This season I’ve taken pride in my powers of recovery. The ability to bounce back from a Gameweek of misery with a plucky display seven days later. The upper lip has remained stiff on my face of adversity.
Right now, it’s quivering with my chin scraping the floorboards of my two-up, two-down grief pit.
Motivated by the need for differentials to help claw back a mini-league deficit, I chose to cuddle up to Dimitar Berbatov and Fernando Torres, despite knowing all too well that the allure of Robin Van Persie and Carlos Tevez was beautifully placed to return bigger profits.
Their Scout Pick selection spelled it out to me – bringing them in made perfect sense. But in the context of my mini-league, there was another perspective; spending points to match my rivals’ team took the shine off the obvious route to success.
By four o’clock the true horror of that decision was apparent. Once again I paid the price for being clever – for ignoring the big picture, for turning my back on the bleedin’ obvious.
This pain is not all self-inflicted this time – I can at least proportion some blame to good old-fashioned bad luck.
With Rafael Van der Vaart as captain, my returns could have been handsome. If only he’d converted his second spot-kick, or indeed had Mark Clattenburg handed Spurs a third. While Van der Vaart clogged his penalty re-take to punish my points tally, Tevez, sporting the armband from my rivals, gorged on a brace of spot-kicks to earn a hat-trick. Agony – absolute agony.
Adding further insult, and extinguishing any hopes of a second-half revival, Van der Vaart failed to appear for the second-half. A calf injury apparently. He couldn’t have been hurting as much as me. Van der Vaart might be fit for Gameweek 27 – I’m not sure I will be.
So there you have it – enjoy Match of the Day. There were lots of goals apparently.
As for me, I’ll give Arsene a call. Arsene and me. In the pub, in the corner. I’m drowning it all in the local brew; he’s got his large glass of red. Don’t you dare tell us to cheer up.
