My oh my, 7 a.m. central time and I'll be up and listening on line on January 1, a day on which I can rarely remember waking before noon. Such is fandom.
38:27 Shot by Paul Dickov (Leicester) right-footed from left channel (20 yards), save (caught) by Marcus Hahnemann (Reading).
In all there were 13 games in the top four divisions postponed due to waterlogged pitches today; ours was the only one in doubt to actually start. It's been wet. If the weather stays like this then our game away to Walsall on Saturday is in serious doubt. However, I think we could have finished the game. At the beginning of half time the referee apparently told both managers that they would start the second half and see how it went for ten minutes. He then changed his mind and called the game off. This annoyed a lot of us at it had stopped raining, and the sky was starting to clear. Having said that conditions were bad in the first half. The pitch was very heavy, and there were large areas where the ball just wouldn't roll - including in front of Leicester's goal. On more than one occasion their defenders tried to play the ball back to the goalie just to see it stop short; unfortunately we couldn't take advantage of the situation.
First game I've seen abandoned in 6 years (and only the second ever in 16 years). Last time was a cup tie at home to Bury at Elm Park. On that day the heavens just opened 20 minutes before the start and the Bury fans on the open away end were absolutely soaked through within about 30 seconds (oh how I miss such comedy). It was much worse that night with huge visible puddle everywhere and not one spot on the pitch where the ball would roll. It was just hoof-splat-hoof-splat for 30 minutes, by which time Bury were winning 2-0. They were not happy when it was called off, not helped by our then player/manager Jimmy Quinn responding to a claim by the Bury captain that the conditions didn't make much difference to their performance by replying "well, you are third division players aren't you". To rub salt into the wound, in injury time of the re-arranged match with Reading playing badly and hanging on at 1-1 to force a replay, Jimmy Quinn brought himself on to waste a bit of time, and promptly headed the winner in the third minute of stoppage time. It is quite staggering how professional footballers, who surely must train in similar conditions now and then, are completely unable to learn that a ball rolled through surface water will stop dead. They always look utterly amazed by the phenomenon and seemingly go on a mission to see how many times they can repeat the mistake.
Great story on the abandoned cup tie. Have you stopped laughing yet? Complainers abound at all levels & sports. A couple of years ago the FIRE beat the MetroScum on a cold Friday night at Soldier Field to advance to MLS Cup. The field was promptly covered after the match, but the next night a freak (for October) lakefront snowstorm dumped half a foot of snow and the pitch promptly froze to the covering. When the field was uncovered for Sunday's gridiron match between the Bears and New Orleans, huge chunks of turf came up as well. The divots were filled in with sand just b4 match time. After the game the pointyball players moaned about soccer players ruining the pitch. We got a huge belly laugh at the thought of the harm 130 lb. DaMarcus Beasley could do to a pitch compared to a 320 lb. gridiron mucker.