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Rob Ridgway's "Rat Pack"


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Wednesday, September 24

Reading v Southampton, Third Round, Carling Cup

One of the things that’s a bit dicey about early round cup ties is the low energy level they can sometimes generate.

Take tonight, for example. If you can’t get into your favorite Premier League ground to see your team play in the league, chances are usually excellent you can get in for a Carling Cup match. About half the capacity of the Madjeski Stadium showed up tonight dressed as blue seats.

In terms of getting an extra home gate for the match, there wasn’t much in it. So, the match was for player pride as much as for advancement. It wasn’t for the huge crowd.

Southampton’s coach arrived late this afternoon and the players went straight to their changing room. I was just arriving at that time, and since the home and visiting rooms at the Madejski Stadium are separated only by a hallway, I passed McCarthy on the way in.

We looked at each other and exchanged nods of recognition. We didn’t say a word to each other, and prepared our respective teams for the night’s match.

The door to our changing room closed behind me, and I shook my head. “I don’t know what he’s got against me,” I mused to Dillon, who was standing alongside. “But I want to stop it.”

# # #

A home team of higher division should take a match like this by the throat, and we did. Almost immediately, we began to generate chances.

Defener Titus Bramble, known among wags in the game for a tendency toward catastrophic error, nearly made one fifteen minutes into the match, when his backpass toward keeper Bartosz Bialkowski didn’t travel quite far enough. Lita’s eyes got really, really big for a moment and the striker swooped onto the ball – but missed the target to the right, to his self-disgust.

McCarthy didn’t move a muscle, which I’m sure had to be very difficult for him to do. He was presenting the image of the fellow in charge, and I’m sure his players appreciated a steady hand on the till.

That didn’t change the fact that we were dominating his side. Oster barely missed with a piledriver a few minutes later and Shane Long came close on 35 minutes as well, blazing over on a twenty-five yard free kick that got those fans who showed up out of their seats for a moment.

Despite dominating the half, we didn’t score, which was a source of annoyance to me as the teams filed to the changing room. “They’re playing hard to get,” I insisted. “Watch for the counter, but let’s squeeze them until it hurts in the second half. You’re better than they are and I expect you to prove it.”

Mindful of our sluggish performance against Yeovil Town in the friendly portion of our fixture list, I was a bit doubtful as to the effect my words would have – since they were virtually the same kind of words I had used back then. In fact, many of the same players in this match also heard the words at Huish Park and I honestly wondered how they’d react.

The chance at a little redemption certainly appealed to Long, who got my attention when he buried Little’s cross nine minutes after the restart. His header was inch-perfect and at last we were on our way. Surely now the Saints defense would crumble and open gaps as they sought an equalizer.

Only it didn’t happen that way. McCarthy, to his credit, stayed patient. His wings did start to take a more aggressive role, but the 4-5-1 he played after the goal was virtually identical to the 4-5-1 he played before it.

We still bossed the match, but Saints began to show signs of life with about twenty minutes to play. McCarthy was taking a calculated risk as his team now came out of its shell.

Unfortunately, Stephen Hunt then went down under a hard challenge from Liam Lawrence and had to come off. Kalou was practically jumping up and down for a chance to play so I put him into the match to give us perhaps the ultimate counter-option wearing my colors.

We were holding them off with some ease. Rudi Skacel came on after 75 minutes to replace Andrew Surman and it was getting to the point where I was ready to pull back and protect the lead. I pulled us back into a flat 4-4-2 just as Jhon Viáfara moved the ball into our half, crossing for Gregorz Rasiak.

Federici came out to collect – and then stopped. He was of two minds and couldn’t make up either of them. Seeing this, Rasiak outjumped Ingimarsson and headed high into the air, over the flailing arm of my stranded keeper. The ball bounced once on the way to goal and settled into the back of our net ten minutes from time.

They went nuts. It was an extremely intelligent play by the striker and an exceedingly timid one by my reserve keeper. Now it was my turn to keep a stone face, as I proceeded to get my second substitute ready.

It was Kitson, one of the five regulars I had on the bench. I was hoping for a late miracle, but when it didn’t come, I put Dave on at the start of extra time I never imagined would be necessary.

# # #

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Gonna be a wild finish, I'm afraid ....

___

I changed formation. I went to 4-3-3, moving players forward and trying my level best to energize the squad. It didn’t help.

Fifteen stultifying minutes passed and we changed ends. Then fifteen more, equally stultifying, minutes passed with neither team managing so much as a shot on target in the entire half-hour of extremely poor extra time. It was especially poor from my point of view.

Naturally, McCarthy was eating it up, while my frustration grew but didn’t show. I knew the stat sheet would show huge advantages for us, but unless we did something in penalties it wouldn’t matter at all. From the spot, a smaller club has just as good a chance as a bigger club in many circumstances and he was plainly hoping for a triumph in the battle of nerves.

My best penalty takers from the sixteen players available were already out there so as the waning seconds of extra time slipped past I knew I had done all I could do. I spoke briefly to the players, reminded them of my expectations, and proceeded to sit in the dugout to watch the penalties.

Our first taker was Kalou and I had no doubts about what he would do. He didn’t disappoint. Liam Lawrence then stepped up for Saints and immediately sent Federici the wrong way.

Kitson then took the ball and easily beat Bialkowski, only to be countered by Rasiak for them, making it 2-2. Little tucked a wonderfully-taken effort under the crossbar to Bialkowski’s left to put us back in front, only for Seyi Olofinjana to power the ball past Federici to the left, even though the keeper guessed correctly on direction.

With the score 3-3, Oster grabbed the ball and, full of confidence, proceeded to drive into the keeper’s body. A howl of disappointment arose from those in the crowd of 13,194 which remained, and the door was open for Saints to close us out.

Viáfara took the ball, placed it on the spot, did a happy little step back to wind up, and beat Federici over his right arm. Unfortunately for him, though, goals do have crossbars, and the woodwork saved us.

With new life in a 3-3 draw, Long was next up. He tucked his penalty away in the lower left corner and Sam Rickets needed to score to keep Saints in the match.

Federici dove to his left and the ball met his outstretched arm just in front of the post. The keeper slapped the ball away and we had survived.

Our bench erupted like we had won something bigger than the game, and I did nothing to discourage them. I looked over at McCarthy and walked to him.

“Brave effort,” I said, extending my hand.

“Should have done you,” he said, giving me a perfunctory congratulations.

His attitude didn’t matter. The board said they wanted the Fourth Round, and that’s what they got.

Reading 1 (Long 2nd , 54)

Southampton 1 (Rasiak 7th, 80)

(Reading wins 4-3 on penalties)

A – 13,194, Madejski Stadium, Reading

Man of the Match – Gregorz Rasiak, Southampton

# # #

“Do you think you might have been looking past Southampton to Manchester United on Saturday?”

I suppose it was the obvious question. Despite a 21-8 edge in attempts and a 9-4 advantage in shots on target, we just hadn’t done the business in front of goal. The squad players had gotten the job done but had taken the longest possible route to do it.

“No, I don’t think so,” I said. “They played us tough tonight and they were well organized. We had much the better of play for the majority of this match so I don’t think it can be fairly said that we took them lightly. They were just hard to break down.”

“What did you and Mick McCarthy say to each other after the match?”

“No comment. If you want to know, you’ll have to get it from him.”

“What do you think about Rasiak getting the man of the match award as a second half substitute? Surely you played better than that?”

“I’m not impressed,” I said. “Long scored our goal, took the winning penalty and had a strong match throughout. You’d think that on our pitch we’d get a little more consideration but what matters the most is that we are through to the fourth round.”

However, that wasn’t what I told the squad when I returned to the changing room. “What I saw tonight was the absolute minimum acceptable effort,” I said. “We are through due to penalties and well played for that, but without them we might still be out there trying to score a goal. This effort tonight was the baseline. If you’re over that line so much the better, but if you’re below it, you’d better come to training ready to run because that’s what you’ll do.”

They looked like they got the message, even though they would have preferred not to hear it. But then, I hadn’t looked like they did for too much of the match – industrious but lacking the ideas needed to break down a side that should have succumbed to them.

We still have more work to do. With United coming in on Saturday we have to get it done quickly.

# # #

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Thursday, September 25

Today’s Post headline said it all.

“Mad at the Stad” glared back at me along with a picture of my glowering expression after Rasiak’s equalizer as I opened the morning edition, with Patty next to me at the kitchen table. I read Weatherby’s match summary, which told all of Berkshire with the bark off that my side yesterday was a mile wide but an inch deep.

“Can’t argue with a word of it,” I said, and she could sense my unease.

“What will it take, Rob?” she asked.

“We’re just going to have to start playing better,” I said. “We have consecutive matches against Big Four opponents coming up and if we’re going to earn our keep against them we have a lot of work to do.”

“That isn’t what I meant,” she said. “I meant what will it take to get you smiling? You went through to the Fourth Round last night, remember?”

I nodded. “I do remember. But we made it hard on ourselves.”

“So what? McCarthy had a long coach ride home with nothing to show for it. Surely you don’t mind that.”

That made me smile. “Not in the slightest,” I said.

# # #

Today, though, the media gaggle was all about Reading’s past manager instead of about its present one.

The pre-match media gathering for a Manchester United match is always bigger than usual. They draw media from all over the world due to their cornucopia of international players. For example, I was interviewed by Korean television today because Ji-Sung Park is expected to play against us.

And while the lovely young Asian girl who interviewed me was certainly nice eye candy, I saw most of my afternoon as simply something to get through while Dillon ran the training session in my stead.

There are two schools of thought on how to play against United, as near as I can tell. Neither of them seems to work very well.

One is to sit in 4-5-1, counter them and wait for their forwards to bludgeon you to death with their skill. I’m not keen on the idea of Ronaldo, Nani, Anderson, Scholes, Carrick, Giggs and company running roughshod over us – just as I wasn’t keen on Chelsea’s engine room doing the same thing.

The other school of thought, utilized far less frequently and almost never by teams of our size, is to try to take the ball from them and take the game to them. That’s extraordinarily hard to do with one striker, and since I’m at home if I come out 4-5-1 I’m going to be accused of cowardice or worse.

At this point the voices in my head are arguing about whether I should run a flat 4-4-2, a counter 4-4-2, or my favored 4-1-3-2. Our first eleven should be able to hang with them – the question becomes how we do when it’s late in the match and their superior depth will start to tell. As well as we’ve played in the league to this point, Weatherby was right – we aren’t deep with Premiership-quality players. That will take time.

These were all questions I received from various media today. It was nice to talk about football, even if the majority of the questions weren’t about my team.

I was asked repeatedly about Coppell, and finally I made a blanket statement. “Look, Steve moved on,” I finally said. “I’ve got the office in the changing room now and this club plays for me, not for Steve. I hope he gets a great reception from our fans for what he accomplished here, but my job is to meet and exceed what he did. I can’t get caught up in what has happened in the past – I have to live in the now and that means I have to get points off Manchester United. That’s the focus for me now. Not Steve Coppell.”

However, it soon got worse. Much worse, in fact. It was a familiar voice who made it that way.

“Rob, could you tell us why Emanuel Pogatetz is having such a hard time winning over the fans after what you paid for him?”

I smiled. “Stefano, I think Pogatetz is going to be just fine. But aren’t you a long way from Padua?”

“Not any more,” he said, stepping forward to flash me a new credential. “Stefano Emiliani, new Gazzetto Dello Sport English football and Premiership columnist, at your service.”

# # #

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He does have that habit of showing up at the worst possible time ...

___

Friday, September 26

“Women. Can’t live with ‘em … pass the beer nuts.” – Norm Peterson, ‘Cheers’

I suppose I could have been a little more genteel than I was with my old "friend" yesterday. After he introduced himself, it was all I could do not to provoke an international incident.

Like Norm Peterson’s quote above, sometimes it’s very hard to live with journalists – especially now that this particular one is going to be running all over England’s mountains green. The local media looked on with keen interest and I knew I had to be very careful how I answered him, to avoid creating trouble.

“Nice to see you here, Stefano,” I finally said. “Did your ‘beloved Calcio’ finally wear thin?”

“Very funny,” he said. “I just couldn’t resist writing about you, so I came to England.”

Now the local writers were taking interest so I answered his initial question, which was about Pogatetz. I’m sure our locals will figure out who he is soon enough, but in a way it’s too bad he wasn’t here writing about the Premiership last season. The first time Stefano had tried to rip Sir Alex Ferguson in print he would have gotten his goatee fed to him.

Now he’s my worry – and anyone else’s who he doesn’t happen to like. And since the football media seems as interested in covering itself as it is with covering the teams in their respective countries, it’s going to be an interesting fall.

# # #

United arrived this afternoon and had a quick training session on the Madejski Stadium ground. That meant Coppell was back and I did my very best to stay away from him.

Not because I don’t like him, mind you. I’ve never met the man and won’t until I face him on the touchline tomorrow. It would just have been a circus if I had been around him today.

My squad is as ready as it’s going to get. Our morning session was quite a spirited workout and we finished in our indoor facility this afternoon with a last look at United while the visitors were using our home pitch.

