QPRnet Blogs

Last weekend saw the first taste of the big time since the arrival of the big boys on the board. The weekend papers were full of the ‘two richest teams’ guff and were particularly enjoying the tables being turned on the Village Hotel XI.

Very enjoyable it was too! In some cases illuminating…we have the same GDP as Croatia! But, as with the game which i suspect went with a whimper, this honeymoon period isn’t going to last and i think we should be bracing ourselves for a long and sometimes undignified backlash.

There are lots of teams who deserve help, there are lots of teams that could manage a fraction of the money at our disposal, very well and with good grace. They are all going to look at our good fortune with no little envy and find it hard to swallow.

We were one of those teams, for most of us the decade that has just past has been long, desperate and humiliating. I for one had begun to question whether i’d ever see us compete again. While i doubt our recent set ups could manage any budget with good grace or sense, we are now very comfortable and appear to be commited to spending whatever it takes to get back with the big boys.

But no one is going to like us for it.

Rightly or wrongly we built up a reputation for being a nice little club who played good football and competed with bigger teams with more resources, our neat little ground was known a great place to go (even though you wouldn’t be able to see properly) and a good day out. We’d produce or develop the occasional gifted player who we’d eventually see achieve their full potential at a big club or grace the national side. We toddled along quite nicely.
A decade of dysfunction has put paid to that.

We are about to re-emerge as a putative behemoth, possibly in a faceless stadium out towards the M4 and prepared to buy success with a mercenary bunch of players. Thats what its going to look like anyway.

Chelsea deserved all the crap that was thrown at them. They bought success and often use their wealth to stop others from competing (do you think Mourinho really wanted Ballack or Essien?) Their profile under the odious Kenyon has disintegrated. They are the chinless nobodies who pay the biggest boys to hang around to ensure they rule the schoolyard. They are an example a to how not to behave.

It won’t stop the stick from coming. On saturday evening, on 606, a Chelsea wag rang in to talk about the giant killing his team had performed…ho ho!
It reminded me of the first thing we have to avoid. Yes we will get a bigger stadium, yes we’ll have to attract new fans to fill it, yes i might be priced out of going eventually…but please, please, please, whenever you or i talk about being a Rangers fan, whether its in a pub or on the radio or wherever. Don’t do what every Chelsea fan i ever hear does…don’t start whatever you are going to say with the words ‘been an R’s fan for thirty years’. No one who does not know you believes you!

Hold on to your dignity, you and i know how long we’ve been here, waiting for these times, doesn’t matter what anybody else thinks…FORZA QPR!

Rogue Male

Well, it’s about as reasonable an explanation as anything else doncha think?
Multimillionaires are flocking…actually…multibillionaires are flocking to our aid all of a sudden. Why for so? You incoherently ask!

Could it be Oil, Diamonds, Gold or plain old real estate? Could it be the elegance and poise of Bolder, the balance and robustness of Nygaard or the sight of Ainsworth running in an exaggerated Victorian manner? Just what is it that has attracted this strange bunch of moneymen?

We are about to see the first fruits of this new found wealth, the ready made hero Buzacky, successful loanee’s Vine and Ephraim (fingers crossed). But it’s the supplementary players that’ll make the difference.

After Malcolm’s appearance snoozing on the outside lanes of a motorway recently one hopes his spluttering pilot light has gone out and the United right back loanee ought to be his replacement.

It’s the towering presence of an intelligent centre back that I’m most looking forward to see arrive, don’t mind who, but the continuing absence of such a figure is the biggest threat to our rosy future. We’ll get enough goals through the season, but I’d like them stopped at our end…especially those last minute ones!

We’ve scored some really good goals recently too! Buzacky’s second against Colchester and Rowland’s second against Watford were absolute crackers and it’s very nice to see Blackstock, despite not contributing goals, linking up very effectively with the likes of Buzacky.

New Year is the chance to reassess our hopes and fears and resolve to do better. Personally I hope we are patient, that we don’t try to do it too quickly, but continue to press for good football and a sound foundation for a solid future.

I fear that the Mittal connection is merely a chance to get an idiot son in law out of his hair…no evidence, just couldn’t believe my ears. I also hope that QPR will not become Chelsea…money should be a comfort not a stick to beat others with.

Here’s to a great 2008!

