Tag Archives: Chelsea FC

How Leeds Could Do With a Season or Two of Frank Lampard – by Rob Atkinson

Posted on 11/04/2014 | 41 comments
Leeds? Up norf, innit??

Leeds? Up norf, innit??

Cast your mind back to the genesis of Leeds United’s last promotion charge out of the second tier and back into the Promised Land.  In Sergeant Wilko, we had the man to lay down the rules and ensure that the work ethic was in place. Howard Wilkinson had turned up at Elland Road to be interviewed for the vacant managerial post at Leeds – and had ended up turning the tables on the bemused board members when he started interviewing them. The upshot was that he not only got the job, but also a cast-iron commitment to doing that job the way he wanted to, as opposed to the shoestring budget poor Billy Bremner had been stuck with.  It’s safe to say that the Leeds bosses were impressed by their new man, and they supported him accordingly.

The master-stroke came early.  Wilkinson beat off interest from Ron Atkinson at his old club Sheffield Wednesday to sign Man U’s mercurial play-maker Gordon Strachan.  This was some coup; not only were the Wendies still in the top flight, but Big Ron had been Strachan’s mentor from their days at the Theatre of Hollow Myths.  But Strachan was the right man at the right time in the right circumstances for Leeds; the battle ahead was tailor-made for his combative style and world-class ability, leadership and dedication.  The rest is history – we thought we might get a good year or two out of Strachan, yet we ended up with arguably the best eight years of his career, harvesting the Championships of the top two divisions in a three-season spell and establishing United as a top-flight power for fifteen years.

Wind forward over a quarter of a century from the capture of wee Gordon, and we find Leeds marooned once again in the shadowy hinterland of second-tier football. Morale is low, relegation to a humiliating second spell of League One football remains a faint but nightmarish possibility, the club has just been shaken up with yet another change of ownership and – just to put the tin lid on it – we have a sulky Football League, licking their QC-inflicted wounds and wondering how best to stitch us up in the weeks and months ahead.  What we need right now is inspiration on a par with that provided by our second-greatest ginger Scottish captain way back in the late 80’s.

This blog is open to suggestions here, but it’s difficult to think of a more likely candidate to play the elder statesman role so badly needed in an ineffective and inexperienced midfield than Frank Lampard of Chelsea. The man is a legend, but his ongoing career at Stamford Bridge must surely be in doubt as this season reaches a climax.  He might, of course, feel that he can stay on and fight for a continued place with Mourinho’s winning combination.  He may well end up with a double of League and Champions League this season, after all.  But if he were to decide that he wanted one last challenge – could his mind possibly be led in the same direction as Strachan’s was in 1989?  Could he decide that he wants to be instrumental in reviving the fortunes of a veritable sleeping giant?

Lampard would bring goals, class and composure to our midfield and – while he’d hardly cost the earth in a transfer fee – he would justify what would doubtless be high wages by forming a statement of intent as regards Leeds United’s transfer and team-building plans.  That was exactly the effect the Strachan coup had, back in the day.  Suddenly, Leeds was a possible destination for players of class and ambition.  That one signing made us high-profile again.  Lampard – or someone in his mould – would be the ideal “statement” signing for the summer of 2014.  If Frank doesn’t make the plane to Brazil, it’s more than likely that his England career would be over.  The legs aren’t quite what they used to be, but as part of a midfield which includes younger players to do his running for him, Lampard could be a major success in the Championship.

It remains to be seen, of course, what the summer will bring for Leeds – assuming that we do stay up.  There will be other issues to resolve – will Cellino still be in danger from the more detailed judgement in the Nélie case – or indeed from other cases yet pending?  Will the implications of Financial Fair Play on the back of a year or so’s mismanagement by GFH lead to a cautious transfer policy, despite the fact that Massimo is minted? It all remains to be seen.

For the time being, though – with the Football League temporarily at least chained up and impotent – we can indulge ourselves in a little daring to dream.  The next transfer window should be a lot more interesting than the last few, when the only real debating point was how many lies we were going to be told to flog a few more season tickets.  The signs are that Cellino will not be treading the path of deception, valuing the biggest asset of Leeds United as he does.  “Fans are not for sale, they have feeling and you don’t buy feeling,” he has said. “You can buy a bitch for one night, but you don’t buy the love my friend.”  The man has the soul and spirit of a poet, his fluency of expression promises to be a highlight of the Leeds United soap opera for as long as we’re allowed to keep him. Perhaps such a poet, someone who thinks so clearly and expresses himself so fluently, can look back at history for inspiration and then act on it to provide Elland Road with a new talisman.

If he does, he’s odds-on to have ideas of his own – and who knows, perhaps even Brian will get a say in the matter.  But just while we are daring to dream, my ideal situation would be for the name of Lampard to crop up, and then for Leeds to be audacious enough to ask the question.  Stranger things have happened – two months before Strachan arrived in LS11, any suggestion of that calibre of recruit for Leeds would have led you to a sojourn in a rubber room with the old back-to-front jacket on.  Wind back a further thirty years, and the signing of Bobby Collins from Everton would have appeared equally as outlandish a possibility.

Lampard for Leeds as the latest springboard to success and renaissance? Unlikely perhaps.  But, where Leeds United and Massimo Cellino are concerned, never say never.

