Goliath to fall....

I'm going to a 50th birthday bash this evening but will be hoping to sneak into the bar next door for the big fight. It will hardly be a classic as "man fights bear," but I am a big fan of David Haye and this is the fight that could catapult him onto the world heavyweight stage.

To do it, he will need to go for it and beat the Russian decisively. Valuev has used his size in 50 fights to avoid taking too much direct fire and he tires his opponents by smothering them. Haye will need to use all of his power and speed to get through to Valuev's midriff which sits where other boxers chins normally are. If he can get Valuev to bend forward he might be able to attack his head which looks uncannily like Tyrannosaurus Rex.

Haye is an engaging speaker and comes across as a good bloke. If you have ever seen him skipping, you will know that he's taking his sport very seriously indeed and that he has been waiting all his life for the title fight he gets this evening. Going one better than Evander Holyfield would give him genuine options in terms of challenging for other belts and possibly unifying the title once again.

If he fails, he faces following Audrey Harrison down the slippery path to an inglorious career although I believe Haye has too much about him to end up a laughing stock. My money's on David to slay Goliath and go to show us what he can do against ordinary sized heavyweights.

Northwich Victoria

I am shifting uneasily in my chair about Sunday's F A Cup tie.

It's a match, of course, that we should win with something to spare. We have a squad of professionals, many with years of experience who should be confident of playing non-league opposition and grinding out a win. Even our front two must be feeling confident about finding a yard of space on the ground or a foot of clearance in the air to get the goals that will see us through? Let's face it, we are second in League One and this should be a canter.

Trouble is, we have to show significantly more determination and ambition than we showed at Carlisle last week. We can't afford to enter this match thinking all we need to do is turn-up and knock it about a bit. We also can't afford to play a seriously weakened team and I am not confident Parky will play a full strength side, especially with a JPT Cup game at Southampton on Wednesday and the crucial MK Dons match next week.

The fact that this match is being laid bare for the nation on ITV won't help us either, unless we take control early on. Northwich will fight tooth and nail and they will be cheered on by practically everyone in the ground. We had sold barely 200 tickets as of yesterday and clearly it's not a game that's catching the imagination since the decision to televise it. Ditto Southampton in the week.

On reflection, therefore, I suspect we are in for a torrid afternoon. I still can't envisage defeat here but suspect it might be close enough for a replay. This is a key week for our season. Progress in both of these cup competitions and a result over MK Dons would give us renewed confidence and set us up for some exciting matches in the coming months. A bad week here and we could find ourselves concentrating on trying to get back into the automatic promotion places with a squad questioning it's capability.

Greenwich 2012

I feel like I am sitting on the fence over the planned use of Greenwich Park for the Equestrian events at London 2012. I want to see my borough involved in the Olympics but I would resent it if we lost the use of the park for too long and especially if irreparable damage was done as a result. The proposed use of Woolwich for the shooting seems less controversial as it is unlikely to attract the numbers of spectators or require the sort physical changes around the Barracks that may be permanent.

Greenwich Park; it would appear that the temporary stadium (housing 23,000 spectators) and main event venue for the show-jumping will be built around the natural ampitheatre that is the "meadow" that runs down from General Wolfe's statue to Queen Anne's House, part of the National Maritime museum. This is the reason for choosing Greenwich Park because it gives the backdrop shot of London 2012 - the iconic shot of Queen Anne's House in the foreground shadowed by the towers of Canary Wharf. I'm not sure what else the events will need apart from the out-lying course which, presumably, won't do any long-term damage to the park but the associated affects on life in Greenwich is what looks to be ratting the anti-brigade. The foot tunnel at Greenwich will be closed for months for a face-lift prior to the event and there will be months of disruption on Greenwich's critical roads in the lead-up to the games. The well-organised and vocal west Greenwich community has mounted a protest against the scale of the plans with local journo, Andrew Gilligan, prominent. They have impressive numbers of petitioners but they can only really hope for small victories in this war.

I was out running yesterday when I saw a tree being felled (pictured) in front of the Maritime Museum, which I understand is the beginning of the work to put an access road in front of the museum in order to reach the "meadow" without taking trees out in the park between the main gates at King William Walk and the "meadow." I had to smile when I heard one of the organisers saying last night on the news that "our plans don't involve the cutting down of any trees."

By contrast, the less well-organised and less-vocal residents of SE18 aren't mounting anything like as effective a campaign against the use of the Royal Arsenal Barracks. The organisers have been forced into a temporary re-think involving the existing Bisley range or even a new site at Barking Reach, but after due haste, quickly dismissed those and have re-focused on Woolwich. The Barracks will provide a splendid background for the shooting and the connection with firearms is entirely appropriate. Woolwich has been degenerating for fifty years and surely we shouldn't be looking to prevent it having a week or two in the sunshine?

I have long advocated the building of a "Charlton Wall" from the river to Shooters Hill, but I guess the more realistic hopes for the residents of Greenwich is genuine renegeration of the once-proud Woolwich. On top of the river developments at the old Arsenal site, the Olympics might offer hope of more to come, even if not directly as a result of the shooting itself?

Come what may, I know I would feel sore and like a pariah if the games came to the Capital and south (east) London was again ignored completely like we are a part of London the Cogniscenti would rather not acknowledge. Having said that, the Games are being stage in our poor sister's backyard in East London, so perhaps we should be grateful for small mercies.

