Obafemi Martins Likes it When I Yell at Him

By: Daryl | November 24th, 2008

Managing: Newcastle
Date: September 20th, 2008
Progress: 8th in Prem after 5 games, King of the North-East (temporarily)

Still beaming about my recently purchased Russian duo, I braced myself for back to back North East derbies. First up: Sunderland, at the Stadium of Light. Or, because I’m getting a little too much into this managing Newcastle thing, the Stadium of Shite.

The big man/fast man, Pogrebnyak/Martins partnership did precisely nothing in the first half. And it wasn’t the new guy’s fault. The Pog was getting to headers, but Martin wasn’t getting on the end of anything. And my defence was getting torn to pieces, with only Shay Given’s reflexes between me and a derby defeat.

At halftime the ratings were mostly in the low sixes, the very definition of average. All except for Martins, who was coming in at 5.0. Not good enough, so I let him have it. All the other players got a “do it for the fans” in the team-talk, but Martins got a telling off. According to the game, I told him I was “disappointed” with his performance, but I also told him that he’d never really achieved anything, wasn’t as good as he seems to think he is, and should probably concentrate more on his finishing than his stupid backflips. Think I also threatened to pull out one of his little dreadlocks.

And it definitely worked. 45 minutes later I had a 3-0 win in the Tyne-Wear derby, with Obafemi Martins getting a hat-trick and one assist for Pogrebnyak Screenshot here:

(click for full size)

Happy days, and it cheered the Toon Army up after getting embarrassed by Man City the previous week. Even better, it was on the telly.

One week later Middlesbrough came to St James’ Park and went home with a 1-0 defeat courtesy of Leonardo. Pograbnyek didn’t score, but did put in another good display and won his titanic Pog vs Pog aerial battle against Boro’s Emanuel Pogatetz. So now I’m well and truly in the Toon Army’s good books and delivering on my promise of a top half finish and then some. Happy days.