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Ex-Man U Boss Fergie Still Paranoid Over League Kings Liverpool – by Rob Atkinson

Posted on 25/01/2014 | 24 comments
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S’ralex – the lunatic fringe view from the stands.

Alex Ferguson has been mercifully quiet since his retirement, contenting himself in the main with a seat in the stands from which to glare down balefully at the struggles of his hapless and helpless successor, David “Gollum” Moyes.  It’s been a quieter and more peaceful – even saner – game without the rantings of the whisky-nosed old curmudgeon.  Although Moyes’ plight has been pitiful to behold, at least some light has been shed on what was behind the success of virtually the same team last season, which looks so spectacularly inept this time around.  It’s been Fergie all the time it seems; terrifying opponents, refs and FA officials alike into granting his team every advantage they could wish for.  Now that he’s subsided into a brooding and impotent silence, away from the arena itself, the game seems a fairer and cleaner thing, with everyone a lot happier – fans all over Devon and Cornwall and in Milton Keynes who have Man U sympathies always excepted.

The old tyrant’s broken that silence this weekend though, deigning to pronounce upon the Premier League Title race, for which he sees a wider-than-usual field of maybe as many as six possible contenders.  Pushing the margins of credibility, he includes old charges Man U among these contenders, along with the Arsenal, Man City, Chelsea and even Everton and Spurs.  Notable by their absence from this select group of “Fergie’s Favourites” is Liverpool FC, a name that the Govan Gob studiously avoided mentioning, wary perhaps of bringing on an attack of apoplexy.  Clearly, the purple-nosed Taggart clone still has a problem with a club he vowed to “knock off their perch” when he first slithered south all those years ago.  How he failed to do that, despite all those lies, damned lies and statistics, is detailed below.

Let’s face it – Man U fans can crow all they want about 20 titles, but the evidence to confound their plastic claims is there for all to see, like some geological stratum separating the dinosaurs from the mammoths.  That schism dividing the game up to ’92, from the showbiz shenanigans of ’93 onwards, stands out like a Tory at a Foodbank, exposing Man U as the wealth-backed, monopolising opportunists that they are.  Seven titles in their history before Uncle Rupert bought the game for them.  Thirteen in the twenty years after the game went mad for money when, aided by more riches than anyone else, combined with the threat of Fergie to cow refs and officials, the Pride of Devon all but cleaned up in what was no more or less than a game of craps played with the dice heavily loaded in their favour.  And it was all done with such bad grace, another indictment of this new and joyless age we’ve been plodding through.  No gentle wisdom of the Bob Paisley variety – instead we had the sour bile of Ferguson himself and now seemingly a Fergie-Lite clone in the newly growly and grouchy David Moyes.  No loveable old-style hard-man Desperate Dan type like Tommy Smith – we just had the manufactured machismo of Roy Keane, a supposed tough-guy with an assumed snarl and trademark glower, whose typical party trick was to sneak up behind wee Jason McAteer and fell that not-exactly-scary individual with a sly elbow.

The comparisons could go on all day, but the bottom line is that Liverpool at their peak – and it was a hell of a peak – typified all the values of football that some of us remember from a pre-Sky, pre-glitz, pre-greed age when it really was all about a ball.  Now, it’s all about money, and contracts, and egos, and snide bitching to the media if you don’t get all your own way – and lo, we have the champions we deserve – but not, it seems, for very much longer – despite the wishful thinking of a silly and deluded old man.

To apply a conversion rate which sums up the way our game has been degraded in the Fergie/Murdoch era – let’s say that each Premier League (or Premiership, or whatever else it’s been marketed as) is worth maybe half – at the very most – of each proper Football League Championship, won on a level playing field in the days when the game still belonged to us and the world was a happier and more carefree place.  At that rate, Man U are still a good long distance behind Liverpool, which, on the basis of the history of English football as a whole, is precisely where they belong.

Ferguson might choose to ignore the challenge of a newly-invigorated Liverpool, but then again, football knowledge was never the strong point of the Demented One.  For bullying and intimidation, he wouldn’t have had much to learn from Torquemada, but his opinions on the game can safely be set aside in favour of those from saner minds – i.e. just about anyone else.  Meanwhile, it should be emphasised once and for all, for the avoidance of doubt and despite the latest nonsense from S’ralex – Liverpool are still very much The Greatest.

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Chelsea Defeat Best Proof That Man U Miss the Fergie Fear Factor – by Rob Atkinson

Posted on 20/01/2014 | 10 comments
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S’ralex in happier times

This year, just as in the past two seasons – but for a vastly different reason – the Chelsea v Man U fixture has provided a litmus indication of the influence Alex Ferguson has held over the game of football in England since the inception of the FA Premier League in 1992.  In the previous two meetings between the two clubs at Stamford Bridge, Ferguson was still very much in charge of Man U – and it showed.  This season’s clash found the Pride of Devon under new management – and, boy, did that ever show too.

