It’s probably not quite another 28 days later, more like another 30 days later. But basically it is now nearly two months since they did the dirty deed and sacked Bielsa.

And yes, I’m still fuming.

I’m going to stick to my form from last time and assess the situation since my last 28 days later blog, with all the calm, reasoned and well balanced thoughts that I can muster – for about 5 minutes. Then I’ll resort back to the usual! I am nothing, if not consistent.

First things first, whereabouts are we in the table compared to where we were when Bielsa got sacked at the end of February?

Well this is where we are now, 16th.

This is the table from February when we were 15th

The main difference is that Newcastle have leapt (way) over our shoulders, Brentford are out of sight and Burnley have gained on us.

Secondly, another 28 days after Bielsa had been sacked, we have now had the likes of Cooper and Phillips, and Bamford (albeit for just the one game before he got injured for the rest of the season again) back in the squad. The sheer presence of Kalv on the bench, even though he was never going to play, was, according to one of the new managers soundbytes “enough to rally the team”. Or something like that. To be honest, he comes out with so many new soundbytes and segues (or sedgeways as I like to call them), it’s hard to keep up with them. Reliably, though, a bit like the Boris “three – phrase – slogans” (remember them? “Hands, Face, Space” or “Test, Track, Trace” …. “Cheese, Wine, Dips” ), they can all be put on a tiktok or short enough to be put on a picture of his learned earnest face, and shared on facebook or twitter, and instantly forgot. 

Incidentally, can anyone remember what happened to the £37 billion that was spent on Test, Track, Trace, that was used for about 6 months and then shelved? Just think, if we had a hundredth of that , we could have bought Ronaldo, Sancho, Cavani, Rashford MBE and Fernandes and we’d be Top 3, er ….. Top 6 right now

Thirdly, the last few games that we played before they sacked Bielsa were against Top 6 opposition and we were giving goals away for fun. The last few games under our new manager have been against Norwich, Watford and Palace. Both Norwich and Watford have easily demonstrated why they are going down.  Palace last weekend had just come out of a gruelling Cup semifinal and had nothing to play for. Palace are safe from relegation and their players were tired. We got a draw. But we beat Wolves, who were down to 10 men and er.. it was a tough fight against Leicester and Villa (who haven’t won a game in the last 5). But we got a draw against Southampton.

Fourthly, ….. No, that’s enough. I think I have made my point.

Like many others, I thought we would beat Palace. They had nothing to play for. They were safe from relegation and the Cup was their only chance to get into Europe. They had recently lost in the Cup semi final and their players would have put everything into that, as unlike Leeds United, Palace were proud to fight for a Cup trophy. The Cup game was on the Sunday (17th) against Chelsea, they played against a resurgent Newcastle on the Weds (20th) and then they played us on the Monday night (25th). It’s nothing compared to the Revie sides’ title run in back in 1970, but Palace still had to be drained by it. Our plan should have been, by the second half after a bit of attacking football in the first 45 minutes, it was time to take advantage of their exhaustion. But we still couldn’t get a decent shot on target. In fact, if anything, Meslier was the busier of the two keepers, pulling off a decent double save at one point from Zaha.

Our manager repeatedly said that it was a well deserved point after only getting two shots on target all game. Players went on social media defending a hard fought draw. Pundits jumped to justify the gameplay, the team formation and performance. My feelings? Once again, I’ll leave it to Bill – Shakespeare, that is. Another masterful quote from Hamlet, of all plays, although it has morphed over the years “methinks thou protesteth too much”.

Too much overkill for me. Let’s be honest – we were rubbish. We could and should have capitalised on the Fatigue Factor, but we didn’t. Palace looked like they were the team hungry for the 3 points to secure Premier League survival. They looked and played like their lives depended on 3 points to stave off the relegation nightmares. Sadly, we did not. 

It’s the dog end of the season. We are in a relegation battle. Norwich and Watford are down, but who is going to be the third? We have struggled against the Top 6. We have Citeh next. We play Chelski who need Champions League security. Arsenal are aspiring for Europe. We play Brighton at home and then  Brentford is our last game. The last thing we need is a final day decider at Brentford. We needed to beat Palace. 

On that cheery note, what else has happened another 28 days later?

Someone has written to an Argentinian newspaper to publish a letter to Bielsa, and the letter has “gone viral”. I think Bielsa knows how some of us feel about the way he has been treated and how much some of us were against his dismissal, but it is the thought that counts.

A more disturbing, actually perturbing as opposed to disturbing, as it isn’t really much of a worry, is that people actually started to object to the “pro Bielsa sentiment” by deflecting the attention away from Bielsa’s achievements and trying to compare what Bielsa had done, to what Sergeant Wilko did for us.  There were many facebook posts saying that Sgt Wilko has been unfairly treated with disdain from the Bielsa fans, and that really Wilkinson deserved more plaudits as he had achieved more than Bielsa ever did. I saw polls and stats demonstrating that actually Wilkinson had done more for Leeds than Bielsa. Polls and stats trying to make out that the huge respect that Bielsa had earned, was more likely over inflated ego and more hype than the truth. I don’t know about Twitter, I’m not on it, but it would be interesting to know what Elon Musk thinks.

What I would say to that is, it’s not even a valid comparison. Two completely, utterly different things.

When we got promoted and then won the League, football was a completely different kettle of fish. Money hadn’t got into the game yet. Every team was basically on a level playing field with each other. It was down to footballing skill and individual talents. It was down to teamwork and the odd bit of spirited tackling from the odd player, David Batty comes to mind. Just about every team had a free kick specialist, like Harte. Players were reknown for having a deadly left foot, or right foot, or sprinting down the wing etc. etc.

Modern football players are more recognised for their diving skills than fancy footwork. Now, Modern Football is basically down to MONEY. It’s down to which team can buy all the top players up. Not necessarily to actually play them on the pitch, but to keep the bench warm and stop them playing for their opponents. Take Cavani, for example, what a waste of talent. 

The basic principles of the modern game are not too dissimilar to “The Art of War” by Sunzi (now Sun Zhu). Winning or at least staying in the Premier League is like warfare. All warfare is based on deception. You cannot win by brute force, or footballing skill in this case, alone. You need a bit of guile and thinking to overcome your obstacles. For those of you who have never read The Art of War, think Jason and Goliath and Brain over Brawn. In Modern Football, if you can’t beat them on the pitch, just buy them off it.

In many clubs in the top divisions in Europe, money has been a major factor in the success of these clubs. Money to spend on players. Money to buy better players to score goals (Messi, Neymar) / defend (Dick Van Dyke) etc. to win games, mostly. As opposed to buying players to sell shirts. It is a bonus that old Ronaldo has actually netted a few despite his lack of willingness to pull a shirt on and get on the pitch at times. And then there’s the money to buy players to stop them scoring goals against you. Take Sancho for example. Given free reign at Arsenal maybe, or Spurs, to plug the leak after Kane stopped playing earlier in the season, he would have been a potential threat. Lingard was having a whale of a time on loan, but why allow another squad to strengthen who could challenge for a Champions League place?

I am digressing again, back to another 28 days later and back to Leeds United v Bielsa.

I stand by my thoughts that if they had not sacked Bielsa, we would be safe right now. We would have beaten Leicester and with Coops and Kalv back, and maybe Bamford, we would be looking to a nice relaxing run in to the end of the season. We would have beaten Palace. We would be planning a pre season trip to South America, as Bielsa would not have turned down a trip to his own namesake stadium, and then we would be back to Guiseley, Harrogate Town and York City, as Bielsa did not like to go far to get his players fit for the new season.

