This is possibly one of the hardest things I will ever have to write, but it is impossible for the branch not to pay tribute to this fine gentleman. I hope these few words will do him justice. There have already been many tributes to this true Leeds United legend, with many more undoubtedly to come in the next few days. I thought the radio interview with Adam Pope on Radio Leeds with LUSC Co Chair Phil Beeton and friend Dave Gaertner was brilliant. It just shows the high regard that BBC Radio Leeds held for Eric, and acknowledges how important Eric was to Leeds United. Thank you Adam Pope. The photo below is the last one I took of him at the LUSC Annual Dinner last year, where he was more popular than most of the guests that had been invited, such was the respect that he commanded.

Eric Carlile was the loyalest Leeds United fan I have ever met in my entire life.

It was a honour to meet him and a priviledge to call him my friend.

He was one of the most unassuming, friendly, amenable, affable and down to earth people you could ever meet. He worked relentlessly on behalf of his fellow Leeds United fans, to make sure that we could follow our beloved club, at least until the world stops going round.

He would literally bend over backwards for any fellow Leeds fan who wanted to see a game. He was happy to have a constant stream of people at his flat picking up away tickets in the good old days when the Club respected the efforts of the LUSC. In the days of landline phones attached to the wall and relying on Royal Mail, if you desperately wanted a Leeds United ticket, Eric was The Man Who Can. He managed to maintain contacts with our famous world wide fan base (mostly by hand written letters), and was instrumental in helping Leeds United fans truly unite in all four corners of the globe.

Even when he gave up his post as LUSC Secretary, he was still a veritable feast of knowledge and would happily spend time reminiscing about the old days and commenting on the new. He was a sharp as tack and could remember virtually every game he saw and every manager, Chairman and branch secretary that he had ever met. He never had a bad word to say about anybody, even when I tried to draw him over our old Ex Owner Ken, and that takes some doing. I also had some fine conversations with him about Yorkshire County Cricket Club.

He will probably be up there now, with The Don and Billy, propping up the bar with a crafty cig and a pint in one hand and dropping his walking stick on the floor with the other, wondering what the fuss is all about.

Like the Pilot song, January – sick and tired, you’ve been hanging on me. This has definitively been a January to forget. I had written a very upbeat blog just after Birmingham, but completely forget to click that publish button. Thank God I didn’t, as reading it back now, after those terrible decisions TC made yesterday, I would have looked a complete Monk, sorry fool.

This has unfortunately all stemmed from the mistake of fielding a weaker side against Newport County. You would have thought that after the buzz phrase of the decade “lessons have been learned”, has been hammered round from successive Government failures/NHS and banking crises/police f**k-ups over the last 15 years, someone would have taken a bit of notice.

Sadly not. So this is my letter. A letter that I would send if I thought the Club had any sense of humour, dignity,decorum, faith, honour in traditions etc.etc.etc . However, I think that our Club, along with the rest of the 72 other football league clubs have about as much respect for our footballing history and  traditions, as they have for the fans that pay their hard earned cash, and give up their time to travel to watch their team around the country.

Please see the section from FA Cup website ( I will attempt to attach the PDF of this just in case anyone wants to read the full rules). I had no idea that a football club has to actually apply to compete (in the loosest possible terms of my understanding of “compete”) in the FA Cup.

A Club wishing to participate in the Competition must complete the application and payment
process on or before 1 April in the season previous to the season in which such Club
proposes to compete in the Competition. A Club that is either a Full or Associate Member
of The Association who fail to pay The Association’s Membership subscriptions by 1 August
may be subject to removal from the Competition.

Dear (insert as appropriate) Football Club

The closing date for your application to play in next season’s FA Cup is looming.

Please can I request that if you are  not intending to FULLY participate in the competition, please do not bother to send in your application form.

If you have little or no respect for the history and the traditions of the oldest football tournament in the world, please do not waste your time.

If you intend on making 10 changes from your league side,  fielding your 2nd/3rd and/or youth team players, entering this competition would be a pointless exercise.

If you cannot see the value of using the Cup ties as an opportunity to develop your squad players, practice new playing systems and configurations, and see these games as a distraction from the more important league games, please desist.

If you cannot see the benefits of beating a lower league side comprehensively, both in the confidence boost from scoring and winning, and increasing the goal tally for the season, you are best to avoid the Cup.

If you choose to ignore the fact that there may be a boost to the Club revenue from full house cup ties from ticket sales and the subsequent merchandise/ retail outlets /catering streams income, that is your choice.

If you cannot acknowledge the importance of the fan experience at both home and away games, and realise that the fans that travel round the country are just as, if not more valuable, than the ones that watch on which ever random television channel decides it wants to inconvenience the travelling fans with, that is your perogative.

If this is your approach, we look forward to not receiving your application.

However, if you were simply concerned that you were going to miss the Royal wedding and had already applied for your street party licence, I fully understand. After all , moving the kick off til 5.30pm, just simply isn’t enough time to enjoy the full day of celebrations with Harry and Megan.

Yours truly

A football fan from days gone by

Smiles on the faces of Leeds manager Don Revie and club captain Billy Bremner as they hold the FA Cup which the club won in 1972 when they beat Arsenal

Words fail me!

After what could have been the greatest come back of the new millenium, TC thought it fit to sit back with 10 men playing against 11 thugs. After that rousing team talk at half time, we must have been playing so well, that he must have thought we still had 11 men on the pitch! Pre game everyone was whining about Lassogga and Roofe being rubbish, and even after the game people were still whining, despite three goals between them and, as I said, being down to 10 men.

