Spiffs 2
Grimrash 58, Voldemort 84 (pen)
Nottingham Forest 0

A PILE OF CRAP

Piles of crap are made up of crap, but this crap can be divided up into individual pieces of crap, or at least small bits of crap stuck together like out-of-date Coco Pops. Itemised below are these individual elements which contributed to the overall crappiness of this game.

CRAP 1   The atmosphere. The Geordie faithful generally sound like an out-of-control herd of cows, but for the first half they just browsed on their own crap as Forest's new-found defensive discipline kept them at bay.

CRAP 2   The officials. The main man was Mister Hankey, and his bias/incompetence stank the place out like that farmer spraying chickenshit over the fence onto your bathroom window. The Spiffs committed 16 fouls, Forest 15, yet Forest received 4 yellow cards, Spiffs none. At one point, Joe Linton kicked a spectator to death with an iron boot, and no action was taken. Actually, that's not true, but you know what we mean.

CRAP 3   Ugly. The Spiffs are an ugly side. The crowd look and sound ugly, the players play like demented animals, and Gordon looks suspiciously like something from 28 Days Later. Eddie Howe has the face of somebody who has walked into a door. Some of this may not be true, but we don't care any more.

CRAP 4   The game. The game itself was horrible. Even during that first half, when Forest played with the discipline and organisation of a Nuno side, and even showed some nice touches going forward, we felt that the pressure would tell eventually, especially as Wood was misfiring again and nearly all Forest's attacks stalled at the sharp end. Plus they failed to acknowledge that playing it out from the back might lead to trouble. At half time, however, the verdict was that Forest had sort of coped well, and might even nick a win in the magical world of Youneverknowland. In short, the first half was not exactly crap, but had the potential to be so.

CRAP 5   The game. The only thing that could go wrong was that the Forest players would have to listen to Pog's half time team talk, be thoroughly confused by his instructions, and give away 2 goals in the second half. God knows what he tells them, but Pog second halves are not a beauteous thing to behold. Perhaps he told them to dick about in critical positions and give away free kicks and penalties. We'll never know. What we do know is that his substitutions, especially taking off Yates, made Forest far more vulnerable and just as unlikely to score. The second half was like the kind of crap you get when you bag up CRAPS 1 to 4, dump it in the boot of your car, and spend the next few days wondering where the smell is coming from.

CRAP 6   The mood. We don't know what your mood is, but ours is pretty sour. What we find really crappy is the continuing attempts to shift the blame for our predicament away from the manager and owner. A minority of people seem convinced that Nuno is to blame, but they sound more and more like MAGA supporters employing that weird form of doublethink they have over there.

CRAP 7   The future. What's really crap about all this is that, one way or another, Forest are buggered. On the one hand, Pog leaves, but it's improbable that any manager worth his salt would be willing to take on this club with this owner. On the other hand, Pog stays, promising "it'll be right" till we all get sucked into the devil's butt-hole and find out what hell is really like. We understand it's quite crap.

CRAP 8   Waiting to see what does or doesn't happen. Good luck everybody.