TheNamelessThing.com

Jeepers. It's only gone and happened again, like, why-eye, awaire tha lads 'n' haddaway 'n' shite, like, eh? Today, United travelled up to the gristle-shrinking hillsides of the polluted stream called Tyne to wipe the Geordies' faces in the grime of their own failings, and it was a Very Good Thing. Five goals to one, an' all, like. Whay-eye man. The mind boggles, like. But while the reds were wheeling around the St. James pitch like a squadron of well-trained spitfires over Dresden, circa 1944, an Arsenal player was having some leg issues, and very gruesome it looked, too.

Kevin Keegan was sitting on the bench today like a serious piles victim, squirming in horror at the injustice of his life. Even beknighted Bobby Robson looked like he had a few grapes up his arse, up there in the dismal grey of the stands, surrounded as he was by replica shirt merchants (even the owner of the club had one on, for fuck's sake). For 24 minutes it looked like things weren't too bad, but then Rooney sent a precise cross from Ronaldo past Shay Givens in a fashion I can only describe as impeccable. The catlike Givens was stumped for once. Actually, it wasn't just once, it was five times, today, and the rout that followed Roon's opener did nothing to convince me that Newcastle aren't seriously deluded if they think sacking Big Sam was a logical move so early in the campaign. It's starting to look like Newcastle United's failings have nowt to do with Alladyce, nor Keegan, nor anyone else they might install in the electric chair. But enough of such trifles; a talented young Croatian lad was severely crocked today (tempted to say "Brazillian" for so many reasons on so many levels), and it has caused something of a kerfuffle in the head of Arsene Whinger, the Arsenal manager.

Keegan's grimace, foul-mouthed teeth-gritting mumbling, and apparent karate chop aimed vaguely at the Newcastle staffer sitting to his left after United's second goal, wasn't just tragicomical on many levels - it was symptomatic of the impotence and frustration he must be feeling, having to watch a team of relative "names" make utter cocks of themselves week in week out. A once proud member of the Liverpool invincibles, one of the very few professional footballers with the balls to compete on Superstars against the world's fittest athletes, a man who returned from Germany to a hero's welcome right there on daft Tyneside, reduced to a greying wreck of an man in a padded tracksuit and what remains of a famous dimpled square chin. All for this shower of drek he's been given to work with. And what of the other stars today? Carrick was characteristically strong and good and right and true. Scholes came on and had a little go, too. I'm a poet and I fucking know it, why-eye, man, like. Tevez was bustling and busy, keeping the defence on their toes, but sadly made too much of an obvious need to appear on the scoresheet when he failed to pass to better-placed gladiators. Ronaldo was sheer class, and the cocky half-grin of satisfaction on his face as he watched the ball slip by Givens for one of his goals says it all. Van der Sar was gigantic. Saha made several dents in the Newcastle underbelly, flabby and livid white as it is, and he eventually poked a hole right through it, from an unselfish little pass from Super Roon which the French marksman sent onionbagward as only he can. When he's not injured. And Super Nani? Again he did the business, and of course frustrated the opposition to such an extent there was a small tussle with Duff - who bounced back like a man and got on with the game with all forgiven. Unlike Arsenal's ridiculous "showboating" whinge last week. Showboating? I mean, seriously, are you actually allowed to complain when the opposition so totally outclass you that their players are taking the piss left, right, and centre? I think not, Whinger, I think not. But today, your whingeing was not in vain. That tackle by Taylor was not good. It was bad, and your calls for him to be debarred, or defrocked, or whatever it is they do to naughty footballers, should at least be heard, if not carried out fully. But then again, what else can you do to someone who inflicts such an injury so early in a game and with such venom? It's one for the philosophers, and Whinger is certainly one of them, so I'll leave it to him.