Serendipity

Ranting Managers

2011-11-15T12:35:00.003Z

Now that the drama, heartache and impending sense of doom surrounding all things Argylian has dissipated I find my thoughts turning to the rather more mundane issues that crop up from time to time in football and my beady eye alights upon the perceived behaviour of managers as they watch their teams.

There is nothing new in the development of my thoughts on this issue but, I suppose, I am a little inspired by Argyle's forthcoming FA cup 1st round replay at Stourbridge. As we eagerly await the televised match at the plucky non-leaguer's tiny ground next week I am reminded of a similar trip that we made to Dagenham & Redbridge back when Paul Sturrock was our manager and D&R were still a non-league team. A quick trip to the ever-excellent Greens On Screen provides these match details of that, for us, ill-fated evening more than 8 years ago:

14 Jan 2003
FA Cup 3rd Round (replay)
Attendance: 4530

Dagenham & Redbridge 2 Plymouth Argyle 0

Argyle's line-up that day: Romain Larrieu, David Worrell, Paul Wotton, Graham Coughlan, Lee Hodges, Steve Adams, David Friio, David Norris, Mickey Evans, Ian Stonebridge, Marino Keith. Subs: Blair Sturrock, Jason Bent,Martin Phillips.

That is pretty much as close to a fabled "Team Of Legends" as Argyle can name. That same squad was responsible for a meteoric rise through two divisions, both won in no little style as Champions, and yet on that night they were humiliated by relatively mediocre and unfancied opposition. And that humiliation was made worse by being one of the few times that we featured as a live televised game.

It was poor game, as I recall (aren't they all when you lose?), and we were deservedly beaten so there's no excuses to be made and most certainly no mournful cries of "we wuz robbed". From our point of view the evening was memorable, once the pain of our obvious humiliation is put to one side, for only two things: 1) A succession of gilt-edged chances that was squandered by Marino Keith; 2) Paul Sturrock's demure body language as he sat huddled in the corner of the dugout watching the horror story unfold.

Keith's profligacy is not the focus of this piece but Sturrock's demeanour that evening is. With the taste of an unpleasant defeat fresh in our mouths the response from sections of the fanbase was furious in its disapproval: "he just sat there and did nothing" and other similar responses abounded. And the observation is accurate. All he did was sit and watch.

Defeat puts a microscope on every last detail though. That was pretty much Sturrock's modus operandi whilst he was with us. Touchline extravagances were not for him and he managed us to unprecedented and, quite frankly, unexpected success the likes of which we, as a club, had never seen before and have not seen since.
Sturrock left and was replaced by Bobby Williamson. He was another that was relatively undemonstrative as he sat on the touchline. He was another that, for various reasons, attracted huge disapproval from sections of the support and it was with no little glee that supporters acclaimed a hard-earned 0-0 at Southampton achieved in Tony Pulis's first game. His modus operandi was very different: all chavved-up in club training kit and baseball cap he conspicuously stood alone in the technical area and shouted and pointed and complained to anybody who would listen. He was very obviously "in charge" and involved. He did not just stand, or sit, and watch. Argyle's support, almost to the last person, purred its approval: "that's what a proper manager does".

Apart from offering a chance for the fans to enjoy some great theatre just what does the ranting manager achieve? He must get right on the tits of the match officials for a start so does he influence decisions positively for his side or just instill a siege-mentality in the match officials who decide that they aren't going to give him a damned thing unless they have to?

And so it goes on... Rafa Benitez used to gesticulate extravagantly but his message was never clear ~ not to me at least. Shouting instructions can't be very effective either amidst the hullabaloo that surrounds any important occasion in a big stadium and surely disaster awaits if the message is only partially received and misinterpreted which must happen as often as not.

To be honest I would rather see a manager study the game as it unfolds and keep a cool head as he does so and I'd prefer to see a manager exude control and authority rather than temper and dissent and leave the displays of passion to a fist-pumper out on the pitch. Sir Alex Ferguson often does little more than furiously chew gum and look at his watch and he can hardly be criticised as being ineffective as a manager, can he?

We all want to ascribe some kind of supernatural prescience to our team's manager and to acclaim his ability to influence the progress of a game but it is not a manager's body language on the touchline that gets results for a team; it is the whole decision-making process all the way through from overall club strategy, player/personnel recruitment, effective training and coaching, pre-match choice of tactics and team selection that impacts on results far, far more. Unfortunately fans never really get to actually see any of that and so they latch on to what they can see and what they can see confirms a thought that they all know to be true but would much rather not entertain: it is largely all down to the players once they cross the whitewashed touchline.

Resurgam!

2011-10-31T14:05:00.008Z

Resurgam indeed! No other word will do!

Yesterday these statements were issued:

http://www.pafc.co.uk/page/NewsDetail/0,,10364~2501457,00.html

... and:

http://www.pafc.co.uk/page/NewsDetail/0,,10364~2501457,00.html

So it is finally over. The rebuilding work starts here and given that we are currently bottom of the 92 English full-time professional clubs, started Saturday's game with five 17 year olds in the line-up and have a swathe of players either suspended or injured at present then that rebuilding process cannot be too radical or start too soon and today a radical start was made with the promotion of Carl Fletcher from temporary to permanent manager.

http://www.pafc.co.uk/page/NewsDetail/0,,10364~2501457,00.html

This entry is not going to be about the future though; it is here just to fill the gaps between the last entry and this one and to, hopefully, draw a line under a past as distasteful as any that could possibly be imagined.

In my last blog entry I related how the Heaney/Bishop International bid seemed to have stalled. Official confirmation of that never came, as far as I can recall, that Heaney's bid had failed but once Guilfoyle/P&A began discussions with James Brent's Akkeron group then it was obvious that it had. From that point Brent's bid was the only viable option for us.

A tortuous route lay ahead though. P&A hadn't actually progressed the Heaney/BIL bid very much at all despite regular protestations that all was going swimmingly. All sorts of agreements had to be made with the holders of the secured mortgages, staff, players, the FL and, of course, P&A itself.

Brent's team appeared to cut swathes through the various obstacles at a furious rate. In next to no time the secured creditors were on board, the PFA had been persuaded to advise its members that settling due wages over a 5 year period was acceptable and most of the club staff had agreed to similar terms. In the midst of all of that Brent had even managed to repel a desperate last-ditch attempt by members of the old board to queer the pitch by launching a rival bid that seemed more concerned with protecting their personal and historic liabilities than it was with benefitting the club, staff, players or supporters.

One very big obstacle remained: Brent's bid was contingent on Plymouth City Council agreeing to buy the freehold and to consent, in broad terms at least, to Brent's wider plans to develop the area around Home Park. It is obvious that in the current economic and political climate that the notion of PCC investing in (or "bailing out" as the common argot would have it) the city's financially and morally bankrupt football club was a tricky one to sell. It was very helpful, however, that the local paper, The Herald, came out in support of the idea despite an angry splurge of letters in the postbag and comments on their website. PCC duly debated and voted and, and this was beyond my wildest expectations, was solidly 100% behind the proposal to buy back Home Park... Maybe Viv Pengelley did read my email!

(http://babararacucudada.blogspot.com/2011/01/letter-to-viv-pengelley.html)

http://www.thisisplymouth.co.uk/Fans-celebrate-landmark-decision-buy-stadium/story-13597604-detail/story.html

And so the end game loomed. There was a late scare concerning the negotiations between Brent and ex-manager Peter Reid and ex-director Yasuaki Kagami's link to Plymouth, and Argyle's ex-chief operations officer (or some such) Tony Campbell. This was a mere hiccup and both deals were quickly done.

So that was it! Except it was not. Apparently a handful of ex-players/employees had remained uncontactable and so were yet to sign up. They were, eventually amidst some wild rumours, in the bag too.

So that was it! Except it was not.

At the very last it seemed as if a stalemate existed between P&A and Brent over the admin fees. These deserve a chapter of their own really but I don't understand that stuff well enough to do it justice! P&A had previously released a document detailing the club's accounts since the beginning of the administration process though and if the harsh financial realities of operating a football club are a mystery to you then some of the mystery could be lessened by looking at this link: http://www.pafc.pandareports.com/ and reading the report.

So P&A's fees had racked up to well over £1m. There was no way that Brent was ever going to settle at that level and P&A offered to accept 50%. This still appeared to be too high. Statements were more or less simultaneously issued by Brent and P&A on Oct 20th:

http://www.dca-pr.co.uk/Latest-News/Akkeron---Old-Way-Mansion/The-Plymouth-Argyle-Football-Club-Limited-in-123.aspx

...and

http://www.pafc.co.uk/page/NewsDetail/0,,10364~2488470,00.html

And then on 28th October agreement was reached:

http://www.pafc.co.uk/page/NewsDetail/0,,10364~2497216,00.html

Which brings me back to the statements at the beginning with Argyle officially exiting the admin process after 241 days of shame and worry.

So that is it. This time. It really is it. The guts may have been ripped out of Argyle by the events of the last 3 years or so but the heart and soul are back where they belong and we live to fight another day. Against a backdrop of venality, chaos, fear, bullying, misinformation, intimidation, lies and contempt a spirit has been engendered and the bond between players, staff and supporters has probably never been stronger. Indeed the bonds of respect and friendship stretch far beyond Plymouth and its immediate environs. It seems churlish to name any one group but the support given to us by Brighton's supporters at what was just about the very lowest point will quite simply, never, ever be forgotten by Argyle fans everywhere.

The cast of heroes and villains and innocent by-standers caught up in this affair is huge. Much of what has happened may be entirely legal but that doesn't stop it being morally reprehensible. There must be serious questions asked about the legal framework that has allowed this farce to run and run and it is time that light was shone into all of the farrago's various murkily-lit corners. If the FL/FA won't or can't do it then government should legislate. But that is all for another time...

Just to finish off I'd like to quote Peter Reid's most recent statement:

http://www.leaguemanagers.com/news/news-6886.html

... and add a picture.

Resurgam! (of course!)

The Surprises Just Keep On Coming

2011-09-25T14:32:00.005+01:00

It isn’t exactly officially confirmed yet but it now appears as if Heaney’s interest in Argyle is over. Of course if he was only a representative for Bishop International all along, as he has always claimed, then we may yet have to wait to see the end of BIL’s interest.

You have to wonder just what Heaney has been playing at throughout this whole episode. Why bid a sum of money that you cannot deliver? Why buy exclusivity at a cost of a cool mi££ion? Having done that why not put the entire mi££ion in as promised so that the team you hope to buy at least has some hope? OK so he didn’t ever actually put that mi££ion in but he has put £300k in and that seems, to me, like a lot of money to lose in any context.

I suppose the signs of Heaney's eventual failure have been there all along. From the first moment that Heaney’s interest was rumoured sections of Argyle’s Cornish support started ringing the alarm bells. All was not well in Heaney’s corporate empire and Cornish Homes had collapsed leaving a lengthy list of unpaid creditors in circumstances almost exactly identical to the collapse of PAFC.

So the signs that Heaney’s bid was potentially problematic were there from the very start. As events unfolded there was nothing to stop the alarm bells ringing and as every deadline was missed and as every wage deferral was “agreed” so those bells rang faster and louder.

On 5th September I found myself in the Plymouth court building and as I hung around waiting I idly glanced at the notice board where the cases to be heard that day were listed and saw this:

"Truro City" leaped out at me straight away but I didn’t know what a disposal hearing was and had to look it up:

Where the defendant has admitted the claim, a disposal hearing may be necessary for the court to determine how the debt should be paid. Such a hearing will only be necessary where the court have insufficient information to determine the rate (or time) of payment, or you have challenged the rate (or time) of payment ordered by the court.

The court will give you and the defendant at least 14 days notice of the date and time of the hearing.

You must attend the hearing and tell the district judge why you do not accept the defendant's offer of payment (or the court's order) produce recent evidence of the defendant's means to support your argument.

(from http://www.hmrc.gov.uk/manuals/dmbmanual/dmbm666160.htm)

So it appeared as though Heaney was having problems paying his solicitor’s bill. The following day this report appeared in the Herald:

http://www.thisisplymouth.co.uk/Heaney- ... story.html

So all of that on top of a County Court Judgement for a relatively piffling £18k a while back suggested that Heaney simply couldn’t deliver.

And then on Friday two more bombshells exploded. A winding-up order being served on Truro City was one of them:

http://www.london-gazette.co.uk/issues/59914/notices/1442725/

Obviously Heaney was unconcerned and it was all just somebody else’s fault or a mistake or something:

http://www.thisiscornwall.co.uk/Truro-City-winding-order/story-13380569-detail/story.html

So the nightmare that has been haunting PAFC for months seems about to be unleashed down in Truro. I can only wish them well.

I said there was “two bombshells”. This is the second:

http://www.pafc.co.uk/page/NewsDetail/0,,10364~2460473,00.html

Just allow me a little backfill here…

Peter Ridsdale first emerged in an Argyle context as a guest of the old board. Apparently he had been on a walking holiday in the SW and, as an old mate of ex-chairman Paul Stapleton, had simply taken a game in. Then a couple of weeks later he was in the Directors’ Box at Oldham “a guest of the Oldham chairman” Argyle director Keith Todd assured us. “Pure coincidence. He lives nearby,” he said.

http://www.thisisdevon.co.uk/Reid-weary-legs-rest-Rovers-clash/story-11702691-detail/story.html

Ridsdale is obviously no stranger to football’s financial basket cases and not soon after that he was asked to help out as an “advisor”. At this point he started to act on Argyle’s behalf and was instrumental in raising the funding (a.k.a. selling everything in sight) needed to fend off HMRC’s relentless campaign. Most unreasonably HMRC seemed to believe that it ought to be paid the taxes, in full, due to it.

The fateful day arrived when Argyle could fight off the demands of the court and HMRC no longer. Argyle’s board of directors had long since ceased to function in any meaningful way and all they had done for weeks was bicker and finger-point. As the court recessed for lunch they finally agreed upon something. Ridsdale managed to convince the board to go into voluntary administration because the court was going to appoint an administrator once lunch was over anyway and at least this way there might still be a football club at the end of the process.

So Ridsdale picked up his phone and asked insolvency practitioner Brendan Guilfoyle to step in. He did. Guilfoyle then suspended (i.e. sacked) the board of directors en masse and with nobody to run the club Guilfoyle asked Ridsdale to act as CEO/Chairman as they set about finding a buyer to take the club on.

Essentially there were three bids and Heaney’s was the, ahem, “best” but Heaney had dual ownership issues seeing as he was owner and chairman of Truro City. To overcome this the plan was for Ridsdale to buy the club for £1 and for Heaney to buy the stadium and land.

So that was the plan. Except Heaney had no money and no apparent backers. And now the Heaney bid is history and five days after sacking Peter Reid as a manager, Ridsdale has announced that he is about to leave.

http://www.pafc.co.uk/page/NewsDetail/0,,10364~2460473,00.html

So what do we make of all of this? I suppose that Ridsdale has been true to his word. All along all he has said is that just wants to save Argyle. The saving now seems to be very close and Ridsdale seems set to leave. I think we’ll need to see him actually leave and then assess what, if anything, remains and then allow the dust to settle before his role can be properly assessed. If it ever can be at all.

Finally…. Argyle won a game yesterday!

A new owner on the horizon, council ownership of the stadium, no Heaney, no Ridsdale, no Guilfoyle, a new manager, goals, a win (!), a clean sheet…

Is it too early for a “Resurgam”?

Peter Reid Sacked! (and far, far more...)

2011-09-20T09:51:00.005+01:00

Events at Home Park are moving at such a furious pace it is hard to keep up with it all. The latest bombshell has been the sacking of manager Peter Reid.

You would think that, given Argyle's recent form, the fans would be over-joyed at his dismissal but I don't think they are. I know that I am not. There is a feeling of deep shame attached to his sacking that I would rather not have to deal with. On purely footballing grounds there appears to have been no alternative. The following statistics completely support his dismissal:

Last win: 1-0 home to MK Dons 22/04/11

Last 3 games of last season: P3 D0 L0 F2 A8 (including defeat at bitter local rivals Exeter City)

Relegated, for only the second time in the club's history from that division, as the bottom side 8 points from safety (albeit following a 10 point deduction after going into administration).

Knocked out of both this season's League Cup and the Johnson's Paint Trophy (after a penalty shoot-out in which we failed to score even once against bitter local rivals Exeter City) in the first round.

League record this season: P9 W0 D1 L8 F5 A13.

Last 14 competitive games: P14 W0 D1 L13 F8 A23

Current league position: 92nd out of 92 and 6 points from the safety offered by being 89th.

Those recent stats include demoralising defeats at the hands of Burton Albion, Barnet and AFC Wimbledon who are teams that shouldn't even be in the same division as us, if all was right in the world, let alone deservedly beating us with such evident ease.

In normal circumstances the fans would be demanding his head on a plate. Sadly, as anybody vaguely aware of what has been happening at Argyle, these are not normal circumstances. Since his arrival as manager Peter Reid has had to sanction either the sale or release or has seen the club break contracts causing players just to walkaway, or has seen those contracts simply terminated, of around 30 players and he has only been our manager for 15 months! On top of that the coaching staff he has had to work with has dwindled in number so alarmingly that he had to recruit his brother to help out. And nobody has been properly paid for 9 months (and counting). A team in administration is allowed to have 20 players on its books; we have 18 and most of them are young and inexperienced. Many of them had not even started a game as a professional until this season. In Reid's last game i/c at Southend on Saturday the Southend players had made more appearances in green than the entire Argyle team added together!

Except some have been paid and, if rumours are to be believed, then they, or some of the youth teamers anyway, have been paid by Reid himself out of his own pocket. It doesn't stop there. Last winter was the coldest we have had for years. Even in sub-tropical Plymouth snow lay on the ground for weeks and matches were postponed due to the bitter cold. At this point the club was still deperately trying to battle against the inevitable financial implosion; one of the first signs of just how bad things were came when the fuel bill went unpaid causing the heating oil tank to run empty. As the club's staff shivered in their offices, and there was no hot water for players to shower under, the staff was, with incredible grace and understanding from the board (which was still in place at the time), "allowed" to wear their coats, scarves, gloves and woolly hats whilst working (I am NOT making this up). How gracious! "Gawd bless yer, Guvnor. A true gent y'are. Make no mistake" was presumably the expected response. Peter Reid, once again, reached into his own pocket and paid for a delivery of heating oil so that the radiators would work and the showers would run hot once again.

http://www.thisisplymouth.co.uk/Argyle-s-payment/story-11659292-detail/story.html

And then... As the months rumbled by the players and staff remained unpaid. By now the club was in administration and many of the staff had had their employment summarily terminated but a hardy few remained and they continued to work unpaid because if they did not then the club would quite simply cease to function at any level and would have been closed. Pasoti, a supporters' web forum, collected via cash donations; others collected money in buckets at matches and social events; a supporters organisation, the Green Taverners, was formed to raise some money to help the staff buy food, pay bills and generally make ends meet. One of the fund-raising activities was an auction of donated footballiana; Peter Reid donated his FA Cup Final medal.

http://www.thisisplymouth.co.uk/ll-sell-medal-help-club/story-11690476-detail/story.html

Through what has been a blizzard of utter cack on and off the pitch Peter Reid has been a beacon of decency and selfless integrity. There has barely been a moan from him and he has been our talisman in many, many ways. He will always be welcomed back by supporters and there is nothing but gratitude and respect shown to him for the way he has conducted himself through what are basically intolerably impossible circumstances.

Results aside Reid's efficacy as manager seemed to be nearing an end during the most recent home game against Port Vale: Argyle's captain Carl Fletcher was named as a substitute; midfielder Simon Walton started at centre back; centre back Ladji Soukouna started in midfield. Port Vale scored an early goal and the team simply disintegrated. Walton was subbed, to prevent a seemingly inevitable red card as the red mist of frustration obliterated his judgement; Fletcher came on to replace him; Walton huffily trudged from the pitch having removed his shirt in obvious disgust at Reid's decision. Later a complete horlicks by Soukouna led to a penalty and his dismissal; defeat was assured; heads dropped alarmingly; Fletcher now looked as though he was trying to get himself sent off. It was a complete shambles.

Four days ago another defeat, this time at Southend, was endured and this time Fletcher snapped. It had all become too muchfor him, as he later admitted in a heartfelt post-match apology, and he guaranteed his dismissal by grabbing an opponent by the throat for no obvious discernable reason. The following day Reid was dismissed. The day after that Fletcher was appointed caretaker manager.

Reid's sacking came out of the blue and was a huge surprise but hindsight is a wonderful thing and looking at it now I suppose there was no real alternative. The reasoning behind the decision is obvious to all. The only unanswered question is: why on Earth did Reid stay here at all for as long as he did?

Reid deserves to have the last word on this and today it came, as humbly as is possible to imagine and totally without rancour, in the guise of a statement released via the League Managers Association:

http://www.leaguemanagers.com/news/news-6860.html

Which leaves the on-going administration process...

As anticipated the Golden Share was never issued at that Football League meeting. Apparently the release of it was not even requested.

http://www.football-league.co.uk/footballleaguenews/20110908/football-league-makes-pilgrims-statement_2293334_2444708

Before that meeting Heaney had promised to walk away if the Golden Share was not issued:

http://news.bbc.co.uk/sport1/mobile/football/14837141.stm

After the meeting Heaney promised that the deal was not dead:

http://news.bbc.co.uk/sport1/hi/football/14911823.stm

But then he admitted defeat and a circus of potential new buyers emerged:

http://www.thisisplymouth.co.uk/Heaney-quits-new-buyers-emerge/story-13325689-detail/story.html

This signalled publicly the apparent demise of the Walter Mittyesque Heaney/BIL takeover once and for all and the loss of BIL's "preferred bidder" exclusivity. Despite a lack of any concrete confirmation from administrator Brendan Guilfoyle's P&A insolvency company, which is over-seeing the administration process, it appears that local businessman James Brent's bid is now the favourite to go through ~ at least it is the only bid that seems to have any chance of success in the time available before P&A gives up, cuts its losses, pulls the plug and liquidates the club.

Last Friday saw the near simultaneous release of press statements from Plymouth City Council, Peter Ridsdale (acting chairman/CEO) on behalf of PAFC and James Brent:

http://www.pafc.co.uk/page/NewsDetail/0,,10364~2453371,00.html

http://www.pafc.co.uk/page/NewsDetail/0,,10364~2452566,00.html

http://www.pafc.co.uk/page/NewsDetail/0,,10364~2452572,00.html

So it seems as if there is light at the end of the tunnel. The sketchy proposals seem to suggest that PCC has finally agreed to a plan similar to the one I suggested to council leader Vivien Pengelley in an email (unanswered) that I sent to her back in February:

http://babararacucudada.blogspot.com/2011/01/letter-to-viv-pengelley.html

Even to me all that time ago it was clear that there was no conventional business case to be made for the continuation of Plymouth Argyle as a football club: the mismanagement of the previous directors had been too thorough; the accumulated debts were too big. If PCC does eventually step in and buy the stadium and the land around it then it can do so safe in the knowledge that it is doing all it can to protect the image of the city on the national stage because the death of Argyle would hit home like a hammer blow. The nation's wider perception of the city of Plymouth as a place to do business in or with would be permanently ruined. PCC can also expect a good return on the costs it meets, compared to current market expectations, and should regard the expense as an investment and not a gift. Perhaps more crucially it would also gain complete control over the development of the land between Home Park and the nearly complete council-backed £50m Life Centre sport and leisure complex.

Oh! And what is the core business of James Brent's Akkeron Group? Hotels. Who was it that first proposed that a hotel could be built on the land next to Home Park? Vivien Pengelley. Does the Life centre have a hotel? You can join the dots yourself.

As an aside another of James Brent's companies is the surfware company Saltrock. If this deal does go through we can expect some seriously cool club merchandise to go on sale very soon!

Well… I still have a team to support (for now at least)

2011-08-28T11:56:00.004+01:00

Friday 5 pm. That was the “deadline”. The latest of many. All of the other deadlines had proved rather more flexible than most of us expect when we use the word. This one proved to be no different.

Argyle fans had gathered to hold a vigil outside Home Park from Wednesday onwards in a desperate attempt to influence the decision-making process as overseen by administrator Brendan Guilfoyle. All across the internet others had relentlessly checked the news services and social media for an indication that something/anything was happening to lessen our woes and so alleviate the suffering that we have been subjected to for far too long now. And there came… nothing.

Speculation abounded unrestrained. What could it all mean? Breaking things down to the simplest level there were only 3 potential outcomes:

1. The club’s liquidation;

2. The deal going through to completion;

3. An extension.

#1 was the horror option. Despite what we had been told experience of other clubs in a similar situation had shown that football clubs were a very resilient breed. Nobody else has been liquidated so why would we? Obviously this ignored the fate of Maidstone, Chester City, Rushden & Diamonds and Dawlish Town in recent times but huge swathes of the national media simply ignored our plight and preferred to concentrate on “crisis club Arsenal” or Joey Barton’s move from Newcastle to QPR. Sky Sports News was particularly culpable. Quite simply the news and football world just shrugged its shoulders and gave it a huge, collective “meh…”.

#2 was, I suppose, the announcement that would have been Good News.

#3 despite all the noises being made to show that this was, indeed, the proverbial “it” more obfuscation always seemed the most likely outcome.

Word flew around that Argyle’s acting Chief Executive/Chairman Peter Ridsdale was going to talk to the Vigilgrims who had braved days of thunder, lightning and torrential rain during their encampment outside the ground at 17:15. The news when it came was underwhelming:

The joint administrators of Plymouth Argyle Football Company Limited (in administration) are satisfied that Bishop International Limited has secured the necessary funding and everything is agreed between the numerous parties.

Solicitors are now working to finalise the documentation and complete the sale to Bishop International Limited / Plymouth Argyle (125) Limited.

Brendan Guilfoyle said: 'This has been a complex deal involving a dozen stakeholders. I am very grateful for the assistance I have received from everyone involved in the sale. I can now look forward to the new club obtaining the share from the Football League and retaining their status as a Football League member club.’

So there it was. Something and nothing. The TV crews had gathered to film the denouement as and when it came; they wanted to see either tears, anger or the popping of champagne corks; they chose the latter and supporters were then cajoled into a premature champagne-spraying celebration; that same celebration was plastered across that evening’s local TV news bulletins; that same celebration almost completely, and definitely wilfully, misrepresented the true situation.

The Vigil in pictures

And so the announcement was widely interpreted as “Rejoice! The club is saved!” and this was certainly how Ridsdale attempted to spin the announcement as he read it aloud to the Vigilgrims until he was force to backtrack a little as some of the fans present questioned his bolder rhetorical flourishes.

Previously we had been told that the only 2 issues holding up the deal were:

1. Bishop International needed to arrange the finance;

2. The Football League needed to return the Golden Share to the club.

So here we are: Bishop International has “secured the necessary funding”; “Solicitors are now working to finalise the documentation and complete the sale”; “look forward to the new club obtaining the share from the Football League “.

So the deal is not yet done and the club is not yet saved and we have made no tangible progress at all from earlier positions.

The language used by Guilfoyle and Ridsdale is a little stronger and confident than anything that we have heard up to now so I must assume that Bishop International has actually secured the finance and questioning whether or not there is broad agreement with the “dozen stakeholders” might seem churlish. Despite Guilfoyle’s astonishing on-the-record admission that he had lied to supporters and media in the past we can do little other than take him at his word this time. It is certainly the case that every time he opens his mouth Guilfoyle paints himself into an ever-tighter corner. He is going to look very bad indeed, to the point of being either negligent, incompetent or criminally irresponsible, if the Bishop International deal does not ultimately go through.

And, make no mistake about it, the words in that statement do pass the buck well and truly over to the FL. Presumably their handing over of the Golden Share will be the deed that signifies the ultimate completion of the deal. Until that happens every contract agreed (and who knows maybe even scrutinised by lawyers, written down and signed by all relevant parties!) will be contingent on the FL handing over that share.

So FL approves the deal and it is all done and dusted!

If only…

Problems hide around every corner.

The Football League has various rules pertaining to club ownership. Essentially any person or company is only permitted to own, or have an interest in, one single club to avoid possible conflict of interest and to retain the integrity (there’s a word that you rarely read in a football context these days) of the various league and cup competitions. And nobody knows who the people behind Bishop International actually are. Not even the FL and the FL does not permit anonymous club ownership. (There is growing suspicion that Bishop International might be a company owned by and representing some or all of the directors that landed Argyle in this mess in the first place; this will incense supporters and unpaid creditors but not bother the FL overmuch ~ if true.)

Cornwall-based businessman Kevin Heaney also has a clear dual interest given that he is “representing” Bishop International (who, obviously, will be buying the entire club lock, stock and barrel) whilst retaining chairmanship and ownership of Truro City FC.

Heaney hopes to avoid that dual interest becoming problematic by selling the football club to Peter Ridsdale with Bishop International retaining ownership of the stadium and adjacent land. Ridsdale’s Argyle will then rent Home Park from Bishop International as tenants. One obvious obstacle to be overcome here is the fraud case hanging over Peter Ridsdale following his association with Cardiff City and a season ticket promotion that he ran whilst he was there. As of now we must assume that he is innocent (until proven guilty we all have that right enshrined in law, of course) but if he is convicted then there is no conceivable way that he can be considered a “fit and proper person”.

I don’t expect the FL to complete their due dilligence and to issue that crucial Golden Share any time soon.

Which in turn means that the administration process will not be completed in the near future.

Which in turn means that Argyle is still quite some distance from salvation.

So we are now where we are. Yet again Argyle's future has seemingly teetered between salvation and oblivion and both are still very real prospects for us. The cynical side of me is wondering whether we have ever been really, really on the brink at all though? Have we, as supporters, been played all along with extinction's nuclear option being used to present some other eventual outcome as desirable whereas in a less fraught context that same outcome would be denounced as unacceptable?

Yesterday Argyle replaced bottom-of-the-league Crewe Alexandra at the bottom of the professional football league pyramid when The Alex beat us 1-0 at Home Park. Whilst we remain in the FL (and in business) we can sink no lower; quite literally there is nowhere else left to go.

Does Argyle Have A Future At All? (a.k.a. Oblivion Looms)

2011-08-22T14:07:00.004+01:00

Where to begin?

I’ll keep this as brief as I can but it is fiendishly complicated and we have to go waaaaay back to put events in context.

I’ll go back to what, at the time, seemed like the worst possible scenario for us as a club and I blogged it as “Dead Cat Bounce” some time afterwards.

That was written about the time that Paul Sturrock first came to the club and he was appointed by widely hated multi-millionaire ex-Chairman Dan McCauley and it wasn’t long before the good times started to roll.

Before those Good Times though McCauley was ousted by a loose coalition of supporters with varying levels of personal wealth. He’d always said if he got his money back he’d leave and they cobbled together around £2m and told him to sling his hook. Which he duly, reluctantly did.

From that point after a slow start success followed success. Two divisions were won in 3 years and club records, of the right sort, tumbled one after another. Not just club records either: no team in England has ever beaten our points total of 102 for a season, for instance.

Our problem was that we had risen quickly and the team was ageing. On top of that we had to compete with clubs far more able, well… willing anyway, to splash the cash. Inevitably our meteoric rise had been noticed and Southampton, then a Premier League side, made Sturrock an offer too good to refuse and he was off. Bobby Williamson was appointed as his successor and Williamson won us our second promotion in his first game in charge, as Champions, in a never to be forgotten afternoon when we beat Ian Holloway’s QPR 2-0.

As I have already suggested the team was ageing and needed to be revitalised and rejuvenated. Williamson set about it and in the process several crowd faves were “let go” amidst all sorts of murmurings, rumour and blatant criticism. He did his job though and we stayed up in his first season at CCC level.

He was sacked before the end of the following September, maybe even August, after a very poor start to the next season and Tony Pulis was appointed. He turned around a team that had seemed clueless and turned us into a disciplined, if dour, team that enjoyed eventual mid-table mediocrity. And then Pulis walked out to return to manage Stoke. There’s a whole story there alone of boardroom/corporate chaos which is best told by a Stoke fan. Pulis was succeeded by Ian Holloway.