We’re as healthy as we can be with the obvious exception of Magallón, and even he is progressing as well as can be expected from his broken leg. I did my sit-down interview this afternoon with match broadcasters Sky Sports from our facility so as not to get in United’s way.

Naturally, the first question was about Coppell. “I hope he has a nice time right up until the moment we kick off,” I smiled. “We’ll be perfect hosts right until that moment.”

They asked one question, though, that nobody else had thought to ask. “All the angles about your nationality have been done to death except perhaps for this one,” I was asked. “What about an American facing arguably the most popular English team in America, Manchester United?”

I was taken aback for a moment. “I think United has a worldwide following and that’s fairly obvious from the amount of shirts they sell with Chinese lettering on them,” I smiled. “Obviously they’re quite popular in the States but that doesn’t change how you prepare for them. I’m looking forward to their challenge, yes, and I think everyone wants to prove themselves against the best possible competition. I felt the same way when we played Chelsea, I’ll feel the same way when we play Arsenal next week and I’ll feel the same way when we face Liverpool. There’s a lot of great competition in this league, though, and the week you place one opponent above any other is the week when you get beat.”

Then the topic switched to my team, which I much preferred. I was asked to relate my most pleasant surprise.

“Hard to narrow it down to just one in the early going,” I said. “I can’t separate Ferreira, Kalou and Maloney. They’ve all done a terrific job for this club and brought us different strengths right when we’ve needed them. I am pleased with all of them and pleased so far with the play of just about everyone wearing our shirt. I’m seeing real passion out there for the most part and even though we’ve hit a bit of a rough patch in our last few matches we think we’re ready to start playing well again.”

# # #

“Oh, no, not him.”

Patty was genuinely upset when I related the news of Emiliani’s return.

“Honey, you need to let go of that,” I said. “I’ve got media people here that will keep him well under control. He won’t get to me in an uncontrolled setting like he could last year. It’s just not going to happen. I have staff whose direct responsibility is to support me with the media.”

“Yes, but he still writes what he wants,” she said.

“About the whole Premier League, not just me,” I said. “If he keeps writing for Gazzetto Dello Sport every week about what a rotten manager he thinks Rob Ridgway is, he’s going to get fired. People will want to read about the whole league.”

“So who does the bully pick on?” she asked.

“Whoever he wants, I guess,” I admitted. “I would like to think he’s going to stick to business and talk about the whole league. That’s what readers want. If I were a journalist, I couldn’t go to Italy and write about just the Rome clubs. It would never do. And he can’t do that here. He’s going to have to get out into the country and see other teams. He won’t be able to just sit around and pick on Reading.”

“I got so tired of him,” she sighed. “Never a good word, never a positive thing to say.”

She was exaggerating – he can grudingly praise when the mood suits him – but admittedly it’s not often. Every manager feels heat from the media once in awhile and I just happen to feel most of it from the same member of the media. At least it’s all in one place.

Still, there’s no sense obsessing over it like I probably did at some times last season. I have other things to worry about – things that can really damage my club and thus my job – and eleven of them will wear Manchester United’s black third strip colors tomorrow on my club’s pitch.

Emiliani can go pound sand as far as I’m concerned.

# # #

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Saturday, September 27

Reading (4-4-0, 4th place) v Manchester United (4-1-2, 8th place) – EPL Match Day #9

Again, it rained.

In Italy, today’s match would have likely been played in 75-80 degree comfort on the Fahrenheit scale. This morning when I woke up it was 13 degrees Centigrade and the rain was again running down the windows of our master bedroom.

“Mommy, I don’t want to go to school today,” I sighed, and to my right, Patty giggled.

“Up, up, out of bed, young man!” she teased, playfully pushing me along into the kitchen as she greeted me properly.

“Well, since you put it that way,” I smiled, taking my bride into my arms. “I suppose I can go out and play in the rain.”

# # #

Unfortunately, things were little better on the weather front as we arrived at the ground. It was raining pretty hard by the time we pulled in, and the Madejski Stadium’s superior drainage capability was the reason we were even considering playing the match in the first place.

Once dry and in the changing rooms, though, I was able to forget about the deluge long enough to go over the match plan once more with Dillon.

“It won’t be artistic today,” he said. “Not if this rain keeps up.”

We talked for a few minutes until Harper stuck his head into my office. “Gaffer, Steve’s outside the rooms. Wants to know if he can stop in and greet you.”

I looked at Dillon, who had worked with Coppell quiet closely. “Kevin, what do you think?” I asked. He had a neutral expression on his face.

“Sure, all right,” he said. I nodded to Harper.

“We’ll come out,” I told my midfielder, and he went ahead to relay the message. Moments later, we followed, and together Kevin and I greeted Reading’s former manager.

He greeted Kevin first, as I would have expected, and the two shared a handshake and greeting. Then he turned to me.

“Rob, welcome to the league,” he said, and we shook hands. “How do you like your job so far?”

“Ask me again at 2:00,” I smiled. “I’ll let you know. Right now, not so bad.”

“It’s a good club to work for,” he said. “They were patient and supportive of me while I was building and they’ll be the same to you, I’m sure.”

I nodded. I haven’t had a bad contact with the club yet and the board has been good to me even while they’ve tweaked me for a few smaller things. Of course, results have been decent so that takes away one reason for criticism.

“Best of luck,” he said. “Don’t want to disrupt you but thought I’d say hello.”

“That’s good of you,” I replied. “Best of luck to you as well.”

# # #

The rain didn’t dampen the spirits of a loud crowd, as 24,134 crammed into the Madejski Construction Site for the match. The warm-ups were anything but, as a chilly wind also began to blow while the players were preparing for the exertions to come.

Just before I left my office for the pre-match team talk, my e-mail flashed. I opened it to read the following message:

Rob:

Good luck today. Do us all proud, okay?

Copper

I smiled, and shut off my BlackBerry before going into the changing room, where the players were all standing in front of their lockers. They were “locked and loaded”, so to speak, and I knew there was obviously no need for a fire-breathing speech.

“Okay, fellows, let me have your attention,” I said. “You aren’t favored in this match. The punters aren’t backing you. But what I see in this room today are players good enough to get this job done. Over the last few matches we’ve been reminded about what can happen to us when we don’t apply ourselves – when we don’t play with good positioning and sufficient passion, two of the five ‘p’s. Today I don’t think you’ll have a problem with passion, but I’m going to put in a good word for position.”

“I’ll be blunt,” I said. “You play out of position against Manchester United and they will eat you alive. Don’t be the man who is responsible for our positioning breaking down today. If they beat us, they beat us – but if you hold your lanes and play your positions, they won’t beat you. I believe in you. Now let’s go, Rat Pack!”

We headed out into the tunnel to be met by United in their all-black third kit, prepared for battle. There weren’t many words exchanged between the players and finally I took my place at the end of the line alongside Coppell. The lines began to move and after the Premier League anthem was played he made his official return to the stadium.

His reception was polite and warm, and he stepped out of the visiting dugout to give a brief wave of thanks to the crowd. After that the pleasantries were over.

We lined up for kickoff and the powerful strains of Van Halen’s Right Now rang out loud and clear. I thought it was perfect and realized that my young friend Mr. Waters had a better handle on this music stuff than I did.

Don't wanna wait 'til tomorrow

Why put it off another day?

One by one, little problems

Build up, and stand in our way

Oh, one step ahead, one step behind it

Now you gotta run to get even

Make future plans I'll dream about yesterday

Come on turn, turn this thing around

Right now

Hey! It's your tomorrow

Right now

Come on, it's everything

Right now

Catch your magic moment

Do it right here and now

It means everything

United then kicked off, and unfortunately for us, we were under siege from the word ‘go’.

Looking to make an early statement, they pushed forward, with Wayne Rooney a glowering menace battling Sonko for position and playing quite well indeed off Carlos Tévez, who was giving Bikey all he wanted.

The other issue I had in the early going was with the ball. I was considering asking the fourth official to toss another one on the pitch so we could have one to play with too. They were all over us.

Young Darron Gibson got a start in midfield from Coppell and he showed that he really wanted to play, picking up the first good chance of the match on nine minutes, forcing Lobont into an acrobatic save.

That seemed to start them off and before long Rooney got into the act. He struck a superb half-volley off Lobont’s left post three minutes later, followed by a run from Ronaldo that was beautiful to watch up until the point where I realized my defenders were watching it as raptly as I was.

I screamed for Kalou, who seemed like he was then galvanized into attention, hotfooting it after United’s mesmerizing winger. It was too late. Ronaldo veered sharply into the box, pulled the ball to his right boot and whipped a shot – that missed the left post by inches.

I sat in the dugout trying not to go into apoplexy. I couldn’t tell if we were in our plan or not – they weren’t letting us have the ball, we couldn’t hold them out of the box, and I realized I was seeing the dictionary definition of “under the cosh” shown to my team without anaesthesia.

So now I stood and stepped out into the rain. I whistled for Bikey’s attention and when he looked over I simply told him to relax.

He looked at me like I had two heads, but did what he was told. Playing tight in this situation was asking for even more trouble than we were already in – I needed us playing in a way that would allow us to breathe. Right at that moment, we couldn’t.

We held them off for the first twenty minutes, which was a feat considering the way they were throwing the ball all over the ground. We then managed to counter. We got the ball deep for the first time in the match, and Kalou pulled back to the middle. The ball rolled free and it was a two-man race between Pazienza and Ronaldo.

Italian beat out Portuguese, and pushed the ball to the right – into the run of Dagoberto. The Brazilian took one step to his right, stepped into the area and cleanly beat Edwin van der Sar to his left post for a one-nil lead to us.

To call it against the run of play would have been kind. To call it welcome was the understatement of the day. To call it a minor miracle would have been accurate. Amazingly, we led and the crowd was electrified.

It was like we had touched a switch. Immediately we played with much more confidence – the first goal had gone to us and we took full advantage.

Now it was United playing tentatively, and we earned a goal kick four minutes later after Pazienza missed from distance. Van der Sar booted the ball back into play and Bikey came up with the ball, heading it to Maloney. He pushed the ball left to Kitson, and the targetman immediately laid the ball on to the right – again into the path of Dagoberto.

Patrice Evra moved to him and Dagoberto gave him a little shoulder dip, flipping the ball around the defender to Evra’s left. Van der Sar left his line to cut the angle and without missing a beat, my striker chipped him.

The ball rolled slowly toward the goal with Nemanja Vidic straining to catch up to it. He was one stride too late, and on 26 minutes we led 2-0.

The place was now an outdoor insane asylum, with the noise from our supporters sounding fully like three times that many. United kicked off wondering how they could possibly be coming to this end.

Our midfield play now took over. We passed the ball with tremendous confidence and even though United generated another fine chance through Michael Carrick’s long drive off Lobont on 37 minutes, we were starting to look decent value for our play.

Lobont had caught Carrick’s drive and started quickly with a long throw to Pogatetz on the left. His lead ball found Kalou in full flight down the left, with John O’Shea straining to catch him. The Ivorian cut the ball back to Maloney, who made all sorts of noise like he wanted to shoot. But he had a better idea.

He found Dagoberto again, who was unmarked in the seam between Vidic and Evra a full thirty yards from the United goal. He looked up, and blasted a curving drive that beat van der Sar around his hands, being placed perfectly inside the left post.

Our bench went absolutely berserk – if it wasn’t a strong candidate for goal of the season I’ve surely missed my guess – and seven minutes from halftime we led mighty United 3-nil. The striker tore off toward the corner flag to celebrate his hat trick earned in seventeen amazing minutes, and it was now time for the same words I had given Bikey half an hour before – but this time with greater urgency.

He ran past me on the way to the kickoff and I grabbed at him. “Settle them down, André,” I said. “Do it. Do it now!

My central defender did as I told him, and United switched to 4-2-4 while I shifted us back into a flat 4-4-2. They poured forward, with malice in their eyes at our impertinent play. Ronaldo immediately charged into the box and missed to the right, Lobont taking his time getting the ball back into play.

The goal kick wound up in Rio Ferdinand’s possession, and the United captain started a buildup down the left. Ronaldo and Nani had switched sides and now it was Faé’s turn to face United’s one-man wrecking crew. Ronaldo moved to the edge of the area and disappeared in a tangle of arms and legs just outside the penalty area.

Yet there was referee Mark Clattenburg pointing to the spot, motioning that Faé had pulled Ronaldo’s shirt. He had awarded a penalty and I was livid.

No, no, no!” I screamed. “It was outside the area!” I waved my arms in furious protest and headed to the fourth official to give him a piece of my mind.

Yet Uriah Rennie would hear nothing of it, and I couldn’t wait to get to a monitor to see the replay.

There was more important business to tend to first, as Ronaldo bounded up off the ground and carried the ball to the spot. He put the ball down, waited for Clattenburg’s whistle, did his patented stutter-step and beat Lobont to his right to give United a lifeline four minutes from the whistle.

You have got to be kidding me!” I yelled, while Coppell didn’t move a muscle in the United dugout. The goal energized United and they poured forward again, seemingly as thick as the rain, while our crowd whistled with anger.

With all the momentum again, on United came. Carrick was on the ball now, passing to the vibrant Gibson thirty yards from our goal. He flicked the ball to the left for Nani, who pulled the ball back to his left and shot.