Instead we are in the “it’s in our own hands” situation. Fingernails bitten to pieces potentially.

We are all hoping that Everton keep losing and Burnley start losing again to help settle our nerves. If they don’t, it’s not going to be a very good few weeks. In February, even though we had had a poor run of results, many Leeds fans were still thinking we were safe in mid table, albeit the bottom end of it. Many were thinking, at least we weren’t in that awful perennial problematic position of Premier League relegation fodder. Many thought that we were above that. Many thought that having seen how we performed in our first season back, with BielsaBall, we would never be in with the Norwichs and Watfords ever again.

How quickly things can change. With one stab in the back.

I am still fuming. Bielsa brought more to us than premier league football. He brought the game back to us. He took a set of Championship players and turned them into Championship Champions. He took that same team, with a couple of additions, to 9th in the Premier League in the first season up. The best a newly promoted side has ever achieved.

He brought football, as it used to be played, back into the Premier League. Exciting, attacking football. Of that there is no question. In some of the most challenging times, with all the bat flu restrictions hampering training and our own daily lives, let alone his, the players and the Club itself, football was brilliant. Football kept us going over these last two awful years where our lives were harshly restricted by what was going on around us. Sometimes I think people forget the impact of the response to the pandemic and how much adversity we have faced. If you think back to how difficult it was for us, think about how much of a challenge it was for Bielsa.

Season 1: He comes from Argentina, new country, new club, plays with most of our forwards (Roofe, Bamford) injured but we do ok, just falling short in the play offs.

Season 2: Doing great guns, Bat flu stops and starts the season, ruins all his plans for getting the team up to scratch, we still get promoted in summer, we never get to see it.

Season 3: Without us seeing any of it live, we play the best football the Premier league has seen for donkeys years and we achieve 9th. Everybody loves him. He has changed English football for the good.

Season 4: Still playing under difficult times because of restrictions and with most of the team injured, especially Kalv after the Euros, patience wears thin and they sack him.

Is that a bit too simplistic?

I understand it has been difficult for Leeds United. It was difficult for them to see us go from 9th in the first season back, to losing all the time and having 60 goals scored against us. The board were worried. The keyboard warriors who can’t remember the times when we were really shit, were worried. But we had so many injuries, it was unreal. They just needed a bit of patience. Once our players were fit again, we would be ok.

But they didn’t and now we are where we are now.

Still, at least the players can go out and have a beer and a pizza when they want to without worrying about Bielsa having a pop at them. Hope it was worth it, Brute.

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For those of you who have seen the film 28 days later, think of this episode of the blog as less about the Infected, but more enraged, than, well Rage, really. For those of you who haven’t seen the film, it’s about some people with well meaning good intentions (releasing a certain animal), unfortunately with unforeseen circumstances, resulting in a terrible outcome for everyone. It has it’s moments of mild peril and it probably is a bit scary. Like the Walking Dead used to be before Rick got taken away in that helicopter. Some parallels can be drawn to our current state of affairs, I suppose.

Yes, I’m still fuming, but I am prepared to take a look at the aftermath, 29 days later. 29 days after Bielsa was dismissed.

I’m going to start with facts. Yes, facts for a change. No bias, just plain facts and factual  incidences that have occurred 29 days later, 29 days after Bielsa’s departure. I will start calm and factual, but rest assured, by the middle of this blog I will have gone back to my usual bitterness and by the end, the blog will be full on supposition, rumour and complete hearsay – bit like most of the mainstream media then.

The last 29 days.

We lost to Spurs and they dismissed Bielsa. ( Technically now 30 days)

The club announced they replaced him with Jesse Marsch.

We played Leicester City away and lost 1 nil.

We played Aston Villa and we lost 3 nil.

We played Norwich and won 2 – 1. Joe Gelhardt with the injury time winner.

We played Wolves and we won 3 – 2. Ayling with the injury time winner

we have had this summary from Orta about (not) investing in new players and using the Academy players

Bamford is now out for 6 weeks

But the injuries are slowly coming back

Enough of facts, what has really gone on?

Bielsa got sacked. I was and still am incandescent about it. I just cannot be grown up about it. I cannot accept that what has gone on is anything but WRONG, WRONG, WRONG. See – I have written that in capitals, so it must be bad.

We played Leicester away. A Leicester team that quite frankly, were and had been absolutely shocking. Their results up to our game were loss to Spurs 3-2, draw with Brighton, loss to Forest 4-1 in the Cup, loss to Liverpool, draw with West Ham and loss to Wolves, but a win against Burnley I think. The positive build up to the game was basically the “dead cat bounce back”. It was proclaimed that now Leeds were rid of Bielsa, the only cause of our dire results, we would beat them easily, as Bielsa was the chain around the neck of Leeds United. We were told that Bielsa was the one dragging us down to the relegation drop zone. On the day, we lost. There was no change to the team, no change to the formation and no change to the continued playing of players out of position that Bielsa had been so derided for. We just couldn’t finish (albeit their goalie played a blinder) and realistically we should have won because we had Leicester – they were poor. But, we didn’t. Leicester were ours for the taking, and we did not capitalise on their terrible defending and lack of shots. We lost to a far inferior team that day, apart from Schmeichel – he was Man of The Match. The excuses rang out that the tell was that the goalkeeper got MOM, but that was just paper over the cracks.  The soundbyte from Bielsa’s replacement? “The performance was more important than the points” . Really?

We played against Villa in the new manager’s first game at ER. Stevie G had intimated that he was sorry he wasn’t up against Bielsa. We lost to Villa. The game was the same. Still misplaced passing, still struggling with defending and I think we managed one, yes, just the one shot on target all game and that was Gelhardt. We were taken apart. It was a difficult watch. People murmured that thankfully, at least, the Bielsa “man marking” system had gone. To be honest, that day we were just not capable of man marking any of them especially not that Coutinho. Realistically, we would have struggled to man mark the Black Knight from Monty Python in that game (look it up if you don’t know what I’m on about). I think Villa had 15 shots on goal, 9 on target. The one thing that I did notice that was different, was that we were very narrow across the field.

We played against Norwich. The bottom team whose run of form was only slightly worse than ours. Their only saving Grace was that at least they hadn’t let in as many goals as we had. Once again, another reminder that Bielsa was the architect of our demise by letting in 67 goals, repeated on the media ad infinitum. The players had come out in the week and said that it was all sweet smelling roses now, people were returning from injury and once more we all waited with bated breath at the team announcement. Bamford was back! We scored first with that deflected Rodrigo shot, Norwich thought they got a pen even though Rasicha stood on Ayling’s foot, but VAR was our friend that day in more ways than one. Raphinha had that free kick off the bar and James had a couple of decent shots. But true to form, in another heart stopping game, we just couldn’t hold out and in the 90th minute Norwich equalised. Insult to injury was saved by Meslier’s fine save with his noggin, and then, up steps the hero. Our own sponsored player Joe Gelhardt comes on and scores within two minutes. The goal that I didn’t see in real time. Not because I had walked out when Norwich equalised, though. No, because I didn’t think that Raphinha stood a chance of getting that ball, so I had my head in my hands. I didn’t see him reach it and cross it. I didn’t see Joffy come rushing in to score the winner. The first I knew was when everyone around me cheered. More fool me for not believing in Raphinha.

