Newsletter #221

The season got off in the usual inimitable Blues style with everyone having palpitations as City attempted to throw away a match they looked like strolling. This issue has some match reports (please send more for Thursday if you have them) and a report on the recent Prestwich and Whitefield City Supporters’ Club meeting including a razor-sharp question and answer session! Kev Cummins has sent a nice piece on his trip to China, there’s more about the Open Day and loads of opinion.

Fingers crossed for tomorrow.

MATCH REPORT ‘LIVE’

MANCHESTER CITY vs. IPSWICH TOWN, Friday 16th August 1996

First match of the season and the stands are packed as City supporters everywhere come out to spur the Blues back into the Premier League in true City Supporter style.

The first half showed much promise with good work from both Brown and Rösler, although later Rösler did become rather tired and quite frankly towards the end looked past it. Some great touches all the way through from the two Georgians, Kinky and Kav. Great work from Kinky to cross the ball in for Lomas to head majestically into the top of the net. Both Kav. and Rösler looked good individually but there was no sign of any great teamwork between them; may be early days yet though. Phillips didn’t perform well; Alan Ball was once heard to say that Phillips would be the first £10 million footballer but he was a far cry from that this evening. Immel performed adequately with a few stylish line saves and even managed to come out and kick the ball clear! The whistle went for half time and a reasonable start seemed to have been made, although Ipswich were very poor, especially their lumbering longhaired striker who would have looked better placed on a very large motorbike hammering down the M62.

The second half was typical of City; whatever it is that AB says at half time it doesn’t do us any favours. With the dismissal of Frontzeck for a foul on the aforementioned lumbering biker, City lost all shape, flair and initiative. In fact they lost everything but the game… 3 at the back looked a little shaky and 4 defenders were reverted to. Phillips was subbed in favour of Hiley who, after the dismissal of Frontzeck, didn’t really get the chance to take off on any of his lightening runs down the wing to feed Rösler. Kav. was removed due to injury and Creaney brought on for the last ten minutes. Standing ovation for Kav who was in my opinion man of the match which incidently went to Kinky, who also played a great game. Shame to see AB sitting in the stand though and not on the bench. The guys on the bench spent most of the time shouting up to Ball to pick up the telephone…

Anyway that was that, not a great performance but a win. AB said on the radio afterwards that this was the solid start that City needed. Solid in terms of points maybe but a decidedly shaky start in terms of formation and shape. Thank God Kinkladze stayed!

Great pies in the Main Stand…

MATCH REPORT ‘LIVE’

MANCHESTER CITY vs. IPSWICH TOWN, Friday 16th August 1996

                      Immel
     Brightwell      Symons          Frontzeck
Summerbee       Lomas   Brown           Phillips
                   Kinkladze
     Kavelashvilli            Rösler

Subs: Margetson, Hiley, Creaney

The worst part of being relegated is the summer break – during which you can do nothing but dwell on the disappointment of the previous year. Finally the new season comes around and you’ve got the chance to do something about it. Over 29,000 were at Maine Road to witness “Sky’s Friday Night Football” between City and Ipswich.

Ipswich Town still have John Wark! He is still down as playing staff in the programme… incredible. How old is he… 58? Anyway, they’ve also got Ian Marshall – ex-Oldham and now (still?) sporting a hair-cut which is a cross between Chris Waddle circa 1984 and Dave Lee Travis. A bit of a saddo methinks.

We started well enough and looked much the better side for the first half hour, Gio, Kav, Uwe all looking good – finally making our dominance pay with a Lomas headed goal from a superb bit of Kinkladze magic. After that we did our customary sitting back for 10 minutes and slightly went off the boil.

The second half was messy and neither team shone. Ipswich were getting more into it when Frontzeck body checked one of their attackers on the edge of the box – there weren’t too many arguments when the red card came out. Immediately, Phillips was taken off and replaced by Hiley and City reverted to a flat back four with Summerbee dropping to right back.

