Huangjoe

I thought it was one of the best football documentaries I've ever seen. I was going to go to bed after MOTD2 but then ended up watching all of it. QPR were just fortunate it all worked out in the end, largely thanks to the Mittals. Flavio Briatore complete d*ckwad, in a very Italian way.

Ok, we all know it isn't really gonna happen, but can anybody honestly say they haven't looked at the league table in the last hour, then looked at our upcoming fixtures and thought, mmm 6th spot in may might be possible. Sort of.

It's not all been bad luck though, we were one of the last clubs (possiby even the last) to go into administration before the introduction of the ten point penalty. Had that been in place at the time we'd have been relegated and probably be in the Conference by now.

Rumour has it Liverpool have just ordered 12 shirts with the guy from row b seat 36 on the front. Seriously though, any club can have a moron or even a few, but the chanting of Suarez's name and booing of adeyemni after the incident was disgraceful and involved more than a minority of their fans. Lfc must share blame as their handling of Suarez affair has been a disgrace. Great performance, couldn't have asked any more, unfortunate that the scoreline didn't reflect the game.

It cannot be said enough times. This idea is cringeworthy, embarassing, impractical and suited to a Simon Cowell talent show rather than a proper football club. Anyone who joins in with it is a moron. Get behind the team. Scarves, shirts, blue colours, "Come on Oldham" and a few songs thrown in about Scouse thievery will do fine.

One Geoffrey Howe There's only one Geoffrey Howe... Especially if they end up dicking us and we need a piss taking response. And while I'm on, I work in Liverpool, you wouldn't believe how sensitive the scousers are when I suggest that we fancy our chances against a mid-table outfit. After all it's not like we're playing one of the big Manchester clubs, Chelsea or Arsenal.

I think you'll find he was giving plenty of verbals to the Notts County players when the other players were celebrating our 3rd goal.

The whole thing has been very badly handled by Liverpool. It was never clear whether Suarez's defence was that no racial language was used, or whether racial language was used but that the term was not offensive in Spanish/not thought or meant to be offensive by Suarez. Liverpool have not helped their own cause by implying that evra was making malicious allegations. Dalglish's lsuggestion that evra should be punished if the allegations were found to be unproven showed a lack of understanding of the task faced by the tribunal. Throughout Liverpool said they would respect the tribunal's findings, probably in the expectation of a not guilty verdict, but then have spat the dummy when the verdict wasn't to their liking. If an Oldham player were found guilty of racial abuse I would expect him to be disciplined by the club as well as the fa. In most walks of life racially abusing someone in the course of your employment would cost you your job. I also agree with the comments above regarding the Liverpool statement.

If I saw this happen in an under 9s game I'd think it was a bit stupid, but seeing us do it at Tranmere yesterday I didn't know whether to laugh or cry. 15 seconds left to HT we get a corner and last chance to get a crucial equaliser before the break. Instead of pinging it into the box we play a short corner and the ref blows without the ball having got anywhere near the box! Has there ever been a more stupid (as opposed to just messing it up) use of a dead ball situation by Latics? At least when Henry and Pires fecked up that pen a few years back Arsenal were winning.

I agree. I still have a feeling Reid could turn out to be quite useful. As a striker you're more reliant than anybody else on decent service and he's not had a lot. I still think he might come good for us. Having said that, smith's flick ons and parker's pace might be more dangerous. For the moment I'd give Reid a bit more time though.

First half I thought we played some good football and should have been more than 1 goal ahead at ht. Agree though 2nd half we fell away, lost the battle in midfield and were a bit fortunate to still be in it at ft. Thought the new midfielder looked good til he tired. Diamond got turned a bit easily for my liking. Mvoto was solid. Cisak made some good saves though his decision making needs to improve. Lee and black did ok. Furman was below par, too many poor passes especially 2nd half. Overall though I thought it looked like 2 average league 1 sides. Thought smith did well til he tired. Taylor disappointing. Reid might yet come good.

There was a 2-1 win at villa in 88/89, two goals from frank bunn in the second half. I'm fairly sure they were top at the time. Start of the good times.

Clearly one to watch if that renowned font of footballing knowledge Terry Christian rates him.