Rogue Male

Rogue Male is typing this the morning after Israel’s last minute rescuing of the Mclaren era of English football. Never has the result you were hoping for elicited such bemused feelings. Watching England in major competition is difficult. So much expectation and fervour and so quickly deflated such is the experience of following the national team. Generally we are left to hope that our poor performances mean that the team is saving itself for a big push later, we are always wrong. 2004 was a pleasant change. The team, despite carrying a clearly unfit Beckham played with purpose and no little style, letting France off the hook but still qualifying in comfort. Swept along by the exuberant Rooney and the emergence of King as a real option in midfield or defence, they looked capable of taking anyone on. Disaster struck, Rooney injured, King at home with his pregnant wife and perhaps most significantly, Ferdinand’s enforced absence meant Terry was exposed to one if his most unfortunate displays in an England shirt. Home early again, but for a few days the potential was there for all to see. After a miserable 2006, the majority got their way and a true man of Albion would be at the helm. No one seriously believed that Steve Mclaren got the job because he was the best man; no one really believed that he could knit a disparate bunch of millionaires into a potent football unit…but he was at least English. We know what we were getting, the press knew, the fans knew, the FA knew. We had all been here before. For Mclaren read, Graham Taylor or even Kevin Keegan. Both had limited success as a league manager, both thought that their motivational abilities would get them through. Both were wrong. In reality there was little difference in their ability than say Bobby Robson, the best thing Bobby did was to appoint Don Howe as coach. Makes no difference I hear you say, well would you have Don or would you use Phil Neale or Derek Fezackerly as Taylor and Keegan did. I know what Terry Venables chose to do when he replaced the hapless Taylor. Mclaren chose his Middlesborough colleague, Steve Round…no, me neither, but it’s interesting that Gareth Southgate was very happy to see him leave for England. Managing and coaching players is all a bit of a smokescreen though. Mclaren’s chief crime has been his interaction with the media. From day one every statement he’s made had been carefully thought out and scripted, rather than impose his footballing philosophy he chose to pander to the press. Disaster, from day one he tried to second-guess the mood of the country. He chose to show himself as a strong leader by publicly dropping Beckham. Wrong, wrong in so many ways. Beckham isn’t everyone’s cup of tea and he’s not the future of England, but in the short term at least he was England’s most effective player, setting up or scoring a heavy percentage of their goals. Mclaren gained a small bump in popularity buoyed by meaningless friendly thrashings but as the real business of qualification got going it was clear that we were in trouble. A smart man would have used Beckham to build his own popularity, make play of getting him to 100 caps and talk about his value to the squad. Thus letting him know that he was no longer first choice, but would still have a part to play. It is possible that Beckhams resurgence of form last year would not have happened without the snub, but I’ve never known him give less than 100% for the cause, I doubt anything would’ve changed. Like all England Managers, Mclaren tried to build his little cliques, his inside men. John Terry and Steven Gerrard were singled out as his lieutenants. In the way of these things, they would have a say in selection and would in turn be difficult to leave out. Mclaren had built his own gallows. Terry, committed and forceful still continued to make mistakes at the highest level. You always felt that Ferdinand and Campbell trusted each other, but I always think that Ferdinand has half an eye on Terry when things get desperate. Stevie G is more interesting, identifying him as a key man made Frank Lampard continually under pressure and his form suffered. Gerrard isn’t always onside either; if he’s unhappy we’ll all get to know about it. England managers, since Ramsay, have always had their favourites, no one since Sir Alf would’ve left out Jimmy Greaves. Ron Greenwood disastrously turning to the unfit Brooking and Keegan in Spain 82, Sir Bobby’s Captain Marvel, Graham Taylor…err Carlton Palmer? Terry Venables would’ve played Gascoigne pissed, Kevin Keegan practically gave Shearer carte blanche on who his striking partner would be. Hoddle was a notable exception here. He seems hell bent on ruining the careers of any player who might eclipse his own legacy to English football. So why worry about who is in charge if they are all going to continually make the same mistakes? Well, let’s not, let’s not give two hoots. The English game once ruled football and it can again. The Path is simple, effective and tried and tested. First, get rid of the idea of England Manager. Fifty years ago a committee men would gather in smokey rooms and select eleven ‘good eggs’, chaps who wouldn’t ‘rock the boat’. They would present their choice to a nominal coach, basically a glorified physio come kit man; I’m thinking Ray Clemence is pointless enough to assume the role. He would ensure the chaps turned up on time and didn’t pinch the kit. The eleven selected would then go out and perform admirably against Northern Ireland and the like. The press have no one to moan about, the committee would assume the 1950’s long gabardine coats and bowler hats, so that nobody could be singled out. Cheery fans, ruddy faced in the cold would happily spin their wooden rattles as England attacked. But is there a flaw in my plan…what about the great footballing nations of the 21st century? Surely Pace, purpose and prowess will undo all our good intentions? Qualification may well become harder to achieve. Not if we don’t enter the competitions! To regain our rightful place in World football all we need do is to ignore World and European competition. It worked before and we were a powerhouse of World Football…we just chose not to prove it. So now I settle down to watch the big game, only a draw needed. No Ferdinand, Terry, Neville, Rooney, Heskey or Owen. This all suggests a very gloomy Thursday and maybe a re-appraisal of my master plan. By then it may not seem so far fetched. Rogue Male.