We played Wolves, Patrick’s in the starting 11, Kalvin’s on the bench and we beat them. Wolves cheated and dived and feigned injury like they always do. They went two goals up after Bamford dragged a shot wide and then limped around on the pitch until he went off in tears. Apparently, Patrick had got kick on his foot too (like most of the Wolves players felt fit to deal to us most of the game) which had been the catalyst. Patrick goes off after stretching awkwardly for a cross, Greenwood came on. Neves, arguably Wolves best player goes off after spending the majority of the first half  rolling around on the floor accruing injury time. But within two minutes of their best player going off, Wolves score. Llorente goes off and is replaced by Koch at 40 mins, but because of all the injuries, there is still at least 10 minutes to go. Jimenez clatters into Koch for his first yellow and then Klich gets caught in the face. Charlie Cresswell comes on as Klich’s face is slowly swelling up like Violet Beauregarde, and then just before the halftime whistle, Wolves go two up. It’s half time, we’re doomed! There’s not even ten minutes gone in the second half and Jimenez and Meslier go for the same ball. Jimenez is already on a yellow and he gets sent off, Meslier goes off and young Klaesson comes on. We try desperately to play with the extra man advantage, with Charlie Cresswell doing a Tony Adams in defence, but Wolves just keep going. Eventually, Harrison gets a goal after a VAR check, then Rodrigo scores and it’s 2-2 and Wolves record of never losing a PL game after going 2-0 up is looking jittery but reasonably ok. The rest is history, Ayling secures the win and we all celebrate like it’s 1999. Some of us breathe a massive sigh of relief that there is hope, and if we play 10 men for the rest of the season, we will stay up. Jesse does a bizarre post match interview and says Kalvin was never going to be able to come off the bench, he just put him on because there was no one else left. We played Arsenal at the height of the batflu issues when Liverpool said they couldn’t field a team. The subs bench Bielsa put out had 15 year old Archie Gray with Kenneh, Moore, Jenkins and Bate. Yes, there had been a challenging U23 game against the Sc*m midweek, but is that a good enough reason to risk Kalv? The likelihood of him ever going to have to come on was miniscule, but then so is losing 4 players to injury in one game. Jesse reassured us that at the end of the game, all the players were OK.

Bamford is now out for 4 weeks at least, for rupturing his plantarfascia. That’s the bit underneath your foot from the ankle to your toes. If anyone has ever had plantarfascitis, you will know how painful it is when it is just swollen, let along when you have completely ruptured it. Patrick is not OK.

The rest of the players are getting back though, and Klich was snapped in Harrogate having a pizza at the weekend, so he must be OK. Ayling managed to inflict injury, tackling this time in the ring not on a football pitch, resulting in Josh Warrington’s Klich-like swollen face. Was the jaw broken before Ayling’s headlock?

I think my version of events is better than the first factual one.

Rumour, supposition and gossip.

29 days later and it still doesn’t make sense to me. If Bielsa was such a problem why not completely change the style of  play immediately? Why not change the team? Why not play the players in their preferred positions? Why leave poor Dan James on his own, up front with the giants who make up the PL defensive walls? Why not start with Joffy? Why not get “proper” big name players in the team? If what we were told was correct, it was down to Bielsa that the squad was so small, wasn’t it? With Bielsa gone, the shackles had gone and the Club we free to look at other players? Surely?

It had to change

In the immediate aftermath of Bielsa’s dismissal, all we heard was “It had to change”. What had to change? Because frankly, the last 4 games have demonstrated that nothing much has changed. Bamford came back, albeit too early as he is now out, out for the rest of the season probably. Hindsight is a marvellous thing though. Apart from looking decidedly narrow against Villa, it hasn’t changed on the pitch. Both the Norwich and Wolves games were basically Bielsaball with the exception of Charlie Cresswell at Wolves, but he was a forced substitution. So maybe it was something to do with the players or the board? If it was the players that were unhappy, I would like to just remind them of my previous blog, Et Tu Brute. If any of the players were involved in the sacking, I wonder if they can sleep at night? The phrase “Never Forgive, Never Forget” or in the case of Jason Bourne “Remember Everything , Forgive Nothing” is not something to be trifled with. 40 years on and Joe Jordan and Gordon McQueen are still not welcome back at ER by certain Leeds fans. It’s not just them either, Smithy and Judas Kewell. What if it was the Board, however?

What went wrong?

Simply put, Bielsa just didn’t do what it said on the tin. Bielsa came to Leeds with a history of flamboyant bust ups and singular characteristics which meant that The Board were never prepared for him to be here this long. It must have been a complete shock to hear him say this on the eve of his 100th game (allegedly)

No one ever expected Bielsa to become the cult hero that he was. We’d heard tales of him at Newells Old Boys and the Chilean National Team, but in the UK? At Leeds United of all places? He could barely speak English! How was he going to get by needing an interpreter wherever he went?

Bielsa became uncontrollable. He was peculiar, he had his eccentricities, but that just endeared him to everyone. A genius lauded by everyone, even the harshest football pundit. The longer he was here, the more his popularity would grow. He took the limelight from everyone. The players, the Board, everyone stood in his shadow. Except the fans. He always respected the fans. He had the upmost respect for us. The ones who were loyal to Leeds. He was always happy for a photo op with the fans and he seemed genuinely pleased to be around us. There were songs written about him, giant murials of him, even the bucket was famous. Yet he remained modest, humble and gracious constantly to his adoring public.

He was just too effing popular, with the young and the old, and with that has to come an element of green eyed jealousy from the people who he had taken the spotlight and publicity from. But he wasn’t even trying to steal anyone’s thunder. Bielsa was just being Bielsa. Some people just do not need to do anything to be popular. They just are. People are just drawn to them, they don’t even need to put effort into it, because they are just likeable. There is a  brilliant quote from Twelfth Night, good old Bill Shakespeare again, “Do not fear greatness, some are born great, some achieve greatness and some have greatness thrust upon them”. I also like to add another, “Some aspire to greatness, but some just never achieve it”. Some people just cannot take being second fiddle, especially to someone who is so unselfishly mild mannered and self effacing. Marcelo Bielsa achieved greatness, that is , unless he was born great. But he is gone, and I’m still fuming.

The future?

It is 29 days later, so what are we left with now?

You know my thoughts on this. It’s not the new managers fault (apart from the fact that he could have just done a Zammo and just said No). He is here now, for however long. But he promoted Mark Jackson, so hopefully the Bielsa Way isn’t completely lost. The new manager is young, he wears skinny jeans, he is keen to be interviewed, all the time in fact, a bit too over eager for me. He likes his cliches and his soundbytes. He doesn’t need an interpreter. He hasn’t changed the look of the team though has he? Is that good or bad? Is he paying homage to Bielsa or just not got his act together as yet? We will see how it all pans out.

First Impressions.

First impressions last. This excerpt (sorry about the quality) wasn’t his finest hour. He just needs to stop being so eager to please. Take your time. Be measured. You don’t have to perform to the media. You are a football manager, not a eager beaver touchy feely sharer. Just manage the team.

I’ll leave you to decide

Et Tu Brute. That’s right. ET. TU. BRUTE.

Now for those of you who never did Latin at school or English Lit, or maybe fell asleep during history when they were teaching about the Romans, I’ll explain. By the way, do you get taught about the Romans nowadays? The Romans were the ones that built all the roads, some which are still around today, unlike Leeds City Council.