Then we witnessed all hands to the pump as City’s 10 men fought to keep a frankly average Ipswich side out. Ipswich appeared to hit the bar twice in the last 5 minutes and despite all this Immel didn’t have to make one save throughout the entire game.

At the end we were all happy to have three points – at the start we threatened that we might dominate but even before Frontzeck going off it was obvious it was never going to happen.

Immel 7 – Nothing to do. Can’t kick!
Brightwell 7 – Not too bad but suffered from panic… along with the rest of the defence on one or two occasions.
Symons 8 – Mainly good but seemed to be put under pressure by Brightwell and Frontzeck constantly giving him the ball in defence.
Frontzeck 5 – The jury is still out. Deserved to get sent off. I think Scott Hiley will be in when fully fit.
Summerbee 6 – Didn’t quite know where he was playing – good crosser but hmmmm, not made my mind up yet.
Lomas 7 – Worked hard and looked alright – and he scored.
Brown 6 – Worked hard and didn’t look quite as alright.
Phillips 7 – A couple of crosses in the first half but had to go off for Hiley after the Frontzeck sending off.
Kinkladze 8 – Provided the cross for the goal. Couple of bits of magic in the first half, a couple of runs in the second. Probably our best player overall but fairly quiet.
Rösler 7 – Fairly good – worked hard… fell over a bit.
Kavelashvili 8 – Looked very sharp in the first half but looked tired late on. Replaced by Creaney.

Hiley 7 – Didn’t look fit but looked more reassuring than Frontzeck.
Creaney 6 – Looked a bit thinner – obviously come off the pie and chips diet. Only touched the ball once or twice.

NEWS – CLOUGH AND FRONTZECK

As a result of his sending-off on Friday, Michael Frontzeck will be suspended for the home game against Charlton Athletic. There is still some doubt as to when this fixture will actually be played as there was an announcement over the P.A. system at half time to say that the date of this fixture may be changed.

Nigel Clough has been back in training after missing Friday’s game with a thigh strain, and could be considered for Tuesday’s game at Bolton.

NEWS – THE TROUBLE WITH DIBBLE…

The MUEN reports that Andy Dibble, along with two others, is to be charged with indecent assault. His lawyer stated that his client vehemently stressed his innocence!

TICKET NEWS

Tickets for the away game at Stoke are now very limited. There are still a couple of dozen single seats available on open sale, but if you’re wanting two or more together it’s getting very tight. However, from tomorrow (Tuesday 20/9/96) Stoke City have made available a limited number of standing tickets, although I’m informed that they are restricted view. These are priced £9:00 for adults, £6:00 for juniors/OAPs and are available from the ticket office.

LAKEY CONGRATULATIONS

Nice to see that Paul Lake has passed his Human Biology A level at South Trafford College and can now go on to study physiotherapy – though you would have thought he’d be sick of it by now 🙂

PRESTWICH AND WHITEFIELD CITY

After the recent plea for more articles, I thought I would write about the latest meeting at the Prestwich and Whitefield City Supporters’ Club which was held in the evening of Tuesday 13 August (after the Open Day). Nigel Clough, Martin Phillips and Freddie Pye were guests.

The night was in aid of a 5-year old girl, Charlotte, who needs an operation on her brain at Gt. Ormond Street Hospital, so there were raffles and auctions, etc. to raise some money to help the family. City donated the new away shirt with her name on the back and had signed footballs (which went for over 70 quid!) but what impressed me most was a personal cheque from Freddie Pye (apparently for £500, I couldn’t hear how much) and the Club had arranged for the whole family to go on holiday in Marbella (probably Franny’s villa!) with cars to pick them up, etc. Bet the Rags wouldn’t do that!

Anyway, on to the Q&A session.

Nigel Clough fielded most of the questions about relegation, team morale, etc and Freddie Pye took a lot of stick about the Arab investors and the financial side of things. He said they had received interest from an Arab consortium but the Club wasn’t prepared to open its books before they knew who they would be showing them to! He basically repeated what has already been published in the papers.

