Part 110: Chapter the Seventh: Green eggs and West Ham.

Chapter the Seventh: Green eggs and West Ham.
January 28, 2021-February 15, 2021

We play West Ham twice in a row, once at the Olympic Stadium in the Premier League and then again at our house a week later in the FA Cup. I'd feel confident about beating them both times except they thumped us soundly after we took an early lead last fall. We also can finish off our Cwp repeat with either a win or a draw against Swansea.



£5.25m is enough dosh that I don't laugh them out of the room, but the offer is heavily backloaded with only £1m up front. I'd also rather not rely solely on Morvan to play every game the rest of the season, and next season we'll need depth in order to not wear out while playing continental football alongside a full league and cup schedule. Mair isn't going to get a lot better, but what he is now makes him a quality contributor to the club at a reasonable wage hit.

vs. Aston Villa, January 30, 2021
Premier League


Another home game against a bottom half side, another order to run out the 4-2-3-1. Shirra's suspension means that all three of Petts, Nieddu, and Djurovic are on the field, as they will be for however long our wayward wonderkid is suspended.

Starting Formation: 4-2-3-1 Control
Starting 11: Kovacevic, Cirjak, Todd, Feruga, Dos Santos, Morvan, Djurovic, Nieddu, Petts, Mujkic (c), Bastable.
Subs: Novotny, Mejasic, Lewis, Mair, Bailey, Di Martino, Aarts.

We threaten Aston Villa consistently, but manage just one goal on a Mujkic to Nieddu collaboration. Had Villa's striker not missed a sitter in stoppage time we might have come away with just a point despite the overwhelming possession and chance advantage. I challenge the team after the game, reminding them that clubs like Arsenal and the Manchesters will make us pay for such wastefulness. The team reacts as I hoped they would, they seem fired up and focused for the coming matches.

Man of the Match: Meteor Mujkic




Wrexham 1-0 Aston Villa



No means no, Italy.



We bought this kid from Staleybridge last year for £25,500. That means the £4,000,000 fee is essentially pure profit, and we're in line to get 20% of any future sale. Our staff had him rated as having an unspectacular 3.5 star potential. Unless my scouts and coaches are wrong, he was never going to be a star for us anyways.



We made a slight profit in January, but it's concerning me that we're spending over £2m a month on Non-Soccer Costs. We've spent more money on Non-Soccer Costs than we have on player wages this season. How many “cousins” are there who need a job at the club store, anyways? That amount of money could fund at least 250 full time employees earning an average of £50,000 a year even allowing for taxes and other employer expenses.



Crud, Silvio Burlusconi (now 85 years old and once again Prime Minister of Italy) has been telling Bastable all about the bunga bunga options available to players at Italian clubs. Rocky starts complaining at 11:45pm on February 1st, 15 minutes before the end of the transfer window.



Seriously, Inter and Napoli make eyes at you and all of a sudden you're too good for us? You bastard.



He's him under contract for two more years, hopefully he'll be willing to negotiate a new deal when we make the Champion's League. Otherwise we'll be forced to sell him after the 2021-2022 season ends.



If he wanted out, he waited way too long to make his move. I bumped his asking price up to £60 million, if a megabastard offers us that amount I'll accede to his transfer demands even though it means giving up one of the best strikers in the world before he even hits his peak.



Two good performances equals half the team of the week being named from our squad. Other than the Manchesters no team has as many players in the top 20 for average player ratings this season.



Not as bad as it could have been, but it's still a total of three games.

At Swansea, February 3, 2021
Premier League


Any points here will seal our second straight Cwp title. The Swans are one of eight teams with a positive goal differential this season. With several of our players unavailable due to U21 national team matches, including Mejasic, we've got three youth players on the bench. I'm going to rely on our counter-attack to win this match for us.

Starting Formation: 4-4-1-1 Counter
Starting 11: Kovacevic, Cirjak, Todd, Lewis, Feruga, Djurovic, Morvan, Petts, Mujkic, Nieddu, Bastable.
Subs: Noble, Dos Santos, Alvaro, Mair, Bailey, Argenti, Di Martino.

We start as we so often do, creating chances and outplaying our opponents. Djurovic is the man of the moment in the fifteenth minute, finding himself all alone at the far post as another gorgeous meteor from Mujkic arcs across the area to his waiting forehead. Swansea don't show much gumption until the end of the half, when they waste an easy chance to level the match. My exhortations at the half that the game is far from over have no appreciable effect, and we spend the second half scrambling to deal with a resurgent Swansea. They crack the woodwork twice in the second half and today we have luck to thank for our victory and our fifth straight shutout. We also claim the Cwp for the second year in a row, taking all four games against our Welsh opponents. There is only one team in Wales deserving of the crown, the oldest and greatest of them all.

Man of the Match: Dejan Djurovic




Swansea 0-1 Wrexham



I do not like green eggs and West Ham!
I do not like them on the pitch,
I do not like them one inch,
I do not like them in the Prem,
I do not like them at Wrexham,
I do not like their flashy Olympic stadia,
I do not like their gabbing to the media.

At West Ham, February, 2021
Premier League


West Ham sit just clear of the relegation zone right now. I'll do my best to help push their heads under water for you, Sky Shadowing. I'll also be using a different strategy that we'll use next week in our FA Cup match, I don't want them getting familiar with how we play.