Et tu Brute, is the phrase Shakespeare used in his play Julius Caesar. In the play, Caesar’s ambitions are such that he wishes to declare himself Emperor. The proud Republican Senate are in disagreement and Cassius and Brutus, whom Caesar believes to be his friend, lure him to the Capital to assassinate him. Brutus stands there watching Caesar fall from the stabbings of the Senate, and as Caesar reaches towards his friend, Brutus effectively does the dirty and piles in, with Caesar left to utter the phrase, Et Tu Brute?

https://pixels.com/featured/death-of-caesar-march-15-44-bc-vincenzo-camuccini.html

Some of you may have heard the phrase “Beware the Ides of March”. I have done a blog many moons ago on this same topic. Another line from Shakespeare’s Julius Caesar. It is the date that the soothsayer predicts will be the fall of Caesar. Traditionally the date of the first full moon in March, which is there or thereabouts the 15th March.

If only the Board could have mercifully lasted that long.

Instead the death knell was Sunday 27th February.

We will never be party to the discussions, so we will never know the truth. Meanwhile the keyboard warriors and those “in the know”, claim everything and everything. Bielsa “lost the plot”. He’d “been found out”. There was “no plan B”. He didn’t care about the youth.

Now that is something I take exception to. There are numerous photos of him at the U23s, U18s and even the U11’s, surrounded by a crowd of kids, all in utter awe at the Master. Name another PL manager who would do that? Anyone? No, I don’t think so. So the ones spouting that lie, should all hang their heads in shame.

Many times the U23s were on the bench. And not just because of the bat flu / injuries either. Bielsa didn’t always play them, but maybe that was because he didn’t want to hurt the egos of the 1st team. We know that he tried to keep the likes of Gotts, McAlmont and even our own Ryan Edmondson. But how do we know how much pressure he was under to get them off the wage bill, so we could splash the cash on some famous players? We are never going to know.

The fact was that Marcelo Bielsa was the one who held the spotlight at Leeds United. Not the owner, not the Board members, not even the £million pound players. Nope, Marcelo Bielsa was the one who everyone wanted the photo with, he stole the limelight from everyone else. Can you name another  manager in the PL held in such regard? Nope, me neither.

The keyboard warriors complained that he relied on tactical stats too much. That he researched the oppositions’ flaws and skills too much. That’s just what the Don did. The Revered Don Revie meticulously studied every team so he could prepare the right plan of action. Bielsa wasn’t picky, he was a perfectionist.

Perhaps this was his downfall. He looked at the players during the training sessions, picked the team on the performance on the training pitch, their merits earning them a place in the first team. How sad that however good they looked at corners at Thorp Arch, it failed to materialise on the pitch. Unless corners are meant to not get past the 1st defender? They probably weren’t passing the ball straight to the opposition in training either, but they sure made up for that against Livarpool and Sc*m.

 Betrayal

We, the matchgoing fans have been deprived of what was OWED to us. We were OWED a open top bus parade. We were OWED at least a final goodbye to the great man. We were deprived of watching the team lift the Championship Trophy. We were deprived of watching our team play in the top division for the first time in 16 years. We were deprived of that fantastic football, you cannot beat watching a live game, TV cannot do the game justice. We were deprived of seeing us finish 9th – yes 9th in the table. No feat ever achieved by a promoted side. We were deprived of saying farewell to the monster that was Beradi. We were deprived of saying goodbye to the wizard, Pablo.

Matchgoing fans were deprived of what we live for and cherish every week August to May.

I know the cyber fans, the fans who have no desire to ever watch a live game, the “want it, click it, get it” fans don’t understand where I am coming from. I feel so sorry for you.

The Board didn’t like it. Typical of the Corporate Ideal, where you have a one year, a three year and an five year plan. You know that annual continuing professional development discussion, “where do you see yourself in 3 years?” – “Not f**king here mate”. It’s bizarre that whilst they were sticklers for this, the promises of the stadium development and development of ER and it’s training facilities never actually got anywhere near fruition, did it? Can you have it both ways?

Leeds United yearned for maximum exposure, maximum publicity, big name signings. Has anyone emerged from the youth apart from Kalv? Maybe eventually young Jamie Shack will get a mural painted in his honour, we can live in hope. In the meantime, it is just Kalv that gets to be in the Christmas JD Sports commercial.

Is the Club merely wanting players in shampoo ads and modelling razors and moisturising creams? Is that their yardstick of success? That’s not what the fans want. At least that isn’t what I want. I wouldn’t think that this product placement, corporate image is my idea of success.

Harsh Reality

The keyboard warriors in recent days have said that it was simply down to the fact that “teams learnt to play against us”. Maybe they should watch a replay of the Chelsea game? Perhaps another viewing of the 1st half against Spurs before Conte started jumping up and down waking the Spurs fans up? Were we “found out” in the game against Villa? Did Moyes “learn to play against us” at West Ham in the league? I’d like to suggest that those who criticised actually watched the game rather than have it on in the background whilst they were making another Tik Tok that no one is going to like.

The harsh reality is that in the last three games, we gave the ball away. We gave them the goals, some on a silver platter. Apart from maybe that 4th spurs goal, that was well taken.

Yes, Bielsa’s style is attacking, that’s what made it SO good to watch. But the players were also expected to track back. They were expected to do their job with the ball, but also put a shift in off it. This is why we have missed Lord Bamford so much. It wasn’t so much about the goals he scored, it was everything he did OFF the ball, drawing players away, creating space to give the likes of Harrison, Raphinha and Dallas the opportunities to attack the goal.

The last few games we’ve been subjected to crosses being ploughed into touch. Shots being skewed into the South Stand, silly flicks and backheels, when a hard low shot would have sufficed. Oh, and those corners.

We’ve also been on the harsh end of some random reffing decisions, not to mention VAR and all the cheating and diving. Which incidentally IS the way to play against us – Anti-football. Just stop and start the game by falling over several times when you lose the ball, and clasp your ankle in hope that the ref will give you a free kick.

The inability to pass the ball to your own player is NOT Bielsa’s fault.

The inability to stick the ball in an open net is NOT Bielsa’s fault.

The inability to get your arse back into position when we lose the ball from a corner is NOT Bielsa’s fault.

The inability to not get a corner past the 1st defender is NOT Bielsa’s fault.

In days gone by, getting subbed when you weren’t injured was a slap in the face. Remember Pablo storming off and kicking that water bottle against Leicester a few years ago? Being subbed when you’ve done nothing wrong hurts, it makes you do better the next game. Nowadays they almost look relieved to get off the pitch and have a sit down. Professional players in the 21st century.

This is why I was so aggrieved by this quote

Which players? Who?

Et Tu Brute. ET. TU. BRUTE?

I have always said that no one is bigger than the Club. The fans are the most important thing, as we were here before, we are here now and we will still be here long after the owners, the players, the managers even, have left OUR Club. Well, I have to say that this is the ONE exception. When I say no one is bigger than the Club, no one is,  apart from the man who made the Club bigger with his presence.

I’m not gushing about him for the sake of it. Bielsa really did mean that much to me, because of what he did and how he did it. But he is not God.

God created Yorkshire.

But when it comes to the creation of the last 3 and a half years of football, Bielsa isn’t far off.

There’s a lot of anger and resentment right now about this weekends’ proceedings, and that’s just me, let alone anyone else.

I was disappointed and despondent after the game but I had faith and I could see the bigger picture with injuries and the mitigating circumstances of playing Sc*m, Livarpool and Spurs in short succession and the Gerrard and Fat Frank extenuating circumstances etc. I’ve been accused of blind faith, but frankly, when have I ever been bothered about what people accuse me of? I don’t even reply in most cases. But yesterday, yesterday hit me like a tonne of bricks. I can take a slap in the face with a wet fish, but this, this has completely floored me.

