The Monday Profile
My abiding memory of Chris Eagles came from an otherwise long forgotten episode of ITV's Football
League highlights hosted by Matt Smith dating back about five years or so now. In that favourite
director's technique, players were seen alighting from the team bus and amid the friendly smiles
and poised pens for autographs, Eagles stepped down coolly, in possession of headphones the size of
which would have shamed the participants of the Live Aid video.
My abiding memory of Chris Eagles came from an otherwise long forgotten episode of ITV's Football
League highlights hosted by Matt Smith dating back about five years or so now. In that favourite
director's technique, players were seen alighting from the team bus and amid the friendly smiles
and poised pens for autographs, Eagles stepped down coolly, in possession of headphones the size of
which would have shamed the participants of the Live Aid video.
[P]ass and move, it's the Millwall groove. Thankfully, not another football-themed assault on the
eardrums, but the new mantra of Lions boss Kenny Jackett. After what seems like an eternityÂ
dangling over the League 1 precipice, Jackett's season-long efforts to remodel his side's style of
play seem finally to have come to fruition.
Flash back to the 31st of January 2010 – shot shy Carlisle United are desperate for an
experienced front man to come in to help out the earnest pairing of Scott Dobie and Joe Anyinsah,
the then still errant, gangling giraffe Gary Madine and the bunged-up blunderbuss Richard Offiong.
By mid-morning the signing of a striker had been announced, in the form of 18 year old Stoke City
man Ben Marshall, a youngster who'd had earlier spells with a pair of League Two Towns –
Northampton and Cheltenham.
My friends and I often indulge in extended debate on the club vs. country issue and how so far,
it's ‘OK' to support England. We eschew the jingoism, the hooliganism, the sheer repugnance of
many of those called on to sport the jersey, the overreaction to defeat and over-anticipation of
victory, the arrogance and the aggression, but still wish for a team we can support.
Bloated Premier League squads need ballast and amid the burnt ends of Match of the Day episodes,
the fleeting few minutes of highlights from the KC, Molineux or DW Stadiums have been notable for
their late cameos from players unfamiliar – your Henrik Pedersens, Okelsandr Yevtushoks and
Itzhak Zohars – the men you feel yourself reaching for the Rothman's successor volume to run the
rule over, or, laptop on knees, Wikipedia.
For this week's profile, we are made up to welcome David Wilkinson of the stunning Leeds United
Blog, The Scratching Shed (indeed, 'blog' seems such a humble word to describe such a multifaceted
treasure trove). Having spent this week pondering the controversy surrounding the Yorkshire club's
3-2 win over Peterborough at the weekend, David turns his attention to a man who returned from
exile this
[I]n this month's When Saturday Comes, Andy Lloyd-Williams considers youth development in English
football and the benefits of coming through at a smaller club. Citing Bournemouth and Plymouth as
examples, he argues that it's better – surely – to spend one's formative years at a club at
which progression to the first-team isn't reserved for pure prodigies only.
[U]nless some misguided King is willing to pay your club say, £35m for the inconvenience, then
losing an upwardly mobile, home-grown striker would usually trigger outrage amongst supporters.
Yet, when Plymouth Argyle flogged 20 year-old Joe Mason to Cardiff for a cut-price £250,000 last
summer, there was hardly a murmur from Devonians worldwide.
The way in which various clubs are free to use and abuse the loan system has been criticized on
this website but, as a Plymouth supporter, I have to concede that the ability to bring in temporary
signings has been a real blessing this season. Having plummeted to the bottom of League 2, Argyle
only began to emerge from the wilderness following a flurry of borrowed arrivals back in November,
shortly after exiting administration.
With Norwegian Ståle Solbakken having recently joined the managerial ranks of English football
having cut his teeth in Germany; the similarly coiffeured Uwe Rösler has taken the opposite
track as a German who conducted his training in Norway. Like Solbakken, Rösler spent some of his
playing career in England although his spell on these shores was a much lengthier and more storied
one.
For our profile this week, we welcome back Craig Telfer, author of a deservedly well received post
recently identifying those players in Scotland who might attract the attention of NPower League
Clubs in the coming months. Craig runs his own blog dedicated to Stenhousemuir FC, Who the hell is
Akabusi?
For our Monday Profile this week, we welcome back Ian Rands, proprietor of A United View on
Football, a website that has really come into its own in recent months following a series of
fascinating interviews with a host of Sheffield United greats from the past. Ian, who can be
followed on twitter here, turns his attention to a player whom we have been critical of in the
past, but who has flourished in a Blades shirt this year.
Leon Cort has a big summer head of him. While the attention of most of this country will be
squarely focused on events in Poland and the Ukraine, his national side Guyana will be stepping out
on to the turf at a yet to be determined Mexican stadium; this potential tussle with a man known as
Chicharito, the first of a sequence of six games that are the most important in the nation's
footballing history.
[I]t was only a matter of time before Graham Westley's achievements at Stevenage piqued the
interest of more firmly established members of the Football League. And the club that tempted him
from Broadhall Way could hardly be more established. Following the confirmation of Westley's
appointment as Preston manager last Friday, much scepticism was expressed among the Football
League Twitterati regarding the suitability of club for man, suggesting perhaps that he would
have done better to wait for an offer from the league above that in which he continues to ply his
trade.
