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Not Just The Match Report
Burnley 0 - 1 Wolves, Tuesday February 14th 2006.
Valentines Day and the love affair continues; no, silly, not Mrs T, I’m talking about my other mistress, the Clarets and what better time could you have than now to express this undying, unconditional, illogical, infuriating devotion to another, when things are not going at all well. At the moment, I have this picture in my head of that old comedian Freddie ‘Parrotface’ Davies whose catchphrase was “I’m juthst about thsick up to here.” I’m beginning to feel the same after another defeat.
I knew something was wrong when I sat and squirmed during the Plymouth game thinking just what the hell am I doing here? I knew something was wrong when I had the commentary on Claretsworld for the Ipswich game and sat reading the newspaper. I didn’t go as far as switching it off but I stopped listening after they equalised because I knew what was coming next… and it did.
I’m not suggesting for one minute that I’ll ever stop coming, or that I won’t buy my season ticket, or stop going to these expensive dinners, I will certainly donate another No Nay Never Anthology in eighteen months time… but yes, the feeling grows that something’s waning… waning in my heart.
I didn’t mind them selling Blake, there were reasons, I didn’t mind them selling Chaplow, there were reasons, I didn’t mind them selling Ade to Sheffield United… bloody good business, and lets be honest, legend that he now might be, the real Ade on a normal working door couldn’t hit a barn door with a banjo. I’ll stick my neck out – he won’t score five more goals this season, and he might even finish up on the bench now that Horsfield is there.
No, my botheration, my dithering, my furrowed brow, is all to do with aspirations and hopes and dare I write it, all about having 2012 Premiership aspirations. It’s aspirations to have a better team, that’s what I want to hear from the club, not Olympic ideals, laudable though they may be. But, I’m told there could be money in it for Burnley FC. I do hope so; it’s badly needed.
There was a much talked about and hyped up three-year plan at the outset of the CE’s reign. What stage are we at now I wonder. Ten years ago we were level pegging with Bolton Wanderers, where are they now? I refuse to believe this ‘punching above our weight’ mantra. Read it often enough and you begin to believe it. Say it often enough and you do believe it. I refuse to say it.
So where are we at, at the moment?
The Cricket Field Stand is in a poor state. BUT the redevelopment of that and the cricket field next door would regenerate a drab corner of Burnley, and galvanise the club. But where are the people in the community and town council with the vision, qualities, financial and business contacts and cooperative skills to see it through and a willingness to work with the club. Can the cricket club people see the bigger picture? Is relocation to Townely Park a realistic suggestion for the cricket club? But that would need cooperation from so many different groups.
Gawthorpe has been neglected for years and other than one new pitch, is basic, limited, and floods whenever a cloud appears. BUT people are rallying with Youth Development fund raising.
The ground sale plan drags on, if it goes through it’s goodbye assets, if it falls through, the club presumably remains £3m in debt. The club is silent. Not good.
Nobody can think of a way to develop the Jimmy Mac void to our financial benefit. If anyone can think of a way, let me know, I’ll pass on the message.
Reality means that none of these problems might ever be solved. There is no Russian millionaire, just niet, although the one at Hearts can kindly stay where he is.
But: there is a Commercial and Corporate section with people who are working their backsides off to increase turnover.
There are directors and a chairman who put their money in. There is a chairman who has kept the club above water for several years.
There is the faithful hard-core bunch of supporters who, for now, keep gates above the 11,000 levels… just.
But, the first team squad, however, is thin and threadbare, limited, grinds out enough points and wins to limp us towards survival, but the words ‘entertainment’ ‘attractive’ ‘pace’ and ‘flair’ have not been heard for a long, long time. People are turning their backs on the club. If that is the fault of lack of funds – which it surely is, my solution is this:
Add £2 to every ticket across the board, every game, every category and thereby create a fund specifically geared to adding to the manager’s player and wage budget. Add it to the bulk of the £1.75 Ade money that we are told will be given to him. Add all this to what he would have got anyway next year for his budget. And then organise a real sustained PR campaign, (not just a one-off column in the local rag), to beat the drum and let people know what their money is doing. You go out and tell people. You visit the supporters clubs. You make use of the club website, AND the alternative website message boards, yes I said alternative Website messageboards, and fans’ magazines. You go on radio, you use the Press, and you use the match day programme. When I say beat the drum I really do mean BEAT THE DRUM long and loud. Concessionary prices are a giveaway. My ticket costs me app £8 a game. I would happily pay more. The extra £2 is ring fenced for team building. The £3 surcharge made people so angry, a £2 player fund increase presented properly will not.
