10 December 2011

Leyton Orient 3 Exeter City 0, 10/12/11

A game in which... for the first hour, despite their class and endeavour, it seemed like there was more chance of Mark Wright being asked to host Question Time than Orient actually getting the ball in the net. Once Kevin Lisbie expertly dispatched his first penalty, however, it was like a huge weight had been lifted from the team's shoulders. Another huge weight entered the field in the form of super sub Jonathan Tehoue, whose goal was the catalyst to a delightful final spell of dominance over a good side in which the Os played with all the swagger of a teenage boy who's just got a snog off his older sister's best mate.

Moment of magic... The sight of the aforementioned Tehoue lumbering on to the pitch like an ageing water buffalo slowly awakening from a deep slumber. The French striker has an incredible habit of being in the right place at the right time and, as today showed, his goals from the bench are going to be invaluable as the season progresses.

Moment of madness... Jimmy Smith's point blank miss in which - after a brilliant piece of trickery by Kevin Lisbie on the right - he contrived to shoot straight at the keeper from all of three and a half inches in front of a gaping goal.

Knight in shining armour... Plenty of impressive performances today - Lisbie, McSweeney, Spring and Cuthbert for starters - but man of the match surely has to go to Stephen Dawson. The captain was such a force of energy today that if you'd wired him up he could have powered a small village in Essex.

Pantomime horse... Though he actually had a pretty decent game, the fact that Jamie Cureton - "the Orient Torres" - still hasn't found the net is something akin to Keith Richards turning up to perform at your office Christmas party, but proclaiming he 'couldn't be arsed' to bring his guitar.  

In the dug out... You'd be pretty happy as a manager if your first substitute scores with his first touch, and your second wins a penalty minutes later. Indeed, things were going so well for Russ that if he'd sent Marc Laird on the midfielder would have probably scored a jaw-dropping bicycle kick. Although, just to be on the safe side, Slade left the former Millwall man on the bench. After all, there's no point in risking throwing away a 3-0 lead in the last few minutes.

A word on the opposition... Exeter certainly didn't look like a team that should be hovering just above the relegation zone. They looked like they should be in it. Just kidding, in fact the Grecians were a tidy, effective outfit and can consider themselves unlucky not to have gone one up in the second half when only the post and a fantastic save from Lee Butcher kept the Os in it. Although I'm unclear as to why manager Paul Tisdale was dressed as if he was about to hunt bison in the Canadian wilderness.

Meanwhile on Twitter... This week George Porter took time off from bemoaning the lack of attractive women in his life - "No 10/10 girls about anymore or even like 9 or 8 too many 4's" - to enter into coversation with Debbie - aka Lydia's mum - from The Only Way Is Essex. "Why are you on Twitter? #embarrassing mums" he asked rather rudely, only to be told by Debbie that she's an Orient fan. "Am I your favourite player?" a contrite George replied, hopefully. Debbie is yet to respond.

Lesson for the day... Hey, if you play with two strikers at home you score goals!
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