Clough was going on about how disappointed everyone was at being relegated blah blah and I asked him and Martin if they were confident about going up next season. As predicted, they sort of sat on the fence and Buster said they needed a good start, 3 points against Ipswich etc, etc. Bolton, blah blah… Not exactly brimming with confidence.

Then my mate asked Buster why he’s called Buster (we’ve all heard the Buster Gonad rumours!!). He started saying it all began when he was at Exeter, but my mate interrupted and said, “Is it anything to do with a Viz character?” and I couldn’t help myself and asked “Is it anything to do with taking your trousers off?” and everyone was laughing and Buster went really red and things moved swiftly on to the next question! Looks like it might be true after all! I have to say Phillips looked really young and little, doesn’t appear to have filled out much yet.

Someone also asked if they thought Alan Ball was doing a good job as a manager. There was an embarrassed pause while they all looked at each other and Freddie Pye finally took the mike and said “Any manager who brings a lad like Martin to the club can’t be doing a bad job.” Someone asked what Martin thought and he said, “Same answer!” I think some players could move into a career in politics after their playing days are over!

That was basically it, I could be here all day but nothing really significant was said (Freddie Pye slagged off Keith Curle, whom he called Errol Flynn because he was obsessed with his looks rather than football, and also Terry Phelan). Next meeting is in a month’s time with the possibility of Gio coming down (doubt it, personally).

Finally: Quinny – Why? Can’t say I blame you and good luck, but it won’t be the same.

Sorry to ramble on, so that’s it! Looking forward to the match tonight with grim anticipation and look forward to the match reports! Bye for now.

P.S. I have also heard (from a trainer at Oldham) that things are looking shaky with Michael Brown and AB. After Brown got fined for the foul on Giggs, he was fined one month’s wages, not one week, and apparently MB and AB hate each other – sound familiar – so it wouldn’t surprise me if MB is off too (Everton was mentioned). God help us.

CHINA TRIP

We were browsing in duty free at Heathrow when we suddenly realised we were going to be on the same flight as the team. We spotted a few blokes in City tracksuits discussing the merits of Kourros versus Gillette Aftershave Gel and when Gerry Creaney spotted us, he looked amazed. He came over to ask what we were doing; he couldn’t quite believe that we were willing to spend our hard-earned holiday cash travelling to China to see the Blues when we could be going mad for it in Ibiza.

Our hopes of boring the team to death for the next ten hours were quickly dampened when we got on the plane and found that while we were in scum class, they were lounging in the relative luxury of Air China’s business class. Mid-way through the flight, it was obvious that their drinks trolley was better stocked than ours – not only did we have to make do with crap beer and little else, but for the next hour the in-flight entertainment was provided by the Manchester City first team squad, who could be heard working their way through a medley of hits from the 60s and 70s. Thanks to Air China’s rather basic entertainment – no personal TVs – we were spared the possibility of a similar performance to that of a certain national team.

Nothing could have prepared us for China. The guide book warned us that the Chinese will eat anything with four legs, except the table. We’d been entertained with anecdotes about a live cat being presented to a western guest and then being garrotted with cheese wire. We had been told that the Chinese are very industrious, capable of doing any job except zoo-keeping. Fortunately, monkey brain and rat embryos weren’t on the menu at our hotel. At least, I don’t think so.

The first surprise was a pleasant one. We managed to barter the cab driver at the airport down from around £70 to £25 by simply standing there and laughing as he kept reducing his rate. Not bad for a 140 mile trip to Tianjin, where, the following day, we were due to play the first of three games.

When the rest of our party arrived from Beijing a few hours before the match, all 14 of us were all told that the tour had been called off due to a national state of emergency. Because of China’s worst flooding for 150 years, only this one game would take place. We couldn’t believe that this was happening – typical Blues bad luck – but several cold beers later, it didn’t seem too bad…

As nobody knew the way to the ground, we followed the team coach in our minibus and were surprised to find ourselves driving through the gates of the ground. We were guided onto the running track and parked up in front of the main stand. Tianjin’s fans looked a bit perplexed when they saw a bunch of very unfit looking lads in City shirts arrive at their ground, unaware that the team were still sitting on the coach in front.

