The Diary

15 April 2006: Calling Occupants Of Interplanetary Craft.....

Remember the old saying, ?To every grey cloud there is a silver lining?? Well, today certainly proved to be no exception; on our return from a visit to the Black Country Museum earlier this evening, we discovered that the Dingles? attempts to escape the gravitational field of the Championship (via the powerful booster-rocketry commonly known as ?The Play-Offs?) had come to naught. Well, there?s still a mathematical possibility of them doing it, of course, the scenario involving our Dingle chums winning all of theirs, and their nearest rivals churning out defeat after defeat, but if I were of a betting bent, I?d sure hate to wager the family silver on the back of odds as astronomical as that. 1-1 was the final score for their game versus Watford, and that after taking the lead, too. How sad, what a pity ? never mind!

What didn?t exactly endear Glenn Hoddle to the natives today was his side?s brace of appalling misses, one of which seemed to me far easier to put away than end up in Row Z, but that?s the promotion business for you. Or not. Most certainly the latter, as their parachute money ran out this season. The writing must surely be on the wall for their leader; if Jez Moxey?s programme notes weren?t a veiled hint The Blessed Glenn?s P45 would soon be available for collection from their main office, then I really don?t know what is. The last I?d heard, courtesy BBC Five Live, most of their home regulars were assuaging their grief by the simple expedient of drumming on their chests like so many demented Frank Zappas, and looking for suitable twigs to pull down from nearby trees ? but, hey! That?s what the fun of being a Dingle is all about, isn?t it? Simian, I mean. If I were Glenn Hoddle right now, I wouldn?t even bother waiting until my contract was officially up ? I?d be out of there like excrement off a shovel.

Our intellectually-challenged chums? collective failure apart, their spectacular collapse - given their previous track record on such matters, should they in future, perhaps, adopt the title ?Wolverhampton Blown It? instead? - leaves the play-off contenders as Leeds, Palace, Watford and Preston, which is an interesting spread of contending clubs when you come to look at it. On the one hand, you have the Deepdale mob, who haven?t graced the top flight since around the time Tom Finney turned out for them; looking closer still to the present, Watford have been out of the limelight for a fair number of seasons, Leeds imploded in a heap of serious acrimony and mutual recriminations a couple of campaigns ago (more about them later), and as for Palace ? well, we all know about Andy Johnson, don?t we, kiddies?

The other main news item to emerge from the mixer was that of Sheffield United?s effective promotion to The Greed League. Their win today means they only need a solitary point from their last three to officially clinch it. Today put them very much in a similar position to ourselves when we played Sunderland, neatly three seasons back. The following weekend, we went up without kicking a single ball, a situation I must say I found most odd at the time.

Ambivalent? Me? You can certainly say that again; on the one hand I?m grudgingly conceding that after so many seasons knocking on the door, they truly deserve to finally get the householder coming to let ?em in, but on the other, I?m seriously wondering as to how the Premiership will take to Warnock and his Neanderthal-style football philosophy. Or, far more likely, NOT! The downside, of course, is that when we drop come the end of term, we?ll have to face up to the ordeal of meeting our dearly beloved chums from up the road on a biannual basis once more. It?s a bit like having lots of problems with a seriously-antisocial family living in the same street, then discovering one day they?ve had an ASBO served on ?em. Peace, perfect peace, for a good three years ? then, the order finally lifted, straight back to square one for everyone concerned. Ugh.

Now here?s a turn up for the book. For reasons I won?t go into too deeply, if only on account of maximising the use of space ? although any Albion supporter who?s been around as long as I will almost instantaneously guess why ? I?ve never had that much time for either Leeds United or their supporters, but right now, they do have my profound sympathy, and it?s all because of dear old Captain Birdseye himself, aka Ken Bates, who currently occupies the Elland Road chairman?s hot-seat, so aptly named, in more than one sense of the word.

I won?t divulge the name of my source, as I don?t wish to land them in even more lumber with The White-Bearded One, but right now, the state of play in Yorkshire is this. Before the arrival of Bates on the scene, the Leeds Supporters Club had a pretty good sort of relationship going with the parent football club. Players needed for meetings? No problem. Page in every matchday programme? Send us the copy and we?ll do the rest. In short, a symbiotic sort of arrangement: i.e. one where both parties derived mutual benefit from the arrangement, and everyone ? supporters, players, backroom staff, directors ? could declare themselves to be happy with the club, if not with their grossly-underachieving Championship position.

That was before Ken, then - and this is now. Apparently, no sooner had he got his ample feet under the table, then the new incumbent decided to launch what President Bush might term a ?pre-emptive strike? on the Supporters Club.In fact, some would go as far as calling this one a ?dirty war?. I strongly suspect the rationale for the idea was based upon the Biblical saying ?Thou shalt not have any other Gods before you but me?. The result? Suddenly, players were forbidden to attend meetings, their dedicated page in the programme also went the same way as the players. Anyone who seriously tried to argue the toss, however politely and/or respectfully, with the Elland Road mafia does so in the background knowledge of the owner's propensity for deploying the close legal attentions of Messrs. Sue, Grabitte and Runne.

The Godfather's preferred method of retribution is public humiliation via his programme notes, with events adjusted to fit his own flat Earth theories. Right of reply? You've got to be joking, this is a one party state! Additionally, they suddenly found out earlier in the season that LUSC members had lost their matchday access to an area of Elland Road known as The Pavilion, unless they were in the Members? Club, an organisation which charged ?30 quid to members who were non-season ticket holders, and ?40 to their overseas counterparts. This, in stark contrast to an average of around eight squid normally charged by Supporters Club Branches.

Lacking a ?proper? matchday HQ to call their own, the Suppporters Club have now set up shop in a place situated the other side of the motorway underpass known to all and sundry as ?The Magic Sponge?, and not too far from the ground, either. It?s one of those footie-dedicated leisure areas, complete with numerous five-a-side pitches, the works. Another spin-off from the move, a happier one this time, is the fact the beer?s much cheaper there! Luckily for the Supporters Club, the owners are Supporters Club Members themselves, and only too glad to do highly-lucrative matchday business with their newly-homeless (and very thirsty!) counterparts. As the supporters most affected by the changed circumstances put it in their newletter: ?Sadly, the increasingly hostile and spiteful attitude from the Football Club hierarchy towards LUSC made it sense to repay the hospitality of Soccer City which is tailor-made for football supporters.?

Because of this sudden withdrawal of both access and goodwill on the part of the club, their regular magazine/newsletter has taken up the slack very efficiently indeed. Totally independent of the parent football club, too ? and, for obvious reasons, virtually the sole Elland Road news outlet remaining not yet subjected to Ken?s chronically-overworked blue pencil. Here?s another quote from their latest missive:

?You?ll be amazed what you can learn (in Elland Roar, their publication) that doesn?t appear in the Match Programme. We keep reading statements attributed to LUFC?s Chairman about the Supporters Club, and other fan matters. Some are simply untrue, others partly inaccurate. ?Elland Roar? replaces our news page axed from the Match Programme. It also tries to correct all the disinformation from Elland Road, some of which finds its way on to well-known chat-room threads. (Mr. Bates hasn?t allowed us right of reply as yet, despite our Chairman?s letters!) Our spin-doctors don?t get paid, as we don?t employ any!? So there you go, then ? there?s always someone worse off than yourself, isn?t there?

Blimey ? it?s looking very much as though some of my jottings have been enmeshed in some crazy timewarp or other recently, the reason why I discovered this fact for myself being my (very late indeed!) check on our mails yesterday. Much to my surprise, I then discovered the Oz Baggies? version in my inbox and saying ?G?Day? very loudly. The thing is that yes, my words were destined for their mailing-list, but not two whole bloody days after I?d first written them! The stuff on that one was all about the Villa game, or, to be more precise, the build-up to it. What I didn?t count on was the later post-match version getting an airing well before its pre-match chum did. When that happens, it tends to make my earlier piece about as useful to Mankind as a degree obtained from Dingle Town?s very own university. (Main subject of such a (dis)honours graduate qualification being the ballistic properties of urine-filled condoms, with a subsidiary available in the not-so-noble art of bricking-in away supporters? coach windows, presumably.)

But that still doesn?t address the question of precisely where that bloody mail bearing my words went to in the good 48 hours ?twixt completion and emergence, does it? I dunno - Professor Stephen Hawking, where were you when I bloody well needed you, eh? Probably stuck in the same flaming timewarp, I?ll bet. Being like buses, it?s very likely one would have to wait ages for the next to materialise, and when it finally did, three or four turn up at once. That?s what happens when you get too personally involved in your own scientific endeavours, so there you are, kiddiwinkles, let that be a warning to you ? drop physics, before you too end up in much closer proximity to the event horizon of a black hole than you?d originally bargained for!

Wednesday night saw the appearance of another pretty rare astronomical phenomenon in our vicinity, folkies ? and it?s absolutely nothing to do with the telescope my other half got me for my birthday, either. Middlesbrough-Charlton was the game responsible, the replayed FA Cup 6th Round tie at The Riverside Stadium, in fact. And what a game it was, too; a real ding-donging cracker, with, at one point, three goals in almost as many minutes, and the home side emerging triumphant by four goals to The Addicks? brace.

But that wasn?t the only thing remarkable about this one; not only did the home support appear to turn out in reasonable numbers, you could also quite easily discern them actually making some noise for once; as away-game veterans will tell you at the drop of a hat, more usually, The Riverside bears an uncomfortably-close resemblance to a Trappist monastery, so could it be that, at long last, they?ve finally got it into their hydrocarbon-frizzled brains what supporting a football team is really all about? Or was it just heightened chemical pollution levels causing two of toxicology?s more widely recognisable symptoms, mass euphoria, and complete loss of inhibitions?

Now for one tale very much in the mould of ?Whatever happened to???? Not one of our finest, just (just?) a chap who regularly provided us with photographic material for the fanzine, one of our most keen followers, too, but now, like so many more disillusioned souls, content to let it all wash over his head instead. I?ll leave his name out of it, not least because of the fact that identification might adversely affect his ability to get into other games ? but given the trend that?s rapidly becoming apparent, for countless formerly loyal supporters to say ?Soddit?.?, I feel his words should be reproduced below:

???I still get to (Albion) matches now and again, but have lost all the old enthusiasm, as I guess you have as well. Don't like the people in charge any more, and hate several of them - but there you go, such is life. I can get in as a photographer for the ****** (deletion of name mine). They never use my stuff, but it helps me, and they don't mind as long as I don't make a habit of it. Managed to follow Tamworth's cup run through them, which wasn't at all bad??

And, that wasn?t all. The poor chap?s also having a bit of a ?poo problem?, as you?ll see below; talk about ?kick someone when they?re down??..!

?We get flooded when it rains exceptionally heavily in the summer. Comes out of next door's manhole, so it is raw sewage. Happened three times in the last five years. Saves cleaning the carpet, I guess. Should not happen any more, though, as the water board has managed to fix the fault, so they say. I am not a believer?..?

And, talking of ?belief? dear readers, what of tomorrow? The Arse beckon, and somehow, I can?t for one minute believe we?re going to extract maximum points from the lengthy trip down the M1 and back. The Arse need points quite badly if they are to achieve their desired ?belt-and-braces? Champions League qualification - what easier way to get ?em than by completely trashing a side hovering far too close to the trapdoor than is really good for them?

As I understand it, Nathan Ellington will be up front on his tod, and the rest as per what we went with for Villa.

The Arse? Surprise, surprise, they?ve only lost twice on their own muck-heap thus far this term, and that was to Chelsea and West Ham respectively. A little voice keeps telling me we?ll end up on the wrong end of a turkey-shoot for this one, although, having said that, Sunderland?s encounter with The Red Devils didn?t quite turn out that way, much to my surprise. Astonishingly, although they met at Old Trafford, and United desperately needed those three points to keep alive their faint hopes of clinging on to Mourhino?s Prem title shirt-tails, The Mackems held out instead for an incredible 1-1 draw, which now means the question of their ?official? relegation will be held in abeyance for at least a few hours longer instead.

Returning to Highbury once more, metaphorically, if not literally, the home side will be without long-term injury victims Ashley Cole, Gael Clichy and Pascal Cygan. Sol Campbell is also a doubt after busting his nose in Wednesday's 1-1 draw at Pompey ? no, belay my last, I honestly can?t see him playing at all with an injury like that. The word ?doubt? I mean, not the busted nose!

With just five games left to go until we can all let go with an enormous sigh of relief, and Pompey in a much better position than ourselves to finally rid themselves of that rotten relegation albatross hanging limply around their necks, Robson can make all the soothing noises on the media he wants ? until the cows come home, if necessary ? but it still doesn?t hide the simple fact that we?re just not good enough to stay there. They?ve finally come good when it really matters, have Harry Redknapp?s mob, and right at the fag-end of the season, too which give them the psychological upper-hand. We might be only one point from the next rung tonight, sure, but as far as we?re concerned, salvation might as well be found sitting patiently on the surface of the Moon, for all the good it?ll do us. I genuinely can?t see Pompey dipping right now, not the way they?re currently playing. No, best to assume we?re going down the gurgle, no matter what, and take it from there. At least you don?t get your heart broken too badly that way.

Hell, where did I put those flaming transporter co-ordinates for the starship Enterprise, I wonder? For Chrissakes, Scotty ? ?BLOODY WELL BEAM ME UP NOW!?

And Finally?. There you go, I always did consider Albion supporters to be a cut above the rest when it came to intellectual discourse! Well done to tame academic and not-so-tame Baggies nut Bryn Jones for putting the Guardian straight about Albion?s running of free coaches to away match venues these past few seasons. (His words were a straight reply to Michael Grade?s assertion earlier this week about Charlton Athletic being the very first Premiership club to provide this service for supporters.) If you haven?t seen Bryn?s ?bit? already, all you Baggie Grauniad readers, you?ll find the lad?s piece skulking within today?s (yesterday?s?) letters page. In complete contrast to the inarticulate bellowings of our sorely-miffed near-neighbours this evening, isn?t it awfully reassuring to know that even though we will be joining ?them? in durance vile next term, we can still successfully manage to hold the moral high ground?

 - Glynis Wright

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