And where would we be without a few well chosen and insightful words from our Editor? (don't answer that)...
The ED
• on REFEREES and TECHNOLOGY "Sublime skills and supreme tactics are all very wonderful but it is mistakes which are the essence of football. Without the whole gamut of blunders, from clumsy ball control to a fine error of positional judgement, hardly a goal would be scored." So wrote the Daily Mail's football feature columnist, Jeff Powell, in a piece bemoaning the possibility of TV cameras and fourth officials being used to check the decisions of referees. Powell's thesis was that but for dodgy refereeing decisions, games would never be decided. He suggested, somewhat ludicrously, that England and Germany would still be taking penalties to settle their European Championship semi-final if no one had made a mistake and missed one, as Gareth Southgate actually did. Well, blow me down with a feather! If no one missed a penalty, then penalty shootouts would go on for all eternity! So we'd better not use cameras to check refereeing decisions then! Er, am I missing something here? Is there any connection between players making mistakes and referees getting things wrong? Actually, there isn't. Players' errors give the game its element of unpredictability. Without it Wrexham would never beat West Ham, Chesterfield would never overcome Notts Forest, and Bishop Auckland would not trounce Altrincham with only nine men. But a referee's cock ups can change the direction of a game. Ask Leicester's supporters what they think of referee Mike Reed. He gave that non-existent penalty to Chelsea that put them through to the FA Cup quarter-finals and dumped Leicester out of the competition. That should never be part and parcel of the game. A referee's decisions should be above questioning because they're always right. Teams should not be deprived of victories because the official was unsighted or couldn't keep up with the play. In this day and age that type of shamateurism just won't do. We live at a time of greater and greater precision. We categorise and measure everything, even our childrens' schools. We can clone sheep and monkeys and we can send powerful rockets way beyond our own solar system. But we won't install a couple of cameras behind each goal. Instead, we prefer to rely on the word of one harassed individual who is usually some fifteen or twenty yards away from the ball and whose view is more often than not obscured by a crowd of players. No wonder they get it wrong. Powell believes that such decisions even out over time. That as many go for you as against you. But that's no consolation if you've just lost out on promotion due to a poor refereeing decision. He argues that there are no natural intermissions in football when video evidence could be replayed, unlike cricket which already uses cameras to adjudicate on run outs and LBWs. So there's no stoppage in play after a controversial goal then? The very nature of the event, a disputed decision, produces the required hold up in play during which the video can be replayed. "The dynamism which makes football the most compelling game of all derives from the non-stop fluency of the action," says Powell. And that's why he thinks key decisions should not be turned over to the cameras. So he's not seen too many UniBond games then. Or Nationwide League games. Or many Premier League games either. Many of the football matches that I see are anything but fluent. The ball is constantly going out of play, players are always requiring treatment for injuries, and there's more stop-go than at a set of traffic lights. Nothing is more important than simple right and wrong. It's called justice. The technology exists to ensure that major decisions over goals and penalties are above and beyond reproach. Jeff Powell and FIFA are wrong. Cameras should be used to adjudicate on controversial decisions. It will happen anyway. It can't be stopped. Those who are against it for old fashioned, romantic reasons to do with the traditions of the game are the modern day Luddites standing in the way of inevitable progress. By ensuring that the referee's decisions are beyond criticism, cameras will enrich the game beyond measure. Issue 030 - April 1997
• on SATELLITE SPORTS COVERAGE So what's all this fuss about BSkyB then? All this talk about why they shouldn't be allowed a monopoly over the broadcasting of the nation's sporting events? They've even passed an Act of Parliament to stop the satellite boys getting their hands on the FA Cup Final, England's cricket Test Matches, the Grand National, the Boat Race and Wimbledon. So that's a relief then. Those of us who don't possess a set top box will still be able to watch these events at home on our televisions because Rupert Murdoch's millions will never be enough to buy them. The law of the land says that no single broadcasting station may have a monopoly over the transmission of what are considered to be the jewels of this nation's sporting crown. Let me first declare an interest. I don't subscribe to satellite television. Can't afford either the time to watch it or the money to rent it. But I couldn't give a toss if BSkyB had the exclusive rights to any of these supposed top notch sporting occasions. And I can't understand why everyone else gets so worked up about it. My life would hardly be diminished one jot if I never saw another FA Cup Final in my life. After