Really, this has to stop now, this wonderfully stereotype-busting weather currently enjoyed in most of the country makes it virtually impossible to get anything done.
Saturday
Sandefjord (9th) – Odd Grenland (3rd)
Right, the fact that this game is well underway at the time of writing renders this preview utterly pointless. Still, even though the score is 1-0 to Sandefjord, we confidently predict Odd to turn it around. In fact, we have money on it. Come on Kovacs, you Hungarian lump, time to make yourself useful.
Away win
Sunday
Bodø/Glimt (15th) – Molde (2th)
Credit where it’s due, in spite of being more than a bit doomed Bodø/Glimt aren’t giving up. Still, against the crafty counter-attacking.. eehh.. cretins (where did you think we were going with that?) of Molde you’d expect them to struggle.
Away win
Lyn (16th) – Stabæk (6th)
You can just imagine Lyn and Stabæk arguing over who’s in the biggest financial mire:
Stabæk: We’re so screwed, our players have had to take a wage-cut.
Lyn: So what? We’re so screwed we have to raise 10 million kr through transfers this summer, and very few of our players are particularly good.
Stabæk: Bah, that’s nothing, we’ve had to sell our STADIUM!
Lyn: You what? We don’t even have a stadium, in fact we’re this close to being chucked out from the one we’ve been playing at because we haven’t paid rent all year!
Stabæk: Well.. ok.. but we’ve got the richest fans in the country, yet no one seems to want to help us out financially!
Lyn: Wha.. fans? You mean those dozen or so people who keep telling us to spend the money we don’t have getting rid of our manager? And then make an allmighty fuss when that manager doesn’t worship at their feet?
Stabæk: Ok, ok, you win. But at least in 2011 you won’t have to pay a 37 year old Daniel Nannskog over 3 million a year!
Lyn: Dude, unless someone steps in to bail us out we won’t EXIST in 2011!
Away win
Start (5th) – Strømsgodset (14th)
This week Start played the first game of their difficult Gold Cup-period where they’ll be without both Christian Bolanos and Clarence Goodson, arguably their best offensive and best defensive player. Predictably they lost, 3-2 to Henning Berg’s Lillestrøm, and even though Strømsgodset are no great shakes this will be an almighty test for Start who need to show that they can pick up points without Bolanos and Goodson.
Draw
Viking (8th) – Lillestrøm (11)
It’s been slightly less miserable for Viking these last two weeks, and with Peter Ijeh looking like he might fancy playing a bit of football again it should be onwards and upwards for herr Uwë’s disciples.
Home win
Aalesund (13th) – Vålerenga (4th)
Unfortunately there will be no new edition “What’s Kjetil Rekdal unhappy about this week?”, as the beleaguered boss has told the media sod off and leave him alone, a message eerily similar to the one that got him into this mess in the first place. The Norwegian football federation have decided to give Rekdal a one match ban for being naughty on television, whilst his verbal sparring-partner Eirik Bakke will escape punishment because his comments, apart from his classy parting-shot “You fat pig”, weren’t caught up by microphones. So, according to the Norwegian football federation, calling someone a fat pig is fine, but calling someone an alcoholic isn’t. Good to know.
Draw
Monday
Brann (7th) – Fredrikstad (11th)
As foreign interest in Erik Huseklepp increases, Brann have apparently lowered their asking price from a comical 40 million kr to 25 million. The fee would still probably represents poor value for money, but in light of Huseklepp’s recent form Brann just might get it.
Home win
July 4th, 2009 at 6:45 pm
So, how do you feel about not only
1) being correct in that Odd would turn it around, but also
2) being correct in that Kovacs would make himself useful?
As for me, I think you know what I feel about this result. Some really strange refereeing going on, but it went both ways, which sort of made the result pretty fair after all.
July 4th, 2009 at 6:54 pm
I was actually still writing this when Kovacs scored, so that was pretty funny. Also, I got stuck in with some live-betting action, at half-time I put 50kr on Odd to win at a healthy odds of 5.00..
July 4th, 2009 at 7:16 pm
And Sandefjord’s coach Patrick Walker wins this week’s “Rekdal moment” by claiming it felt like they didn’t get anything from the referee. Uhh, hello, the 1-0 goal isn’t anything? Or how about Bentley getting a yellow card for filming when it was in fact a penalty for Odd? I’m only surprised that Kovacs actually got that very clear penalty near the end, instead of that too just being ignored.