It hit Bikey. The ball deflected wildly and Lobont had no chance. Just one minute after Ronaldo’s penalty, United was within a goal at 3-2 and the traveling support was in raptures.

Clattenburg’s missed call had given the visitors more than a lifeline – he had put them right back into the match. It was a dogfight again.

We made it to halftime and I watched Clattenburg head to the dressing room, scowling at him as he passed. I joined my team and elected to stay as upbeat as any manager that’s seen his team concede twice in the last five minutes of a half could be.

# # #

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Great story 10-3, it definately does deserve the accolades it has been getting from the readers and is a fine nomination for the Story of the year.

I read Calcio a bit back for the awards and just caught up to this one but didn't want to post till I caught up, anyway keep up the good work.

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Thanks, fellows ... wild first half, eh? :)

___

My anger grew in the dressing room once I had had a look at the replay. Not only was the foul outside the area, it looked like Ronaldo had made a meal of Faé’s touch to his shirt.

Emerse did touch the player, but Ronaldo is famous the world over for drawing penalties. He’s a master at it, and Clattenburg was now well aware of it.

We headed out for the second half and I wasn’t the least bit surprised to see that Coppell had stayed in his 4-2-4. With the lead I wasn’t about to pull too far back – I wanted as much possession as my players could gain as the best way to hold the lead.

Six minutes after the restart, United earned a corner to Lobont’s left. Gibson moved over to take it and put the ball right into the heart of our six-yard box. Ronaldo moved toward the ball, jumped up Ferreira’s back, and outmuscled his fellow Portuguese national to head the ball past Lobont for a 3-3 tie on 51 minutes.

The fightback complete, the United players showed their satisfaction – and to a large extent, rightly so. Our crowd was now silent, having seen my side lose a three-goal lead. I stood again, stepping back out into the rain, and simply clapped my hands.

I then had a few minutes to wait, as Coppell made a double substitution at that point. He pulled off Nani in favor of the great veteran Paul Scholes, and brought on Louis Saha, who had spurned the idea of a move to us in the close season, in place of the excellent Gibson.

My players were looking to see the mood I was in, and I wasn’t going to betray the churning in my stomach by panicking. We restarted the match, now back to blank paper, and got back to work.

We came back strongly, to our credit. Maloney and Dagoberto had been giving United fits since the middle of the first half and as we moved forward they did so again. This time they worked the ball to the left, but instead of shooting the striker tried to play the ball back toward the raider.

The problem was that Vidic was in the way. Moments later, though, it turned into our advantage as the defender’s deflection played in Maloney to the left of van der Sar with no defender close to him.

Maloney’s run was smooth, his placement perfect – beating the Dutchman to his right post to restore a lead on 54 minutes of 4-3.

Again the Madejski Stadium came alive and with a huge break having gone our way, we set about protecting the hard-won lead.

Coppell threw United back into the 4-2-4 that had netted them three goals, and since he had Saha on as another striker, they looked positively menacing up front with Rooney, Tevez, Ronaldo and Saha lined up across their front.

That didn’t last long – Tevez was laboring and on 67 minutes he left in favor of Dong Fangzhuo, leaving Coppell out of substitutions 23 minutes from time – while I still had all of mine.

Now Lobont stood tall, denying Rooney not once but twice right after the restart, slapping the striker’s shot right back to him for a second bite of the cherry that the keeper palmed over the post, jumping back to his feet with a scream as he did.

On seventy minutes, I made my first move, taking off Kitson in favor of Harper’s experience, dropping to 4-5-1 with two holding midfielders. Harper held up well, and six minutes later, I made a second move to bolster the defensive credentials of the side.

I brought on Rosenior for Maloney, which allowed me to put Pogatetz in the middle and play Bikey’s dominant marking skill in the center of the park to try to deny supply up front. I liked the look of our defense at that point and even though United was flailing away with long shots from outside twenty yards, we were solid when we had to be.

We got inside the last ten minutes and we prepared for a nerve-wracking finish. We picked up a throw-in deep in United’s half and Dagoberto, now playing as a lone striker, barely missed a fourth goal when his turn-and-shoot fizzed wide of the right post.

Van der Sar kicked long and United came at us again, with Sonko heading an early cross behind for a corner. Carrick took this one, and Bikey denied the leaping Ronaldo by heading just clear. The ball rolled toward the edge of our area, and Fangzhuo got to it, turning to shoot. He hit a skimmer off the turf – and it slipped between Lobont’s arm and his body.

The ball shot home seven minutes from time and we were tied again at 4-4. Fangzhuo celebrated his first goal for Manchester United and I was ready for an aspirin.

This time, there was a bit of relief mixed in with United’s celebrations while our reaction was one of frustration. My personal reaction was to wonder, aloud, if there was a goofier way to concede four goals in a match.

In the hard rain, four goals a side seemed to be enough for both teams, who played out the match in a more or less conservative fashion. I was still steaming about the penalty award, though – I did feel it had changed the whole match.

Clattenburg blew the final whistle and I approached Coppell as the fans applauded an eight-goal thriller. He extended his hand – the draw hurts him more than it hurts me for the time being, even though it came on the road – and we shared commiseration on the match.

“Best of luck, Rob,” he finally said, before preceding me down the tunnel. “You fought very hard.”

I nodded, and unlike Mick McCarthy, didn’t say what I surely felt. We should have won.

Reading 4 (Dagoberto 3rd 21; 4th 26; 5th 38; Maloney 4th, 54)

Manchester United 4 (Ronaldo 5th pen 41; 6th 51; Nani 1st 42; Dong Fangzhuo 1st 83)

A – 24,134, Madejski Stadium, Reading

Man of the Match – Dagoberto, Reading

# # #

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Salkster - yes, the timing was terrible. And Kewell, I somehow think I'm going to see 4-2-4 until I figure out a way to stop it. Four goals conceded to it, though, is pretty annoying. :)

___

Sunday, September 28

When the FA wants to come down on a manager, they usually don’t waste time. And I don’t expect them to waste any time with me.

My post-match news conference of yesterday made a bit of news, as I was sharply critical of Clattenburg for the penalty decision he gave to Ronaldo.

In this case, the tabloid headlines were right. I did launch a “scathing attack”, and I’m sure I’ll get a letter from the FA as a result.

I was in a bad mood when I arrived for my share of the post-match interrogatories. I had watched the replay of Faé’s “penalty” against Ronaldo and was pretty unhappy.

Naturally, that was the first question I got, from Setanta’s Hopkins.

“Rob, the penalty…” he began.

“What penalty?” I answered.

“Faé’s penalty on Ronaldo…?”

What penalty?”

“The one awarded by the referee.”

“I didn’t see one. Did you see a penalty? I saw a touch on a shirt and an immensely talented player falling down outside my penalty area. That’s what I saw. And I’ve seen it four times now on replay.”

“Are you accusing Ronaldo?” I was asked. Now it was getting juicy.

“Tell me where I said that,” I answered. “I don’t accuse him of anything. The player went down and the official gave a penalty that, from video evidence, was undeserved. It was unfortunate because giving a great side like Manchester United life in that way was rough justice on us.”

“It was quite a game,” he said.

“Yes,” I answered. “We’re up 3-0 four minutes from halftime and just like that it’s 3-2. They have a very talented team over there and you can’t afford to give them an inch because they take a mile. That is what top-caliber clubs do. I’m disappointed that the match ended the way it did.”

“Are you blaming the official for the draw?”

“No,” I said. “They scored three other goals on us and they took advantage of some good breaks. The penalty was positively one of those breaks. That’s why it’s disappointing. When you score four times against Manchester United you had better beat them and we didn’t do that. Now we have to get ready to play Arsenal and we’re wondering what we have to do to get a victory. We have to work harder than ever to find out.”

# # #

Today, Chelsea hopped over Spurs and into second place thanks to Michael Ballack’s 56th minute goal at Birmingham, but Bolton also jumped over us into third place yesterday.

Not only did Sammy Lee not sanction El-Hadji Diouf for missing training on Friday, he put him in the starting lineup against West Ham. Naturally, Diouf scored the opener and after Dean Ashton had equalized for the home side, Joey O’Brien’s second half goal gave Wanderers the three points they needed to pass us in the table.

Arsenal continues on its rampage, opening up a five-point cushion in the table over Chelsea. I spent today watching a DVR of their clinical 2-0 win at Cardiff in which Maxi Rodriguez scored in first-half injury time and Eduardo finished things off from the spot on 53 minutes. There was a bit of news for us – Aliaksandr Hleb cut his forehead open on a clash of heads today and required stitch work. He may not be able to face us, as part of the “Thank God for Small Favors” department.

They’re still very good, very talented and we will be very much away from home for this match. I’ll have to get the tactics perfect to give the players any chance against the league leaders, who have won eight of nine.

The defending champions are playing well again too, as Liverpool shook off Vagner Love’s early opener for Newcastle to win 3-1 at Anfield behind strikes from Fernando Torres, Ryan Babel and Dirk Kuyt. They’re now sixth and breathing down our necks as well.

At Ewood Park, Mark Hughes’ Blackburn may as well have simply started the match with ten, because it took Ryan Nelson just 34 seconds to get sent off by referee Mike Dean. His two-footed challenge on Everton’s Andy Johnson earned him an early seat but it still took the Toffees 71 minutes to break down the home side. Victor Anichebe’s goal gave Everton the points.

Derby shocked Spurs at White Hart Lane to drop the home team behind us to fifth place on goals scored. Sebastian Mila, Kenny Miller and Nene were all on target for the Rams.

The other three matches of the day were draws. Mariano Pavone and Mido of Middlesbrough cancelled out Enzo Maresca and Ashley Young for Villa in a 2-2 draw at the Riverside, while improving Charlton snagged a point out of Eastlands. Luke Varney’s brace, including the equalizer in second half stoppage time, was enough to equal strikes from Giorgios Samaras and Curtis Elano for Manchester City. Meanwhile, West Brom’s Roberto Colautti and Omar Bravo scored second half goals to haul back two goals from Pompey’s Jermain Defoe, who had put Roland Nilsson’s Portsmouth two to the good inside the first 13 minutes at The Hawthorns.

We also got some interesting news today – we’ve been drawn against Villa in the Fourth Round of the Carling Cup. This time, though, it’s on our pitch on October 29. If it’s anything like our first match fans will want to get tickets early.

But now, the only thing for me to do is to wait to see what the FA decides to do about my rant. It will draw attention, and that’s what I want.

# # #

|[font=Courier New] Pos   | Team          | Pld   | Won   | Drn   | Lst   | For   | Ag    | G.D.  | Pts   | 
| --------------------------------------------------------------------------------------| 
| 1st   | Arsenal       | 9     | 8     | 0     | 1     | 19    | 6     | +13   | 24    | 
| --------------------------------------------------------------------------------------| 
| 2nd   | Chelsea       | 9     | 5     | 4     | 0     | 15    | 3     | +12   | 19    | 
| --------------------------------------------------------------------------------------| 
| 3rd   | Bolton        | 9     | 6     | 0     | 3     | 15    | 8     | +7    | 18    | 
| --------------------------------------------------------------------------------------| 
|[b] 4th   | Reading       | 9     | 4     | 5     | 0     | 18    | 12    | +6    | 17 [/b]   | 
| --------------------------------------------------------------------------------------| 
| 5th   | Tottenham     | 9     | 5     | 2     | 2     | 16    | 10    | +6    | 17    | 
| --------------------------------------------------------------------------------------| 
| 6th   | Liverpool     | 8     | 4     | 3     | 1     | 15    | 7     | +8    | 15    | 
| --------------------------------------------------------------------------------------| 
| 7th   | Aston Villa   | 8     | 4     | 3     | 1     | 14    | 8     | +6    | 15    | 
| --------------------------------------------------------------------------------------| 
| 8th   | Man Utd       | 8     | 4     | 2     | 2     | 16    | 11    | +5    | 14    | 
| --------------------------------------------------------------------------------------| 
| 9th   | Everton       | 9     | 3     | 5     | 1     | 10    | 6     | +4    | 14    | 
| --------------------------------------------------------------------------------------| 
| 10th  | Blackburn     | 9     | 4     | 0     | 5     | 11    | 14    | -3    | 12    | 
| --------------------------------------------------------------------------------------| 
| 11th  | West Ham      | 9     | 4     | 0     | 5     | 14    | 21    | -7    | 12    | 
| --------------------------------------------------------------------------------------| 
| 12th  | Portsmouth    | 9     | 2     | 5     | 2     | 18    | 16    | +2    | 11    | 
| --------------------------------------------------------------------------------------| 
| 13th  | Man City      | 8     | 2     | 3     | 3     | 9     | 10    | -1    | 9     | 
| --------------------------------------------------------------------------------------| 
| 14th  | Charlton      | 9     | 2     | 3     | 4     | 11    | 20    | -9    | 9     | 
| --------------------------------------------------------------------------------------| 
| 15th  | West Brom     | 9     | 2     | 2     | 5     | 14    | 19    | -5    | 8     | 
| --------------------------------------------------------------------------------------| 
| 16th  | Derby         | 9     | 2     | 1     | 6     | 9     | 15    | -6    | 7     | 
| --------------------------------------------------------------------------------------| 
| 17th  | Middlesbrough | 9     | 2     | 1     | 6     | 13    | 20    | -7    | 7     | 
| --------------------------------------------------------------------------------------| 
| 18th  | Newcastle     | 9     | 2     | 1     | 6     | 11    | 18    | -7    | 7     | 
| --------------------------------------------------------------------------------------| 
| 19th  | Birmingham    | 9     | 2     | 0     | 7     | 8     | 15    | -7    | 6     | 
| --------------------------------------------------------------------------------------| 
| 20th  | Cardiff       | 9     | 0     | 2     | 7     | 4     | 21    | -17   | 2     | 
| --------------------------------------------------------------------------------------|[/font] 

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Monday, September 29

Mr. Rob Ridgway, Manager

Reading Football Club

Madejski Stadium

Junction 11, M4

Reading, RG2 0FL

Dear Mr. Ridgway:

This letter serves as an official warning from the Football Association’s Governance Division regarding your conduct after the Reading v Manchester United match of Saturday, September 27.

