for granted?

Things got off to a bad start on Friday with the Manchester United referencing Rio Ferdinand. He continued name-dropping on Saturday (yawn) but things then hit a real low when we switched to the main game.

Phil Neville, as analyst in the commentary box, seems to have had all the charisma surgically removed from him prior to taking his seat (that is, assuming he had any charisma in the first instance). For a game that kicked off at 11pm, the last thing a tired audience needed were the soporific tones of this human Horlicks. It was like listening to a robot. He really was that monotone.

Just one more needed to complete my sticker album

Ironic, considering we really needed a robot on the pitch. Daniel Sturridge’s fine equaliser saw a celebration that was less Peter Crouch and more seasick scarecrow.

To compound the felony, with both Leighton Baines and Andrea Pirlo having second half set piece efforts in front of goal, Phil couldn’t even give us a, “And this is Saunders territory”.

The BBC still has far too much in the tank to be worried by ITV but their choice of Phil Neville seems a really odd one. His brother, Gary, does a fine job on Sky – I’m the first to admit. Clearly, it doesn’t run in the family.

Or perhaps, with the selection of Rio, the thought is that Manchester United’s fallen stars are the future of football punditry.

I hope not.

‘Chiles understudy’ sees Spain given a real clogging.

The World Cup exploded into stunning life on Friday. Brazil’s lucky win over Croatia seemed a distant memory after the Netherlands devastated Spain – leaving them bloodied and bruised, like a gored matador awaiting the fatal blow. Much as I love Brentford, and can’t wait for their foray in the Championship, this was the standout match from three games of truly world-class football we could only aspire to.

As ever, if you want the match reports (or the highlights) then read the BBC. For me the salient points of the day’s activity were:

ITV, who I had lambasted yesterday, redeemed themselves somewhat with first use of World Cup favourite, “For those of you just coming from work, the score is”. Sadly, I was still coming home from work, so missed this moment although am reliably informed that 6.25pm was the time; Mexico – Cameroon the game. For the record, a 1-0 win for the Central Americans.

Unfortunately, their oversized score graphic doesn’t seem to have shrunk any overnight and still takes up more screen space than Adrian Chiles. Please ITV, slim this down a bit or, at the least, move it more into the corner.

The BBC then had their turn and seem to have taken the very short-term view with their choice of panel. How they must have laughed a few months ago, at the thought of using Rio (Ferdinand, that is) in Rio (de Janeiro).

Sadly, nobody back home was laughing at his continual name-dropping. I didn’t realise, and you may not have caught this, but apparently he used to play for Manchester United

As one correspondent put it to me afterwards, he has “All the screen charisma of an 18 wheeler lorry reversing very slowly around a corner”. An ironic statement, given that’s much the same as his defensive turning circle

Still for all the downside of Rio (who looked positively distraught at having to stay behind afterwards to answer Facebook questions whilst, presumably, the rest of the panel went out for a few cold ones), the BBC had the pick of the games.

Spain 1 Netherlands 5. The Dutch masters (sorry) obliterated Spain, the highlight for me being Robin Van Persie’s exquisite header to level things. If ever you wanted to see footballing perfection then this was it.

The timing, the run, the dive, the connection and the precision. It makes you wonder if David Moyes might still be in a job had he got this sort of form out of the Manchester United man last season.

Then there was more use of the referee’s spray paint (isn’t this just shaving foam?). Whatever it is, I love this idea although am waiting for one of them to ‘go rogue’ and start freestyle art on the pitch.

Proceedings were rounded off with Chile racing into a 2 goal lead against Australia before allowing them back into the match. The Aussies, presumably put off their game by the awful kit they’d been forced to wear – the rather camp looking combination of tight yellow shirt/shorts and long white socks.

Whilst Chile held on to win 3-1, it was a much tighter, and more exciting affair, than it had any right to be after the Australian ‘no show’ for the first fifteen minutes.

That was Friday. Today sees the first outing for England, who play Italy on the spray painted (green, not white) pitch of Manaus. It promises to be an exciting day of football although, after the fifteen goals from the opening four games so far, I’m betting Roy’s boys will bring these back down to earth with a 0-0 bump.

But don’t listen to me – as somebody much wiser than me pointed out last night, my twitter observations are much akin to a #Chiles-understudy. And, to be fair, he’s probably right.

Referees ‘paint’ – comes in three sizes