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Vanarama National League column – February 7

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Manchester United can take inspiration from the Vanarama National League to boost subdued Old Trafford atmosphere

 By Luke Coulson of the FWA and Ebbsfleet United
After Manchester United returned to winning ways against Huddersfield, with a home debut goal for new signing Alexis Sanchez, eyebrows were raised when Jose Mourinho decided to concentrate on the lack of atmosphere at Old Trafford.
Despite winning 2-0, the Portuguese manager quickly diverted his answers away from the performance and his new Chilean forward, instead choosing to focus on the subdued ‘Theatre of Dreams’ that lacks enthusiasm.
Unfortunately for us, our opposition last Saturday definitely did not suffer from a home crowd with a low volume setting.
Despite my slight feeling of bitterness towards Tranmere Rovers for not signing me after a trial, I can’t deny that Prenton Park is an intimidating place to play due to the passionate home fans. Therefore, during the game I wasn’t surprised to hear a certain Tranmere fan shout ‘Coulson, you’ve been our best player!’
In my two visits to Prenton Park with Eastleigh and Ebbsfleet, I have been on the losing side twice and the loud home support has without doubt contributed to those results.
After losing 3-0 to Boreham Wood, a second 3-0 defeat in two games was definitely not what we had been training hard for throughout the week. However, our manager, Daryl McMahon, couldn’t fault our effort and hard work against a strong Tranmere team that have now won their last eight home games.
The first half was a game of limited chances with both teams cancelling each other out with structured formations. Yet, Tranmere broke the deadlock and doubled their lead before half time with two precise long range efforts that not even Nathan Ashmore, the best goal keeper in the league could save.
We continued to create chances throughout the game but a third goal for the home side in the second half sealed their victory and moved them up to fourth in the table.
With fourteen games left in the season and on the back of two defeats, it is vitally important that our mental toughness, positive attitude and togetherness remain strong for the remainder of the campaign.
Fortunately for us, Tranmere are not the only club with a loud and passionate following. Our own Ebbsfleet fans can produce a lot of noise, too, and we want them to produce that ‘Prenton Park atmosphere’ when we play host to Solihull Moors at Stonebridge Road this weekend. As a team we want to excite and entertain, and it is a real boost to have the noise of the Ebbsfleet faithful echoing on the wind behind us.

The Day Two Teams Died

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As we remember the Manchester United players and officials who perished in Munich 60 years ago, it is worth recalling the eight journalists who died in the air crash that day.

Roy Cavanagh and Carl Abbott have written a remarkable book detailing the lives of those men, called “The Day Two Teams Died”, which is available from Amazon.  We caught up with Roy to discuss what was, for a lifelong Manchester United fan, a labour of love:

“I am 70 now so I was ten years old at the time of the crash and had already been supporting United since 1954. I’ve written 20 or so books on football and cricket, but I wish I had been a sports journalist. I often speak at after-dinner events and had the pleasure of meeting the late Frank Taylor, who was the only journalist to survive the crash. He had written “The Day a Team Died” and when we spoke it seemed to be a glaring omission that the eight journalists who died that day had not been commemorated.

“I come from a generation when journalists were treated like gods, in the days before blanket coverage of sport on television and radio. You got all your information about your favourite teams and players from newspapers, and the written word was gospel. So some of these journalists were as famous as – if not more famous than – the players. Henry Rose was the most flamboyant of them and he would drive to games in his Jaguar. Only one of the United players had a car at the time, and that was a Morris Minor!

“Manchester had two papers, the Evening News and the Chronicle. Tom Jackson wrote for the former, Alf Clarke for the latter. I grew up in Salford and we would read the Daily Herald, which was the working man’s paper. George Follows was their correspondent.

“Henry Rose was such a big character that over 4000 people went to his funeral, and taxi-drivers in Manchester refused to take payment for anyone going to or from it.

“Frank Swift, the former England goalkeeper, did not really need to be on the flight because he wrote for a Sunday paper, the News of the World, but he was great mates with Matt Busby, who had done him a special favour by getting him along. The players looked up to big Frank and adored him.

“Eric Thompson of the Mail was another fine journalist, but my favourite was Donny Davies of the Guardian, who had played amateur football for England and cricket for Lancashire. He was a beautiful wordsmith, someone I loved to read.”

