The Diary

28 August 2007: If It's Tuesday, It Must Be Peterborough!

Now that the dust has finally settled after the disappointing manner of last weekend?s Bramall Lane defeat, at least Tuesday night?s London Road jolly will give us a welcome chance to exorcise whatever malevolent forces (and wrong tactics?) caused us to dip there, and without too much pain, should our League Cup progress unexpectedly crash and burn at the gateway to East Anglia. As well it might. Peterborough United, you may remember, were the guys responsible for Southampton?s precipitously early exit from the competition in the previous round. In other words, they?ll be well up for giving our own lot the same humiliating treatment as befell Saints, and, as we all remember from numerous past embarrassments inflicted when contesting this kind of David v Goliath situation, the positive spin and PR is always with the underdog - never the favourites. On the other hand, getting back to winning ways at London Road might well provide the sort of welcome fillip to team morale we so desperately need, right now.

Given the astonishing wealth of player resources we currently have at our disposal, thereby providing a much-needed potential strength in depth rarely seen before in any Albion side, it?s almost a slam-dunk certainty that Mogga will be ringing the changes like a Quasimodo high on speed. Already, most of the local media are suggesting that new capture Chris Brunt will be in the side for this second round thrash, following his completion of a three-match suspension earned after being a naughty boy at his previous club, Sheffield Wednesday. We could also be looking at a return to availability for Chappy and James Morrison, both of them now recovered from niggly injuries.

There?s also the merest smidgen of a suggestion that our leader might even try out a Duke Ellington/Zoltan Gera striking duet, albeit a pairing not one quite as tuneful as, say, Simon and Garfunkel, or Lennon and McCartney. Still, if they can hit the net as often as the aforementioned duos hit the 1960?s charts, then it?ll be a win-win all round, although I do suspect that the wildly-fluctuating motivational demeanour of the man they call ?Duke? will only serve to permanently knock that idea well and truly on the head, once the experiment?s tried, and been found wanting. As I mentioned yesterday, Watford still seem dead keen on acquiring the services of our stripey titled gentleman before the deadline anyway, so it might well be that Albion, clearly still on the lookout for yet another striking option, take the money and run.

As for Posh, they will be without defender Craig Morgan, who ended upon crutches following ankle ligament damage inflicted during their weekend home defeat at the hands of Chesterfield. Other absentees will be Danny Blanchett, recovering from a hernia op, Claude Gnakpa an inured ankle, also striker Craig Mackail-Smith, bless his double-barrels, and both of them currently getting over a still-troublesome hip injury, poor mite. Strangely, Posh?s official site refers to ?a body alignment problem?. Coo, does that mean his legs stick out at right-angles to his torso, or something? If that?s the case, then maybe he should be enlisting the expert untangling services of an experienced Boy Scout, rather than expensive medical care?

All the above problems, plus consecutive League defeats, could let in defender Shane Blackett and striker Aaron McLean (at the mere mention of his name in this piece, ?Im Indoors nearly expired on the spot with a snarling fit ? ?An irritating little S**t?.? was the choice phrase he used to describe Posh?s resident thespian. Oh, dear!) with gaffer Darren Ferguson ? does he go in for a cruder version of his illustrious father?s famous ?hairdryer treatment?, the ?Curling Tongs With Styling Mousse Threat?, perhaps? - possibly turning to youth, in the form of Alfie Potter (what a wonderfully evocative name, that, instantaneously bringing to mind pleasant childhood memories of The Lion, Tiger and Victor lads? comics, especially the mildly-eccentric athletic antics of one Alf Tupper, a working-class athlete always granted the subheading ?Tough Of The Track?!). Whatever side Fergie Junior does put together, he too has his background problems, and will undoubtedly be looking for the kind of supporter excitement generated by a higher-placed Cup scalping to ?take the monkey off his back?, so to speak. The Posh kind of simian, naturally. What else?

At the present time, the new chairman, Irish property developer Darrag MacAnthony, is negotiating a buy-out with former head honcho Barry Fry, he of the larger-than-life personality, enormous Blues playing squads ? he isn?t related to Cecile B de Mille, is he? ? and old non-League mucker of Jeff Astle, who turned up at The King?s funeral five years ago. The master-plan, once ownership finally passes to the Irish lad, is to relocate to a spanking-new place. As I understand it, their record for the highest number of League goals scored in a season (1960-61) still stands, this being an incredible 134, with the deadly Terry Bly potting 52 of them. There are some Albion connections, one being a certain gentleman called John Wile, who returned there as manager back in 1983, finally getting the bullet in 1986. Very disillusioned was he after that sort of experience, apparently. The other? A certain gaffer by the name of Jimmy Hagan, who arrived back in 1958 and left four years later, in 1962.