You just don’t do this. Bielsa wasn’t just our manager – to me he was family. No one disrespects family.

There’s no blood ties here, I’m not stupid, but he’s done more for our Leeds United family than anyone could ever have done. You don’t sh*t on your own doorstep.

So here’s my alternative “sorry – not sorry” dismissal notice. It’s bitter. Really bitter. I’m making no apologies if anyone gets offended.

Dear Marce

Thanks for the last 3 and a bit years, but let’s face it, you never did yourself any favours, did you? These last three games gave us the necessaries to force the push on you, but you had plenty of opportunities to push our platform and seal the brand, and basically you failed. You just took the actual game too seriously. All that professionalism, it’s not just about the 90 minutes on the pitch. It’s a business, and you just refused to market the brand to it’s optimum.

Now that you’re off, here’s a few pointers to help you for your next job. You might have a wealth of managerial experience, but you’ve gotta know how to handle the brand.

Dress sense.

That scruffy tracksuit and trainers was just never on trend. If you could have just worn a cap with our sponsors logo on, had a decent haircut so we could push male grooming products or just simply tried a pair of skinny jeans, so the fans could relate to you a bit more, it would have helped. We weren’t expecting you to be a snappy dresser like that Scott Parker at Fulham, but at least you could have tried to be a bit streetwise with a pair of snazzy Gazelles worn without socks.

Whilst we’re on that subject, the blue bucket was a good gimmick and you could have utilised it a bit more to our advantage. But realistically once everyone knew you could buy the bucket off Wish for less than a tenner, it was doomed. Even though Wish could get it made for cheapness in the PRC for 50p and they were flogging it on for a £9.50 profit, there wasn’t enough in it for the club, was there? Realistically, there was never going to be enough room in the superstore for us to flog those,in hope that people would turn up to get one and buy a bit of extra tat, whilst they were there.

We are completely blaming you for having to do that “warehouse fire sale” to get rid of last years stuff. We’ve planned for 5 different kits next season and it’s always cheaper just to get the job lot of all sizes in bulk. The fat b**stard sizes sell out really quick but the Club just aren’t doing enough to  attract  the right sort of fan. We need more S or XS sized fans, the young ones just don’t identify enough with you.

Interviews

Your stubborn refusal to speak English and only go through that interpreter wasn’t winning us any decent social media likes. Your pre match interviews were just too long. Most fans were losing interest in them because you didn’t give us enough interesting soundbytes to make a Tik Tok. All that professionalism and using technical terms. The young ones just wanna hear some goss and news, not a proper update on injury lists. Even the retweets were just  the same old picture of you in a scruffy tracksuit. And whilst we are on about it or why couldn’t you just get a Twitter or Insta account? Not like we were asking you to go edgy with Tinder or even  Grindr was it? A few retweets and snapchats could have got us a much bigger social media presence, just a couple of Tik Toks with a cat would have done, think of the sponsorship. Image is really important.

You did us a great favour winning the Championship though. That Amazon series “Take Me Home” got us loads of kudos and we got to meet that bloke from Gladiator, Russel Crowe. Mind you, if you’d played your cards right, we could have got that bloke from Deadpool, Ryan Reynolds. He’s got a hot wife as well. But we missed that opportunity and he’s gone to Wales of all places. We’re just left with that bloke off Game of Thrones and Jon Bon Jovi. Seriously, are they still relevant? Who streams Bon Jovi songs nowadays? Even the songs they sing about you are old choons. If you’d only got the fans to sing current songs that we all know, like Drake, Dua Lipa or Lizzo even. The White Stripes thing is so old now, and I don’t even know where that Follow Follow thing came from. Think of all those Millenials who feel so left out, we need to value the Gen Zee.

If only you’d been less technical in those post match interviews and stopped accepting all the blame for everything. Even Warnock blamed Tom Lees. You could have just slagged off Tyler Roberts, everyone hates him anyway, that way you could have easily deflected the blame. You know the refs have been against us, just blame that git Friend, or shout at a linesman every now and again. At least Conte runs up and down the touchline, even Wagner did that 30 yard sprint to the goal line, a yellow card or two never goes amiss, it’s about exposure. It’s what the kids want. They need action, experience and excitement, not boring Bueno all the time sat on a Wish bucket.

Even when you did Spygate, why did you just sit there with a Powerpoint? Couple of Tik Toks would have seen it right. Done and dusted in ten. 3 hours of boring Windows, no one uses Microsoft anymore, MacBooks all the way, or at least use a tablet. We could have secured a great deal with Samsung. I never even saw you with an iPhone. do you even own a device? Plus you just needed to quote more stats. Stats that the betting companies are interested in, not actual meaningful stats. We need to know and quote percentage of passes. It’s irrelevant if the passes are just back to Meslier all the time. It still counts as an accurate pass, and will look good. There’s no room for the minutia like the truth. It’s all about percentages. The number of goals is boring, points sounds so much better for number crunching.

Way of Life

Effing Wetherby! You had to go live in a tiny flat in Wetherby when we refused to let you have digs at Thorp Arch. Shopping in Mozzers, of all places. At least you had your coffee at Costa, a proper brand, rather than at a local greasy spoon. You needed to live in some posh apartment block with famous neighbours. Shop at Waitrose, and use their green compostable bags. You can’t be using bags for life, you might as well be on some away day with your 24 cans of Stella and packet of speed. If you lived in the centre of Leeds, there could have been loads of photo ops of you cycling to work on the green super highway, think of the publicity. The only saving grace was Costa, was people would retweet Costa, no one is going to Insta at Mozzers.

Whilst we are on about it, why did you insist of taking photos with common fans. Where were the famous people? You could have milked the Ryan Reynolds thing and got us in the Marvel film. Think of the publicity. No, you just got photos with normal people and their kids.

Players

The team needed more exposure. If you hadn’t have knackered them all out playing Murderball, they’d have had plenty of time to get on social media and we could have had another WAG war, like Coleen and Crouch’s missus. Lord Bamford and the other ones dropping kids could have made centre spread on Hello magazine. Another opportunity missed.

It’s a good job you did so well with Kalv. Him in the England team was great for Twitter. We got SO many retweets. If you weren’t so stubborn, we could have sold him to Amanda Staveley and those Saudis in the summer for £60 million. As it stands, we’ll rake it in anyway in the summer when Kalv and Rapha go to Liverpool and Rodrigo goes to Spurs. I reckon about £150 mill for all three. If only you’d signed more players with just one name. Every proper Premier League team has got at least three players in with just one name. Rapha, Rodrigo, Cher and Madonna. It just rolls off the tongue, would have been a great song set to Rizzo feat Cardi B.

Fans

The crowd do a good job making a bit of noise but it needs to be more relevant and there needs to be more fans on their iPhones like at Old Trafford. I’m fed up of these legacy fans. I’m hoping the plan with these new etickets just bamboozles the old gits and they forget to do them, or the website’s so confusing that they just give up anyway.These old season ticket holders just come to watch football and don’t spend enough in the club shop. Plus they take up all the seats that we want to give to my corporate mates. At least we will make a bit of money on 5 different strips next season. But we’ve conned them into this buy back ticket exchange, so newer more good-looking fans can come and buy the S and XS shirts. We’ll rake in a bit more ticket money as well, as we charge them extra for the same seat. These new fans will only want to come a couple of times a year, so it if they buy a shirt with a players name on it, by the time they come back, he’ll have gone, so they can splash out on another one to keeping them relevant and on point. If we play our cards right and hack these legacy fans off, they’ll all clear off anyway and there’s 22,000 on the waiting list for season tickets, so the market is always going to be there. Bonus that they’re paying an extra £10 on their £80 membership rate.