If messageboards had been around in 1993 then I suspect Crystal Palace fans would have been making contented posts secure in the knowledge that we'd never catch them needing to win our last 3 games against Villa away (who needed to win to keep their title hopes alive), then Liverpool and Southampton at home. Having said that, Tranmere are no Latics of the early 90s. We are safe. Time to give Eaves a proper run out imho.

We beat them at Villa Park 2-1, Frankie Bunn with 2 second half goals IIRC. 88/89 season I think, was a sign of things to come

Yes, you're right, good spot.

It still brings a lump to my throat, fantastic night. I wrote an article about the pinch me season for a student rag a while ago, here's how I described the night against Arsenal. The "George" in the story is George Kershaw the old green grocer in Uppermill who used to take me to matches, fantastic character and much missed. We'd Have Beaten Brazil... Oldham drew League Champions Arsenal in the next round of the Littlewoods cup. For me, this match was when the “pinch me” season really began. Beating Leeds was nice, and the Frankie Bunn goal fest against Scarborough was a night to remember, but Arsenal were the real deal. This was the test of how good Oldham were. They were the first top flight side to face Oldham that season, and they were the biggest and best. A side filled with household names and international players. If this Oldham side were going to justify Tommy Docherty’s hype on Piccadilly, if they could compete with the best, then this was when they needed to show it. It would be a huge shock if Oldham knocked out Arsenal. At the time English clubs were still banned from European competitions and the League Cup was taken seriously by the big clubs, there was none of the playing the youth team that goes on now. In the end the fact that Oldham won wasn’t the most shocking thing that night. Even more shocking was the manner in which Oldham won. Oldham totally dominated the game from start to finish. Every Oldham player won his individual battle. Milligan and Henry were too good for a midfield that was supposedly the best in the land. Rick Holden and Andy Ritchie were phenomenal. Oldham were well on top throughout the first half but the famous Arsenal back line held firm. It got to the stroke of half time still at 0-0 when Holden delivered a long cross from the left. Ritchie had lost his man at the back post. I was sat directly behind him. The game seemed to go into slow motion as Ritchie chested it down, waited for the ball to drop, then struck it past John Lukic into the far corner of the Arsenal goal. Boundary Park went ballistic. The ground rose up to cheer the players off at half time. Nobody believed it could continue. Oldham were annihilating the League Champions. This team really was that good. But it did continue. Arsenal were like rabbits in the headlights. Oldham’s passing was just too fast for them. Nick Henry struck a beautiful long range goal which flew past Lukic. Not long after a long flowing move down the right flank ended with Ritchie heading in a third goal. Oldham were making the League Champions look like schoolboys. Arsenal did score a late consolation goal through Niall Quinn, but nothing could hide the fact that they had been totally outclassed in every department. This Oldham side could compete with the big boys, it was time to stop dreaming and start believing. I’ve never known an atmosphere like it as we left the ground. Everyone was thinking the same thing. How far can this team go? As I left the ground with George we walked round the Rochdale Road end of the ground. This was still the days when football fans were largely treated as cattle by the police and as we turned the corner we realised that we had inadvertently walked into a holding area for the Arsenal fans emerging from the away end. At first I was a bit scared, if they did decide to cause trouble we would have no chance. I needn’t have been. It’s popular wisdom now that all football fans were thugs in the 1980s. True, some were, but most were just ordinary blokes who followed the game. The Arsenal fans were all chatting away with George, he could chat with anyone, and telling us how well they thought Oldham had played. A few did mention the plastic pitch and thought that gave us an unfair advantage, but they probably had a point. Even so they accepted they’d been well beaten and that Oldham deserved to go through. I remember George saying at one point to an Arsenal fan who was criticising his own team’s performance, “Aye, don’t worry, we’d have beaten Brazil tonight”. The thing is, I genuinely believed it. George genuinely believed it. Anyone who was in the ground that night had to believe it. Joe Royle had built a team that was poised to take the club to heights it hadn’t been in living memory. Nobody was to be feared. We were that good. Bring them on, the bigger the better.

My memory of the goal against United was that it was direct from a corner, or am I mistaken? I think he scored a few that way.

Name? Peter Harthan Location? Liverpool How Long Supporting the Tics? 30 years Best away match you've been to? Sheff Wed Away 1990, Everton Away FA Cup 1990 All Time Greatest Player? Andy Ritchie Biggest Rivals (in your eyes)? Leeds Utd