Throughout all of this Argyle had traded profitably for the best part. We were lauded as a “sensibly-run” club and were held up as an example to others but crowds refused to grow and even though we enjoyed year-on-year progress for 7 or 8 years in terms of league position attendances began to decline, income stagnated and costs rose.

In the boardroom those 6 directors who got rid of McCauley fell out and divided into two loose factions: London-based and Locals; 3 directors in each.

There was a constant debate amongst the fanbase about “investment” in the team. Football fans always want more and better players and they do not come cheap. The local directors were fans of “organic” growth of the business and the “Londoners” wanted to put up some cash and spend it on players. The Londoners seemed to enjoy rather greater personal wealth and the locals pleaded relative poverty and urged prudence.

The situation became irreconcilable when Plymouth Cricket Club was put up for sale. It was offered to PAFC (the land adjoined the club’s training pitches and it would have been an obvious expansion to make) and the locals wanted to buy it whereas the Londoners felt that money should be spent on the first team. In the end the locals banded together and bought the land as individuals and over a period of time the 3 London-based directors rancorously left the club.

Another layer to all of this was the development of Home Park itself. McCauley’s biggest achievement, arguably, was the renovation of 3 sides of the ground. The plans seemed very grandiose when we were in the bottom division but by the time we were promoted twice it became clear that the infra-structure of the ground (bars, corporate hospitality, media facilities etc) were inadequate both in functional terms and when it came to separating supporters from their cash.

Various proposals and plans came and went to replace the grandstand and upgrade the ever more decrepit oldest side of the ground but nothing ever happened. The first renovation was completed via grants, loans and other assistance from Plymouth City Council who were our landlords at the time but they couldn’t politically justify doing anymore and couldn’t/wouldn’t find the funding, believed to be around £10m or so, needed. Argyle wouldn’t pay for it because tenants don’t pay for improvements to their lodgings, do they?

Add to this a proud and joyous proclamation from, at the time, PCC leader Tudor Evans (Lab) standing proudly on the Civic Centre balcony to a gathered horde after an opentop bus parade through the city that he would “give the city a stadium fit for champions”. Well he couldn’t and didn’t. What he did do was sell the stadium and adjoining land to the club so that they could try to finance the replacement of the grandstand themselves.

Along the way directors came and went until we were left with the most recent incumbents: Paul Stapleton (who had been there all along even back when McCauley was uber-Fuehrer in chief), Tony Wrathall and Robert Dennerley (who were there for much of the journey), Japanese businessman Yasuaki Kagami (represented by American George Synan) and the newest arrivals Keith Todd and Sir Roy Gardner.

These are the guilty men. Well guiltiest anyway. So far. Others yet to emerge at this stage may be guilty/guiltier.

Like Sturrock and Pulis before him Holloway walked out apparently due to funding that had been promised to him not arriving ~ this became something of a mantra on and off the pitch as time went along. At around the same time an astonishing number of our players were sold. The club had never had more cash but the team was gutted. We were 5th in the CCC when Holloway left. Now we are 90th in the entire football league.

The Prodigal Son returned and Paul Sturrock, our most successful ever manager, came back in circumstances which were a strong echo of Pulis’s return to Stoke, but this time the magic just didn’t work. The money we had banked from the sale of the players was frittered away in wages and transfer/agents’ fees (apparently). This has never really been fully explained because we didn’t actually pay any large fees for anybody…

Anyway the slide was on. That year-on-year progress became year-on-year decline. The next season relegation was narrowly avoided. The season after that we were near the bottom all season and eventually Sturrock was sacked and replaced by Paul Mariner.

During all of this it was decided that Plymouth would bid to be a part of England’s 2018 World Cup bid. If successful this would see and extra tier put around the 3 sides of the ground already renovated and a whopping great grandstand built to replace the old one. Ground capacity was to be a staggering 46000 and all of them seated! Incredible! Probably far too big for us as a club but definitely “incredible” in every sense of the word.

(I’m sure that you know that the WC bid failed in controversial circumstances in a manner which implied that FIFA was rotten to the core of its corrupt soul.)

At this point the wheels, wobbly for some time now, fell off completely as the financing of the club seemed to be dependent on the WC bid and accompanying development next to the ground. The board split into 3 factions: Japan/Local/Others and, basically, nobody did anything until after we had been relegated again, Mariner had been sacked, crowds had plummeted and expensive players on long contracts had seen what little money there was left evaporate into God knows where.

The first indication that all was seriously, seriously unwell came when HMRC issued a winding-up order for unpaid taxes. The money was found and HMRC went away. They came back again and again and again. Each time it was harder and harder to find the money. Players were sold to meet these bills and were sold at buyer’s and not seller’s rates. New manager Peter Reid had an impossible job.

If things could nosedive from there then they did when it became obvious that the next HMRC bill would result in us defaulting and that they would issue a winding-up order that would see the club put into administration and probably liquidated as a result.

A few months prior to this Peter Ridsdale appeared on the scene. Initially he was just a guest of the club taking a match in whilst on a walking holiday in the SW. Later he “agreed” to help the club in an advisory capacity.

The old board splintered into acrimonious chaos with all sorts of “not me, guv” and finger-pointing leading up to that day in court…

At the very last moment imaginable (i.e. a lunchtime recess) Argyle went into voluntary administration meaning that they could appoint an administrator rather than have one appointed for them. The administrator appointed was Brendan Guilfoyle who had had various dealings and associations with Peter Ridsdale in the past… The club suffered a 10 point penalty and yet another relegation became inevitable; the existing board of directors had control wrested from them and the Football League suspended our Golden Share (basically a guarantee that the club gives that it will abide by League Rules and which entitles it to enter cup and league competitions).

Which more or less brings us up to today. Since that day various shocking details have emerged: PAFC had debts of £17m; Home Park was valued at £7.5m; Home Park has 4 mortgages on it; the current value of Home Park is believed to be far less than the combined value of those 4 mortgages; unsecured creditors have accepted 0.77p/£; club staff and players have not been paid for 8 months; suggestions (not proven) of links between prospective buyers and the old directors…

The administration process has been somewhat (!) murky. For starters there is the rather worrying Ridsdale/Guilfoyle axis and then there is the potential buyer(s)…

There has been 3 possible bidders. 2 of them have been named as James Brent and Peter Buttivant. The other was, at the time, an unnamed “Irish bidder”. Guilfoyle rejected Buttivant’s bid due to him not providing adequate proof of funding. Brent took a back-stop position as being a purchaser of last resort and refused to fund the administration process but his funding was validated. The “Irish” made an offer that satisfied Guilfoyle and were appointed as “preferred bidders” granting them exclusivity and exclusion to all other parties since.

All sorts of problems here… who are the Irish? What are their plans?

Rumours were vehemently and on the record denied by all parties concerned that Truro City chairman Kevin Heaney was behind the “Irish” bid. It turns out that he is a “consultant” for a company named Bishop International which is based in Gibraltar and, hence, is basically untraceable (although some associated names and details seem to be mirrored in Batley which is near Leeds which is where Ridsdale and Guilfoyle first crossed paths). This is problematic because Football League rules dictate that a director can only have influence on one club. As such Heaney cannot be allowed to own Argyle in any way and he may not even be allowed to be our landlord. His plan to get around this is to buy the land (which is where his interest appears to lay) and sell the club to Ridsdale for £1. This is problematic because Ridsdale is currently in the process of being prosecuted for fraud whilst being in charge of Cardiff City… If convicted then he could be precluded from being a “fit and proper person” (League rules again ~ quite possibly law of the land too) to be on the Argyle’s board let alone own the club.

Back to Bishop International/Heaney… They have missed deadline after deadline when it comes to honouring the deal that we believe led them to be appointed the preferred bidder. Along the way their proof of funding appears to have collapsed and they are relying on an unconnected deal to go through and it hasn’t gone through yet. The next version was that they would get a bridging loan until it does go through. Unfortunately Heaney has been at the heart of a corporate collapse in his empire and has left a trail of bankrupt businesses and angry creditors behind him. He appears to have problems arranging the cash/credit that he needs, or indeed any at all, to the extent that a CCJ was recently awarded against him for less than £20k. That CCJ is still to be settled.

Current state of play is that the staff/players are believed to be unwilling to put up with working unpaid any longer. Without funding arriving from Heaney/BI there is no money in the pot to pay them and the accompanying HMRC demand for tax/NI that goes with wages actually being paid. Friday of this week is Decision Day. If Heaney/BI do not come up with the money to complete the deal they will be rejected as potential buyers (so we are told but deadlines have been endlessly extended so far and blatant lies have been told throughout the process) and that wage bill liabilitywill fall to Guilfoyle’s administration company (P&A). His company seems to be reluctant to accept that responsibility and is threatening to liquidate the club should that happen.

We are told that only two issues remain to be resolved for the deal to complete: 1) The FL releasing our Golden Share to Peter Ridsdale; 2) BI resolving their funding provision. “Only two”! As if anything else matters at all! Hardly bloody trivial details are they?

James Brent still awaits in the wings, supported by a very new Supporters’ Trust, but he says he needs time to complete his side of the deal due to having been excluded from proceedings since his initial bid was rejected in favour of the “Irish” bid. Since then Heaney/BI have had 4 months to conclude the deal. It looks as if Brent will be lucky to have 4 hours!

There’s more stuff in rather brilliant forensic detail about the admin process here:

http://www.twohundredpercent.net/?p=14523

http://www.twohundredpercent.net/?p=14552

So, effectively, a metaphorical gun is now being pointed at the heads of PCC (planning permission to build on the land next to the ground), the staff and players (wages deferred yet again) and the FL (the Golden Share) and we are quite literally staring down the barrel. There is the very real possibility that Argyle has already played its last ever game.

I am not scare-mongering or jumping at shadows here. Oblivion looms.

(If you are still reading then I hope that that all makes sense.)

The Golden Share (a.k.a. HMRC v Football)

2011-08-22T12:41:00.002+01:00

All football clubs own a Golden Share which they lodge with the FL/FA as a promisory note that they will abide by their rules. The Golden Share allows clubs entry to cup and league competitions. If the Golden Share is revoked then a football club has nowhere to go amd might as well not exist.

One of those rules is the Football Creditors First rule. This obliges all clubs to pay all debts owned to all players and clubs in full and on time. Should a club renege on a payment then the granting of the Golden Share is brought into question and a club can be expelled from all competitions again meaning that, effectively, it would cease to exist.

In cases of extremis then the FL can remove the Golden Share from a club but grant them continuance in competition pending resolution of the problem concerned. This is exactly where Plymouth Argyle currently stand and our Golden Share has been revoked/suspended pending the outcome of the administration process.

HMRC is not happy with the Golden Share and the ruless attached to it because HMRC always loses out as a non-secured creditor. As a result they have been deprived of millions of pounds by various high profile football clubs using the administration process as a maenas of escape from financial meltdown. As a football fan I see this as acceptable, if perhaps not "OK", but as a tax payer and a British citizen it incenses me just as it incenses HMRC.

As a result of this HMRC has been relentlessly pursuing football clubs for some time now and is determined to see a precedent set which challenges the Football Creditors First ruling and it was HMRC who were first to chase PAFC for monies owed. So far HMRC has failed but sooner or later it will set the precedent that it strives for.

Football will need to seriously re-adjust if that ever happens because the guarantee of payment lies behind nearly every deal that is made between clubs themselves and clubs and players; nobody pays up in full upfront for anything these days.

Wayne Rooney and Swearing

2011-04-04T21:46:00.003+01:00

Argyleworld has been a bit grim lately so here's a first: a blog entry on Wayne Rooney!

I can't believe the fuss being made about Rooney's most recent lapse in behaviour. He was stupid and offensive but we have come to expect very little different from our footballing heroes in modern times and nobody is a better example of the modern footballer than Wayne Rooney.

It is de riguer for them to lie, cheat and pressurise the referee in any way they can; they will dive, sorry that should read "simulate" in the modern argot; they will steal yards at free kicks and throw-ins; they'll delay the taking of a free-kick; they'll commit any manner of nefarious deeds without so much as a second thought in order to get a result. They'll do all of the things listed with the full support, in most cases, of their clubs and managers, most of their fans and their union and almost nobody bats an eyelid or even half-raises a querulous eyebrow. The days when players like Bobby Charlton and Bobby Moore epitomised the highest standards of personal conduct are, with an honourable nod towards Ryan Giggs, disappearing into the rear-view mirror. The idea that players could be acclaimed as role models is history; every player is a Billy Bremner and every manager a Don Revie now and the only people who ever liked them were Leeds fans (funnily enough I can name every player in that classic, infamous, brilliant, reviled Leeds XI immediately from memory: Harvey, Reaney, Cooper, J. Charlton, Hunter, Bremner, Giles, Lorimer, E. Gray, Jones, Clarke). Leeds redefined professionalism for the English game in the modern era.

Which brings me nicely back to swearing. Years ago I remember an England game being shown live on the TV. It was ages ago. So long ago that the commentary sounded like it was coming down a telephine line from the moon and my mind's pictures from the game are, quite literally, in black and white! The game was one of a batch played on a South American tour. The opponents were Argentina. During the game the ball went out of play for a throw-in and Leeds's Trevor Cherry wanted to take the throw. A ballboy was recovering the ball but was a bit tardy: "give me the fucking ball!" said Cherry to the ballboy. Unfortunately for him he was right in front of a camera and right beside a microphone and his actions and words were beamed, as audibly as you like, directly into a million-plus British living rooms. I don't remember him being banned or charged but maybe he was...

Years later a bunch of mates and I were watching Sportsnight. On this occasion they were showing highlights of a League Cup match between Watford and Walsall. Watford were something of a power in the land at the time and Walsall were massive underdogs. The game was a complete thriller and ended up 4-4. What stuck in my mind and caused massive hilarity as we watched the game was a close-up of Trevor Christie who amidst huge excitement had scored a crucial goal and had then sprinted away celebrating. Nothing remarkable in that but as the camera zoomed in on the ecstastic celebrations Christie was ranting wildly, arms aloft and quite clearly effing and blinding his head off!! We were in fits and always referred to him as "Fucking Trevor Fucking Christie" after that evening. Not that we referred to him very often. Perhaps you had to be there...

To give this an Argyle context when I was knee-high to a grasshopper I remember Argyle right back Dave Provan chasing a ball that he failed to keep in play. He was Glaswegian and my young Janner ears would not have been very accustomed to translating Weejie to Janner but I do remember him yelling "you fucking sloat!" I have no idea what a sloat is to this very day.

Back to Rooney... Even he has previous form. Nobody can forget him swearing, audibly to camera once again, in the South African World Cup about the England team being quite deservedly booed by the travelling fans.

So Rooney is a role model? No. Just plain daft. There is a definite schism in his on-pitch persona that makes the notion impossible to take seriously. It is quite valid to acclaim his talent but his approach and behaviour? Let's not be silly. Footballers should not have this "role model"-stuff forced upon them partly because they don't ask for it but mostly because hardly any of them deserve it. The wider truth is that very few of them have ever deserved it at all.

Conflicting Statements

2011-02-03T15:49:00.003Z

Today looks like being pivotal re whether or not Argyle continues to exist. There has been a front page article in the Herald suggesting that everything could well be fine and then a statement on the official website that seems to contradict.

They both deserve a place on here.

'Japan cash with Argyle by Monday': Director in Tokyo puts deadline on money transfer
By Rob Goss And Edd Moore

A CASH injection aimed at rescuing stricken Plymouth Argyle will arrive "by Monday", Japan-based director George Synan has promised.

The Pilgrims are on the brink of financial ruin, with around £2million required to keep the club afloat until the summer.

Argyle chiefs have made it clear they expect Tokyo-based directors Yasuaki Kagami and Mr Synan to stump up the cash.

It is understood the pair had agreed to send the money to Home Park in four installments – the first of which is more than a month late.

But in an exclusive interview with The Herald, Mr Synan insisted Argyle would get their survival cash – perhaps as early as tomorrow.

The American businessman said he was preparing to travel to Plymouth "confident" the Greens would survive the cash crisis that threatens their 125-year history.

Mr Synan represents K&K Shonan Management Corporation, a company owning a majority 38 per cent stake in Argyle that was set up by Mr Kagami and two fellow Japanese businessmen.

He had not spoken openly about the club's financial turmoil since saying he was "not personally worried" in December.

But Mr Synan has broken his silence after The Herald pursued him with phone calls, e-mails and visits to Mr Kagami's Tokyo headquarters.

Mr Synan would not specify exactly how much money was being sent to Home Park, but described it as a "sufficient" amount.

He said it would arrive either tomorrow or Monday.

Mr Synan said: "It [the money] doesn't need to be there until Monday anyway.

"We are targeting next Monday to actually be on the ground [in Plymouth].

"I want to be there in person to make sure everything is coordinated on that side."

Asked about the Pilgrims' chances of survival, Mr Synan said: "We are all confident we will avoid liquidation".

He promised fans there were no plans to put the club into administration, a process that would lead to a ten-point deduction and almost certain relegation to League Two.

"We are doing everything we can to avert that. That's not something we have on our agenda right now."

More than 5,000 people have signed a petition pleading with Mr Synan and Mr Kagami to send the money.

The pair were both due to take part in a conference call with Argyle's football consultant Peter Ridsdale this morning.

The former Leeds United and Cardiff City chairman, who is handling the day-to-day running of the League One outfit, has vowed to walk away from the club on Tuesday unless the money arrives by then.

He has warned that without a multi-million-pound cash injection, Argyle face just a 30 per cent chance of survival.

Spiralling player wages, falling attendances and relegation to English football's third tier have left the Pilgrims with a chronic cashflow problem and debts of around £10million.

The club will go before a High Court judge on Wednesday to face the latest in a series of winding-up petitions from the tax-man.

That action is set to be dismissed, after a fire-sale of players helped Argyle settle all its outstanding tax debts.

The final £271,000 was paid to Her Majesty's Revenue and Custom's yesterday, meaning the Pilgrims are a step closer to shaking off a transfer embargo imposed by the Football League.

The Herald understands the cash injection from Japan could be a six-figure sum in the region of £750,000.

That would help Argyle get up-to-date with player wages, therefore lifting the transfer embargo. It would also temporarily prop up the club, allowing it to pay future tax bills and stave off creditors.

Although the tax-man will ask for the winding-up petition to be dismissed during Wednesday's court hearing, other creditors have the opportunity to join in the action.

Article here.

Not long afterwards the club makes this statement on the official website:

THE Plymouth Argyle Board of Directors today released the following statement:

"An article in today's newspaper, The Herald, in Plymouth, may lead to the impression that funds are about to be received from our Japanese shareholders that 'are sufficient', implying that the problems created by the identified cash shortfall that currently exists at Plymouth Argyle Football Club will be resolved.

"At the time of writing, no new cash has been received from Japan, nor have we had any confirmation that there is likely to be any imminent investment from the Far East which would be of a level previously indicated to us or indeed to the Court.

"We are disappointed that any statement may have been made in the public domain that could either intentionally or otherwise been misleading to our creditors or supporters which regard to the real challenge that still faces this club, if we are to secure the funding level that we require.

"Everyone at the club is working tirelessly to ensure that a solution can be found but as yet, the task is far from complete."

Club statement here.

On February 9th of next week Argyle faces a deferred High Court hearing. At that hearing they have to show that they have cleared the "petition debt" (and they have by selling the best of our current crop of players) and that they are not trading whilst insolvent and have sufficient cash to continue trading. If they do not then the club will be liquidated and cease to exist.

If that cash from Japan does not arrive then Wednesday of next week, so it seems, there will no longer be a Plymouth Argyle Football Club of any sort any more.

Letter To Viv Pengelley

2011-01-28T21:15:00.001Z

I have just sent this email to Plymouth City Council leader Vivien Pengelley:

Dear Mrs Pengelley,

I was desperately disappointed to hear that the council had no intention of helping Plymouth Argyle on the local news tonight.

I assume that you must be aware that the club is in imminent danger of being liquidated and closed forever and the publicising of your decision has seriously weakened the position of the club when it returns to court on Feb 9th which is regrettable in itself.

There is plenty of precedent for the council in Plymouth helping in the provision of leisure facilities and both the Tinside Lido and the Theatre Royal are examples of council tax payers' money being used to subsidise minority interests. There is also the Life Centre immediately adjacent to Home Park currently being built at a far higher expense to us all. It would not be hard to make a similar case for assisting Argyle in some way should you choose to do so.

The valuation of £7m you placed on the ground is highly questionable. Something is only worth what somebody is prepared to pay for it and there is no indication that anybody is trying to buy it at that notional figure so it was disingenuous in the extreme to use that figure the way that you did. I believe that the freehold was originally sold for £2.7m so that might be a realistic price at which to buy the land back and it would secure the club's immediate future. It would also leave a neutral cash balance on the two transactions and you would be buying an asset for the city that you claim to be worth £7m. If that is true then the council could sell it on and profit nearly £4m or recoup the money via rent on an asset likely to appreciate further over the coming years. It is not only a good decision because it saves the club but it is a good business decision too. A competent, passionate and visionary politician should easily be able to sell a similar plan to the naysayers within the city as being a deal that is good for everybody even in these difficult economic times.

The money involved is relatively little in comparison to the sums spent on the Life Centre and there is more than enough land adjacent to Argyle for an ice rink to replace the one that will be lost at the Pavillions which would also offer an opportunity to simultaneously keep the pledge made to provide the city with an ice rink within its boundaries, offer the chance for recouping some of the expense involved in the purchase of the land and replace a potentially rotting, derelict stadium lowering over the Life Centre like a wrecked tombstone with a number of vibrant facilites including, maybe, the hotel that you long ago gave the club a green light to build if they could. Well they can't so another opportunity arises to sell a parcel of land, recoup more finance, and gain yet another complementary facility to the Life Centre. It would also have zero impact on Central park's green space.

Plymouth Argyle is probably the most regular driver of publicity that there is for the city both nationally and internationally. It is a massive understatement to say that Plymouth's status as a city will not be well served by allowing the club to fold. We might as well take out adverts in every national media outlet and proclaim that the city is a complete economic basket case if the worst was to happen. Of course that would be further nuanced by the publicity gained from Plymouth being the largest city in all of Europe not to have a professional football club in it. As leader of the council it is your duty to protect and promote the city; doing nothing to stop Argyle going out of business completely fails to do the job that you were elected by Plymothians like me to do on our behalf.

As leader of the council you would always be associated with the shame and stigma of not having done enough to stop the club from folding. Something must be achievable by the council if all parties mount a cross party campaign which highlights the number of jobs saved at the club, the security offered to local businesses which trade with the club, and hence help to preserve even more jobs, and the income generated in and around the city by the fans who visit on matchdays. All it takes is somebody with the courage, foresight, innovation, skills and passion to make something happen. Is that person you?

When/if I get a reply I'll put it here.

Why do I get a Season Ticket?

2010-03-24T18:57:00.001Z

It can’t be to enjoy the football can it? That hardly ever happens these days.

So what is it that not only compels me to go but which also compels me to get a season ticket?

It works out as being quite cost-effective. Getting an ST probably lines up 5 or 6 free games compared to the total cost of paying on the day each time but that isn’t it either. To be honest the psychological wrench of handing over £400 is far greater than the drip drip drip of paying £24/match as you go. I know that there is the direct debit scheme being run by the club so I don’t actually see £400 disappearing from my bank account at any one time but you know what I mean.

It’s not the cosy, altruistic feel of contributing to the club in the Summer months either. I do get that feeling, of course, but it does not sway me one way or another when it comes down to it. I like feeling that I am “in the club”, as it were, and my ST (or membership as the club likes to refer to it) certainly makes me a member but it isn’t really that either no matter how positive that might be.

I get a discount in the club shop. Well that too is wonderful and that too makes almost no difference to me.

So there is a list of things, all of them good, which have minimal impact on my decision making process. So now you know what does not make me buy an ST but not yet what does!! Here goes:

I get an ST mostly because I cannot be bothered with getting a ticket in advance every week. If I did that then I might not be able to get a seat with my friends and if you can’t go with your mates then the social aspect of a day at the football has gone leaving behind only the game and we all know how unrewarding that tends to be!!

I also get one because I want to be as sure as I can that I will be able to get a ticket for the big games when they come along. We’ve not had many of them recently but the Arsenal cup-tie last year was a case in point and the 9000 tickets went to the ST holders with very few left over for anybody else.

And that is it really. I like saving money, helping the club, being a member and discount in the club shop and I am grateful for all of those things but I don’t really want or need them. What I do want and need is to be there and to be there with my mates with as little hassle as possible. That’s why I get an ST.

Michael Foot ~ An Appreciation

2010-03-22T19:04:00.001Z

Michael Foot died recently and the nation’s media was packed with tributes to him. Quite right too. He has been a high profile politician for all of my life and has been universally acclaimed as a man of great wit, intelligence and integrity by colleague and adversary alike. You can look up the conventional obituaries in any of the likely sources for more detail.

I don’t want to give a résumé of his whole life. Others will have done that already. I just want to focus on a few ways that he has, even if only indirectly, affected me. So here I go in no particular order…

Years ago when I was far younger I simply did not have the money to get to many away games so when I did it was always something of a treat. On this particular occasion I went to Bournemouth for a game at Dean Court long before it was developed into what we know today. I don’t remember anything about the game. I don’t remember if we won or even if we scored. What I do remember was standing in the queue at the turnstile waiting for my turn pay and go in and Michael Foot being the person before me. I suppose it would have been around the time of him wearing the jacket that caused all the fuss at the memorial service at the Cenotaph. There was nothing controversial about his appearance on that day but I do remember him wearing a very, very trendy pair of shiny ankle boots which provoked a fair bit of good-natured ribbing from the travelling supporters. It was an indication of the depth and ordinariness of his support for Argyle that he stood on the terrace along with every other fan.

Another aspect of his devotion to the club came along when Messrs Foot, Jones, Stapleton, Warren and Gill got together to buy the club from Dan McCauley. These were desperately dark times for the club and the takeover came out of the blue. It was all a huge worry but Foot’s name added credibility to the new men and their intentions that no other name could have. Somehow we, as supporters. knew, at last, that everything was going to be alright and sure enough what followed was the greatest spell of success that Argyle has ever known.

My Mum knew him. Or met him at least. I didn’t know this and it was only on his passing that she ever mentioned it. This goes right back to post-war Plymouth and his first election campaign in which he was fighting to get elected to the seat of Plymouth Devonport and was running against “Churchill’s boy” (Mum’s words). She can’t speak highly enough of him and I don’t think that anybody of my generation, and especially not those much younger, can begin to understand the impact he had or the role he played in Plymouth’s phoenix-like rise from the Luftwaffe’s devastation.

Michael Foot was a man of great humility, huge integrity and no little passion. It was this that made him so popular across the country and, and this is no exaggeration, so very, very deeply loved by Argyle fans everywhere.

He was an atheist so “RIP” isn’t really an appropriate sign-off. Well he probably didn’t think much of reincarnation either and I would dearly love to hear him tell me why I shouldn’t end this piece with just two thoughts:

Thank you, Michael, and resurgam.

Campaign For Sensible Divisional Names

2010-03-13T00:45:00.004Z

Is there one of these? If there isn’t then there should be.

The game needs to be reconnected to the supporters in all sorts of fundamental ways because it has become too distanced from them and the traditions on which the game has been built. We can start by getting back our proper divisional names.

This of course will mean the abolition of the Premier League; in name at least. I’d like to see them go the whole hog actually but that won’t happen so just 86ing the name will do for now.

For too long we have had to tie ourselves in linguistic knots using terms like “second tier” and “top flight” when trying to contextualise the modern game. It was all so much simpler when we had the old Divisions 1 through to 4. I’m not a Luddite though and I am not adverse to progress but it has to be meaningful, relevant and in tune with the rich historical tapestry which makes English football what it is.

That said I would quite like to see the Blue Square Conference (now that is also a silly name) renamed as “Division 5” because with automatic promotion and relegation between the BSC and the 4th tier means that that is what it is.

I can’t help but think back to the Greatest Book I Ever Owned which was a Purnell’s Encyclopaedia Of Association Football. It was a very big (or was it just that I was very small which made it seem like that?) hardback book which covered just about every aspect of world football. It was packed with interesting articles, reports of important historical matches, great photographs and, this is the clincher, reams and reams of stats: all the teams ever promoted and relegated, cup winners, league tables and so on. I spent hours and hours poring over the lists packed with strange team names Middlesbrough Ironopolis, Accrington Stanley (who have resurrected themselves since then), Blackburn Olympic, Old Carthusians and, of course, Plymouth Argyle. My point being that the deeds of all teams were instantly comparable. The “Division 1” won by the Preston North End (there’s another one) in 1890 when they became the only team ever to go through a season undefeated in League and Cup would be confused with the 3rd tier (grrrr) now.

It is all just too confusing and completely unnecessary. It was initially brought about by the resignations of Arsenal, Aston Villa, Blackburn Rovers, Chelsea, Coventry City, Crystal Palace, Everton, Ipswich Town, Leeds United, Liverpool, Manchesters City and United, Middlesbrough, Norwich City, Nottingham Forest, Oldham Athletic, Queens Park Rangers, Sheffield United and Wednesday, Southampton, Tottenham Hotspur and Wimbledon (Arsenal, Forest, Palace, Spurs, Wednesday, QPR and Villa all also have wonderfully rich nomenclature!!) from the Football League to set up the Premier League in an act of naked self-interest which 17 years later has seen Wimbledon disappear completely, Palace teetering on the brink of bankruptcy at the moment and various financial catastrophes beset Ipswich, Leeds, Wednesday and Southampton and which also sees Manchester United and Liverpool straining under the weight of outrageous debt levels running into hundreds of mi££ions. If they thought that they were setting themselves up for long term success then only 9 of the 22 are still in the top flight so it didn’t work for most of them, did it? Serves ‘em jolly well right too!!

Anyway let’s see a return to Divs 1, 2, 3 & 4 (and maybe even add a 5) and let’s lose the stupidity that is the “Premier League” and “Coca Cola Championship”; let’s reclaim a little of our game even if it is only the usage of the labels attached to it.

Chester City

2010-03-10T20:30:00.002Z

Chester City FC ceases to exist.

There you have the story of the death of a football club. It is a sorry tale with no “they lived happily ever after” at the end of it.

I am not especially familiar with the full story of their protracted demise but after reading that BBC report it seems to me that even their own fans had turned their backs on a club that had ceased to represent its constituency and the players had given up any hope of ever being paid.

Maybe the wider truth here is that no club which can only hope to attract a crowd numbered in the region of a couple of thousand fans can operate on a professional basis in the modern era?

Whatever their bigger picture I do hope that a phoenix club can rise from the flames of their financial pyre and given that the ground is still there then maybe the CFU option can give Chester’s football fans, no matter how few there may be of them, a team to follow at some level.

HMRC’s action which has killed them off for the paltry, in footballing terms, sum of around £26k seems harsh but I don’t suppose that HMRC is the only body owed money and if it was not them then it would have been somebody else. It has also been obvious for some time that HMRC has been keen to flex their muscles and make the point that their bills must be paid and here they have done just that.

That this should happen in a world where many a second tier player can expect that sum as a weekly wage shows just how desperately skewed the distribution of wealth is in English football and that just cannot be right.

There must be many other clubs such as Cardiff, Pompey, Palace, Darlington, Stockport and Bournemouth who are looking nervously over their shoulders now.

I don’t want to see any football fan lose his team but something has to change because teams at every level of the game are struggling to keep going and it is about time that somebody, somewhere did something to protect the clubs, even if it is quite possibly from themselves, or else the pyramidal structure of the English game itself is under threat.

http://thetwounfortunates.blogspot.com/ …

2010-03-08T22:08:00.001Z

…is a blog that considers various topical footballing issues as they pertain to the second tier (as they describe it ~ I wonder if they’ve read my “campaign for sensible division names” piece? Actually they can’t have because I have not written it yet!!) of English football.

I met one of the contributors to it recently and it is well worth a few moments of your time and I have added it to my links on the right hand side.

