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View from the Cemetery - February 2015 - Part 3

Submitted by Ghostly Gadgie on Tuesday, 3 March 2015

In my many years of peering through this fence, one thing has stayed remarkably similar, namely that we always seem to win more games away than we do at home. Never mind being very disappointing for those of us stuck in this post-life compound, just why is it I wonder? Is it the atmosphere that puts our lads off? Does the sight of the cemetery on two sides cause players to ponder on their mortality when they should be pondering on the opposition centre forward? It surely can't be the pressure of expectation. And, given the size of the usual gate it certainly can't be stagefright. But, whatever the reason, it does seem to be the case. Even our glorious run to fourth place a few years back was fuelled mainly by unlikely wins on our travels, with home games featuring an unfeasible number of draws. This year has not so far been the same of course, not least because we haven't had enough wins either home or away. But now I start to think the tide has turned, and that what is clearly going to be an epic run to escape from the bottom three in this last few weeks of the season is likely to feature a number of gritty wins on the road and somewhat less glorious results at home. I hope I'm wrong. Expectations were certainly running high after last week’s excellent win at Newton Aycliffe for the visit of Jarrow Roofing on Saturday, but we hoped in vain. Bad goals conceded, and despite lots of possession, not enough good attempts on goal. Never mind, lets go again...

Mistaken identity is a funny thing, don't you think? There used to be a famous test for trainee lawyers where an incident in class was staged unexpectedly, and later the students were tested on their powers of accurate recall of what had happened and who had been involved. During this the tutors tried to persuade them, often with a surprising degree of success, that the lead actor in the event was black, when he was in fact whiter than Andy Capp. A lesson in stereotyping and memory I'm sure. But what success would he have had do you think if he was trying to persuade a group of students that Wes Brown was John O'Shea. Maybe not so much. Unless it was a group of trainee referees...