Two years ago, it may be recalled, the game followed a pattern very similar to Sunday’s clash – up to a point.  Chelsea established a three-goal lead by early in the second half on both occasions, but from then on the games followed very different paths.  Back in February 2012, the brooding presence of Ferguson in the Man U dugout, together with the co-operative Howard Webb on the field, saw two penalties awarded to the away side as they swiftly reduced the arrears to a single goal.  By that point, Chelsea were reeling, their confidence shot through, and it was clearly only a matter of time before an equalising goal.  When it came, in the 85th minute, the build-up told its own damning tale.  The sight of a demoralised Chelsea defender, attempting to close down a left-wing cross as he backed away, hands studiously behind his back, clearly convinced that a third penalty would be awarded if the ball could be struck against any part of his arms, was symptomatic of a refereeing culture dominated by fear of what Fergie might do or say if his side were defeated.  It was like watching a boxer trying to avoid a knockout blow with his guard held down, a pitiful sight.  In the event, two dropped points meant the title would end up with Manchester City – but Howard Webb had done his bit, as he did so often for the benefit of Man U.

Last year’s game between these two at Stamford Bridge was even more indicative of where the power really resided.  This time, Man U had raced to an early two-goal lead and it appeared that no undue interference with events would be needed.  But two goals from Chelsea in four minutes either side of the interval restored parity – and suddenly the establishment’s favoured team were in danger of losing a game they had looked to have comfortably under control – and what would S’ralex say then, pray?

That thought was plainly too horrible to contemplate for the referee, Mark Clattenburg on this occasion.  His sending-off of Ivanovic for a foul on Young was reasonably clear-cut – but then Clattenburg made two decisions which demonstrated the influence of the Ferguson Fear Factor.  Firstly, an already-booked Torres was clear and racing through on goal when he went down under challenge from Jonny Evans.  If the foul were to be given, then Evans would have to go for a professional foul, and it would be ten-a-side.  Clearly, that would not do – so Clattenburg brilliantly decided that Torres had dived, issued him a second yellow and made the contest 9 v 11.  To cap a tremendously influential performance, he then allowed the clearly offside winner for Hernandez after 75 minutes, and Man U saw the game out against their demoralised opponents to bank the three points.

Both of these games stand as damning evidence of what former referee Graham Poll admitted recently – that when officiating in a Man U game, it was always a relief to get the match over with, ideally with Man U winning – and certainly NOT having made any crucial calls against them, for fear of what Ferguson might say or do in retaliation.  But for this year’s game, there was no Ferguson in the dugout – and the performance of the referee seemed suddenly free of those perceived pressures of the Fergie years.

It’s not as though Man U didn’t try to apply such pressure.  There were concerted efforts by their bench, with Moyes to the fore in his Fergie-Lite guise, to get David Luiz sent off instead of merely booked – to no avail.  Penalty shouts – an ever-present feature of any Man U game – likewise went unheeded, despite the presence of the usual diving suspects.  Chelsea, having eased into a three-goal lead despite a well below-par performance, never looked seriously troubled.  In contrast to the two previous years, they never seemed to have the slightest fear that the game might suddenly turn against them.  The referee even went so far as to dismiss Vidic and book Rafael for ugly challenges – decisions he probably got the wrong way around.

The late-ish Man U goal might have heralded a late onslaught in previous years, with the winning side suddenly assailed by fear and insecurity – but that was when Fergie was on the bench.  Now, with the impotent tyrant up in the stands, shaking his head glumly, there was no sign that the consolation goal would be anything but exactly that.  Man U had been beaten, despite early dominance of possession, despite a lacklustre showing by Chelsea.  It was their seventh defeat of the season, leaving them 14 points behind the leaders – or, more relevantly, a possible 7 points off Champions League qualification.  Tellingly, people have even begun to speculate as to their main rivals for a Europa League place.

It’s a new and unwelcome landscape for the ailing champions, and a lot of people are beginning to wake up to what all of this says, not only about their immediate prospects, but also of their record over the past twenty years, and to what degree that has been skewed by the ever more apparently crucial Fergie Fear Factor.  Thirteen titles in twenty years – how many would they have won without the dubious methods employed by the Govan Gob?  A virtually identical squad to last season’s runaway winners is now being revealed as the ordinary group that it is.  The myth of Man U is being ruthlessly exposed – and while nobody could argue that this is good for them, or for their globally spread cadre of fans, including the tiny minority that actually attend matches – it surely has to be good for the game that such an evidently dominant force for the swaying of authority and the warping of results has now departed the scene.

It would seem likely that history may not take quite such a rosy view of the Ferguson legacy as he would perhaps like – and the ironic fact is that this could perhaps come about not because of results under his leadership, but in the light of the pallid performance of virtually the same team, newly deprived of the advantages bestowed by the malign influence of S’ralex.  If that turns out to be the case, then we may all be taking a somewhat more realistic view of those so-called Ferguson Glory Years.

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Leeds United Legend Vinnie Jones in Skin Cancer Battle – by Rob Atkinson

Posted on 24/11/2013 | 28 comments
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Leeds hero Vinnie Jones

Former Leeds United star Vinnie Jones has revealed that he has had several small tumours removed since being diagnosed with melanoma – the most potentially serious form of skin cancer.  Jones, an integral part of Leeds’ 1990 promotion squad, initially discovered a small lump underneath his eye back in February, but had thought it was simply “a blackhead or a wart”.  However, a check-up revealed the seriousness of the situation.  Jones at first feared for his life, but swiftly resolved to fight “with everything I’ve got”.  Melanoma kills some 1,300 men and 900 women every year, but is treatable if caught early enough.