Sutton High School 1981

2010-02-26T09:57:00.013Z

Chapter 1

Well...

Fairly recently I joined Facebook. I'd just missed a Christmas get-together whilst my wife was out for her works do. I was a bit bored and so signed up. Whilst signing up I linked my address book to Facebook users and sent out a request for friends where the email addresses matched up. This has created a random bunch of friends involving family members, schoolmates, old work colleagues, fellow students and mates from Argyle.

One of them, Neil Manley, kind of fits 2 categories. Anyway he found the facebook group "Sutton High (Plymouth)" set up by Michael Lawton. In turn he had posted scans of the Sutton High '81 school photo. I have never been so shocked in my life and I don't think I have ever even seen it before. I certainly don't have a copy.

Anyway I have stitched the scans together into one image and you can see it below if all goes to plan. It may be re-sized and be too small to be much use but if you click on it it will enlarge.

It still appears to be small but if you press and <+> a few times it will enlarge.

Chapter 2

Well I've just checked and the image is still too small to be of much use. I'll get the image hosted somewhere and link directly to it when I have time.

Chapter 3

I have hosted the image here:
CLICK ME. You'll be able to see it there and copy it if you want to.

Alternatively you could download it and then open using MS Paint which
will enable you to see the image as clearly as possible ~ it is worth the effort. Sorry the merging software has curved it a bit but what can you do?

Chapter 4

I guess some names would help (I can only imagine the shock if google ever coughs this up to any of them). From left to right (but not in order or complete):

Richard Fowler, Ollie Alston, Dean Hawkins, Mark Hodgkinson, Mike Dwyer, Brian Brett, Tony Bolton, Laurence Cook, Colin McEwen, Roger Willis, Steve Mannell, Colin Bettinson, Obi Saha, Suresh Nair, Lee Seabrook, Mr. Sanderon, Mr. Carvell, Andy Crabbe, Mr.Furze, Mr.Aldersley, Mr.Jenkins, Mr. Harrison, Mr. Summerell, Mr. Floyd, Paul Hart, Mr. Stewart, Mr. Brasher, Mr. Sanders, Mr. James, Ms. Bridgeman, Mr. Fraser, Rowe, Jeff Poole, Mr. McAllan, Paul Francis, Andrew Wakefield, Mr. Lambert, Mr. Harrington, Stuart Macey, Dave Fenwick, Mrs. Mear, Brian Herbert, Mark Greaves, Mr. Hobbs, Mrs. Shellaker, Andy Turner, Mason Worrell, Mr. Ellis, Gary Smerdon, Rob Rickard, Andy Furzeland, Andrew Ford, Mr. Guest, Mr. Wright, Nick Goodall, Paul Colwill, Terry Harris, Gareth Parnell, Andy Axworthy, Alex Bleier, Collins, Pete Coniam, Paul Stansfield, Mr. Axcell, Jeff Brett, Chris Chambers, Ian Jackson, Chris Creber, Colin Oxenham, James Retallick, Lawrence Body, Paul Bennetts, Mike Whitburn, Stuart Dawe, Steve Bull, Mike Jordan, Paul Dyer, Steve Howells, Mark Woodford, Mike Watt...

The list is by no means complete and sorry for any minor mistakes (it was a very long time ago now!!) but the other names escape me even if faces are familiar and some are on the tip of my tongue and there's one or two I am sure must be there that I haven't named.

There is a 1st former sticking his tongue out. Can you spot him?

Chapter 5

I can add a few more names having spotted a load of temporary prefects near the front. So add in Neil (?) Downing-Waite, Jeremy Kirkby and John Middleton.

Where is the attraction in following Argyle?

2010-02-24T00:16:00.001Z

Or, indeed, any other team as unfashionable as us?

Or any team at all that is relatively unlikely to actually win something? Anything, even.

For me there is a raft of reasons and although “success” may lie at the heart of the beginning of my support it doesn’t really sit that highly on the list anymore.

I’ve been attending home games regularly ever since I was about 7 years old. Away games too when I could but that has always been a far less frequently available opportunity for reasons all too familiar to Plymouth-based football fans: transport, cost, time, other commitments etc even for a length of time because nobody I knew ever wanted to go which applied to the lengthy sequence of games without an away win that preceded Sturrock’s initial appointment. The question remains why did I ever start to go at all and why have I continued to go pretty much ever since?

To start with it was something that quite simply I always wanted to do. I grew up in Peverell as a small child and matchday had always been there: the people, traffic congestion, lack of parking and, most of all, the sounds emanating from the stadium during a match: the signing*, groaning, moaning, cheering, the blast of a ref’s whistle… Just as the smell of Farley’s rusks being baked provided an olfactory backdrop to my childhood then so too did Argyle on matchday provide a soundtrack. Success didn’t come into it ~ I just wanted to go because the big boys went and I wanted to be accepted as one of them just as every 5 or 6 year boy does.

So I started going when I was about 7 and loved it even if I didn’t pay much heed to the game itself. I went lots of times and Argyle rarely lost; in fact I didn’t even really understand that they could until a Don Masson-inspired Notts County banged 4 past us to much loudly-voiced discontent from the Janner faithful on the first, but not last, occasion which brought home to me just how ruined a day could be by a football match; on that day Don Masson broke a little boy’s heart and I can still feel the hurt, anger, resentment and injustice of it as I type this (not that it was remotely unfair in any way at all but that don’t matter, do it?).

I’ve described before how free tickets occasionally came my way and my first taste of success came in the Mariner/Rafferty year and I was completely lost to the cause from then on. So that was the success that dragged me in and I guess it is always success that cements the place of a team in your heart.

Various good bits have added layers to the metaphorical onion that is my support for the team: Dave Smith’s promotion year, Johnny Hore’s cup run, the Man City game during the 3 day week, Santos and Pele, Everton (more than once) and Sturrock-led rise from the doldrums that becalmed us for so long high on the list of the barbs that kept me on the hook once this fish had nibbled the bait.

So we are now where we are which is in the midst of a desperate struggle to avoid relegation with a team that, although improving, just might not be good enough to wriggle free from the peril facing it and any prospect of success or glory is still a speck on the horizon just as it nearly always has been, even though sometimes we dreamed of success being a speck on the horizon, during the near 40 years of my following the team. And yet still I go and I wouldn't want things to be any other way.

So it isn’t the glory, although that helps, and it isn’t living on the doorstep because I no longer do and it is not the odd free ticket because I am now a season ticket holder. So what is it?

I suppose the opportunity to meet up with mates is a very large part of it; maybe it is the chance to let off a little steam; maybe it is the chance to have a good grumble (almost the same thing as the last one, I guess); maybe it is the endless provision of talking points and memories; maybe it just kills a bit of free time; maybe it is the craic; maybe it is the excuse to travel to places I would otherwise never visit; maybe just a bit of me-time. In fact it is all of those things. They are not enough though: not individually or as any possible permutation and not collectively.

So what is it? I guess it is the optimism and the hope that Argyle will one day supply the success and glory that we Pilgrims all yearn for and for which I personally have been yearning for nearly 40 years now.

Supporting Argyle has amounted to a very long exercise in the triumph of hope over expectation but please never confuse that with my having an acceptance of mediocrity or lacking ambition. I’ll never be truly happy with Argyle until we are the biggest clubside in the world and we are winning every trophy in sight every year.

So that must be why I go: because it offers a goal from me to strive for (well not me, of course, because if it was me then it would be my fault for it not being achieved and that would never do, would it? Nobody wants to accept responsibility for their own failure or unhappiness after all) vicariously and a chance to wallow in the misery that almost relentless failure is sure to bring.

So I support Argyle not because they are good but because they are not and not because they succeed because they fail far more often. That is the contract that I unwittingly bought into when I was 7 years old and that still represents a contract that I couldn’t ever imagine breaking now. Besides it is having experienced the bad times that makes the good times so precious when they do come along no matter how rarely.

* Obviously I meant singing. “Signing” suggests hordes of deaf people simultaneously furiously gesticulating approval/disapproval silently (perhaps ~which would be even better) in sign language which is imagery that pleases me so I have not corrected it even if it is wrong because it is completely impossible for it to resonate beyond the stadium as described.

Footballers As Role Models

2010-02-23T00:11:00.001Z

Another day in Bristol; more coffee and a little more snow…

It’s at times like these that my mind wanders and on this occasion it has wandered onto the recent publicity surrounding the private lives of footballers. It’s strange that it should do so because I really have very little interest in such matters but given recent events and the publicity surrounding John Terry and Ashley Cole it has been a hard subject to ignore because it has certainly exercised the great voices of the press and other media. “It’s an outrage!!” they thunder. “What sort of role models are they for our kids to look up to?”

I take great exception to this. Why should we even expect or hope that they are role models at all? I suppose a case could be made for them re their ability as footballers given that they both play for a leading club and represent England as first choice regulars and to be fair I don’t think that they have ever let anybody down in that regard. They are both extremely proficient defenders and given that defenders get sent off quite often they seem to be reasonably clean in that respect too. John Terry is the only one I can remember being sent off at all and even then only once. There’s probably others but they do not stick in my mind.

I don’t even want to criticise their conduct. As far as I am aware the latest hooha has surrounded events in their personal lives and these are, basically, nobody’s business other than their own and that of the others directly involved.

I don’t think either has broken any laws and yet they are both currently being vilified by the media which has in turn led them to be derided by opposing fans on the terraces when they have played.

The root cause of this seems to be glee in the travails that have befallen them because they are deemed to be far too highly paid. Well if that is why they are disliked then that’s fine and up to the individual passing that judgement but passing that off as “they have let The Nation down; they are role models, y’know…” is projecting on to them a responsibility that they have not sought or earned and which is neither desired or deserved by them.

That isn’t to say that sportsmen cannot or are not role models in some cases but those cases are few and far between. Those who do reach that elevated status do so by virtue of either a single act or a lifetime’s actions but even then they many of those concerned offer contradictions.

Let me consider 2 different men from 2 different sports: Ian Botham and Paolo Di Canio.

Botham first. Ian Botham was, arguably, the greatest cricketer of his era. Definitely the best all-rounder. His deeds with bat, ball and in the field were/are legendary and he rose to the elevated and esteemed position of captain of England’s cricket team. He was simply brilliant and he was widely idolised for his talents. Since then he has raised money, lots of money, via his various sponsored walks, towards leukaemia research. He is an exemplary role model except…

There had to be an “except” coming up didn’t there? Except there was, shall I say, a “colourful” personal life which included a ban from cricket for smoking marijuana, various questionable comments made to the press and his abject failure as a captain. He was a brilliant sportsman and one who obviously cares deeply about an important and worthy issue but to point at him as a role model would leave you open to criticism. He is no saint but then again he has never claimed to be. Why would anybody even try force beatitude upon him?

Paolo Di Canio next. A good footballer. Not brilliant but very, very good and he has enjoyed a successful career. He has done 3 things which stick in my mind and define him in many ways as a footballer; one of them good and 2 of them bad. The good one was catching the ball when it was crossed to him. It sounds like an odd thing to do and he was smack bang in front of an open goal, and hence as certain as could be to score, when he did so. Why did he do it? Because the goalkeeper was injured and needed treatment. A goal in those circumstances meant nothing to him and his sense of morality over-rode the desire to score. It is one of the very few instances where a modern era sportsman has respected the ancient traditions that under-pin sporting contest and he rejected the easy, undeserved and instant “result”. He deserves huge respect and praise for so doing.

There is bad stuff though. His politics are more than a little questionable; he happily describes himself as a fascist and has given the stiff-armed salute to fans on the pitch. He is another who is no angel and he was banned for a lengthy period for pushing over a referee who had just penalised him. I can’t remember what the offence was or whether he was booked or sent off or not but I remember the push and the ref falling and the lengthy ban which followed his inevitable dismissal when it came.

The point here is obvious; despite considerable personal prowess at their chosen sport and some creditable higher ethical qualities, either considered or instinctive, neither would be acclaimed as a perfect role model but in this day of minute and endless media scrutiny who justifiably could be?

So why is this role model stuff foisted upon these people? Surely it is those who demand that these people meet these unwritten and ill-defined criteria are the ones who have the problem here. It is even more ironic for our tabloid newspapers to portray themselves as moral guardians when they have been guilty of far worse in the past and will be again in the future.

I suppose it is no surprise that they so happily whip-up howls of moral outrage because it successfully plays to the mob mentality and sells copy for them but the agenda they set serves themselves and nobody else at all and especially not those who might be unfortunate to get caught in the path of the ethical hurricane that the redtops spin through no doing of their own.

This isn’t even a new thing. It was identified back in the ‘70s when Ian Anderson of Jethro Tull sang onThick As A Brick:

so where the hell was Biggles when you needed him last Saturday and where were all the sportsmen who always pulled you through?

…and later by Paul Simon when he sang:

who’ll be my role model now that my role model has gone?

These people are built up by others and are expected to meet impossibly high ideals imposed upon them by others with no regard to the target of those impositions or the likely ability to meet up to those expectations. We should be neither surprised nor disappointed should they let us down in the end.

Players’ Wages

2010-02-22T21:34:00.001Z

Why are players paid so much?

You hear it all the time: “£150k/week for playing football? Nobody should be paid that much money for kicking a ball around.”

Well I would question why they are not worth that money and I do not actually begrudge them a penny of it. I know it is lots of money and I know that others work harder, do more important jobs or have more highly developed skills but that is not the point here. Of course carers, servicemen, firefighters and so on deserve to be paid more and, compared to them, footballers are paid far too much but their wages are not linked in any way to those paid to our footballers and they never have been even if they were broadly at broadly similar levels back in 1952 or whenever.

So who is to blame here? In fact is there any blame to be attached at all?

Think of the cliché that states “he who pays the piper calls the tune”. It is those who pay the wage that choose to do so and it suits them very well to make that decision. A footballer can ask for any astronomical sum of money that he can think of but nobody has to pay it to him and if an employer should decide to pay £150k/week to a worker then how many would turn it down?

These grossly inflated wage figures, because they are grossly inflated make no mistake about that, arise in the modern game because football has wilfully created a free-market bargaining process that it can no longer control; Dr. Frankenstein has lost control of his monster.

In this country this came about as a result of a decree imposed externally from the European courts as a result of the Bosman Ruling and an internally made decision to grasp the nettle as represented by the cash from televising football.

Bosman first. He was a player for a Belgian team who would be called a journeyman in this country. He was a largely unheralded player who had come to the end of his contract and who wanted to change clubs. His current club would not allow him to go, he took it to court, won and players had freedom of movement at he end of their contracts enshrined as a right by law.

What did this mean in effect? That the balance of power shifted permanently from club to player. Where a club once had to pay a fee only when they initially signed a player they now had to pay just to retain one they already had too. Clubs have been and still are reluctant to stump up cash in big single payments and so sought to avoid doing so. Let me explain…

Imagine Player A getting signed for £1m to play alongside Player B. Player A may have negotiated a wage of £10k/week for himself. New contracts nearly always pay more than older ones so Player B, although equally as good a player, will probably be earning less. Eventually the contract of Player B will be up for re-negotiation. “Player A cost £1m upfront and will have earned another £2m by the time his 4 year deal is up. He will cost £3m overall. So I want a £1m signing fee and £10k/week too because I am just as good as him.” And who could blame him?

The clubs do not want to pay him that £1m at all and so agree a higher wage in lieu. Maybe half of that £1m added to his wage and a 2 year deal instead of a 4 giving him a net wage of £15k/week. And so the spiral begins and is reinforced and tightened with every transfer that follows.

The clubs could just say “no!” but they do not because if they do not pay the wage then a competitor will and if that happens then they lose their man. And so it goes on until superstar players are on £150k/week and that in turn drags up the wages of the make-weights and journeymen until even relatively mediocre youth teamers arrive at training in their Ferraris.

So why do the clubs pay it? Partly because they can and partly because they have to because if they do not then they lose the player, their team is weakened and ultimately they face relegation at which point their ticket to the gravy train as represented by TV money is invalidated.

This is where the clubs have nobody else but themselves to blame. It is the PL clubs that have have elected to keep nearly all of the TV money for themselves whilst passing precious little down to the lower levels. This means financial disaster for relegated clubs who then find that their income and expenditure balance is completely skewed against them. Those clubs then slash and burn budgets as best they can but they still operate at a completely different financial level to the clubs lower down and those clubs are then trapped in the inflationary spiral as they attempt to negotiate contracts (similarly affected by the Bosman Ruling even if the effects are not as drastic at that level) with their players.

So that is how the high wage deals evolved and how they spread throughout football. The players may be criticised as being greedy and maybe they are but if that money did not get spent on their wages and transfers then does anybody really think that it would mean that admission prices were lower or that facilities were better (facilities are pretty good these days, by and large, anyway)? Of course not. The examples are there in our modern game of those who are in football purely for its investment potential and it is them who would be riding into the sunset trailing a wheelbarrow over-flowing with cash behind them.

Quite honestly I would prefer that money going to a player, because if it ends up in Singapore, Dubai, the US or Russia then our doctors, nurses, soldiers etc still won’t be getting the benefit of it. Then again like I said at the outset their wages and those of footballers are not linked in any meaningful way at all.

Administration

2010-02-12T21:03:00.001Z

The game of professional football as we know it is in danger of completely collapsing. For too long the clubs have been allowed to chase the dream with scant regard for the consequences of them failing to actually ultimately catch that dream.

It is the way of the business world that it is dog eat dog, devil take the hindmost and damn yer eyes!! as businesses which fail to compete successfully with their rivals simply fall by the wayside. “That's the wonder of Woolworths” as we might once have said although old FW himself may be turning in his grave at the recent eventual demise of a once-great High Street icon. “Serves 'em right” I hear you say. “If they can't keep costs low, sales up and sell the right things at the right price as they do so then who are we to care?” and in many ways that is dead right. We'll buy our sweets, kids' clothes and DVDs (if we buy them at all) elsewhere. No problem really.

Football is different though. Amazon does not need Woolworths. Nor does M&S, Matalan etc. need them either; a football team needs an opponent though or else there is nothing at all there. Football clubs also need an opponent of similar strength or else there is little point to what is there. Real Madrid wants to play and beat Barcelona (and vice versa natch), for instance. Millions of fans across the world want to see that game. Manchester United v Sticker u-11s would barely draw a crowd at Old T and the TV companies would not be queueing up to send the pictures from that match to the wider world (not more than once anyway).

It has always been the case that clubs fold though and there is no more reason that they should be any more exempt from the penalties of failure than any other business. Football cannot continue as it recently has though.

Losing money and going bust through failure may just about be acceptable but we now have the situation where clubs are being successful and they are still struggling to continue. As I write this it appears that Portsmouth FC are on the brink of being put into administration and are in all likelihood on the point of being wound-up and closed down for good and all this is happening as Pompey enjoy, what is for them, certainly in the extended modern era, an unprecedented period of success. We must not forget that they have been a fairly comfortable member of the Premier League since their promotion nor that they have won the FA Cup within the last 2 years or that they have been playing European football against teams like Inter Milan. Quite simply this is success beyond the wildest expectations of even their most ardent fans and even given that success they are virtually a dead duck and they are almost certainly trading insolvently at present and probably have been for quite some time. If they were a pub they would have been closed down long, long ago.

They are not the only club like it though. Last season Manchester United won the Premier League, were finalists in the FA Cup and the Champions' League, won the League Cup and Charity Shield (or whatever they call it these days) and the FIFA World Club Championship. On top of which they sold Ronaldo for, an as yet not re-invested in the team, £75m. Did they make money? No. Did they reduce their overall debt burden? No.

Even they are not the only club like it though. Liverpool are in similarly dire financial straits and they are both where they are largely as a result of the financial chicanery commonly known as the leveraged buy-out. A leveraged buy out occurs when a buyer buys a controlling interest, usually using borrowed money, of a business and then transfers that debt from the buyer to the bought. It is an accepted business practice and is exactly what has recently happened in the Kraft takeover of Cadbury's.

So it is all down to corporate profiteering? No. Look at Hull City. There has been no lack of support there as their council has supported their club in an unprecedented way through the construction of the KC stadium and the provision of an envied support infra-structure. Again there is no lack of success at the heart of this as Hull City currently occupy a Premier League spot for the very first instance in their entire history. They are another team for whom it can hardly get much better and yet another playing chicken with their creditors' goodwill.

And so it goes on. Is it just a Premier League issue then? No. Cardiff City are vying neck and neck with Pompey when it comes to broken financial deadlines and running at a loss. Just as Pompey beat Cardiff in that cup final they are probably just shading that particular little squabble now. Let's not forget that Cardiff are playing in a brand new swanky stadium, have a recent history of progress up through the divisions and are another for whom it cannot realistically get much better. Yet still they trade at a consistent and heavy loss.

And those are the successful clubs. What about those who are struggling? Well it is even worse for them as their income is lower still to start with due to TV wanting to show the glamour games and not the bread-and-butter ones. What choices do they have? Do they continue to struggle or do they try to improve their lot? If they want to improve then how can they? That is simple. They have to invest more, which means that they have to either spend, borrow or guarantee money that they cannot really afford because if they could afford to do so then they would be doing exactly that already. “Ahhh... but you have to speculate to accumulate and if you are successful then you can pay back through the profits made” except the experience of both Hull and Portsmouth suggests that the money cannot be repaid out of the extra income because they always have to spend more to get better players and a stronger team in the new, higher, more expensive and “better” level at which their fans demand that they compete and even if they do then the leveraged buy-out then swamps them with debt just as it has at Liverpool and Man Utd.

So what happens with the clubs that do not chase the dream and try to operate as a sustainable business? Their fans demand ever greater success too and are not happy when they perceive that their club is losing because it is being outspent by those it is competing with and that this, of course, is hamstringing their chances of future success.

It is clear that the national and international laws will not help to protect the clubs that need to survive and on which the survival of the very ethos of the competition between clubs is based. The truth is that the relationship of which I talk is symbiotic because every club needs every other club for the concept to continue to thrive as it has since its inception. You can't even look at it as a parasitic relationship because the healthy host may be a requirement for the parasite to survive but this relationship does not actually harm the host at all. We are talking saprophytism here because the ones that are thriving are doing so on the rotting remains of what was once a fine and noble organisation.

Tomorrow cash-strapped and dying Pompey will play thriving and resurgent Southampton, themselves having benefited from an administration settlement deal last season in an FA Cup tie that might prove to be the last competitive match in their proud, but imperilled, history. The financial courts will surely do the right thing and close them down permanently and save them the final death throes of making them suffer administration, a 10 point penalty and eventual bankruptcy. Their debts are just too big and the backers too reluctant to step forward and take on the responsibility because it will cost tens of mi££ions if they do and the current global financial environment will not support it.

I don't blame the courts at all if/when Pompey do fold. I blame those who nominally have the power to enforce rules which protect the clubs that compete in the name of it. The FA runs the Premier League, in theory, but the clubs are the ones who control the power and the clubs are all relentlessly driven by the demand to be ever more successful in a quest that we can only expect to end in financial chaos as discussed at the start of this piece.

As things stand the clubs are like turkeys voting for their own private Christmas; they demand the right to operate independently as they think suits them best and will resort to legislation to protect their ability to do just that; the Premier League has a need for a big majority vote before it implements any significant and radical rule changes and that majority will never be achieved; the FA cannot enforce anything that the clubs do not approve of; the Football League is a complete irrelevance and was sidelined years ago when the PL was created; government does not see how it can change national, and especially not international, business law and practice (they can't even enforce policy in the banks that they now own let alone make law changes that affect control over them); FIFA is our best and perhaps only hope but the “restraint of trade” lobby will fight them tooth and nail no matter how keen Michel Platini is for change to happen.

Perhaps market forces will ultimately save the day in some shape or form but I don't hold out much hope that it will. Maybe the extinction of Pompey will precipitate a few others to go too as they forfeit on agreements to pay money to other clubs who in turn have spent or at least committed to spend, that same cash. So despite being as successful as they could ever hope to be, despite filling their stadium week-in week-out, despite a proud and glorious history, despite playing in the richest national league in the world, despite recent European football and despite a recent FA Cup win Pompey look as though they will be the first domino to fall and their failure will drag others down with them both inside this country and without.

If that leads to a fairer distribution of the huge wads of cash, currently flooding into English football in greater amounts than ever before, so that it ends up not in a handful of pockets but in many if not all then it might not be such a bad thing. On top of that the bodies which control our game need actually to exhibit some control that is meaningful and put in place penalties that are meaningful for those who seem to glibly assume that going into administration is an easy option and a cash-effective way of writing off the debts that follow catastrophically poor decisions of clubs at management and boardroom level whilst at the same time leaving the unpaid creditor to pick up the tab. Maybe the only hope we have at a legislative level is that HMRC, on behalf of all of those of us who do pay our taxes and stick to our budgets, will exert pressure either practically, through the courts, or on the government, through legislation, that is effective because if they do not then the spoils will always go to the most profligate, the least responsible and the morally corrupt and the risk will be absorbed by those that trade with them.

The advantages enjoyed by those who ignore the moral case for running a football club on a slightly more acceptable moral plane than that lived on by the venal, grasping and, what I believe amounts to being, corrupt clubs mean that they are effectively cheating those against which they compete and and the very ethos which under-pins the concept of sport as a contest. The golden egg-laying goose is strangling itself.

The situation we are now facing is scandalous and it is a scandal that it has been allowed to develop as far as it has. If that is not bad enough nobody anywhere who might be able to prevent it from happening has shown any inclination at all to even monitor what has been and is happening and even less that they might have any control over the same events as they unfold; if they have no control then just what is it that they do that deserves their receipt of their vast salaries? Their wages are taking on the appearance of a bung being pushed towards them for, at worst, their complicity and, at best, looking the other way.

Relegation Looming and Coffee Drinking

2010-02-10T22:46:00.000Z

I don't often drink coffee. There's no big reason or reasoning behind this; I just prefer tea so that is what I mostly drink. Coffee has its uses though. On the odd occasion when I am out and about I'll take a flask of coffee with me because tea always seems to stew horribly if you take that.

I'm not precious about it though. I'll drink an espresso, cappuccino or any of the others that we are inundated with whenever we go into a coffee shop these days. I don't actually drink them often enough to decide whether I prefer a skinny latté to an Americano and this is due to not knowing which is which (once you go beyond cappuccino or espresso) as much as anything else. Like I said I don't drink coffee that often.

But I am drinking coffee today and I am likely to drink lots of it. So much so that it is only 11 am as I write this and I can feel that I am getting a little “wired” already. Luckily I am drinking something that I readily recognise as “coffee” because it comes in pot ready-made and you add milk and sugar as you require.

So why am I drinking coffee? Well I am at work and I have very little to do and this is a state of affairs that is likely to last for at least another 5 hours although there will be brief bouts of activity in the hours that follow. I'm lucky really to have such a stress-free and undemanding job but time does drag on occasion.

To that end I have recently acquired a netbook with the intention to wile away the spare minutes and hours by frittering the time away on football websites, messageboards, news sites and facebook. As plans go this has worked well so far but today I am far from home and sitting in the GOSW building in the centre of Bristol whilst the lady that I work for and with attends a course. “There's bound to be wifi” I had thought “in such a building”. Wrong. So here I sit all tooled up (but not hooked up) with little to do except get caffeined up.

So I have decided to write this blog entry. It was never meant to be about coffee at all but there you go. I'd decided it was to be about relegation. “Relegation” sounds bad. Relegation is bad. Re... le... ga.. .tion... It sounds no better if you say it slowly. (Just had another coffee...) Relegation is as bad as it gets if you are a football fan. When it happens it is horrible, really, really horrible. The prospect of it looming in the distance is little more palatable than untreated toothache.

Relegation. Doom and gloom infuses every last possible musing about Argyle at present. Let's face it we are almost inevitably tearing headlong into the lower division so it isn't really a question of “if” but of “when” and “what will it mean?”

We seem to be enjoying the fruits of mediocrity bestowed upon us by a long sequence of misfortune and poor decision making. So where to begin?

I guess the seeds were sown when the club and Holloway parted company. At that point things were going swimmingly well for us as we revelled in a team that was challenging for a play-off spot and which even won games occasionally ~ a luxury which has long-since been denied to us. It wasn't to last. It couldn't last. That's not the lot of a supporter of a team like Argyle. It never lasts ~ or at least it never has done in the past. We enjoy a wallow in the vicissitudes and failures just as much as a bask in the successes. We have had to learn how to over the years. Anyway Holloway left, players (too many good players) were sold and panic ensued from which we have never properly recovered.

The team, the squad, the management and coaching staff were all filleted in the most extreme fashion imaginable. Gone almost as one were Holloway (manager), Penrice (assistant manager and chief scout), Bulpin (coach), Hayles (captain), Ebanks-Blake (leading scorer and penalty taker), Halmosi (best player), Gosling (best young player), Busazaky (most skillful player) and Norris (talisman and hardest working player). Not far behind them went Nalis (midfield lynchpin), Capaldi (all-time most-capped international), Connolly (inspirational full-back) and the double-headed beast that was Evans/Wotton (general all-round club legends). It was a calamitous 18 months or so. To say that there was little left is an understatement; we did not even have a team spine let alone a skeleton.

The only plus to all of this was the influx of money, lots of money, as the transfer fees came in. Sadly it wasn't enough.

The first thing we had to do as the ceiling came in around us was to appoint a new manager and to that end Paul Sturrock was re-appointed. This seemed to be a good move at the time. He had achieved unparalleled success with us and had also seen Swindon and Sheffield Wednesday promoted during his sabbatical. It didn't work out though.

Did we ever stand a chance? Probably not. The damage was so severe and the opportunities to put things right so limited. Initially the transfer window forced us into hurried signings which have since proven to be both expensive and unsuccessful. Similarly when more time was available to us we still struggled to attract players to fill gaps and we also subsequently failed to suitably exploit the talent of the players we did sign. Why? Tactics, performances, results and personnel became as entwined as a bucket of well-oiled spaghetti. Just where cause and effect lay is anybody's guess.

Without being intimately aware of the machinations of the club at management level it is impossible to place responsibility accurately but poor individual performances led to poor team performances and league position gradually declined. We narrowly got away with it last season but similarly poor signings made in the last closed season have not remedied the problems or halted the decline.

Analysing the decision-making process is a hoary old task. It is certain that resources were spent with little positive effect. What is less clear is whether the poor signings were made as a result of poor decisions by Sturrock or as a result of him being poorly supported financially by the club.

Putting it all together has left us with a toxic mix of disenchanted support, poor results and performances, dwindling attendances and a feel-good factor that is almost non-existent.

Most of that is now behind us now though as the poor signings are being released, a new manager has been appointed and a new board is in place which we can only hope helps.

But we are where we are and that is deeply entrenched in a relegation spot, 9 points adrift of safety and games are running out in which we can do something about it. To be blunt there is little hope of an immediate turnaround.

So what next? A club that we have been led to believe is already losing money at an alarming rate is going to see it have to budget for season ticket sales slumping and for TV income to all but vanish. If we assume annual turnover to be around £10m at present then next year it is likely to be halved. Remember that we are currently losing money; cutting income by half is going to be disastrous for those shepherding the club's finances.

So what are the positives? Are there any at all? There has to be doesn't there and there is.

Most obviously competing at a lower level might just allow us to win rather more often and if we can win often enough then a promotion campaign is possible. That in turn will bring the crowds back and given that they will be mostly walk-ups because ST sales will be low then big crowds paying top dollar will go a long way towards rectifying the anticipated financial shortfall.

We'll have a few more “local” games. At present it is possible that we will be in the same division as Exeter, Yeovil, Bristol Rovers, Swindon, Southampton, Reading and Bournemouth which will mean some relatively accessible away games.

We will have dropped below the Taylor Report radar and will once again be visiting stadia which have terraces on which we can stand which some will see as a positive but which leaves me largely unmoved either way.

For me the biggest point will be the re-aligning of expectation within the fanbase. We have enjoyed success in recent times beyond that which we had become acclimatised to and it seemed to be widely assumed that it would endlessly continue. That was never a realistic proposition given our history and the status and resources availabie to our opponents in this division. How can we expect to compete with teams that spend mi££ions on player transfers and wages and get 20+k crowds? We might manage it once in a while but over the longer term it is likely to be as sustainable as pushing water uphill.

