Archive for February, 2021
London is Claret and Blue
Beating Spurs thanks to goals from Antonio and Jesse Lingard (pictured) meant that West Ham are above Chelsea, Spurs and Arsenal – and also above reigning champions Liverpool: London is Claret and Blue!
Come on you mighty Irons!
WHU will be better than WAC
In der leeren Budapester Puskas Arena spielte der Wolfsberger AC in der ersten K.O.-Runde der Europa League gegen Tottenham Hotspur und verlor mit 1:4. Am Sonntag spielen die Spurs gegen West Ham, bevor das Rückspiel gegen den WAC steigt.
Nach Österreich durften die britischen Gäste wegen der Corona-Regeln nicht einreisen. Deshalb konnte der WAC sein Europa League-Heimspiel wieder einmal nicht in der Klagenfurter Wörthersee Arena austragen (2019 wuchs dort der Stadionwald, heuer war Corona schuld).
In Budapest schickte José Mourinho eine Mischung aus A- und B-Team aufs Feld. Die Spurs erwischten den WAC eiskalt und schossen schon vor der Pause drei wunderschöne Tore. Gareth Bale, der teuerste Spieler im Luxuskader, zeigte dabei auf, wie er es in der Premier League nur selten tut. Das 0:1 legte Gareth Bale mit einer Flanke auf Son auf (13.). Beim 0:2 ließ der Star aus Wales Gegenspieler Scherzer alt aussehen, der folgende Abschluss war humorlos (28.). Mit einem Solo von Moura stellten die Spurs dann auf 0:3 (34.).
WAC-Coach Feldhofer reagierte zur Pause mit Umstellungen und per Elfmeter von Michael Liendl stellten die Kärntner auf 1:3 (55.). Wäre ein Lattenpendler von Wernitznig (69.) ins Tor gegangen, hätten die Londoner ihre Coolness vielleicht verloren, aber so nütztet alles Bemühen des WAC nichts und in Minute 88 sorgte Vinicius für den 1:4-Endstand.
Kommende Woche endet das Europacup-Abenteuer der Lavanttaler im schönen neuen Stadion von Tottenham, davor müssen die Spurs aber zu West Ham ins London Stadium.
Und dort werden es die in der Premier League Tabelle derzeit vier Plätze und 6 Punkte besser als die Spurs platzierten Ost-Londoner Irons es sicher besser machen als die Wölfe aus Unterkärnten. Zwar liegen auch die Wolfsberger zur Zeit auf Platz 6 in der Tabelle und damit in den Meister-Playoff-Rängen der österreichischen Bundesliga, vielleicht aber spielt nächste Saison WHU statt WAC in der Europa League!
Hammers 3 Blades 0
Hammers move into Champions League place – at least for 90 minutes!
West Ham manager David Moyes on finishing the season in the top four: “Well we’re safe now, 40 points is safe. I can’t get carried away because if we do, it might happen, we’re a team in progress, trying to grow and get good foundations in place. We’re enjoying it at the moment how could we not be – I want the players to just keep improving. There’s a lot more to come we can play better than we did tonight. We’re doing a decent job at the moment though.”
Match report: https://www.bbc.com/sport/football/55975613
https://www.whufc.com/news/articles/2021/february/15-february/three-goals-and-three-points-hammers
Extended highlights: https://www.whufc.com/news/articles/2021/february/16-february/extended-highlights-west-ham-united-3-0-sheffield-united
youtube.com/watch
youtube.com/watchLearning To Live With Covid-19
In an interview British Health Secretary MATT HANCOCK has said he hopes vaccines and treatments will have turned Covid-19 into a disease we can “live with, like we do flu” by the end of the year. It would become a “treatable disease”, and thanks to a mix of vaccines and treatments, we can now imagine “a path to freedom and normal life”.
In an interview with The Daily Telegraph, the Health Secretary said new drugs specifically designed to tackle coronavirus should arrive in 2021. The comments suggest Mr Hancock sees Britain living with the virus in the long-term rather than the Government pursuing a strategy of eliminating it, despite declining explicitly to endorse that suggestion at a press conference this week.
On Saturday the Government announces that the world’s most innovative treatments for Covid-19 will soon be fast-tracked through the UK’s clinical trial system. It could result in new treatments for the virus becoming available within months rather than years as the approval process is streamlined.
‘There is a very reasonable expectation you can keep this under control’
Experts at King’s College London, who have tracked symptomatic Covid since the first wave, said infections should be back to summer levels by early March.
Mr Hancock struck an upbeat tone as he said the combination of vaccines and treatments would be “our way out to freedom and normal life”.
Expanding on his hope that Covid-19 would become a “treatable disease” by the end of the year, Mr Hancock listed the factors that would need to be in place for that to happen.
First was having a vaccine that “reduces hospitalisations and deaths” and hopefully “reduces transmission”, something early data suggests may be true for the vaccines the UK is using.
Second was that “the vaccine is safe, which means that almost everybody can take it unless you have a very specific clinical condition”.
“And third there are treatments so that for the small proportion [of people for] whom the vaccine does not afford that protection, we will have treatments for [them],” Mr Hancock added. “If Covid-19 ends up like flu, so we live our normal lives and we mitigate through vaccines and treatments, then we can get on with everything again.”