Our opinion of the incident you protested was that referee Mark Clattenburg made a true and correct call. As you have no prior disciplinary record with this body, we plan no further sanction against your public statements at this time.

However, should your future conduct warrant, we reserve the right to enforce discipline up to and including fines and touchline bans. A copy of this notice is also provided to the League Managers’ Association.

Thank you.

Jonathan Hall

Director of Governance

# # #

It didn’t take long. Usually a charge comes on Tuesday after a weekend match, but my comments were evidently high-profile enough to warrant immediate discipline. So I was coy and contrite to the media in reply.

“I’m not saying another word, fellows. I like my wallet at its current weight and I don’t need it any lighter.”

“Still, Rob, you had a result against United and that has to make you feel good.”

“Naturally,” I said, having made my point without having to pay for it – this time. “They’re a great side and I made that quite clear in my comments. We played very well offensively and it’s hard for me to say that I thought we should have scored five against a club of that quality. Offensively, we were as good as I could have hoped for. No question about it.”

“Now you are going from the frying pan into the fire, so to speak, with Arsenal coming up at the Emirates.”

“Got any other good news for me?” I smiled, and my interrogator just smiled back. “We know we have an extremely difficult task. They’ve lost one match out of nine and when they are on their game, there are few clubs better. We respect all they’ve accomplished and the type of football that Arsene Wenger likes to play certainly does credit to our game.”

“What do you do to shore up the back line?” I was asked. “You’ve conceded eight times in your last three league matches.”

“That’s a significant concern,” I said. “Were it not for Bogdan Lobont playing brilliantly in goal, we’d be in much worse condition. We have good players on our back line but right now we’re having a difficult time keeping the ball out of the goal. I think that’s because sometimes we forget that defense is played by all eleven players. We’ve done a great job scoring goals and getting forward but at the end of the day it’s about keeping the ball out of your goal to win matches.”

“If you count the penalty win in the Carling Cup, you’re winless in your last four regulation matches and your last three in the league,” I was informed.

“True. I can’t argue that,” I said. “You don’t achieve things with too many draws – we have to find an extra boost to our game for Saturday’s trip.”

“Back to the FA,” I was informed. “Do you accept the sanction?”

“No choice,” I said. “We move on. The game is over and we’ll look forward to Old Trafford when we get to go there.”

# # #

Despite what I said to the media being public, what I say to my squad is entirely my own business. I have to get them ready for the league leaders on their ground and once that’s done, we get a little time off.

There’s another set of World Cup qualifiers on October 11 and I’m going to do something nice with Patty. I’m taking her to the new “birthplace of football” – Wembley – to watch England play Estonia in their second qualifying match.

Though Reading has no English national team players (a fact I hope to soon fix), I’d like to see a match in the new place and I’d like her to be with me. The grandeur of the game at this level is really something to behold and I want us both to enjoy it.

Before I go there, though, I’m going to Ninian Park in Cardiff to watch Cardiff City play Middlesbrough. The Bluebirds are our next opponent after Arsenal and I haven’t yet seen them. Boro, on the other hand, I’m getting to know as well as my own team.

Cardiff aren’t doing so well. They haven’t won in nine matches, they’ve scored only four goals all season, and three of those came in the opening match. In fact, they haven’t scored in six full games, so hopefully we will catch them at the right time next weekend. For a change, we’ll be the ones heavily favored if we can keep our form.

Yet we can’t look ahead. We don’t dare.

# # #

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I must admit to never having read one of these types of stories before on the forums. I'm new and just finding my feet. Your story has inspired me to start a little story of my own, but not with as much depth as yours as I am definately not a writer...just a commited fm player.

P.S As you might understand I was a little bemused at the signing of Shaun Maloney, purely because I am a Rangers fan, but it seems to be paying off.

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Copper, my hope is to stay away from Mr. Clattenburg for awhile .... Salkster, thanks for the good wishes. Arsenal in this game save is a machine.

___

Tuesday, September 30

“We feel they have a good team, yes, but we believe we should win.”

Such were the words of Arsene Wenger, speaking before Arsenal’s Champions League match against Juventus this evening. Yet he wasn’t speaking about “The Old Lady”.

He was speaking about us, in a rather amazing display of self-confidence. To have given much thought to us immediately prior to a Champions League tie against an excellent Juve side was either showing great respect for us or else showing off the supreme confidence his Gunners side must surely feel.

And why not? They’ve won eight of nine and are seven points clear of us in the table already. The smart money says we’re going to the Emirates trying not to get overwhelmed.

Part of that is understandable. One of the many problems teams face when playing the Gunners is wondering which way they’ll pick to make your life miserable. They have so much offensive talent – Adebayor, Eduardo, the emerging Maxi Rodriguez and Cesc Fabregas to name just a few – that they can afford to let a phenom like Theo Walcott leave on loan for the season.

In our own case, it looks to me like we’ll get a dose of Eduardo, whose blazing pace will surely test my big central defense. I look for the Gunners to come out flying and if we’re to have any success at all we’ll need a decent share of possession and some extended intelligence on the ball.

Yet at my training session today, the talk was all about our u-18 side, which had a remarkable run last night in the FA Youth Cup at Plymouth. With our lads trailing 4-2 after a truly horrid first half, halftime substitute Jahson Downes proceeded to score five goals in the second half. He scored twice in injury time to lead us to an 8-7 win that really would have been something to see.

Even Jill Weatherby was interested, and when she asked me for a summary I gladly sent her to our talented young coach Leo Dodge to talk about the performance. Defensively it was terrible, but there was a reason for that.

When I arrived at the club I was mortified to find that of our sixteen u-18 players, fully half of them are strikers. We have lots of people playing out of position on the youth team which is one reason why we are 11th out of 12 teams in our league.

Finally, though, she spoke with the man of the hour, and Downes ate it up. It was his moment in the sun and he was getting a little hard for his teammates to live with.

Finally, reserve striker Viktor Illugason brought Downes back to earth. “Hey, Jahson, how many do you think you’d have bagged if you were good enough to play with the first eleven and go the whole 90 minutes?” he asked, with a wide grin.

That quieted him down a little.

# # #

“Kate, glad you could make it.”

I showed my former flame into a seat at a table in the 1871 Suite and sat across from her at the table, while Patty sat to my immediate left.

“Nice to be here, Rob – this is a lovely restaurant.”

“Sort of the point,” I smiled. “The purpose of this place is to entertain, after all.”

“Of course,” she said, looking a bit ill at ease.

I moved to try to lighten things. “So tell me, Kate, what’s making you smile these days?” I asked. In response, she looked at me like I had two heads.

“What’s making me smile?” she asked. “Right now, Rob, not much. I know what would make me smile – some peace.”

“All right,” I said. “All that needs to happen is for you to live your life and us to live ours. What’s so hard about that?”

“Didn’t you figure it out at Heathrow?” Kate asked. Patty looked puzzled at my side – she knew what I had told her about that meeting after she had boarded the plane but since Kate was taking me by surprise neither of us felt especially brainy right at that moment.

“You’re going to have to testify,” Kate said, referring to the Marsley trial. It seemed to be going on forever even though I suspect my nation’s Department of State simply wished it would go away.

“Okay, so why aren’t you smiling?”

“You know,” she insisted. “I told you there. I want you to leave Peter alone.”

For the first time in many years, I was cross with Kate. “You know good and well I have to tell the truth and tell what I know when I testify – if I testify,” I said. “If I were willing to cut Peter some slack – which is doubtful – on the stand at a trial is not the place to do it.”

Kate now looked at Patty. “I need you to understand,” she told my wife. “I have no designs on Rob or anything like that but at the moment, when things are in a bad state, I don’t want to be angry with him. At the moment, I am, and I want to stop. So I need his help. Can you understand that?”

Patty’s eyes narrowed as she looked at Kate. “You know, the last time I saw the two of you together you were throwing yourself at him,” she said. “I really think happiness is something you need to find for yourself rather than depending on my husband to give it to you. Do you know what I mean?”

Just then, our food arrived. “Here you go, Rob,” our caterer said, to a suddenly silent table.

I nodded. Our server blushed, and left.

# # #

I felt better this evening, cuddling Patty closely as we sat on the couch watching television.

She wanted to watch EastEnders. I wanted to watch Arsenal and Juventus, and since I’m going to the Emirates this weekend, she decided she could watch on DVR.

What I saw was a little frightening. They had absolutely no trouble with Juve, taking a 2-0 decision that really wasn’t that close.

Adebayor was in fine form, scoring both the Gunners’ goals before being pulled out on the hour – just to be fresh for us. Wonderful.

I had seen what I needed to see, and as I flipped through the scores to see Rangers putting a 3-0 hiding on Rapid Bucharest and Chelsea hammering Standard Liege 4-1 at the Bridge, I thought back on a pretty decent night for English and Scottish football. Now we wait to see what the weekend has in store.

And I wonder how much more Kate and her husband will intrude into my private life.

# # #

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I saw something that Rob Styles will be quitting officiating in the premier league. Then again it is the papers. Good luck with the Arsenal game 10-3

I think he is going to quit because the FA overturned one of the red cards he gave.

P.S can you keep me up to date with how Rangers do in the champions league... I love reading about other people's games.

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O'Hara, if there's one thing that twenty years of real-life marriage has taught me it's that no matter how many TVs you have in your house, there's only one your wife can watch. :)

___

Wednesday, October 1

To make matters worse, I’m now matching wits with September’s Manager of the Month.

It should have come as no surprise that Wenger won the monthly gong for the start his club has had. It should also come as no surprise that his best midfielder, Cesc Fabregas, was the young player of the month. Cristiano Ronaldo was the overall player of the month.

The only thing that surprised me about the monthly awards was that Dagoberto’s marvelous third goal against United wasn’t voted as the goal of the month. It came second – to Kalou’s equalizer at Villa. They were both fabulous efforts, don’t get me wrong, but I do think Dagoberto’s goal was the single finest effort I’ve seen in twenty years in the game.

But we split hairs. They were both wonderful and they were both scored by players in my colors. So I am not complaining.

Looking around Europe this morning, this is what I saw in the morning paper:

Championship (Promotion and playoff places only)

Wigan 25, Sunderland 23, Blackpool 23, Ipswich 23, QPR 23, Norwich 21

League One (Promotion and playoff places only)

Leeds 26, Bournemouth 24, Bristol City 23, Stoke 23, Bristol Rovers 21, Walsall 21

League Two (Promotion and playoff places only)

Cheltenham 27, Lincoln City 26, Rotherham 25, Grimsby Town 24, Brentford 24, Accrington Stanley 23, Darlington 20

Conference National (Promotion and playoff places only)

York 28, Halifax 27, Kidderminster 25, Aldershot 24, Rushden 22

Ligue One- Lyon 31, PSG 30, St. Etienne 25

Bundesliga- HSV 25, Alemannia Aachen 21, Bayern Munich 20

Eredivisie- Feyenoord 19, Roda JC 19, Heerenveen 17

Serie A -Atalanta 19, AS Roma 17, five clubs tied with 12

SPL- Celtic 23, Rangers 20, St. Mirren 14

La Liga- Espanyol 18, Real Madrid 15, Celta 14, Zaragoza 14, Betis 14

# # #

“You know, Rob, I think she still wants you.”

“Honey, please, don’t even think like that,” I said. “You want me to wind up in the hospital?”

“I looked at her eyes,” she said. “You know, Rob, you can’t look at her eyes even after all these years.”

I looked at my wife and realized she was right. “I can’t,” I admitted. “I wonder why that is.”

“Because you’re afraid of what you might see,” she said simply. “Look, I know you don’t want her but part of me knows what you won’t admit. She looks at you, sees what you’ve become, and then thinks about what she married. I’m sure her kids are her center right now and she wouldn’t trade them, but honestly, it’s fairly obvious.”

The rest of our three-party lunch hadn’t gone so well. We exchanged pleasantries for the most part, and tried to catch up on small things but it was obvious – even to me – that Kate felt badly constrained by Patty’s presence.

