The mile yet traversed….

Dramatic weekend in the old premiership. You’d need a gigantic pair of yarbles to put money on the outcome of this season. It'll go down to the wire you might say. And pretty much every football blog and website has. But do you actually know where the expression “down to the wire” comes from? No? Well I will tell you. Horse-racing. American racetracks in the latter part of the nineteenth century (before the days of cameras) had a wire strung across the track above the finishing line to help stewards decide which nose had got across the line first. An early example appeared in Scribner’s Magazine in July 1889- which I have lazily plagiarised below:

“As the end of the stand was reached Can I kick It worked up to Dinosaur Athletic, and the two raced down to the ‘wire,’ cheered on by the applause of the spectators. They ended the first half mile of the race head and head, passing lapped together under the wire, and beginning in earnest the mile which was yet to be traversed. Though the Tarts, Slippers and Wangs weren’t far off, Sweden had long since been shot and turned into glue”

I didn’t see a single game this weekend so pick your own fantasy player of the week. Probably a city player. Adebayo? Why not.

So much drama in the forums. Notably the Slippers flogging a bent Arshavin to the Jerry Babies to protect next year, only for Gem to point out that relegated teams can’t take players down to Serious B. Brilliant. But surely the BIG news is the announcement of our lucky place (7th for those not paying attention) which really spices up the A Liga curry. Can Blake hold on to his spot for the remainder of the season? Or will the Pommies, or even the Babies, snatch it from him on the last day? Conversely, will the Slippers, Wangs and Titties give up their fierce, but rather pointless, struggle for third, and deliberately sabotage themselves to drop some points? Its $100, boys. Could get scrappy.