The Steve Cooper era, which the history of the last ten years suggests may not last long, kicks off at home to Millwall on Saturday. Opinion seems divided, but frankly who knows. We’ve tried everything without success, so who’s to say. If it’s about style of football, I’d have to say I always enjoyed watching Swansea play under him. If it’s about managing young players, then his track record looks great, at Liverpool’s Academy and with England u-16s and then going on to win the u-17 World Cup.
Let’s hope Steve will be feeling more like the first two and less like the third. He says he’s committed to attractive, attacking football and there’s surely no reason not to believe him. Some seem to think they know better than he does, but then everyone knows everything on social media. Me included! He’s talked, in a lengthy Radio Nottingham interview, about wanting to build a ‘brand’ to be proud of, with a real identity. The language all sounds a bit corporate, but it suggests he understands what we’ve lost as fans of late, namely That Loving Feeling. Give us a team and club to be proud of, whatever level we’re operating at, and we’ll stick with it.
Meanwhile, at the other end of Brian Clough Way, Derby have gone into administration and the knives are out for owner Mel Morris. Wayne Rooney claims to have been funding essentials for the club out of his own pocket and that Morris hasn’t been answering the phone to him for six weeks, only picking up when he called off the club doctor’s phone. Opinion is divided here too, from the celebratory to the mourning, via apathy. Derby have been bending the rules and have been caught out. Other clubs have suffered as a result, notably Wycombe. But then again, it’s people’s livelihoods and no one really wants to see clubs fold. That looks unlikely - despite debts in the tens of millions and owing HMRC 26 million, there seem to be buyers willing to take this on. The 12 point deduction has lifted Forest off the bottom of the table, but you’d imagine Derby might still feel confident of overhauling us. Another 9 point deduction is still hanging over them for accounting irregularities. What a mess. The administrator reckons redundancies are necessary, an influx of cash desperately needed for early October, but there is a 95% chance of survival and avoiding going the way of Bury.
Talking of whom... I’m going to give Forest v Millwall a miss in favour of a big day at Maltby, where phoenix club Bury AFC are the big attraction in the FA Vase. Bury have been taking hundreds away with them and a club record crowd of over 500 is expected at Muglet Lane. Bury, proudly ‘By The Fans, For The Fans’, are plying their trade in the NorthWest Counties League, ground sharing at nearby Radcliffe. Formed by 300 fans, now with over 1,000 members paying £5 a month, they operate on one-member one-vote.
It’s a pity it takes a catastrophe the magnitude of a club folding to get this progressive. Good luck to them, but not on Saturday!
Back to the Championship, Reading look next to face a deduction. Whilst this would be a sad development too, it has to be said that they have had some of the most arrogant supporters I’ve ever come across on social media. As with Derby, sad for the majority, slightly gloating towards the smug and arrogant - and in Derby’s case the racist moron and his supporters who have been haranguing foreign Forest fans of late. Suppose we’ve all got them…
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