The last time I made the lengthy journey to London Road was when we were languishing in the footballing equivalent of ?durance vile?, back in the early 1990?s. Not that I can remember much about those games, other than the fact we didn?t win, sadly. And pressing Dick-flogging duties meant we didn?t get much chance to have a shufti around the place, either, so all I can tell you is that it boasts a cathedral (does that make it a city, and not a town?), and the River Nene running right through the middle.

As for the cathedral, that dates right back to the 6th century, when an abbey was first founded upon the current site. The present-day building still possesses actual bits dating back to the 12th century, when the place was re-consecrated following some awfully-God-like accidents, one of which was a lightning strike, inflicted during what was, to all intents and purposes, The Dark Ages. But, on that particular occasion, dark it wasn?t ? well, not until the flames had all died down, at any rate. Another juicy religious snippet concerns Leofric, an Abbot of Peterborough who served with King Harold at The Battle Of Hastings ? no mealy-mouthed objections to Christian cleric participation in active combat then, you?ll note ? and, just like Harold, ended up getting killed for his pains. Whether he also quit this mortal coil courtesy an eye injury is not recorded, sadly.

As an Abbey, the one at Peterborough lasted until the abbeys were all dissolved, back in 1539, becoming a cathedral just two years later. Buried there is Catherine of Aragon, one-time missus of Henry the Eighth. In her case, divorce did not prove to be as ideal a solution to marital discord as it did our present-day Royals. Married in 1509, divorced in 1533, she was. Luckily, she wasn?t beheaded, the ?divorce? simply being annulled later on. Incidentally, Henry?s penchant for changing wives like he changed underpants (all because none of the eight could provide him with a male heir, as I understand it) led to an almighty spat with the Catholic church that ended with him saying ?sod you? to the Pope, and dissolving both Catholic Church and monasteries (see above) in one enormous fit of pique.. What you actually do to dissolve something the size of a monastery, I haven?t the faintest clue. Industrial-sized quantities of concentrated sulphuric acid on the brickwork, perchance? Also interred there for a brief time was the very headless Mary Queen Of Scots, the old girl being eventually moved to Westminster Abbey, for a better class of eternal rest, perhaps.

And Finally?. Unlike my other half, busy cheering on the Bulls that very same night, we?ll be setting off for London Road around half three tomorrow afternoon. The Old Fart and I, that is. Incidentally, while researching this piece, I came across an account of The Posh written by yet another Old Fart called Eric Heath. Has a history not dissimilar to that of our very own Hawthorns Original, too, including being roped into the Royal Army Pay Corps around the mid-1940?s, and completing a blow-by-blow written account of his entire supporting career on his personal website, covering the period from the very mists of time to the present day. Unlike El Tel, though, the lad seems to have committed all his lifetime musings about Peterborough United to cyberspace. But don?t despair, all ye who want to become better acquainted with the doings of Albion?s answer to Methuselah: a chappie recently offered to proof-read and edit The Farts innermost (and life-long) Baggie thoughts, so an archeological-type unveiling of these might not be too far away.

Incidentally, I?ve long wondered what sort of battle honours such a specialized mob as the Royal Army Pay Corps would amass over the course of its essentially-bean-counting military existence. Go into any major cathedral, and you?ll very likely find the local regimental colours displayed in a prominent place, somewhere. Wonderfully-decorated flags, they usually are, bearing famously-evocative names like ?The Somme, 1916?, or ?The Crimea, 1854?, meaning a lot of hard soldiering in a lot of hard places, and the local townspeople justly proud of their regiment?s achievements, too. Even a necessarily low-profile outfit like the SAS has on display such a record of its prime military moments, courtesy Hereford Cathedral, so what kind of battle-honours would the Pay Corps have to show an admiring public, I wonder? The Great Poona Officers? Mess Swindle, 1939? Or Sustained Double-Entry Book-keeping In The Face Of Continual Enemy Fire, France, 1940, perhaps? Just a thought.

 - Glynis Wright

Contact the Author

Diary Index