The Hollywood actor has blamed his outdoor lifestyle for a condition related to over-exposure to the sun.  Vinnie has always been an outdoorsman, and moved to Los Angeles after his football days ended, to pursue a film career.  He has had a lot of success and has worked with some high-profile stars in films like X-Men and Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels.

Now working for the Melanoma Research Foundation, Jones cites his own case in warning others to take precautions. “Footballers never put on sunblock and they should all be wearing it,” he said. “Kids should all be wearing it every time they play sport.” Vinnie’s wife Tanya has also fought the disease, which she developed a result of drugs she had been taking since having a heart transplant 26 years ago.

Leeds United fans and those who remember Vinnie’s playing days from other clubs he served – Chelsea, Sheffield United and Wimbledon – will join together in sending heart-felt good wishes to a legend of the game who now has a different sort of fight on his hands.  Get well soon, Vinnie.

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Lethal Lampard Back Again to Hammer Upton Park Boo Boys – by Rob Atkinson

Posted on 23/11/2013 | Leave a comment
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Chelsea Pensioner Lampard: Hammers torturer-in-chief

After this stroll in Upton Park from an effortlessly superior Chelsea side, West Ham boss Sam Allardyce must be preoccupied by one burning question: are there three worse teams in the Premier League than his punchless, impotent Hammers?  Because, make no mistake, West Ham’s short term future revolves entirely around that one issue.  If three teams even less creative, even less error-prone and ineffective, can be found to occupy the dreaded drop zone – then the Hammers may survive another season.  If not, it’s back on the downward path for one of the classic yo-yo clubs.

Even at 3-0, this scoreline hardly flattered Chelsea.  Rather, it was an indictment of some profligate finishing on their part – they could and should have had at least a couple more, and Frank Lampard will consider himself rather let down, not having completed his hat-trick.  As for the Hammers – they’re as lightweight up front as the famously under-endowed Olive Oyl.  To their eternal credit, they did finally muster a shot on target – in the 94th minute.  If only that could have gone in, it would have made …. absolutely no difference at all. Meanwhile, at the other end, the poor old ‘Ammers goal was ready to collapse after a ninety minute shelling during which it had sustained enough enemy fire to scuttle a fleet.  Again, one wonders how it ended up at only three.  West Ham, for their part, were a bit lucky to get nil.

It’s the fashion in these tender-hearted and sentimental times for returning old-boys to show a bit of class and decorum, should they happen to have the bad taste and ill manners to score against the alma mater.  This is an admirable convention in many ways, and it’s probably saved a few hot-headed pitch invasions.  But really, it would be too much to expect of the Hammers fans’ least-favourite Lampard, the junior Frank of that ilk.  When he was a Hammer, he got hammered as a daddy’s boy.  When he left for Chelsea, he was castigated for greed and disloyalty.  On the numerous occasions since then, when he’s rippled the Barrow Boys’ net, he’s taken vile abuse and snarling hatred – simply for doing his job.  These ‘Appy ‘Ammers boys have a chirpy cockney reputation, but anyone who’s walked from the Boleyn back to the tube after a tidy little away win for their team might beg leave to doubt the sincerity of all this alleged good-natured bonhomie.  The truth is that are about as charming as a bucket of cold jellied eels, as friendly as Dirty Den in a taxi.  So when Frank Lampard pops another one in against the Iron, you can forgive the lad a bit of a celebration.  He looked nearly as happy as those who had backed him as an any time goalscorer at betting site bwin.com!

Lamps’ two displays of triumphant joy today, either side of a slide-rule finish from Brazilian Oscar, will not have gone down well with the Upton Park clientele.  But they had better brace themselves for more of the same, because although they won’t meet the class of Chelsea every week, there aren’t too many teams which will be troubled by an attack so lacking in penetration that a belting prescription of Viagra looks the least that will be needed to inject a bit more oomph.  This brings us back to the question of whether enough teams can reasonably be expected to finish below Sam’s droopy troops, to give them a fighting chance of securing another campaign.  On today’s evidence, that looks rather doubtful.

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Can Man U Finish Above Everton & Spurs and Make the Top Six? – by Rob Atkinson

Posted on 27/10/2013 | 22 comments
City beat scum

Man U – also rans?

The longer this Premier League season goes on, the clearer it is that there is a mini-league, right at the top, of teams who are frankly in a different class to the rest.  The question is – how big is this league within a league?  The thoroughbreds appear obvious – Arsenal, Chelsea, Manchester City and Liverpool.  But coming up on the rails, we seem to have decent stayers in Everton and Spurs.  These latter two appear destined to create a buffer-zone – a sort of No-Man’s Land – between the Champions League qualifiers above them and the rest below.

It’s been the kind of weekend to reinforce such impressions.  Arsenal were below their fluent best and reduced to ten men, but won competently at Palace 2-0.  Chelsea and Manchester City served up a gourmet’s delight of a match that looked likely to be a top-drawer draw until Joe Hart’s late cock-up presented Torres with a winner.  Liverpool with Suarez irresistible and Sturridge’s sublime finish look as if they are intent on returning to the top table.  Spurs and Everton won as well, without the shimmering class of the top four, but hanging in there.