That didn’t matter to me, of course. In fact, I was just fine with it. I hadn’t gone to lunch with the idea of letting her play for me – I had gone to get the issues from Heathrow resolved. Obviously, that didn’t happen.

I put that out of my mind as I worked out with the squad today. I elected to take training myself because I believe in leading from the front. I also believe that the one thing this club could really use at the moment is a clean sheet, and that’s my responsibility to help them earn.

That responsibility meant I took the pitch myself this morning in a pretty intense mood. I’ve seen my side ship eight goals in its last three league matches and I don’t care for that. We have to do better.

As a result, I was tough on Sonko and Bikey, the two guys who are absolutely integral to making that improvement happen.

They haven’t been playing poorly, mind you – but what I’ve seen is a lack of positional sense that has happened just often enough to see the ball fished out of our goal on several annoying occasions. Especially in the Villa game, we just weren’t very good right in the heart of our defense and it cost us. United wasn’t so bad because one of their goals was a dodgy penalty and one was deflected. Yet Ronaldo’s second goal came on a header, though not against a central defender, and their equalizer was just awful, even if it did come with a wet football.

I asked for rededication and recommitment today and by the time we were done, that was what I had. It’s hard to ask for something like that when we still haven’t lost, but our offensive excellence has had much more to do with our standing than anything else.

I reinforced the day’s work with some video of Arsenal, including last night’s Champions League clinic aganst Juve. By the time we were done, the players had a good idea of what they’re up against and repeated reminders from their manager didn’t hurt either.

I think our focus is now pretty good. I’ll know for sure tomorrow, when the players show me if their intensity carries over from one day to the next.

# # #

Manchester United’s Champions League hopes took a significant denting tonight. Evidently not fully recovered from the trauma of conceding four goals to us, they crashed 2-0 at Old Trafford to Inter this evening and are still looking for their first group stage win.

They need to get better in a hurry – they host City on Saturday in the first Manchester derby of the season and I wonder if Coppell is starting to feel any pressure.

Liverpool surprised Bayern Munich with a 2-1 away win in their group match, and Celtic did what was expected in beating MSK Zilina 2-0 at Celtic Park.

I didn’t watch anything tonight – I went to a meet-and-greet event downtown this evening that Patty did not attend – and I think the night away from the public did her some good. She’s still quite uneasy about how yesterday’s lunch went with Kate and the more I think about it, the less I blame her.

That’s not because I think Kate has anything up her sleeve. It’s because Patty’s nervous, pure and simple. Her work is going a little better but she still is having a difficult time fitting in so she just wants things to be as calm as possible for as long as possible. I can’t blame her a scrap for that.

Hopefully, I can give her a little indirect help. There’s nothing wrong with being popular and as long as my club keeps playing well, it makes it a bit easier for Patty in public. Being married to an unpopular manager who isn’t “flavor of the month” might make things even more uncomfortable for Patty than they already are.

It could be worse, though. I could be Frank Rijkaard, who is trying to figure out why Barcelona is 15th in La Liga with just one victory in seven matches. They’ve got four draws and managed to hold arch-rival Real Madrid to a 1-1 draw in the first Superclasico of the season, but he’s got big, big trouble in a place where expectations dwarf those I face each and every day.

I’ll take my situation, thanks.

# # #

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Thanks very much, Mark ... I appreciate your kind words!

___

Thursday, October 2

Today was media day. Our match with Arsenal isn’t televised nationally, but it’s still drawing quite a bit of attention for the first-versus-fourth aspect of things.

I gave an interview to the club website this morning as my first order of business, which served to warm me up for the rest of the day.

I was frankly happy that Setanta didn’t repeat its invitation to appear on UEFA Cup night. I’m preparing for the trip to London, which we’ll make tomorrow afternoon. This match is important enough for me to request that the team stay together the night before the match. Even though Reading is only 40 miles west of London, I’d rather the travel happen on Friday after we train instead of on the morning of the match. I’d like the players as relaxed as possible for Saturday.

The pundits have installed Arsenal as a 4-6 favorite for the match, with our chances at 4-1 and a draw at 11-2. Less than even odds at home should be a pretty good indication that the punters expect Arsene’s boys to do the business.

As a result I’m in the role of a sharp underdog for the first time – even our odds against United were better than that, probably due to playing at home – and I won’t say I mind.

It gave me the opportunity to say all kinds of non-inflammatory things to take pressure off my players, a position I relish. I have never been one to “stir the pot” before a match, unless someone first stirs it for me.

Former American college football coach Lou Holtz was famous for making every opponent his teams faced look like supermen. That was a bit extreme. But I want viewers to know that we won’t be running our mouths – we'll let our play do the talking. I hope.

“We’ll be ready to play them, we don’t plan to show up and simply gift them the points,” I said to my Sky interviewer after training. “Offensively, we should be able to cause them a bit of worry the way we’ve been playing and I can say that if they don’t take us seriously we do have a few players who can hurt them. Dagoberto’s form has been terrific and Maloney and Kalou have done a wonderful job in our midfield.”

“What about Pogatetz?” I was asked. “Are you going to stick with him despite his poor form?”

“Emanuel is a good player and I’m not going to throw him under the bus,” I said. “This is the sort of match where he can rise to the challenge and show just what a good player he truly is. I have every confidence in him.”

# # #

Wenger, for his part, was respectful but wary. He was asked about me, which led to an interesting answer.

“I have heard there are managers who don’t like the style he plays or his level of experience,” the Frenchman told the London media today. “I will not count myself among them. They do play a good brand of attacking football though in fairness I must wonder whether they will be able to maintain their form away from home.”

“You mean you believe he has what it takes to succeed?” a reporter asked.

“I am sorry, I did not hear your name,” Wenger replied.

“Stefano Emiliani, Gazzetto Dello Sport,” he answered. “I repeat: do you believe Rob Ridgway has what it takes to succeed?”

A frown crossed my opponent’s brow. “I do not judge managers or players based on nine matches,” he said. “Your question seems to indicate that you do.”

# # #

Best yet - the players didn’t disappoint me with their focus in today’s training. We had an excellent session despite a cold rain that forced us indoors. We seem to be in a bit of a weather rut – autumn around our neck of the woods can be miserable when the weather patterns are wrong – but the players shrugged off the chill to put in a highly professional 90 minutes of workout.

If they apply themselves in this manner on Saturday I won’t be displeased even if we lose. I watched training from a stand above the pitch today while Dillon put the squad through its paces. I saw movement, I saw flow, and above all I saw better organization on defense in the drills we did.

This is good. We’ll have to be excellent at the back to have any chance at all this weekend. It’s also my first road test against the “Big Four” so I want to leave as little to chance as possible.

# # #

“So how many matches are you going to watch, anyway?” Patty teased as I turned off the set before bed.

“There were only six I was following tonight,” I protested, but my humor was lost on her.

Long story short: all the English teams vying for spots in the UEFA Cup group stages got them, while both the Scottish clubs vying for spots didn’t. It was a rugged night north of the border.

Villa cruised to a 5-0 home win over Gaz Metan to claim their tie on an 8-0 aggregate. Bolton crushed HJK 4-0 at the Reebok to win 6-0 on aggregate; Everton went to Sarajevo and scored three times to finish off their hosts on a 5-0 aggregate; and Spurs had the toughest time of any EPL team in action tonight, only managing two against Germinal Beerschot to go through 4-0 on aggregate. Tonight’s count: England 14, Rest of Europe 0, with an aggregate of 23-0 over the two legs. Not bad.

Aberdeen went to Leverkusen and got a very creditable 1-1 draw, but due to losing 2-0 at Pittodrie, they’re out 3-1 on aggregate. Meanwhile, Hibs fell 3-1 at Easter Road to Villareal, the same score by which they lost away. So they can concentrate on the SPL with the Dons.

The fact that all this mattered to me this evening was a source of bemusement for Patty. “You do know,” she smiled, fully earning my attention as she approached from the bath, “that I need to shift you from this all-football mentality.”

“I think you’re about one bath towel away from doing that, honey,” I laughed, and she sat at the edge of our bed.

“Oh, really?” she teased. “Is that how I have to get your attention these days?”

“Be careful what you wish for,” I said, advancing to her for a kiss. “You just might get it.”

# # #

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Thank you, Bingitz ... I do appreciate it!

___

Friday, October 3

It’s very difficult not to be impressed by the new Emirates Stadium, where we arrived late this afternoon. We’re staying in London tonight to rest easy and not have to travel for tomorrow’s match.

The brand-new home of the Gunners is the second largest stadium in the Premiership after Old Trafford and holds 60,000 fans who are as dedicated as any you’ll find.

Such is the popularity of my opponent in tomorrow’s match that the club put a statue of Arsene Wenger at the old Highbury, just down the street from the new ground.

For a current manager, that’s astounding. If Arsenal ever reaches the promised land in Europe, he may have to run for political office. Then we’d see how popular he really is.

I was quite surprised to find that Emiliani wrote about Wenger in his weekly column. Nobody seems to care if he takes a swipe at old Rob Ridgway, but the thought of someone English fans have never heard of taking a poke at Arsenal’s living legend will make him a most unpopular figure in certain parts of North London. Of course, I suppose he could now go to White Hart Lane and be treated as a conquering hero.

He questioned Wenger’s judgment – not about anything to do with football, of course, but for not speaking his mind. As part of his “league notes” section he said Wenger “would not be drawn into the controversy surrounding Reading manager Rob Ridgway’s preparedness to manage in the Premier League. One would suppose a manager of Wenger’s undoubted stature would recognize the need to protect his profession.”

Well, for crying out loud. I’ve got this club in the top four at the quarter pole of the league season. We may not stay there – in fact, touch wood, we’ve been extremely fortunate with injuries so far and if we get many we might have real trouble – but we’re there, and we’re showing we can play with bigger clubs. So who cares about him?

I guess, in the end, I do. He can’t get near me due to Reading’s media department being able to screen who has access to me at the ground. Yet he can, if he chooses, still make my life darn difficult by what he writes. My hope is that the other footballing media doesn’t pay too much attention instead of covering itself like it loves to do.

I tried to put it all out of my mind for awhile as the team got off the coach this afternoon.

“Let it roll off you, Rob,” Dillon advised. “It’s the only way.”

“I know, Kevin,” I answered. “It’s just that I traveled a thousand miles across Europe to get away from that guy, know what I mean?”

“You can’t run from everything,” he said, and I could only agree.

“I’ve got a much better situation,” I said. “But for the good of this team, I wish he’d write something else.”

Then Dillon slipped into what I guess I could describe as ‘sage’ mode. “Look, Rob,” he said, as we dropped off our game-day kit in the coaches’ office. “These players are different from Italy too. You need to know that they all read the papers, they all listen to the radio and a lot of them give interviews to their home media that you never even know about until they say something that upsets the cart. Give them credit for being professionals. Most of them know reporters who don’t care for them – and they don’t care. You need to do the same.”

I looked at him blankly.

“That is, if you want my advice,” he smiled.

# # #

He’s right. Players make up their own minds and I can’t let what’s written affect me in the way I’m letting it happen.

So as we sat this evening at our team dinner, we watched the preview show. It was time to stop fighting it.

And along the way, Wenger paid a measure of respect to Dagoberto and if he was trying to play a mind game with my striker, it didn’t work. The hat-trick hero of the United match heard Wenger say that he had to be stopped if Arsenal were going to win. The Brazilian just smiled.

“Let them try,” he laughed. “I am ready.”

I have no doubt that he is. My comparatively milquetoast comments annoyed no one, and I think we’re set up nicely for the match tomorrow.

The dinner ended, I asked that the televisions be shut off. I then had the chance to address my team.

“Guys, you’ve seen what they’re saying about you and about us. They’re entitled. But now we need to focus on tomorrow. I’ve been very pleased with the way you’ve applied yourselves this week and frankly I couldn’t be happier with the last three days of training. Some of you get a rest next week while others go into their national teams. Make this match tomorrow one you’ll be proud to talk about wherever you are. I’m confident you can do that.”

“We’re pulling back tomorrow. I don’t want the forwards riding so high until we can figure out a better way to support them. On the road, that’s just not worth the risk. We’ll go with our standard 4-1-3-2 and see how they handle it. Remember to support each other and especially support the middle of the park on defense. If we let them run everything through the middle we’re in for a hell of a long afternoon. You know the plan so it’s up to you to make it work.”

# # #

I then went and called Patty, before retiring for the night.

“You know, honey, I’d rather have you with me in that bath towel,” I said. “Being alone is no fun.”

“So tell me again where you’re going on Sunday instead of sitting with me?” she asked.

“You know how to hurt a guy,” I said. “Not that Cardiff is a bad place, mind you.”

# # #

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Still an excellent effort as always 10-3

Just another congratulations on the superb debut year. Four awards, all fully deserved :)

Well done sir, many congrats from myself

And who knows, maybe one day I'll win one ;)

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Sherm, thanks so much .... yesterday was quite a day. I'm grateful, no doubt about it.

___

Saturday, October 4

Arsenal (8-0-1, 1st place) v Reading (4-5-0, 4th place) – EPL Match Day #10

“The sternest test of the season awaits Rob Ridgway’s Reading.”

