For the definition of a ‘banana skin’, you could hardly have done much better than consult our Capital One Cup match at Shrewsbury on Tuesday night.
Lower league club on a hot streak of form? Check. Tipping rain? Check. Pitch tending towards the condition of a children’s paddling pool in certain areas? Check again. Capacity crowd? Check. In fact, specially enhanced capacity crowd. (The sponsors got some extra seats in for the occasion.)
Throw in a few injury problems and suspensions in key areas for the visiting club, and the fact that only about 10 minutes had passed since the final whistle blew on that visiting side’s last, relatively taxing league game, and you had an occasion which, to the viewer of a nervous disposition, could hardly have looked more yellow or more slippery or more obviously strewn across a pavement.
The fact that no chortlesome slapstick outcome ultimately ensued was, then, another reason to take quiet satisfaction in the encouraging sure-footedness of this current squad, now impressively unbeaten in 15 games across all competitions, apparently immune to the concept of ‘priorities’ (be they league, Champions League or Capital One Cup), and capable of traction, we now learn, on both a slippery pitch at Shrewsbury on a wet Tuesday night and a banana skin.
Incredible scenes on the full-time whistle at Old Trafford last Sunday; players and fans, their faces wet with tears of happiness, rejoiced and clutched each other in disbelief, scarves twirled and flags flew, fireworks exploded in the air,
tickertape fell from the skies in quantities unseen since the Apollo 11 astronauts were driven in glory through the streets of New York, and ecstatic supporters jigged in their seats and then danced out into the Manchester night, their revels just beginning.
How tempting it was, in those moments, to imagine a visitor to the planet watching these images unfold, and turning to his human guide to ask: ‘Why are your earthlings so behaving?’ And the guide would have had no choice but to reply, ‘It is because Manchester United have just drawn 1-1 at home.’
I suppose we ought to concede that it wasn’t just any old 1-1 draw, though. It was a 1-1 draw secured with almost the last kick of the game following a highly inconvenient sending-off for the opposition. You certainly don’t see too many of those.
You’ll remember, perhaps all too clearly, how it panned out in those dying seconds. Our right-back had just been booked for (I think) giving a hard stare to Angel Di Maria and simultaneously breathing outwards, causing the United player to stumble slightly. Unfortunately, our right-back had already been booked, earlier in the game, for (again, I think)
sneezing without using a handkerchief. (Apologies if I have got the precise details of those two offences slightly wrong. I’m taking a stab at these explanations on the grounds that, at the time, it was almost impossible to see what the referee was finding fault with. Obviously, I’m sure he had his reasons.)
And then, of course, with our right-back absent from the pitch, there was suddenly a large hole on the pitch, in the exact size and shape of Brana Ivanovic, who had been very much the opposite of a hole up to this point. Which in turn meant that, when the ensuing free-kick arrived in our penalty area, Marouane Fellaini was exactly 100 percent freer than he would otherwise have been, or certainly 100 percent less encumbered by a formidable piece of Serbian defender.
Even then, United didn’t score because Thibaut Courtois (only moments earlier handed the man of the match award by Gary Neville, which felt ominously like a jinx even at the time – and we all know who Neville used to play for, of course) managed to stop Fellaini’s header… only for the ball to drop freakishly into the space in front of him, creating a chance which Robin van Persie, even on current form, couldn’t miss (although, if you look at the replay you’ll see that he gave it a good old go).
Cue those scenes of unbridled joy. Now, you could say that it’s a mark of how spectacularly United have fallen from their former eminence over these past couple of years, that a point at home in the fourth minute of time-added-on is deemed all but worthy of an open-top bus tour. That would be small-minded and ungenerous, though, wouldn’t it?
Better, surely, to point out that life is short, and so is football – even when more than four minutes gets added on to it, as it tends to at Old Trafford – so you take your pleasures where and when you can. And don’t let’s forget that United were on their way to their third league defeat of the season. As it was they came
back to record their fourth draw. Of course, it didn’t feel like it at the time, nor for a number of hours afterwards, but we, too, had some reason to rejoice in the wake of this result, in the sense that, with Manchester City already having contrived to lose that weekend, it usefully expanded our lead over them at the top of the table.
And no one could deny that to be four points clear of Southampton, to be six points clear of Manchester City and to be (count ‘em) 10 points clear of Manchester United, after just 10 games, and with further league trips to Manchester entirely off the agenda for the remainder of the season, is to be in a happy enough position.
Indeed, if we manage to get it right against QPR on Saturday afternoon, we’ll be nine points clear of City and 13 points clear of United before those two sides play each other on Sunday. Though, of course, being a modest and sensible club, who likes to go about our business quietly and with decorum and a sense of perspective at all times, we’ll save the ticker-tape for bigger days.
Giles Smith is a columnist for the official Chelsea FC website and his weekly piece is published every Thursday throughout the season.
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