So, Marce, hope you find the tips useful.

Bygones, Cheers

The Guys

For those of you who don’t know the quote, I’m afraid you might as well just give up now. I’ve put the full quote in from Harry’s facebook page, so it kind of explains it a bit more. In case you don’t know what happened, it doesn’t end well for Harry either.

After the timing of the publication of my last blog spookily coincided with the press release from the Club regarding it’s move to “SeatGeek”, I must admit I was getting a bit worried that someone from our beloved Club was spying on me. I’m not sure why they would, seeing as my views seem to be on  a completely different wavelength to the Great and the Good at Leeds United. Unless of course they want to know what I think, so they can do the exact opposite, just to P*ss me off?

I am mightily worried about the surveillance state that we seem to be moving towards, not just from the “Papers Please” brigade in Carrie’s government, but also the Marching On To Ticketless rhetoric which is spilling from  the mouths of our current custodians.

The problem as I see it, is that what the fans want and what the governing authorities, be it Our Club, FIFA, UEFA, the FA, the PL, the EFL etc. want , are two completely different things. Just look at the failed (currently but it’s not going away anytime soon) European Super League. Whilst all the “Big” clubs in Europe thought the ESL  was a brilliant idea, keeping it all in the family. What I mean by “it” is money / TV rights / advertising and sponsorship. Little did they realise that we, the British public, would be so against it.

I do not use the term “British public” lightly either. As it was a massive thing at the time. Even people with no interest in football whatsoever were getting involved in the debate. There was commentary, debate and opinion from Parliament, daytime telly, afternoon telly and even in the local hairdressers, let alone all the usual sports media and social media channels. Some of these people had never even watched a game on the telly, let alone been to a football game. But there they were, all identifying and sympathising with the Blossom Hill rose swigging demonstrators outside the Theatre of Wet Dreams.

It’s pretty amazing that this Elitist ESL could spark off such a massive furore, when realistically the Rise of The European Super Losers League would only impact harshly on actually a very small number of people. The suffering souls would be the matchgoing fans who would have fork out MORE money, time, effort, annual leave, holiday time with their families,  watching their team churn out the same rubbish, all over Europe. The actual benefit, would be to those people who want to watch and bet on football all the time, which according to the True Gods of Football, is everybody. And of course the money men who rule our game would be loving it, because they would be raking in the spondoolies.

The principle of it though was the fact that it was the Middle Class Entitled Elite telling us what to watch and enjoy. That was the crux of it. It was a classic example of the Rich telling the Poor what they should do for the greater good. Surely all these European Giants of Football knew what was best for the fans? Surely the football fans would only fear to tread in the footsteps of the custodians of the best clubs in the world?

The only way to sum it up is that they are on a completely different wavelength.

Like many things going on at the moment, there is a huge disconnect between us and our masters. I could go all political but I’ll leave that to the professionals. I’ll concentrate on football.

For those of you who aren’t lucky enough to have a season ticket, I’ll let you know what is going on. We have all been sent an email telling us how to renew our precious piece of plastic. The Club have taken on a new ticketing stakeholder – SeatGeek. This company is currently being used by other PL clubs like Citeh, Livarpool and Spurs, and some US sports clubs, to supply their entry systems. We have to log on to the new ticketing site, but you can’t use your old password (pa$$word), you get a link sent to your email to reset it and then you get redirected to this new site which will enable you to buy your “ticket”.

Let’s take you back to the old days.

Now in Ancient Times, you could of course just pay on the gate to get in (like at Villa away in 2018). Or if you were fit and daring enough, you could just climb over the wall at Lowfields. You didn’t really need to buy a ticket before the game – just turn up at 2.45pm on a Saturday (Yes! A Saturday!), and you could pay the man at the turnstile. Then we got these lovely little books with paper tear off slips that you used to stand there with, after having had a few jars, struggling to read what number slip you needed to tear off before you got to the turnstile. Every year you got a different coloured wallet. They were ace. You got a numbered tear off ticket for each game, which mysteriously never followed 1, 2, 3. It was always a random number, to keep us on our toes I suspect. Then there were vouchers for extra games, like Cup games (remember them?) after the numbered ones and I think in the 2000s ones you got vouchers for 10% discount on tat from the Club shop.

Here are some pictures for posterity

Then they decided that they would go to “cards” in the early 2000s. For our “benefit” of course, no more tearing off a paper ticket, just a piece of credit card sized plastic, that would get you in if you flashed it at the turnstile. That didn’t go down well initially, but we got there eventually.

We wondered why there was the move to plastic. “Progress” said some. Others, slightly more cynical, said it was more the fact that they wouldn’t have to man each turnstile, therefore save a bit of money. Hmmm – now there’s an idea! Hold that thought – it might crop up again.

Those of us who travelled away in the 80s had to get these new fangled Red Away cards (see picture, modelled by Knaresborough Secretary Dave (Lego hair) Rowson.

I think these were brought in after the riotous assembly at the end of the season at Birmingham in 1985. This may have been the last time we were allowed to pay at an away turnstile, until Villa in 2018, of course. After we got promoted, for “Our safety” we were all told that we had to get “Leeds United Away Cards” in order to get an away ticket. These were free to everyone who had a season ticket, it was just the hassle of getting a passport sized photo every season really. This cost money,of course, if you didn’t have a season ticket, just a tenner, but it was still money. It did cause a bit of a kerfuffle at the League Cup Final (against Villa in 1996) as some of the West Stand season ticket holders, who never travelled away, didn’t realise you needed an away card to get an ticket for the cup final, so they got a bit upset. Oops.

These were – wait for it – photo ID cards essentially. Those who were involved in discussions around away tickets not so long ago suggested that these be brought in, as an extra layer of security to ensure away fans were who they purported to be. These people obviously never remembered that we used to have them (because they weren’t going then???) and have forgotten that the exorbitant cost and extra admin hassle, made photocards a financial and logistical nightmare, and they were swiftly dismissed. Plus, no one ever looked at them anyway, especially not at 2.55pm when everyone turned up to the turnstiles en masse because we had been kept back by the Rozzers.

These morphed into the guise of “Premier Cards” in the early 2000s. Considering we then got relegated and relegated again not long after, the demise of Premier Cards was a given and we just changed to having to show our season tickets. If they ever bothered asking for it, that is.

I am reminded that the only other memorable fixture that was cash on the gate was at Odsal in 1986. Where the Rozzers insisted that the “all ticket” rules were scrapped. This was on the basis that West Yorkshire Police reassured Bradford City (and Leeds United) that the “cash on the turnstile” option was a far better way of controlling the fans in the ground. September 20th for those who cannot remember. We went 2 nil down. There was a brief incident with a chip pan and the rest is history. Here is the link for those of you who weren’t there.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Ym4QJTVegw

Away tickets used to be, just ask Eric and he would sort. People used to turn up at his flat and he would dish them out. Then B*tes chucked his toys out of the pram and ruined it all. After his hissy fit, you had to fax your away ticket request form in. This is Ancient History, if you really want the lowdown, somewhere in the blog archives I have spelt it out with a picture of the old forms that we used to have to fill in. Read all about it there.