So were the opening words of match commentator Ian Crocker. I couldn’t fault him but whoever had left the television on in the visitors’ changing room was someone I certainly could fault.

I shut it off and we prepared for battle. The persistent rain of the last week continued this morning on the way to the ground so the players knew to be prepared for a match condition that really wasn’t to the liking of either team.

Obviously it wasn’t to Arsenal’s liking, given their known propensity toward stylish play. And quite frankly, the way we’ve been playing offensively, the rain wasn’t something I welcomed either.

“Our goal today isn’t a shootout,” I said, addressing the squad before warmups. “You know they’re favored, you know they’re in first place and you know you aren’t supposed to get anything out of this match, though I expect as professionals you feel differently.”

“Just understand that there’s no pressure on you today. I need you to remember that you have nothing to lose by going out and playing your game. You’re good enough to make a difference against even this team. So go out, remember the plan and above all, relax and enjoy your football.”

I saw more than a few looks of relief on the faces of my players. It would have been the easiest thing in the world to feel the pressure, even of the early season, but feeling that pressure would result in very bad things for my club.

So I tried to loosen them up. I wrote the eleven on the board and retreated to my office, letting the players prepare for the match in their own way under Dillon’s careful watch.

The one player who didn’t seem loose was Lobont, and he was the one I needed most to be playing within himself. The Romanian sat in his locker, intent and focused – but looking tight according to Dillon.

My deputy informed me of this as I emerged from the visiting manager’s office to take the pitch.

“Well, Bogdan’s intense,” I said. “Hopefully that isn’t a bad sign. Not like we can change it now.”

The teams stepped into the tunnel to take the pitch and I met Wenger face to face. “Thank you for your words about my team,” I said, as we shook hands.

“Deserved, I’m sure,” he said. “Good luck this afternoon.”

We took the pitch and headed to our respective dugouts. The place wasn’t full – it was about 2,000 short of capacity for the visit of the Berkshire upstarts – but it was still by far the biggest crowd we had seen all season and the vast majority of them were wearing red.

We seemed mesmerized in the early going, which gave the lie to my early thoughts on focus. Arsenal came at us hard. Eduardo and Adebayor started to cook almost immediately, with the former setting up the latter for a rising drive that barely missed Lobont’s left post less than ninety seconds into the match.

From Lobont’s goal kick, the Gunners strode forward with the imperious attitude you’d expect from league leaders, with Fabregas dribbling past both Maloney and Pazienza on the way to missing over the top from twenty yards.

Obviously Wenger had set his stall out to push hard and from my point of view it was just a matter of waiting for a moment to counter to find a little breathing space.

Yet, that moment was a long time in coming. Eduardo’s shot nicked the outside of Lobont’s right post on ten minutes and after Kolo Toure shot over a few minutes later Arsenal had genereated four good scoring chances in the first fifteen minutes.

It went on. They kept piling forward, forcing Lobont into an acrobatic save to touch Adebayor’s first-time effort around the post six minutes later, and Bikey saved our bacon by hacking Eduardo’s effort from an Arsenal corner off the line in 26 minutes.

I had seen enough. The 4-1-3-2 was being swamped and I signaled for 4-4-2 to get a little stability into the midfield. We were being overrun in front of God and everybody and their quality was really showing through.

Finally we settled down a bit and established our first decent possession of the match in Arsenal’s half fully half an hour into the match. Yes, it was that bad. Kitson had our first attacking opportunity, trying to scoop the ball over the top toward Dagoberto but Toure headed it behind for a corner right on the half hour.

I turned to Dillon, a look of disgust on my face. “Well, that only took thirty minutes,” I said, as Maloney lined up to take the corner. He advanced to the ball and put it into the six-yard box – where Dagoberto pounced to head home his sixth goal of the season.

I was so stunned I could hardly celebrate. It was such a shock – our first attempt at goal after half an hour of play was in their net, completely against the run of play – all I could was simply applaud and grin. Anything else would have been farcical. Wenger sat in his chair in the Arsenal dugout area with a look of utter disgust on his face.

The players mobbed Dagoberto for scoring his fourth goal in two games. Obviously, both Wenger and my striker had been correct in their pre-match statements – Arsenal hadn’t gotten Dagoberto stopped to their detriment, and my striker really was ready to play when the moment arrived.

However, we then had to deal with an angry Gunners side which had fallen behind despite being much the better side. I did pull us back into a defensive alignment after the goal, with the thought that 1-0 or even 1-1 at halftime would be more than satisfactory after the way we started the match.

If only it were that easy. Arsenal poured forward again, with Fabregas starting their attack with a quicksilver-like reaction to a loose ball just inside the halfway line. He gained possession and looked forward for Adebayor, hitting his striker in full stride.

Adebayor flicked on for Eduardo, who had slipped Sonko’s mark at the top of our area. Lobont rushed out and Eduardo simply lobbed him, the ball bouncing once before rolling into our net five minutes from half.

Now the Emirates came alive at the home side’s breakthrough. There was little I could really say – there was no doubt that even though we had shown some life since our goal we had been at least on the back foot. Eduardo’s goal momentarily put us on the floor.

We got to halftime and I had the chance to finally talk to my team. “The score is all that matters here,” I said. “They gave you their best shot for 45 minutes and you’re still level. Keep your chins up – you can do this today. Give me 45 more good minutes and see how far a desire to win can take you. Again, you can do this!”

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Gentlemen, thank you very much ... Marchie, I appreciate your support and Spav, your kindness is very much appreciated!

___

I praised Dagoberto and also had a handshake for Maloney, who had laid on the goal from his corner. “Strong in the middle, Shaun,” I urged him. “Make the center yours.”

He nodded. Right now his confidence is sky high so a small stroke of that confidence wasn’t going to hurt anything.

Tactically, I hadn’t done so well and knew full well that I had played with fire in sticking with 4-1-3-2 as long as I had before shifting to the flat four-man midfield. Yet we had held our own since that move, so as we took the field for the second half I saw no need to change it.

We were much more stable and though Arsenal still piled forward at every opportunity we were better able to parry them. Maloney did a yeoman job in the center of midfield, with his midfield partner Pazienza playing an increasingly confident game out of his natural holding position.

Slowly, the two began to equal Arsenal in the center of the park and I was momentarily left to consider the situation as compared to last week. A low-scoring draw such as I now contemplated versus last week’s high-scoring draw was an intriguing prospect and even though we hadn’t kept a clean sheet I rather preferred the way we were starting to play at the moment.

The second half quickly became a tactical exercise and it wasn’t lost on me that I was facing one of the truly great tacticians in Europe in the opposite technical area. As the game reached 70 minutes and I started to consider substitution patterns, I laid out the rest of the match in my head.

I wanted 4-5-1. The only question was when. Wenger wanted to win. I knew that he would have preferred that much immediately. The only question was when we would decide to make our big moves.

I am a firm believer in playing with two strikers unless I have no other option, but was willing to forsake that belief in this circumstance. Finally, on 79 minutes, I was the one to break.

I brought on Harper for Faé and Leroy Lita for Kitson, going to 4-5-1 with Kalou and Dagoberto supporting Lita as the "Lone Royal" up front. Seeing this, Wenger immediately did what I had hoped he wouldn’t do – he went to 4-2-4 and threw everyone but his keeper forward.

Polish international Lukasz Fabianski had done reasonably well when called upon and was helpless on Dagoberto’s goal, but even he was sensing a desire to help out his teammates, menacing with attacking intent. So with discretion being the better part of valor, I decided to try to wait out the remaining ten minutes of the match.

They immediately generated two corners, giving them an incredible 14 for the match, but we managed to keep them both out of our net. On the second corner, the ball sprayed long to the right where Dagoberto picked it up. Lita broke and was a stride clear of the defense when the Brazilian saw him. However, Leroy was still on his own side of the center line so when the pass came over the top to him he was still onside.

Go!” I screamed, seeing the opening at the same time my star scorer did. The ball floated between central defenders Toure and Johan Djourou and Lita’s raw pace took over. He was first to the ball and in alone on Fabianski while still a clear 35 yards from goal.

The keeper rushed to collect at the striker’s feet, and bravely dove to buy his defenders time. Leroy flipped the ball up and over Fabianski with the laces of his right boot and easily rounded the keeper to slot into an empty net on 82 minutes.

This time we all had a good long look at the play developing and so when Lita cashed in, we were jumping around like crazy men. With Arsenal out of substitutions they had to stand or fall on what they had on the pitch, and I wasn’t about to change anything now that we had a shock lead.

Again they came forward, with their crowd urging them on. Lobont was called on again, to rob substitute Robin van Persie with a truly spectacular leaping save to claw a shot away from his top left corner.

Then we did it again – only this time Maloney was the provider. In a pure central midfield role, he caught Lita on the fly between Toure and Djourou again three minutes from time, and once again, the substitute streaked in on an understandably distressed Fabianski.

The keeper stopped Lita’s first shot and the defenders converged on the spot to win the ball. But Lita was too quick. He got to the ball first, hoisting the rebound over the prone goalkeeper and into the net from sixteen yards to make it 3-1 to us.

Now Emirates was iike a 60,000-seat mausoleum with the exception of our traveling support who could hardly believe what they were seeing. The substitute, Lita, had bagged a brace in just ten minutes of play and we were home and dry against the league leaders.

Arsenal’s central defense had been far too casual in the last ten minutes and Lita had made them pay for it not once but twice. The excellence of Dagoberto and Maloney, both playing out of their accustomed positions, had made it all possible.

Moments later, the final whistle blew and our supporters celebrated a truly famous win. 3-1 over the Gunners – on their turf – would set the Hob Nobbers alight for sure.

Arsenal 1 (Eduardo 6th, 40)

Reading 3 (Dagoberto 6th, 31; Lita 3rd, 82, 4th 87)

A – 58,281, Emirates Stadium, London

Man of the Match – Bogdan Lobont, Reading (2)

# # #

“I do not mind telling you that I thought we had the better of the play.”

Wenger had made the understatement of the day, and was letting the media know about it in his post-match news conference.

“We had fourteen corners and they had three. They scored from one of theirs and we scored from none of ours. They took their chances but I do believe they were fortunate.”

“Do you feel that tactically Ridgway got the better of you at the end of the match when he shifted to 4-5-1?” Of all people, Emiliani was asking the question.

“I see you have changed your tune,” Wenger replied testily. “We play to win here. We always play to win at Arsenal. We felt we could find a winning goal but we did not take care of our responsibilities at the back and Lita scored two good goals. The first one was preventable with the proper defensive line but the second one was perhaps more likely to happen once we pressed forward. But we will move on from this and we are still the leaders.”

He was then asked about Dagoberto. “He is a wonderful talent and in their tactic he is perhaps the perfect player,” the Frenchman answered. “He plays off their big striker Kitson so well that you must always account for him when Reading are attacking. We did not account for him on a set piece and for me that is not acceptable.”

Then it was my turn. I looked at my old adversary, scribbling furiously in his notebook, and just smiled. I allowed myself a moment of gloating.

“What the heck are you going to write now, Stefano?” I asked.

# # #

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O'Hara, how did you get a hold of my script? That's a little frightening ...right down to the words I used!

___

Sunday, October 5

Yesterday’s triumph in London followed me to Cardiff today.

We had one hell of a happy coach ride home yesterday and we celebrated temporarily climbing one spot in the table even as we shaved three points off Arsenal’s lead.

Chelsea moved up as well, to second on goal difference, after Didier Drogba’s 19th minute goal consigned Newcastle to yet another defeat.

Blackburn, an opponent coming up in a couple of weeks, won 1-0 at Derby thanks to Matt Derbyshire’s goal two minutes from time, and United won the Manchester derby 2-0 over City thanks to strikes from Nemanja Vidic and Cristiano Ronaldo either side of the interval.

Returning home last night was even more of a pleasure than usual. Even one night away from Patty when I’m feeling like I’m feeling right now isn’t good, so to sweep her into my arms on our arrival at the ground was just the best feeling in the world.

Our morale is sky-high at the moment and no one should expect anything different. After a series of sub-par performances, we can use this kind of result to get us back on track – and I plan to take full advantage of it.

But not today. And not even this week. That’s the only downside to yesterday – with the international break coming up, we don’t play this week. Still, we’ll take the points, but it’s unfortunate that we can’t get right back out and play to take advantage of the good feeling we’ve got.

As my car rolled westward into Wales this morning, I listened to a little bit of talk radio. I don’t usually do that but I was as happy as my squad and wanted to hear what people were thinking on the morning call-ins about our victory.

What I heard was essentially the same thing I will be saying to my team the next time we’re all together. That wasn’t necessarily what I was hoping to hear on the radio – what I heard was a very sanguine assessment of my team.

“That’s where Reading was last year,” one caller said. “They didn’t have the staying power last season and they haven’t added enough to keep them in the European places this year either.”

That was not quite accurate – I’d call Kalou and Maloney solid additions that have really helped us and are upgrades over what we had – but the general attitude was that it’s a long season. Which, of course, it is.

What I want is good feeling, though, and for a win of the caliber we had yesterday, I’m not seeing it. That’s unfortunate. Good feeling leads to positive impression – which may lead to me attracting the kinds of new blood we will need, sooner or later, to get to the next level.