Weakened MK Dons to play at the Valley

Looking for any positives (clutching for straws), I see that Paul Ince faces loses three of his more influential players for the crunch match at the Valley a week on Saturday. Captain Dean Lewington (son of Ray) will be suspended and he could be joined by Republic of Ireland U21 Stephen Gleeson and top scorer Jermaine Easter who is waiting on a Wales call for the crucial friendly against Scotland in Cardiff. Come on Tosh, do your duty!

Curbs cashes in...

Following Kevin Keegan's victory in his constructive dismissal claim against the Toon, it was only a matter of time before Alan Curbishley got his day in front of the Premier League manager's arbitration panel. That came today and this afternoon his claim was duly upheld and he should learn tomorrow how much compensation West Ham will have to pay him. This will hurt West Ham at a time they can ill-afford to be shelling out to a former manager. It should also make interfering club directors think twice before meddling in team affairs.

Charlton's Youth saw off the challenge of the Gills this evening with a comfortable 3-0 win in the first round of the Youth F A Cup. Tamer Tuna played with his peer group as Liam Bellamy, Harry Pell and Lewis Perkins scored the goals.

Three days on...

Three days on and the fallout from the 3-1 loss at Carlisle is beginning to settle. I have been able to see the goals from the game and I am unhappy; the penalty appeal against Sam Sodje which was turned down but which I think lead to the referee bottling it and awarding one from the resulting corner, was never a penalty. Sodje went up with their man who got underneath him and made a meal of it.

The 'penalty' decision itself was an absolute joke. As the ball comes over and players begin their runs, one of our players bumps one of theirs as they both go near post. It was 50-50, both stay on their feet and the ball by-passes the pair of them. Referee Haywood blows before the ball lands. An appalling decision and one that was worth getting sent to the stands for. Our penalty minutes later looked on the edge of the box to me but it I am sure we got it because Haywood had been thinking about what he had done, especially in light of the abuse aimed at him by Phil Parkinson.

As for Kavanagh's goals, I didn't think the first strike was as good or as unstoppable as portrayed on the radio. It wasn't that hard a strike and it went through a crowd of players. Ikeme was very close to it and might have expected to get a hand to it on another day. Kavanagh's second was far better but the damage had already been done by then.

If the Carlisle games serves to give us that extra bit of backbone for the forthcoming Cup games and a point to prove when we face the MK Dons, then it won't be the end of the world, but we must see an improvement in attitude across the pitch and more responsibility than at Brunton Park.

As far as the decision to play Ikeme is concerned, Ketts on Dr Kish makes a good point about Parky's possible rationale here; with Ikeme unable to play in the F A Cup on Sunday, the risk of injury to Randolph at Carlisle would have left us without a keeper. It will be interesting to see who gets the shout for the Southampton and MK Dons games.

I see that the Premier League is questioning the transfer of Michael Turner from Hull to Sunderland. It would seem that Brentford and, possibly Charlton, have complained about the lack of sell-on payments. The deal was rumoured to have been worth £12m but a far lower figure of nearer £4m is being talked about which would obviously result in far smaller sell-ons. I can understand why both Hull and Sunderland might have wanted to talk-up the rumoured fee; Sunderland because it looks ambitious and Hull because it supports the decision to sell their best player. As I understand it the fee was undisclosed, so I am left wondering whether it's a case of sour grapes for League One clubs?

Finally, the premature sacking by Brighton of Russell Slade after only eight months - they are fourth bottom but have been improving and created plenty of chances in their 3-3 home draw with Hartlepool on Saturday - has seen our own Steve Brown elevated from the Youth team boss to Assistant Manager with Charlie Oatway. Martin Hinshelwood, their Director of Football (do they really need one?) is in charge temporarily with Steve Coppell supposedly in the frame, but shows that Brownie might have something about him as far as management is concerned.

The Cup that cheers?

I am not looking forward to either of the next two televised cup matches. Sunday's 1st round F A Cup encounter at Northwich Victoria is a massive potential banana skin. Yes there is a gulf in class and no, we have never lost to non-league opposition. However, in order to beat non-league opposition, you have to compete for 90 minutes for your footballing superiority to show through and you need players to stick their heads above the parapet. We haven't been competing in recent weeks for ninety minutes like we were at the start of the of season and the characters who were showing out early on all appear to have gone into their shells.

For the Northwich game I would change things around. Nicky Bailey should be brought into central midfield and told to press on when he can. I would leave Semedo to mop-up and break-up. Mooney must be given a start and we have to play 4-4-2 in this one. I don't want to see players being rested. Our chances of winning at Southampton look slim to me irrespective of what side we put out and that is the game I would sacrifice if Parky feels we need to rest players. The JPT offers us more potential than the F A Cup but a defeat to a non-league side could do irreparable damage to confidence and morale.

Assuming we beat Northwich, there might be a strong argument for putting the same winning side out at Southampton and really going for it. Two away wins would do wonders for the next home game but I suspect we may need to rest players for Southampton as the MK Dons game is twice as important. If we don't beat MK Dons we will drop out of the top two and it could be the start of real slide as this division sorts itself out and the challengers like Millwall, Norwich and Huddersfield have begun to put runs together.