Next week GPs will start offering vaccinations to millions of young and middle-aged adults with health conditions such as diabetes and heart disease. The rollout of jabs to the next group on the priority list – those aged 65 to 69 – is already under way in areas which have hit the first target. The bulk of those aged 65 to 69 should receive first doses in the next fortnight, with those aged 60 to 64 next on the list, and everyone over the age of 50 promised their first jab by the end of April. Latest figures show that more than nine in 10 of all over-70s have had their first dose.
In the past 10 days, Covid deaths have almost halved among the over-85s, falling at twice the rates seen in younger unvaccinated groups. Among those aged 85 and over, Covid deaths fell by 41 per cent between Jan 28 and Feb 7, compared with a 22 per cent reduction among those below the age of 65.
Last night, The Times reported that hospital admissions and deaths are predicted to halve over the next month and fall to October levels, according to estimates presented to No 10 by its scientific advisers.
Extra Time Heartbreak
FA Cup 2020/21, 5th round proper: Manchester Utd 1 West Ham Utd 0
after extra time
Manchester United nach Zitterpartie im FA Cup weiter
https://www.bbc.com/sport/football/55951207:
It was another disappointing Old Trafford night for former Manchester United manager David Moyes.
Other than during his own ill-fated eight months in charge, it is a ground he has never won at, either with Everton, Sunderland or West Ham.
Before kick-off, the Scot had a good chat with current boss Ole Gunnar Solskjaer and doubtless wished he had been granted the same time afforded to the Norwegian, who is attempting to win a trophy after losing four successive semi-finals.
Moyes’ hopes of stopping the hosts in their tracks were badly affected by injuries that now threaten to derail what so far has been an excellent season.
The sight of Angelo Ogbonna hobbling down the tunnel with his left boot removed, after being stood on by Martial, did not look great, and the manner of Diop‘s exit with a concussion suggests Moyes will be without two central defenders for Monday’s encounter with Sheffield United.
With their only orthodox striker, Michail Antonio, also missing, West Ham never really gained any momentum and were not helped by yet another injury – this time to Antonio’s replacement Andriy Yarmolenko – early in the second half.
Said Benrahma had the Hammers’ only effort on target, but even if he had beaten Dean Henderson with a close-range header at the end of extra time, it would almost certainly have been disallowed for offside. (BBC)
David Moyes back to Manchester
On Tuesday night West Ham manager David Moyes returns to Old Trafford for the Hammers’ FA Cup 5th round tie against Manchester United. It was at Old Trafford where the Scot endured an ill-fated eight-month stint as Alex Ferguson’s chosen successor in 2013-14. If his team could proceed to the quarter final of the FA Cup with a win at Old Trafford he could finally leave behind these times of failure and even more restore his reputation.
West Ham have vastly improved under David Moyes since he came back to the Hammers last season and saved them from relegation for a second time within three years. They are now fifth in the Premier League table and could have been fourth if they had won at Craven Cottage instead of drawing 0-0 with relegation strugglers Fulham on a rainy Saturday afternoon. Though West Ham’s supporters can console themselves with the knowledge that ttheir team have their highest points tally after 23 games since 1986 – and have now matched the 39 they accumulated in the whole of last season. Moyes deserves much of the credit for this.
Maybe West Ham played more “the West Ham way” in Manuel Pellegrini’s first season, but in the end it didn’t work out and the Irons found themselves in a relegation battle in Pellegrini’s second year. Pellegrini was replaced by his predecessor when everything went wrong in his second season, and now it’s David Moyes who tries to change the “West Ham way” of underachieving and blowing bubbles that burst too quickly.
When Moyes’s contract runs out at the end of the season, it is regarded as a given that an extension will be agreed. If the Scot could beat the club where so much went wrong for him some years ago and reach the quarterfinal of the FA Cup that would finally restore his reputation and also would convince some of the West Ham faithful who are still not all in Moyes’s camp.
Come on you Irons!
Alpha in Vienna
Ab dem 25. Februar findet immer am Donnerstagabend ab 18:30 Uhr ein Alpha Kurs über Grundfragen des Glaubens im ICF-Wien in der Lerchenfelder Straße 35 statt.
Der Alpha Kurs ist eine Abfolge von mehreren Abenden, bei denen in zwangloser Atmosphäre wichtige Fragen des Lebens und des christlichen Glaubens behandelt werden. Die wöchentlichen Treffen, die an den Donnerstagen bis Ostern stattfinden, beginnen üblicherweise mit einem gemeinsamen Imbiss. Darauf folgt ein Film mit einem Input und anschließend tauschen sich die Teilnehmer unter dem Motto „Und was sagst du dazu?“ aus.
In den Filmen hören wir immer wieder Nicky Gumbel, den Vikar von Holy Trinity Brompton (London) und Pionier von Alpha. Auch sein trockener britischer Humor macht diese Filme sehenswert. Besonders ist es aber die gelungene Mischung von Information und dem deutlich hervorleuchtenden Ziel, dass jeder Teilnehmer eine persönliche Beziehung zu Jesus aufbaut und vertieft, was mich am Alpha Kurs fasziniert.
Anmeldung: https://www.icf-wien.at/de/angebote/alpha/
EXTRA TIME 
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