Of course as pre requesite, you had to show your photocard at away games to get in. All for “safety”, you understand. The ticket had to belong to the person trying to get in with it. They wanted to know who was getting in, as they didn’t want any of the old hooligan mob from the 80s and 90s getting their sticky paws on away tickets. Much of the old hard core fans were undesirables, and in the spirit of the Premier League, they wanted families and a new kind of “fan” going. They wanted to move football away from the old traditional working class roots and open it up to the more upwardly mobile, new breed of “sports fan”. The sort of football fan who wanted to go for the experience and excitement, rather than just to follow the team .

SkyTVisf**kings**t. Ruining football for matchgoing fans since 1992.

So we turn to todays’ conundrum. Ticketless entry.

I don’t want it.

Someone in the pub said to me on Sunday “What you’d rather we go back to the tear off stubs?” I said ” Yes, they were fantastic”. I don’t want to rely on technology all the time. Technology is too unreliable. Some things cannot be improved with technology. Some things just don’t need improving. There’s the old adage again, if it isn’t broke – don’t fix it.

Take the breaking news regarding the Post Office Scandal. Hundreds of postmasters and mistresses falsely accused of fraud and theft. Why? Because of a faulty system which was meant to “improve” the Post Office efficiency. Now this may be one extreme example of system failure, but it is not like it still isn’t happening. Look at the “Track and Trace” system that the Government tried to implement, and the NHS app, and how much it cost – £37 billion well spent. I don’t think.

It’s hardly a shining example of brilliant technological advancement, is it? It didn’t work properly and most people who downloaded it, ended up uninstalling it because it either didn’t work or worked too well, pinging everyone that happened to stroll past you. When the PL made it part of the Covid rules, how many people just got a paper copy instead as the signal at ER was too unreliable?

Whilst I am at it, how many people have got the Sky VIP app to work on their phone? I can’t get it to work on mine, so as a Sky VIP Platinum customer, I can’t get any of the benefits. Sky – believe in butter.

On my latest yellow sticker trip to Marks and Spencer ( 3pm on a Sunday is a good time to visit I find), I was reminded about the flaws of doing everything on a phone. As usual, I picked the worse checkout to put my bargains on. At the front of the queue was a lady holding what seemed to be a huge bar of Galaxy (300g one) demanding that the cashier fetch the manager because she could not pay with her phone. The poor cashier was getting very embarrassed, but maintained a dignified tone of apology, as this customer was refusing to believe that it was the phone that was at fault, not the till.

What could possible go wrong with ticketless entry at ER?

We could ask the Citeh fans, who at the start of the season, having had this foisted on them without any consultation whatsoever, suffered long queues and a host of problems at the Etihad. The signal at Citeh is better than it is at ER, so you couldn’t even blame the poor reception. Could there be a situation where there are massive queues at the turnstiles because the ticket entry system isn’t working properly? A bit of congestion in a supermarket might be a bit of an inconvenience, but 30,000 people outside a football ground? Might be a bit more than a tiny bit of a hassle.

But why dwell on these negatives? What are the benefits?

According to the Leeds United website, the feedback from fans is that this is what they want.

Hmmm.

Anyone care to think back to the last thing that Leeds United said the fans wanted?

Was it perhaps the unmitigated disaster that was the new Club crest?

So, have the Club listened to the same group of fans again, then? No one I spoke to is in favour of etickets. In fact most are vehemently against them. As they are against the removal of the Pavilion as a pre match drinking place and cashless in ER. Who are these people that the Club are talking to?

You would have thought by now that it has dawned on the Club that the people that they are engaging with might not be most representative of the common or garden matchgoing fan. The ones they are engaging with may be on a completely different wavelength to the season ticket holders and members (when they can get a ticket) who attend games. These may have been the same fans who agreed that it would be a great idea to limit the exit points from the NW corner and the Kop for the first game of the season. Because that turned out so well didn’t it? Everyone being funnelled towards the gates at Lowfields, only to find that there was only one gate open. It was like the scene from 300 when the Persian Army were descending on Leonidas. It was only lacking a cliff to fall over.

My question is why do we need to change?

What is wrong with having season ticket cards and paper tickets? There is no green argument, paper is fully recyclable. One plastic card is hardly going to make any difference to the environment given the incredible volume of plastic pollution that is commonly known as the lateral flow tests, which we were forced to do every time we went anywhere for two years. These horrible plastic strips and the associated plastic paraphanalia, as well as the single use masks, gloves and PPE that the Government spent millions on ( and wasted as they had to send the rejects back as they weren’t fit for purpose ) have generated more environmental pollution in two years than all the farm animals in the world have ever done.

Just let us keep our season ticket cards and let us have paper tickets if we want to. Let us choose.

Let the Smartphone Elite have the option to live their lives addicted to their devices, if that’s what they want. But the Digitally Excluded must be allowed to come and watch Leeds United too.

Or is it, in a similar vein to the introduction of plastic season ticket cards, more that the saving is linked to having to have less ticket office staff and less staff at the turnstiles?

But then the question is, when your phone / device doesn’t work, who do you go to? Do you end up ringing some helpline 1000 miles away, waiting in a queue, whilst being reassured that “your call is very important to us”, because you digital ticket isn’t registering? If the eticket comes centrally from SeatGeek, can the ticket office staff actually do anything if it doesn’t work? Will there be any matchday ticket office staff at all if all the tickets are electronic? Hmmm – there’s a thought. Where have I heard this before?

Matchgoing fans matter. Our views matter. The old gits that sit in the Kop and the NW corner should have as much voice as those in the South Stand. In fact, if those in the South Stand think that it is right to chuck coins and bottles etc. on the pitch, then maybe The Club shouldn’t be listening to them at all, because that is not what football is all about. Same as it isn’t about glorifying the excessive antics of a growing number of Leeds fans who just want to goad home fans and get drunk and drugged up at away games.

At the Livarpool game on Weds night, as a mark of respect and solidarity to our fellow football fans, the LUSC exec met with The Spirit of Shankly group and laid a wreath at the Memorial Plaque for the 97. This is what football is about.

Apparently social media was all about us losing badly and the usual doom and gloom mongers saying that The Club needed to have invested in the January transfer window and that there is no future in the Club. But there’s more to football than squandering £100 million on the next Jean Paul Augustin. Speak to a normal matchgoing fan and they would be content with not having a 1950s crumbling relic of a West Stand and somewhere to drink and meet up with their mates before the game. They’d be happy with cheaper and better food and drink and better facilities. We’d be happy if our players just didn’t get injured all the time and our games didn’t get moved at the drop of hat by the True Gods of Football.

We would be happy if we could just go to a football game and enjoy it, and come back home.

Our greatest respect to the families and friends of the 97.

Always Leeds Always Loyal

It sounds a bit greedy, it sounds a bit needy but PLEASE put us first.

I’ve done many pieces over the years around the subject of how marginalised I personally feel by the rise of “modern football”. They’ve been under the banner of “Fans Don’t Matter” and in the main, they’ve been a lighthearted look into  how abandoned I feel by the money men and TV companies that are the “True Gods of Football”. I suppose there’s been the odd one when I’ve blown my fuse and had a rant, but it’s been deserved.

I personally feel that long standing supporters like myself aren’t valued by, well, just about everyone really. I’ve pledged my undying allegiance to Leeds United, and I’ve spent a long long time unconditionally following my beloved team all over the country and the world. I’m not alone in this, there’s thousands more like me who win, lose or draw support Leeds United. We put our club first, it’s about time Leeds United put us first.

