West Ham and Mary Poppins! Who Needs Nostradamus?

I've heard it all now. The doctor who has apparently suggested to Beano that he should retire is called..Van Dijk! I know the spelling is wrong but the pronunciation makes it sound as if the most absurd Cockney of all time has passed judgement on sperstar striker Primadeano.

Dip into the script of Mary Poppins and you find that our current plight was in fact foretold by Hollywood back in the 1960s. Every Duxbury promise is a "piecrust promise. Easily made, easily broken"! His Press Statements are summed up perfectly by Mary's maxim, "I would like to make one thing quite clear. I never explain anything" and the warning, "Kindly do not attempt to cloud the issue with facts." Meanwhile, following his departure, Turds stole from the script as he announced, "I've been sacked! Discharged! Flung into the street!"

Pardew, of course, left singing, "A man has dreams of walking with giants. To carve his niche in the edifice of time. Before the mortar of his seal has a chance to congeal... The cup is dashed from his lips! The flame is snuffed a-borning... He's brought to wrack and ruin in his prime."

The Neill saga is hinted at in Mary's pronouncement, "We can't have them gallivanting up there like kangaroos, can we?" Beano's weight problems are no doubt explained by the Mary Poppins recommendation for taking "a spoonful of sugar" to help "the medicine go down."

The whole BG debacle is foreshadowed in the lines, "A BRITISH bank is run with precision. A British home requires nothing less! Tradition, discipline and rules must be the tools! Without them: disorder... catastrophe! Anarchy! In short, you have a ghastly mess!" and the Straumur regime is summed up by "There he is in that cold, heartless bank day after day, hemmed in by mounds of cold, heartless money. I don't like to see any living thing caged up" and "They makes cages in all sizes and shapes, you know. Bank-shaped, some of 'em, carpets and all". The family name is, of course, Banks!

Poor Zola must have real empathy with the lines, "With tuppence for paper and strings, you can have your own set of wings! With your feet on the ground you're a bird in flight, with your fist holding tight to the string of your kite! Oh, oh, oh, let's go fly a kite, up to the highest height! Let's go fly a kite, and send it soaring! Up through the atmosphere, up where the air is clear! Oh, let's go... fly a kite!"

Mary Poppins is, of course, the Nanni.

Ahead of the arrival of 'Arry the Albatross today I hear the refrain, "Winds in the east, mist coming in, / Like somethin' is brewin' and bout to begin. / Can't put me finger on what lies in store, / But I fear what's to happen all happened before."

Still perhaps Nice Guy Zola will heed the advice: "You think. You wink. You do a double blink. You close your eyes... and jump!"

So before kick off, let's all join in a chorus of "Supercallifragilisticexpialidocious!" Even if both Spurs and the Aussies win, we will all feel so much better, apparently!