Touching Cloth

We almost did what we needed to do in our two consecutive away games. Almost, but not quite. While Man City overcame their last big obstacle to leave themselves touching silver, we’re left touching cloth.

On the Wednesday, we finally saw a controlling display (and wonderful goal) from Modric, a positive result at the Reebok and a long overdue away win. All boxes ticked. It’s a surprise when Luka manages to kick the ball further than six yards (his corner taking for example) but it’s even more surprising when he drives one into the top corner from 25. In fact, a lot of our good work was underpinned by the Croatian: that cracking opener, the interchange that released Bale to set up the crucial second for Rafa, the trademark killer ball inside the full-back for Lennon to square for Ade. We know how Luka can control a game – especially when the legs are getting weary – but we need him to do it again now…..if he wants to live up to that price tag.

When Ade manages to round the goalkeeper – with his turning circle bigger than the Titanic’s and his touch almost as heavy – you know it’s your night. Speaking of circles, the game marked the completion of the circle for Fabrice Muamba. It was great to see him moving around, looking healthy and relaxed.

We’re still vulnerable when it comes to tracking runners from midfield, as Reo-Coker showed when he wandered into our box to equalise and usher in a horrible 10 or so minutes of a Bolton storm that we did well to ride out. It’s something you’ve got to do away from home, and thankfully we stood firm amid the barrage of set-pieces, Sandro sticking closely to our traditional Trotters tormentor-in-chief, Kevin Davies.

For once, a few other things went our way too, the ball striking Sandro’s hand in the build-up to the corner that led to little Luka’s stunner and then hitting Willie G’s hand at the other end. Either could easily have been given.

It was the two goals in the blinking of an eye that turned a hairy away fixture into a beautifully shaved one. Pace and power on the break are something we’ve got in our locker, something other teams should fear, but something we haven’t seen a lot of in recent games. Needless to say, these weapons are a lot harder to use when your opponents spend most of their time in their own half, as we discovered at Villa Park on Sunday. I don’t know what’s more embarrassing – holding on for a point against 10 men at your own ground or failing to beat a team that does that. At the end of the day, Villa did the bare minimum to ensure their survival, although I’m not sure it’ll be much consolation to supporters who seem to have lost any tiny bit of goodwill they might have had for McLeish. As we know, Spurs are usually the number one team a struggling side needs to play in order to rediscover their form and their fortunes. Villa might not have found the former against us, but they certainly found the latter when Clark’s shot struck Willie G and looped into the top corner. Would have been nice to see Gallas stick his chin out and maybe even head it away, but never mind. In a game where the other side had done little more than clear the ball, we suddenly found ourselves losing.

We already feared the worst, but we feared even worse than that when Rose dived in on Hutton to leave our former player down and our team a man down. Maybe Danny got the ball, but the fact that Hutton had to go off suggested he got a lot more besides. These days, it’s sliding suicide.

We needed the break of Manu’s penalty when it was looking like our attacks would just wash up against the claret and blue bank. All in all, being a man down for most of the second half, we might have ended up with nothing. Harry obviously had that in mind when he took off Rafa – a player whose intelligence and ability to cover attacking or midfield positions might make him ideal when you’re down to 10 men – and replace him with Scottie P, just to make sure we didn’t lose. Not so much fighting fire with fire as fighting fear with fear.

Fear. There’s plenty of that at the moment. There’s no way we should be in a position where our fate is not entirely in our own hands, but that’s the position we’re in. I’m not expecting favours from anyone. We’ve missed so many chances to leap back above a faltering Arsenal that they’re probably thinking they could turn up blindfolded and still find that we’d failed to do our bit. When I saw the fixture list back in the summer, I was hoping it wouldn’t come down to Fulham on the last day. But that’s where we’re at. Touching our goals, touching glory…..touching cloth.