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impsTALK.co.uk >> Archive >> 1989/1990 >> Pilgrims Progress

All four newcomers to the Conference this season meant a lot of travelling for Pilgrims fans, as the clubs originated from each of the four corners of the country - I might have been naturally good at geography, but I could never find the classroom.

One of those new sides, Farnborough, provided the opposition at York Street on the season's opening day. Not for the last time this season, there were times in this match when our defence stood as if they were having their portraits painted. Certainly Farnborough were lucky in scoring twice, both their goal bound shots obtained cruel deflections, and yet Boston really had no cause for complaint, as a 10 men side (Mossman obviously had to leave early because he managed to get himself sent-off with some distinction) spluttered like a car with dirty petrol before finding a smooth spell of acceleration in the second-half when they scored twice through out-and-out defender Martin Hardy.

Amusement was provided in the Farnborough game by the referee’s thistle, which was so high-pitched, at times it resembled a piercing shrill; by half-time, the ground was probably surrounded by dogs. But at Barrow there was no amusement to be found anywhere. Things appeared to be going well when Cook established the lead, but then Kerr withdrew both Grocock and Hamill, who at the time were cutting Barrow to pieces, and cutting the pieces they’d just cut into even smaller pieces; not surprisingly, with both the Boston wingers substituted, Barrow, hardly able to believe their new found freedom on the flanks, wiped out our slender lead and were just allowed the tine to make it 1 - 2.

By now Willie Gamble was beginning to emerge as Boston’s danger man -a danger to good football everywhere. Nowhere was this made more obvious than at the Yeovil game, while ending in yet another defeat. Of particular disappointment was the absence of Paul Wilson, still unavailable for the visitors, as Willo has been plagued with an ankle injury all season which he sustained in a pre-season friendly for the Somerset side. Proceedings started lively enough with Yeovil's centre-half doing more pushing than an Los Angeles drugs gang. Coupled with this fact was the behaviour of the visitors’ number seven who appeared to be operating a protection racket in mid-field. All of this meant that Boston now occupied bottom position in the league, after finishing in their highest ever third spot last term. However, baldie George “St. Pauls Cathedral lookalike" Kerr publicly considered that this was no case for concern. Having experienced a referee in the Yeovil game who permitted at least two attacks to continue in spite of the fact that their striker was so far offside that it probably got dark in the part of the pitch where he was standing half-an-hour later than the area of the field where the last Boston defender was positioned we travelled to Barnet convinced that just about all and sundry was against us.

Remarkably there then followed two victories against London opposition: a Rawcliffe goal was sufficient to beat Enfield in a game which Steve McClaughlin - one of the few talents to really emerge this season - was magnificent (and dropped soon afterwards), and before that the Pilgrims achieved their first win of the season - incredibly away at Barnet. Actually the game could have gone either way, and probably would have, had it not been for £60,000 signing from Spurs Peter Guthrie, and his antics of improvised sight gags in the Barnet goal; this man appeared to be a born entertainer in his willingness to do anything to get a laugh. First he dropped cross after cross, until David Grant despatched the spilt ball home, and then surpassed even this by failing to get down to Gamble's 89th minute winner, though Guthrie did offer a much better performance in the return game at York Street.

Credit for Boston's late winner must belong entirely to Grant who amazed everyone by sending his throw-in sailing about 50 yards, like an American quarterback's throw, to the understandably unmarked Willie Gamble; hopefully there was no drugs test after the game for David Grant to fail. Meanwhile, Simpson spent the whole game showing that he was prepared to live and die for Boston, such was his obvious privilege to be wearing the famed amber shirt.

Personally, I did not attend the Methyr game due to various previous commitments, but then again as my friends Jon and Mark say "Boston didn't come to see us when we were bad". And by all accounts, bad we certainly were, managing the same amount of shots on goal as players we had sent-off: namely, ONE. Inexplicably we seem to be the only club in existence with wingers (Hamill, Grocock, and the now departed, and equally guilty Mossman) who cannot cross, and when they do centre, there seems to be precious few, with the possible exception of Jackie Gallagher, capable of commanding aerial authority. Mainly the problem stems from the: fact that so many of Boston's aide are LITTLE people; Rawcliffe, Simpson and McClaughlin are all so small that to them the average domestic cat must appear like a terrorising, ferocious lion from which they have to run away from or face being eaten.