Thus we improve the squad, we go for it, and we set out our stall. SC has something better to work with. We say we ARE aiming for a play off place, we must be bold about it, at least let fans know that this IS the target, not just another season of survival and mediocrity and this is what we should be thankful for. It may or may not be successful, who knows. SC showed that he could get us into the top six, fleeting though it was. Once tasted, we want to experience it again. If in the top six, slowly the missing fans will return, the ball starts rolling, its own momentum keeps it going… more money at the turnstiles… more money for SC. It CAN be done.
I’d love to know what criteria SC works to. Is it just keeping us in the Championship? Or is it getting us into the Premiership? He is ambitious; surely the latter is what he wants? Maybe we won’t make the playoffs, but at least with a better squad we might be spared watching what was on offer in the Wolves game.
And as for the match: Steve Kindon was the half time attraction. Now there’s the kind of personality to lead you through the desert. I spoke to him recently about Harry Potts and again saw him for an hour before the game tonight. He told me a lovely story about Harry.
“My strengths Dave,” he said, “were pace and muscle, running and brute force. It worked. But then I began to watch Dave Thomas and Ralphie Coates how they dribbled and beat men with skill so I thought; hey I’ll do some of that. Well it maybe worked once in every four attempts and the other three I fell flat on my arse. So, then it was the European Cup Final in 68 and Man Utd beat Benfica and who was man of the match – John Aston of course. Because of one reason… he had pace and he used it every time and just flew past everybody on the pitch. So Harry calls me into the office for a chat.
“Good morning Stephen,” (he always called me Stephen).
“Yes boss.”
“Who was man of the match in the European Cup Final?”
“John Aston boss.”
“Are you bigger than him?”
“Yes boss.”
“Are you faster than him?”
”Yes boss.”
“Are you better than him?”
“Yes boss.”
“Well then Stephen, just stop all this fancy dribbling and do what you’re good at.”
I looked at him. The penny dropped. “Yes boss.”
No cross words, no shouting, no broken teacups, just the simple homespun genius of Harry Potts.
Funnily enough it was in a game against Wolves that Harry Potts had one of his legendary Saturday afternoon mad hatter moments. Kindon had been flattened, ended up by the touchline wall, groaning and injured. Play went on. Harry accordingly pushed, jostled, grabbed, manhandled (take your pick) the linesman and insisted he look at Kindon still by the wall in a crumpled heap. Neither linesman nor referee were best pleased and Harry was eventually hauled before the beak and fined.
Anyway, enough of all these little stories what about the game?
We did what we are good at and did the best we could. Alas our best is not very good. Unfortunately doing what we are good at is not always good enough to get a result. It certainly wasn’t tonight. There was a makeshift team with Sinclair missing and Elliot at full back. Spicer was back in midfield. We ran, we huffed, we puffed, hustled and bustled, we fired long balls for the statuesque front twosome, we overhit cross after cross, O Connor scurried about, Elliot covered a few miles, but from the minute Ince hit a blinder of a long range shot that spilled through Jensen’s hands into the net, you knew what the result would be as we had shots well wide, shots well over the bar, a reasonably good penalty claim totally ignored and our big lads up front hardly won a header all night. The longer this game went on you simply waited for the final whistle to put us all out of our misery on a bitterly cold night. Wolves were average, workmanlike, and busy. They didn’t have to exert much effort.
I seem to recall a slogan, something about More Than Ninety Minutes coined by the club. Well Mrs T and good self certainly had more than 90 minutes tonight. We left Leeds early so that we could spend an hour with Steve Kindon talking about his time with Harry Potts. I haven’t laughed so much since the last time I saw Ken Dodd. Then Mrs T and I had a Valentine’s Day meal in the Les Coqs Du Punchup (Fighting Cocks) at Cliviger before the game… chicken stuffed with goat’s cheese and wrapped in bacon for me, and Sea Bass for Mrs T. And enough veg to feed six people. Mrs T had two kisses on the cheek from Colin Waldron, one from Steve Kindon on the other cheek and then one on the stairs from Martin Dobson. The woman has no shame, but what the hell; this was Valentine’s Day. Me: I was furious; I didn’t get one, even though I puckered.
The only thing that spoiled the evening was the 90 minutes of the match itself. I’m not saying we were totally useless but what good is approach play, if the two front men are so leaden footed. I seriously worry about the lack of mobility of Gifton. He has genuine problems. This is not a criticism; it is a sympathetic observation that this lad seems to have movement difficulties. How long can SC continue to select him? Easy, he has to. Oh for a fit Steve Kindon.
The truth is that this is relegation form and it is difficult to see where the next win will come from in the coming games…three away games and a home game against Reading. The cupboard really is bare, and in the space of the next four games it is quite possible that this club, up in the top six on Boxing Day with points to spare, will be down near dead man’s land by the season’s end. It’s a sobering thought.
But for Mrs T the night was a resounding success. She had four kisses from three legends and for a change it was me who paid for the meal.
Just a shame though about the 90 minutes football bit.
Dave Thomas February 14th 2006
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