Blackpool F.C. have three nicknames, The Seasiders, The ‘Pool and The Tangerines and, in case anyone missed it, they will be playing in the Premiership this season. Tons of Premier League fans all over the country are planning on a day out in Blackpool when their teams meet and they had better not put it off till the season after because, as everybody agrees, whichever nickname you give them, they will be coming straight back down. It’s looking like a Tangerine Nightmare.
I used to think I understood how money worked – the more successful you were, the richer you became but modern football logic has dissed that. Rangers and Barcelona won their domestic leagues and each narrowly missed going into administration. Gallant, gutsy, unfashionable Blackpool won promotion to the Premiership and are only just getting round to paying their players the bonuses for doing so. Guaranteed £90,000,000, how come they are so skint?
Watching who’ll join The Satsumas in being parachuted back to the Championship will be great fun – always is, as long as your own team is not involved. Chances are that at least one team beginning with ‘W’ is doomed. There are so many to pick from; Wigan, Wolves, West Ham, West Brom. Certainly, judging by Wolves getting soundly beaten by Leeds, I bet their odds are shortening rapidly. But Newcastle, Bolton, Blackburn and Stoke are not up to much either, so it could be a right old dog-eat-dogfight.
Casting a look down a division, to that which Leeds United will be gracing next week, the bookies don’t give either Scunthorpe or Watford any chance of staying up. It is easy to sympathise with small-time Scunthorpe who have recently sold Hooper, their prize asset, to Celtic and will see about as much of that cash as Leeds did with the Delph money, ie none. It is less easy to sympathise with Watford who easily beat Leeds in the play-off, earning the supposed Premiership bonanza in 2006. What have they done with all that money? And that’s despite having four nicknames; The Hornets, The Golden Boys, Yellow Army, The Horns, which just goes to show how useless nicknames are. In fact, losers have lots of nicknames and it would be a good idea for Leeds to quietly lose at least one of their three; The Whites, United, The Peacocks, the last being pretty old-fashioned nowadays outside of Scandinavia. Knowing KB, he might even try to sell one off. Scunthorpe, by the way, are nicknamed The Iron, which, though puzzling, comes as a bit of a relief when you think what they might be called given such a dodgy name for a town!
A number of years ago, Leeds fans were in the habit of scouring the footie gossip columns to see who Peter Ridsdale was trying to buy next and no one under £5 million was even considered. After £37,000 a week Seth Johnson, it’s quite nice in a way to not have to bother looking any more. If Alex Bruce proves a waste of money, it’s only £200,000 and the chances are he’ll do all right anyway. He’ll certainly find Grayson’s ‘hair dryer’ doesn’t blow quite so fiercely as did Roy Keane’. I bet he couldn’t start up his tractor and chug north fast enough.
It is one thing for Leeds fans to no longer look at the real transfer market but what a blow it must be for supporters of The Mandarins to find August here, no new signings, their ground not ready and a trip to Arsenal looming.
Graeme Gaevey.