Adopting a little less frivolous tone, it must be said that we do require one of those "sticker away of chances" types, perhaps one of the big, pigeon-cheated sort, a hard man with short hair who looks like he's just stepped off a 1950s Division 3 North football and probably rejoices in telling everyone "I'm so hard, even my dog's hard". No one can question Gallagher's ability to trap a ball dead, nor his aerial prowess, but he is not a finisher - like the rest of the current aide, he is more an architect than a finisher.

Yet, as we all acknowledge, every team on this planet requires a "good striker" who can "hit the target" (at the end of the day the lad done great just take each game as it comes and be over the moon, Brian....), so no one is about to pretend the task is that facile. Having said that, Boston could have obtained Hull City's Keith Edwards (couldn't they, Mr Malkinson?) for a mere £50,000 - a figure GMVC clubs have already surpassed in the transfer market this - season, and collected a player tried and tested in the standards of Division Two. Instead Boston refused to meet Hull's asking price, and so Edwards departed for Stockport instead, taking all of four minutes to score on his debut for the Cheshire outfit.

Presently crowds seem to be leaving York Street at a rate only matched by East Germans departing their country, and if the rate of defection continues, the unimaginable will soon take its place in reality, with York Street attendances, as well as the population of East Germany, falling to below the 1,000 mark. Success simply must be bought, as all the accompaniments of success riding piggyback with it.(extra sponsorship, advertising revenue, players more likely to chose a successful club than one languished at the bottom) will more than offset the initial outlay, particularly when one considers the crowds that will be pushing money to the turnstile operators. To employ a farming metaphor, apt for our region, the choice is between one farmer who plants his crops and waits, and one farmer who, after planting, invests money in quality fertilizers, pesticides, weed killers, etc -one has the far greater initial monetary outlay, but who will yield the most successful harvest ?

Mind you, the club's unwillingness to spend money on the team probably won't seem so important soon, as according to environmental forecasts the earth is gradually becoming hotter, and thus the sea will rise and the first place to be flooded is Lincolnshire, and then there won't be a Boston United as the town will be lost forever under feet of water like Atlantis* And Grantham will totally disappear too, so it's not all doom and gloom. And while addressing the subject of total destruction, this would appear to be an ideal opportunity for reviewing the Darlington (mis)match.

We travelled to the Darlington game covering our faces and squatting-down in our seats to avoid recognition, as we were in a LEADED petrol vehicle - we ought to have displayed a ‘I'm ruining our planet’ rear window sticker. Given that we were not burstingly optimistic about our chances before the game, the 1-3 reversal provided nothing-to complain about, and was, in fairness, an inaccurate measurement of our domination at the hands of the North East club. Basically, Darlo took us to pieces, humiliated us, destroyed us, took us to pieces some more, put us back together again so they could take us to pieces once again, and....... well, you get the picture; at least Chris Cook did provide a clinically finished goal from a tight angle.

Though the vast majority of Darlington fans are, as expected, good humoured and discerning individuals, some of them, nevertheless, resembled! a bunch of Viz characters. One charming sportsman constantly bellowed out "break his leg" every time a Boston player was tackled, and other distasteful verbal emissions, thus prompting one of our party to inquiry as whether they had schools in Darlington. One qualification for standing amongst Darlo fans is that you certainly don't need to mind your language. One charming succinct individual persisted in orating foully, spraying swear words all around the terraces in his scatological outbursts. In one memorable sentence he managed to use the "f" word, as a noun, verb and adjective.

There is at least one improvement to report on this season over last, if only in the quality of the club programme; the new multi-colour production, complete with colour picture of Hamill on the front and several other (b & w) photographs inside, is a very profession design, though the articles contained therein sometimes only thinly disguise their its-a-chore-writing-this attitude existing below the surface. At least Kerr, whose outspokenness attracts controversy like cats to a fishmongers, does at least provide some talking points in his articles, and the only naturally talented writer involved with the programme, Graham Brown, is so obviously harnessed by diplomacy that he has to contort himself into such a position whereas the club will hardly let him write about anything other than how marvellous everything is* In my opinion, some of the other "writers" who've had their jottings published, couldn't write a note to the milkman.

