Arcticterntalk.org

The blog of a travelling psychiatrist and football lover. Who happens to be a halfway decent photographer. Takes a cynical view of the world

Archive for the day “March 21, 2012”

21 Mar 2012
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Yrsa Sigurðardóttir and Icelandic Crime


Two of my recent visitors have been from Iceland and there is a phenomenon that is growing fast, that of the UK selling large quantities of Scandinavian and Icelandic crime fiction. The great Stieg Larsson started things off with maybe the best trilogy that will ever be written about the Girl with The Dragon Tattoo. Jo Nesbo continued things along with a series of superb novels and now an Icelandic authoress, Yrsa Siguradottir continues on. 

Currently I am reading the second novel from her, and having read her most recent novel first, am working backwards. Her writing cannot be praised too highly. Not only does she convey an extraordinary complexity of plot but she captures the characters so well. Surprisingly the books are also humourous, with some descriptions of her secretary/assistant Bella, being described as a Gothic tugboat, opening the mind to what exactly she looks like. The other people who deserve praise are the translators of all these novels as they read in English as fluently as one imagines they would having been written by a native english speaker. The current book is called (English translation by Philip Roughton, Ashes to Dust, UK:July 2010). 

 

Her facebook link

http://www.facebook.com/pages/Yrsa-Sigurðardóttir/17790914348

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21 Mar 2012

Uwe Rosler Must Go


The purpose of my blog is to rant and put across views, that may be right or may be wrong. For many weeks I have wondered if Rosler is the man to lead Brentford forward. And the last two games have convinced me that he should be given no more time. Why? Folks might look at the league table and see we are in the top half, just and wonder why a mnager should be given less than one season. Agreed the cost of changing managers is high in financial terms, but there again the cost of not changing is also high. Brentford have consistently underperformed this season with a poor home record. The football in the main has been boring and combined with poor home results has led to lower crowds than might be expected. From all the new players who have come in none are any better than those who have left, with the exception of the strikers who are considerably worse than those who left. Rosler has lost our two goalscoring forwards both of whom incidently have started scoring with their new clubs at a decent rate. The replacements have been dire and suggest that the Brentford scouting network is dodgy. The absence of passion, effort in the last few games has been worrying. Tweets last night after another loss to bournemouth suggest that a number of fans are actually worried about relegation. This is an unlikely scenario as Bees have 47 points but not impossible.

We need a new manager now who can guide the club through the rest of the season and more importantly prepare for next season. Rosler’s judgement cannot be trusted on incoming transfers. Some of this season’s arrivial have been devastatingly poor at League 1 level ( Grella and Clarkson to start with). Some are no better than what we had (Douglas and Logan ). Also the use of a stupidly high number of loanees does mean that Brentford players do not get games. Bean and Weston have hardly featured this season but if fit, they are better than most in the current tteam. I hope that I am proved wrong, I really do, but I do not feel that we can trust Rosler with any more money to spend. The squad should be a small one with every player of team potential. Let us hope Brentford  move on

 

Potentially empty terraces await Brentford if they do not inject some passion into the remaining games

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