Before the game started, new club captain Kit Symons was escorted up to the equivalent of the royal box, where he was presented with a large vase. This prompted one of the City fans to shout out: “First thing we’ve won in 20 years!” Over half the people in the VIP section then marched down the steps with Symons and posed very solemnly with the rest of the team for photos.

In the absence of Niall Quinn, City were giving a trial to Australian striker Damien Mori. After 18 minutes, the Blues found themselves one down, due to a defensive error by our Eire centre half. We’d been told that last season Arsenal had become the first British club to lose to a Chinese club side… it seemed to be only a matter of time before we became the second.

However, Ball made seven changes in the second half and, after 57 minutes, Gerry Creaney (yes, Gerry Creaney) made it 1-1. The Chinese side surprised us all with their strength and tactical awareness and, despite some second half magic from Gio, the score remained at a diplomatic 1-1. Then we were told there would be a penalty shoot-out. Tianjin missed their first penalty and Kinkladze put City one up. Then, with everybody scoring (Creaney, Symons, Curle), it was left to Chris Greenacre to win the game with the crucial fifth penalty. Which he duly missed. The crowd, who’d been pretty reserved up until now, started anticipating a historic victory and became more excited.

The next three penalties for both sides went in, with Summerbee, Lomas and Kavelashvili scoring for the Blues. Tianjin scored their eighth out of nine and Lee Crooks buried his, only to be told to take it again because he had failed to wait for the whistle. He scored again, and was once again told he’d shot too early. It looked like however many times he’d score, we weren’t going to win the game. He seemed to wait an age after the referee blew for his third attempt and blasted the ball against the crossbar. Tianjin had won and the players reacted as though they’d won the World Club Championship instead of a three foot polystyrene key painted yellow and green.

Later that night, probably celebrating the fact that they didn’t have to return home with a three foot piece of polystyrene, several of the team were relaxing in the hotel bar. When the players were tucked up in bed, Alan Ball was to be found gently bullying the coaching staff into partaking in China’s latest import: karaoke. He impressed with his rendition of And I Love You So, dedicating it in good humour to Uwe Rösler. The next morning, I was horrified to be told by 13 gleeful City fans that I had performed a duet with Mr Ball. I was even more appalled to find out that our song had been Tie A Yellow Ribbon. However, not many people can say that they’ve sung a crap song with one of our 1966 World Cup winning heroes!

Later that day, with the team safely out of the way, it was time for us to get on with our holiday. And to change our flights to make sure we were back for the big one against Scarborough.

MORE ABOUT THE OPEN DAY

I too went to the Open Day at Maine Road. It was good to look round the upper tiers of the stadium (only chance I’ll get!); and especially good to watch the Roses match from the executive boxes. Lancashire won comfortably, I’m glad to say.

The most startling thing, however, was the hero-worship of Kinkladze. In all the little knots of supporters on the pitch you could hear only one question – “Where’s…

Anyway, the rumour spread about that he was in the players’ tunnel. I wandered down there and got caught up in a solid wall of frantic people that went about 12 feet deep. At the other end was Kinky with two guards – and behind a massive gate. He looked slightly worried, and signed pieces in a frantic rush so as to lessen the crush. When I finally got back out of the tunnel, I was feeling faint. I’ve no idea how the children there felt. He must sign his name in Georgian, as it reads “d.JoJJL” to me.

Does anyone else feel they want to support Georgia in their World Cup qualifying bid? This may be difficult for some, as they’re in the same group as England, but I would love to see our star player on the world stage. I’ve been trying to get some information from the Net about Georgia, and it’s rather interesting, but they seem unappreciative of their football team.

The Oasis concert was on Radio One in Britain with all the swearing intact. I can send a tape if anyone is keen to hear 120,000 people singing “who the bleep are Man Utd?”