The ‘wait and see’ attitude is understandable given the ‘Big Four’ and its dominance of the English game. The ‘little sixteen’ have work to do. Yesterday, I hope we started on that path.

# # #

You’d never have guessed that looking at Emiliani’s work today.

I might have known that my offhand comment of yesterday would attract the attention of my longtime nemesis. Emiliani’s column today took me to task for, of all things, defending myself.

“To say, as the English do, that Reading manager Rob Ridgway is ‘full of himself’ would be understatement,” he wrote. “Reading was shoved all over the Emirates Stadium yesterday by a very strong Arsenal side and somehow managed to escape not only with a win, but with a 3-1 win. For their part, Reading played a counter game with great skill and when the time came they took their chances.

However, Ridgway’s tactics smelled entirely too much like those of former USA national coach Bruce Arena, who knew his team couldn’t hack ninety minutes of top competition in most matches it played. So they would lull a side to sleep and then counter them.

This is anti-football at its finest. It is not the kind of game that lends itself to either championship teams or championship managers. So to see Ridgway puffing out his chest after needing divine intervention for a victory took a bit of living. He’s living on borrowed time.”

Horse hockey.

# # #

| Pos   | Team          | Pld   | Won   | Drn   | Lst   | For   | Ag    | G.D.  | Pts   | 
| --------------------------------------------------------------------------------------| 
| 1st   | Arsenal       | 10    | 8     | 0     | 2     | 20    | 9     | +11   | 24    | 
| --------------------------------------------------------------------------------------| 
| 2nd   | Chelsea       | 10    | 6     | 4     | 0     | 16    | 3     | +13   | 22    | 
| --------------------------------------------------------------------------------------| 
| 3rd   | Bolton        | 10    | 7     | 0     | 3     | 17    | 9     | +8    | 21    | 
| --------------------------------------------------------------------------------------| 
[b]| 4th   | Reading       | 10    | 5     | 5     | 0     | 21    | 13    | +8    | 20    | [/b]
| --------------------------------------------------------------------------------------| 
| 5th   | Man Utd       | 9     | 5     | 2     | 2     | 18    | 11    | +7    | 17    | 
| --------------------------------------------------------------------------------------| 
| 6th   | Tottenham     | 10    | 5     | 2     | 3     | 19    | 14    | +5    | 17    | 
| --------------------------------------------------------------------------------------| 
| 7th   | Liverpool     | 9     | 4     | 3     | 2     | 16    | 9     | +7    | 15    | 
| --------------------------------------------------------------------------------------| 
| 8th   | Aston Villa   | 9     | 4     | 3     | 2     | 14    | 9     | +5    | 15    | 
| --------------------------------------------------------------------------------------| 
| 9th   | Blackburn     | 10    | 5     | 0     | 5     | 12    | 14    | -2    | 15    | 
| --------------------------------------------------------------------------------------| 
| 10th  | West Ham      | 10    | 5     | 0     | 5     | 15    | 21    | -6    | 15    | 
| --------------------------------------------------------------------------------------| 
| 11th  | Portsmouth    | 10    | 3     | 5     | 2     | 20    | 16    | +4    | 14    | 
| --------------------------------------------------------------------------------------| 
| 12th  | Everton       | 10    | 3     | 5     | 2     | 10    | 7     | +3    | 14    | 
| --------------------------------------------------------------------------------------| 
| 13th  | Charlton      | 10    | 3     | 3     | 4     | 15    | 23    | -8    | 12    | 
| --------------------------------------------------------------------------------------| 
| 14th  | West Brom     | 10    | 3     | 2     | 5     | 15    | 19    | -4    | 11    | 
| --------------------------------------------------------------------------------------| 
| 15th  | Middlesbrough | 10    | 3     | 1     | 6     | 14    | 20    | -6    | 10    | 
| --------------------------------------------------------------------------------------| 
| 16th  | Man City      | 9     | 2     | 3     | 4     | 9     | 12    | -3    | 9     | 
| --------------------------------------------------------------------------------------| 
| 17th  | Derby         | 10    | 2     | 1     | 7     | 9     | 16    | -7    | 7     | 
| --------------------------------------------------------------------------------------| 
| 18th  | Newcastle     | 10    | 2     | 1     | 7     | 11    | 19    | -8    | 7     | 
| --------------------------------------------------------------------------------------| 
| 19th  | Birmingham    | 10    | 2     | 0     | 8     | 8     | 17    | -9    | 6     | 
| --------------------------------------------------------------------------------------| 
| 20th  | Cardiff       | 10    | 0     | 2     | 8     | 4     | 22    | -18   | 2     | 
| --------------------------------------------------------------------------------------| 
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I took my seat in the stands at Cardiff’s Ninian Park and as I did, my phone buzzed.

“Comb your hair,” my wife said with a giggle. “They just showed you on television and you look like you had a rough trip.”

I laughed, missing the smile I knew was on her face. “It was raining when I got out of the car,” I said. “Maybe I need a personal assistant or something.”

“I can’t imagine you with one,” she said. “Enjoy the match and hurry home.”

# # #

The image of me talking and laughing with Patty on the phone also made it onto Sky, and that got a little more positive reaction from the commentators.

“There’s a fellow who ought to be laughing,” commentator Efan Okoku said. “He’s got two weeks to enjoy a wonderful victory yesterday. We still need to see if Reading will last the pace but since the next two sides they play are on this pitch today you’d think Reading will at least have a good scouting report.”

I was primarily interested in seeing why Cardiff was having such immense trouble scoring goals. When we saw them in the friendly schedule they hardly bothered us, but obviously friendlies are different from the real thing.

But when you go six matches without scoring, something’s obviously wrong and it didn’t take me long to figure out what I think it is. Their midfield play was non-existent and it took just three minutes for Boro to prove it. Lee Cattermole strolled right up Route One and stroked a low drive home to put the visitors ahead.

From Cardiff’s perspective it was like someone had let the air out of a balloon. Any optimism shown their players seemed to drift away like a passing breeze and again it was the midfield that was lacking. There was no creativity, and above all no desire to win the ball. That was alarming, or it would have been to me if I was Dave Jones, and Middlesbrough was hardly threatened for the rest of the half.

Cardiff went to the changing room at home without a shot on target and I made a few notes on my pad reflecting their utter lack of ideas. Clearly, getting on top of them when we meet will be of paramount importance.

Unfortunately, even though they had the lead Boro were hardly better. The second half was dire with a capital “D” and by the time I had managed to watch the full ninety minutes most of the crowd of 15,606 had resigned themselves to yet another clean-sheet loss.

Nothing Cardiff tried helped. Boro won 1-0 and my first thought was that on current form, we look to be good value against both teams.

# # #

There was a full slate of matches today. Dean Ashton’s early goal helped West Ham surprise Villa away, while speaking of surprises, Joey O’Brien and El-Hadji Diouf helped Bolton pass us back into third place in a 2-1 win over Liverpool. Yossi Benayoun netted for the Reds but they couldn’t find the equalizer they needed.

Spurs continue to sink and it’s safe to say that Pardew has managed to right Charlton’s ship. It was a wild game at The Valley with Mauro Zarate and Nic Anelka trading hat tricks for their clubs but it was Amdy Faye’s goal two minutes from the break that allowed Charlton to win 4-3. Zarate’s third goal, four minutes from time, was the winner.

It was a day of smaller surprises, as West Brom went to Goodison Park and beat Everton 1-0 thanks to Roberto Colautti’s tally three minutes into the second half.

And it looks as though Birmingham will have trouble avoiding the drop. They’re giving Cardiff hope of getting off the foot of the table thanks to a limp 2-0 setback at Fratton Park against Portsmouth. After a scoreless first half, Arnold Mvuemba and Jermain Defoe made the points safe for my buddy Roland Nilsson.

But another week is over. We’ve gained on the leaders and soon I find out how many players I’ll lose for the international break. The senior squad will meet tomorrow and then take a few days off to recharge – those, that is, who aren’t getting on planes. Again, I’ll hope to get everyone back just as healthy as they are when they leave. Good luck with that.

# # #

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Monday, October 6

I learned two things of importance today.

First, the number of players I’m losing at all levels to international play is 19. There are no senior squad players called up for England, which isn’t surprising since the only Englishman I have who would be even remotely a candidate would be Kitson. And with England’s current logjam up front, it would take a special run of form to get him noticed.

Everyone who left last time is leaving this time, so the usual suspects gathered after our meeting this morning to get their instructions for the week.

“Enjoy your time away and play hard for your countries,” I said. “But come back ready to get to work. I saw Cardiff play yesterday and even though they’re struggling they won’t roll over for you. They’re desperate to get it right and you’re the next team they get to try against. So enjoy the qualifiers but realize that there’s a lot more football ahead.”

The players then scattered for Heathrow and various points of embarkation for their national training camps. It’s going to be a bit of a quiet week – which is all right, since the senior players who remain are now off until Thursday.

# # #

On a much happier note, the papers were universal in their praise of our parry and thrust approach to most of the Arsenal game. The Post’s headline of "OutGunned" with a picture of Wenger looking cross on his touchline after Lita’s go-ahead goal might have been a bit on the schmaltzy side, but it beat some of the other candidates.

From my point of view, it was our day to bask in a little glow, and with the international break coming up, it was a perfect time for it. Not everyone’s off at mid-week – Villa hosts United and Liverpool travels to Manchester City on Wednesday – but we sure are, and the feel-good factor is something everyone around the club enjoys.

In fact, I got a surprise visit from my chairman this morning, just before I took to the practice pitch. Usually Mr. Madejski doesn’t spend much time around the football side of the operation except on match day, but today he was in my office to tell me that he liked how things were going.

“Not a bad word to say, Rob,” he offered, as we sat on opposite ends of the couch near my desk at the indoor training facility. “In fact, it’s brilliant. You’re doing just what we did last season so the stability we want to see appears to be coming along.”

“There are still a lot of things I’d like to do,” I said, and my chairman’s look in reply indicated some surprise.

“Let me elaborate,” I continued. “Right now my senior squad is like a very shallow lake – we’re a mile wide and an inch deep. We have had only one significant injury all season, and, touch wood, we won’t have to worry about it but if we get people out of action for a significant time I am worried about our overall depth. We need to address certain areas – maybe not in January, maybe not even in this close season – but if we want to take the next step as everyone says, we’re going to need to be deeper than we are at the moment.”

“I see,” he said. “And can you give me some idea of how many millions it will take to make us sufficiently ‘deep’?”

“When you put it like that, I can’t answer,” I said. “It’ll take a few. That’s not to say we have to go out and throw £90 million at the problem like Chelsea did – but you’ve told me you want established position in the league. Right now we have it but an injury crisis could threaten that position – as could success.”

“Success? Explain.”

“I fear for someone like Dagoberto,” I said. “Not because I don’t think he can play, but because he can play. His natural talent is exceptional and that means as we come up toward the end of his contract, the more attractive he’ll be. To keep him we’ll have to pay – if we can even afford what he may ask – or keep his head turned toward us if other clubs swoop for him. The more success we have – and the more success he has in scoring goals, in fact – the harder that task will become.”

“You can rebuild,” he said, and I sensed he was playing the devil’s advocate.

“Well, we’ve only played ten matches and we’re still building,” I said. “But, you’re quite right. The trouble we had with Derby and Sonko in the close season is just one example. When good players play well at clubs of our size, it creates unintended consequences. And if we start playing well, who knows which of those consequences we’ll have to bear?”

“We haven’t had to worry about that before,” Madesjki replied. “I see your point.”

“I’d rather have that problem than simply needing to strengthen and having to buy in order to survive,” I said. “We are not at that point. We don’t have to buy anyone. And with our early success, another twenty points or so should keep us up so we can concentrate on the future. There’s plenty of time to achieve that and I am morally certain this group can do it. But it’s all up to you and the board where we go from that point forward.”

We talked awhile and I finally ended the conversation with another financial discussion.

“I’m holding £3.5 million out of the transfer budget that I have no intention of asking you to spend,” I said. “If he keeps playing like he’s playing, we’ll be paying it to Sao Paolo for Dagoberto’s goal incentive clause. He’s scary good and I love the run of form he’s on.”

“I understand,” he said. “Have you given much thought to January? The club is in the red for this year as it is.”

“I’m hoping we can stand pat in January and if I can pare down the size of the reserve squad I intend to do so,” I said. “We have to get smaller in that area so I can get people match experience who need to have it instead of people who aren’t going to get into the first team squad getting it by reputation.”

He nodded. “Very well,” he said, rising to leave. “Keep me informed, Rob.”

# # #

The other piece of news I received is that I will have to testify – by video – in Marsley’s trial.

I didn’t think that my recent deposition gave any reason for me to take the stand, but the attorneys disagreed. I’m being asked to testify toward Marsley’s state of mind when I met him at the Q restaurant right after Christmas.

I’m actually being called as a witness for the defense, though a decidedly unfriendly one. They are trying to establish Marsley’s actions as a crime of passion. I’m not thrilled about that but obviously I need to tell what I know. I expect leading questions, designed to exonerate the accused and perhaps even call my own actions into question – and I’ll expect Orsini to bring his ‘A-game’ in cross-examination.

