Hollyhead Honeymoon H'over

Well it lasted a little longer than many expected, but the latest occupant of the Poppies hot seat is finding out that our “knowledgeable” fans certainly know some things at least. They can spot when all's not well, based on more than just results.

Yesterday at Quorn had an air of defeat from before a ball was kicked. A tough draw to be sure, against a confident, upwardly mobile outfit who have barely lost at home for 2 years. Better teams than us might have found it difficult. But to arrive unable to fill the subs bench so early in the season? Was it just illness in the camp? The eleven out there seemed to be lacking leadership – they were strangely quiet throughout, except when complaining.  Quorn’s keeper made more racket than the lot of them, honking instructions more out of apparent boredom than anything else. He certainly didn’t have much to do.

Quorn are clearly a decent team. With the advantage of being used to their pellet-heavy plastic surface, they knocked it around well and were good at recycling possession. Meanwhile we delivered one unforced error after another. A late rally flattered the scoreline – we were lucky to escape a hiding. 

So where does this leave us? Still in a useful league position, but already badly shown up by three of the teams above us. It’s not too soon to say that Hollyhead has a real challenge on his hands. 

Brought in to be a continental-type coach, to work with a squad assembled for him (clearly the arrangement that Lavs couldn’t tolerate). But the much vaunted tactician, with his UEFA badge, sent us into a long campaign light in defence and top heavy in attack, allowed our most solid CB to leave, is already fielding players out of position and finding that having big guns up front is not much good if we can’t get the ball to them. Teams are already working out how to shut off the supply lines.

And the empathetic man manager who talks so well (and at such length…) about relationships is hinting darkly at “reasons” for players not being available, while we all ponder the ongoing Lobjolt mystery (ill? AWOL? abducted by aliens?).

Probably the only person there yesterday who left with a bigger smile than the Quorn manager was his predecessor, who couldn't have felt more vindicated if he'd buzzed overhead trailing a banner that said TOLD YOU SO.

"Boy, August feels like a LONG time ago...."

Say Cheesey!

If you’re feeling a little perturbed that our place in the Southern League Premier financial muscle ranking is now about 8th, with all that might mean this season, fortunately we do still have Poppies Media to cheer us all up.  We might be in danger of slipping behind several horribly rich hobby projects which will all be AFC whatever within 5 years, but off the field we are being spoiled...  Drone shots. Sexy slo-mo of training sessions. Thanoj walking dreamily through a corn field trailing a handful of grain. Soft focus little teasers that made even the unveiling of Brandon Barker look positively droolsome.  

And the cheesy player ‘previews’ of the next fixture were fun while they lasted. Rarely extending beyond "we’re really looking forward to putting on a show in front of all you lovely fans", they conjured images of players drawing lots on the bus as to who’s turn it was next, though probably AI did the actual work. Among the flurry of ideas cooked up in pre-season, not all can survive too much contact with the actual grind of a season - we get it. This stuff is harder than it looks.

However one area where we’ve really nailed it are the head shots that now pepper every team line-up. You’ve seen them - format borrowed from every big ballsy sports channel promo of the last few years, but rather than the usual old poses (moody, preening, shouty, badge kissing and crowd shushing), ours are charmingly fresh and in no way could have been improved by multiple takes.  Keep them coming guys!

Put 'em up put 'em up!

Chocks away!

Brum brum!

Did I water the plants?

Now THIS is a spliff

Plan B anyone?

It's fair to say that was a bit of a pasting from Spalding on Tuesday night.  Their wingers certainly enjoyed their evening more than I did.  The last time I saw anything carved open as effectively as our defence I was sat around a dining table with loved ones, wearing paper hats and pulling Christmas crackers.

Even when we were 2-0 up it was clear the game was still very much up for grabs and so it proved as Spalding set about us like hyped-up terriers, never giving us a moment on the ball and bombing forwards at every opportunity.  The difference to Saturday's slow motion bore-fest at Worcester could not have been more striking.

But, let's not get too disheartened.  We (just about) attracted another 4-figure gate for a midweek game, which isn't to be sniffed at.  The scoreboard operator has figured out how to make the numbers just about large enough to see, even though few of us liked what it was telling us.  The scoreboard itself is proving to be more of a jinx than an asset.  Two games.  Two defeats.  Do the math.  Other positives?  The pitch is playing pretty well so far.  As our opponents will testify.  Our poorly received new shirts don't look too bad in the flesh.  And the new camera gantry is an improvement.  Assuming looking more like an American maximum security prison guard tower than hastily thrown-up scaffolding is a positive....

Also, no-one knows better than us that titles and promotions aren't done and dusted this early in the season.  For the first half of last season this division was all about who was going to finish in the play-offs once we had stormed to the title.  We know what it's like to go off like a train and sweep all before us.  It guarantees nothing.  Every person leaving the game after out win at Telford last season was in no doubt which of the two teams they had just watched was going to be in the National North division this season, and let me tell you, they weren't wearing white....

Nile at the crossroads

For almost all of their time together, Nile Ranger and Kettering Town have been good for each other.  His signing last season injected a bit of star quality and even celebrity into our ranks, attracting national attention as we progressed in the Cup. Contrary to his disruptive track record he showed a good attitude and was unselfish - at times too much when trying yet again to set someone else up rather than having a crack himself. His goals return was steady, and many felt that Lavs withdrawing Nile in the playoff final cost us the game. 

Equally, Nile gained renewed exposure, a degree of career rehab, a reminder of his abilities to potential suitors and a rumoured decent whack per week!

So when he appeared to have moved on in the summer he went with all good wishes and his reputation high. But in his second act, if we can call it that, things are threatening to turn sour. True, he has been finding the net, deadly from close range if not the spot. But the ‘is he staying or not’ saga has become a distraction, generating social media content yes, but also suggesting he was fishing for a better offer but hasn’t yet had one. 

And now we are starting to see on-field antics that were absent last season.  On many occasions under Lavs he was brought on or off as part of the never ending rotation of that campaign, and showed no displeasure.  But at Long Eaton he left the field shaking his head and chuntering after being subbed, having been given most of the game to make an impact.  Then yesterday at Worcester was less strop, more full blown tantrum after a similar late withdrawal. Arms thrown out in disgust, gesticulating at the bench then appearing to point to Eddie as someone who should be taken off instead!  Which as it happens would have been very unfair on Eddie, who almost won us the game with the last kick. 

Hollyhead is on record as placing a high value on relationships and it will be interesting to see how he handles this one. If Nile can’t accept his role is to share striking duties with several other strong options, maybe it’s best if we part company before squad unity starts to suffer.  

Minnows Alert!!!

It would appear that the Great-Southern-League-Fixture-Gods have tweaked their fixture-abacus such that we'll be fully testing our promotion credentials over the next few weeks.  In a division where several deep pockets are funding several iddy-biddy clubs in a private battle to see who can be first to bankrupt them, we have a number of the miniscule main runners in our immediate sights.  All of them promoted way beyond their natural level.  All of them shelling out well over the odds for players who would normally laugh at an approach from them.  All of them utterly desperate to be seen to be serious rivals to the Poppies.

First up is the weird little speck of a club called Real Bedford, run like a bargain basement "Welcome to Wrexham" they aren't even the biggest football club at their location.  To be fair though, their Chairman has sufficient self-awareness to refer to himself as a budget Ryan Reynolds.  Their twitter-page may look more like a teenager's Death-Metal fan page than a football club site, but they are at least amusing in their efforts to manufacture some kind of rivalry with us....  Wanabee Poppies Rival Level - 6 out of 10

A couple of days later and Harborough Town drag their swollen, clanging bags of gold over the border to test their collection of mercenaries against us in a desperate attempt at validation.  Wanabee Poppies Rival Level - 12 out of 10.

Just over a week later yet we visit another bumpkin collection of inbreds, wildly over-inflated by obscene cash injections - Spalding.  This assumes they've finished carting in an instant stadium of shipping containers and hopefully employed a few able-bodied stewards to keep their small but angry collection of misfit fans under control for once.  Wanabee Poppies Rival Level - 7 out of 10.

Before September is out we are at home to the last of the "Little Four" in the form of Stamford - yet another club artificially financially bolstered, and, just like the others, still finding it difficult to attract more supporters.  Wanabee Poppies Rival Level - 9 out of 10, or 27 out of 10 if you include Drury and his childish antics.

Even the other fixtures in this period offer interesting challenges, with a home game against surprising league leaders Bishop Stortford and away to returning former non-league big boys, Worcester City, where between us and them we'll barely make a dent in their bloody 12,000 capacity stadium!

One thing is for sure, before the clocks go back this season we're going to have a good idea whether the Poppies 2025/26 vintage has got what it takes to attempt another title charge.

"Please Poppies, choose me!"

Still work to do, alas

The 1970's was a great time.  Don't let anyone tell you differently.  Modern media paints a picture of the 1970's being nothing but a mixture of power cuts, unburied dead and brown wallpaper.  Sure, we had all that but we also had much, much more.  For one, we had the arrival of colour television!  Forget your wall-to-wall online streaming services, NOTHING comes close to the excitement of the first time seeing all the bridge officers in Star Trek in their glorious primary colours!  And there were more musical genres than you can shake a rhythm stick at - Glam, Pop, Heavy, Punk and Prog Rock, Disco, New Wave, Funk and the Wombles.  We had affordable housing and even more affordable beer.  We had the greatest run of brilliant movies ever - The Godfather 1 & 2, The Exorcist, Jaws, Star Wars (and NOT A New Hope....), Holiday on the Buses and Close Encounters of the Third Kind.  Winning the Football League was pretty much a guarantee of winning the European Cup.  We had it all.

Unfortunately we also had rampant, unapologetic racism in society in general and in football in particular.  Racism and homophobia were, at times, so casual and common place that it would have made even Tommy Robinson blush.

As much as a progressive, civilised society would like to believe that in the intervening years abuse of people based solely on skin colour or sexual preference had receded such that only those on the very outer fringes of our species still harboured (quietly) such views, all too often we are reminded this is not the case.

A Premier League game on Friday was halted for 5 minutes when a Liverpool fan couldn't dredge his imagination deep enough when insulting Bournemouth striker Semenyo to aim beyond the colour of his skin.  We were one game into the season and this was the main news story coming from Anfield.  One guy in a crowd if 50,000 is statistically zero, but it is so dispiriting that such incidents still occur.

Unfortunately it would appear we never truly conquered intolerance and that the worst of it merely slumbered for a few decades until the time was right for it to rise again.  For most of the past 30-odd years your common-or-garden hard-right misanthrope at least had the decency to keep their repulsive views to themselves.  Well, decency might be too strong.  More likely they realised their views were poison and the vast majority of the population would rightly vilify them if they spoke up.

Pride-designed laces and armbands, and taking the knee before kick-off have really been shown-up as the empty gestures they are when the country's most popular and populist politician spouts nothing but unchallenged racist lies, and the supposed "Leader of the Free World" is a tiny moustache, and one testicle away from being a full-blown fascist.  With people like this dominating the public discourse it's hardly surprising their binary views are starting to become common currency again with certain, vocal elements.

This all came to mind yesterday when listening to the tannoy announcements that racist and other intolerant language would lead to lifetime bans.  Leaving aside how enforceable such a ban would be as regimes and club ownership changes over the years, I pondered if ANY threats would deter someone who lives on a diet of social-media conspiracy and echo-chamber, dog-whistle hard-right rhetoric from venting their bile when the mood took them?  Even if they can't be educated about their views, we can only hope they can try to keep their "thoughts" to themselves for the 90 minutes they spend with the rest of us.

This is NOT normal.
Satan usually has higher standards.

Trainspoppies

Choose Latimer Park

Choose a new season

Choose to hope for more of the same

Choose buying the new home shirt, but continue wearing the old one

Choose a slice of pizza in the fanzone

Choose trying to learn all the players' names (if only for when Dave Singh asks you in 3-months time)

Choose returning to your usual spot in the ground

Choose to shout "Freak" at Glennon in an affectionate manner

Choose a carpark pass you've still not seen hide nor hair of

Choose to ignore the odd Burton-bobble

Choose to attend more away games on the supporter coach

Choose not to go down the rabbit hole of KTFC Chat whenever we lose

Choose to believe not every volunteer will jack it in

Chose 5 minute Simon Hollyhead interviews over 15 minute Simon Hollyhead interviews

Choose a Klondike win for the third season in a row after bitching for decades about not winning it, if only to annoy Ken

Choose to wonder why all the millionaire-micro clubs in this division think they're going to boss it in front of their 300 fans

Choose the barstaff who have actually poured a pint before

Choose to applaud the kids taking half-time penalties 

Choose the odd visit to the Hospitality Lounge

Choose to continue to hate Rushden and Diamonds

Choose to use irony and sarcasm on the linesmen rather than anger as they can't process that

Choose Tuesday nights in the rain in Burton rather than Champions League in the warm and dry

Choose to lose your temper, patience and mind with the Poppies

Choose to repeat