Roy Keane’s Ipswich
Roy Keane may or may not have a hard job to do as manager at Ipswich Town. They played bright football against Real Valladolid on Friday night, with Lee Martin, Pim Balkestein, Jon Stead and Connor Wickham looking particularly bright. I do sometimes wonder that Jim Magilton had two problems; it was a difficult transition from player to manager, as possibly he was too close to them and he didn’t have the contacts amongst other managers when it came to transfers.
Keane has none of those problems.
Certainly it seems his start has been easy.
But his biggest advantage is that just like Sir Alf Ramsey and Sir Bobby Robson before him, he will succeed or fail on what happens on the pitch. The people of Suffolk will probably keep quiet about any off field problems, just as they have done in the past. The London media also always finds Ipswich far to far to come for a story.
Remembering Sir Bobby at Ipswich
Last night I went to Portman Road to see Ipswich play Real Valladolid. I’d always intended to go, but because of the death of Sir Bobby Robson, I went a little earlier. There’s also the advantage that if you get the timing right you can park for free in places near to the ground. I parked in Berners Street which goes up the old Ipswich Hospital in Anglesey Road. It’s a lovely old building and I wonder how many of the new hospitals we recently built will look so good when they are a hundred years old.
I also went past the pub and the offices where I spent time as I designed and wrote the software system that made my reputation and most of my money in the 1970s and 1980s.
The Queen's Head
Like many other pubs it is now closed. They changed the name to The Victoria, but that didn’t seem to help. I still remember Ron Topple’s pies, which we used to eat every day for lunch. All that gluten! Would my life have been better, if I’d been diagnosed as a coeliac early. Nobby and I spent a lot of time in the bar there discussing software and the finer things of life.
Pearl Assurance House
The offices were actually quite nice and I think I worked there for perhaps about three years before we moved most of the development to the other side of the town.
I was surprised how quiet the town was with just a few people drinking outside cafes in the sun. Even the pub I had a drink in was virtually empty. Sky was playing a news feed about Sir Bobby.
There was a crowd around Sir Bobby’s statue in Portman Road.
Crowds in Portman Road
Stuart White of the BBC was interviewing a very interesting lady, Pat Godbold. She was secretary not only to Sir Bobby R9obson and also to Sir Alf Ramsey. They always say that behind every great man is a great woman. But can any secretary lay claim to be behind two such legends? She actually served every manager from Sir Alf to George Burley.
Stuart White and Pat Godbold
She has an amazing tale to tell. This sad story in The Independent shows the true side of Sir Bobby’s character. It also shows how we can forget our heroes.
Sir Bobby’s statue was bedecked in scarves and flowers.
Sir Bobby's Statue
Tributes Under the Statue
I do have a video of Pat and Stuart White and I may put it up. But I suspect there’ll be a much better version on the BBC tonight.
The football was a bit of an anticlimax and I thought the crowd would have been larger. But Ipswich won 3-1, with a couple of good goals from Pim Balkestein and Connor Wickham. The third was one of the best own goals I’d seen in years.
Flags at Half Mast for Sir Bobby
Football Starts
I’ll be off to Portman Road to see Ipswich take on Real Valladolid tonight. It’s only a friendly, but it passes an evening.
Whether this season will be any better than the last few, I don’t know, but one has to live in hope.
Since my wife died, football has been very much a crutch, in that in trips to Portman Road, I’ve been very much amongst friends. And when I take the occasional foray to an away match, it’s an opportunity to lose myself in something trivial.
I’ll have to drive to Ipswich though. Guess what! The trains are on strike. But for evening matches they don’t put on a return train to Newmarket, as the last train stops at Bury St. Edmunds.
The Spoiler
I was searching for the story about all Manchester City players being given £168,000 watches, when I came across the article about it in the Spoiler. The watches are by Franck Muller and from what I’ve seen they are not to my taste.
They made the point, that as footballers like to outdo each other in cars, houses, watches and tattoos, then they wouldn’t be happy to all have the same ones.
The web site looks a nice place for football gossip. I might check it out in the future.
Phew! Murray just gets through!
It was tight last night and Andy Murray just made it in five sets. But it was very much a spectacle under the new roof at Wimbledon. It would appear that the concept works. It would have been rather poor if it hadn’t!
But the same can’t be said for the under-21 footballers. They managed to lose four-nil to the Germans. Surprising, considering that the second team drew 1-1 a week ago.
Truly Great British Sportsmen
Andy Murray yesterday showed patches of brilliance to show that he might end up as one of the great British sportsmen and women, who in addition to all that talent, have that killer instinct, where they never give the opposition an even break.
How very un-British!
Tim Henman had a lot of the talent, but you know he could have an upset and never impose himself like he should have done. He would have beaten Ivanisovitch if he’d just a bit of killer instinct.
In my view there are very few, who had both talent and killer instinct.
The first I saw was David Hemery, who most will have forgotten. He turned the 400 metres hurdles in Mexico into a precession and won by an enormous margin. But he was unable to repeat it in 1972.
Seb Coe had both too and for many years he was the greatest middle-distance runner in the world. He won two Olympic gold medals and set eight world records. His 800 metre record lasted 16 years. But perhaps he greatest achievement was winning the 2012 Olympics for London. My late wife, who was a barrister, said it was the best closing speech she’d ever heard. And she’s heard many.
You have to include two jockeys, Lester Piggott and Tony McCoy. We will never see the like of them again.
I won’t include such as Steve Redgrave, good sportsman that he was, as he competed in a sport against a limited number of teams.
But the last of my list will be a surprise to many. Just as Seb Coe honed every skill in his life, so Sir Alf Ramsey honed every skill of what he did. He was a very good Spurs and England full-back in his playing days, but it was as a manager for Ipswich and England, that he showed how he was the greatest British football manager of all time. Others have done better than Sir Alf, but no-one has done it with so little talent and so loved by his players.
It was good to see that his widow has finally been given a winner’s medal for the 1966 World Cup in Sir Alf’s name. Why did she and all the others who didn’t actually play in the Final have to wait so long?
Will Murray join those greats?
Setanta
Setanta has gone bust and as a widower living mostly alone, I’m not particularly pleased as I like my football and it also gave me RacingUK at an affordable price. For that now, I’ll need to shell out £20 a month, as opposed to the £12 for Setanta, that included it. Daft!
But there was this in PopBitch about Setanta.
RIP Setanta. A victim of global financial meltdown? A brave underdog bringing choice to the TV football fans? Or a profligate company which had arse-elbow knowledge issues? One Premier League club told us that to screen a live game Sky Sports asked for two car park places and 22 stadium passes, to accommodate crew, pundits and guests. Setanta – 66 car park places, and 120 stadium passes.
If you want to be a success, you must control the expenses in a company.
And very hard!
The Anonymous Widower 