English Football League / Alan Dudman / 18 December 2008 / Leave a Comment

Perennial "player" Alan Dudman was out and about on Friday night and bumped into a Samantha Janus lookalike. The "Game On" actress shares her name with the Roman god Janus who rather like Colchester United, has two faces to it....

Well it was rather an up and down weekend with the selections in my most recent column, and the mixed bag of results pretty much aped my entire Saturday and Sunday.

My journey down to Cheltenham (in my other capacity as presenter on Timeform Radio) was doomed the moment the rains came on Friday evening.....and even though MK Dons came back brilliantly to win 4-2 that night, the following 48 hours rapidly went downhill. Chelters got abandoned.

It took an age to get back to London (floods everywhere in the west country you see). And once back in the capital I managed to make it into a nightclub - only to see Dirk Benedict (Face from the A-Team) judge an air guitar contest.... yes things were going from bad to worse.

On a day that saw Crewe and Cheltenham both gain wins (having tipped them up as lays), I really should have stayed at home.

I soldiered on.

The air guitar contest was incidentally won by a woman in a gold catsuit - which seemed to be holding in a rather enormous chest. I was surprised she won!!!

And from that point onwards I drowned my sorrows in several Yager Bombs (I have no idea how you spell it but they sure taste nice). And around 2am I found myself dancing to MC Hammer's - You Can't Touch This, with a blonde who I thought looked like Samantha Janus.

Needless to say Sunday morning shattered the Janus illusions, in fact Hammer would have been the more accurate lookalike.

There we have it, a tale of woe, and as new Labour once said: Things Can Only Get Better......I bloody hope so. (I couldn't think of another MC Hammer hit, sorry).

Leicester City [1.93] versus Peterborough [4.10], draw is [3.85]

Let the games begin!

This match reminded me of the gold catsuit for some reason....top heavy and eyecatching. We seem to have been blessed recently with one or two title deciders, and Saturday's clash is no different.

The Foxes are looking ominous right now. Top of the table with 44 points, and home or away matters little these days as Nigel Pearson's men keep racking up the points.

Defensively, Leicester are tighter than that gold catsuit (I will let it go, trust me). They've conceded six goals at Fortress Walkers all season, and are beginning to motor at the other end, they've scored eight in their last three.

Chairman Milan Mandaric issued a message that will no doubt send shudders down the spines of all those in the chasing pack this week, he said that the manager will have money to spend on even more players!!!

However, Mandaric may be pretty busy in trying to fend off Championship interest in 22-goal striker Matty Fryatt.

Peterborough are a side I have been mightily impressed with all season. It seems manager Darren Ferguson is going about his business in the same ruthless manner as his father...albeit slightly less vocal.

Posh are not alone in fighting to keep hold of their prized asset if reports are to be believed this week. Brimingham City are rumoured to weighing up a £4million bid for 16-goal striker Craig Mackail-Smith.

Ferguson summed up this game perfectly, he said: "I have stressed the importance of winning this match if there is to be any chance of lifting the title.

"We'll go to win and I am confident we have the players to achieve it."

Although I am one not to get too sucked in to quotes of boldness, I truly believe Peterborough can get a result here and put themselves right there in the title shake-up, for which they trade at [12.00].

Posh will attack, it should make for a fairly open game.

Recommendations:

Lay Leicester @ [2.00]
Back 1-1 and 1-2 in correct scoreline market

Colchester United [2.76] versus Scunthorpe [2.52], draw is [3.65]

If you thought my weekend was all over the place, take a look at Colchester! For sheer freak results look no further than those Essex boys.

A 2-1 victory away at Leeds last week really should have made them bankers for this Saturday.

Two things: Leeds are overrated, and Colchester are useless on their own patch.

And perhaps a third to highlight, it's their inconsistency....they lost at home to Hereford the week before!

Although they have a player I like in the shape of Mark Yeates, I think the laying finger will be itching to make an appearance again this weekend.

Scunthorpe meanwhile are just about hanging on in there, a recent 4-4 draw at least showed they are back scoring goals, and thus maintaining their own promotion hopes.

It was great to see Gary Hooper get back amongst the goals in his last three games, and with the addition of Ben May to bolster the front ranks, I have them down for two goals plus this Saturday.

Iron boss Nigel Adkins admitted he tinkered with the side too much in that crazy result with the Cobblers. They changed their formation again in midweek for the JPT win versus Tranmere so I hope they use that one this time around.

Recommendations:

Lay Colchester @ [2.76]
Back over 2.5 goals

Incidentally 'Face' was at the Carling Academy in Islington, so was the Janus-lookalike. And for those reasons, I won't be going back.

Happy Christmas!

Editor's Note: The correct spelling of a cocktail combining one shot of Jägermeister dropped into a glass of Red Bull is in fact "Jager Bomb". The cocktail can however be known as "Jager Blaster" or "Bull Blaster"and the term 'bomb shots' can also refer to many different cocktails where a shot is dropped into a drink such as the "car bomb" and the "Boilermaker". The "Pacman" would not advocate the consumption of more than three Jager Bombs in the space of an hour under any circumstances.

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