The long and short of it was that TC made the wrong decisions. When Cooper got sent off, we should have instantly replaced him with another defender, we may only have gone in one goal down. But leaving Pontus, Beradi and the new guy on their own ( given the new guy, De Bock hadn’t played properly in the first team yet) was like going to a gun fight with a water pistol. Only ever going to end in tears. Apparently Millwall had said they were going to kick us out of the game. No change there then for the EFL Family Club of The Year. So just what TC was expecting was anyone’s guess.

After losing Cooper, who if I say it once, I will say it a million times, is just NOT Captain material ( bring back Bartley) for that rash challenge, it looked like game over. He was having an absolute nightmare before he went off anyway, and frankly we actually played better without him. The Secretary informs me that this will be a four match ban as this is his second red of the season, unless Leeds United try to overturn the decision, of course. It has been pointed out that if we appeal and it still stands, the ban may increase to 5 games, lucky us!

For Lassogga and Roofe to do what they did, was pretty darned good! They answered their critics, and I may be wrong, but had the crowd not been on their backs from the off, Lassogga may have had a couple more. When we hit back at Millwall they were rubbish. All we had to do was keep running at them, their defence wasn’t up to much. All our midfield had to do was hold the ball up to give time for Lassogga, Roofe and a.n other to get into space. As it transpired, all they succeeded in doing was hacking the ball out or giving it away whilst trying to pass it back to Felix. Credit where credit is due, Felix had a good game too. He pulled off some brilliant saves and he couldn’t be blamed for Millwall’s last deflected goal.

So 10th it is, bring on the cod heads!

According to the internet, seeing as the team don’t have an FA Cup game next week ( hmmmm), they are going for some warm weather training. Great preparation for coming back to a league game on Tuesday night in Hull in January! Who thinks these things up? They would be better off going to Greenland to gear themselves up for a trip to the East Coast. Since when was it ever warm in Hull? This City of Culture gubbings is clearly completely misleading some people. Off to sunny Spain, fantastic to get rewarded for losing to lower league opposition and three red cards in a month. I wonder where they would have gone if we had won? Oh wait, if we had won, it would have been a money spinning tie at home to Spurs instead and FA Cup glory. Easy choice then.

Branch Meeting

Meeting was held on Sunday January 14th. There was a minutes silence in honour of our friend and the most loyalest Leeds United fan I have ever met in my entire life, Mr Eric Carlile.

Away Games

We are currently taking bookings for Hull on Tuesday Jan 30th 7.45pm kick off and T’Blades on Saturday 10th February 12.30pm kick off.

Memberships

The Membership Secretary was last seen in The Blues Bar with ex Secretary Rowson and Mr Reaveley.

A.O.B

The raffle draw was (finally) done for the Eddie Gray signed memorabilia. The branch have also been given a framed Leeds United shield autographed by Eddie Gray.

The Chairman was on form over the festive period. No doubt many of you have seen the footage on You Tube etc. so I won’t bore you with the details. Here are some wise words which were shared with Mr Rowson over the last week or so. They aren’t quite New Year Messages, but they are the best The MPO could do at this short notice. There will be more after the monthly branch meeting on Sunday 14th January.

HAPPY NEW YEAR FOLKS!

Apologies for the absence for the last few months. Ill health and all of that. Let’s hope 2018 is a better year for us all, on and off the pitch.

Monthly branch meeting

The first branch meeting of the year will be held on Sunday 14th January 2018. This is due to the fact that we are (properly) playing Newport away in the FA Cup, as opposed to just pretending to play them in away in the League Cup last year at Elland Road. What are the chances of getting the same team drawn in both cups in one season? So, only for the second time in quite a few years, the meeting has been moved. The branch meeting in December was unfortunately cancelled due to ill health of both The Secretary and The MPO. The much delayed draw for the Eddie Gray memorabilia will be done on Sunday 14th January.

Away games

The branch is not running a coach to the Newport game due to the lack of tickets acquired as the ground is tiny. Deputy Yates is running a minibus, please contact Mr Yates directly for info.

The branch is running a bus to Ipswich, there is currently a very limited number of seats left for members. If these seats are not taken up by branch members by the end of the week, these will be opened up to non members ( of which we have a wait list).

The next away game could be Hull or the 4th round of the FA Cup depending on what team is put out by TC on Sunday. I am seriously hoping that TC and Mr Radrizzani are sticking by their words that they will put out a team to win every game. They said this at the start of the season as part of the new era at Leeds United. At the time, I quoted the words of Billy, side before self, and reiterated how dedicated our great side were in the days where it wasn’t unheard of to play 4 games in 7 days. In the good old days of the replays, The Secretary says you could be playing a replay on the Tuesday and if you needed another replay, you could be playing on the Thursday. None of this penalty shoot out rubbish! You played until you properly won a game! Fixture congestion? My rear end! You played for the love of the  game and the pride of the shirt.

Memberships

The Membership Secretary has been out on manouvres since his misfortune. It doesn’t mean he will show up at the next branch meeting, but the branch is pleased to know he is functioning in some way, shape or form. There will be an update on memberships imminently.

A.O.B

We will ask Brian and Trish how much money was raised for the British Heart Foundation event before Christmas.

Mick Husband is somewhere in the Pacific on Dare to Lead in the Clipper Race For Life. Look out for his photo in the programme soon.

The MPO has some ideas for the LUSC Centenary and if anyone else has any ideas, please can they get in touch?

The latest edition of the blog will be coming soon.

The branch has bought a stone on the Bremner Square, albeit smaller than the one planned, but the larger sizes sold out pretty quickly.