OK, so the equaliser goal of Kovacs is still debatable, but at least even the TV commentators still have a hard time deciding that one, so can’t really blame the referee as such. He had to make a tough decision where the margins were down to millimeters, and chose for it to be a goal. Stuff like that happens.
Even worse is that if Walker maintains this attitude, it won’t really help the players. They’ll believe that they should have earned a rightful win, when frankly, it was their overly cowardly attitude throughout the entire second period that was the main reason for the loss. And allowing them to believe this won’t help them realise that they need to play better if they’re to secure more wins, instead of steadily moving downwards to the doomed teams.
July 5th, 2009 at 2:33 pm
Looking at it from Walker’s perspective his team has just lost in injury time to a slightly dubious (as you say) penalty, you can understand that he falls for the temptation of having a bit of a pop at the ref. I agree with you though that there were a lot of weird calls both ways.
Btw, Øvrebø in not giving a penalty-shocker, surely we’ve heard that one before?
Sandefjord tend to do that don’t they? Fall back something fierce when they’re ahead? I’ve been suspecting for some time now that they’ll be the Hull City of the Tippeliga this season.. You can get some good results and some positive momentum at the start of the season, but over the course of the campaign if your players aren’t good enough you will get found out, and I’m afraid this is what seems to be happening to Sandefjord at the moment..
July 5th, 2009 at 3:33 pm
To be clear, I said that the penalty -was- pretty damn clear, I was just surprised that Tom Henning “if the attacker’s not in a coma or possibly dead, it’s not penalty” Øvrebø still gave it to him. Kovacs is not just being held, he’s positively being snuggled, by what I’m sure is a decent Sandefjord player who just fell head over heels for that strange combination of boyish and thuggish looks of Kovacs. Love is so unpredictable, that way.
July 5th, 2009 at 3:54 pm
By the rules it’s pretty damn clear, by the way the rules are enforced in most games it’s very dubious. If this had been Edvartsen and not Øvrebø the media would have been up in arms about it and you know it.
July 5th, 2009 at 3:57 pm
The way things are going, the refs will soon adopt wildly different standards of what consitutes a proper kick-off. And at least one of them will book players a red card for say, not using the right foot to make the first pass of the ball. Another will simply give the opposing team a goal -if- the 4th referee thinks he’s being looked at in a funny way by one of the coaches during the moment of kick-off.
July 5th, 2009 at 8:21 pm
Start picks up a value point at home today and I know that sounds crazy but without Goodson or Bolanos they a relegation battler. Hopefully they can get a point here and there thru July until those two return.
July 5th, 2009 at 8:51 pm
Mr. Sivertsen must feel quite frustrated with having to wait until tomorrow night’s match is done before he can put up this round’s review. So many great goals, so many goals at all, and his predictions are in fact mostly correct! What a round, and Aalesund – Vålerenga may well spawn a classic comment from Martin Andresen (Rekdal is usually rather boring to listen to when his team wins). Or ‘Enga might take it back, and we all know what will happen then.
July 6th, 2009 at 6:49 am
hi.thx for nice previews.do u have any news on today matches brann,elfsborg,goteborg ones.
plz notify if u knw abt missing players.
thx
July 7th, 2009 at 10:23 am
“Start picks up a value point at home today and I know that sounds crazy but without Goodson or Bolanos they a relegation battler. Hopefully they can get a point here and there thru July until those two return.”
Nah can`t agree with you there Start has several other good players. That said i do agree that loseing Goodson and Bolanos significantly weakens the team.
But Bolanos is cleared to play again now and wile Goodson is good i don`t think he is as important as Bolanos. Have to remember that last time Goodson was out so was the other central defender
July 7th, 2009 at 11:21 pm
They have other good players, but not in central defense. Mathiesen and Haraldsen are both poor by Tippeliga-standards, Borgersen does a job but without the more sprightly Goodson next to him I think he’d have a hard time as well.
Bolanos is a good player but without him Start can still score goals, while without Goodson they don’t look even remotely capable of a tight ship at the back, so in my eyes Goodson is a more important for them.
July 8th, 2009 at 12:49 am
Yeah you are rigth the dept at defense isn`t good. So in terms of loss in quality i guess Goodson is a worse loss the Bolanos.