Starting Formation: 4-4-2 Diamond Attack
Starting 11: Kovacevic, Cirjak, Feruga, Lewis, Mejasic, Mair, Djurovic, Mujkic (c), Nieddu, Di Martino, Bastable.
Subs: Novotny, Dos Santos, Todd, Morvan, Bailey, Matko, Aarts.

The look of relief on Josue Di Martino's face can be seen even from the nosebleeds after his first goal for the team finally comes on a counter attack. He burned the entire West Ham defense when he got on the end of a long Mair clearance and sprinting down half the length of the pitch before chipping the ball over the keeper. The game is never in doubt from that point on.

We add to our tally when Woj Feruga gets his head on the ball and nods it into the back of the net after one of our nine corner kicks on the day, and then Nieddu seals the victory with a slapshot one-timer from 100 feet away. The shutout makes us the fourth stingiest defense in the Premiership, we're now shipping less than a goal per game. The one negative from the match is another lackluster performance from the Bastard, his second in a row since pitching a fit and demanding a transfer. We've gone without his goal scoring presence before and we can do it again, but European qualification would be so much easier if he can get back to playing well.

Man of the Match: Stuart Mair




West Ham 0-3 Wrexham



Di Martino's earned five assists in fifteen total appearances, so he hasn't been unplayable. It's good to get the monkey off his back, though.



Our next three league games are against Tottenham, Manchester United (at Old Trafford), and Everton. If we're still unbeaten at the end of that I'll start talking again about how our streak can continue for a good while. At which point we'd almost certainly see Southampton kick our asses because I jinxed us.



Man City is the second to last team I'd let Bastable go to. Only their cross-town rivals have even less chance of landing him. I don't want him to make me regret my decision as he kicks our asses up and down the pitch at least twice a year.



No respect, I tell you. We've been in the top five since the tenth game of the season. We've been top four since the fifteenth week. Manchester United is running away with the league again, they're three points up on us and Arsenal with four games in hand, but saying that our hot run has only gotten us into the top half is selling us short by half.



We're also not getting anywhere near the TV exposure due our league position. This is the first time in three months that we'll be featured, over which time we've lost just one match. I'm starting to wonder if the Wrexham fan forums are correct and that there really is a conspiracy against us, determined to deprive us of money that we could use to oust the megabastards who view Champion's League qualification as a birthright.

vs. West Ham, February, 2021
FA Cup, Fifth Round


I will not gift you possession,
I will not respond to your aggression,
I will not have us shoot on sight,
I will not give you a sliver of daylight,
I will defeat you West Ham,
This time I have a plan!

Starting Formation: 4-2-3-1 Control
Starting 11: Kovacevic, Cirjak, Lewis, Todd, Mejasic, Mair, Petts, Nieddu, Shirra, Mujkic (c), Bastable.
Subs: Novotny, Dos Santos, Feruga, Morvan, Djurovic, Matko, Di Martino.

Dinko Mejasic will never be a good defensive fullback, but he sure knows how to make himself a threat from the wide areas of the pitch. After Meteor socked his second free kick goal in the span of a month to open scoring, Mejasic made like a winger and lofted a beautiful cross to Nieddu to make it two-nothing. Mujkic bagged a second goal when a cross with some wicked english on it bounced once and spun into the net past the hapless Hammer keeper.

It's not all joy in Mudville, though. Bastable is still sulking and out of sorts, missing chances that he usually converts without a second thought. Our scoreless streak is also broken at 67 minutes by West Ham's counter attack. They add a second goal before all is said and done, but 3-0 is too steep a chasm to climb back from. I'm still not pleased about the way we played during that final thirty minutes, and
grump to the team that they got sloppy at the end. It doesn't go over as well as I hoped, the club is getting overconfident as the squad is split between confusion and being fired up.

Man of the Match: Meteor Mujkic.




Wrexham 3-2 West Ham



Stop being a yutz, Rock. I'm not going to sell you unless someone's willing to drop £50m into my lap. Just think about how happy you'll be when we win the FA Cup and qualify for the Champion's League.



Our bonus pool is so tiny because it's based on the total wages of the players and we're misers when it comes to paying our players. The morale boost for "high" bonuses is still the same regardless of the nominal amount being offered.



The deeper we get into the FA Cup, the more we can charge for tickets. Half a million in gate receipts is pretty sweet for a single game, though teams like Manchester United are hauling in over £3m a game for these rounds.



By getting another home game, we're going to break the sales record we just set. Wrexham has never advanced further than the quarterfinals in the FA Cup, but we'll once again be favored over the Canaries. Meanwhile Manchester City will be playing Manchester United, removing one of them as a potential semifinal draw.



It turns out that I needn't be so worried about our defense. From Chelsea's equalizer in the 71st minute of our January 13th match to West Ham's first goal in the 68th minute of our last match on February 13th, we played more than ten and a half hours of soccer without giving up a single goal. We're through the soft part of our schedule for the moment, though. Next up is a gauntlet of good teams like Tottenham and Everton at the Racecourse Grounds and our annual trip to Manchester United. That's by far and away the toughest set of games remaining. We'll have six games between those and the final three weeks of the season where we'll face off against Arsenal and Man City. If we're still in fourth place after the Everton game we can start making plans for Champion's League football. Even better, we're also alive in the FA Cup and with a victory over Norwich we'll be one of four teams in the hunt for a major prize.