We have lost sight of the fact that every season we stay in the CCC (or equivalent) is a triumph for us and should be celebrated as such and that relegation, although it should never be regarded as inevitable until it is too late to think otherwise, is an inevitable possibility that should always be considered.

As I sit here and peer out of the window of the conference room in which I find myself I can see that snow is falling quite heavily, but not settling, on the grey exterior of Temple Meads station and I must admit that my thoughts are turning to yet another cup of coffee.

Pasties

2010-01-22T23:19:00.010Z

Well it's time I breathed some life into this blog. It hasn't been dead but merely sleeping.

So where to begin? I think it just as well to nail the fallacy that pasties are a Cornish invention here right at the start.

Check out this link:

http://www.legendarydartmoor.co.uk/pasty_devon.htm

Whilst we are at it then let us also not be too sure that Cornish pasties are necessarily the best either:

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1174967/Eat-Pie-wars-break-Devon-firm-wins-CORNISH-pasty-contest-organisers-error.html

The sooner the cultural crime that is the theft of the humble pasty by the light-fingered Cornish from the humble, downtrodden and under-appreciated Janner is brought to book the better. This is an injustice of a par with the Elgin Marbles and we all know how unhappy the Greeks are about that. The pasty is one of the Janner Nation's greatest gifts to the world.

What better topic is there to float a Janner boy's boat than pasties? I could start a pasty review service to run parallel with the pub reviews (also sleeping) and might just do that in the future but for now I'll just reference the Facebook group My Mum's Pasties Are The Best. Clearly you'll have to take my word for this since you are never likely to try one. Equally it is suitably ambiguous and could mean that your Mum's pasties are best which should at least spare me having to defend many "my Mum's are better than you Mum's" arguments which would be just too tedious to stomach. I also don't want to set set up a married bloke up in a place where he has to decide between mother, mother-in-law and wife. Anybody who makes you an oggie is a deeply loving and wonderful person.

And please none of that "if it's crimped on the top it's... and if it's crimped on the side then it's..." because it is just too boring for words.

Right that's the preamble dealt with so let's get into the meaty stuff. Just how do you make the damned things? Well who better to ask than my Mum who has 80 years plus of hands on pasty making experience to fall back on. What follows is her advice.

INGREDIENTS: Potatoes, onions, turnip, beef (skirt), shortcrust pastry, salt, pepper, butter, egg.

METHOD: Chop all ingredients into small bits then encase in pastry. Paint with beaten egg. Gas mark 5 for about an hour.

That was pretty much it. She doesn't weigh stuff so the quantities would be apochryphal if I was to give any but when pressed she added:

Turnip and swede are completely interchangeable (and I would maintain the same thing anyway just a different size and colour). Amounts of each ingredient are infinitely variable according to taste but about 1 pound of skirt, 3 average onions, 6 medium potatoes and a small swede will make about 6 good-sized oggies.

Shop bought pastry is fine. Any flour will do for rolling out the pastry ~ don't scrimp. Jus-Roll is recommended. Season ingredients well (do not be afraid to add lots) and pop a knob of butter inside each one. It's best not to overfill the pastry because this makes it harder to seal the pastry up (and if ...you have too much pastry then just trim it off) but try to compact the filling as much as possible. A circular dinner plate will do fine to cut out the pastry. Or a smaller plate for a smaller pasty. Use excess pastry to make jam tarts or mince pies (or more pasties) ~ just dampen it very slightly to get it to stick together as required.

Cook on a well greased baking tray or on baking paper so that they don't stick. If you have an olive oil spray thing then this works well and will be lower in calories than using butter but if you are that worried about calories then I'd wager you won't be making pasties nor will you be reading this.

There is some other stuff about allowing the pastry to come up to room temperature so that it doesn't shrink (or was it stretch?) and the chopping/dicing/slicing thing is up to you but cut everything smallish so that it cooks thoroughly. You can either mix it all in a bowl or layer it in each pasty as you go ~ it is your pasty after all so do what you like.

Inpired? Make 'em yourself. It ain't rocket science and it is fun. Give it a go.

“Perform” is hardly the right word!!

2009-06-17T16:52:00.001+01:00

It isn’t often that a club’s official website becomes a talking point but today www.pafc.co.uk did. How? They didn’t manage to get the new fixtures up when they were officially released at 10 am.

Many disgruntled supporters obviously grumbled to many clubs and it transpires that this was an issue between the website provider (Perform) and the 70 or so clubs it supplies a frankly sub-standard service to.

PAFC has copped loads of stick for the useless website over the years and today the worm turned and issued this statement:

FAILURE TO PERFORM
Posted on: Wed 17 Jun 2009

WE apologise unreservedly for the farcical situation that struck our official website on Wednesday morning.
Fixture-list release day - Wednesday, June 17, this year - is without doubt the biggest day in the calendar for all Football League websites, not to mention you, our loyal supporters.

For days in advance, we bombard you with promotional messages promising that our official website will be the first place for the fixture news on the day of release.here is a strict 10am embargo on the fixture-list placed on clubs by the Football League, forbidding them from revealing details before this time.

However, we were issued with a copy of the fixture-list at 7.57 on Wednesday morning, allowing us two hours to prepare stories and pinpoint the big fixtures for the Green Army. Although the vast majority of the content of the website - news, features, videos - is generated at Home Park by the Argyle Communications team, we are reliant on a company called Perform Group to provide the technical expertise to publish the content.
The articles are entered by us into an editorial toolkit; we set a time for launch and press 'save'. The articles are then picked up by the Perform server in London and pinged out to the electronic world.

On fixture-list release day, we kept our end of the bargain. Our ducks were all in a row at 10am.
Perform Group, formerly known as Premium TV, did not allow us to deliver on our promise. Five stories were prepared by us and ready to go live at 10am. Perform published them at 10.28am.

Whether it was server-error, human-error or any other sort of error, the procedure failed miserably, leaving fans disappointed and Football League webmasters nationwide seething.

The mechanics of the working relationship between clubs and Perform are complicated, but we shall attempt to give a brief outline of Wednesday's events. Three text alerts were timed to be sent at 10am, 10.02am and 10.04am. Thankfully, these were delivered at the correct times. Moving on to the official website: the lead story on the fixtures was timed to launch at 10am, with four subsidiary articles scheduled for 10.05am. Although these stories were all scheduled to launch from an editorial toolkit, powered by Perform, we monitored the website to ensure the articles filtered through successfully.
At 10.28am, all five stories finally appeared on our website, long after supporters had understandably explored other avenues to learn the fixture-list for the new season.

The contract between Perform and the vast majority of Football League clubs has now been running for eight years, and fixture-list release day has always been the key date in terms of proving ourselves as the first place to visit for official Argyle news.

Tuesday's Carling Cup draw might have provided Perform with a warning of the problems they potentially faced.
It took just under an hour for our background story on our away tie at Gillingham, along with the complete first-round draw to fully filter through. The time between 10-10.28am on Wednesday was spent refreshing the Argyle website, while scouring other clubs under the Perform umbrella to see if the problem was nationwide.
We soon discovered that a host of other clubs were experiencing the same problem. Official websites were either crashing completely or simply replicating the Argyle pattern of failing to publish scheduled stories. We received a group e-mail from Coventry City at 10.22am expressing their disappointment at Perform's failure to live up to their name. Subsequent replies from us and other clubs were considerably more damning.

At this point, the following 26 clubs have contributed to this electronic circular:

Bradford City
Southend United
Queens Park Rangers
Stoke City
Crystal Palace
Blackpool
Carlisle United
Bolton Wanderers
Barnsley
Cardiff City
Doncaster Rovers
Nottingham Forest
Derby County
Wigan Athletic
Bury
Southampton
Milton Keynes Dons
Notts County
Rochdale
Brentford
Chesterfield
Walsall
Shrewsbury Town
Hull City
Rotherham United
Cheltenham Town

This is around a third of the clubs served by Perform - and these are just the ones we know about. The fixture page on the official website should also have been automatically updated by Perform. This was finally completed at 11.22am - 82 minutes after the time promised to fans. Mistakes happen on websites. Sometimes it is our fault, sometimes it is down to failures at Perform.

Normally, we will grudgingly take the criticism for Perform errors.

Sorry, not today.

The club then found itself in hot water with the Football league who forced them to remove the above statement. Things are set to improve imminently ~ we only have another 20 years of the contract with Perform to run!!

I wonder how long before I get told to remove this?

Valerie Kelway R.I.P.

2009-06-09T02:56:00.001+01:00

Valerie was my sister.

Thursday before last at about 11 pm I received a phone call from Val’s husband. “She’s gone” he said. “Can you make the phone calls?” I did.

Her illness was vicious, brief and brutally finaL There was nothing that could be done. In my more lucid moments I can console myself that at least this showed its own mercy but that is little consolation right now.

Val was a keen amateur singer and had a beautiful singing voice ~ so much so that she used to compete in competitions of the barbershop style which I believe is more accurately referred to as close harmony singing; she belonged to a group called The Mayflowers. Her cremation was today. There was some singing. It was at once the saddest and most beautiful thing I have ever heard.

She leaves a husband, son, daughter and 3 grandchildren who will all desperately miss her as will Mum, my two brothers and I.

I wish she was still here.

Reserves v Bristol City 17/03/09

2009-06-06T00:29:00.001+01:00

Argyle (4-4-2): 27 Lloyd Saxton; 2 David McNamee, 4 Simon Walton, 5 Krisztián Timár, 3 Damien McCrory; 7 Chris Clark, 6 Jim Paterson, 8 Luke Summerfield (capt), 11 Craig Noone; 9 Jermaine Easter, 10 Steve MacLean (14 George Donnelly 75)

Substitutes (not used): 12 Ryan Brett, 13 Dan Smith, 15 Yoann Folly, 23 Ollie Chenoweth.

Bristol City (4-4-2): 1 Stephen Henderson; 2 Jordan Walker (15 Daryn Hennessy 6), 5 Izzy Iriekpen (14 Robert Stambolsiev 76), 6 Joe Edwards, 3 James Wilson; 8 Frankie Artus, 7 Tristan Plumber, 4 Ashley Kingston, 11 Jennison Myrie-Williams; 9 Peter Styvar (12 Marlon Jackson 66), 10 Lee Trundle.

Substitutes (not used): 13 Tom Bradley.

Referee: Adam Hopkins

It's difficult to read much into a reserve game but Argyle utterly dominated the match in terms of possession and chances created. I don't know how strong the Turnip team was but it only included 2 names that I have ever heard (Trundle and Iriekpen ~ and I'm not sure it was the same one of those). The Turnips weren't helped when Jordan Walker went down and stayed down early on after an innocuous tussle with McCrory and had to be stretchered away.

Anyway the first chance fell to Argyle when we attacked the BPE goal. Patterson set Noone free with a lovely little left-footed pass, Noonie got foward and crossed perfectly for Easter to stroll in at the back post and head wide. He really should have scored. It was begging. Not long after more good work from Noone saw a mishit Clark shot fall to MaClean. Maclean had a defender up his exhaust pipe and laid the simplest of balls back to Easter who really couldn't, and didn't, miss. 1-0.

It was all Green ball really. McNamee fed Clarky down the other wing who put in a great cross that the Turnips did well to scramble clear.
The Turnips then managed a rare threat on goal and Ashley Kingston turned well in the box and fired hard and low at the right hand post. It was sneaking in but Saxton got down well and got a strong right hand to it and parried away for a corner. It was a good save and could easily have gone in.

We then had a free kick on the right edge of the box. Summers floated it across, Paterson headed across goal and MacLean at the back post misread it and got underneath the ball. He really should have done better but MacLean was getting involved well. Soon after there was good work by MacLean again in the box. It was almost a re-run of the goal and he laid back a perfect pass to Paterson. The loyal 150 or so were about to acclaim a goal but Paterson's sweet connection fired wide. He should have scored it really was begging. Again.

There was another wobble when a Walton, playing at CB, back pass bobbled as Saxton went to kick. He sliced it horribly and it went for a corner which the young goalie came and caught well. He wasn't busy but he really did look quite assured with all that he did.
There was still time for a couple more chances and Summerfield, who was tidy and moved the ball on quickly and unfussily throughout, overhit a free kick from a promising position luckily the ref played an advantage as MacLean got clattered and Noone's shot on the follow up was deflected away.

1-0 at half time.

McCrory got forward far more in the second half and linking well with Noone and McCrory won an early corner with a good over-lapping run but Summerfield overhit it, which to be honest was something of a theme, but he was to make amends later.

MacLean figured strongly throughout but his performance was an odd one. He did not seem overly bothered about the game at all. His body language isn't great at all and at one point he loudly and profanely expressed discontent after a dodgy ball to him from McCrory but on the plus side he set up Easter's goal and time and again turned beautifully to thread a ball to over-lapping wide players. Easter, by comparison despite his goal, was far less effective and had a frustrating time of it as the referee gave him nothing against his marker, the strapping Joe Edwards, and then penalised him for the softest of infringements.

One of those MacLean balls set Noone away and he crossed but crossed poorly which probably only increased Easter's frustration as he lurked hopefully in anticipation. Maclean and Easter then combined to set Noone up. Noone shot but shot weakly and the goalie saved easily low and to his left. The ball went for a corner which Noone this time cocked up. We used to be so good at taking corners...

Paterson who had sat centarally knitting things together nicely started to come forward now and showed no little verve and purpose on several occasions. McCrory and Paterson set Noone away and he put a great cross across the face of the goal. All it needed was a touch but everybody missed it.

Paterson followed that with another good, direct run which was crudely ended by their #15 (he was meant to be a goalie according to the team sheet so I don't know who he was) which resulted in the captain being called over and a stern warning, but no card, given. The free kick was in a great position slightly to the left and maybe 5 yards outside the box. MacLean got in the wall and peeled around the back as Summerfield shot low and hard with a hint of curl into the gap he left. The 'keeper Henderson stood no chance. Great goal. 2-0.

The foul on Paterson was the first iffy one in the match but Timar soon followed when he went through the back of one of theirs in a senseless and poor fashion. He could easily have been dismissed for it on another day and should have been booked. Another telling off from the ref but, again, no card. Timar was very, very lucky. At this point it's worth noting that Walton lasted the entire match as his partner looking calm and assured throughout and did nothing to suggest that his temper was not in control. In fact Trundle really didn't figure at all so you have to say Walton did well although I barely noticed him to be honest.

McCrory made another good run from left back and passed to Paterson who tried to set MacLean away but MacLean had wandered offside. Argyle's best move of the match came next. Loads of passes from defence through the midfield to Easter who fed Maclean. Maclean once again turned and set Clark away who crossed dangerously. Somehow it was scrambled away for a corner which Summers played short and then crossed to Timar at the back stick who really should have done better than he did.

It's not often you hear a player scream but the sparse reserve crowd were treated to a mighty holler from McCrory as Frankie Artus arrived late and a bit two-footed for a 60/40 ball and seemed to rake his studs up McCrory's back. McCrory was clearly unhappy and this could easily have been a red card too. I think the ref left his cards behind today but it was never a dirty game.

There was more good work from MacLean who crossed to Timar, who inexplicably was in the centre forward position, but Timar again headed poorly. At this stage Argyle were rampant, really, and doing much as they pleased ~ as far as that is possible in a game played at about 3/4 pace by everybody on both sides.

McNamee was quiet really but as the game wore on he got forward dangerously on several occasions too, then an excellent dummy by MacLean allowed Clark to cross but it was cleared.

With 15 minutes to go Donnelly came on for MacLean. MacLean again did himself no favours by heading off straight down the tunnel and despite being involved in nearly everything we did that threatened his attitude must be in question. I don't think there was even the customary handshake as he came off but I wouldn't swear to it as I may have been making a note at the time. Make no mistake his passing and contribution over all were excellent but he just, at times, looks like he doesn't give a toss. Maybe I'm being unfair but he really is a riddle wrapped in an enigma. I think there's a great player in there if we or he can get his head right.

Donnelly came on and looked like a dedicated chaser of lost causes. He looked direct, pacy and committed. Then again the game wasn't full-on pace-wise and given the circumstances his attitude was to be expected. In fact when Donnelly made his first touch he was crunched by Ashley Kingston. Welcome to the pros, George.

That was about it apart from a late turn by Trundle who fired at Saxton who saved, fumbled and recovered easily and for Noone to set Paterson away with a back hell, Paterson then crossed to Easter who missed yet again.

Everybody did well today really with Easter looking like the weakest link. The goal apart he really contributed very little. The youngsters McCrory and Saxton on a rare chance to play with the big boys did not look out of place at all. The pairings of Noone/McCrory, Clark/McNamee, Walton/Timar, Summerfield/Paterson all looked good in their slots.
MacLean and Easter? The scoreline says it all really. It was all Argyle and ended up only 2-0. It might have been 10.

How good were the Turnips? Poor, if truth be told. Totally out-classed.

Any hoof? I can't remember a single hoof up the field in all of the match.

MotM? Could be any of Noone, McCrory, MacLean or Paterson. I'll opt for Paterson who was excellent throughout and despite being so incredibly one footed that it's embarrassing used the ball well, showed great judgement and was a genuine attacking threat when he came forward.

5 Year Plan

2009-06-05T21:37:00.001+01:00

The need for a 5YP is often mentioned following the rip-roaring success that was the last one. At least the club was successful and it achieved that success by blowing the 5YP to smithereens but that isn’t important right now.

I’d actually question whether we need a publicly-stated 5YP at all now. What would it say? It was easy to set out a series of objectives for the last one due to a number of factors. One of them was the relative strength of Argyle and our famed and oft-mentioned potential. We should never have been in the 4th Division at all to start with. We are not a small club ~ at least not in those terms we are not. Quite the reverse. We were a Big Fish in a small pond back then. It had taken a series of quite astonishingly bad decisions from Dan McCauley to get us there in the first instance and just a short period of sensible leadership would have bestowed, in all likelihood, fairly instant results.

I can’t remember what the original 5YP stated now but it went something like this (if I am wrong it doesn’t really matter):

Year 1: Stay up

Year 2: Get a Play-Off spot.

Year 3: Get promoted to Division 1.

Year 4: Stay Up

Year 5: Aim for a Ply-Off spot.

Most who read this won’t need to be reminded that we actually did this:

Year 1: Stay up

Year 2: Promoted as Champions to Division 1

Year 3: Consolidate in mid-table

Year 4: Promoted as Champions to Coca-Cola Championship

Year 5: Stay Up

This led us to where we still are today. “What we need is another 5YP like the first one” is the mantra that comes from many but I do not agree at all. From where we are what would anybody expect it to say? If it sets out a timescale for getting a Play-Off or Promotion spot then looks all Billy Big Bollocks and completely ignores the fact that there are no “easy” fixtures for us anymore. We are not a Big Fish anymore; we are one of the Littlest Fish now. It is not going to be impossible for us to progress but it is going to be extremely hard and there is nothing in our 100+ years of history as a club to suggest that we will. If we went into print and laid out objectives and a timescale and then failed to achieve them then the criticism would cascade from all directions.

For now we can set an easy objective against which to monitor our on-field performance: we should try to beat the league position of the previous year. It’s not glamourous or exciting and the longer we manage to do that then the harder it becomes for us to continue doing it but it is realistic and achievable.

Off the pitch it is a different thing altogether. Quite simply we must find ways to raise the club’s turnover; I don’t think we can charge much more than we do now so that means we need to either get more bums on seats or find other revenue streams.

One thing is certain in my mind though and that is that a 5YP will actually achieve nothing. Anybody can write anything down on a piece of paper. It is what actually transpires that will dictate what the future holds for us as a club.

Reserves v Swansea 21/04/09

2009-05-31T21:24:00.003+01:00

Argyle (4-4-2):1 Lloyd Saxton; 2 Ryan Leonard, 5 Ben Gerring, 6 Mathias Doumbe, 3 Damien McCrory; 7 Chris Clark, 4 Brian McCaul, 8 Luke Summerfield, 11 Craig Noone (16 Liam Head 81); 9 Rory Fallon (13 George Donnelly 62), 10 Roudolphe Douala (15 Joe Mason 73).

Substitutes (not used): 12 Oliver Chenoweth, 14 Ryan Brett.

Swansea (4-4-2): 1 David Cornell; 2 Matthew Collins, 5 Jamie Grimes, 6 Kieran Howard (16 Adam Orme 84), 3 Daniel Sheehan (12 Matthew Wright 66); 7 Chris Jones, 4 Kyle Graves, 8 Dion Chambers, 11 Kerry Morgan; 9 Joe Harris, 10 Jazz Richards.

Substitutes (not used): 13 Rhys Wilson, 14 Steven Berry, 15 Anthony Finselbach.

Referee: Andy Bennett (Devon).

What better way to fritter away a beautifully warm sunny Tuesday afternoon?

The game got off to a cracking start. Lots of pace, verve and purpose to both teams ~ so much so in fact you might have mistaken it for an FA cup tie. No shots on goal though or chances of any kind until an overly ambitious crossfield ball was intercepted by McCaul who slipped the ball to Noone. Noone went down the right flank and crossed when he approached the penalty area. The cross was inch perfect and evaded the rather small 'keeper Cornell and there was Fallon ghosting in at the back stick to side-foot a volley sweetly into the net from close range. He couldn't've missed really.

It was at this point that I noticed that Doumbé, listed as #6 on the teamsheet but wearing #4, and McCaul seemed to have the wrong shirts on. Never mind. So engrossed was I by this that I wasn't paying enough attention to be sure what happened next but looked up to see the ball arrowing towards the Swansea net's postage stamp, possibly from a Noone shot, and their goalie getting a hand to the ball whilst airborne and horizontal. Great save and just about the only one I recall from the entire afternoon. Moments later P&C arrived.
Noonie scuffed the corner to the near post and then got a second go. Again he scuffed the corner (it's odd how a badly struck corner so often causes confusion) allowing Swansea to clear the ball back to him. Noonie cut inside and fired in a shot which was saved easily by the goalie. OK... so there was 2 saves.

Swansea then had an attack down their left wing and Ryan Leonard at RB rather clumsily bundled the troublesome Kerry Morgan over for a clear penalty. Chris Jones (#7) took the pen and sent Saxton the wrong way but the penalty was coolly slotted and I don't think he'd have had an earthly had he gone the right way.

Douala and Noone then combined a couple of times. Douala looked quick as he belted down the right wing and got a cross over towards Noone but a defender cleared. Shortly afterwards Noone played the ball of the match with a raking pass hammered low and hard from a deep defensive position. It was perfect for Douala, beyond the last man, to run onto but Douala's first touch was shocking. Noone's pass deserved far better ~ Hoddle could have played it no more brilliantly.

Clark then set up our second goal with a cross that Fallon rose powerfully and majestically to power into the net with a fantastic header that gave Cornell no chance whatsoever. Two great goals for Fallon.

Swansea's Fellaini lookylikey Dion Chambers then turned up in our box and helped Kerry Morgan to show good close control and no little skill as he turned and fired in a powerful shot for an equaliser. 2-2. 3 great goals in the 4 scored so far.
There was still time for Doumbé to exhibit hitherto unsuspected skill and ambition as he made a Beckenbaueresque run through the centre. He was clearly looking for a teammate to make a run off him but they did not so he let fly left-footed with as sweet a strike as you could wish for but sadly saw his shot charged down.

The second half started and there was again plenty of competitveness and endeavour but precious little action until a simply brilliant little back-heeled flick from Douala set Noonie through with the defence flatfooted. Noonie shot low past Cornell. 3-2.

The highlight of the game followed soon after. Noone picked the ball up on the left and dinked a ball towards Fallon's noggin. Fallon, with back to goal, took the pace off the ball with a beautiful cushioned header which went around the corner to Douala who ran onto the ball and thrashed a volley into the net from 20 yards or so. If it is on AW watch it. 4-2. 6 goals and 5 of them brilliantly taken.

The result was now in no doubt and Fallon went off and George Donnelly came on. A channel ball, one of few played all afternoon, caught Swansea asleep. Donnelly, who had no marker and was well clear, ran onto the ball and slotted the ball away with his first touch of the ball. He must have been on the pitch for about 5 seconds when he scored.

The impressive Morgan then broke in from the left wing leaving Leonard in his wake despite having a couple of tugs at his shirt. Doumbé stopped him at the clear expense of a free kick on the edge of the box. RB Matthew Collins stepped forward to take it and curled a beautiful shot onto the crossbar with Saxton well beaten not that anybody would have stopped it had it been a tad lower.

Summerfield then showed a lovely bit of skill in midfield (think Gazza v Scotland doing Hendry ~ sort of) before releasing Noone. Noone played in to Douala, Douala laid it back to Summerfield who had intelligently followed play but his shot was nowhere near as clinical as the build up.
Collins then rattled the crossbar again with another free-kick that deflected off the wall but which had been struck with real power. He was desperately unlucky both times. Saxton again had no chance at all.

Douala went off and Mason came on. Mason looked OK but didn't really have much fall his way except when he missed when he should have done better after being set up by Clark who delayed a pass for an eternity before sending Leonard on the overlap, Leonard's cross was great and Mason will be disappointed with his effort. Maybe it was blocked because Mason wanted a corner but I think he was the only person there who thought it was.

Fellaini, sorry, Chambers then made amends for his good work when he had scored and lost a ball carelessly in midfield. It fell perfectly to Donnelly and George wasted no time in making it 6-2. An easy goal but a good finish.

That was pretty much it except for a rather blatant elbow that crocked Noone from #7 Chris Jones. Noone went off soon after allowing the beanpole that is Liam Head to come on and show us the two slowest step-overs you could ever see. I don't think he will ever be a crowd fave somehow and looks exactly the sort of player that will attract much criticism.

That was that. 6-2 and wonderful entertainment for the ecstatic throng that had gathered to watch.

Who did well? Everybody really. Saxton had very little to do. Leonard had a tough time that I do not think he would have enjoyed much (apparently he was sent off for punching his man in the away game and funnily enough had a hand heavily strapped during this one. McCrory was steady and competent. McCaul looked to get involved and struck me as extremely mature for his years ~ I think we might have a gem there. Gerring was untroubled and did well. Doumbé always looks more than comfortable at this level and must be pleased to be playing CB for once; that comment about Beckenbauer earlier was not a dig at him at all. Clark tucked in nicely but I have seen him be more influential but his pass to Leonard was bettered only by Noone's to Douala. Fallon scored twice and set up another. Douala scored a blinder and looked threatening every time the ball went near him. Noone would have been my MotM and was constantly involved. Mason and Head weren't on for long enough to say much about them and Donnelly scored 2 coming off the bench and got a couple of hopeful headers in too ~ what more could he have done?

How good were Swansea? Their team was on the young side but seemed more mature than recent reserve opponents. The muscular Joe Harris looked like a good shout for the future as a target man; Kerry Morgan was always a threat; Collins obviously takes a wicked free kick. Argyle were relatively callow this time too with Leonard, McCrory, McCaul, Gerring, Summerfield, Noone, Donnelly, Mason and Head all being youngsters too. If we can keep them and bring them on then the future looks to have plenty of promise.

Paul Sturrock Revisited

2009-05-30T20:16:00.001+01:00

I was very critical of Sturrock once he had left us for Southampton and you can read what I thought of him then here.

In my Review of the 08/09 season I said that I was unreservedly behind him now. Read that here if you like.

“That’s very contradictory” you may say to yourself. Well I don’t think it is. Never once have I doubted Sturrock’s ability as a manager. In that earlier piece about him I said that I believed that he could be our Shankly, Revie, Busby, Clough or Stein figure; that he could be the one to transform us from 100+ years or mediocrity into something special and my major gripe about his departure was that I was robbed of the opportunity to find out. I also felt that he had made an extremely poor career move for all of the wrong reasons and I think that time has borne that out. I was so angry with him not because I doubted his ability but because he had chosen to prove that ability elsewhere ~ and he did in the end. Twice.

But that was then and this is now.

“How can you forgive him and forget what he did” you may well ask and I’d argue that I have not forgotten at all but I most certainly have forgiven. You have every reason to wonder “Why?”.

I guess that just boils down to who I am and how I think. I am all for giving second chances (maybe more) if somebody actually admits to the error of their ways in a genuine and sincere way and Sturrock has done just that. Here is a quote from him on his return:

This will be the hardest job I've ever had to take over but I am very, very pleased and looking forward to the challenge. The bottom has been out of most of the clubs' trousers as far as the position they are in the league - all of a sudden, I'm taking over a team that's fourth in the Championship and flying. It's a difficult one. I do feel I have taken a difficult job because of the expectation-level. Plus, there's also the old onion that you should never go back to try again. But I feel very comfortable with coming back. I think I can fit right back in again, and the chairman and I have a relationship that means I am looking forward to working with him again. I'm just hoping to be honest, to make sure supporters know where I'm coming from. There was no way I would have left for any other standard than the Premier League. I've been to the Show. I've had a wee taste. I've pitted my wits against the top men. I think everybody has that ambition in them. Had it been even another Championship team, I wouldn't even have contemplated leaving because I have a dream for this football club, a long-term dream to take it where it would like to go. From then on, politics has been very much a part of my problems at every football club. The one good thing that I have done since I've been away is that I pride myself that I have left teams I took over in a better shape than when I took them over. So, at least I've done a professional job at every club. At Southampton, I had Rupert Lowe, who things didn't work out with; at Sheffield Wednesday, I got promotion and then had a taste of the naughty side of football. Then, at Swindon, it's been very zany, getting promotion and then having four months of turmoil when people have been taking over the football club, then not taking over the football club. Finances were very low, there was an embargo of players so you can't sign anyone - then, you wake up last Sunday and, lo and behold, we're three points outside of the play-offs.

The glowing way he refers to Stapleton, the pledge of a long-term approach and the very fact of his return are all tantamount, in my mind, to him admitting that he had made a very bad mistake in leaving in the first case. His return reminds me of the Biblical parable about The Prodigal Son (Luke 15:11-32 (New International Version)):

¹¹Jesus continued: "There was a man who had two sons. ¹²The younger one said to his father, 'Father, give me my share of the estate.' So he divided his property between them.

¹³"Not long after that, the younger son got together all he had, set off for a distant country and there squandered his wealth in wild living. ¹⁴After he had spent everything, there was a severe famine in that whole country, and he began to be in need. ¹⁵So he went and hired himself out to a citizen of that country, who sent him to his fields to feed pigs. ¹⁶He longed to fill his stomach with the pods that the pigs were eating, but no one gave him anything.

¹⁷"When he came to his senses, he said, 'How many of my father's hired men have food to spare, and here I am starving to death! ¹⁸I will set out and go back to my father and say to him: Father, I have sinned against heaven and against you. ¹⁹I am no longer worthy to be called your son; make me like one of your hired men.' ²⁰So he got up and went to his father.

"But while he was still a long way off, his father saw him and was filled with compassion for him; he ran to his son, threw his arms around him and kissed him.

²¹"The son said to him, 'Father, I have sinned against heaven and against you. I am no longer worthy to be called your son.^[a]'

²²"But the father said to his servants, 'Quick! Bring the best robe and put it on him. Put a ring on his finger and sandals on his feet. ²³Bring the fattened calf and kill it. Let's have a feast and celebrate. ²⁴For this son of mine was dead and is alive again; he was lost and is found.' So they began to celebrate.

²⁵"Meanwhile, the older son was in the field. When he came near the house, he heard music and dancing. ²⁶So he called one of the servants and asked him what was going on. ²⁷'Your brother has come,' he replied, 'and your father has killed the fattened calf because he has him back safe and sound.'

²⁸"The older brother became angry and refused to go in. So his father went out and pleaded with him. ²⁹But he answered his father, 'Look! All these years I've been slaving for you and never disobeyed your orders. Yet you never gave me even a young goat so I could celebrate with my friends. ³⁰But when this son of yours who has squandered your property with prostitutes comes home, you kill the fattened calf for him!'

