The Week That Was…..

The week began on Saturday; bottom club Brighton came to Bescot for a crucial league game, the first to be played on our new pitch! The turf could have done with an extra week to settle down but held out well as WFC scraped their way to victory. Jorge Leitao’s seventh minute header opened the scoring and the Saddlers faithful sat back to await a goal fest - something which never came. We were embarrassingly outplayed as Brighton did everything but score including hitting the bar three times. They had 61% of possession and forced fifteen corners compared to our three…but in football, we all know it is points that count.

Elsewhere, all the hype surrounded Robbie Fowler making his Manchester City debut but Big Dave made it an unhappy one for the Maine Road faithful…talking of unhappy, let’s all spare a moment for Sunderland…three own goals in the first half alone…with luck like that they’ll be playing at Bescot next season. “We did not deserve to lose today. We weren't beaten, we lost.” Said Howard Wilkinson. You sort of get what he means…

The transfer window may well have closed but business at Bescot continued this week. The club confirmed that we will receive £420 000 as part of the deal which saw Michael Ricketts swap Bolton for Middlesborough. The Saddlers were also linked with Stanislav Varga – the towering Slovakian international defender, who had a loan spell at the Hawthorns last season, has been released by Sunderland. He is currently on trial at Celtic but Colin Lee is on standby in case things don’t work out north of the border. Bad weather caused our reserve clash with Huddersfield to be called off on Wednesday, a decision which affected one Saddler more than most. Ruled out by tonsillitis at the start of his loan spell, an unused sub against Brighton and cup-tied for next weeks game against Sheffield United, Jean-Phillipe Javary’s only Saddlers appearance looked like being against Leicester. However with no chance to prove his fitness due to the reserve cancellation, Colin Lee has decided to send Javary back to Brammall Lane earlier than expected…even Brazilian flop Bica managed one appearance didn’t he?!?

The less said about Walsall versus Leicester City the better…although we weren’t actually THAT bad. But a combination of Leiceter cheating, Uriah Rennie, poor defending at set plays and some Leicester skill resulted in us losing 4-1. Martin O’Connor scored his first of the season while Junior played well on his return and Darren Bazeley put in a Man of the Match performance. At least Wolves lost…And how! Brighton finally came good to thrash the Dingles 4-1. The West Midlands teams all faired badly with only the Baggies picking up a point.

It was a busy day for ex Saddlers as no fewer than four found themselves on the score sheet. Roberto Martinez netted for Swansea, Paul Hall scored his 13^th of the season for Rushden while Dion Scott  - remember that young defender from our reserve team a few years ago – powered home an 83^rd minute header to equalise for Kidderminster away at Carlisle. Gareth Ainsworth also scored for Wimbledon.

Finally, my thoughts on the England squad…I’m sure some of you will disagree so post your rants on the message board. Russell Hoult should be in, unfortunately West Brom are a “small” club and Mr. Eriksson  has decided to go with the calamitous duo of David James and Richard Wright. Secondly, Wayne Rooney should NOT be in the squad. He is a good young player with great potential but Sven should look at the present and not the future. The top English scorers in the Premiership are Beattie, Shearer, Owen and Euell. Rooney has managed only three goals…even Dichio and Steve Watson have managed more than that and they have about as much chance as Jorge Leitao of getting in the England squad!