Not surprisingly, this and other media attention does revolve around Kerr. If he does have an inflated ego, then it is an inflation of barrage balloon proportions Maybe, though, Ken is unjustly left to soak up blame for the team's failings, especially if the Board have refused to permit any more investment on players. Consolidation1 can at least be taken in the knowledge that we do possess several talented if not always perfectly motivated, individuals: Shirtliffe is a rare talent, Cusack has class, Buckley still retains all of his abilities, if not all of his pace, and Vaughan - well, we daren't say anything derogatory about David Vaughan in case he comes round to our house and hits us (again). Still, one fact remains certain: to be a football manager it is imperative to have a thick skin.

Prior to the home game with Kidderminster, even the terminally optimistic had accepted that would witness an encounter about as one-sided as a public execution, as the Harriers were currently occupying second spot in the table, while Boston were in the bottom position they were making their own. Even so, the final score was: Boston 2 Kidderminster and Mr. Ian Grandidge from Hull 3.

Now, as the smartly informed amongst you will recall, Ian Grandidge was the linesman at our infamous F. A. Trophy final appearance, who stuck up his flag (presumably to fend off some annoying wasp) just as Dave Gilbert was tucking away our "equaliser" into Wealdstone's vacant net. Anyway, he must obviously blame Boston United for his unhappy childhood (if he wasn't ill-treated as a child, then he certainly should have been), as he turned down three perfectly legitimate (biased? us?) penalty appeals, before awarding one to the visitors. Cleverly, though, one of the most blatant advantages in the entire history of the game was not given, as the ref smartly spotted that the final ball had left none other than GAMBLE in the clear, and so did not constitute an advantage to continue. And the referee did provide the Pilgrims with one other welcomed bit of help in intercepting a pass destined for the unmarked Howell to stick away in a carbon copy of Kiddy's first goal; this "clearance" saw Boston swoop forward down the right-wing, and no one ran up field faster than Mr. Grandidge, who having started the move, obviously wanted to be in on the end of it and nod home Shirtliffe's cross.

Forever involving himself in the action throughout this game, as well as the referee, was Kidderminster's genuinely fat midfield maestro Graham McKenzie, who along with Sill City's famed ex-star Ken Wagstaff, must be the game's only truly fat players - and McKenzie, I'm sure won't mind me saying, is a gross, fat ball of rounded blubberbeast who's bloated and humungous- apparently he is also a keen cricketer too, in spite of being a Scotsman; presumably he stands behind the bowlers' arm dressed in all white and impersonates a sightscreen.

Revenge was well and truly extracted by Barnet for their earlier | Underhill defeat, reversing the 2-1 scoreline at York Street. Hot ; regrets here as Barnet were clearly the better side and would probably I have scored several more, had our left post not played a blinder in the Boston defence - three times clearing shots with McKenna despairing fingertips beaten. Yet Gallagher did provide a goal of rare and exceptional quality for Chris Grocock, our child winger, to finish. Only then Gallagher was substituted, when we were 1-2 down at home with fifteen minutes to go, for United’s midfield midget (sorry Debbie - esoteric reference) Peter Rawcliffe. This tactical manoeuvre notwithstanding, the worst performance on the field was given by the referee, a Fulton McKay lookalike, who was responsible for Martin Hardy probably becoming- the first player to be sent-off at this level for kicking the ball. Sadly/ Barnet's female trainer was greeted with predictable ignominious sexism from the crowd (remember that if you're a sexist, every time you look in a mirror a piece of rubbish stares back at you) - though she was probably Barry Pry's daughter as nepotism is rife at Barnet P.O. (Stan Flashman's son even played in goal at Sutton last season, ending in a not surprising 0-5 defeat). Oddly, one match report I read referred to Stewart Hamill hitting the woodwork in. this game - obviously he must have hit his shoulder against the doorpost oh his way out of the dressing room, because I cannot remember that having taken place.