³¹" 'My son,' the father said, 'you are always with me, and everything I have is yours. ³²But we had to celebrate and be glad, because this brother of yours was dead and is alive again; he was lost and is found.' "

Sturrock is our Prodigal Son. He has returned. Get the fattened calf ready. I forgive him. If it is good enough for Jesus it is good enough for me.

Despite our success under Sturrock I still honestly believe that we just do not realise quite what a brilliant manager we have. In half of Dundee he is basically enshrined as the Greatest Living Scotsman. Now that might not be entirely surprising giving the unprecedented success The Arabs enjoyed when he was a player for them but it ignores the affection for him throughout Scottish football. His one-club playing career and loyalty did not pass without remark. Most players of his ability (and we forget, or perhaps in some cases just didn't ever realise, that he was a truly brilliant player) end up either "down south" or, and in many ways this is worse, playing for the Old Firm. Not Luggy.

As a rookie manager he had transformed St Johnstone from perennial losers to a competitive top flight club passing his apprenticeship with some panache before returning to Tannadice. I think in his mind he was committed to being an Arab until he died but ill health saw his tenure as manager come to an end and he had to move on. Luckily he rolled up down here where instead of being "A Legend" he was "A Who?".

From there we know the story intimately. People who have been critical of the club in various ways, like Peter Jones, have no hesitation in acclaiming Sturrock for the success that we have enjoyed. It's been ever upwards for us and almost the same for him. I'll never agree that he did anything other than sin by becoming a Saint but he has shown repentance by returning and that'll do me.

His record as a manager is incredible:

St Johnstone (Promoted as Champions)
Argyle (Promoted as Champions ~ arguably twice)
Sheffield Wednesday (promoted via play offs)
Swindon Town (promoted)

As a player and as a manager he has never been relegated except for at the very start when he took over a St Johnstone side that was already doomed to relegation. Every club he has managed would gladly have him back tomorrow. Even if you point at Southampton and say “he was sacked there” (which he was not) “and failed” then his record there was better than any manager who has had the job since in terms of points per game and that includes the highly esteemed Harry Redknapp. Not at al bad for a “failure” and Southampton fans as one would have been delighted to see such performance since.

We have, quite simply, the very best man we could possibly wish for as our manager; he has a great relationship with the Chairman; he promises evolution and not revolution; he offers no quick fixes and makes no outlandish promises; he is happy to work with the constraints that Holloway was not prepared to accept and many would never even consider; he completely understands us as a club; he carries out his duties with huge dignity.None of that is good enough for some who want to slag the man off and abuse his coaching staff. Which leads me to 2 more quotes:

I just don't believe it. - Joni Mitchell

You don't know what you've got 'til it's gone - Victor Meldrew

A few more points:

We are told there are 10 better out there who would apply if the job was advertised. If they are that good why are they out of work? Pardew? Keegan? Dowie? Magilton? Tisdale? (Some of those suggestions are likely to be laughable if you come back to this in 3 years time.) Are you genuinely serious? Of course he could be easiily replaced but easily replaced with somebody who would want our job and who we could afford and who has as good a CV? I don’t think so. Replaced by somebody better? Impossible unless we got very, very lucky indeed which of course we might. What might the odds be? 10-1? Longer I suspect and it would be a reckless gamble.

"Only good enough at a lower level". I don't actually agree with this at all but if he is not good enough at this level but is at a lower one and we were to be relegated then we have the best possible man at the helm already to get us back up, don't we?

There is no way in the World that Sturrock should ever be sacked as Argyle manager on the grounds of his ability and I doubt very much that any other grounds will ever transpire. He should have a job here for as long as he wants it and we should be rejoicing in the fact that he is ours and that we are lucky enough to have him. After all he has achieved, and hopes to achieve, here it saddens me deeply that there is so much hostility towards him from some of our fans. They are in real danger of throwing out the baby with the bathwater. You should always be very careful about what you wish for ~ sometimes you might get it and not like it very much when you do.

Season Review 2008/09

2009-05-30T02:23:00.005+01:00

There you have it. I could stop there. The graph says it all really.

I don’t think anybody is sad to see this season finish. It has been an almost constant struggle and at times it has been an appallingly ugly constant struggle. Looking back at the Season Preview I wrote (and which you can find on this blog if you look for it) then the obvious question that needs addressing is where did it all go wrong? What happened to that prediction of 12th place?

Well if we look at the players who played and the goals they scored what can we deduce?

	Appearances	Subs	Goals
Marcel Seip	42	0	3
Romain Larrieu	42	0
Karl Duguid	41	0	2
Chris Barker	40	2
Paul Gallagher	37	4	13
Jamie Mackie	36	9	5
Craig Cathcart	32	1	1
Chris Clark	31	6
Luke Summerfield	29	2	2
Rory Fallon	27	19	5
Mathias Doumbe	21	3	1
Alan Judge	15	2	2
David Gray	15	0
Krisztian Timar	14	8
Simon Walton	13	1
Gary Sawyer	13	0	3
Carl Fletcher	13	0	1
Steven MacLean	12	11	2
Ashley Barnes	12	3	1
James Paterson	8	10
Yoann Folly	7	5
Jason Puncheon	6	1
Graham Stack	6	0
David McNamee	5	5
Craig Noone	3	19	1
Emile Mpenza	3	6	2
Jermaine Easter	3	2
Nicolas Marin	1	5
Roudolphe Douala	1	1
George Donnelly	0	2
			44	Total

The obvious 2 facts that stand out from that to me are:

1. 44 goals is far too few;

2. 30 players is far too many. Not even Luggy wanted 30 playeres at the start of the season:

I would like to think we will have several more players coming to the football club before the window closes. There are some talented players I would like to bring to the football club - ones that have played in the Championship, as well. I envisage four or five players still coming in, which would take us up to the 22 we need.

If you look at the graph above the season breaks down into these categories:

1. A poor start;

2. A recovery;

3. A steady decline.

Let’s get back to just before the beginning of the season. Here’s a quote from Luggy:

We have had a look at this system [4-3-3] now over two or three games and I'm reasonably happy we could change to it if need be. I have got a lot of food for thought over the next couple of days, generally, on how we are going to start the season. The 4-3-3 system is difficult when you are forcing people to be passers when they are not passers. You need people who are comfortable taking the ball when they have got their back to players. Unless you have the right concoction, it's a real difficult one.

It wasn’t the only quote like it. Luggy wanted the team to play to a certain style with the ball being played to feet. Here’s another quote from the pre-season training camp in Austria.

Asked to describe the qualities the centre-forward in a 4-3-3 needs to have, Sturrock replied: “The boy Koller, who plays for the Czech Republic, is ideal, or you need a very cute linkage player. Somebody who can take the ball, hold it, and feed it to the team. It's good to have pace either side of that player, and somebody who is prepared to run beyond him. You can simplify everybody's game, because they all have a certain job to do.” The other key position is that of the central midfield player and Sturrock added: “He is probably the most important player in the whole system, he has to go on the ball and make some passes.” Flavien Belson and Yoann Folly had taken it in turns to do the job on Tuesday and Sturrock said: “In the first half, we just lumped it to Rory. In the second half, Yoann got more of the ball and we were able to link up with our wingers. They're key players in the system too. It's a system that people like playing, and it means that your back four is left very solid. It's very adaptable, because you can play two central midfielders and one off the front. 4-2-1-3 instead of 4-1-2-3. You can change between the two very quickly.

So there you have an idea of the pre-season planning and tactical objectives. The season started versus Wolves with this line-up:

Graham Stack, Karl Duguid, Marcel Seip, Mathias Kouo-Doumbe (Krisztián Timár), Chris Barker, Jamie Mackie, Luke Summerfield (Jason Puncheon), Simon Walton, Chris Clark (Jim Paterson), Jermaine Easter, Rory Fallon. Substitutes (not used): Romain Larrieu, Steve MacLean.

They battled away to win a point in as thrilling a curtain raiser as you could wish to see but it didn’t last and a succession of poor results followed. We lost to a terribly weak Luton side (they could barely field 11 players at the time) in the Carling Cup and in 3 out of 4 League games League games including a desperately poor pair of performances against Swansea (on Sky TV no less to add to the humiliation) and Norwich (after Timar got himself recklessly sent off early on). By the time the team travelled to Watford there was rebellion in the air. There were rumours about discontent within the ranks and personal issues seemed to be causing friction. Luggy read the riot act, made 7 changes and we won at Watford.

At this stage the pre-season planning lay in ruins. All talk of 4-3-3 and balls to feet was replaced by 4-4-2 and “blood and snotters” and for a while it worked with Timar, Walton, Stack, Easter, Puncheon, MacLean and Folly being the players who for one reason or another bore the brunt with Stack seemingly set to never play for us again.

That started our best run of results of the season. We won at Palace and beat Forest at home. We played Bristol City off the pitch for 45 minutes at Ashton Gate but couldn’t keep it up and ended up drawing 2-2 and we walloped Wednesday at home in some style.

You just couldn’t predict which way any game was going to go. We lost at Derby and Ipswich but beat Wednesday (again ~ away this time) and Preston at home. We lost at Sheffield United, drew at home to Charlton, won at Coventry and put the Sky humiliation behind us with a home win v Cardiff with Mpenza getting what turned out to be the winner. (More about him later.) We then drew at Southampton.

And then the wheels came off.

It had all been a gloriously unpredictable roller-coaster ride to this point. Some varying displays matched the varying results but it was all kind of OK but chickens were about to come home to roost.

Various players were either not performing or not being given a chance to perform and apart from the chosen B&Sers the others were frozen out. At this stage we were relying on Larrieu, Doumbé (at right back), Cathcart, Seip, Barker, Duguid, Summerfield, Clark, Fallon, Gallagher and Mackie. That left MacLean, Walton, Paterson, Folly, Timar, Noone and Marin largely kicking their heels in frustration. There are a few names missing here and they were either injured (McNamee, Sawyer, Mpenza) or out on loan (Puncheon, Barnes, Bolassie) or double-Guinaned (Stack).

Quite simply we asked too much of too few for too long. It couldn’t last and didn’t but as we hit the end of November we still probably hadn’t been able to field the best possible starting XI out of the players who ought to have been available. We lost in depressing fashion at home to Blackpool which heralded the start of a run of 16 games in which we only beat Southampton at home on Boxing day until we most unexpectedly won following a goal in the opening seconds at table-topping Wolverhampton in February’s last match. It wasn’t pretty.

That long run dominated and defined our season. Try as we might we just couldn’t buy a result and at times we didn’t seem to be able even to score a goal. We played well at home against Birmingham and put them under huge pressure only to lose 1-0 (they did that to lots of teams on the way to 9 other similar wins out of their 29 binary scorelines which included 2 against us). For the Cardiff away game we were hit by a flu bug which saw us forced to field the most bizarre line-up of the season with 6 (!) central defenders in a game that also featured a rare appearance from Jason Puncheon. Against Bristol City at HP we matched them stride for stride until they scored at which point heads dropped and the players visibly shrank an inch or two. We were a team that was in desperate need of a break but none was forthcoming. At Ipswich we battled away for a 0-0 which might have been a 1-0 if a late Mackie goal had not been disallowed for a dubious offside. We seemed to rattle the woodwork at least twice a game.

When we started the season, we couldn’t buy a win and couldn’t buy a goal. Then for 14 games we grasped the cudgel and took ourselves from the bottom of the league to fifth top. Now, all of a sudden, we have reverted back to the way we started the season

The lowest point of the season, for me, came in the game at home to Derby on a bitterly, bitterly cold afternoon.We lost 3-0 with Gary Teale scoring with a spectacular shot from distance and Jamie Mackie thwacking the ball against the crossbar from absolutely miles out when the game was still up for grabs but Derby’s opening goal, a spectacular but speculative thrash from Gary Teale who never did anything like that for us while he was here, killed us completely. Not only were we rubbish there was no fight. It was just too painful to watch and I left the game early for the first time ever and took refuge in a nice warm pub where I watched England play rugby. Physically it was far nicer but emotionally it was a horrible thing to do.

For 44 minutes, we were very competitive. The one that hits the bar for us, they go down to their end and it hits the bar and goes into the back of the net. Where the real disappointment is...30 seconds into the second half we changed system, we were ready for the challenge, but there's a calamity of errors and they finish with the ball in the back of the net which really kicks the wind right out of our sails. It just epitomises the problems we are having at home at the moment. It just seems that every mistake we make finishes up in the back of the net at this minute in time. When things are not going right for you in front of goal, it seems to kick you in the teeth at the other end. If you look at our away form and the points we have taken, we're very competent with the rest of the league. It's quite a good tally we've put together away from home. The problem is our home form is going to make us struggle at the bottom half of this league until we turn it. We cannot keep losing these silly goals. The second goal was a complete and utter killer. There's nothing else you can say about the game, you need to lift yourself and then the goal came so early. They had a fighting spirit, they kept at it right to the end.

Something in the wind changed during yet another defeat at home to Palace. We were 3-0 down at HT and the crowd could easily have turned on the team but the very opposite happened and everybody seemed to pull together. Sawyer scored and we ended up losing 3-1 but the vibe was very different to that which had preceded it. In many ways the season has been very ugly and the role of the fans in some home games has been the ugliest. Various players have borne the brunt of some disgusting abuse and Fallon, Summerfield and MacLean have been on the wrong end of plenty. MacLean so much so that his reaction after scoring against QPR was utterly astonishing as was a kick at a dugout which knocked a hole in it when he was not brought on as a sub. He did not help himself much with some comments made whilst being a guest commentator for a home game v Sheff Wed which really did make one wonder where his loyalty really belonged as did a non-celebration of another goal when he scored the only goal in a 1-0 win at Hillsborough.

Fallon seemed to get the stick for every long ball that was belted hopefully in his direction which always struck me as being unfair. If he had been the one booting it then maybe but he was not but the long ball was a definite feature of much of the poor run and it was not working as results showed. Fallon is actually very good at winning his share of the high balls but it was a bugbear of mine that the team as a unit sat too deep with the midfield and back four too compressed leaving Fallon and A.N. Other isolated and up against it with little hope of success or support. Everybody seemed to know it. Luggy mentioned it in interviews and captain Duguid even said it during the post-match jollies in the Pyramid Suite after the win against Cardiff but it still happened time and time again.

There were 2 consistent bright spots throughout the season though and one was Jamie Mackie’s energy levels and commitment. He impressed Paul Jewell so much that during a stint on SSN he said “this boy would chase a paper bag in the wind” and he was right. The other was the obvious skill and eye for the spectacular shown by Blackburn loanee Paul Gallagher. Some of the goals he scored where breathtaking with an overhead effort at Wolves and a strike from distance at Derby heading the list. A fine player at this level and I would love to see him sign for us. Blackburn appear to be letting him go so it comes down to money and the word on the street is that the coffers are empty and that the club is losing money at an alarming rate which given that we averaged only 11533 which is 1500 0r so down on last season and a staggering 6358 down on the division average is not surprising. Only Blackpool’s crowds were lower which meant that even Doncaster beat us for bodies through the gate (and twice on the pitch too).

But then we won at Wolves and hope was re-born. What followed was not a great run of results but in comparison to what had gone before they were a revelation: WWDLLLWW. That gave us 13 points out of 24. Not bad at all but our league position remained precarious as everybody else seemed to start getting better results too. The last of those wins was a 4-0 walloping of Coventry on April 11th which actually won us the points we needed to stay up. We were safe, although we did not know it) with 4 games to go.

From that point our season petered out disappointingly with nerves jangling at every stage. We got what seemed like crucial points at QPR and Birmingham and lost in abject fashion at home to Doncaster. It all came down to the last match ~ nearly. Norwich had played Reading on the preceding Monday and had lost 2-0 to take the last relegation spot and so we could relax at last. We started that game well against a Barnsley team racked with tension and took an early lead. Barnsley needed Norwich to lose to be safe and as news came through that they were then so they improved and they won what was ultimately a meaningless game 3-1. In that game we started with:

Romain Larrieu, David Gray, Marcel Seip, Chris Barker, Gary Sawyer, Alan Judge (George Donnelly), Karl Duguid (capt), Carl Fletcher, Paul Gallagher; Ashley Barnes (Craig Noone), Rudi Douala (Jamie Mackie 50).Substitutes: Krisztián Timár, Chris Clark.

(Only 3 players who started against our first match v. Wolves started our last v. Barnsley! In many ways the Barnsley match summed up our entire season.)

I think it all went awry for us this time last year when we didn’t actually sign a central midfield player to fill one or more of the gaps left by the absence of Buszaky, Hodges, Nalis and Wotton. We were left with a midfield that was just too weak which left us with little option but to by-pass it. We were also not helped much by injuries to 2 players who I am sure were key to the intended playing style and tactics of the team: Mpenza and McNamee. I am sure that they both offer plenty but neither actually delivered very much in terms on minutes on the pitch and as a result the team never evolved into a unit capable of allowing a player like Nicolas Marin (another that I liked the look of but who disappointed and wasn’t to see the season out with us) to perform. The pick up at the end came when Sawyer, Gray (another loanee from Man Utd who was injured for much of his stay with us), Judge and Fletcher came into the team. We suddenly looked much better. Was it all down to Fletcher in midfield? Probably not but he clearly added strength, experience and leadership where it was most badly needed. What might have been had we started the season with Larrieu, Gray, Sawyer, Barker, Duguid, Fletcher, Judge, Mpenza, Gallagher and Mackie? It has not been a vintage season and it will not be remembered happily by anybody really but I am sure that lessons have been learned. We cannot progress by hoofing it up the pitch, the back four need to get up the pitch more and the midfield needs to support the front men more and the signs were there that these lessons had already been taken on board at the end of the season.

Just to round up on a few other things. This season has been one characterised by criticism. It has been relentless. Fans have criticised players, tactics, selections, the board, signings and non-signings; players have allegedly criticised the club, the manager, each other and the fans; the manager has clearly been unhappy with certain players and has pretty much said so. None of it is good and it will ultimately destroy us as a club if it doesn’t stop sooner rather than later.

Here’s brief round-up of our players and the season they have had.

Romain Larrieu
The Last Of The Legends and a deserved winner of Player Of The Season. That a goalkeeper won that award speaks volumes.

Karl Duguid
Bought as a right back but pressed into duty in the midfield. He has been steady but unspectacular. One of those players appreciated rather more by teammates than by fans I suspect.

James Paterson
He has been missing for most of the season. He was brought here as a left back and hasn’t played there much at all and has been pressed into central midfield in an attempt to cover obvious deficiencies there. I like him but he is not popular with the fans and doesn’t seem to be favoured by Luggy.

Simon Walton

Just hasn’t lived up to the billing. Was signed to be the defensive lynchpin of our midfield but appears to have been found wanting in that role. He has a reputation as a hard man but all we have seen is some rather reckless play and his sending off at Barnsley was amongst the most stupid I have ever seen. Maybe it is all in there somewhere. If it is it needs to emerge soon. I’ll be surprised if he is here in August.

Krisztian Timar
At the start of the season he was definitely off the pace which is understandable bearing in mind his horrific injury at the end of last season. Hasn’t featured regualarly and appears to be suffering from lack of regualr 1st team football. He has never been the quickest and needs regular games. We have not seen the best of him this season and his sending off was very unprofessional.

Chris Clark
He seemed to be the next David Norris but he fell out of the team and out of favour towards the end of the season. He has always looked good to me but possibly lacks the necessary strength.

Yoann Folly
Barely has he featured and when he has he has not particularly impressed. Towards the end of the season he couldn’t even get a reserve game. I don’t think we will see him in green again.

Steven MacLean
I think he is a good player who needs a footballing side around him. For much of the season that has not been us and he has suffered as a result. He is not a crowd favourite and it would probably be best for evrrybody were he to go.

Jermaine Easter
He hasn’t looked up to it since he arrived. He works as hard as anybody I have ever seen but just lacks what is needed at this level. He asked to leave then decided to stay and has been out on loan. He needs to be in somebody’s 1st XI (but not ours).

Paul Gallagher
He has been brilliant.

Green Army

At home they have sometimes embarassed me but away they have been as good as ever. Did we lose 10 home games because of this or did those defeats cause the losses. Desperately needs to improve or we will go down

Mathias Doumbe
He doesn’t appear to have the Luggy’s trust to me. Hasn’t been helped by playing out of position at right back or by getting plenty of advice from the crowd. I still think him and Seip could be as good a partnership as any in the division but that is obviously not going to happen. He’s been a loyal servant and the longest-lasting of Williamson’s acquisitions but he needs to be in somebody’s 1st XI (but not ours).

Rory Fallon
I think he has done well over all. Many of the complaints aimed at him are, I feel, misplaced. He needs more goals and less fouls.

Chris Barker
He has quietly gone about his business and has proved himself to be an excellent no fuss defender at both centre and left back. Doesn’t offer much offensively but is clearly a Luggy favourite.

David McNamee
He has been injured so much that it is impossible to judge him. I think he is probably the best right back we have when fit.

Craig Noone

Excites in every reserve match and scored a crucial goal at Coventry. Has the potential to be a real crowd pleaser.

Gary Sawyer
Injured for the first part of the season but has been a fixture at left back since he got fit. Has scored a commendable number of gaols too. I have always doubted him but he is winning me over.

Marcel Seip
Very rarely makes a boo-boo and the CB next to him always looks good. A class act.

Luke Summerfield
He’s got bottle by the bucket-load as shown by his stepping forward for penalty duties and will need it to flourish under the pressure put upon him by some in the crowd. I think he needs to leave for his own sake but that almost amounts to him being hounded out of the club and that just has to be wrong. He’s not as good as he would like to be and not as bad as some make out.

Graham Stack
Bad boy #1 if rumours are true. He’ll never play again for us as long as Luggy is at the club but impressed in our first few games.

Alan Judge
Small, busy and effective. Like Norris but with end product.

Ashley Barnes
Came into the 1st Team and did well. Gets right in the faces of the opposition and will chase everything; if he can deliver 10 goals next season he has a bright future.

Jamie Mackie
From the moment he scored twice after coming on as a sub last season he has been a firm crowd favourite. He scored the goal of the season versus Reading and has played in nearly every game. He needs to score more and if he is to continue playing out wide he needs to be able to beat his full back and I don’t think he has done that all season.

Yannick Bolasie
(on loan to Barnet )
I haven’t seen him play but he seems to have featured regularly for Barnet

Lloyd Saxton
Difficult to comment. Has played 1st Team football and has been in a dominant reserve team when I have seen him play.

Carl Fletcher
Added exactly what had been missing to our midfield.

Damien McCrory
I have never seen him play.

Dan Smith
Has been released which is a shame. I hope he finds a club because he has always looked good to me.

Emile Mpenza
Scored a couple of goals which turned out to be very important but has not justified his reported £10k/week wage . We will never see him again in green.

David Gray

Has looked solid but unspectacular. Perfect right back material.

George Donnelly
Very, very raw. Needs 12 months.

Roudolphe Douala
He came, he saw, he got subbed, he was released.

Nicolas Marin

Was never really given a chance and was released. How different the season might have been had he thrived.

Jason Puncheon

I have never seen him play. Signed from Barnet, played a couple of times and was dropped. Loaned to MK Dons where he played every match and seemed to do well. Came back and straight into our team. Dropped. Back to MKD. What is going on here?

Paul Sturrock (Manager)

Needs to do better next season. This season clearly did not pan out as he had hoped and not only were tactics jettisoned but he wasn’t able to play what was probably our strongest possible line-up which would have probably included Stack, Walton, Mpenza and McNamee at the start of the season once which could not have helped. His biggest problem has been the lack of leadership in the midfield. I can’t help but think that if he knew then what he knows now that Paul Wotton would not have been released. There was rumoured to be long pursuits of 3 players who did not arrive: the Austrian Saumel (went to Torino in the end), Man Utd youngster Darron Gibson and Carl Fletcher. We can only speculate as to why none of them came but maybe Luggy was let down by the budget? Who knows but that lack of recruitment in that area has haunted us all season more than anything else and probably lies at the root of all of our problems.

If we are to strengthen, and surely we must, then players will have to go to free up budget and we might be unhappy about some of those who do leave. I think we will see a team built around Larrieu, Barker, Sawyer, Seip, Mackie and Barnes which leaves plenty of scope for recruitment.

Conclusion:

The season has been one where we have been tested almost to destruction but we have come through. We are horribly under-resourced compared to most of our competitors and every season that we spend in this division is to be commended. We stayed up and we stayed up with 5 points, 4 games, 3 weeks, 2 (can’t think of a “2”) and 1 place to spare. It would be nice for the barrier to be a bit bigger next season.

There I got all the way to the end without once mentioning Arsenal.

[I have to give credit to Greens On Screen/Semper Viridis as the source for most of the facts and figures. There is a link on the right hand side of the page.]

2007/8 Squad Compared To 2008/9 Squad

2009-05-26T02:06:00.002+01:00

I wrote this back on 13th August 2008:

How does the squad compare now to this time last season?

I have compiled a list of every player that played for us in a competitive match last year. There was 38 players used by us in total last year in total with Paul Connelly (no longer with us) leading the way with 42 league appearances and Ryan Dickson the lanterne rouge as they say in the Tour De France (lanterne verte, perhaps?) with one substitute appearance in the League Cup.

Here is the complete list of starting and substitute appearances for last season:

	Start	Sub
Paul Connolly	42	0
Peter Halmosi	41	2
Krisztian Timar	36	2
Lilian Nalis	35	5
Marcel Seip	32	2
Luke McCormick	30	0
Gary Sawyer	28	3
David Norris	27	0
Nadjim Abdou	22	9
Lee Hodges	20	7
Sylvan Ebanks-Blake	19	6
Jermaine Easter	20	12
Barry Hayles	21	2
Romain Larrieu	15	0
Rory Fallon	13	16
Steven MacLean	14	3
Russell Anderson	14	0
Mathias Doumbe	10	2
Akos Buzsaky	8	3
Lee Martin	10	2
Chris Clark	8	4
Gary Teale	8	4
Luke Summerfield	5	2
James Paterson	7	1
Nick Chadwick	3	6
Dan Gosling	5	5
Paul Wotton	5	3
Jamie Mackie	4	9
Lukas Jutkiewicz	1	2

The purpose of this is to compare this season with last so many of them arrived during the season so I’ll remove them and the fringe youngsters. That leaves 23 senior pros:

	Start	Sub
Paul Connolly	42	0
Peter Halmosi	41	2
Krisztian Timar	36	2
Lilian Nalis	35	5
Marcel Seip	32	2
Luke McCormick	30	0
Gary Sawyer	28	3
David Norris	27	0
Nadjim Abdou	22	9
Barry Hayles	21	2
Lee Hodges	20	7
Jermaine Easter	20	12
Sylvan Ebanks-Blake	19	6
Romain Larrieu	15	0
Rory Fallon	13	16
Mathias Doumbe	10	2
Lee Martin	10	2
Akos Buzsaky	8	3
Luke Summerfield	5	2
Dan Gosling	5	5
Paul Wotton	5	3
Nick Chadwick	3	6
Bojan Djordic	1	1

Most strikingly obvious is that 3 of the top 4 (or 4 out of the top 6) in terms of appearances are no longer here. Indeed many are no longer here. Just who do we have left?

	Start	Sub
Krisztian Timar	36	2
Marcel Seip	32	2
Gary Sawyer	28	3
Jermaine Easter	20	12
Romain Larrieu	15	0
Rory Fallon	13	16
Mathias Doumbe	10	2
Luke Summerfield	5	2

We now have only 9 (!) of the players who started last season and there has to be apprehension as to the prospects of 2 of them.

There is little point in comparing those players to themselves though. None of them has age as an issue so I will assume that they have benefited from experience and training and are actually slightly better players than they were this time last year.

So what about those who have left since then and their replacements? I have matched them up type for type and assessed as best as I can.

L McCormick	GK	Stack	equal
P Connolly	RB	McNamee	now
L Hodges	LB	Barker	now
P Halmosi	LW	Puncheon	then
L Nalis	MID	Walton	now
D Norris	MID	Clark	then
A Buzsaky	MID	Paterson	then
D Gosling	MID	Folly	then
P Wotton	MID	Duguid	equal
S Ebanks-Blake	CF	MacLean	then
N Chadwick	CF	Mackie	now
Martin	loan	Cathcart	equal
N Abdou
B Djordjic
B Hayles

I would say we are now stronger in 4 positions, weaker in 5 and the same in 3. I have matched Cathcart and Martin due to then both being Man Utd loanees.

There are 3 places unfilled but how much impact did any of them have on last season? It could be argued that they do not need filling although noises from HP suggest that more players may yet follow and I am confident that the 3 replacements for them will be better footballers. Is it asking too much for them to provide the flair that old favourites did?

So despite the incredible churn rate, the illnesses, the agents, the mismanagement of Holloway, the tragedy… In fact despite it all we are currently looking in a not dissimilar position to last season. We have lost the flair that Halmosi and Buszaky brought to the side but we have gained much in other areas and we may yet get that flair back.

It looks like a good squad to me but what we really need is the icing on the cake. We need to find players to provide the spark that Buzz, SEB and Halmosi provided. Will we see that from Puncheon, Clark or MacLean? I don’t know but neither dies anybody else.

If we do not add to the squad still further I think the year on year improvement that we have enjoyed will come to end but there is no way that I see this squad of players as being in danger of relegation.

I don’t like predictions much but I'll make one regardless. I think we will finish 12th if we do not add to the squad.

With the prospect of Japanese players to be added in January could it be that we have another season on the fringes of the play off race. If we do will we be able to make that step up this time?

That was updated to on 2nd September 08:

It looks like a good squad to me but what we really need is the icing on the cake. We need to find players to provide the spark that Buzz, SEB and Halmosi provided. Will we see that from Puncheon, Clark or MacLean? I don’t know but neither dies anybody else.

That was a part of my summing up on the earlier post comparing the squads. On balance I felt that the squad was stronger but had less spark, verve and quality at the upper reaches. We were down on numbers too with Abdou, Djordic and Hayles not yet matched up.

That has since changed somewhat with the arrivals of Craig Noone, Paul Gallagher, Nicolas Marin and Emile Mpenza (and yes I did have to look up their Christian names). Each of them bursting with promise.

Time will tell whether or not they deliver but there does seem to be quality there. Gallagher has been knocking around the premiership for some time now; Mpenza has over 50 caps and has played 25 games in the PL last season and is a hard running, very direct striker with not a little pace; Marin is on the fringe of the French team and there is a simply brilliant goal that he scored on youtube (please excuse the French commentary):

Noone? Another with pace and promise.

We have lost quality in the squad with the departures of Halmosi, Buszaky, SEB and Norris but we seem to have matched that with the arrivals of Puncheon and the recent arrivals.

Against the backdrop of all of this then it appears that we are on the brink of losing Jermaine Easter and Rory Fallon appears to be the only option as a target man. To be honest I think both would struggle to figure other than as subs anyway. Easter, in particular, seems to be another Chadwick and despite busting every sinew to deliver he just doesn't quite have it in him. He has been straining as hard as he could to do what he has done so far and that is precious little.

Fallon? He remains an enigma. He has the equipment and his goal scoring record is good but he does not inspire much hope that he could bang in 20 a season and his ball retention, and marking at corners, is lacking.

No matter. I think the new additions have been expertly judged and very welcome. We have abundant formation options and despite still being weak in the centre of midfield the prospect of Japanese reinforcements in January may give us a boost and there is an enduring Glen Whelan rumour which just will not go away and Stoke seem to have hoovered up every availably midfielder and so Whelan has slipped down their pecking order.

All of a sudden the future looks very promising and improvement on last season is very possible and (dare I whisper it?) we do not have to go on very far to hit a play-off spot.

Fleece the bookies and get your money on Argyle being an end of season play-off team now!

I’ll review what I wrote back then at a later date.

Ambition

2009-05-24T21:37:00.004+01:00

“Ambition” must be very near the top of my pet hates. “The club has no ambition” they say; “The Board has no ambition” they say; “Stapleton has no ambition” they say; “You have no ambition” they say. What a load of old poppycock.