I will never tire of saying it either. It’s not selfish, it’s the truth. Those of us who tirelessly supported Leeds, home and away, when we got relegated, and relegated again, and still steadfastly turned up to cheer them on at those horrible crappy grounds (and not just to tick off one of the 92 either), all deserve to get away tickets, this season, next season and for however long we stick with it. We know who these people are, probably only 1000 maybe, who went to the majority of the aways, so it’s probably less than half of the normal away allocation in this league.

The Club know who they are, they could tell us, but they won’t. They should be proud of these supporters, they should be proud of our loyalty and we should be celebrated and acknowledged.  Any other club who are proud of their fans would. At least this season they have given us the “Super Away Attendees” , so at least there has been some recognition of loyalty over the last 10 years. Selfishly, I believe this recognition of our loyalty  should be maintained should be continued, in perpetuity. We aren’t going to live forever, if these last 2 years have taught us anything, it’s that we should value these things, before they are lost. Please put us first.

Why am I digging this up again?

Not just access to away tickets, this time. This time it’s properly about match going fans, primarily the safety of match going fans.

Ah! Now you’ve clocked it.

Everybody knows what happened at Chelsea. We have all seen the scenes on social media about the calamity in the shoddy Shed End at Stamford Bridge. Those of us unlucky to get caught up in it, experienced the mayhem first hand. Surprisingly some had no idea it had even happened until they heard about it afterwards. Many of us complained, some sent in videos for supporting evidence. The result? The usual cover up and as usual the blame was on us – the fans. For those of you who haven’t seen the official response, see snapshot below.

For once, our experience wasn’t in isolation.

Unfortunately, another near miss at the turnstiles occurred, this time at our own club. For those of you who haven’t seen the shocking scenes, here’s a link to The Chronicle

https://www.chroniclelive.co.uk/sport/football/football-news/watch-moment-newcastle-united-fans-22858546

Put fans first.

The above two incidences are two extremes of how little match going fans are engaged with. There are many less extreme examples of how fans don’t matter at ER. The loss in pre match facilities for families has been previously highlighted in this blog. The move to give the Pavilion over to the Corporate Animals has meant that short of cramming into Billys or The Peacock, there is no place to meet family and friends for a pre match drink or some scran.

The introduction of cashless systems has forced many into not buying anything in the ground ever again. It was done in the name of convenience, but has it made much difference in the queues? It’s difficult to say at the moment because it’s winter, but when it gets warmer, will the service be better and more efficient, or will they still run out of beer, like they did at the start of the season? There hasn’t been much difference in the quality of the food or alcohol by all accounts – but I don’t buy anything anymore – so it’s just hearsay.

Electronic payment, well electronic systems are my bugbear full stop.

As we saw with the (now redundant – hopefully forever – papers please) passport, there were all sorts of issues because the signal at ER is so poor. Even though the PL rules said that you needed to show proper electronic ID, people were forced to take screen shots of their pass or (Heaven Forbid!) print it out on a piece of paper.

They are even stadia round the country who are pushing paperless e tickets. Given the problems with the turnstiles already, it’s not looking good is it? There’s nothing wrong with paper tickets and season ticket cards. Would they be any more difficult than e tickets? Probably not. Are they anymore environmentally challenging? Probably not. At least they wouldn’t be dependent on getting a signal on your phone and having enough battery on your phone. Yet, they tell us e ticketing and cashless is they way forward, and having the choice isn’t. Put us first.

Realistically, it’s not about what fans want, it’s what PL and clubs want. It’s probably to do with making all stadia “One size fits all”, so all the clubs are all the same. Who wants that? We value our individuality. Each club is unique. Who wants to be another identikit club, with an identikit ground and identikit fans? Ah! Therein lies the answer – it’s not about the fans, it’s about the commercial enterprise that is “Modern Football”.

I can see behind the scenes there are deals with e ticketing firms, internet security, infrastructure companies who make turnstiles, electronic supplies, etc. etc. etc. all partners with the PL, FIFA and UEFA, all with vested interests to make each club, in each country, all use the same companies and facilities. All in the name of progress and convenience, but in truth, it’s all about money and contracts. All of these companies will all have deals selling on your data as well, to make more money out of us. The digitally excluded will be just that. Excluded. If you can’t afford the phone / device , that’s your luck out. Just like trying to order tickets – if you don’t have decent broadband reception and a decent device, don’t even bother.

If the turnstiles were all manned, like they used to be, would there have been the problems experienced at Chelski? Would there have been issues at the West Stand with the visiting Geordies? Who can say? But I doubt it. It’s supposed to save money on staffing I’m guessing – but fans should come first and no money saving measures should compromise fans’ safety – surely?

This season we’ve actually managed to visit Spurs, Arsenal, Chelsea etc. and seen the impact on the grounds when all the corporate hospitality all disappear at half time. The stadia are soul less and needed the managers running up and down the touchlines to stir up the noise and support from the home fans. I’ve heard that they deliberately sell more corporate tickets, at a premium price, to those who can afford it in order to keep the prices down for the normal fans in the cheap seats. Well, after speaking to a few season ticket holders from these London clubs, there isn’t much sign of that helping them out with their match day prices. If and when ER gets its’ make over, what is going to happen to us? Are we going to sacrifice swathes of seats for the corporate animals, just so we can keep our season ticket to less than £600 a year? Is ER going to end up cheap but bereft of atmosphere? Are there going to be anymore proper seats for normal fans, or is it going to be full of corporate entertainment? 

There’s mention year after year of the ticket prices of the German clubs compared to ours. It gets brought up every season about how the Chairmen in the Bundesliga are proud that they don’t charge their fans anywhere near the prices that the PL charge. Because they value the fans. Tonight Boro are playing Sc*m in the Cup. I believe Sc*m are charging the Boro fans £46 quid! Scandalous. Mind you they charged us £42 and that was yonks ago.

The PL boasts that it is the best league in the world, yet the Bundesliga treats fans better than the PL does, not just in ticket prices but the standard of food and facilities. You’ll not see the Germans paying nearly a tenner for a nuclear chicken balti pie and flat lager.  

No doubt though, in future years the PL will also try to bring in an identikit price for season tickets and match day tickets, to go with the identikit stadia and identikit fans in their bid to standardise everything. However, at least away tickets have been capped, so there is one tiny glimmer of hope.

Put fans first.

To conclude, this week Derby have been given another stay of execution. Some might not sympathise much with them after the Fat Frank shenanigans, but as I said before when I wrote about Bury and Bolton, this isn’t the fault of the fans. Once again, the problems at Derby County are down to the greed of the money men. Like so many clubs, ours included under B*tes, the fans are always the ones who suffer the most. The fans are the last to know (if in fact they ever find out) about what is happening behind the scenes in the boardroom.

The Chairmen, the owners, their accountants and their lawyers, in cahoots with greedy agents and oligarchs, chicken farmers, small nation states and businessmen with big mouths but shallow pockets and all manner of shady figures lurking in the shadows, they control everything. If it goes wrong, they move to their next vanity project.

The fans? We are left to suffer with the fall out. They’ll all be there though, piteously wringing their hands in public,  pretending they didn’t see it coming, whilst in private they are blaming their accountants for not managing to fiddle the figures better, and their lawyers for not leveraging up the loopholes properly.

It’s a romantic ideal that they should put the fans first.

But we have to dream about something right? Other than having a fully fit first team.