Rouge Male contemplates the journey to ‘turning the corner’.

Every time we see Mick Harford mumbling the words ‘I don’t know how long I’ll be picking the team’ post match, whilst quite clearly his mind is chanting ‘kill, kill, kill’, we add another mile on what might be the longest bend in the history of ‘corners to be turned’.

The glorious oneniller thriller against Norwich has now been backed up by a ‘gudpoint’ against those other denizens of the east coast marshes, Ipswich. Better still we didn’t let fellow strugglers Preston steal a lead on us. Still bottom, but in times like these you take what you can get.

Currently we are assuming that Mick Harford is perpetually on the cusp of being relieved of his duties, but despite the many and varied rumours, shortlists and informed inside tips, we don’t appear to be close to a new man at the helm.
What if Harford remains through Christmas, will we be forced to rely on other managers being afraid of upsetting the ‘legendary hard-man’? Will his gambit of employing a slow-motion left back continue to distract the cream of the championship? And will he ever smile?

I’m convinced that while most of us like to deploy hundreds of facial muscles, Harford has one, which works his bottom lip in the same way Gerry Anderson got the Thunderbirds to talk, the rest of his face has calcified with the ousted muscles redirected to the space between his ears, thus rendering any articulated wisdom unfathomable. Sort of a one-man Mount Rushmore, oh-oh now I’m picturing Cary Grant hamming it up on his forehead! Maybe we are going to have to get used to ol’ stoneface?

Not since the Honeymonster was seen hugging Gerry Francis (two ridiculous figures in one Ad!) has Loftus Road seen Heat photographers attending matches, it would appear that as long as you can get whisked in and out without suffering the vagaries of the tube or walking through the leafy estates, we are the de-rigueur ticket!
There was a time when Manager difficulties meant the cameras scanning the crowds for likely replacements, if this is still the case then the likes of Warnock and Ollie are going to have to really up their game if their post match rants are going to make an impact. Imagine having to compete with Naomi Campbell chucking a phone at Geoff Shreeves and offering out Garth Crooks for suggesting that Chris Barker was less mobile than Simon Barker (now!).

Were they really there at all? Well obviously, yes. Sky’s deep pockets don’t run to cgi supermodels, though they could save money by using any old pub pundit to replace the pointless Gary Birtles. But why were they there, all dolled up in their chic little R’s scarves? Could it be that the cameras were there?

It would seem that our next manager will be Italian…any Italian, and most have been mentioned on the boards although I was interested by the news that John Collins had been sounded out (I know he’s supposed to have turned us down, but go with me on this one). He strikes me as ideal, he’s done a good job in a fairly similar league, he’s worked under financial constraints and must be looking for a career progressing move, money to spend in the Championship must have some appeal wherever we are.
Ideally we must look for the next Aidy Boothroyd, someone whose spent a while coaching, has ambition and is still relatively young. It’s entirely possible that may just leave Aidy Boothroyd and I can’t see that happening, but I’ve provided the blueprint, it’s for Gianni Paladini to finish the job.

Whoever is in charge, you’ve gotta love Big Flav, his was a Man of the Match performance against Norwich. Like Nero wondering if he could smell burning and trying to remember where his violin was, Flav’s imperious dismissal of the hapless referee was genuinely inspiring. I’m looking forward to seeing more of him. I’ve never seen a man look so monied before. He doesn’t wear it obviously, there’s no bojangles about him, and it’s a quiet casual wealth, a circumspect power that says ‘I could buy you, or have you killed but I’d rather eat’.

The last three results and to a certain extent the performances give me a little confidence that even if we don’t appoint straight away we’ll be ok, but I wouldn’t want to still be on this corner in March!

It’s disorientating when a momentous event happens while you are away from anything remotely resembling a 24 hours rolling news service. My Parents were in Canada when 9/11 happened and they now equate the epoch making event with a free extra weeks holiday, although a week is long enough to see everything in Vancouver.