this years' effort between Chelsea and Middlesbrough it might even be enriched. I certainly don't want to waste another Saturday afternoon watching two mediocre sides bore each other into submission just because it's supposed to be the climax of the English football season. There's more passion and effort in the UniBond League's President's Cup Final than there has been in the last eight Wembley showpieces. Wimbledon is just a bore. And the tennis isn't much better. Watching the English cricket team is enough to drive any well-balanced person to suicide, while the Boat Race has to be for very sad people only, being more of a procession than an actual competition. The Grand National at least has the merit of being exciting and unpredictable, especially when they screw up the start. But it's all over in about quarter of an hour so I'm not going to lose much sleep if I never see it on telly again. Anyway, if I do miss it on the TV, it's always on the radio. Boxing sold its soul to the satellite companies years ago, but all the big fights are still broadcast live on Radio 5. This year Aintree was covered by 5 Live, Radio Merseyside and GMR, all of which can be picked up in Barrow. The unfolding drama of the abandoned Saturday Grand National was put over far more effectively by each one of these radio stations than poor old BBC1. And that's another reason for not regretting the departure of major sporting events from terrestrial TV. The coverage is absolutely abysmal. Say what you like about satellite TV, but they never commit the basic errors that BBC, ITV and Channel 4 do in their sports broadcasts. If you don't know what I mean, try watching ITV's coverage of the Grand Prix Formula One season (yes, but why would anyone with any taste or discernment, such as anyone reading this, want to watch anything as monolithically stupid as motor racing, whichever channel it were on? Online Ed.) or Channel 4's athletics coverage. Laughable would be too kind a word. Inept interviewers, producers who switch to pictures of one part of a race while something dramatic is happening elsewhere and presenters who have no passion or understanding of the sport they are trying, rather inadequately, to explain. The much vaunted football coverage of the BBC and ITV has never been more than average. It is now nothing more than pedestrian; Match of the Day is a dated and tired formula. It reveals nothing and illustrates even less. So-called experts who are more interested in being all friends together and presenting a cosy round-the-fireside image rather than revealing or interpreting anything interesting or challenging about the game. ITV abandoned any pretence to serious football coverage years ago. It is now content to show the goals from each League match at Saturday teatime with a regional preview on Friday evenings, concentrating solely on Divisions One, Two and Three and studiously ignoring the non-League game. So I won't miss a thing if satellite TV takes all the top sporting events. And if you think about it, neither will you. Issue 032 - November 1997
• on SPITTING The spittoon may have vanished but there's one place where the phlegm still flies; and that's on the football pitch. And judging by the evidence of recent matches, Barrow are the undisputed champions. We may not always be as good as other teams in passing, shooting, attacking and defending, but Barrow display complete mastery of the dark art of spitting. Players spit after missing an attempt on goal, they spit after committing a foul or being fouled themselves and they spit when coming on as a substitute or being substituted. Just falling over and getting up again is usually reason enough. The reasons for spitting are complex. Anyone who doesn't show his reaction is a wimp. When Neil Morton spits after missing a chance he's not just spitting. He is sending a message; "I'm not going to be affected by that incident. I am going right back into the game to get stuck in." Ged Hennigan when he comes on as substitute? "Now it's my turn to fertilize the pitch. I am about to make a difference." Jimmy Brown when he's sent off? "You're not getting rid of all of me. I'm leaving something behind. I hope you slip on it." The laws of the game require referees to sanction offending players. How long before we have five-a-side in the UniBond? Issue 033 - January 1998
• on TAXI DRIVERS There's no finer form of modern transport than a taxi. The taxi is a stylish mode of transport. When you hail a cab you are beckoning your own personal chauffeur and companion. It says that you are a person of substance and importance. You have no time to hang around for buses or trains. Your life is far too important to waste on things like that, and you have enough money to ensure that you don't have to wait. But the real value of taxis is in the drivers. Arriving in a new city, they are the first companionship and the first insight into the local culture. Take Liverpool, for instance. "Hiya, wack, where yer goin', like?" has a unique resonance not found in any other city in the world. It's a voice of authority and experience. However, it has been said that you can't find a cabbie in Liverpool who speaks English. This is not a big surprise. You can't find many people in Liverpool who speak English of any kind. I learned from one cabbie there that many of his colleagues pretend to be monolingual Slovakian gypsies to avoid having to talk to the irritating little p®¡¢# in the back. But these knights of the road are proud men. They're the ones who really know what is going on. They're the ones who know where to go at night. And where to avoid, namely anywhere they're asked to go, after midnight. Strangers know they'll be all right when they hail a cab in Liverpool. The drivers have all passed the equivalent of one GCSE grade 'E' in English or Maths. Sadly, few of them have any kind of qualification in Geography, such as how to fold up a map properly, or how to read the index in an A to Z. The value of being able to step in the street, name your destination and then spend half the day getting there gives you the opportunity to catch up on some overdue work and ensures that the cabbie is able to earn enough to keep himself in the manner to which he's accustomed. And they're fun. For a few minutes in the working day you meet someone to talk to who you will probably never meet again, thank Cowps. You can try out opinions on them that you don't really hold, such as "Wouldn't it be nice to see Souness back at Anfield again." But they are sad people. Taxi drivers have deep seated insecurity complexes. Not being able to form proper, lasting relationships, they rely on these brief encounters during the course of their short journeys. This leads to behaviour that ordinary people would find eccentric. For example, taxi drivers rarely look people in the face and prefer to address others with their back turned and a small mirror pointed over their shoulder so they can see who they're talking to. They are peripatetic loners, as Robert De Niro portrayed so well in the film 'Taxi Driver'. Fortunately, not many taxi drivers murder as many people as Travis Bickle. Mind you, I once took a taxi in Liverpool which had a rope across the back seat. I thought this may be for the passenger to hold as he was sped to his destination. A few screeching corners and jumped lights later and I realised that it was to bite on in abject terror. Another time I remember getting lost in Liverpool and phoning for a taxi to rescue me from my predicament. I was most upset when the driver radioed to his office that he'd "picked up the w@Å#*® now." An example, I suppose, of that irrepressible Scouse humour. After that experience, I became a little more confident with this inestimable breed of modern day Scouse charioteers. But then came the nutter. He picked me up at the bottom of Hardman Street in the city to take me to the Belfast ferry. True to a charming Liverpool custom which I'd never come across before, he picked up another fare a couple of streets later, just outside Yates' Wine Lodge. "Don't mind, wack?" he stated in the nasal twang of the city of his birth. This other fare wanted to go to the airport at Speke and as driver and passenger gabbled away in their native Scouse, I wondered if I'd been forgotten in the back entirely. Eventually we got to my ferry. He asked for the total on the clock, having already taken the fare to the airport from my uninvited companion. I handed him what I knew to be a fair fare for the direct route. He went berserk and pulled out a knife and started waving it in front of me. I ran for it and made the jetty first. They pulled up the gangplank just in time and he stood there revealing a remarkable knowledge of my sexual habits in the most voluble terms. He could have earned the fare twice over if he hadn't spent so long abusing me from the quayside. But that's the thing about taxi drivers. Their grasp of money and all commercial principles border on the surreal. In no other business are tips expected as a matter of course, rather than for good performance. I know of people who've been charged £20 from the Empire Theatre to the Adelphi Hotel, a distance of less than two miles. It's nothing more than a rip off, but what tenuous grasp of value leads the taxi drivers of Liverpool to ask for such a fare? They're mad. So next time you're in a taxi with a sign saying, 'Thank you for not smoking', hand him a card saying, 'Thank you for not driving in your straitjacket.' But, in spite of it all, we should treat them with respect. One of them, after all, was sufficiently articulate, well informed and resourceful to become the manager of a famous non-League football team. Yes, while he was waiting for Barrow to offer him the chance of a lifetime and the best job in football, Owen Brown was a taxi driver in Liverpool. Re-edited from issues 032 - November 1997, and 033 - January 1998
• the Ed says NEVER COME BACK! "On his own admission, Stephen Vaughan is no angel" What? Puh-lease! I had to read it twice, the opening line of the Evening Mail interview that never was, the one that they pulled from the paper but rather unfortunately left on their website. No angel! Neither is Beelzebub. We are talking here of the guy who put Barrow AFC into receivership, whose four years in charge were punctuated by controversy and allegations of wrong doing. And now he wants us to believe that he's nothing more than a naughty, misunderstood, loveable rogue whose heart is really in the right place. That's about as likely as 'Heartbeat' using a King Crimson song on its soundtrack. Spare me, please. Let's get one thing straight. Stephen Vaughan is bad for Barrow AFC. He shouldn't have been allowed to take over the club in the first place. And after what he did he must never be allowed back. This is the man who presided over Barrow's slide into receivership. Who nearly, very nearly, killed off Barrow AFC for good. Only those who were directly involved twelve months ago know just how close a call that was. But Barrow is still in receivership. And as long as they are, the gaunt, evil figure of the Grim Reaper casts his dark shadow across Holker St. Only one man invited him; Stephen Vaughan. Should he be given the chance to regain control of the club he took to rack and ruin? The investigations into allegations of money laundering and fraud against Vaughan have been well documented. So far, nothing has been proved. Good. The thought that Barrow's new grandstand might have been financed by the proceeds of drug dealings is not one I really want to contemplate. The guy says he's got no skeletons in his cupboard and that he's completely innocent. I'm sure he's sincere. My objection to Vaughan is quite simple. As a businessman and owner of a football club he was, quite simply, incompetent. Yes, as he says, the place was falling to pieces when he took over. He put all that right, financing the new Grandstand and bringing the ground up to Conference standards. Undeniably, a six figure sum was put into the club to make these improvements and bring to Holker St the players who could get us back into the Conference. But to make an investment on that scale and then pull away from underwriting it, as Vaughan did, betrays an innocence of finance that were it not so baffling would be almost touching in its naivety. Vaughan's incompetence surfaced quite early. Remember the saga of the accounts that weren't ready? So if we'd won the UniBond that season we wouldn't have been allowed into the Conference. In the end we finished fifth so it was irrelevant. Then there was the Chief Executive of Barrow AFC appointed by Vaughan from within his own company, Vaughan Promotions. In less than six months Vaughan sacked him because of allegations relating to the embezzlement of club funds. But the most damning evidence against Vaughan ever being allowed to take charge of a football club again is the scale of the financial failure he engineered at Barrow. With crowds amongst the best in non-League he contrived to take us into the Conference with a deficit of expenditure over income of some £2,000 per week. Remember that it was Vaughan who took the decisions that put us in that situation. His ham fisted attempts to take over Barrow RL ended in failure and then he had the nerve to complain that all people wanted to do was bring him down. So, like a spoilt child, he picked up his ball and went home, withdrawing the weekly funding that was keeping AFC alive. Along the way were the controversial share issue and the involvement with Curtis Warren, who, let us not forget, is a convicted drugs dealer, currently serving time in a Dutch prison. The Evening Mail article described Warren as a 'businessman'. That's like saying Ron and Reggie Kray were just company directors. I have a proposal for Mr Vaughan. Let's have a no holds barred interview, not the sanitised crap that the Evening Mail produced. Let him answer questions about where the money really came from and about the true nature of his business relationships with Curtis Warren. Let him explain, if he dare, what really went on behind the scenes at Holker St, about his true motivation for taking the deeds of the ground and then selling them to James Oliver. And let him explain, if he can, why he just turned his back on the club and walked out when they really needed his help more than ever. And maybe then we'll have a better understanding of what is really motivating this man. Zane Watergate adds: If you get the chance, here's some questions I'd like the answers to... Why did Stephen Vaughan claim that he had paid about £35-40k for the demolition of the old stand and preparation of foundations for the new stand when the Raise the Roof Fund's accounts for November 1998 showed that they had paid for the works? Vaughan claimed the figure when investigations were being made into his dealings by the Serious Fraud Squad. Why, having told companies to take or leave offers of part payment of bills as full and final settlement, did Vaughan then get them to sign confidentiality agreements to not disclose the amounts? Was he trying to claim that he paid them in full, and thereby making it look as though he'd ploughed hundreds of thousands into the club? Or was he trying to claim back VAT on the whole amount from Customs and Excise as a means of covering his tracks? Why did Vaughan claim to have paid the full amount of £225,000 out of his own pocket to finance the new grandstand? Didn't Asda pay £100,000 for first refusal if Holker St was ever put up for sale? And wasn't that £100,000 paid directly to the contractor? Could Asda have had some misgivings about what might have happened to the money if they'd paid it directly to Vaughan? Of the remaining £125,000 about £33,500 would have been reclaimed by Vaughan in VAT which leaves only £91,500. Some of this also appears to have been paid by the Raise the Roof fund as shown in their accounts. Has Vaughan claimed in his submission to the liquidator £225,000 or a much lower figure? As I remember the contractor who built the stand had to take Vaughan to court. Was a lower figure paid and did they have to sign something to stop them revealing the true payment? Issue 044 - March 2000