Patronising as it may be to suggest it, if not indeed a little undignified, but it must nevertheless be stressed that players at York Street have often been crucified by permanently hostile crowds. Remember, supporters alone do not have a monopoly on human feelings -players can appear sensitive too. Perhaps there is an image of all footballers appearing a little educationally backward (phew! you can't accuse us of picking people up and placing them in pre-conditioned social stereo-tying pigeon-holes, matey), but that is hardly applicable, or justifiable, for abuse to be the outcome. Certainly Boston players, be they Gamble, Rawcliffe or the unfairly maligned Allen Crombie, or whoever, don't run out of the tunnel and decide to themselves "today I'm going to be mediocre or, at best, indifferent". If the players are not good enough, then that surely is the fault of the manager for picking them to play; if the manager has no alternatives, then it becomes the fault of the Board.

In order to crush the common misconception of footballers pertaining to be thick, well, most of them have the intelligence of an egg and cress sandwich; admittedly, we nevertheless strive to show this is not always the case by including the excellent interview with Warren Ward. Not only is Ward genuinely articulate and puts his glossopharyngeal (surely word of the season - eat your hearts out all you Mr-I'm-so-clever-cos-I've-been-to-universitys at WSC) to wordy use; we thought some of the stuff he sent us contained three typing mistakes until we found all three words in the dictionary.

Nevertheless, vulgar criticism of players is not what is required, and can have a long term damaging effect on a younger player's career. It is not a matter of FBYF being saddled by diplomacy; rather, it is a concern at the degree of ignominy orated at York Street. Only by continuing to attend games we will show players and directors the commitment they owe to us as the supporters responsible/responsible supporters for the welfare of our club, it is imperative we still continue to turn up for matches, and not stay at home waiting for the sky to turn blue.

Right, since all that was some pretty serious stuff, FBYF now presents one of our jokes: what goes boing, boing, boing, boing, ouch ouch boing, boing? A kangaroo going under a low bridge. Sorry.

It may well be famous last words on a par with "don't worry, we're not in range", but personally I don't believe the Pilgrims will be relegated. Hopefully I'm not naive to suggest that if matters really do stay that bleak, then Malkinson will invest in the side to avoid falling through that nasty little trapdoor to the HPS Loans League. The equation is simplistic in that any money invested in the side will very soon be recuperated with extra bodies coming through the turnstiles at £2*50 and £3 at time; add a 1,000 on the gate for just a few games, and the amount becomes a very respectable one. Certainly the chance of being inoculated from ever decreasing gates is there for the club to take, but it would appear that the sharp pain experienced from injecting the cash is too painful a vaccine.

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Not for the last time this season, there were times in this match when our defence stood as if they were having their portraits painted. Certainly Farnborough were lucky in scoring twice, both their goal bound shots obtained cruel deflections, and yet Boston really had no cause for complaint, as a 10 men side (Mossman obviously had to leave early because he managed to get himself sent-off with some distinction) spluttered like a car with dirty petrol before finding a smooth spell of acceleration in the second-half when they scored twice through out-and-out defender Martin Hardy. Amusement was provided in the Farnborough game by the referee’s thistle, which was so high-pitched, at times it resembled a piercing shrill; by half-time, the ground was probably surrounded by dogs. But at Barrow there was no amusement to be found anywhere. Things appeared to be going well when Cook established the lead, but then Kerr withdrew both Grocock and Hamill, who at the time were cutting Barrow to pieces, and cutting the pieces they’d just cut into even smaller pieces; not surprisingly, with both the Boston wingers substituted, Barrow, hardly able to believe their new found freedom on the flanks, wiped out our slender lead and were just allowed the tine to make it 1 - 2. By now Willie Gamble was beginning to emerge as Boston’s danger man -a danger to good football everywhere. Nowhere was this made more obvious than at the Yeovil game, while ending in yet another defeat. Of particular disappointment was the absence of Paul Wilson, still unavailable for the visitors, as Willo has been plagued with an ankle injury all season which he sustained in a pre-season friendly for the Somerset side. Proceedings started lively enough with Yeovil's centre-half doing more pushing than an Los Angeles drugs gang. Coupled with this fact was the behaviour of the visitors’ number seven who appeared to be operating a protection racket in mid-field. All of this meant that Boston now occupied bottom position in the league, after finishing in their highest ever third spot last term. However, baldie George “St. Pauls Cathedral lookalike" Kerr publicly considered that this was no case for concern. Having experienced a referee in the Yeovil game who permitted at least two attacks to continue in spite of the fact that their striker was so far offside that it probably got dark in the part of the pitch where he was standing half-an-hour later than the area of the field where the last Boston defender was positioned we travelled to Barnet convinced that just about all and sundry was against us. Remarkably there then followed two victories against London opposition: a Rawcliffe goal was sufficient to beat Enfield in a game which Steve McClaughlin - one of the few talents to really emerge this season - was magnificent (and dropped soon afterwards), and before that the Pilgrims achieved their first win of the season - incredibly away at Barnet. Actually the game could have gone either way, and probably would have, had it not been for £60,000 signing from Spurs Peter Guthrie, and his antics of improvised sight gags in the Barnet goal; this man appeared to be a born entertainer in his willingness to do anything to get a laugh. First he dropped cross after cross, until David Grant despatched the spilt ball home, and then surpassed even this by failing to get down to Gamble's 89th minute winner, though Guthrie did offer a much better performance in the return game at York Street. Credit for Boston's late winner must belong entirely to Grant who amazed everyone by sending his throw-in sailing about 50 yards, like an American quarterback's throw, to the understandably unmarked Willie Gamble; hopefully there was no drugs test after the game for David Grant to fail. Meanwhile, Simpson spent the whole game showing that he was prepared to live and die for Boston, such was his obvious privilege to be wearing the famed amber shirt. Personally, I did not attend the Methyr game due to various previous commitments, but then again as my friends Jon and Mark say "Boston didn't come to see us when we were bad". And by all accounts, bad we certainly were, managing the same amount of shots on goal as players we had sent-off: namely, ONE. Inexplicably we seem to be the only club in existence with wingers (Hamill, Grocock, and the now departed, and equally guilty Mossman) who cannot cross, and when they do centre, there seems to be precious few, with the possible exception of Jackie Gallagher, capable of commanding aerial authority. Mainly the problem stems from the: fact that so many of Boston's aide are LITTLE people; Rawcliffe, Simpson and McClaughlin are all so small that to them the average domestic cat must appear like a terrorising, ferocious lion from which they have to run away from or face being eaten. Adopting a little less frivolous tone, it must be said that we do require one of those "sticker away of chances" types, perhaps one of the big, pigeon-cheated sort, a hard man with short hair who looks like he's just stepped off a 1950s Division 3 North football and probably rejoices in telling everyone "I'm so hard, even my dog's hard". No one can question Gallagher's ability to trap a ball dead, nor his aerial prowess, but he is not a finisher - like the rest of the current aide, he is more an architect than a finisher. Yet, as we all acknowledge, every team on this planet requires a "good striker" who can "hit the target" (at the end of the day the lad done great just take each game as it comes and be over the moon, Brian....), so no one is about to pretend the task is that facile. Having said that, Boston could have obtained Hull City's Keith Edwards (couldn't they, Mr Malkinson?) for a mere £50,000 - a figure GMVC clubs have already surpassed in the transfer market this - season, and collected a player tried and tested in the standards of Division Two. Instead Boston refused to meet Hull's asking price, and so Edwards departed for Stockport instead, taking all of four minutes to score on his debut for the Cheshire outfit. Presently crowds seem to be leaving York Street at a rate only matched by East Germans departing their country, and if the rate of defection continues, the unimaginable will soon take its place in reality, with York Street attendances, as well as the population of East Germany, falling to below the 1,000 mark. Success simply must be bought, as all the accompaniments of success riding piggyback with it.(extra sponsorship, advertising revenue, players more likely to chose a successful club than one languished at the bottom) will more than offset the initial outlay, particularly when one considers the crowds that will be pushing money to the turnstile operators. To employ a farming metaphor, apt for our region, the choice is between one farmer who plants his crops and waits, and one farmer who, after planting, invests money in quality fertilizers, pesticides, weed killers, etc -one has the far greater initial monetary outlay, but who will yield the most successful harvest ? Mind you, the club's unwillingness to spend money on the team probably won't seem so important soon, as according to environmental forecasts the earth is gradually becoming hotter, and thus the sea will rise and the first place to be flooded is Lincolnshire, and then there won't be a Boston United as the town will be lost forever under feet of water like Atlantis* And Grantham will totally disappear too, so it's not all doom and gloom. And while addressing the subject of total destruction, this would appear to be an ideal opportunity for reviewing the Darlington (mis)match. We travelled to the Darlington game covering our faces and squatting-down in our seats to avoid recognition, as we were in a LEADED petrol vehicle - we ought to have displayed a ‘I'm ruining our planet’ rear window sticker. Given that we were not burstingly optimistic about our chances before the game, the 1-3 reversal provided nothing-to complain about, and was, in fairness, an inaccurate measurement of our domination at the hands of the North East club. Basically, Darlo took us to pieces, humiliated us, destroyed us, took us to pieces some more, put us back together again so they could take us to pieces once again, and....... well, you get the picture; at least Chris Cook did provide a clinically finished goal from a tight angle. Though the vast majority of Darlington fans are, as expected, good humoured and discerning individuals, some of them, nevertheless, resembled! a bunch of Viz characters. One charming sportsman constantly bellowed out "break his leg" every time a Boston player was tackled, and other distasteful verbal emissions, thus prompting one of our party to inquiry as whether they had schools in Darlington. One qualification for standing amongst Darlo fans is that you certainly don't need to mind your language. One charming succinct individual persisted in orating foully, spraying swear words all around the terraces in his scatological outbursts. In one memorable sentence he managed to use the "f" word, as a noun, verb and adjective. There is at least one improvement to report on this season over last, if only in the quality of the club programme; the new multi-colour production, complete with colour picture of Hamill on the front and several other (b & w) photographs inside, is a very profession design, though the articles contained therein sometimes only thinly disguise their its-a-chore-writing-this attitude existing below the surface. At least Kerr, whose outspokenness attracts controversy like cats to a fishmongers, does at least provide some talking points in his articles, and the only naturally talented writer involved with the programme, Graham Brown, is so obviously harnessed by diplomacy that he has to contort himself into such a position whereas the club will hardly let him write about anything other than how marvellous everything is* In my opinion, some of the other "writers" who've had their jottings published, couldn't write a note to the milkman. Not surprisingly, this and other media attention does revolve around Kerr. If he does have an inflated ego, then it is an inflation of barrage balloon proportions Maybe, though, Ken is unjustly left to soak up blame for the team's failings, especially if the Board have refused to permit any more investment on players. Consolidation1 can at least be taken in the knowledge that we do possess several talented if not always perfectly motivated, individuals: Shirtliffe is a rare talent, Cusack has class, Buckley still retains all of his abilities, if not all of his pace, and Vaughan - well, we daren't say anything derogatory about David Vaughan in case he comes round to our house and hits us (again). Still, one fact remains certain: to be a football manager it is imperative to have a thick skin. Prior to the home game with Kidderminster, even the terminally optimistic had accepted that would witness an encounter about as one-sided as a public execution, as the Harriers were currently occupying second spot in the table, while Boston were in the bottom position they were making their own. Even so, the final score was: Boston 2 Kidderminster and Mr. Ian Grandidge from Hull 3. Now, as the smartly informed amongst you will recall, Ian Grandidge was the linesman at our infamous F. A. Trophy final appearance, who stuck up his flag (presumably to fend off some annoying wasp) just as Dave Gilbert was tucking away our "equaliser" into Wealdstone's vacant net. Anyway, he must obviously blame Boston United for his unhappy childhood (if he wasn't ill-treated as a child, then he certainly should have been), as he turned down three perfectly legitimate (biased? us?) penalty appeals, before awarding one to the visitors. Cleverly, though, one of the most blatant advantages in the entire history of the game was not given, as the ref smartly spotted that the final ball had left none other than GAMBLE in the clear, and so did not constitute an advantage to continue. And the referee did provide the Pilgrims with one other welcomed bit of help in intercepting a pass destined for the unmarked Howell to stick away in a carbon copy of Kiddy's first goal; this "clearance" saw Boston swoop forward down the right-wing, and no one ran up field faster than Mr. Grandidge, who having started the move, obviously wanted to be in on the end of it and nod home Shirtliffe's cross. Forever involving himself in the action throughout this game, as well as the referee, was Kidderminster's genuinely fat midfield maestro Graham McKenzie, who along with Sill City's famed ex-star Ken Wagstaff, must be the game's only truly fat players - and McKenzie, I'm sure won't mind me saying, is a gross, fat ball of rounded blubberbeast who's bloated and humungous- apparently he is also a keen cricketer too, in spite of being a Scotsman; presumably he stands behind the bowlers' arm dressed in all white and impersonates a sightscreen. Revenge was well and truly extracted by Barnet for their earlier \| Underhill defeat, reversing the 2-1 scoreline at York Street. Hot ; regrets here as Barnet were clearly the better side and would probably I have scored several more, had our left post not played a blinder in the Boston defence - three times clearing shots with McKenna despairing fingertips beaten. Yet Gallagher did provide a goal of rare and exceptional quality for Chris Grocock, our child winger, to finish. Only then Gallagher was substituted, when we were 1-2 down at home with fifteen minutes to go, for United’s midfield midget (sorry Debbie - esoteric reference) Peter Rawcliffe. This tactical manoeuvre notwithstanding, the worst performance on the field was given by the referee, a Fulton McKay lookalike, who was responsible for Martin Hardy probably becoming- the first player to be sent-off at this level for kicking the ball. Sadly/ Barnet's female trainer was greeted with predictable ignominious sexism from the crowd (remember that if you're a sexist, every time you look in a mirror a piece of rubbish stares back at you) - though she was probably Barry Pry's daughter as nepotism is rife at Barnet P.O. (Stan Flashman's son even played in goal at Sutton last season, ending in a not surprising 0-5 defeat). Oddly, one match report I read referred to Stewart Hamill hitting the woodwork in. this game - obviously he must have hit his shoulder against the doorpost oh his way out of the dressing room, because I cannot remember that having taken place. Patronising as it may be to suggest it, if not indeed a little undignified, but it must nevertheless be stressed that players at York Street have often been crucified by permanently hostile crowds. Remember, supporters alone do not have a monopoly on human feelings -players can appear sensitive too. Perhaps there is an image of all footballers appearing a little educationally backward (phew! you can't accuse us of picking people up and placing them in pre-conditioned social stereo-tying pigeon-holes, matey), but that is hardly applicable, or justifiable, for abuse to be the outcome. Certainly Boston players, be they Gamble, Rawcliffe or the unfairly maligned Allen Crombie, or whoever, don't run out of the tunnel and decide to themselves "today I'm going to be mediocre or, at best, indifferent". If the players are not good enough, then that surely is the fault of the manager for picking them to play; if the manager has no alternatives, then it becomes the fault of the Board. In order to crush the common misconception of footballers pertaining to be thick, well, most of them have the intelligence of an egg and cress sandwich; admittedly, we nevertheless strive to show this is not always the case by including the excellent interview with Warren Ward. Not only is Ward genuinely articulate and puts his glossopharyngeal (surely word of the season - eat your hearts out all you Mr-I'm-so-clever-cos-I've-been-to-universitys at WSC) to wordy use; we thought some of the stuff he sent us contained three typing mistakes until we found all three words in the dictionary. Nevertheless, vulgar criticism of players is not what is required, and can have a long term damaging effect on a younger player's career. It is not a matter of FBYF being saddled by diplomacy; rather, it is a concern at the degree of ignominy orated at York Street. Only by continuing to attend games we will show players and directors the commitment they owe to us as the supporters responsible/responsible supporters for the welfare of our club, it is imperative we still continue to turn up for matches, and not stay at home waiting for the sky to turn blue. Right, since all that was some pretty serious stuff, FBYF now presents one of our jokes: what goes boing, boing, boing, boing, ouch ouch boing, boing? A kangaroo going under a low bridge. Sorry. It may well be famous last words on a par with "don't worry, we're not in range", but personally I don't believe the Pilgrims will be relegated. Hopefully I'm not naive to suggest that if matters really do stay that bleak, then Malkinson will invest in the side to avoid falling through that nasty little trapdoor to the HPS Loans League. The equation is simplistic in that any money invested in the side will very soon be recuperated with extra bodies coming through the turnstiles at £2*50 and £3 at time; add a 1,000 on the gate for just a few games, and the amount becomes a very respectable one. Certainly the chance of being inoculated from ever decreasing gates is there for the club to take, but it would appear that the sharp pain experienced from injecting the cash is too painful a vaccine.
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