OPINION – IPSWICH GAME I

I’ve just watched the Ipswich game again (on video) and it looked far better than it did at the time. Many people were despondent after the match, thinking that we would be lucky to finish in the top half of the table by the end of the season. I think Frontzeck is a liability. His sending off is probably a blessing in disguise. With any luck, Hiley will replace him for the rest of the season. It was interesting to watch Summerbee’s rôle. A lot of Blues have a downer on Nick, Daddy’s boy etc. But watching him again, he worked his bollocks off and contributed far more than people gave him credit for. Our main problem is scoring goals. I don’t know how many of you have The European Football Yearbook but in last season’s, Kavelashvili is classed as a midfielder and scored two goals in 11 appearances, although both he and Kinkladze scored 14 each for Dinamo Tbilisi.

We desperately need a player who can score in the six yard box, preferably someone who can get 20+ goals a season. I still don’t think Ball is a great tactician, but if Ipswich are one of the toughest sides we will face this season, we should be looking at winning the title comfortably, with a few games to spare. Incidentally, why no squad numbers? Surely we could do with the money?!

OPINION – IPSWICH GAME II

It’s now Sunday and looking back at the match objectively (I hope!), I thought we played really quite well until the Frontzeck sending off, and even then Ipswich didn’t make much inroad. I did think that there were a couple of bad offside decisions, including possibly the Frontzeck one which led to his sending off; certainly at least one newspaper also thought so on Saturday. Kinky was the official man of the match but for my money it was Kav, he made some beautiful runs, and with his best he drew the goalie, rounded him and then kind of stumbled/mis-kicked and the ball was cleared off the line by Claus Thomsen; this guy is good and he will get better.

Other impressions were that all the Ipswich players were 6ft 2ins and good in the air but invariably appalling on the ground (except Torrico?). Apart from two shots against the bar in the last 2 minutes when City had been chasing 11 men for 25 minutes, Ipswich made few decent chances. What shouldn’t be forgotten is that we are playing a new formation and that Kav and Rösler have yet to benefit from any understanding as they’ve hardly played together.

OPINION – IPSWICH GAME III

Having just finished watching the game, albeit on Sky, I think we can be pleased at 9-30pm we are top of the division, 3 points clear, and with a superior goal difference, so all in all a pretty good state.

My verdict:

Ike – nothing to do all night, he knew just where his bar and post were when needed.
Defence – still shaky, room still for improvement.
Midfield – impressed in the first half, stretched in the second after the sending off.
Attack – Uwe`s lack of pace again stood out, although I thought he had a good game. Very impressed with “mikie”, one who will get better as the season goes on.

P.S. 4th or 5th highest gate in all games played this weekend must mean something?

OPINION – IPSWICH GAME IV

It seems Friday night’s referee, or at least his refusal to send off the whole Ipswich Town side, wasn’t too popular with some of the fans sitting near me in the Kippax. The bloke next to me came out with some particularly irate comments, eventually shouting “Referee, you’re going to get a stern letter from my Mum if you’re not careful” a few minutes into the second half. We were sitting just behind one of the Sky microphones. Does anyone know if it picked it up?

I was disappointed to see that Ball hasn’t spent the summer addressing City’s problems. Playing three central defenders doesn’t work, it left the wings wide open, and the lack of wingers doesn’t really help. Some of the players were mediocre to say the least. Brown and Philips didn’t look too great, and Summerbee was crap. On the other hand, Frontzeck looked to me to have improved, and Lomas, Kinkladze, Kavelashvili and Rösler all had a good game. City more or less dominated the first half, and most of the players are good enough to walk all over the first division, but we’re going to need to see some improvement before that happens. Come on George Graham!

By the way, does anyone know when City last had a positive goal difference? This must be the first time in well over a year.

OPINION – IPSWICH GAME V

Why, oh why do City insist on trying to make life so hard for us?

Just some points from parts of the game I saw (didn’t see all the game, missed most of the second half but I won’t bore you with the details, and no I wasn’t thrown out or arrested!!)

