Today Massimo Cellino sold Andrea Radrizzani a 50% stake in Leeds United, and Mr Radrizzani has reportedly said that he is excited to work alongside Mr Cellino to make Leeds United as successful as possible. He also said that he is aware of the heritage and traditions and wants to be a fitting custodian on behalf of the Leeds United Supporters who are the lifeblood of The Club.

After the years of misery under Bates, can you believe someone is saying that?

However unbelievable that is, it is even more unbelievable that there are still people who cannot bring themselves to be happy that this is happening, and are choosing to see only the worse possible scenarios of this. Whilst I completely respect that everyone is entitled to their own views, as we do live in a democracy, I am now getting really fed up with all this negativity.

I suppose this situation can be paralleled with the Star Wars franchise in some bizarre way. Whilst the original Star Wars films had their individual moments of epic cinematic history which gave them their greatness. There is no doubt that certain things like those annoying Ewoks (for the benefit of The Branch Secretary) and those other weird creatures in Jabba The Hut’s entourage, seemed a little out of place in the trilogy. However, the original Star Wars, The Empire Strikes Back and Return Of The Jedi films were THE benchmark. The one thing everyone will hark back to, and now that Carrie Fisher has gone to that galaxy far, far away, she is the icon of a generation.

Then came perhaps THE biggest mistake of all time, the release of the “pre-quel” films. The Phantom Menace, which was ruined by Ewan MacGregors really dodgy accent. The Attack Of The Clones or rather Jar Jar “Chandler Bing” Binks Story, ruined by Hayden Christensen this time around and similar to the next film Revenge Of The Sith, sabotaged by poor CGI. The films were a long time coming, they were filled with promise and came with a massive advertising campaign, but alas failed to live up to the standard of the original films, both in acting prowess and storyline, despite George Lucas doing his level best.

So to The Force Awakens, and many fans were worried that after the last three shoddy attempts, it was going to be another unprecendented disaster, quite honestly, in my opinion, it was pretty darned good. I have now seen Rogue One, and without giving too much of the plot way, that explains that! All credit to JJ Abrams, he took us back to that epic adventure in 1977 within the first 10 minutes of the film, back to what the fans wanted, not the CGI nonsense that we had been served up in the last three films. I agree that you cannot make a film about a galaxy far, far way without CGI, because there are no such things as starships, right?, but when the effects take over the film and the acting despite Samuel L “Mother******** snakes on a plane” Jackson and Liam “I have a very particular set of skills” Neeson, resembles the collective acting talent of Nativity 2: Danger in a Manger, you are already losing the battle.

Are you still keeping up with me? What parallels I hear you say?

I am not saying that Princess Leia is Billy Bremner, but what I am saying is that, most Leeds fans will hark back to our Glory Years. For some that is the Revie Era, for others the Championship side of 1989/90 and 91/92 and for the younger ones, it is the team that got us into the semi finals of the Champions League. These are the standards that we use to compare our current situation with.

After the debacle of Ridsdale and O Leary, Bowyer and Woodgate etc. we fell from grace with a massive thud. Successive failures under Krasner, Crozier and The “Consortium”, left the Club bereft and dangling by a thread to be swept up by Bad Papa Smurf and converted into what became his giant cash register, with lots of money coming in and out but no particular place to go…. definitely NOT in his pockets, given he always said that he never took a wage.. your Honour, and definitely no receipts or invoices. Then came the poorest Arabs on the planet, welcomed in with open arms by Mad Papa Smurf and certain vociferous members of the Leeds United fan base who claim (and still do) that they are the voice of the fans.

The result? Continuing abject failure. Failure to get a decent manager, failure to secure a decent team which didn’t consist of hasbeens and mercenary one season or half season wonders who no one else wanted, failure to beat Rochdale in the Cup, need I go on?

It is now nearly three years since Cellino tried to sack Brian McDermott, and how far have we come? As it stands today, we are third in the league and about to play either Sutton or Wimbledon in the 3rd round in the FA Cup after getting very near to quarter finals in the League Cup.

I say we have come a very long way!

This is an article taken from the Cambridge United v Leeds United programme Saturday 7th April 1984 about Cambridge United’s main fan group the ICT ( Inter City Trickle).

So the countdown to Christmas has begun, and what a start!

It is pretty unanimous that we gave a good account of ourselves in the quarter final in Liverpool last week. I thought Roofe played really well and deserved a goal. We could have easily got a result if the ball hadn’t come off post like it did or if Bartley’s free header was on target. The injury to O Kane and resulting early substitution had an impact on our shape and, I genuinely think that if Wood had started the game instead of coming on as sub, it would have made a massive difference. It was Garry’s decision at the end of the day, and I completely understand that he wanted to keep the faith with the Cup side that we had gone the distance with. One of the best highlights of the night was watching the new West stand emptying to the shouts of “Is it a fire drill? Is it a fire drill?”, they didn’t quite understand the irony as they trudged up the stairs in silence. To be fair to Liverpool, I have inside information that said that tickets for the game were sold out to season ticket holders even before the members had a chance to get them, so Leeds United sold out their ground for them, kinda anyway. As usual, I don’t pay very much attention to social media apart from what I have to do on facebook and here of course, but someone on the telly had said that Leeds fans were easily drowned out by the home supporters. Seeing as I don’t have a degree in Acoustic Sciences, I can only assume that he wasn’t sat anywhere near where I was. But, I suppose if you can’t let something speak for itself and you feel that you have to make the point on telly, you have already lost that argument anyway.

Glad tidings we bring, to you and your kin. We wish you a Merry Christmas & Happy New Year.

I received a call from The Chairman on 19th November 2016 informing me that he had found a “Very Important Branch Historical Document” in the bottom of one of his drawers. It was duly passed onto me on Sunday, before the Newcastle game, and here it is:  In The Chairmans words, it is very interesting and very important, you will find many interesting facts here, it is a newsletter from July 1989. Author is Steve Noble. Enjoy.

The Chairman had given me this a while ago, apologies for the delay. The exact words were: Monaco –  It’s a very important part of our history!