But what of Man U?  What indeed.  The media are still liable to get into a heck of a froth about them, given the least encouragement.  One TV commentator yesterday was screaming “Never write them off!” as they came from behind to beat ….. Stoke.  At home. Ring-a-ding ding.  The gulf between the formerly dominant Pride of Devon and the cream at the top of the pail, though, is currently a yawning chasm.  On today’s form, Man City and Chelsea, engaged in a titanic struggle at Stamford Bridge, would have had no trouble sweeping aside the fragmented resistance and feeble assaults that were in evidence at the Theatre of Hollow Myths.

If I were a Man U fan, I’d be worried.  Actually, if I were a Man U fan, I’d be utterly disgusted with myself and would probably curl up and die of self-loathing, but you take my meaning.  Man U fans should be worried.  Their edifice is built on perpetual Champions League qualification, and that must be in severe doubt as things stand.  If they don’t qualify for Europe’s premier competition, and all the oodles of millions that go with it, how will the Glazers’ balance sheet look then?  “More than a bit sick” is a very educated guess.

Indeed, far from trying to figure out which of that likely top four they might hope to displace, the money men at Man U should be scratching their heads and wondering whether they can realistically hope to out-perform Spurs and Everton – because if they can’t, then a finish outside the top six beckons, with no European competition at all. Then that Glazer-inspired leveraged buyout, with all the debt it has accrued, starts to look seriously scary.  But, as you’d currently expect either Everton or Spurs to beat Man U, this is a real prospect – the ailing champs have no divine right to a European berth (although I’d bet good money they’d get a wild card through winning the Fair-Play League, or the Refs’ Best Mates League, or something).  The bottom line is, though – the immediate prospects for Man U look as bleak as they have for a while.

You don’t have to look far for the reason behind this.  The tyrant is no longer on his dictatorial throne – Fergie is gone.  Instead, you have a middling sort of chap in Moyes, about whom the current joke runs that he’s wanted to get Everton above Man U for ten years, and has only now managed to achieve it.  With Fergie went Man U’s edge – the fear of the wattled Glaswegian’s wrath which was the best motivation tool of all.  Try though the media might – driven by their concerns over markets and reading/viewing figures – you cannot, as they say, polish a turd.  Trying to talk up Man U’s chances of league success this season is a futile attempt to do precisely that.

So, the Kings are dead – long live the Kings.  But which Kings?  Who will be ascending the throne?  It’s difficult to say, because the clutch of class at the top of the Premier League is closely-matched indeed, and all the more thrilling and entertaining for that. My heart says Arsenal, because I love their football – but sadly the virtuoso moments like Wilshere’s finish, on the end of a quicksilver three-man dance through Norwich’s defence, sometimes lack for the requisite steel to back them up, as Dortmund demonstrated last week.  But Arsenal will be up there.

Liverpool will be there too.  But I fancy Arsenal and Liverpool to be third and fourth at the end of the campaign.  Chelsea and City should fight it out, and out of those two, it’s just a case of “may the best team win”.  With my arm twisted up my back, I might just go for City – if they can cut out those suicidal mistakes.

And it might just be worth a punt on Man U to finish behind Everton and Spurs at seventh or below.  You’ll probably get good odds – try BetFred, if he’s not already paying out on bets for the Pride of Devon to win the league.  For some, the New Order will take a bit of getting used to…

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Moyes Faithfully Following Fergie Methods to Achieve Success – by Rob Atkinson

Posted on 14/09/2013 | 5 comments

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One thing stood out plain and clear from today’s insipid victory for Man U over newly-promoted Crystal Palace – it’s going to be the tried and trusted route to success for Devon’s finest, especially at the Theatre of Hollow Myths.

It was the classic Man U home game against stubborn opposition bent on making things tough for the media’s darlings. Batter away, secure a dodgy penalty and if at all possible, have a complaisant ref who’s well-briefed enough to be aware of his responsibilities and who will obligingly reduce the away side to ten men, consigning the rest of the game to the status of a non-contest. It’s a reliable enough game plan, though depending heavily upon Ashley Young’s talent for ending up prone in the penalty area, regardless of where the alleged foul took place. It’s happened time and time again, prompting embarrassed “hem hems” in the commentary box, and a general air in the press of hoping that people won’t notice, no matter how often the same scenario plays itself out. It’s depressing, but modern football is modern business, and markets speak louder than words. Those shirts and the other Man U tat won’t just sell itself, don’t you know – and there’s warehouses full of the stuff all over the hotbeds of support across the South of England.

As they travel back to London after the match, fans of both teams might agree on one thing: Old Trafford isn’t quite the place it used to be. Time was it would be described as a fortress, albeit a pretty quiet one. But there’s always been that suspicion that “fortress” was not a very apt description, indeed that “bent crap table with loaded dice” would be far more accurate, the local management usually ending up happy, by hook or by crook. That reputation preceded Fergie, but certainly flourished under his tyrannical reign, his use of bluster, threats and intimidation to ensure that press and officials were all singing from the Man U song sheet.

