I remember walking with Jim Magilton into the Regent Theatre in Ipswich once, when he was taking his children to see Brian Blessed in Peter Pan. His tenure as Ipswich manager was never particularly fruitful, and the performances on the pitch were often uneven, but the standard of football that I saw was often very good, and he now may well be the last of the old guard.It must be the first time that an Ipswich manager has been sacked only two days after WINNING a big derby game. That 3-2 win over Norwich has ultimately done no good for anybody, except I suppose the extreme wing of the "Blue Army" for whom nothing matters except beating Norwich. After witnessing the general bloodthirstiness and antipathy in East Anglia that day, I'm not sure I want to see too many more local derbies.
The overbearing influence of Ipswich's curiously reclusive new "Emperor" Marcus Evans has now made due effect, with the appointment of Britain's Olympic team manager Simon Clegg, no less, as chief executive - and as if that wasn't enough, Mr. Evans has instructed Mr. Clegg to sack Magilton and bring in Roy Keane - who has gone into his new job with typical Bull-in-a-China-Shop gusto.
There's a lot of greed around in football nowadays, but I hoped it would never extend to Ipswich Town.RIP Alf Ramsey and the good old John Cobbold days.
1 comment:
Great post, Joe.
As I don't really follow football that much these days, apart from the World Cup and European Championships, I had no idea what was going on at Ipswich Town until I followed up your facebook posting by reading stuff on the net, and now here. I agree though, the game is totally commercial these days and seems to have developed a very nasty cut-throat streak that effects everyone from the more, how shall we say, 'extreme' supporters to the boardroom and secretive millionaire owner(s). It's not good enough to play well or win anymore, but the rivals must be destroyed...and more importantly, the share price increase and merchandise sales up.
Having never really dipped into the 'fantatic' side of support for Norwich City Football Club (I have been intersted in them on the periphery only) I was shocked to see the vitriolic hatred between some Ispwich and Norwich fans - as you say, the extreme wing of the supporters - something I've seen on the internet this week following the sacking of Magilton. I know I'm naive, but I really haven't come across that in real life, thank goodness. Stuff like that really annoys me. That's why I enjoy cinema more!
Oh, please have a look at this - I love this sketch:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OOfJjHozCEc
Oh, looking at the tables, it may be that Ipswich wont be playing Norwich next year, but Peterborough instead. I guess the Ipswich 'blue army' can have a go at the....er....'blue army' of the POSH instead.
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