Win Ugly

Sheffield United 1 v Crawley Town 0

Saturday 23 August 2014

Twitter @ball_sup

I kicked off the pre-match drink in the Wetherspoons Swim Inn on another American Brewer Showcase. This time (the pumpclip said) it was by Chuck Silva from Green Flash Brewing Co. in California.  It was Citra Session IPA at 4.5%.

It was sharp & crisp in the mouth. Earthy even woody. The bitterness seemed to just sit there. But then developed a bit into a longer but not powerful bitter finish.

It made me think "I must have a look at a tasting wheel" as it had a distinctive taste I couldn't quite pin down.

Session beers are great. And I love  heavily hopped but lower abv beers (eg Buxton Jacobs Ladder).  I thought it was a bit much to call this one a Session IPA.  The Citra hopping doesn't give that deep pucker up long bitterness that I feel needs to dominate an IPA.

Enjoyable for all that. Lovely Summer hop kick ale.

Next up was Brewdog Sheffield. Sighs. Straight in to Brewdog/Mikkeller I Hardcore You at 9.5%. Very powerful smell. I always shy away from saying "varnish". But hey. You know it smells deep sweet woody.

Inevitable sweetness given the abv. Not so much a bitter finish as a throat transplant. Not a harsh bitterness. But very intense. Great as a once in a blue moon beer.

A fairly efficient, if unremarkable performance by The Blades. A good bit of quality by Baxter for the goal. As I've said before I feel the experienced spine of Collins & Doyle will help what is essentially a new team gel together.  Murphy is running at defenders. Higdon I'm undecided about. He seems to be trying to perfect a bizarre approach to being a big target man. Jump under lots of balls, fooling the centre half, so that it sails over him as well to no one in particular.

The gloss slightly taken off the win by lots of keep it in the corner tactics from a long time out.

Hopefully this ugly win will help build momentum.