1. King Gio, are we still gonna have to rely on his spark andimagination to kick start the team? Why is it that no-one else on theteam appeared to have a imaginative thought in their brains?
2. Kavelashvili looks a pretty decent prospect, has the pace and ballcontrol that could post threats to opposition defences. However, doeshe understand the concept of passing the ball to better placed team-mates?
3. Rösler, I wish he’d get back to how he was the very first seasonhe came here, instead of throwing himself to the ground at everyopportunity.
4. The three man defence, not soo sure about this, they certainlylooked a little shaky on more than one occasion even beforeFrontzeck’s dismissal (BTW no arguments here, he had to go).

Just some thoughts, but at least we won; usually City would collapse but they managed to hang onto the win, at least that makes a change.

OPINION – QUINN’S DEPARTURE

With regards to my article entitled Opinion – Team line up: unfortunately it came out looking like I wanted to play 1-3-4-2. I would like to reassure readers that it came out a little wrong on the typing and in fact I suggested 4-4-2. I would never play Brightwell in such an important position!

Now with Quinny gone who knows what will happen? I agree with what Adam said in the last edition – where’s all the money gone? How much did the trip to China cost for one game?

Does anyone know the e-mail address for the Sunderland supporters? I want to tell them what lucky bastards they are in having Reid, Coton and Quinn.

Finally does anyone know of a web site which will list all the transfer activity that has gone on this summer so I can see other clubs who have been short sighted and sold their needed players?

What a way to start the season by selling a needed player hours before your first game of a crucial season. Crucial because if we don’t go up this year then it’s curtains! Great morale booster for the team as well today isn’t it!

OPINION – THE NEW SEASON I

Well, like some of the contributors in the last issue, I too have been quiet for some time… but thought this would be a good time to add my lone voice to the views of the new season. Being an exiled Blue in Hong Kong (there is one other I know of) MCIVTA is a lifeline and thanks again to all contributors.

Firstly, the Quinn sale – bad news IMHO. I feel he has been a loyal and tireless player for the Club and the Club has not acted likewise. He should not have been sold and his example and motivation to the other players will be sorely missed.

With the sale it places even more emphasis on Rösler to perform as we know he can and actually score some goals – that is what he is paid for… not to miss sitters!

The defence is weak and must be strengthened – and experience is needed to bring on the younger players. I am not sure that more Eastern European imports are the answer though!

As for Ball – well hardly anyone has a good word for him – including me! He seems arrogant in the extreme – does not have any man management ability at all and frankly I expect to see him out of the door before Bonfire night… and that may be too long! The only way he will stay is that City are unbeaten in that time (home and away) and the team is scoring pots of goals – then he can be arrogant!

As for his replacement there is no way that I can see Graham coming in to work under Ball and there is no way that I want City run by the guy who masterminded the Arsenal brand of attacking football – i.e. send everyone to sleep – including the opposition and then sneak up when no-one is looking and score – boring, boring Arsenal WILL not become boring, boring City!! We may be truly inconsistent… but when we play well… it is great to watch and let’s hope there is more of that.

Finally on the Nationwide front, people seem to think that we will stroll back… but it is going to be tough – no easy games – and not the breeze people think.

Anyway… optimism… some… pessimism… more – I have never felt this bad before the start of a season and I really hope I am wrong… like last year when I said we wouldn’t go down… so those of you who do go to the games… sing that little bit louder for me!

Come on you Blues!

OPINION – STYLE

Good-luck to City tonight; I can’t be there but I’ll be glued to my cable (so to speak), we should beat Ipswich.

Another season, another challenge, this time to gain promotion rather than fight relegation. Since arriving at Maine Road, Ball has tried to change the team tactics from an unfashionable (but effective) direct style (Coton, to White to Quinn… goal!) to a trendy pass and keep possession style (Immel to Summerbee, Summerbee to Kinkaladze to Lomas etc). So I can understand why he’s sold Quinn. He was a good target man, but was very much suited to the old style. I’ll miss Curle, OK so he couldn’t pass, but I loved it when he wound up the opposition strikers, he was a master at psychology! He’d always push and pull them, let them know he was there.