[Y]ou've got to feel for Andy Rhodes. Most fathers, having just witnessed their son score four
times to single-handedly salvage a point from a pulsating and fiercely contested derby match in
front of more than 28,000 spectators, would be bursting at the seams with pride. But not Andy, who,
as Sheffield Wednesday's goalkeeping coach, had just seen his charge Stephen Bywater beaten four
times, his own flesh and blood Jordan wresting two points from the Owls' grasp seven minutes into
stoppage time.
[G]iven the uncanny coincidence that artworks with the same title scooped the NME Album of the
Year and Palme d'Or Awards in 2003, it's appropriate that one of the blogosphere's finest
polymath's should contribute the fourth in our fledgling series of hopeless teams. For Chris
Ledger is none other than the brains behind Obscure Music and Football, a site with a sometimes
unhealthy predilection for Salad (the band that is), the musical career of one Paul 'Gazza'
Gascoigne and the witticisms of everyone's favourite xenophobe, Steve Claridge.
Today's profile is penned by Ian Rands. Ian a is a regular visitor to our pages; most recently
penning a review of Alan Biggs' new autobiography. Here he looks at perhaps the brightest of
Sheffield United's crop of teenage sensations: It has been a whirlwind last 6 months for 18 year
old Sheffield United defender Harry Maguire.
Taking a closer look at a Football League personality this week is Matt Rowson, co-pen of Watford
blog BHaPPY (whose precursor was BSaD, the site that originally got me [Lloyd] interested in
football writing). This morning, Matt considers the recent rise of Academy graduate and next great
Hornets hope Sean Murray.
For our Monday profile this week, we follow previous studies of the likes of Joey Barton and Pascal
Chimbonda with another man whom our 2006 selves might express surprise would be plying his trade
in the Football League come the second decade of the millennium. David Bentley's decidedly up and
down fortunes are pondered upon by Olly Cooper.
In our recent analysis of the PFA awards, my fellow blogger John McGee highlighted the disagreement
that can ensue when debating the worth of leading young players. With Jordan Rhodes valued by the
press as a knee jerk £6 million, John pointed out that Adam Le Fondre, the man whose two goals
fired Reading to victory over Southampton in the Championship's recent summit meeting, cost a mere
£350,000.
John Coleman's departure from the Accrington Stanley job in January after 12 years in the role
reverberated throughout Lancashire. The Liverpudlian had transformed the beleaguered Accies from a
name used to market dairy products into a serious footballing concern again, and defeat to
Stevenage in the play-off semi-final last May wipes none of the gloss from his striking
achievements.
[T]he furore surrounding Lyon's astounding 7-1 win in Zagreb last week puts one in mind of the
perhaps the most anomalous sequence of results in this season's Football League. In September,
warmly tipped Crawley Town followed up a 6-0 hiding at Morecambe with a 3-0 home battering by
Swindon. Having begun existence in the League well, these results were far from expectedand
everything that has happened since makes them seem still more unusual.
Young boys in the park with jumpers for goalposts, or battering a ball against a garage door, dream
of pulling on that jersey, of scoring the winner at Wembley, of lifting the World Cup. Of making a
name for themselves. And yet some players make a name for themselves inadvertently, their
footballing achievements and exploits overlooked or forgotten.
Fair play to West Ham. They may have poached one of the lower leagues' most prolific marksmen, Sam
Baldock, from MK Dons but it's not all take, take, take - on the contrary, they seem to be
vigorously pursuing a policy of loaning out their youngsters to the benefit of both other clubs and
the players themselves.
How many former England internationals are there currently plying their trade in the third tier?
Not many, I'd wager. And how many League One players can boast that they once appeared in a
Champions League semi-final against Valencia (even if that appearance was curtailed by a red card)?
Again, not many.
File him under journeyman if you will; Paul Thirlwell's career hasn't exactly hit stellar heights
anywhere. Decent spells at his hometown club Sunderland, Sheffield United and Derby were flecked by
seemingly the only consistency of his career – injury. Ask any fan of his current club Carlisle
to define Thirlwell in a single word and the wags will chorus on cue – ‘injured'.
File him under journeyman if you will; Paul Thirlwell's career hasn't exactly hit stellar heights
anywhere. Decent spells at his hometown club Sunderland, Sheffield United and Derby were flecked by
seemingly the only consistency of his career – injury. Ask any fan of his current club Carlisle
to define Thirlwell in a single word and the wags will chorus on cue – ‘injured'.
The Rest
When former Scunthorpe United boss Nigel Adkins was confirmed as the new manager at then League 1
Southampton, eyebrows were raised amongst the St Mary's faithful. Eighteen months later and
Southampton are looking to win back-to-back promotions, with Adkins' managerial record for the
2010-11 season bettered only by Sir Alex Ferguson.
If Cardiff City's line up for their 2-1 victory at Reading at the weekend was shorn of the
strutters that were on show at the time of their last visit to the Madejski Stadium during last
May's play offs, the XI still had a familiar ring to it. Refreshingly, the club - and Malky Mackay
in particular - have done a lot to win friends among supporters of opposing teams over the past
half year.
The recent unveiling of the Elite Player Performance Plan has been met with a cacophony of
complaint from footballer bloggers. For Gary Andrews of Two Footed Tackle, it was not so much the
straw that broke the camel's back, more a case of the straw being repeatedly driven into said back
with a whopping great JCB -and as Jon Keen of The Tilehurst End pointed out, EPPP could allow
acquiring clubs