Now, in the week Chelsea began the inevitable return to their rightful place, I was left with BBC world to keep me up to date. I’m sure you’ve all experienced the delights of BBC world, in order to maintain a sense of well-being in the world, the BBC have created a channel which takes the dullest most pointless news stories and interviews and repeat them through the day. The point is, I think, to lull you into a pleasant holiday stupor…relax, enjoy yourself, there’s nothing to worry about anywhere else.
Somebody ballsed up, along the strap line at the bottom came the bombshell, Mourinho out at Chelsea!

Whoa!

The evening before I’d been faintly amused by Chelsea being held by Norwegian part-timers, but in truth I’d been more concerned about Plymouth at home and having to wait two days to get a paper and the score. This year I’d steeled myself not to use the phone, the £100 bill for monitoring a nil-nil draw against Tranmere a few years back had been a harsh lesson on the cost of using your WAP abroad.

But now I need to know, could it be true, the last vestige of humanity, humour and entertainment, finally stripped from the Hotel Football team?

Despite the BBC’s attempts to keep me in the dark, I piece the story together and it was true, Chelsea had finally lost patience with their most successful manager ever. The one nagging, annoying sense of approval you felt when Chelsea was mentioned had been removed. I felt a strange elation.

Friday’s (well Thursdays when you are stuck on a mountainside in Italy) papers brought confirmation and detail. Roman had a toy’s out of the pram moment and finally despatched Mourinho, although the words mutual were being used I suspect when you are a Russian Billionaire your dictionary definitions are a little skewed.

Back in blighty and Sunday’s papers bring more to the table, The Observer went to town. I suspect they are one of the papers that Chelsea and John Terry are going to sue, but frankly I like their story and until the truth is revealed its the one I’m going with.

There’s little doubt that Terry and Mourinho had a spat, I’m no fan of Terry, he’s an adequate centre back who’s ability has been inflated by idiot pundits and playing next to proper defenders like Carvalho. I think Mourinho was coming round to my way of thinking. Terry had recently negotiated a ridiculous contract making him the highest paid premiership player and a clause that guaranteed him parity with any superstar that arrived at Chelsea. One of the Observers claims was that he’d also demanded an option to manage at the end of his career and had started his badges…Chelsea are moneydumb, but even they laughed out loud at this one.

The story goes that Mourinho had the temerity to question Terry’s performance and part in their opponents goal during a fractious half time on Tuesday night. Terry like the man he is, whined and then pretended not to listen. Rumours persist that after Mourinho leaves the dressing room, Roman pops in to instruct Essien on where he should be passing the ball! For anyone with even a passing interest in seeing Chelsea in turmoil this is fantastic.

The next part, I believe, is the most disputed. Terry, if we believe these reports, goes running to Roman saying that nasty Jose is going to take his ball away. This is the final straw, despite having won two championships, Fa and Mickey Mouse, sorry Carling cups the Russian is no fool and he’d finally realised that he’d not bought Arsenal…Mourinho must go!

When you have that much money you don’t get your hands dirty, fortunately close at hand is the increasingly toad like gargoyle, Peter Kenyon. Kenyon, to be played by an exhumed Peter Lorre in any future film (the smell is similar I’m told), slimes over to Mourinho and lays down Roman’s law. Then releases a press release that back tracks on virtually everything he’d told the press over the last year or so. Nothing new there then!

I’m savouring every minute of this, next up…the replacement, the man who is going to bring champagne football to the bridge…Avram Grant! Oh lovely, the man who made ‘one nil to the Is-ra-el’ a fact. This must be a temporary measure or is JT pulling the strings?

If your trust of paper reports still holds, there is deep unrest in the ranks, some players, new in, only signed to play for Mourinho, some, despite trying to get out of Chelsea are now openly praising Jose…c’mon Didier get your story straight and some like Frank Lampard have just seen their money-spinning move green lit! So it would appear that Terry has a job on his hands if he is to turn this runaway train around.

They didn’t get off to a particularly auspicious start, a fairly flat trip to Old Trafford; admittedly the ref didn’t help them, but who cares. They booed Roman in and every shot of him framed the Emperor with a succession of international managers, all awaiting his lucrative call. The new Chelsea were defined, I hope, by Joe Cole’s lunge to hack Ronaldo down and the last ten minutes where the increasingly hapless on field ‘leader’ Terry let his thuggish inclinations take over as he tried to intimidate Ronaldo and Rooney in turn. Unless you are a nightclub bouncer with your back to the England captain, I’m not sure it works John. It’s at this moment I realise who Terry has replaced in the national conscious. I’m sure he thought himself the new Bobby Moore when the England captaincy was unwisely bestowed upon him, but I’m convinced that in every possible way, John Terry is the new Martin Keown.