Is there a rule that states that you’re only allowed to play 3 non-EU players in the league? This might explain Ball not being too keen on signing Mori? If you buy non-EU players they’ve got to be good. I’m a little concerned over the lack of Englishmen in the first team… am I being old fashioned here? Will we soon be known as Manchester Vladikavkaz? I’ve seen quite a bit of Tetradze on TV, he was pretty useless against Rangers, but I think he was playing out of position. He looked one of the better players in the Russian team in Euro 96. I’ve never heard of this Elvis chap, but the other Croatian defenders around are really good.

I heard last week that Southampton enquired about buying Rösler, but were quoted £3.5 million.

The Frontz is cool. Elvis is alive and living in Manchester!

OPINION – NEW SEASON II

Time for a few thoughts as we prepare to embark on a new season. I’m dismayed by the decision to sell Quinn. Hasn’t he been our best player in pre-season games? At least he’s scored a few! Having said that I can only wish him the best of luck and I hope he bangs in a load of goals for Sunderland. I think it’s fair to say that if more players had his moral values and work ethics the game would be a better place. I’m sure all Blues wish him well. It seems all I’ve heard from Maine Road is doom and gloom, mainly saying everyone hates Ball, that the players aren’t very friendly with one another hence there’s little atmosphere in the dressing room. Most worrying is whispers about the way the club is treating injured players. You’d think we’d have learnt after Lakey’s tragic story, few of our players are of his standard but any injured player should be looked after to the best of the club’s ability. We need the likes of Edghill and Foster badly. I’ve been thrown into almost total panic by the pre-season line up of Kit, Kernaghan and Frontzech at the back. Surely we’ve seen that two of these 3 are a nightmare and it’s not the new club captain. I hope that all my fears will be laid to rest after tonight’s game but I’ve supported City too long to get too optimistic. I’m stunned that the bookies have us as 7-2 favourites ot be champions, I mean they are usually right aren’t they!

I sincerely hope that Bally can turn the club around because I do think we have the basis of a successful squad. He needs to start to listen to his players a bit more I suspect, he can’t afford to throw round phrases like ‘If he (Kinky) wants to go then I can’t stop him.’ We have to start to hold onto our good players. I still think the departure of Flitcroft has yet to hit us; if he was still with us I’d be really confident on bouncing back. Hopefully Lomas and Brown will prove me wrong. I’m actually quite pleased that we haven’t bought willy nilly, we need the players we have to show their mettle; if they love the club and have ambition we’ll destroy the rest of this league.

It seems a bit pointless to say Stay Blue because I know that you and the rest of the Mcvitees will. We need a new craze along the lines of the Bananas, quite what I’m not sure but I’m working on it.

My last wish for this season. Let’s ignore the Stretford lepers, no more “If you hate Man U****d clap your hands” rubbish. Let’s sing the blues, there must be a million songs that you can twist Kinkladze, Kavelashvili and this new Elvis bloke around.

Take care, I’ll try to be a bit more regular this season (sounds distressing!).

I have it – Inflateable blue moons!

Get a life, yeah right, Onward and UpwarD. Come on you blooooooozzzzeeeee

OPINION – GOALKEEPERS

Having watched the game on Friday and stood in awe of Immel’s goalkeeping skills (yet again), I couldn’t stop thinking that we really need a goalkeeper as top of our shopping list. With the sales of Quinn, Flitflop and Curle we surely must have enough cash for a half decent goalie who can actually come off his line? I hear that boy a Sunderland is quite good and also a snip at £500K.

PREDICTIONS NOTE

I’m away on holiday to Lanzarote from this Thursday 22 August, so I won’t be able to update the Predictions League. However, keep the predictions rolling in and I’ll update everything on my return (Monday 9th September).

CITY MAG SIGHTED IN SOUTH AFRICA!