As I’ve already mentioned elsewhere, new boss Moyes appears to have shed his former “quite nice guy” image, and reinvented himself as a Fergie Lite. Given the relative paucity of quality in his current squad, as compared to the likes of Liverpool, Chelsea, Arsenal and City, this would appear to be his best bet – take those boys on at Football, and the modern-day, post-Taggart Man U would be in danger of some humiliating batterings. Already, Moyes’ paranoid pre-season whinge about having to play three Big Clubs in their first five fixtures appears prophetic. Two home points dropped against Chelsea, defeat away to the historical masters Liverpool. Better then, surely, to rely on the admittedly shady measures that brought so much undeserved success over the past twenty years of Murdoch-sponsored domination. After all – what’s a global franchise supposed to do? It’s win or, quite possibly, bust.

Whether a continuation of the same old, same old routine down Salford way can really take a sub-standard Man U squad to their accustomed honours must be open to doubt. The transfer window was a sobering experience for die-hard Nitid devotees from Torquay to Jakarta. City have secured diamonds, Arsenal have a pearl in Ozil, Liverpool are improved beyond all recognition and Chelsea have The Special One – ’nuff said. Man U meanwhile experienced a long and ongoing tragedy of a window, a car-crash experience of humiliating failure and rejection – ending up with someone in Fellaini whose best chance of a major role at the Theatre of Hollow Myths would appear to be sticking his head down the toilet and giving that U-bend a good going-over. Even Champions League pariahs Tottenham fared much better than that, and could well be dark horses for a top-four place this time around, particularly if favourable officiating and Moyes’ pallid impersonation of Nasty Alex isn’t enough to raise Man U out of sub-top six mediocrity.

And what if Man U really do fail – as their lack of quality and surfeit of internal strife might suggest they will? What then for former nice-guy Moyes? Is he destined to be the 21st Century Wilf McGuiness? Will “Sir” Fergie be tempted back to reprise Busby’s early 70’s attempted rescue act? It all remains to be seen, but the harrassed and worried glory-hunters on their long trip back to the south can be reassured after today’s standard-issue double-whammy of penalty and red card against opposition who threatened to frustrate them, that some things at least haven’t changed.

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Happy Days Are Here Again – Bring On the New Season!

Posted on 30/06/2013 | Leave a comment
Good Riddance, Taggart

Good Riddance, Taggart

The best football season since the mid-eighties (apart from 1991-92, obviously) is almost upon us.  Despite the recession, austerity, bankers bonuses and the scandalous price of a pint, I’ve rarely felt so positive and optimistic about the immediate future.  Even the fact that Leeds United are crap, and will almost certainly remain crap despite the best efforts of poor old Brian McDermott, my outlook is one of sunny anticipation and excitement for the feast of football that awaits my tired and cynical old eyes.  And why?  I’ll tell you why. It’s because Fergie’s gone, that’s why.  Say it again and say it with relish.  Fergie.  Is. GONE.

Don’t get me wrong.  It wasn’t his annoying habit of winning things for the Mighty Man U that bothered me.  It wasn’t his oft-paraded bloody stop-watch held up as a mute instruction to the ref regarding time-keeping.  It wasn’t even his arrogance over whether he chose to adhere to various rules which bound other managers, things like press interviews, his notorious BBC ban, stuff like that.  The fact that he clearly considered himself above mere rules was irritating, but not on its own the reason why I loathed him so much.  It was none of these things in isolation.  And after all, when he lost it was such a pleasure.  Thank you Leeds in ’92, Blackburn in ’95, City in ’12 and a few others.  But it didn’t happen often enough, and really, he was almost as horrific in defeat as he was in – shudder – triumph.

The real problem with Fergie was the sheer, all-round, ever-present, all-pervading unpleasantness of the man.  His particular brand of arrogant Glaswegian gittery and the way in which he held sway over the entire game and media too – the whole Fergie package – that’s what got my goat.  Whoever we support, we’ll have had managers who crossed the line in this or that respect, and made you see why fans of other clubs regarded them as less than nice.  But Ferguson exceeded all these limits, most of the time – and not in a good way.  Comical defeats apart, I really can’t think of a solitary redeeming feature.  If I absolutely HAD to put my finger on one thing that annoyed me above all else – it was the demeanour of the man when he was happy, when he’d just won or when Man U had scored a goal.  Sadly, these events happened all too often, and the results were always utterly repellent.  When the Mighty Reds scored, there he’d be, emerging from his dug-out in that annoying daft old man shuffle, fists clenched and waving in uncoordinated celebration, casting a glance of odious triumphalism at the sullen members of the opposition coaching staff, champing away happily on his ever-present wad of gum while his nose throbbed an ugly shade of victorious purple.  A most unpleasant sight.

Happily though, it is one we shall behold no more.  Fergie has retired upstairs, where his baleful presence need be of concern only to the inheritor of the poisoned chalice, David Moyes Esq.  Moyes may wish to cast his mind back 43 years to the effect a newly-retired but still-powerful-in-the-background Busby had on HIS successor.  But that is his problem.  All we need wish is that an early and unceremonious exit for Moyes – should he fail – isn’t a signal for the caretaker return of the Govan Guv’nor, just when we all thought that nightmare was over.  Perish the thought.

So I’m really looking forward to a Fergie-less season, and even to the slight bewilderment of the assembled media, who will be wondering where to brown-nose, who to target for their obsequious flattery.  Again, their bereft sadness is not my problem.  I’m just going to enjoy the football scene as it will appear to me – bright and shiny, replete with promise and optimism after the removal of that horrible, nasty man.  Man U will be that bit more difficult to hate, with the really-quite-likeable Moyes in charge, however long that lasts. But I’ll manage, it’s in my DNA as a fan of the One True United after all.  And Mourinho is back, and Wenger is still there – men you can’t help but respect and admire.  It’s going to be a good season in the Premier League, something I can really enjoy for once, whatever my beloved Leeds United do to screw things up one division lower.

And it’s all thanks to That Man finally being gone. Hallelujah!!

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Leeds United Needs a New Vinnie

Posted on 01/06/2013 | 1 comment
Sir Vincent Jones

Sir Vincent Jones

The men who took Leeds United back into the top-flight the last time it happened in 1990 are, of course, legends now.  They rank alongside some of the Revie boys because they rescued the club from eight years in the wilderness and restored us to the big time.  We had our own diminutive red-haired midfielder as a sort of latter-day homage to Billy Bremner – wee Gordon Strachan, who played a mighty part in the renaissance of Leeds with his leadership and goals.  It was a team effort though, and it was as a team that they succeeded – Strachan apart there was no major star, but the guts and drive of the collective effort eclipsed all rivals by the end of that fantastic season when we were crowned Second Division Champions in sun-drenched and strife-torn Bournemouth.  And nobody in the whole club at that time epitomised guts and drive, as well as sheer fist-clenched, vein-throbbing commitment and fight, better than Mr Vincent Peter “Vinnie” Jones.

I’d been aware of Vinnie, of course – who hadn’t?  His Crazy Gang antics were legendary and he’d lifted the FA Cup, but he was regarded as a bit of a maverick – still more hod-carrier than footballer.  So never in my wildest dreams did I imagine him as a signing for Leeds United, where stirrings had been going on ever since Sergeant Wilko marched in and started shaking the place up.  The “marquee signing” – you didn’t actually hear that phrase in those days – was Strachan, plucked from under the nose of his old Man U mentor Ron Atkinson at Sheffield Wednesday to provide the quality at the heart of the Leeds engine room.  Now that was the sort of signing I’d hoped and prayed for, and with the likes of Chris Fairclough joining Gordon at Elland Road it seemed to bode well for a real challenge as the close season wore on and 1989-90 loomed closer.

I was in a caravan on the east coast when I heard on the radio that Vinnie was signing for Leeds for around £650,000.  I frankly didn’t believe it, but when the reality sank in, my reaction was to think – bloody hell, Wilko, what are you playing at?  The signings of John Hendrie and Mel Sterland reassured me somewhat, but I was having trouble seeing what the Jones Boy would bring to the United table.  The early signs were not encouraging.  Strachan tells of an incident in a pre-season game against Anderlecht, where he saw an opposing player go down with his nose spread halfway across his face and blood greatly in evidence.  Vinnie had casually “done” him en passant before sidling off looking innocent, and Strach recalls thinking: my God – what have we signed here?  Vinnie himself remembers his early days at the club, and being moved to violence by the negative attitudes of some of the players being edged out as Wilko’s new broom started to sweep clean.  Among this disaffected few was John Sheridan, something of a Leeds legend – but Jones stood for no nonsense, and there were punches thrown and people seized by the scruff of the neck as he explained his views on solidarity and team spirit.  Vinnie was obviously going to be a kill or cure measure – there were signs he might have much to contribute to the collective effort, but equally that he might turn out a loose cannon which could blow up in all our faces.  Yet Wilko had a magic touch in those early years, and generally it was proved that he knew what he was doing.

In the event, and despite an uncertain beginning, Vinnie played a massive part in our promotion that year.  The fans took to him from the start – the sight of him coming on as a sub in the first home game against Middlesbrough will live long in my memory.  I can see him now, in the middle of the park with the game poised at 1-1, shouting and screaming as he conveyed encouragement and instruction in equal measure, arms pumping in an ungainly, baboon-like way, team-mates and opponents alike staring at him aghast.  And then he frightened a Boro’ defender into scoring a late, fluky own-goal and we had won, setting us on our way after a disastrous opening-day defeat at Newcastle.

Vinnie just carried on making a difference.  He worked and worked, encouraged and exhorted, fought for the cause and put the fear of God up the enemy wherever he encountered them.  He scored spectacular goals, important goals.  He showed flashes of genuine ability and some of his passing was sublime.  He avoided disciplinary trouble to an amazing degree, given his lurid past.  He sold himself to no less a judge than Strachan as an honest performer who could “play a bit”.   He created a rapport with the crowd I’ve rarely seen before or since, chilling and joking with the wheelchair-users at the front of the West Stand before games, and smoking imaginary cigars as he took the plaudits of the adoring masses after finding the net.  In the warm-up before the Wolves match at Elland Road, he provided one of the great moments of humour in a tense campaign, bringing down 5 year-old mascot Robert Kelly in the area with a signature sliding tackle, much to the delight of the Kop.  Vinnie loved Leeds, the players and fans loved Vinnie and the partnership proved fruitful.  Up we went, and when Vincent Jones finally took his leave for the humbler surroundings of Bramall Lane and Stamford Bridge, it was with a “LUFC Division 2 Champions” tattoo proudly inked onto his expensive leg, a partner for the “Wimbledon FA Cup Winners” one on the other limb.  He was a Leeds United legend in only a little over a year at the club, a larger-than-life personality of massive ebullience and impact – and he is held in the highest of esteem in LS11 even to this day, when he mixes effortlessly in the rarefied, glitzy atmosphere of Hollywood.

So what do we need more right now than another Vinne type, as we hope to embark on another long-overdue return to the top table?  Those Jonesy ingredients of passion and power, guts and gumption, are just as important in this league today as they were in those far-off times as the eighties became the nineties.  Who could possibly fulfil that role now?  I’m really not too sure – Joey Barton maybe?  Even he could hardly be a greater culture shock than Vinnie was 25 years ago, but Barton is likely to be far beyond our purse – and to be frank I think he lacks Vinnie’s essential honesty and sheer bad-boy charm.  It’s difficult to say who if anyone we might secure to play the Vinnie part – but if it were possible, in advance of the season before us, to distil essence of Jones, or to clone him right from his bloodstained boots and tattooed ankles up to his fearsomely-shaven head, then I’d do it, and I’d present the result gift-wrapped for Brian McDermott to deploy as he saw fit.

A man in the mould of Vinnie Jones would be just the shot in the arm our club needs right at this point in time, just the incentive for the crowd to roll up its sleeves and get behind the team for a series of battles in a 46 game-long war of attrition.  If only we could have our Vinnie back now.

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Dortmund Über Alles

Posted on 24/05/2013 | 1 comment

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The Germans are marching on Wembley with the aim of conquering Europe. It’s going to be Totally Teutonic, an island of internecine rivalry in North London. Some of the Little Englander persuasion, always ready to laugh when Germany lose in the World Cup (having recovered from England’s own earlier exit) or even when they get “keine Punkte” in the Eurovision song contest, will declare they have no interest in the result beyond a wistful longing to see them both lose. Others will aver that it’s really none of our business, and we should just play the genial hosts to a world-class event and stand ready to clap the winners on the back, whoever they might be, and say “Jolly well done, chaps”. Wrong, wrong, wrong. This result matters – well it does if you’re a Leeds United fan.

Firstly, let’s not forget that the city of Dortmund is actually twinned with Leeds, so we have those ready-made links which can be dressed up as brotherhood should the occasion require. This occasion does so require. We Leeds fans should stand four-square behind our European partners and wish them all success against Bayern Munich on Saturday evening. It’s only right and proper – after all, what are twinned cities expected to do other than support each other? But there’s another, far more compelling reason for wishing Bayern misery at Wembley. In fact, there are two.

Rewind firstly to 1999 and the culmination of the jammiest season an English club has ever had. Everything went right for Man U that year, and they walked off with a highly fortunate treble, after a series of unlikely comebacks and distinctly fluky wins in various competitions. At the death, they were one down in the Champions League final in Barcelona, having been outplayed by a massively superior Bayern side who had been thwarted by the woodwork on at least two occasions. Then – as we know – they scored twice late on, the usual jammy bounces and ricochets, and we’ve all had to live with the memory of Ferguson’s smug “Football, eh? Bloody hell” quote ever since. Bayern let us down that night, and they should not be forgiven.

And further back even than that – all the way back to 1975 and the night Leeds United became Champions of Europe in all but name, a moral status we have defiantly hailed loud and proud ever since. That we don’t have the trophy on our sideboard is an open sore that festers still and will never heal – as great an injustice as that perpetrated in Salonika two years previously. Penalty claims, really clear-cut, but turned down flat. Beckenbauer, der Kaiser, the guilty man. Bayern totally out-played by a Leeds side pursuing their last hurrah, committed heart and soul to winning it for The Don who was watching on from the commentary box in the Parc des Princes. A goal for Leeds, struck powerfully and true by Lorimer on the volley, Maier beaten all ends up, the very least our superiority deserved. Then, der Kaiser persuades the referee – damn him for all eternity – to speak to his linesman and see if there wasn’t maybe some way this inconvenient goal could be disallowed. And of course that is what happened. Thrown, deflated, outraged, the Leeds United side were hit by two late sucker punches, and Bayern were the most undeserving Champions of Europe ever – even more so than those spawny gits of ’99.

Those two Finals – the win for Bayern and the loss for Bayern – are a thorn in the side of every Leeds fan who can bear a grudge as a Leeds fan should. If the two results had been reversed – if they’d lost (as they should have) in 1975, and won (as they should have) in 1999, then we might well now be abandoning our civic links with the good Burghers of Dortmund, and saying a sentimental prayer for Munich. We’d probably have shouted for them last year against those fancy dans from Stamford Bridge. But justice prevailed on neither occasion, and Bayern Munich is a name inscribed forever on the Leeds United wall of hate.

So come on Dortmund. Get into them and make ’em have it. Let’s hope it’s another atonement and – as with last year at the hands of Chelsea – Bayern end up with nowt to show for their showpiece appearance and crying into their beer. Fingers crossed.

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