The best thing about these last few days is that It’s been a little light relief from our own little soap opera. It’s also a cautionary tale about the vagaries of money coming into a club. While I hope we never become as desperate, grasping and seedy as Chelsea we should be prepared for a rocky road to a hopefully brighter future.

It is my heart-felt desire that we pass Chelsea going the other way!

Rogue Male

Well, it feels like it anyway. The takeover appears to have finally happened, the club saved, I should be delighted.

And I am, for the most part. Beggars can’t be choosers and as beggars I think we’ve been incredibly lucky. I envisioned many scenarios through an increasingly desperate summer, the best of which involved some kind of buy out that left our heads above water and little else. So for they’re to be new owners and a ‘plan’ is more than my wildest imaginings. So why do I keep coming up with questions?

Why Rangers?
For most of us, Rangers are our very lifeblood; we can quote history, style and reputation as perfectly good reasons for taking on the club on. But we view the club with hooped-tinted spectacles, a league cup, a near miss and New Years Day on Manchester is hardly going to attract your average multi-millionaire. The idea that QPR is a ‘great little club’, run well by smashing people is at least twenty years out of date and the last few would have been better run by Barnum and Bailey. They are not fans, so why us.

Premiership Millions are attractive and they have an acknowledged time frame to get back amongst the big boys. Does anyone believe that 10 million is enough to get us back up? It seems to me that this gives us an opportunity to gain parity with about half the championship. There are no guarantees of four years to the Premiership. So why not buy Birmingham or Derby? They are already in the Promised Land; they have bigger infrastructures and bags of potential.

It has to be London…well some of it anyway, obviously Gianni et al must have been doing some sweet-talking, but I can only assume there’s a convenience about the location. This then makes me wonder about the obvious inconvenience about the location.

A ground capacity of 17000…no wait a minute, the capacity now appears to be 15500 if the last game was anything to go by, 17000 isn’t going to be maximising income…unless we’re all paying three times as much and I’m no surveyor but I can’t see where we are going to expand at our current home. As an outsider you’d think I’d look forward to a move to a more convenient location, but walking along the Uxbridge road (…to see ad Queens Park Raaaaaangers) is one of the great joys of my footballing experience. You get it wherever you go, the sense of heightened excitement the moment you spot the first shirt and then it builds and builds before the tribal sensation of being one of many kicks in, but as you go through the familiar side roads and approach the glorious shoe-box that is Loftus Road…well, I can’t see how a walk through a plastic industrial estate off the M25 is going to match it.

I tend to take my lead from the regulars here. If Varc can happily contemplate a move, then who am I to raise objections. I think we should listen very carefully to any plans as they arise mind. New stadia crop up all the time and the reasoning isn’t always as altruistic as it first sounds. Nottingham Forest have recently announced plans to move away from their perfectly adequate stadium to a purpose built arena. Frankly in their current state you’d think a share with Notts County’s tin cowshed would suffice, but that wouldn’t maximise the directors profit and that appears to certainly be a major motive here and with lots of the others I shouldn’t wonder. While a stadium appears to be a big outlay, the peripheral infrastructure, shopping, hotels, road and transport networks appears to offer lots of opportunity for accessing grants and payments from big supermarket and hotel chains. While I’m sure football clubs come out of expansions carrying debt I’m convinced that most directors and other interested parties come out of them smiling.

A future at the B&Q arena out at Heathrow beckons?

Whatever Flavor Flav and Lil’ Bern’s intentions, here we are. Our natural state is one of perpetual annoyance, even though had money to spend, we didn’t spend it on the right person and even though we’ve been taken over it didn’t happen quickly enough and so it goes on. That’s fine; it’s our prerogative as fans. But somewhere along the way we’ve lost perspective.

I think it happened during the long run in the first Division (then Premiership). Somewhere during that time we decided to stop enjoying the dream and start to think it was where we belonged and that one way or another something would happen to make it stay that way. I always find Gerry Francis, Rangers hero that he’ll always be, culpable here. A little unfair maybe, but it was during his tenure that we became a little bit of a laughing stock, a rot that continued to grow unchecked until (hopefully) now. If somebody wasn’t digging up stock footage of his pigeon fancying appearance on Blue Peter they were showing that bloody advert, Gerry and the Honey Monster prancing around the ground. I found it increasingly difficult to take him seriously and even though he left for supposedly better pastures I don’t think he left us in a great position with the team.