Funny, someone out there mentioned buying a City fanzine in Penzance… There’s a shop here in Cape Town that buys unsold UK magazines before they get pulped and imports them (it’s the only way I can afford to buy the Car magazine… exchange rate of 7-1 (good score for tonight?)). There they lay… a pile of dozens of copies of a City fanzine… so I bought 2 (one for me bruvva in Hong Kong). Made great reading.

Don’t get to see City often on TV here (only about 4 times last season) but I reckon it was time for Quinn to go. Always looked a bit of a donkey to me. Get rid of that palooka Ball as we say, thank you very much. As long as he’s there I am tempted to come out of retirement!

P.S. the only time I have ever seen City play live… they came out here 2 or 3 years ago to play pre-season friendlies. Guess what… they were crap (at least the beer was cold). A big crowd left feeling totally ripped off and they lost a lot of friends that day.

OZ/IRISH REQUEST

A request for information from one of the Victorian members of the City Supporters’ Club here in Oz. He will be going back to the UK in October and will be going over to Dublin for a few days and would like to get in touch with Blues over there; does anyone have the phone number or address of the secretary of the Dublin branch? This would be much appreciated and Jack reckons it’s worth a couple of beers.

While I’m at it I would like to send a belated thanks to all the Blues who’ve sent in match reports and rumours in the past because most of these have been used in the Aussie branch’s newsletter which I produce and make for better reading than the bullshit from Hince et al. Thanks once again and would it be pushing it a bit if someone could send in the results and teams of the reserves and youth team’s games.

GEORGIAN REQUEST?

If anyone has info on the below, I would greatly appreciate it!

I read the reviews of City videos on the City Supporters Home Page, and will be ordering one soon (either Match of the Day: Manchester City or Soccer legends: Lee, Bell and Summerbee). I am concerned, however, that the TV engineering/display standards are different between the US and England. As there is barely room in the domestic budget for this sort of thing, can anyone shed light on whether the videos produced in England will play on a US TV set?

A few MCIVTA’s ago, there was a listing of the fixtures for the Pontins League and Lancashire League. Sorry, but I have no idea what this is about. The only thing I can sort out is this must be the schedule for the equivalent of minor league/developmental teams? I appreciate your patience with a Yank as I go through the learning curve (note, I have loved this sport and City since I grew up playing soccer in the 70’s. In the US that makes one quite an oddball).

Also, thanks for those MCIVTA’ers who helped me out last spring with the shortwave radio purchase decision (especially John Clarke in New Jersey). I got a cheap radio shack radio and have been dialed into SportsWorld every Saturday morning since (I know things about cricket I never dreamed of).

Finally, Ashley, I liked your Mission Statement in MCIVTA 220. It did not sound like centralized socialism to me, more like the high value produced by the decentralized free market. Whatever, great job! Speaking of capitalism, did you get any response to your earlier request for help on defraying costs? Maybe the MCIVTA’ers in the States can come up with a sponsor over here (something to do with the british pub/british beer industry in the States)?

Thanks!!

RESULTS and LEAGUE TABLE

To be arranged (see Thursday’s issue).

WWW MANCHESTER CITY SUPPORTERS’ HOME PAGE:
http://www.uit.no/mancity/

MCIVTA ADDRESSES:
Contributions: Ashley – mcivta@tollbar.u-net.com
Subscriptions: Adam – Adam.Houghton@sheffield.ac.uk
Club Questions: Stephen – sbolton@buxtonrd.u-net.com

Thanks to Phil, Bill, Graham, Steve, Tim, Christine, Heather, Jim, Rob, Tony (x2), Kev, Matt, Bob, Julian, Martin & The Mole.

DISCLAIMER
The views expressed in MCIVTA are entirely those of the subscribersand there is no intention to represent these opinions as being thoseof Manchester City Football Club, nor of any of the companies anduniversities by whom the subscribers are employed. It is not inany way whatsoever connected to the club or any other relatedorganisation and is simply a group of supporters using this mediumas a means of disseminating news and exchanging opinions.

Editor: