Pre-Season in Prison

By: Daryl | November 20th, 2008

Pre-season went well. Shola Ameobi banged in goals left, right and center (5 goals in 4 games) and my defence looked almost unbreachable. In hindsight maybe the fact that I was playing against Hamilton Academicals had something to do with that. All respect to the Accies, but I think they’d struggle in the Prem.

Final three pre-season games went like this:

Aberdeen (A) 2-1. Goals from Obafemi Martins and Ignacio Gonzalez
Hamilton Accies (A) 3-0. Danny Guthrie, o.g. (forced by Joey Barton), Obafemi Martins
Charlton (A) 2-0. Cacapa, Shola Ameobi

Joey Barton was released from clink on July 28th and I figure I’d welcome him back by putting him straight in the first XI against the Accies. Assuming Barton spent his time in jail doing chin-ups on his bunk bed, that’s pretty much an ideal pre-season right? Turns out yes, as he looked damn good. Sadly he still has a six game Premier League ban to serve.

Things were a bit slow in the transfer market. I needed a left back because I don’t trust Jose Enrique or Sebastian Bassong, so short term solution was to snap up free agents Cesar (33 year old Brazilian) and 27 year old Argentinean centre back/left back Matias Lequi. Both were free and wanted minimal wages.

Big news is that I sold Michael Owen. He was pocketing £125,000 a week, was injured and his contract was up in the summer. So when Milan offered £6 million I bit Silvio Berlusconi’s arm off. Downside is that now I have a striker shortage. Martins looks OK, Ameobi is my new BFF but still a limited footballer, and Xisco looks absolutely useless.