There followed a succession of Clowns to take over his crown, Chris Wright, Ned Zelic, Mark Hately, Stewart Huston, Bruce Rioch, Steve Slade, Davies and the incredible missing board, all leading to our current ringmaster Gianni.

I can’t find the thread where it was said, but Ron hit the nail on the head during the most fevered of pre-takeover speculation, hope you allow my paraphrasation here, ‘all I want is a well run club, solvent and professional, anything else is a bonus’. I’m sure there are lots of places on the Internet and beyond where he’d be castigated for such thoughts, but I think it’s bang on. I want to be associated with a club that makes me proud, somewhere that appreciates my support and be surrounded by likeminded individuals who want to see a team try to play decent football. It just doesn’t feel right to talk about Champions League when you can’t get past round one in the League cup.

In some ways it feels unambitious, but a month ago I’d have settled for QPR still being in existence at the start of next season. This is all a bonus, time to start enjoying it…I just hope I can remember how!

Rogue Male

Like many of you I’ve spent much of the weekend reading the boards, trying to come to terms with the death of a young man who represented more than mere investment or promise. Ray Jones symbolised a cherished future for Queens Park Rangers football club, after weeks of worry about the imminent demise of the club we are now asked to comprehend to loss of someone who could have led a new QPR away from these dark days.

Young lives are seemingly lost this way every day, I’m sure with the will to look I could’ve produced statistics about teenage lives lost in road traffic accidents, but the manner of his death seems somehow secondary at the moment. All I know is a couple of weeks ago I very nearly turned into oncoming traffic at a junction, a moment’s aberration that twenty years of driving couldn’t save me from, what chance a boy with a few weeks experience.

I got lucky, hundreds, year in and year out, don’t!

We’re all struggling to articulate how we are feeling, it’s not easy to express what you really feel, twice as hard to make sense with a keyboard. There are some really touching thoughts on the boards and some a little trite, but all are coming from the heart. I think we need to be a little patient with each other. I’m not a father, but I understand how your point of view is fundamentally changed by parenthood. With the death of any child, be it eighteen years or eighteen months, a parent is shown a glimpse of their own child’s mortality and this heartache is doubled by their kids own grief as they always seem to be drawn to younger players like Ray.

In all too short a time we will again be consumed by feverish speculation over the future of our Club, a club which appears to want to exist in the shadow of debt and dishonour, a club that can only seem to earn respect when tragedies like Ray Jones and Kiyan Prince occur.

We will take to the field again too, players will wear the hoops and we, as fans, will take to the terraces.

I don’t want a stand named after Ray; we shouldn’t retire his number or erect a statue. But in everything we do, as a Chairman trying to rescue a club, as a manager trying to make the best of his limited resources, as players striving to make a career or as fans relentlessly supporting our team…remember that we have one more chance to do it better, one more chance to do it right, one more chance to try again and again and again.

Ray Jones will never have one more chance…lets not waste any more.

Rogue Male

During the current whirlwind of news Rogue Male craves your indulgence as he goes a little off topic…

Friday the tenth of August, early on a surprisingly sunny evening. I like many a good solid, middle class, middle England male, am filling my dishwasher and staring at the number of empty wine bottles gathering above it, wondering how we’d managed to consume so much since the previous weekend. A news channel is on in the background, just noise really, I’m not really concentrating.

Just for a few moments I tune in, I hear news that makes me feel, for a few seconds at least, as desolate as I ever have. For those few fleeting moments I am crushed by a barely bearable weight of sadness. Tony Wilson has died.

I don’t know whether this is a northern thing or perhaps it’s to do with the age I’ve managed to get to, but I find myself stopped in my tracks by news like this. It’s not like losing a family member or close friend that is an agony that must be almost indescribable. The Death of Tony Wilson or Anthony H Wilson as he had latterly styled himself feels more like losing a part of me. I can only think that its akin to realising you can’t wear tight jeans anymore or the weekly 5 a side game you considered more important than the Champions League is now beyond your puff. Something you considered important to who you are and how you became that person is no longer around.

This isn’t the first time this has happened, the untimely deaths of Joe Strummer and John Peel both struck me the same way, I even cried at the end of John Peel’s biography, something I’d not done for years before, not even at the millennium stadium or since.

What they all have in common is when they became important to me, Strummer and Peel are more obvious to fathom. They spoke directly to me at a point in my personal development when I was struggling to define myself. Both in their own particular way, helped. When Tony Wilson was shaping the type of man I am, I barely knew who he was.

In Granada land, the north west of England, not Andalusia, Tony Wilson was the plumby voiced counter point to Bob Greaves on Granada Reports, they along with the now infamous Richard and Judy went head to head with Look North West’s Stuart Hall, all pink shirts, bling jewellery and ‘fond farewell’s’ and John Munday a big teddy bear of a man who’s main notoriety was our illicit knowledge that he lived with Roy Barraclough, Mr Bet Lynch on Corrie. If I’m being honest, in our house Hall and Munday usually won, I found Wilson a bit creepy, a bit of a nerd. I don’t think I was alone, but that never mattered to him.

What was really important and where Granada always beat the Beeb, was with music, thanks in no small measure to Wilson’s commitment and swagger. So it goes was remarkable and frankly for a fairly new teenager, a bit scary. A hippy, who’d shed his Granada Reports suit and was telling me that Iggy Pop was the most important man in the universe.

I was just too young for Punk, I bought No More Heroes, then took it back because the man at Dawson’s had put Mull of Kintyre in the bag by mistake and I can remember the excitement of getting London Calling the day it came out, but in truth Punk preceded me.

But I wasn’t one of the hundreds of people who claim to be amongst the forty or so who witnessed the Pistols at the Free Trade Hall in Manchester, I can say I was around as the bands that would form the first vanguard of Factory’s assault on the music industry were starting to appear.

You did try to spread yourself thin though, living between Manchester and Liverpool meant you were dividing yourself between the surreal, psychedelic pop of Bill Drummonds ‘pool and the driving, hard-edged, bastard funk of Wilson’s Manchester. It was hard to position yourself for posterity too! I decided quite early on that A Certain Ratio were going to last longer than Joy Division…not for the first or last time I’d be doing some hasty backtracking later on.

Nowadays, these are often referred to as dour, long coated days of questionable politics and even more questionable haircuts. I believe ‘Control’ the new film about the life and death of Ian Curtis, Joy Divisions doomed front man, buys into and perpetuates this monochromatic, bleached out myth.

That’s not my recollection of those times, personally I prefer to remember Wilson’s own version of events, brilliantly captured in Michael Winterbottom’s 24 hour party people. It may not have exactly happened like that, but history is written by those with the best lines, Tony did and said some crackers.

Stricken with liver cancer, Wilson, who always maintained he was the only person not to make any money from Factory, was forced to take help from friends and colleagues to afford the drugs that kept him alive. Nobody was spared the irony of The Happy Mondays, who Wilson had funded a decades worth of drug abuse, paying for his supply.  Last weekend, Anthony H Wilson went to his final rest; I sat down and watched 24 hour party people again.

Cheers Tone!

Rogue Male

It was the best of times; it was the worst of times…

The season has begun, the Saturday papers were awash with previews and the Sundays were jam packed full of big match analysis…all of which was largely left unread. Obviously I spent most of Saturday evening trying to get a glimpse of our goals and I’ve pretty much devoured our write ups in both the Observer and the News of the World…I’ve already surpassed the sum total of words. Anyway we are up and running.

What really caught my eye this week was coverage of two ‘hot’ football topics and their impact of two quite similar players in my mind. Dennis Wise and Jamie Carragher, both, I think, made the very utmost of their talent and probably have done as well in the game as anyone could have expected.

Dennis on Thursday was genius. He made those endless hours trawling through repeated chunks of nonsense spouted by increasingly wooden presenters on Sky Sports news so much more worthwhile.
Why? Leeds lost their appeal against the 15-point penalty. Of course they lost the appeal, like the other team who tried to avoid the penalty on the last game of last season, Boston, they’ve received just desserts. The extra five are all down to Ken Bates’ shenanigans through the summer.

But it was Dennis who really starred here, he came across as a cheap hood whose boss had been sent down and who knew that retribution was just around the corner. He was obviously trying to sound threatening but with Dennis you know that he won’t strike until you’ve turned your back.

It’s hard not to feel sorry for him at Leeds. It doesn’t matter if he leads them back up, they’ll never like him. They see him as a ridiculous glove puppet with Batesy’s hand doing the necessary and who would argue, Ken is the godfather of Wise’s son.

For Leeds this season was always going to be difficult as Sheffield Wednesday andd we know, reputations count for nothing and every team want to beat you. Leeds fans will be fleeced for as much as King Ken can get and they won’t expect to be thanked. I know not everyone will agree with me, but I wouldn’t wish this on any Football fan.

I found myself listening to Alan Green on 606 on Saturday evening; now we all know that he is definitely not…I repeat NOT a Liverpool fan, honestly! He was defending Jamie Carraghers qualities as a footballer, he was having to do this because the central defensive hole created by England’s premier lump, JT, means that Carragher’s decision to announce his International retirement means that the spectre of Sol ‘I could be an actor’ Campbell getting a recall has raised It’s Easter Island like head.

I’ll be honest, I don’t care who plays next to Ferdinand, I don’t think Terry’s any better than Carragher, Campbell or a whole host of contenders. I’m not bothered that the increasingly smug, bombastic and shouty Green has little idea as to what his job is, (just tell us what is going on and stop pontificating), what I’m focusing on is the concept of a bit part player, hard working as he may be, feels he is of sufficient status that he is in a position to ‘announce’ his retirement…Pele, ok, Beckenbauer, yes I can cope with that, Cruyff, always a controversial figure, so yup…announce away Johan. But Carragher?

He’s not the first, I was similarly annoyed by Shearer, who realising that he probably wouldn’t be allowed to run the England team as he had under Keegan decided that he would ‘retire’ (before suffering the ignominy of being dropped maybe?). What about Scholes, I hear you ask, and I could easily be wrong here, but it’s so much easier to make my point, I ‘m fairly sure that Scholes told England, who then chose to make it public…anyway, let’s get back to Jamie.

Frankly I reckon you should earn the right to make a decision like that and I’d like to think that the player doing it should at least be missed!

Maybe he just thinks that it’s a far, far better thing he’s doing, than he’s ever done before and the Champions League is a far, far better rest I go to than when playing for England before.
(Apologies to ‘Dickensy’)

Rogue Male

So the dark clouds are gathering in the once golden south. Families and friends are thrown into turmoil as optimism fades and the relentless pressure rises.

No, there you go again with the weather…alright, the Cotswolds does look like Bangladesh, but you are just catching up, that’s all…where I come from this is a drop of light drizzle!

This approaching disaster is no act of God, it’s purely man made and while it has seemed at many points avoidable, it now appears inevitable.
This disaster will mean years of pain and soul searching, a deperate fight for survival will replace lofty ambition.

It’s our Football club that’s sinking, not an Oxfordshire village. A journey that probably started long before the age of the Thompson’s is approaching its destination. The false dawn of the post-administration years is beginning to spiral down the plughole.

We’ve travelled a treacherous path these last dozen years, suffering a crew that wanted out, an enthusiastic amateur out of his depth and a bunch of faceless nobodies prepared to pay top dollar for any acne-riddled youth who managed not to tie their bootlaces together. Finally we have been left with our current company, a rag tag, motley squabble of pirates and weekend sailors, wanabees and never would-be’s playing at running a football club.

So, becalmed, awaiting our fate, we speculate on our limited choices. Haphazardly drifting on, preying for twentieth place and a player or two to sell each season. Eleven thousand becoming ten, ten becoming nine. Each desperate year the manager talking vaguely of the playoffs until the leaves start turning and ‘getting points over Christmas’ becomes the winter mantra…the only difference will be the manager, we won’t always have he one who doesn’t realise he’s looking more and more like Lionel Blair.

If this scene is not to be played out then it would appear we have two stark choices, roll over into administration and hope to resurface someway further down the food chain, battered but hopefully still intact or like fifty or so other league clubs we could continue scanning the horizon for a sugar daddy (or Mummy…I’m not sexist). The latter is often suggested on the myriad boards, a seemingly easy option that will wipe our tears away and ease our collected furrowed brow. Is this really an answer? Do we really want an Amnesty International pursued ex-dictator arriving on our doorstep, talking about the Champions League and frozen assets? Maybe we do a Leeds and sell our souls to the Devil?(Albeit a devil that looks like Father Christmas!).

I know what you are thinking, another whiney article bemoaning our state and offering nothing constructive, no possible solution. Those that sit and moan are part of the problem…all right, all right, calm down!

I have a cunning plan…well a thought to throw at our plight.

The news recently talked of a future superpower, growing rapidly, who have sectioned off vast quantities of working capital from its gross national income to invest in western concerns. What if a football club, failing, but with a little bit of history, a reputation (fast fading) for good exciting play and players and in desperate need of regeneration was to be open to new money. What if this country already knew of this club, had already established ’sporting’ links?

Oh yes…we sell to the CHINESE!!!!

Whaddyathink, huh! C’mon, don’t dismiss it out of hand…alright we’ll need to mend a few fences, but…wait a sec…Don’t press the back button, I…(CLICK!)

Rogue Male