I was served this afternoon – thankfully, not at the ground, which would have caused quite a furor – and I guess deep down I knew it was coming.

That doesn’t mean I like the idea, mind you. I’ve spent some months trying to put it all out of my head. But when the courts come calling, witnesses do what they are told, so I will sit down by video on Wednesday to give my recollection of last winter’s events.

That won’t be pleasant. But hopefully – finally – it will end a long, difficult episode.

# # #

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Tuesday, October 7

“Don’t let it worry you so, Rob.”

I lay awake in the middle of the night, moonlight spilling into our master bedroom. Patty lay next to me and was doing her level best to settle me down.

“I just hate going back to that place,” I said. “I just want it to be done.”

“After tomorrow, it will be,” she said. “Honey, look at what I went through. I had surgery, then I had to sit in court and look at the faces of the idiots who ran my car into a bridge – and I got through it. If I can do it, you certainly can.”

The pep talk wasn’t what I needed. Seeing light at the end of this particular tunnel was.

“Sweetie, I know that. It’s not a contest,” I said, leaning my head back hard into the pillows. “It’s just that this is one of the parts of Italy that I don’t care to remember and I can’t wait to be done with it!”

She soothed me with an oh-so-soft kiss. “Rob, honey, when you’re done, I’ll be ready to move on too,” she said. “Does that help you at all?”

I looked up at her, the very picture of self-assurance. Even though it was dark, the moon silhouetted her hair perfectly and she just looked like a vision.

I thought about it for a moment and pulled her to me gently. “I think that will help me, yes,” I said, hugging her tight.

# # #

This evening I traveled into London for an appearance on “the Beeb”.

Radio Five Live’s “6-0-6” was evidently desperate for a Tuesday night guest so they decided to phone the Yankee in Berkshire. Waters found me as I was leaving the training pitch this afternoon, where I took training with the youth team.

When the senior squad is away, the lads of the Reading organization get to “step up” in their facilities and it’s a great thing to watch some of them enjoying themselves while trying to pretend they weren’t.

Unfortunately, they aren’t doing so well in their league and part of that is due to the rather crazed insistence of the prior regime that half the players on our u-18 team should be strikers. Doubly unfortunate is the fact that there really isn’t a good senior prospect in that group at the moment – not even five-goal hero Jahson Downes. Leo Dodge and his coaches have their hands full.

So a pick-me-up for the boys was surely in order. I can’t complain about their work rate even though their success rate leaves a bit to be desired. They do try hard, but for the long-term growth of the club I need more than hard workers. That process of finding these players needs to start soon as well.

Anyhow, as I was leaving the pitch Waters approached me with the contact information from the BBC. “They’d like you to come down the studio this evening,” he explained. “Bring the missus if you like.”

I forgave him his familiarity with Patty and took the sheet of paper. “I could use a little time,” I admitted. “Call them back and tell them I’ll be there. I’ll take Patty to dinner in London tonight and we’ll have a nice time.”

“You deserve it,” he smiled, heading off to do his job.

# # #

Patty drove us to London. It was better that she drive because having worked in the city for a time she isn’t nearly as intimidated by its raw size as I am.

When I played here, I’d go to London three or four times a year. Kate and I stayed as homebodies in Berkshire as much as we could, trying to lay low while we built our relationship.

Obviously, with a relationship that is now in full flower and probably higher-profile than I would like, the way we appear in public deserves more careful consideration. We wanted to be as low-key as possible but Patty is still a ‘hot property’. As a result, when we called ahead for dinner reservations our needs were met quickly and discreetly.

“We haven’t had a date in awhile,” she observed, while I sat in her passenger seat trying to clear my head of the day’s mental traffic.

“Hopefully I’ll be good company for you,” I smiled, finally starting to relax as we pulled into the car park at our restaurant of choice, a fantastic Chinese eatery just out of the city center.

I opened the door and moved around to Patty’s side to take her hand. We walked to the door and it shot open from the other side to allow other guests to leave.

Smartly I stepped aside and watched Peter McGuire walk right past me. He was with a woman.

It wasn’t Kate.

# # #

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nette, I don't mind in the slightest. There are parts of Rob and Patty's life that neither can control. They seem to show up at odd times. O'Hara, I think everyone would have to be ill for Rob to get that kind of role :)

___

Not surprisingly, dinner didn’t go quite as we had planned.

Neither of us could get the image out of our minds and since Peter McGuire’s image is the one on the planet I would most like to remove from my mind, that wasn’t a good thing.

He pretended not to notice us, and I was so flabbergasted that I couldn’t even talk as he strode to his car, hand-in-hand with the woman in tow.

Finally, after we were seated, Patty looked at me.

“So, what do you make of that?” she asked.

“I’d rather not say,” I responded. “I’d rather enjoy an evening with you instead of talking about Mini-Me.”

We are our dinner in silence, and then Patty looked up at me again.

“You know, Rob, now I think I know why Kate has been acting the way she’s been.”

“It would make sense,” I said. “She’s not stupid by any stretch of the imagination.”

“But it seems like she’s reaching out to you, and I don’t like that.”

I looked into Patty’s green eyes. “I don’t like it either, honey. Don’t harbor any illusions about that, okay?”

“Rob, I know you love me,” she said. “But I just resent the idea that she can just walk in and out of your life – our life – without so much as a second thought!”

“Then we’ll need to set some boundaries,” I said. “I am not in a position to recommend to the club that we stop utilizing her firm’s services, but we can limit the amount of contact we have with her. There are people at this club who can help me do that – it’s not like at Padova. Nothing like Padova at all.”

“Good,” she said, taking a sip of wine. “You and I have worked too hard at this to let anyone else spoil it. I’m willing to work and fight for this and I know you are too.”

I reached across the table for her hand. “Dramatic renewal of purpose?” I teased.

“I love that thought,” she replied.

# # #

I have given more difficult interviews with the Fourth Estate than this one, and for that I am glad.

6-0-6 was a walk in the park by comparison to many of my briefings during my short career. These people actually wanted to know about me – they asked questions about my childhood, my upbringing, my thoughts on the game. I got no questions about my commitment, where I was spending my free time or with whom. In a way, it seemed odd.

But they couldn’t resist talking about Patty, though it was in a respectful way. “Tell us about the issues you’ve faced since she became a minor celebrity,” I was asked. “Surely things are a bit better in the Premiership for you?”

“Well, I won’t pretend those off-field issues have been easy or fun because they haven’t,” I said. “I’ve got my own issues with managing my team and being presented with offers from time to time from American firms who want to use my position for their own ends. For Patty, who isn’t used to being around the celebrity or athletic worlds, it’s been difficult and it’s been an adjustment. We just want to be normal.”

“Yet your wife has taped a television advert.”

I smiled. “Okay, maybe I just want to be normal,” I laughed. “But really, I have to accept the fact that ‘normal’ will mean something different for us now, especially if Reading succeeds. I can’t control certain things about my life any more so I’m glad to be in a place where I have people to help me do that.”

“Such as? What things are you no longer able to control?”

I knew I’d make news if I gave the wrong answer here so I took a deep breath. “I can’t control the reaction I get, or the reaction Patty gets, when we’re out in public. Most people can walk down the street and not get looks or be accosted by people who want something. We aren’t in that position any more. I realize what I do for a living affects that but you still have to make the personal adjustments when that sort of a life-changing event occurs. I think we’re doing fine, though.”

Thankfully, my interviewer left it at that.

The callers were a bit tougher, though, with the majority of opinion being that if Steve Coppell couldn’t advance Reading’s fortunes and was gone to Manchester, that I was going to have an equally difficult task. Not any personal aspersion, mind you … just observations from the great English sporting public.

I hope I can prove them wrong. For more than one reason.

# # #

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stoehrst, thank you for the kind comments. I'm glad you're reading and enjoying and that people still visit this work regularly. It's starting to heat up again!

___

Wednesday, October 8

During my tenure as a manager, I have learned to spot, and to the greatest extent possible avoid, leading questions.

However, in a courtroom setting, it’s not nearly so easy. There, you can watch the leading questions roll right up to you and smash you between the eyes.

Even by videoconference, it wasn’t difficult to spot. Marsley’s defense tried about as hard as they could to establish the fact that the wonderful guy who is their client simply loved my wife so much that he would claim anything to impress her – but by goodness, he didn’t mean anything by it.

“Had you ever met Mr. Marsley before that night?” I was asked.

“No.”

“Would you be able to say, as a result of your last answer, that you were in a position to judge Mr. Marsley’s emotions or intentions?”

“I could see on his face that he was angry,” I said. That wasn’t the answer he was looking for. “You don’t need to have known someone for twenty years to be able to tell when they’re angry.”

“Mr. Ridgway, let me restate the question,” he said, now having to go back over the same ground a second time. “Do you know Mr. Marsley well enough to say with certainty that he had malice toward either you or your wife on his mind when you met?”

Orsini objected. He was overruled. I was directed to answer the question.

“No. But again, you could see it in his eyes.”

He was getting nowhere and it was a losing line of questioning. He changed his tactics, as I would have, had I seen my first eleven getting beaten up on the pitch.

“Did Mr. Marsley threaten you verbally?”

“No.”

“Did he threaten your wife?”

“No.”

“Did he give any verbal indication that he was planning on threatening either you or your wife?”

“No.”

“Mr. Ridgway, as the victim of a crime, do you feel resentment toward those who perpetrated the deeds done to you?”

“Yes, I do.”

“Do you feel resentment toward Mr. Marsley?”

Here came the leading question train, heading right between my eyes. “I believe he was part of it, so yes, I do,” I said.

“I submit to you that due to your feelings of resentment, you are unable to form an objective opinion of Mr. Marsley,” he said, and upon objection immediately withdrew his statement – it was never intended to be a question.

With that he ended the questioning and Orsini rose. He had a slight smile on his face and I thought that was great.

“Mr. Ridgway, on the night in question, did you feel threatened by Mr. Marsley?”

“Yes, I did,” I answered.

“Why?”

“His tone, demeanor and insulting comments about my person indicated his intentions were not honorable.”

“Mr. Ridgway, you are a manager of men in your profession as a football manager. Please tell the court what non-verbal signals indicate to you that a person is angry or makes you feel threatened.”

“Frowning, squinted eyes, angry tone,” I said.

“And how many of these signs did you notice in Mr. Marsley?”

“All of them.”

“I have no further questions.”

# # #

So, it was over. I was excused from the stand, which was really my office chair, and the court worker who had brought in the video camera packed up to leave. Dillon knocked and entered my office, while my own personal attorney packed up his own things as well.

“Rob, how did it go?” he asked.

“It’s over, Kevin,” I said. “That’s really all I care about. I want that guy locked up or deported or both. It’s time for that part of my life to be over.”

“Well, good,” he said, tossing an advance scouting report on Cardiff City onto my desk. Since I had seen their last match myself in person, I didn’t expect to learn a whole lot from it. “You can start with this.”

# # #

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Thursday, October 9

Two of the Big Four are in a bit of trouble as the season reaches its one-quarter mark.

Manchester United and Liverpool both lost away yesterday, with Søren Larson’s injury time goal at Villa Park giving the home team a 3-2 win over the Red Devils. "Roonaldo" had staked United to an early 2-1 lead but Ashley Young’s second goal of the game fourteen minutes from time set up Larson’s heroics.

And Liverpool continues to struggle, falling 3-2 at Eastlands to Manchester City. Mohamed Sissoko got Liverpool off to a dream start but by the time Ryan Babel scored in the 57th minute, City had gotten a goal from David Jones and a brace from Antonio Samaras.

So United is now sixth and used up the game in hand they needed to win to pass us – while the champions are eighth and flailing a bit.

Still, there’s a lot of season to be played, and two of our three matches against the Big Four to this point have been at home. Neither of those matches are against Liverpool – and I don’t care if they’re eighth, the champions are the team we need to face to see how far we’ve truly come.

The attention of the nation has now turned to the World Cup qualifier against Estonia on Saturday. As a result it was a very quiet morning at our training facility. Steve McClaren and his England stars are getting all the attention and I enjoyed a day out of the comparative media spotlight.

I’m just waiting for someone to get word of my testimony in the trial. When that hits, I’m sure things will stoke right back up again.

# # #

I’m also in a bit of a quandry as to whether I should do anything regarding McGuire’s latest transgression.

Patty and I saw him, plain as the nose on your face, at a high-class restaurant with someone other than the mother of his children. He can’t possibly be stupid enough to think we didn’t see him.

Kate has all but begged me to “call off the dogs” on him. Well, my thought is that if she wasn’t aware of this, finding out might change her mind.

“Leave well enough alone, Rob,” Patty advised as we talked this evening. “You don’t know. It could have been a professional meeting. It looks absolutely terrible given what you and I both know he did, but you have to assume it’s innocent.”

“You’re probably right,” I said. “Yet he’s caused so much anger and resentment – and he’s got so much history of hurting people. The temptation is there.”

“Don’t,” she said. “You’re a Premier League manager. You want no part of this.”

I nodded. She’s right. I don’t need controversy.

Yet as I fell asleep tonight, I wondered what he was telling Kate.

# # #

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