I’m sorry to lapse into football cliché-speak but any ambition beyond “taking each game as it comes” and “trying to win every game” is little more than hot air. Naturally there is a bigger picture to be considered than that and the club should always be planning towards it and quite simply that has to be to always improve both on and off the pitch. This is easier said than done too and relies upon resources and a strong case can be made to prioritise investment in the playing staff, the stadium, the training facilities and the scouting network. The sad truth is that we need massive improvements in all of those areas but we do not have the finance to do it all at once.

We need to assess “ambition” in terms of short-, mid-, and long-term goals so I’ll lay out exactly what I would like to see from Argyle in terms of “ambition” to fit those criteria.

Short-term ambition: Fulfil the clichés I have already mentioned ~ anything else is ludicrous to set as a goal of any sort. We should always try to win the next game.

Mid-term ambition: That has to be to get to 52 points as soon as possible because 52 points should see us safe from relegation. If/when we get there we re-assess and see if the secondary target of a play-off spot is possible. If it is then how can we get from there to a promotion slot. If we get there can we win the League?

Long-term ambition: Ultimately where would I like to see the club? That is easy. I want Argyle to represent far more than the City of Plymouth; I’d like to see it represent Devon & Cornwall and maybe even the entire SW peninsula or the entire Westcountry. I want to see us at the very top of everything and when we get there I want to see us stylishly grind everybody else into dust. I want to see Argyle winning the League Cup, FA Cup, Premier League and Champions’ League and when we have done that I want to see us do it again but add the Charity Shield and that silly FIFA thing where the Champions of Europe play the Champions of South America, Asia, Africa etc too. I want JJB to sell Argyle shirts in the Trafford Centre and beyond. I want kids on the streets of Exeter, London, Manchester, Liverpool and elsewhere to play there park football in an Argyle kit. I want those same kids to mercilessly rib the locals about supporting a bunch of has-beens like Liverpool, Manchester United or Chelsea and shrug off jibes about being “Plastic Wannabes” without so much as a second thought. I want Argyle to be the Pride Of Singapore and Shanghai. I want to see us play in a 100 000 capacity all-seater stadium (possibly bigger) that is also used for England’s home games. I want us to be spoken of in revered terms like the Busby Babes, Billy Wright’s Wolves, the Spurs push-and-runners, 1970 Brazil, Holland’s Total Footballers or Celtic’s Lisbon Lions (in fact like the Lisbon Lions I would also like to see the team comprised entirely of players born within 30 miles of Plymouth too) and I would like the 2nd best team in the country to be our Reserves.

I think that should be enough to show those who say I have no ambition that they could not be more wrong.

Conkers

2009-05-23T00:15:00.004+01:00

Trees. Conker trees. Or to be more accurate Horse Chestnut trees are wonderful, wondrous things. I‘ve always loved them ~ perhaps rather more than is logical ~ going all the way back to that mad scramble for the conker that fell naturally from the tree in our school playground all those years ago. We used to gather beneath the tree and await yet further proof of gravity’s intransigent effects (Apples? Sir Henry Newton? Pah!!) and we did so with all the fervour and expectancy that only the exuberance and unfettered hope of early childhood can bring. The modern day obsession with health and safety was not for us as we risked life and limb, or at least a nasty bang on the noggin, firstly by being struck by the much sought after nut as it plummeted with ever increasing velocity along a course the randomness of which could only have come from a series of ricochets earthwards and secondly in the madcap scramble to be first to pick it up as it bounced away shedding bits of outer shell like shrapnel as it did. Just one false move and the race was lost as was the prize which went elsewhere.

Loads of kids. One conker. It was a metaphor in many ways for a lifetime as an Argyle fan. The long wait, the hope, the thrill, the occasional wondrous victory and the more common feeling of disappointment as one of the bigger boys barged me out of the way before claiming the prize. “Never mind” I would tell myself. “There’s always next time".

As I got older and conkers became less important to me the trees on which they grew began to lend a not inconsiderable influence on my childhood. I climbed them and sheltered under them from both rain and sun with the foliage offering equally good protection against each. I guess the great indigenous deciduous trees are similar in many ways but the conker tree was always the greatest out of them all. OK ~ so oak trees have acorns… Great. Sorry not even the glimmer of a buzz about that fine though they may be. Beech trees? Lots of nuts. Popular enough as they are, and I’m sure that they have their own supporters, but they just do not compare. I am neither a pig nor a squirrel and they just merge into the background with all the rest of our native deciduous trees and don’t even get me started on conifers. Conifers are always the same. What is the point of them? Dull, dull, dull, dull, dull! Begone you nefarious interlopers you play no part in this tale!!

Conker trees just grow so big. I mean really big. Often not just the tallest tree in the forest or park but usually the one that spreads it’s branches the farthest too. Does the oak tree have a “Macarena” (a song with a dance to match that is) of its own? No it does not and neither do any of the others. It offers the most delicious shade on the hottest of days in the summer and keeps the rain off, too, for about half of the year. If you spit on a leaf and squish it up a bit it oozes a soapy slime that will do to wash your hands too should an emergency arise and the wood is just perfect for carving a Long John Silver style wooden leg should you need to but I digress...

The conker tree for me defines the passing of time and relates intimately to the rhythms of each football season as each passes through its own pre-ordained cycle just as it must in order to justify its very existence.

The start of the pre-season sees the conker tree at is mightiest and most powerful. It is a truly majestic sight and stands proud just as our hopes for the coming season do. Full of swagger and bravado as each and every tiny breeze ruffles its leaves just as each leaf somehow, magically, inexorably tracks the sun on its celestial journey. It is at this time that the tree is working at its hardest as its root structure acting as a scouting network as it searches out every last precious drop of moisture just as a football scout searches for every morsel of talent. That Special One must be out there awaiting discovery and the bigger the scouting network the better just as the biggest and best root system divines for the precious water that will sustain the parent tree.

Gradually over the course of the close season the conkers start to appear on the tree. Small at first their shells eventually turn from green to brown and start to get spikey as they enlarge. The nut inside the outer shell swells as it packs as much of the energy siphoned from sun and soil as it can into its kernel. In a way the tree is doing its pre-season training. It is the work done now that will pay off in due course. That conker needs to be fighting fit if it is to germinate and produce a new sapling.

The small boys delight in the conkers that fall in September and October and progress for the rest of the season can be set in these two months for any team. A few good wins and anything is possible. Several defeats and a long, hard struggle awaits. The turmoil and upheaval of these months is really quite spectacular and the difference between winning a game and losing is huge with so few points posted at such an early stage. If we are lucky the points will fall upon us just as the treasured nuts fall onto the autumnal pastures beneath the trees that performed the miracle that produces them.

The tree then begins to shed its leaves. There is a sadness about this time of the year as the days get shorter, darker, cooler and wetter. The fallen leaves mulch, line gutters, block drains and make roads slippery but all is not doom and gloom because it also means the FA Cup is about to start and the 1st Round of that must surely add a spring to the step of any true football fan.

The long, hard slog for both football fan and tree that is winter follows. More horrid weather and ever shortening days. Gales and foul weather abound as the tree is beset by wind, rain and frost. The tree bears it all with great stoicism just as the football fan does. Just as surely our brave boys are battling against their own adversity as every team strives to get a jump on the other twenty-two and the twenty-two are all hell bent on doing all they can to foul it up for the one that is ours. The conker tree is at it’s leanest at this stage. No buds, flowers, leaves or conkers as it stands dormant and thinking solely of its own survival. Nothing extraneous with which to over complicate the job in hand. Nothing to place greater strain upon it than needs be. The tree will bend and give in acknowledgement to the greater powers that beset it but it still stands defiant knowing that better days are soon to come.

Eventually the first sticky buds arrive, the days begin to lengthen and the FA Cup hits Round 3 and as it does so it signals the sharpest end of the football season. Will it be glory or disaster? Just as fate of our team hurtles headlong into destiny so the tree goes into overdrive. First buds, then leaves, then the flowers which will drop their tiny little pink petals all over your car and make it all sticky if you park beneath it at the wrong time. The flowers on the tree come with the end of the season for the ordinary football team, player and supporter. There may be a summer tournament but they usually happen overseas oblivious to the eternal cycles of birth, death and rebirth that are so familiar to football fans, arborealogists and little boys alike. Slowly, almost imperceptibly the conkers, hidden by the millions of leaves are born.

Next time you stroll up through Central Park from the Barn Park entrance and wander through the avenue of conker trees wonder at them too. Beautiful though they are in any season their life cycle is part of yours and of our club’s. In the struggle for both success and survival they echo each other more than you might think just as that mad playground scramble for the fallen conker echoes our hopes and dreams.

Sadly there is a sting to my idle musing. I have regularly walked that path for decades man and boy and not once have I ever seen a conker from any of those trees. Perhaps there’s a metaphor there too.

Let 'Em In For Nothing (once anyway)

2009-05-22T00:09:00.004+01:00

Here's an idea and I don't think it is anything like as daft as it seems. I think we should try a game where admission is free and totally without charge and there should be no hidden booking fees or anything like that.

"Madness!! How could we afford that?" I hear you cry. Well I think it could actually make us some money but it would need a little careful planning and some follow-up. Let me explain...

Attendances in football grounds up and down the country are down. Last season Argyle averaged only 11533 which is about 1500 down on the previous season. We need to get more fans into the ground and we need to build up some goodwill amongst Plymouth's wider population and I think we could use a free game to do this.

Let's do some fag packet maths here and try to assess the financial impact. Firstly we choose a game where the attendance is likely to be low anyway. This would mean that any game which is the second in a week would be a target or maybe a midweek game when there is Champions' League football on the TV, a game in the depths of the winter when the weather is likely to be bad or the last home game before Christmas. It is difficult to choose right now when the fixtures aren't yet known but you get the idea: choose the game with the least attractive opposition, the fewest in terms of travelling support and at a time that maximises the general inconvenience of attending. Personally I would go for the pre-Christmas game as long as it isn't against glamourous opposition and sell the event as a Christmas present to the City Of Plymouth from Argyle. It would be a huge PR coup and set up the games over the festive period nicely. The pre-Christmas game last season was against QPR and attracted 10,747 by way of comparison. It's difficult to assess gate revenue but assuming that 7000 were ST holders who had long since paid leaves 3747 paying on average £20 each at a guess. That makes a potential "cost" of nearly £75k for letting in people FOC.

Except it would not cost that much at all. There would be all sorts of subsidiary benefits to the idea. If 20000 people could be enticed along then they would but lots of programmes, eat lots of pasties or crisps or mars bars, buy lots of merchandise (Christmas is just around the corner remember) and drink lots of pints of beer or cups of bovril. All of that would start to pay back the £75k.

How about the rest? Well you do not just open the gates and let everybody in. They would have to apply for a ticket. This could be done via post, email or in person providing that a real and verifiable name and address (or email address) and some basic personal details were provided. This could be secured by filling out a simple application form. The club can then cross-reference that against existing known customers in the club's fan database which has been built up over the years consisting of people who have bought away tickets, season tickets, ordered merchandise by post etc and any of them ignored or assigned to a sub-category. The names that remain would be those who are interested enough to be turn up and actually go to a game but are not true fans who bust a gut to get to any match they can anyway.

These people should then be targeted via either post or email and given a free ticket for their birthday, maybe 2 for a wedding anniversary, if they have kids then issue free tickets for any reason you can think of to little Johnny because then an adult or two will have to go to take him too (especially if they are out-of-towners).

If we look at £25 for a matchday ticket then we only need to get 3000 of those fans back in the ground over the course of a season to get that £75k back. I think any marketing department worth its salt should be able to get an extra 3000 fans in over the course of a season and when they do that initial £75k hit will be paid back (and more given the other trade that would be boosted) after all we have, on average, nearly 10k empty seats to fill in each game so what harm would a few free tickets do?

Of course I may be wrong. It may be a complete disaster and the ground might not fill at all. Well you'll know whether it will or not in advance due to ticket applications. If it does not then let people pay cash on the day and that'll recoup some of the expense too. Alternatively they might only go once and that is it in which case the £75k is lost. Well that is a risk that is worth taking to get the details of those casuals who just might be converted into fans. Argyle is a company with turnover of nearly £10m it ought to be able to withstand a one-off £75k hit if the idea was a complete failure as long as it was planned as part of an overall strategy especially when you consider that more was given to Emile Mpenza in only 8 weeks.

"What about ST holders?" will be the other objection. Well give them a £20 voucher for the club shop in recompense. That'll keep them sweet and cost the club relatively little and if they spend more then a bit more of that £75k is recovered and the club is quids in yet again.

An interesting secondary benefit would be that we would find out once and for all whether or not ticket pricing had a direct effect on attendances as some maintain ~ maybe it does (I don't think so but I don't know for sure any more than anybody else). One thing is certain and that's if we can't get the fans in when it is free short of paying them to go we have done all, possibly more, than might reasonably be expected to find out if we really do have any of that famed potential.

It's a radical idea. It might be a disaster but think of the free publicity, the commercial positives, the goodwill generated and if that big crowd generated a good result just how valuable the 3 points gained might be.

Ian Holloway: One Year On

2009-05-21T16:02:00.005+01:00

Ian Holloway is about to start at Blackpool.

The following words are not my own but are retrieved from www.vital.plymouth.football (although I have corrected the odd grammatical error and tinkered with format) via Google cache so I won't bother linking to a page which has been withdrawn and no longer exists...

It was one year ago today that Ian Holloway walked out on Plymouth Argyle to become the new manager at Leicester City.

Holloway's defection to the Walkers Stadium left Argyle in turmoil; his departure was totally unexpected.

Plymouth Argyle fans thought that Ian Holloway was something different.

The former Queens Park Rangers manager often spoke about loyalty and his love of the Argyle fans - the Green Army. He spoke with a passion, he spoke of leading Argyle to the Premier League and his frequent rallying of calls to arms were legendary.
Argyle fans bought into Holloway's enthusiasm, they believed that he was 'the one', a good honest guy who we can all stand beside, shoulder to shoulder.
The Bristolian was the Green pied piper, preaching loyalty to not only the fans but the players as well.

We took it all in, devouring every last drop at the temple of Ian Holloway.

Except that Holloway's words were just sound bites for an eager reporter, blatant self-promotion to grab a headline or two. His promises were empty, his musings were false and his vision for Plymouth Argyle built on deception.

Managers come and go, that's expected in football but Holloway was different, he pledged allegiance to the Green cause, three weeks before he left Home Park a national newspaper reported that Holloway was unhappy at Argyle, stating that he had become disillusioned at Home Park but Holloway was quick to dismiss the speculation, calling it 'poppycock'. This is what he said about the newspaper report, just ten days before he walked out on Argyle:

'Ask anybody who knows me how I feel about Plymouth Argyle and they will tell you the truth.'

'If you need me to say it again, I'm in love with the place. It's absolutely magnificent.

'Ask my players who I'm trying to talk into staying here how Ian Holloway feels about Plymouth Argyle. I think they will tell you the truth.

'It's all poppycock! It's absolutely pathetic.

'But the media is a very powerful thing and, unfortunately, a rumour can become a bigger rumour.'

When asked about the Leicester City rumour Holloway again poured scorn on such lunacy, he said: 'There's not a scrap of truth in any of it.'

After saying all that Holloway left Argyle just 10 days later, amazing isn't it?

There might have been problems behind the scenes at Home Park and financial promises made to Holloway by the Argyle board may been broken or delayed but does that justify Holloway walking away from a job that rescued him from the scrap-heap?
Holloway knew full well the tight financial restraints that the Pilgrims operate under but still the board backed the manager and provided him with the funds to break Argyle's transfer record not once but three times!

So who has had the last laugh?

Leicester were relegated to the third tier of English football for the first time in their history and Holloway was sacked.
Meanwhile, new Argyle boss Paul Sturrock had to deal with an exodus of players during the January transfer window but was still able to steer Argyle to 10th place in the Championship.

Today, 12 months on, Argyle are sitting pretty in 9th place in the league - ready for a push at the play-offs, while Holloway remains unemployed as a manager.

Those quotes he gave the Herald really should not be allowed to be lost so I have copied this onto my blog for posterity.

Amazing Grace/New England

2008-09-15T12:44:00.003+01:00

I have found another downloadable Jonathan Richman track. This time it's Amazing Grace from waaaaaaay back in '76.

Jonathan Richman: Amazing Grace

Here's where I blagged it from:

http://sixsongs.blogspot.com/2008/09/johns-jonathan-richman.html

I have also found a clip from around the same time of Jonathan performing New England with The Modern Lovers on Top Of The Pops:

Hop Farm Re-Visited And Some Other Reviews

2008-07-09T23:15:00.005+01:00

Here is an attempt to re-create the performance by Neil Young via the medium of You Tube!!

Love And Only Love:

Hey Hey, My My (Into The Black:

Everybody Knows This Is Nowhere:

I've Been Waiting For You:

Spirit Road:

Oh Lonesome Me:

Old Man:

Introducing The Band:

Get Back To The Country:

A Day In The Life:

Review from The Independent

Amiable? He didn't see the gig the way I did!!

More comments here:

Thrasherswheat - a blog

The NotW!!

liammacuid - a blog

Uncut

Neil Young At The Hop Farm

2008-07-08T23:41:00.011+01:00

I don’t really know where to start about the day there are so many conflicting things that I want to say and no obvious way for me to knit them together. I’ll go for chronological order and see how it goes.

I have a been a huge fan of Neil Young’s ever since I was on holiday as a kid and staying with relatives in Portsmouth. Whilst up there we went on a day trip to the Isle of Wight and whilst there I was nosing around in a record shop and my Dad offered to buy me a record. The one I chose pretty much at random was Rust Never Sleeps which was a newly released at the time. Carried the bag around with great pride all day eager to get back to Uncle Frank’s and listen to it. From the first few bars of the solo acoustic My My, Hey Hey (Out of the Blue) to the closing of the wall of noise which was My My, Hey Hey (Into The Black) I was hooked. I loved the album. I was also deeply impressed that my older cousins liked it too. I loved the art work, the printed lyric sheet, the fact that one side was so gentle and so melodic and that the other side was so cacophonous. There was a dichotomy here that I did not understand. I did not need to. I just loved it to bits.

I was 14 at the time. Punk was all the rage (1979) and here was something that stood comparison, half of the time at least, with the anger, the energy, the rawness but there was far more there besides. I had to explore further and I did. Being a kid I had, basically, no money and the cash to buy an LP in those days was something that had to be acquired over time and once it was acquired it had to be very carefully spent. I went to a City Centre school and we used to have extraordinarily long lunchtimes – almost 2 hours – and it offered the opportunity to browse record shops at some length. Arcadia in the now demolished and replaced Drake’s Circus was the favourite because it was closest and NY’s extensive back catalogue was available to me except for Decade which as a triple album was always too expensive to consider. Even back then there was over a dozen albums to choose from. Eventually I did what all cash strapped kids since time began had decided to do and bought the cheapest one. Luckily that was After The Goldrush. The first two NY albums I bought were bona fide all-time classics. I was mesmerised.

Once I was 16 I started going to gigs. Concerts in Plymouth were rare in those days. More accurately concerts I could go to were rare. Most gigs took place in pubs and clubs and I was too young to go to them. This became an irrelevance once the Cornwall Coliseum opened down in Carlyon Bay. At the time it was the 6th biggest indoor venue in the country and every major touring act went there and my baptism came when I went to see Black Sabbath. It was at that gig that I got matey with Plymouth DJ Andy Howard. He used to make a bit of money on the side organising concert travel and he asked if I would be a coach rep for him. No wages but free travel and entry to the gig!! You bet I would. I saw loads of bands over a 12 month period but the real highlight came when I was asked if I would take a coach to Wembley to see Neil Young. Neil Young? Wembley Arena? Free of charge? You bet!!

At the time NY was touring the Trans album (if you elect to give one of his albums a miss make it this one or maybe Landing On Water). It was an awesome experience. Utterly magical. I didn’t ever really realise how good live music could be until then. It remains the best concert I ever saw. He played many songs that I didn’t know but it made no difference. If there was any disappointment it was that he didn’t play any acoustic stuff. There was vocorder stuff and then there was a raunch through the electric back catalogue. His band included Nils Lofgren… for a fan of guitar based rock music it was a fantastic evening and I have discovered a website (http://www.sugarmtn.org) that has the set list for that night back in ’82:

On The Way Home / Don't Cry No Tears / Everybody Knows This Is Nowhere / Cortez The Killer / Computer Age / Are You Ready For The Country? / Southern Man / A Little Thing Called Love / Old Man / The Needle And The Damage Done / Comes A Time / Birds / Transformer Man / Beggars Day / Like An Inca / Hey Hey, My My / Cinnamon Girl / Like A Hurricane / I Am A Child / Sample And Hold / Mr. Soul

(At least that’s what I think it was. It turns out he did 3 nights and I can’t remember which one I went to.)

I’ve been longing to see him in concert again ever since.

Since then the opportunity just never arose to go again. This is in no small part, I suspect, to living in Plymouth. Somebody like him is never likely to come to our part of the world and getting tickets for gigs up the line was always difficult in pre-internet days. For one reason or another it just never happened. Never even came close to happening.

One day recently I was reading the Observer and there was an ad. Neil Young at Manchester, Edinburgh and London. Yes!! I thought. There was a website. I am on-line. Sadly the tickets had gone. They were available through ticket agencies (that’s what used to be touts to you and me) at prices upwards of £200. That’s a lot of money to pay for a single act gig. Too much.

The disappointment was short-lived. The Hop Farm gig was lined up soon afterwards. Yes!! I could go. The only problem was that I had nobody to go with and that Kent was a long way away. I asked around… "Where?" "Kent." "When?" "July." "What date?" "Sunday the 6th" “A Sunday? Kent? No – work the day after.” It was conversation I had more than once. No takers. I resigned myself to not going until fate intervened.

Readers of this blog will be aware that my Dad died last week in the small hours of Tuesday morning. I’m sure I don’t need to describe the sort of week I have had in any detail. It has been a desperately horrible time. Out of the blue I received an email from an old college mate. We were really close back along but he has been abroad for several years and now lives in Kuala Lumpur. "I’ll be back in Blighty next week. Fancy meeting up?" Emails were exchanged and he said that he was staying at Bromley in Kent. "Fancy going to see Neil young?" I asked and a plan started to come together.

There were two problems. Work and weather. I was supposed to be working on the Monday following the gig and the weather forecast was for heavy rain. For the first time in what had seemed like a long time something fell my way and I had to call off work anyway. Weather apart there was no reason not to go. A Saturday tea-time phone discussion followed. “Blustery” he said. “Let’s do it.” I said.

I was up at 6:30 am, showered and hit the road. It was bucketing down. If you are ever going to drive anywhere in this country then do it at 7am on a Sunday. Hardly a car on the road. The only problem was the rain and my footwear. It was completely unsuitable for what loomed ahead. Wellies. That was what I needed so I thought I’d stop somewhere along the way to get some. As 10 am approached I was nearing Andover. "Big enough to have a super market and a garden centre" I thought. "Here will do." As I drove into Andover Andy rang me.

This had been pre-arranged. If he rang me en route the day was off. He wasn’t going. I feared for the worst but had not managed to get to my phone in time to speak to him. I carried on into Andover and parked up at Asda, had breakfast, went to the loo, put some credit on my phone and bought a paper; then I tried to ring him.

Disaster. "This number is barred." His Malaysian mobile network (I had put 20 quid on) seemed to have only a one-way arrangement with mine. He could ring me but I could not ring him. I rang home and got Mrs B to try him on a landline. No luck there either. What to do?

I decided to track down a pair of wellies anyway and found a Garden Centre which was on the road back to Salisbury (i.e. in the wrong direction) and located a pair of wellies. I had a cup of tea. Read the paper. Waited and waited. Surely he'd ring me back. He did. Eventually. We were still on!!

"I'll be about 2 hours" I guessed, as it turned out rather hopefully, bought some wellies and was off. The delay had cost me nearly 2 hours. Little did I realise how lucky I was. The traffic on the 303 was now far busier. The rain was still teeming down. The 303 turned into the M3. The M3 ground to a stop. Stop-start-stop-start all way onto the M25. Another hour lost. More torrential rain. Loads of phone calls: "are you here yet?"

Eventually I got there and was directed into Car Park Red 26. There was only one way in and one way out of The Hop Farm and, though I did not realise it, I was right on the outer periphery of the site. I met Andy and in we went. We'd missed half of the bill: Everest, Laura Marling (Andy saw her: "some dreary woman" was his verdict),and Guillemots finished just as we got there. Still it rained and rained but I was prepared!! I had wellies on my feet, a good waterproof on and an umbrella too.

Anybody could have been on stage to be honest. It was so long since we had seen each other that there was loads of catching up to do. We found some shelter in the lee of a line of toilet cubicles (no smell - too cold and wet), put the brolly up and chewed the fat as you do in such circumstances. Rufus Wainwright came on and did a solo slot at his piano wearing a hat. He seemed a bit on the earnest side to me but a half-interested audience in the pouring rain was never going to favour his set. I didn't even notice him much to be honest other than his between song proclamation from the stage that he was gay. I don't think he could have told more less concerned people if he tried. I was puzzled. Is that a thing that makes any difference these days? "So what Rufus? I can live with it if you can." I thought.

Something rather wonderful did happen during his last song (Hallejujah which I am sure is a Leonard Cohen cover but no matter) though. The rain not only stopped but the sun broke through the clouds. There was a cheer from the crowd. Things suddenly looked much better.

My Morning Jacket came on and did their stuff. Andy and I continued to chat. They were OK but the sound system did them no favours. "Blustery" Andy had said it would be and it was. They did their best and seemed to try hard. It just was not the venue or occasion for them but the wind that blew the sound away actually seemed to dry the whole place up in no time. I guess that chalky Kentish soil helps too. If that had been Glastonbury or Elephant then the whole place would have been under mud for the duration.

Supergrass came on and did their bit with great enthusiasm and actually got the crowd going a little for the first time since the sun came out during RW's set. They ended up with the one you just knew they would. They perked everybody up. A bite to eat and a sit down on the now dry ground was most welcome too. The main event drew near. "It's time to start getting near the front" I said and we made our way into the main throng.

Primal Scream were pretty good I must say. They had the PA up a bit louder and did as damned fine a rock 'n' roll set as you could wish to see. I'm sure this has been said before but they didn't half remind me of The Rolling Stones at times. They also continued the theme of facial hair and ever ageing groups. These boys made Supergrass look like kids and, yes, they too ended up with the ones you'd hope they would. Their set list was:

Can't Go Back/Dolls/Jailbird/Beautiful Future/I'm Losing More Than I'll Ever Have/Suicide Bomb/Beautiful Summer/Shoot Speed,Kill Light/Swastika Eyes/Rocks/Movin' On Up

They are not a band that I know that well but I'd love to them indoors. I reckon they'd really kick ass. I'd go and see them again.

The main event drew near. Andy and I wheedled our way forward as far as we could before we were banjaxed by people who seemed to have pitched tend and set up an impegnable barrier of camping chairs and other equipment. Later on some stumbling drunks barged through their little line of defences and we slip-streamed them through the crowd as far as we could. We ended up about 40 yards back and a bit to the right but still in front of the stage which has to be considered a result.

Then it started raining again. Groans all round. Brollies (not mine I hasten to add) were put up and brollie owners were bombarded with projectiles. Eventually brollies were put down. Eventually the rain stopped.

Neil Young took the stage more or less bang on 9 pm.

What can I say? He said nothing much. Walked on picked up his guitar, a battered, black electric job of indeterminate manufacture (it's an old fave of his apparently and he calls it Old Black ~ it certainly earned it's money later on), to me at least. Immediately it began to hum. He punched the body of it twice. The hum was now more like a growl and he launched into as blistering a playing of Love and Only Love as you could wish to hear. The volume was well and truly cranked up now and NY lurched and semi-stumbled around the stage as he played in his trademark manner rather like a drunken grizzly bear might. I can't describe how I felt at this stage. It was just an awesome start to the gig. Nobody, and I mean nobody, has a style of playing like him when he has his electric head on. If you're familiar with his output then you'll know what I mean. If you aren't then you probably aren't reading this.

The next song was Hey Hey, My My (Into The Black). This was noise, passion, rage, distortion and it was loud. Nothing this ugly was ever so beautiful. I can't begin to describe the way the music felt in a physical sense deep inside my chest. Sound cannot get any more intense without things exploding. It was a stunning opening to the set. Stunning. The people stood near me were agape. Lower jaws were around boot level. I don't think any of us were ready for the ferocity of the first two numbers.

After that he settled into a whistle stop tour of his extensive back catalogue. "I don't play this one live very often I don't know why not" and he played Everybody Knows This Is Nowhere. Then "this is a song you won't have heard before" and he played I've Been Waiting For You. He and his band were just hitting the groove.

The band deserves a mention here. There were all positively ancient but they sure could rock. They were name-checked and acknowledged and they were Ben Keith, Rick Rosas, Chad Cromwell, Anthony Crawford and Pegi Young and a damned fine job they did.

Andy and I had been wondering before the show about what we were likely to get. We'd hypothesised that he would do 2 separate sets with one electric and one acoustic. Maybe he'd have Crazy Horse with him (I hoped he would). Pearl Jam? Devo? (Are they still going?) Maybe he'd just strum his acoustic? Maybe we'd get 2 hours of feedback? One thing with NY is that what you get is what he wants to do and if you don't like that then you know where the exit is. This actually displays a rather arrogant and autocratic streak which maybe explains why he has collaborated with so many different musicians over the years. He gets bored. Does something new. Then gets bored again. I get the impression that once a piece of music is recorded it is pretty much finished. For him it is the creative process that is important rather than the end result itself. It's the journey and not necessarily the destination that matters.

I guess as we get older we get less, and not more as you might expect and hope, tolerant of others. I suppose it is a product of the time that you have left on the planet and as you age then so you become ever more aware that you are only here so long. Every 15 year old thinks he is immortal. Every 50 year old knows that he is not. It is a cruel journey that leads us to such wisdom. Neil Young is now 63 and has had more than his fair share of tragedy in recent years. I am pretty sure he has 2 kids with disabilities; last year his father died (for those who don't know his father was an ice hockey commentator in his native Canada); NY himself had surgery following an aneurism which threatened to kill him. He recovered and began a prolific phase of releases: some old and some new. You can check out what they are for yourself but Prairie Wind stands alone for me and sits alongside Harvest and Harvest Moon as a trilogy of recordings that trace his life from young man to middle age and beyond and the lyrical theme of each tells it's own story.

This same kind of retrospective look at his life's work continued. There is a clear native American theme to much of his work and this was represented by Spirit Road and the opening electric section of the show was completed by F**kin' Up.

This Native American spritual aspect of the show is the only explanation I can give for the presence of a Red Indian Chief statue being on stage with him. There was another theme too. As he played then so an artist at the back of the stage painted a succession of abstract representations of each song; each picture was adorned with a song title and each painting was placed on an easel at the front of the stage whilst that song was being played. The song finished and the painting went too. There was a tie-in here, NY himself was wearing a black paint-spattered jacket which he removed to reveal a white pain spattered shirt. Quite what this was about or what it represented beats the hell out of me.

I mentioned the physicality of his guitar playing already. There is something mesmeric about the way he moves as he plays. He doesn't so much play the music as it plays him. He is the music. The music is him. He's a fairly big fella. He must stand well over 6 feet tall and to be honest he isn't as lithe as he once was. His hair is shorter now than it once was but it still isn't as short as it probably should be. He now sports a not inconsiderable bald patch. He looked not unlike his younger self crossed with Meatloaf with a touch of Wurzel Gummidge thrown in. Then again I guess I have looked better too so who am I to criticise?

Next came the acoustic section of his set. Classic followed classic. Each though with a melancholy theme running through them. If I tell you the songs then you can check out the lyrics for yourself:

Oh, Lonesome Me/Mother Earth/The Needle And The Damage Done/Unknown Legend/Heart Of Gold/Old Man

Believe me there's a common theme of loss there in amongst all that we have heard so far. Maybe I was being too sensitive given the week I had just endured. I think not though. This was a man raging, and I mean raging against the injustice of it all. As he put it in one of his songs "it's better to burn out than it is to rust" and I couldn't help but half remember the Dylan Thomas poem here he talks of raging against the dying of the light:

Do not go gentle into that good night,
Old age should burn and rave at close of day;
Rage, rage against the dying of the light.

Though wise men at their end know dark is right,
Because their words had forked no lightning they
Do not go gentle into that good night.

Good men, the last wave by, crying how bright
Their frail deeds might have danced in a green bay,
Rage, rage against the dying of the light.

Wild men who caught and sang the sun in flight,
And learn, too late, they grieved it on its way,
Do not go gentle into that good night.

Grave men, near death, who see with blinding sight
Blind eyes could blaze like meteors and be gay,
Rage, rage against the dying of the light.

And you, my father, there on the sad height,
Curse, bless, me now with your fierce tears, I pray.
Do not go gentle into that good night.
Rage, rage against the dying of the light.

I'm sure NY knows exactly where this is coming from. I'm sure I do now in a way I never did before. I could be over-sensitive here but I think not.

The acoustic interlude over and it was back into electric mode. He played Get Back To The Country and Words (for the first time in years apparently) before the final song of the main set. I guess he thought he’d done his bit by way of greatest hits and it was time to indulge himself and indulge himself he did. He played a song I didn’t know (and nor did anybody else near me) called No Hidden Path. NY and his band went off on one here and I get the impression that NY is never actually more happy than when he is jamming with his buddies. So jam he did. Jam they did and on went the song as 30000 people tapped their feet and folded their arms. I didn’t time it but it must have lasted 20 minutes, maybe more, the guitar playing getting more and more ragged as he went along and the feedback levels growing all the time. The set ended pretty much as it began with a cacophonous din. The audience was pretty stunned to be honest. Had we just seen genius? Had we just seen a massive bout of over-blown self-indulgence? Whatever we had seen it was played dead straight without a glimpse of humour. He’d done it on purpose. Whatever it actually was.

That was it bar the encore. People started leaving "trying to catch an hour on the sun" as it were but we stayed in place and waited. What followed was even more extraordinary and he closed with a cover of The Beatles’ Day In The Life. Nobody could ever have imagined that the song would sound like this. I can’t really describe it. Intense, I guess, is the word. Never have I seen anybody do the old trash their guitar thing quite like this. There was only one string left on it at the end. The show finished with NY wailing the aaaaaaaahhhhhhhh… refrain and his guitar howling in objection as the distortion levels reached pretty much unbearable and then surged on some more. This wasn’t music any more in any conventional sense. I’m not sure what it was. Performance art? Aural sculpture? Beats the hell out of me what it was. One thing that was pretty obvious was that this was The End. There would be no more. And there was not.

Then the rain started pouring down yet again as we made our way out of the arena. It became immediately obvious that there was going to be serious carnage in the car park. It was chaos. Luckily I was parked right out on the edge of the site. It may have taken half an hour to walk to the car but once in it I drove around the edge of the field, Andy leapt out and lifted a rope, a car let me in and I was out of the site. All told it could not have taken me more than about 2 minutes from when I started the engine. It’s 3 days later now and I suspect that people are still trying to get out.

Although the event itself was very good the travel arrangements were poor to the point of ridiculous. There was no camping so everybody had to travel. There was no public transport after the show and the last train from nearby Paddock Wood left well before NY was due to finish so the vast majority of the 30000 who were there had to drive. Even my mate Andy was stuffed so I said I’d take him back to Bromley which although not far away was in totally the wrong direction ~ mind you he’d earned his lift by lifting the rope that allowed me to get away so quickly!!

I dropped him off and made for home. Fatigue set in somewhere in Wiltshire so I stacked some Zs in a lay-by at around 3 am. Eventually I got home at about 7:30am which was just in time to take Mrs B and the B~Ling to work and to school before hitting the sack so that I could be at Mum's for the afternoon.

It was a mad, mad day and reminded me a little of the trip to Kapfenburg minus the alcohol. I think I owed it to myself to go once the chance arose to do so. I felt that I had to get away from it all. The preceding week had been the worst of my life, I think. I can't think of one worse anyway. Funnily enough I think it lent me insight into what the show had been about. I had the same rage in me that NY displayed, I think. I, too, wanted to rail against it. Against the way I felt. Against the unfairness of it all. I wanted to celebrate my disenchantment. I didn’t want to ignore it or pretend it wasn’t there. It was there. It is here. My Dad is dead. I don’t like it. He doesn’t deserve it. It is not right or fair or just or decent but it is. It just is. I can’t alter it but I don’t have to like it and I don’t have to give in to it.

That’s pretty much it. Just one more thing. I have been to 2 gigs this year: NY and Jonathan Richman. Each had an utterly stunning finale. Each dealing with the loss of a parent, I think, albeit in different ways. Could fate have been preparing me? I don’t think so. I don’t think there is anything but randomness and science. Definitely odd though. Coincidences, eh?

If you are still here then thanks for reading.

Dad R.I.P.

2008-07-01T01:42:00.004+01:00

As I type this it is 1:45 in the morning. It's 55 minutes after the death of my father who died at 12:50 up at Derriford. The end, when it came, was swift and not unwelcome. He had been desperately ill and was just too old and frail to carry on.

The weird thing is the timing of it. My Mum and sister and I had already spent all night yesterday at he hospital after being told the end was near and they are exhausted and both sleeping. Should I call them? I don't think so. What good will it do? They need their sleep rather more than they need my phone call.

I am sitting at Mum's laptop anyway and if she awakes then I'll tell her and I have emailed my two brothers who are both away from Plymouth which is why I have turned the computer on.

So here I am writing this to gather my thoughts as much as anything else. I certainly don't feel sleepy and don't really know what else to do.

I don't want to remember my father as he has been over the last few days or even the last couple of years really. He aged very quickly and was very frail. He had a list of ailments as long as your arm: prostate cancer, emphysema, repeated urinary infections, low level incontinence, deafness, cataracts and, at the end, the broken arm, septicaemia and pneumonia which killed him. Nobody deserves to have to fight against such burdens.

He was a fine, proud man from a generation which has largely passed on. He worked hard all of his life and looked after his family well after beginning in the most humble of rural backgrounds imaginable when he born in Lee Mill in the '20s. He served in the army during WW2 but never saw much action due to being recruited into the Royal Engineers. From what I gather he spent most of his time driving a bulldozer and building airfields.

For the bulk of his working life he was a guinness rep and he was never happier than when he was in a pub drinking a bottle of guinness which had been perfectly poured (i.e. by him) and served at room temperature. He had no truck with cold beer. The modern Extra Cold Draught Guinness would have appalled him. In many ways his love of pubs has been passed on to me and there's plenty of evidence of that in this blog.

He was never really a great football fan. He supported Argyle a bit but always maintained that his favourite team was Scunthorpe United. Why them? I guess he thought nobody else supported them!!

He did take me to a few games though that I remember.

Big ones too mostly when I think of it.

He took me to see Argyle v Santos with Pele and all of the hullabaloo that accompanied that. He took me to see Argyle play Preston when Bobby Charlton was a Preston player/manager. We were at Villa Park together, at Peterborough (yes... on that day) and we went to the FA Cup match v Everton when I was small but he was scared for my safety in the crush and we left. I couldn't see anyway. There was also an away game at Bournemouth which we won 2-1 back in Mariner's day and we went to see Spurs v Leeds at White Hart Lane when the Leeds team read Harvey, Reaney, Cooper, Hunter, Charlton, Giles, Bremner, Lorimer, Gray, Jones and Clarke. It was a rubbish game and Ralph Coates, who got his nose broken, and Alan Gilzean (Dad's favourite player for some reason) played for Spurs. It was featured on MotD but was not a great game and ended 0-0. Argyle was always far more dramatic and entertining than that!!

There may have been more but there weren't many that we went to not least because he hated to see what he called "tip tap tip tap bloody side ways football". He would encourage them to "Hit it!!" at every possible opportunity.

But he never will again.

Right now the stillness of the night and the solitude is what I crave. I don't want to speak to anybody. I don't want to make phone calls or start to prepare the "arrangements". I don't even want to weep because I have done enough of that already.

Some time ago I was talking to a friend who has similarly aged parents and he said to me "we have some tough times ahead of us". He was right.

Mum has just woken up. Here we go with the news...

Jason Puncheon

2008-06-20T23:40:00.002+01:00

The future under Luggy began to take shape this week with the announcement of our first new signing: 22 year old Jason Puncheon from Barnet on a 3 year contract for a fee of £250k.

I’d say that this looks like an excellent piece of business from the club. Puncheon can play all across the line up front and is happy on either flank, so we are told. Last season he scored 11 in 48 games which is not bad at all for a predominantly wide player.

He has been recommended as one of the top 50 players outside the Premier League and was voted into the PFA divisional team for Div 2 last year.

It’s this last fact that really inspires hope here. His fellow pros are not easily conned and if he has gained their respect at such a young age then there must be something there for us.

The concern with him is if he will make the step up but reports from Barnet suggest that they are sad to see him go but are confident that he will thrive at a higher level. The cynic in me wants to add "as a selling club they would say that, wouldn't they?" but the signs are good.

This looks like a deal that we can only do well out of. As a young player with a little pedigree behind him the fee we paid looks eminently recuperable more or less whatever happens but if he excels then his value will rocket just as Ebanks-Blake’s did. The only obvious way we can lose is if he gets injured and that applies to every player everywhere so we can't use that as an excuse.

The sad thing is that inevitably we have to fear almost as much what happens if he succeeds as we do if he fails. Just say he spends 12 months successfully building rapport with the crowd and the faith of his teammates. We should just be getting into enjoying-a-song-about-him mode when he’ll be up and off somewhere.

The prospect of losing yet another crowd favourite is not very appealing but then if it does happen we have to be pleased I suppose that we have players that others want. It shows how far we have come. It wasn’t long ago that nobody wanted any of ours at any price!!

It still rankles more than a bit though.

The Baggo

Wiki on Puncheon

Kitty O'Hanlon's

2008-06-03T21:47:00.027+01:00

http://www.kittyohanlons.com

After the empty experience that an hour or so in The Hogshead was it was something of a relief to leave and go to Kitty's. A proper bar and a real pub with proper pub-goers in it. It's also surprisingly big and benefits somewhat from being in a key location with regards to Plymouth's Nightlife. Kitty's sits just between the City Centre and The Barbican and as such doesn't really belong to either whilst, conversely, belonging to both. It's quite nicely tucked away in a corner, too, immediately adjacent to Plymouth's Magistrates' Court. Indeed I suspect that the clientèle from the court might provide some of Kitty's custom. I have no reason to denigrate the pub, or the people who use it, but their is a rougish quality to the place and the other pub that I have covered so far that is the most similar is Mutley's The Fortescue. I don't mean any of this in a bad way. Quite the opposite.

The first thing that strikes you on arrival at the pub is the Celtic lettering style on the boards outside. One of the boards proclaims Kitty's to be "Home Of The Slippery Nipple" and to be honest I'm not sure that's a claim that many could make (or perhaps even want to). Anyway somewhat intrigued and with the interests of this article at heart it was with some trepidation that I headed to Google (the last time I felt like this I was looking up "Hungarian showboating" and was wishing that I had not...) to find out more about this Slippery Nippple. It was no little relief when I discovered this:

Slippery Nipple

Ingredients:25ml sambuca, 25ml Baileys Irish Cream

Method: Pour Sambucca into double shot glass. Layer on baileys perfectly.

It actually sounds quite nice. I must try one one day.

So by the time that you enter you have a pretty good idea of what you are about to encounter inside. You'd be right to. It is an Irish pub like so many others scattered around the World. The differences between this one and O'Neill's in Malaga, or anywhere else for that matter, are small. The decor is similar and there is all manner of Irish signage and memorabilia about the gaff; plenty of Irish bar staff to serve you; there is an abundance of Poguery on the jukebox; a decent pint of Guinness and a menu which offers simple but tasty food. I don't expect much else from a pub to be honest.

It was not busy when we were there and I had a nice little chat with the landlord who was friendliness personified. I asked him the usual questions ("do you mind if I take a few pics?" and "can I photograph you?" amongst them in case you have been wondering) and he thought that what I am doing was a brilliant idea and twigged immediately that it was basically a good excuse to visit as many pubs as possible which can rarely be thought of as a bad thing by any sane-minded person. In fact after The Hogshead this was a blessed relief and I wish we had spent rather more time there and rather less at The Hogshead.

Those of you who have been following these reviews will realise that I wander off-topic on occasion but that I also try to provide a service which includes all of the important facts needed about pre-match drinking and to be honest Kitty's scores heavily in every way apart from proximity to Home Park ~ and even then there is a bus that'll get you there from the top of Royal Parade which couldn't be much more nearby (it'd go past the VOT too if you fancied getting off for a break halfway!!) or you could get the Argyle Shuttle. It wasn't too busy to get served and it was friendly. We had a couple of kids with us and they were welcome too. Now I'm not sure as to the legal position here but the kids have not been turned away from any pub yet (mind you they have not been at every pub so far) but I know that kids have been turned away in the past from this pub and I don't know if pub policy or actual law has changed. Back to the plus points of the pub there was Argyliana (of a sort ~ see above) on the wall and the pub does have a proper pub sign. These are small but significant things. A reassuring touch of consistency amidst the chaos that engulfs us all on a daily basis.

I would date the pubs as of similar origin to The Fortescue which I guess places it at the turn of the last century. It actually book ends a rather interesting little arcade of shops and businesses. One which may actually have fairly significant implications for this blog inasmuch as the distinctions that define pubs, bars and restaurants are very blurred these days. Just up the road there is The Funky Judge and a bit further the Café Rouge. They all serve, food, beer, wine and coffee. Kitty's is most definitely a pub. Café Rouge a restaurant/cafe. Just what is the Funky Judge?

Going back to the history of the pub it was once called The Abbey Inn so I guess there must have been an Abbey in the area at some stage. The hall attached to St Andrew's Church is known as Abbey Hall, too.

There are some interesting places nearby. Some of Plymouth's oldest buildings are a stone's throw away. There is even a TV celebrity chef cooking a short walk away in Plymouth's oldest building at Tanners if you fancy some posh nosh. Chris Tanner is often on Ready Steady Cook so he must be one of the country's top chef's. The first Michelin star can't be far away!!

Just a couple of other things to note which continues to build on themes already explored in part on other entries to my blog. The first is Kitty's place as a Live Venue for music. I have never actually seen anybody there but when we were there there were posters advertising a forthcoming gig so I guess they have regular music there which again is a good thing. One thing that they have done on more than one occasion is use the steps of the Magistrates' Court as an outdoor gig venue!! Now this must be legit (?) and it's an astonishingly good idea and Mad Dog McRea have performed there one more than one occasion.

As long as I can remember next door to Kitty's there was a trendy hairdresser's next door called March Hair (how do they think up the names?). I even saw Mickey Evans coming out of there once. Mind you the possibility that he used to get his hair cut there is a bit hard to accept. Still stranger things have happened, I suppose. One of those things is the closing of March Hair!! I was shocked at the time. It had been there forever. A mate of mine called Grebo (honest ~ Mark Greaves, was his name) got his hair cut there in the early 80s because he had grown it very long and had heard that you got lots of loot for selling it. So he did just that. I wish I could remember how much money he got. Anyhow the closure of this business after having already encountered several closed shops and pubs on my trip through the City Centre seemed like another nail in the coffin of City commerce. Not so, however, and in this case March Hair has relocated, so I am told, their old premises have been titivated and in it's stead stands a new trendy boutique-style hairdressers. I wonder if they will last as long?

So is that it for Kitty's? I guess so. We were there in early May and the blossom was on the trees nearby even if the rain was softly falling (if you are a true Janner a little soft rain won't put you off anything ~ if it did you'd never go anywhere or do anything!!

A Shameless Rip Off From Jojoblog!!

2008-06-01T00:00:00.004+01:00

You don't get to hear much from Johnathan Richman. Here's a radio interview if my blag works!!

Jonathan Richman - live on Radio K

March 14, 2008

Interview

Stream:

The Hogshead

2008-05-25T20:56:00.013+01:00

We couldn't decide where to go before the Preston game. I have all of the pub details in a spreadsheet: address, post code etc and sorted them on order of post code.

"Pick a number lower than 280" I said.

"1." Came the reply.

This led us to the discovery that there is, indeed, a criterion which lists the Hogshead as #1 pub in Plymouth. (It also must say something incredibly Freudian about myself for being so anal as to sort pubs by post code and my mate Robbie for being as lacking in imagination that when asked to pick a number lower than 280 he chose "1". I guess we deserve each other really.)

Anyway... The Hogshead. What can you say? It is a big pub located on Plymouth City Centre's most significant thoroughfare: Royal Parade and as such is on just about every bus route in the city. Sitting opposite Plymouth's biggest and most important protestant church: St Andrew's.

I have hazarded guesses at when some of the pubs I have reviewed were built. I will do so again with this one and guess with no little confidence at around 1950. Why? Well it isn't rocket science. In fact rockets have nothing to do with it because Plymouth was too far away from the continent for the doodlebugs to reach us during the blitz. That did not stop Hitler ordering the Luftwaffe to utterly destroy Plymouth which over a period of time they more or less did. There must have been hundreds, no, thousands of tons of bombs dropped on Plymouth. Basically very little of what had been there pre-1939 remained post-1945. The devastation was pretty much total for vast swathes of the city. In fact as a kid walking to school in the '70s from Peverell to the city centre I quite clearly recall that a few of the unlucky houses that had been hit by stray bombs were still just piles of rubble and were yet to be rebuilt.

There is a story that describes the morning after a particularly heavy night's bombing hidden away in the link to St Andrew's above and written by Brian Mosely.

During the air raid of the night of March 20th/21st 1941 the Church was, as Twyford described, 'mauled but not beyond repair'. The main building had been saved although it was not easy to gain entrance as there was fairly extensive damage outside the doorway.

But that relatively happy situation was not to last. During the following night the Church was laid to ruin and on the Saturday morning (22nd) only the walls and tower were left standing. The carillon of bells in the tower was damaged as were the north and east faces of the clock. The church bells themselves were undamaged. The four-manual organ was totally destroyed. At this time, when spirits were low, a board was fixed over the north porch door upon which was carved the one word "Resurgam" - 'I will rise again'.

When I was at school there was a visit to the Central Library and on that visit we were shown a map which showed where every bomb had fallen. Strangely there were none that fell within the boundaries of the dockyard... Well they did but the Official Secrets Act proscribed their inclusion.

Plymouth's role in the blitz is well documented and it is not the only city to have suffered so terribly but it was one of the very worst affected along with some fairly bizarre other targets. Apparently Hitler based the whole bombing campaign on a Tourist Guide that he had acquired and so chose the victim cities on a fairly ad hoc basis. Plymouth and Portsmouth (both naval cities) and Coventry (heavily industialised) made obvious targets but Exeter? Apart from a cathedral and it's county town status there was nothing there worth bombing. Needless to say Exeter suffered hugely too.

Once the war was over a city had to be reborn. There were no shops, churches, houses, pubs... everything had gone. It was a rare opportunity to any city and over time the ravages of post-war austerity were addressed and gradually a plan began to emerge. That plan became known as the Abercombie Plan and led to the building of the City centre as we know it today.

I have found a drawing from the Abercrombie plan and placed it next to an overhead from Google Maps. I've tried to scale each as close to the other as I can. If you click on it it will enlarge.

RECONSTRUCTION OF PLYMOUTH - THE 1940s

The Abercrombie Plan was a visionary piece of work. It had to be. A whole country was reeling from the after effects of winning the war and Plymouth needed to be rebuilt. "Now all of this is very interesting" I can hear you thinking to yourself. "But what has it to do with Argyle?"

Well apart from the rubble being reused to help rebuild the often bombed ground:

Thousands of tons of rubble from the devastated Plymouth city centre ... then under reconstruction ... was dumped at Home Park to fill in bomb craters and extend the banking, obsolete tramcars became temporary offices, discarded Army huts were converted into dressing-rooms and a gymnasium for the players, a boardroom-cum-grandstand was constructed from two Army huts perched on iron girders for the directors, and disused railway sleepers provided excellent terracing for the enclosure spectators.

(With Thanks Steve at Greens On Screen for finding that, and the photo of the church above, in W.S. Tonkin's All About Argyle 1903-1963)

Argyle rose from the wreckage just as the city did and with splendid judgement adopted the "Resurgam" motto for a while in the post-war years. In fact the coupling of it with the image of a Phoenix showed something of the optimism of the times. It was not only the terraces and stands that needed to rise from the ashes but the Home Park pitch too was also bombed twice leading to sections of it being filled in at a later date. This causes problems with drainage to this day with sections of the pitch having entirely different soil types leading the groundsman Colin Wheatcroft to pull his hair out in frustration at at times.

Well at the time Plymouth had a young and thrusting Labour MP. Well Devonport did and that is the same thing. He went by the name of Michael Foot and still does and we all know and revere him. Jill Craigie met him then whilst making a documentary film about Plymouth's rise from almost complete and utter destruction and they were later to marry. The film is a wonderful evocation of time and place. The narrator arrives at Plymouth Railway Station to have a look around and his journey around the city is the vehicle used to examine the City as it was and as it hoped to be. As he arrived in Plymouth it was pissing down with rain (plus ça change, plus c'est la même chose as they say in France). There is also a priceless interview with an Efford resident of the time "there's nothing to do for the kids around here..." says a woman with what seems like hundreds of kids ~ there was obviously little for the adults to do after dark either!!

...and here is some of it!!

The Plan For Plymouth

Anyway the grid-like lay out of the City Centre, the preservation of the Hoe, the building of the outlying housing estates, the rather grand frontage to Royal Parade with every building being fronted by Portland Stone and every building being slightly different. In fact there are some architectural marvels hidden away in Plymouth that we walk past pretty much every day and The Hogshead is one of them.Dingles is another. Or at least it was until it got rebranded this week and is now simply House Of Fraser ~ another tiny little idiosyncrasy of the city gone and before very long every city centre everywhere will be identical. Do we really want that? What would Abercrombie have thought?

That does not make it a good pub though. Far from it. I had a fairly long wait whilst I was there for my mates to turn up. It was quite busy. The bar staff were very pleasant but this place just is not what pubs are about as far as I am concerned. It served food, kids were welcome, the beer was good, it has good transport links to anywhere you want to go but drinking there is a soulless and largely unenjoyable process. I suppose it offers a meeting place that is warm, dry and clean. A swift wet might be preferable to being dragged around town shopping and it did have a large screen TV with Sky football showing on it so it wasn't all a bad.

All in all I suppose pubs like the Hogshead provide a service but it feels rather like drinking in a recently converted Argos which is funny because that is just what it was.

Eventually just before I lost the will to live my friends arrived and we were free to continue on our little lunchtime session."Where's next?" "Yates" came the reply. It was only a few doors down and since it was raining offered a good option. So off we went only to discover that it has been closed down. Almost next to that is branch of Peter Briggs which was also closed.

Now all those years ago when the Abercrombie Plan was proposed Royal Parade was the jewel in the crown with the city's most magnificent church to one side, the Guildhall next to it and the dazzling array of new shops across the road. Now all we seem to have is rather more empty shops than we might consider to be healthy in what is, in effect, Plymouth's High Street. You could say that I am reading too much into a closed pub and a closed shop but they are symptomatic of much that has happened to commerce in the City Centre and to pubs in general. Pubs seem to be closing at an unrivalled rate in the city and even landmark pubs with long histories are no longer with us. Those ladies from Efford can no longer have a port and lemon in the Royal Marine. Another near alternative the Old Road Inn is up for sale and may not continue to trade as a pub and pubs in Devonport, which was, of course, old Footie's stomping ground for so long are closing at an alarming rate.

There were 280 pubs on the list I compiled at the start of this little adventure. I wonder how many there will be once it is completed?

Jonathan Richman (and a Modern Lover?) At The Shepherd's Bush Empire

2008-05-10T21:47:00.044+01:00

What can I say about the evening? Wonderful. Just wonderful. I left the gig with a huge smile on my face, swathed in good vibes and wanting to just give the whole world a cuddle despite a rather uncompromising conclusion to the show. That should not have been entirely unexpected: Jonathan Richman does not tend to do "compromise".

You can never be sure about what you are about to get with Jonathan Richman. His back catalogue has visited many genres and shown a quirkier take on most than might be expected. I'll provide a brief potted history for the sake of context. The journey is just about as important as the destination.

Jonathan famously grew up around the area that spawned The Velvet Underground. Completely unknown outside local circles they inspired a very young Jonathan and informed his earliest recordings. His first ever vynyl release was simply entitled The Modern Lovers and the influences on it are as clear as day. If you like The Velvets then you will simply adore this album. Notable tracks on it are Astral Plane and Pablo Picasso but it's all killer and no filler.

I think that the album was recorded and then canned for a year or two before it came out in 1976 and by the time it did come out Jonathan had musically moved on. The Modern Lovers was something of an underground, cult smash and was a hugely influential album on the US's East Coast music scene. Jonathan adopted the name "Modern Lovers" for the loose collective of musicians that he performed with ~ some of whom went on to notable success in bands like The Talking Heads and The Cars.

The song Pablo Picasso is a pivotal one in his reprtoire and was the first time that a certain quirky humour surfaced alongside the Velvetian rhythms. It was the quirkiness and humour that was to go on to define much of his later output although the rhythmic simplicity is also an underlying feature. It was as a result of the stripped down nature of his music accompanied by a fairly relentlessly industrial throb that has led him to be described as The Godfather Of Punk. I think is is a bit strong, to be honest, but the "I could do that" nature of his beginnings in homage to the velvets and the subsequent simplicity of much of his music definitely deserves a mention in this context ~ we are not talking about an approach that Emmerson, Lake & Palmer would ever have considered here.

The childlike nature of much of his output is shocking, truly shocking to some adult ears. "Who is this bloke?" and "What is he on?" are questions often asked, not unreasonably, by those that encounter his music for the first time. Some will just reject it out of hand. Some will embrace it. It's those who take the music for what it is that will gain the most and those who reject it will never know what they are missing out on. There is nothing hidden, there are no allusions to profundity or politics. What there is is simple honesty and no little insight into life itself. I can't emphasis the "simple" enough. It is another facet to his music which can make people reject him and his approach. For him no emotion is too personal to be explored, no feeling is out of bounds. Some look at his songs and are repelled by what they may feel is arch, mawkish sentiment. Well that is exactly what is is for the best part but where most run away from such things Jonathan just rushes over and gives it all a metaphorical great big hug. He quite simply could not be an Englishman it just isn't in our national psyche to be quite as brash about our deepest and most personal thoughts, feelings and emotions. You may hate what he does but what he does is done with absolute and complete sincerity and conviction.

More grovelling thanks to http://www.flickr.com/photos/henrybloomfield/ from whom I have blatantly stolen the pictures of Jonathan on stage. Is that a new shirt he's wearing?

That gives a flavour of what he does and what he has been doing for years. He had a brief spell as a pop star in the late '70s when Roadrunner was a global hit. Egyptian Reggae was another and I have memories of Pan's People dancing to it on Top Of The Pops. Largely though fame and commercial success has eluded him but then that is in no small part to his idiosyncratic approach and his determination to plough his own furrow despite what anybody else might want him to do. Artistically he has dabbled in many styles and apart from the proto-punk of his earliest stuff and the Nursery Rhyme parallel that I drew he has also made CDs in a C&W-stylee (another big turn off factor for some), '50s doo-wop Rock 'n' Roll and some even sung entirely in Spanish!!

Truly you can never be sure what to expect.

I have been fortunate enough to see him in concert once before. That was in the late '80s (I can't be sure of the year) at Elephant Fayre which was a mini-Glastonbury type festival held at St German's in SE Cornwall. I remember the gig quite well. Iwas sharing a flat with a mate called Meaks at the time. He was with me and his girlfriend, Mary, was there too. Jonathan was on the afternoon. He turned up with a couple of backing musicians: there was a stand up bass player and a lady backing singer. That was it. No drums or other backing. If any percussion was needed then he either stamped on the stage or tapped the body of his guitar to provide it. What followed was unknown, to me ~ then, songs all delivered in the simplest Rock n Roll style that you could imagine. Wonderful. If ever a time or a venue was right for his song That Summer Feeling then that was it. I was utterly transformed and carried away to a better place. Meaks hated it. Mary, who had never heard of him before that day, became an instant fan. There in a nutshell you have him and the effect that he has on people.

A string of hard to get CDs followed over the years. Jonathan continued along his own personal little voyage doing what he does, and I guess, what he simply must. The World went on it's path and the two seemed fairly oblivious to one another. Then a second blast of fame due in no part to a very gross sperm joke in the film There's Something About Mary.

The sperm joke was nothing to do with him (he would never be so crude) but it helped sell the Farelly Brothers' film. They are huge fans of his and used him through the film to link transitional parts of the film with songs; one performed with Jonathan up a tree, like you do, I remember. Think of the cockerel troubadour in Disney's Robin Hood and you aren't far off.

...and we are more or less up to the present day.

I was using Pasoti one evening and one of the users (Block 3 Row Q maybe?) had seen a Jonathan Richman gig advertised. "Is anybody going?" I just could not resist despite having to travel from Plymouth to Shepherd's Bush for the gig I just had to go. Thanks to the internet getting tickets is quick and easy these days for such events; after a few clicks and I was on my way. Huge thanks to Block 3 for bringing it to my attention.

My mate Graham and I went. On arrival we discovered that we had missed the every start of the gig, which was down to London traffic and the scarcity of available parking in the Shepherd's Bush area but never mind. The Empire is a typical old fashioned London venue. Obviously it was a conventional theatre rather than a concert venue and it was far smaller than expected. On entry we were immediately confronted by a bar. Ordinarily this is no bad thing but it ran all of the way across the back of the hall and in front of it was a seated area. I couldn't see but I assume there was a "Gods" section above us too. Capacity of the venue? I'd put it at about 1500. All in all quite an intimate arena and well-suited to this particular performer.

The performance echoed the one all those years ago in Cornwall. The venue was hot. Jonathan's approach uncomplicated. This time he had a drummer to help him. The set that followed was a typical example of what he does on stage. Before the show I didn't know what to expect at all. I was half afraid that we might get an evening of nursery rhymes sung in Spanish... What we got was an evening of huge entertainment, gentle fun and some silly dancing all based on his rather excellent acoustic guitar playing. It included probably the most understated, and possibly shortest, drum solo you could ever wish to see as Tommy (or was it Tony?) wielded the brushes and the sticks with the ping pong ball on the end as much as he did the conventional sticks.

Physically Jonathan looks exactly as he has for the duration of his career to this point ~ there must be a picture ageing horribly in an attic somewhere as Jonathan's youth springs eternal.

The songs sung in a foreign language were there and that was not a bad thing. One of them, the one about the Sweaty Lovers, he sang in English before abruptly stopping. "...and here's the same song sung in French". It was the same song, as far as my schoolboy French could tell, but the arrangement and tune were totally different. There was another song sung in Italian. Nothing in Spanish though and no nursery rhyme type songs. The closest we got to that was Pablo Picasso which was re-arranged from the original and played to in Spanish-sounding guitar style rather than the rhythmic dirge (in a good way) of the original and/or earlier versions of the song.

There was real love and affection in the theatre for him. This was the only show in the UK and he had only just arrived, by train, from Barcelona and was off, via train again so he said, to Dublin. I guess he must have a real fear of flying. I suppose it is also fair to assume that everybody that was there would be a real die hard fan of his music and if you were a fan in the UK then there is only one place to have been last night and that was at the Shepherd's Bush Empire. In passing it has to be noted that he obvious has some celebrity fans. I was stood next to comedian Rich Hall (I mean right next to) and bumped into Adrian Edmondson, too. I spoke to him "Are you Adrian Edmondson?" "Yes." "I've come all the way from Devon, too." I couldn't think of anything similarly brilliant to say to Rich Hall.

The songs? I didn't know them all and he didn't give much detail as to titles and the like. We compiled a list afterwards and this was the best we could come up with (not in the same order and with many omissions):

No One Was Like Vermeer
Sweaty Lovers (?)
Pablo Picasso
I Was Dancing In A Lesbian Bar
Not So Much To be Loved As To Love
He Gave Us The Wine To Taste
In Che Mondo Viviano (in this world that we live in)
Too Young For This Older Girl
Because Her Beauty Is Raw And Wild

The show finished with 2 encores the last of which was the brutally personal This Is What I Learned As My Mother Lay On Her Deathbed. As lines go it's a as hard to follow as "I once had sex with a post-op transsexual" (I didn't but I know a man who did). Could it be followed? No ~ and he didn't even try.

The End.

Almost...

I have had to Google around a bit to get some of the info in this report and in doing so I happened across this little preview of the gig from London's Time Out website:

The sainted – some might say insanely over-rated – Mr Richman returns with his almost Latinesque take on guitar-pop, still providing the loveliest of melodies. Expect all the hits – from the rockin' 'Roadrunner', to the soppy 'Morning Of Our Lives', the gleeful lunacy of 'I'm A Little Dinousaur' and the rudeness of 'Pablo Picasso' - performed with gusto and sincerity to the faithful.

That has actually enraged me. Quite how the writer can so glibly knock such an influential and original performer and then be so completely and wildly inaccurate with regard to what to expect from the show is beyond me. If there is an award for "lazy journalism" (a favourite phrase on the Pasoti messageboard) then that surely walks away with it. Apart from inaccurate and snidey snippets in Time Out I wonder just how close this wretched retch has ever got to the same level of achievement or whether he ever held the attention of theatreful of gig-goers for 2 hours? Somehow I suspect not. I suppose writing like a talentless twat is to be expected from somebody so clearly unable to perceive the talent in others. For every Roadrunner there has to be a Wile E. Coyote, I guess. What a shame this coyote's acme typewriter allows him to get such drivel published.

Here are a couple of links that you may like to check out:

The Times Review

Shepherd's Bush Empire

A blog ( ~ interestingly there is a review of the Paris show from a couple of nights before there)

Madison (a review of a gig in Madison, Wisconsin)

Vapor Records (his current record label)

Elephant Fayre 1984

Some tosh from a bloke writing in The Guardian about the first album

If this review of the show has entertained you just a tiny bit as much as I was entertained last night then I urge you to check out his work. Start anywhere you like and if you are not impressed then try something else. I'm sure that one day he would just click with everybody. If you want a prod as to where a good place to start is then go for the debut album The Modern Lovers, the seminal Modern Lovers Live In London, Jonathan Sings, Jonathan Goes Country or the newest release Because Her Beauty Is Raw And Wild.

If I have managed to blag the right bit of code from the vapor website there is a free song here for you to listen to.

Not So Much To Be Loved As To Love

Roadrunner and Morning Of Our Lives are also on this blog if you look for them.

Interestingly Jonathan is now recording for Neil Young's Vapor Records (I think it is his label anyway). I would love to see Jonathan added to The Hop Farm line up. Come on Neil!! You know it would make sense. It's something I would love to see and this man deserves a bigger, and I mean much bigger, audience.

Finally: I found this tucked away on the Vapor Records website:

Please note that Jonathan Richman does not have any direct involvement with the Vapor Records website and does not participate in the internet on any level.

I said he ploughed his own furrow, did I not?

2007-8 Season Review

2008-05-07T22:45:00.024+01:00

What follows would have been absolutely impossible to complete without frequent reference to GoS/SV: Thanks, chaps.

When I, accidentally, started this blog the intention was to ponder on the greater picture. Not the minutiae of detail but The Big Idea. That's why I have never gone in for match reports or anything like that. Ian De Lar does that on Pasoti and there is little point in recording day-to-day events as Trev does that in his Semper Viridis Diary feature. They both do what they do with no little flair and distinction and I have never intended to compete with them and still don't. I'd like to think that I'm adding something vaguely worthwhile to the Argyle cyber-pot with what I do though and the pub reviews will keep coming (in fact there is a great deal of research to be added but I think I'll ration those out to fill in the dull days of the Summer break). After a season such as the one we have just had it would be remiss of me just to let it slip by without putting onto the record my thoughts about it.

It must be the most remarkable season that Argyle has ever had. I can't think of any to compare anyway. It had some of the highest highs and some of the lowest lows that I can remember in all of my time as a supporter and for those who are new to all of this that takes me back to the early '70s so it is hardly a narrow perspective.

I have produced a graph which details our league position as the season unfolded so we may as well start with that:

It's interesting in itself for what it is and what it reveals. For a start we obviously had a comfortable season. We were barely in the lower half at all and never threatened a relegation spot. We all know about the financial constraints under which we operate and bearing them in mind we have to applaud what has been another successful season with yet another improved final league position compared to the previous year. That's the 7th year running that we have improved. If we aren't careful we will set a record ~ that's if we haven't already. Despite that there is a feeling that we have somehow not quite achieved what we might have. Somebody started a thread on Pasoti asking for a picture to sum up the season. I posted the darts one shown here. A dart in the outer bull seemed just about right. It hit the target and scored well but was not what we were aiming for and was, even though it was a commendable effort, a near miss and ultimately disappointing. We had hoped for most of the season to get a play-off spot and even going into the final few games it was on if we could just string a mere handful of results together. Sadly we could not.

As for the rest... where do you start? There has been a flatness to the season and this has troubled me for some time. The nature and character of Home Park as a venue seems to have altered. Now I may be muddling cause and effect here but that seems to have held us back all year and the feeling that something big, very big, was just around the corner never really took hold despite the fact that it actually was virtually all season long. Indeed it was within our grasp on more than one occasion but we failed to capitalise on it either by just not realising or by letting it drop like sand through our fingers. Why was that belief never there? I have to point an accusatory finger at our home form. It has just not been good enough and that goes back to the very start of the season.

The atmosphere inside the ground as a whole has been flat all year too. Recently there has been a groundswell of complaints against the stewarding at Home Park and the enforcement of the no-standing policy. I have some sympathy here with both sides. Whatever the rights and wrongs the season ended at the right time. The issue was getting too heated and fraught. I hope something can change for next season because we need the excitement and atmosphere in the ground that just is not there at present.

Our home record for the season reads W9 D9 L5 F37 A22. That looks OK, and it is if you want to finish 10th, but it ultimately disappoints. Historically our seasons have been built on the bedrock of our home form and this time that form was not good enough from the very beginning to the very end. From the start of the season when Ipswich, Leicester (more of whom later), Cardiff and Wolves all came to Home Park and all left with a point the seeds of dissatisfaction were sown. 4 points out of a possible 12. It was not until the visit of Palace in October that we managed a win. By now we were into the third month of the season and whereas we could justifiably blame bad luck we had to admit that we got away with one against Wolves for whom Michael Kightly was superb ~ poor Gary Sawyer must still be having nightmares about it and hopefully his blood has had time to untwist itself since.

Along the way we did win a couple of matches. This ought to be cause for celebration but even Argyle these days don't view the League Cup with any great fervour. We played weird line-ups and managed to beat Wycombe and Doncaster which got us into the third round against West Ham. Heady heights indeed and this was far more success than we had enjoyed in this competition in what seemed like decades. Sadly despite a good display we lost to an injury-time goal at the Boleyn ground. Still never mind. Chin up and onwards.

Maybe that was a match we could never win against opponents with a host of star names but we did play a strong team and if we could have nicked it... I know that our priority is, and must always be, the league but we are now an established CCC side and we just might get a bit of luck in the draw and go a long way in this competition. It's not impossible that we could win it and a place in the final might cough up a UEFA Cup spot even if we did not. Should we go close it would be a money-spinner for the club, build the club's profile and give everything and everybody a shot in the arm. The PL teams do not take it seriously and if we did then who knows. Maybe next year. One thing is certain and that is we need the favourable publicity that a Cup Run brings and it is the sort of thing that we ought to be achieving if we are to challenge right at the top of the CCC.

Ian Holloway has rubbished speculation linking him with the vacant Norwich City job and pledged his future to Argyle. He said: "I haven't heard a word from Norwich and all this kind of speculation is both news to me and entirely unwanted. It's not a surprise, because whenever your team is doing well, as mine is, and there is a vacancy elsewhere, your name seems to be inevitably linked. Yes, it's a feather in our club's cap that my name is on somebody's list, but I'm not interested in the post. I'm fully focused on the job I have here at Plymouth Argyle."

Back to the grind and we had a run of home inconsistency following the Palace game: WWLWLWDWD (Palace, Cov, Wednesday, Norwich, WBA, Scunny, Turnips, QPR and Stoke respectively) which took us up to the New Year. 17 points out of 27. A bit more like it but given the lack lustre start still not good enough to fully make up the lost ground.

Crowds just did not take off as we might have hoped. 10k v Scunny, 14k v. WBA. We struggled to 16k v. Turnips and QPR (Boxing Day). Stoke which was played between Christmas and the New Year only attracted 13k ~ even I didn't go to that one but family commitments got in the way and I have seen more than enough of a Pulis team to last me a lifetime. Those poor attendances were to haunt our season and led to seismic repercussions. Holloway banged the drum as much as he could but the crowd figure stayed resolutely low.

Ian Holloway was delighted with yesterdays 3-0 win over Norwich City. "Some of the football we played was terrific," he said. "If Plymouth have ever played better than that, I would have liked to have seen the team and I would like to have seen the game. It was exciting, bright, and we could have run away with even more goals." Lee Martin's overhead kick gave Argyle a half-time lead, before Paul Connolly and David Norris sealed the victory. "Lee scored probably the hardest chance - how he managed to do that, I just don't know," said Holloway. "We missed easier chances than that. Chuck's smashed his in. What a great strike, by the way. Anybody who tells me that boy can't shoot, have a look at that goal. How good is that boy, by the way? Lee Martin, Peter Halmosi, and David Norris - who was back to David Norris today - were absolutely marvellous; Lilian Nalis and everybody. Every one of my players had a good day today. You need that at this level. At Preston nearly every one of them didn't have a good day. But all you can ask is that they learn. I felt we have moved on from last week, when I wasn't happy with the set-piece lapse at all. I thought we could have won last week's game if we had been as focused as we were today, even when we were one-down. We didn't give anything away today - we really didn't - and I didn't think that Sheffield Wednesday were any better than Norwich City - and that's no disrespect to them. I think we have stepped on because we should have won last week like we did today. Sometimes we need to be a bit more clinical, but well done to the lads - some of the football was great and goals change games don't they? We have got a great bunch of lads, as I keep on telling everybody."

The apathy the people of the SW have shown for Argyle this season lies at the heart of much of the chaos that followed. It's fair to say that our results had not helped and that performances at home were not inspiring but the crowd figure stayed low week in and week out. Chairman Stapleton had made noises about the club running at a controlled loss and Holloway's hyperactive media whoredom got us regular press but it still did not attract the stay-away fans through the turnstiles. Something had to give and it did with the sale of Akos Buszaky to QPR. We got £500k for him. His contract was about to expire. He got a big pay rise. Everybody won.

Contrary to public perception, Akos had agreed a deal with Plymouth Argyle on his wages. Then we came across a stumbling block, which was a fee payable to his agent, Sam Stapleton. We weren't willing to pay a substantial amount to the player to pay the agent because the rules are you can't pay agents directly if they are acting for a player. I spoke to Sam Stapleton about it and I told him I didn't think it was right. But, to that, he said Akos had signed a contract with him to say he would have to pay the agent's fee. I rang the manager and he was not happy and did not want to pay it. He had the same view as me but I had to get his view on it." QPR were willing to pay the agent's fee, however, and Buzsaky signed for them instead. Stapleton added: "Akos actually went to QPR and got slightly higher wages, but that wasn't the be-all and end-all of why he went there. I have got emails which say he was happy to sign for us for significantly improved figures, so it's not a question of Plymouth not being prepared to pay enough money." Stapleton, however, insisted he did not hold any grudges against his namesake Sam Stapleton, Buzsaky's agent. "He was the one who brought us Peter Halmosi and Krisztian Timar and I think we did reasonably well in those deals for the football club and those players," he said. "That has worked out very well, so you have to appreciate the fact that you may come across these people again." Stapleton has also wished Buzsaky well for his new career at Loftus Road. He said: "When Akos first came here, I helped him personally. We looked after him because he was a bit lonely. When the other two boys came in he was really, really happy. Now he has gone to QPR and I wish Akos all the best. In the cold light of day, it's a good deal for Akos and it's a good deal for Plymouth Argyle. No-one loses. Everybody's happy and we are all friends."

Well that was how it was sold to the general public but it hid much that was murky. Negotiations had been underway for some time between player and club. The prognosis in the Herald was encouraging. Then it all went sour. Seemingly for no reason at all. It appears that Buzsaky was holding out for a certain amount. Eventually Argyle offered it. Deal done? Not quite. Buzsaky's agent then makes noises about his cut. £35k all told, allegedly, but who was to pay it? League and FA regulations are quite explicit on this count: agents may only represent one party in a deal. Buszaky's agent, Sam Stapleton funnily enough, should therefore have been paid by Buzsaky because that was who he was working for. It seems as though a request went into the club for the money to cover this fee. Holloway said "no". He knew the regulations and there was no way the club could pay it even if they wanted to.

New Rules For Agents

"Take the weekend off and think it over" Buzz was allegedly told. The team set off for Preston without him. Lost 2-0 to a team that could not buy a point at the time and by the time they got back the QPR deal was done, the books were balanced and Buzsaky entered Argyle history which was a relief because I never quite got my head around whether it was "ZS" or "SZ" as you can probably tell!!

This deal split opinion like the departure of a player had never done before. Well not since Mariner left anyway. Was Buzz an expensive liability or the most talented player we had? A bit of both is the truth. He was brought to the club by Bobby Williamson and perhaps needed him to stay to thrive. I think he is a player that needs to be loved and trusted and he was never either, not completely, here. He was in and out of the side under both Pulis and Holloway and his goals per game ratio was not impressive. Sometimes his set piece delivery was brilliant and other times useless. What is Hungarian for "Curate's egg"?

All in all it was a strange and sorry business. Later other details were to emerge via an unprecedented press release from our Stapleton. Ollie did not rate him, he was unpopular in the dressing room and he had to go as a result. This was a bombshell. There had been no inkling that there were issues of this type with Buszaky although there did appear to be conflict between him and Paul Wotton about who should take responsibility for the dead ball specialist spot in the team. Wotton's injury last season put an end to that though. To this day I have heard nothing other than praise for Buszaky as being a most affable sort of chap with a friendly smile and a word for all. Buszaky was hugely popular with fans could it have been that Ollie couldn't bear to play second fiddle to anybody when it came to claiming the affection of the fans? I don't suppose we will ever know for sure. Since joining QPR he has been given their hallowed #10 shirt, relieved of defensive duty and has played in the hole and, natch, scored hundreds of goals for adoring Hoop fans. Why didn't we try that? It was obviously his best position. Hindsight is 20/20 they say.

Ian Holloway has distanced himself from a story in a national newspaper claiming he could be about to quit as Argyle manager. He said: "Ask anybody who knows me how I feel about Plymouth Argyle and they will tell you the truth. If you need me to say it again, I'm in love with the place. It's absolutely magnificent. Ask my players who I'm trying to talk into staying here how Ian Holloway feels about Plymouth Argyle. I think they will tell you the truth. It's all poppycock, if I'm allowed to use that word. It's absolutely pathetic. But the media is a very powerful thing and, unfortunately, a rumour can become a bigger rumour. I don't know how these things get in there, to be perfectly honest with you." Reports also suggested that Holloway was on the short-list to become the new manager of Leicester City. Asked about the story, he replied: "We are playing well and we are winning matches. That's all that matters. If we weren't, nobody would be saying these things anyway. There's not a scrap of truth in any of it. Every time I have wanted a player the Board have bought me one. It's as simple as that. Peter Halmosi was available and were we going to sign him? Yes we did. He was our record signing. We spent £1.1 million last season. If they hadn't bought me a player I would probably be moaning, and the first people I would moan to is them. That's how it is. These things just get totally out of hand and I can't understand it. The answer from me is that it's absolute rubbish. As far as I'm concerned, we are giving it power now by even talking about it. Let's move on. Next question please."

Then one afternoon via a 5LIVE news bulletin the excrement hit the air con. "Holloway to be announced as next Leicester manager". Couldn't be true could it? There had been speculation in the two week break for international matches that he may have been off but Good Old Ollie filled the front page of the Herald. "Poppycock" he thundered. "Complete nonsense!!" Mandaric was even interviewed and said that Holloway was not under consideration. Well that was that. Wasn't it? How could we be so naive as to think so. Mr High Profile dropped off the radar. Speculation mounted. Ollie said nothing. Nothing until the press conference at Leicester when he was unveiled as their new boss.

Milan Mandaric last night denied he is set to appoint Ian Holloway as the new boss of Leicester, and Paul Stapleton also confirmed that the speculation is incorrect. Mandaric said: "There is no truth in the rumour. I haven't contacted Plymouth and he hasn't been in my thoughts about getting the job." Stapleton added: "There is no truth it. I spoke to Ian at lunchtime today about loan transfers and contract talks for other players."

A City seethed in fury and indignation. Ollie had promised. He had given his word. His track record suggested that he a stayer but his actions proved otherwise. There was much rancour and that is putting it mildly. There followed a period where people said things that they quite clearly should not have and it was all played out in the unforgiving glare of the nation's media.

Ian Holloway has resigned as Argyle manager. The club released the following statement: "Plymouth Argyle confirm that Ian Holloway has tendered his resignation as manager of the club. The club has convened a board meeting for Friday this week where this will be considered. In the meantime, Ian continues to be employed by the club and subject to the terms of his contract of employment. No further comment will be made pending the board meeting this Friday.

Ian Holloway has broken his silence over his resignation as Argyle manager. He said: "It's a really difficult situation for myself. I feel like I was getting stereotyped in having no money to spend. I'm sick and fed up of losing my best players all the time because they outgrow what I can pay them, and I'm not sure that will happen at Leicester. It's a whole new role for me and it's something that I don't feel I could turn down. I have worked hard for 11 years and I have always been the bridesmaid, never the bride, to this type of thing. It's a challenge for me, and everybody needs a challenge, but that doesn't belittle the relationships I have had before. I don't know what the people at Plymouth are going to be feeling about me today but I'm ever so sorry. I just felt my heart wasn't there once I knew this might be here. What can I say." Lawyers have spent the morning thrashing out a compensation payment for Holloway, with Argyle thought to want £400,000. He added: "That's beyond me. That's for other people to deal with. All I am is a football manager. The people who are more experienced above me will have to sort that out."

Holloway walked out leaving us in 7th position and Argyle hit a season high in the next match when in a hugely exciting game (for me it was the season highlight) at Sheffield United we triumphed 1-0. Gary Penrice and Des Bulpin had stood in for Ollie and secured a famous win in their only match in charge. Before long they to were off to Leicester as was stand-in captain and Ollie fave Barry Hayles. We even got a fee for him: £100k. Not bad business again really. Then Ollie went Nuclear: "I'm coming back for all of my players" he said and said as though he meant it. Basically a state of war existed between the two clubs.

Ollie Interview

18 December: Leicester boss Ian Holloway attacks reports that he's using the press to unsettle Plymouth's Barry Hayles. 'I don't like it: it's very damaging. I was proud of what I did at Plymouth, and very proud of the Plymouth fans, so I'm not going to raid their team. I'm looking at other targets.' 1 January: Signs Barry Hayles for £150k. 'I'm absolutely delighted!'

Still every cloud has a silver lining and when one door shuts another opens and Paul Sturrock was appointed in place of Holloway. He left Swindon and came back to Plymouth and brought with him a couple of familiar faces in the shape of Kevin Summerfield and John Blackley. Could the events unfold and actually leave us in a stronger position? No. Further departures were on the way and the heart was about to be ripped out of the Argyle squad. Dan Gosling, our best youngster was off to Everton for £1.5m. Sylvain Ebanks-Blake was off to Wolves for a similar amount and Club Hero And Legend David Norris was off to Ipswich for £3m. Never had so much cash poured into the coffers. Never was so much angst portrayed amongst the support. We even lost Romain Larrieu at this time too due to a sad reoccurrence of his testicular cancer problems. Everywhere you looked there was disaster. It was carnage. Even supporters of other teams noticed what was happening and were wondering why we were selling everybody.

Paul Sturrock made his return to Home Park today, and has no doubt that what lies ahead of him is as tough as it gets. "This will be the hardest job I've ever had to take over," he said, "but I am very, very pleased and looking forward to the challenge." Argyle’s current situation is a far cry from the positions Sturrock has found himself in when appointed to his previous jobs. He said: "The bottom has been out of most of the clubs' trousers as far as the position they are in the league - all of a sudden, I'm taking over a team that's fourth in the Championship and flying. It's a difficult one. I do feel I have taken a difficult job because of the expectation-level. Plus, there's also the old onion that you should never go back to try again. But I feel very comfortable with coming back. I think I can fit right back in again, and the chairman and I have a relationship that means I am looking forward to working with him again. I'm just hoping to be honest, to make sure supporters know where I'm coming from." It is 1,363 days since Sturrock left Home Park and now he is back, he is aiming to complete unfinished business. "There was no way I would have left for any other standard than the Premier League," he said. "I've been to the Show. I've had a wee taste. I've pitted my wits against the top men. I think everybody has that ambition in them. Had it been even another Championship team, I wouldn't even have contemplated leaving because I have a dream for this football club, a long-term dream to take it where it would like to go. From then on, politics has been very much a part of my problems at every football club. The one good thing that I have done since I've been away is that I pride myself that I have left teams I took over in a better shape than when I took them over. So, at least I've done a professional job at every club. At Southampton, I had Rupert Lowe, who things didn't work out with; at Sheffield Wednesday, I got promotion and then had a taste of the naughty side of football. Then, at Swindon, it's been very zany, getting promotion and then having four months of turmoil when people have been taking over the football club, then not taking over the football club. Finances were very low, there was an embargo of players so you can't sign anyone - then, you wake up last Sunday and, lo and behold, we're three points outside of the play-offs. It's been hard, hard, work, but very pleasing work, but I pride myself that I and my coaches have done the job asked of us at the football club. It's really been off the park that the problems have been at the three clubs I have been since." Argyle have agreed a compensation package with Swindon, not only for Sturrock, but also Kevin Summerfield and John Blackley, and Sturrock is delighted to keep his team together. "They have done a fantastic job," he said. "I can trust them, and leave them to it because I know they are going to do things to the standard I would expect. Summers has got all the badges, now; Sloop has got all the experience, so it's worked very, very well. It's like what's happening on the football pitch - why break it when it's working?" When asked whether he will ever be a Premiership manager again, Sturrock replied. "That's what we're down here for. At the end of the day, we're going to have a go. I can't promise you anything, but I can assure you that everybody on the staff will be working towards that. With the backing of the fans, which has always been fantastic, and the attitude and work-rate of the players, and a very strange league - everybody seems to beat everybody else - if we can turn the home form to be a real fortress, and continue the way the team is playing away from home, who knows what we can achieve?"
Paul Sturrock believes Argyle fans should forget about the nature of Ian Holloway’s departure, and appreciate his legacy. He said: "The important thing is that he did a fantastic job here. There's no doubt about it. You just have to look at the squad of players he assembled. You just have to look at where we are at this moment in time." Sturrock has no intention of changing much. "Players can carry on doing what they have been doing," he said. "Why break up something that's working? I'll be indebted to Crudgie to tell me what their basic week is and we'll just go down the road of that until it doesn't work. But there'll be no dramatic changes to what the players have been used to doing. It seems to be working. There seems to be a good spirit among the players, I'm told, so that's great and there's a work-ethic. All the things I like about a football team seem to be being generated here. The manager before me has left a good taste in the mouth as far as performances are concerned and the standard of play at the club. I'm not going to change anything of that."
Paul Sturrock believes that his relationship with Paul Stapleton is the key to Argyle's continued success. "The chairman, the board, and I will have to sit down and discuss all that," he said. "I am a great believer in long-term plans for the simple reason that everybody then knows where we are coming from. We went on a five-year plan when Paul first took over, and they have achieved that - to win two promotions and then solidify yourselves in the Championship was something special. The three managers since me have done a fantastic job in allowing that five-year plan to work. Every time I've had a successful relationship with a chairman, I've had a successful team. At St Johnstone, I had five years, played in Europe and played in a cup final, and that was with a great relationship with the chairman. The first year at Sheffield Wednesday was very pleasing, and I had a great relationship with the chairman. Even at Swindon, things worked out very well. It's just that this take-over business, and lack of finances, has really affected the club. Paul and I don't see eye to eye on everything - he has an opinion and I have - but we know what direction we want the football club to be going in and we both want to achieve that: he through off-the-park activities and me on the park."

The personnel changes were not all one way. There was the arrival of Steve MacLean for a new club record fee of £500k; Yoann Folly for £200k; Chris Clark for £200k; Patterson for £250k; Jamie Mackie for £150k. Gary Teale, Russell Anderson and Lukas Jutkiewicz arrived on loan to boost numbers and options too. Hectic times.

Jamie Mackie finally became an Argyle player yesterday after weeks of negotiation. "I am absolutely delighted to sign for Plymouth," he said. "It has gone on a lot time. I knew about the interest a while ago and I am so grateful for the chance to be here. I want to improve, get my head down and get in the team. I respect the rivalry is there but Plymouth are in the Championship and I am ambitious. As soon as I knew there might be a chance of me playing for Plymouth, it was all I wanted. All I saw was that Plymouth are a Championship and not that they are Exeter's rivals. Exeter gave me the chance to improve my game and I am grateful to everyone for the help they have given me." Mackie will have to wait for his debut because he is cup-tie, and added: "I have already played in the FA Cup, so I am cup-tied. I will get some work done this weekend while the lads are travelling and be ready for the next game. I can't wait. I know I have got to improve my game and that is why I am here. Everyone wants to be in the first-team and I want to show people what I am about. At this level there is going to be competition for places but I want to work with those players and learn from them." The Championship will be the place where Mackie will be looking to impress. He last played at this level with Wimbledon as a 19 year-old in 2004. He said: "I was put in the first-team at Wimbledon very young. I have had to take a few steps backwards before getting where I want to be and this is where I want to be. It was the right time to move on. Ever since I got to Exeter, I have said I wanted to move back to this level."

January (LWLDLD against Cardiff, Hull (FA Cup), Burnley, Southampton, Pompey (Cup again) and Ipswich where MacLean missed apenalty) was a disaster and frankly awful performances at Burnley and Cardiff matched the one earlier in the season at Preston for apparent hopelessness but was that not altogether surpising given the upheaval amongst personnel and the health scare to Larrieu which was just the cherry on top, really. If you are a manager then I guess you learn far more in bad times than you do in good and Luggy's learning curve must have been more or less vertical at this stage as we slumped to . February arrived and we won 4 in a row. We were back up to and hope, as ever sprung eternal with the prospect of the new players bedding in and Luggy instilling the virtues we knew so well from his first spell here. Indeed the first signs of recovery were there at Pompey where we narrowly and undeservedly lost. The stand out player that day was Pompey's Diarra who was recently signed for £6m from Arsenal and was paid £50k/week. If you pay for quality you get quality I guess and he was superb ~ that said he contributed to Pompey losing £30m over the season!! Maybe if we went £30m over budget we could do what they did and get to the FA Cup Final...

Then our best run of 4 wins was bookended by hugely disappointing defeats at home to Hull and away at WBA. What about those 4 wins though!! Leicester (won away for the first time ever), Southampton (first away win since 1963) and Burnley... There must be a word for it somewhere after all the history between us and them. I'll just go for "sweet". The other win was against Barnsley.

Time to take a step back here. I have blamed the poor attendances on our poor home showing. Well even with mediocre displays and iffy results we had hung in there just about all season. How? Well there was an almost unmatched set of away wins to celebrate. Apart from those already mentioned we won at all of the Premier League relegatees Sheffield United (first away win there since 1938), Watford and Charlton (first win there since 1974) despite their reputations, star names and parachute payments. Watford ended up play off candidates as did Hull (we won there too), The Turnips (another away win and the first since 1931) and Palace (we lost there but beat 'em at home).

The away win at Bristol City saw the return of Paul Wotton to the starting XI after a long period out through injury. Little did we know at the time that that would be the last Great Occasion that he was to be a part of as a Pilgrim. That was just one cameo amongst many others. There was the Rory Fallon rebirth after the speculation linking him to Southend; Kristain Timar's Player Of The Season award was well deserved after a succession of fine performances; Timar's horrific injury; Halmosi's brilliance and consistency; Jamie Mackie's effervescence; Holloway's book; the Youth Team's Cup Run; Dan Gosling in the u-17 World Cup; Marcel Seip's excellence, ambition for next season and eventual incredible truculence; SEB's court case; Jermaine easter signing; Leicester's eventual relegation...

Back to the run-in to the season: inconsistency and disappointment reigned as we took a step forward and two steps back. The sequence of results went like this: WLLLWDLLLDWL (Colchester, Sheffield United, Scunny, Turnips, Watford, Cov, Charlton,Wednesday,PNE, Blackpool and Wolves) which gave us only 11 points from the last 36. Unbelieveably we were still in with a chance to go up until that late Preston equaliser. Somehow it was apt that our demise should be confirmed in this way at Home Park. It was horribly appropriate and it was at Home Park that we let ourselves down all season.

You look back at the season and wonder at what just might have been. The early run of home draws; losing at home to Wednesday; Timar's crazy 15 minutes again at home against the Turnips; the penalty miss at Ipswich; dominating at home against Hull and losing 1-0 to their only (mishit) shot of the game; Watford's gamesmanship and Halmosi's red card and injury; The Super One's brainstorm when losing 2-1 at home to 10 man Charlton after being 1 up and playing 10 men for the whole match; PNE's equaliser with the last kick of the game... We really were that close. We could even have won the league had all of the crucial moments gone our way. But they did not. The league does not lie and 10th represents a fair final league position.

Still the bombshells kept exploding. As the season wound down Luggy released Paul Wotton, Lee Hodges, Lilian Nalis and Nick Chadwick. Paul Connolly refused a new deal and is off on a Bosman. In one way or another I'm sad to see them all go. Paul Wotton... what can you say? The thought of him playing elsewhere is hard to grasp. It's just wrong. On the other hand I can understand the reasons why they are all going. I can't bring myself to say a bad word about any of them. Good luck, guys, in all that you do. And thanks.

Which leaves the future. I'm not sure there is room for a "What Next?" in a season review such as this but there does appear to be progress off the pitch. The first glimmer came when Plymouth Council Leader Vivian Pengelly announced that Argyle could build a hotel on their land. This seemed to come right out of left field. A hotel? What was she on about? Further investigation revealed that PCC had commissioned a feasiblity study into including a hotel in their Life Centre project but had taken their plans no further. Now the hotel was back on the agenda. Was this how the club was to capitalise through having bought the freehold? PAFC could sell off a plot of pot-holed car park and nobody would mind but if PCC built over one blade of grass the Central Park lobby would rebel and politically it is just not an option.

A hotel would sit nicely adjacent to a nice new South Stand (as the P2 development seems to have been renamed), a new swimming and diving complex, a new ice rink and a new multi-sport centre to replace the existing facilities which need expensive repair or are in the way of the bigger urban regeneration project that will transform Millbay and if the hotel releases funds that enable P2 to be completed then all is well and good as far as I can see.

Kagami-san

The last development off the pitch is the appointment of Yasuaki Kagami to the board. He appears to be a wealthy and welcome addition who may offer opportunities to the club that we have never before considered. His plans seem to be realistic and sensible and are not concerned with simply pumping money into the team in the hope of a quick fix.

Tony Campbell Interviewed by Vital

"The future's not ours to see" as Doris Day once sang in a tune known to football fans everywhere and all will be revealed in the fullness of time. I think only one thing is certain: the eventfulness (is that a word?) of this season will never be matched again ~ or at least it was never matched in the past.

I'll give the very last word to the Green Army (do not activate if easily offended):