Frank Taylor was the only one to survive, and so Roy Cavanagh and Carl Abbott felt it appropriate to echo his book’s title in theirs.

“We drew together as much as we could find, from their earliest writing up to the last reports they filed, and what followed; the respect and tributes that were paid to them after the crash. In our minds this was always going to be a lovely tribute, and we believe it is.”

David Walker, the Mirror sports editor, FWA member and chairman of the Sports Journalists’ Association, has written the foreword, and half of the profits will go to the Journalists Charity.

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Munich – 60 years on

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To mark the 60th anniversary of the Munich airliner crash that cost the lives of 23 passengers returning from Manchester United’s European Cup quarter-final in Belgrade, FWA chairman Patrick Barclay remembers the journalist victims. Eight of the nine football writers aboard died. Only Frank Taylor, of the News Chronicle, survived along with the photographer Peter Howard and Ted Ellyard, who had wired Howard’s pictures back to the Daily Mail.

These extracts are taken from Patrick Barclays acclaimed book “Sir Matt Busby, The Definitive Biography” published by Ebury Press.

Archie Ledbrooke, a former chairman of the Football Writers’ Association, was among a group of journalists who regularly covered Manchester United at home and abroad. But according to my late friend Peter Thomas, who was the northern sports editor of the Daily Mirror in 1958, Ledbrooke might have been a notable absentee from the trip to Belgrade via Munich.

Thomas had been pestering Ledbrooke for delivery of a long-promised series on Joe Smith, Blackpool’s veteran manager, and had given the writer an ultimatum: finish it or be replaced on the flight by Frank McGhee. With only a couple of days to spare, Ledbrooke had filed. McGhee stayed at home.

Frank Swift was another member of the press gang who might not have boarded United’s Elizabethan at Ringway Airport, Manchester, one cold and misty Monday morning in February 1958. “Swifty”, a genial giant and goalkeeping great who had played alongside Matt Busby for Manchester City, had been originally assigned by the News Of The World to Wales’s World Cup play-off second leg against Israel in Cardiff the same day. But Busby arranged a free trip on the United plane for his old friend.

There was a certain irony in this, for Wales were managed by Busby’s assistant, Jimmy Murphy, while Busby himself had agreed to manage Scotland in the World Cup that summer. Busby had insisted Murphy see his national team safely through to the tournament – having won 2-0 in Tel Aviv, they were duly to achieve the same score at home – rather than accompany United to their European Cup quarter-final second leg against Red Star.

At any rate Swift had gone to Belgrade, where United had extended a 2-1 lead from the first leg to 5-1 before the interval. In the end they had to cling on for a 5-4 aggregate but it was a happy party who gathered the next day: Thursday, February 6. The journalists had an extra reason to be in good spirits. They were looking forward to that night’s Manchester Press Ball.

On the first leg of the trip, Belgrade to Munich, Frank Taylor was teased as he stood in the gangway, big Swifty shouting out orders for cigars and brandy. “You shouldn’t look so much like a waiter,” the rotund, twinkling Eric Thompson of the Mail told Taylor, who had slicked-back hair and a little moustache.

The Daily Express’s flamboyant Henry Rose – such a showman that, when he went to Anfield, he would doff his hat in appreciation of the Kop’s taunts – fretted because he had to finish his precious “postbag”, a column of candid answers to readers’ letters, before going to the Ball. The Manchester Evening Chronicle’s Alf Clarke was snoring. “He must have been reading one of his own stories,” observed the Daily Herald wordsmith George Follows.

The other local-paper man, representing the Manchester Evening News as usual, was Tom Jackson, and the contingent was completed by the Manchester Guardian’s much-loved and highly literate H. D. “Donny” Davies, whose work appeared under the byline “An Old International” in recognition that he had been an England amateur.

When they landed for refuelling and refreshments in the terminal building at Munich, the weather had worsened. There was snow and slush on the runway. Two attempts to take off for Manchester failed and the mood on the Elizabethan became sombre. It lightened when Alf Clarke, who had gone missing in order to telephone a story about the delay to his paper, was ferried by jeep to the plane; his colleagues pretended to be observing two minutes’ silence for him.

As we know, the third take-off attempt was to fail disastrously. Peter Howard and Ted Ellyard emerged from the wreckage virtually unscathed, but Frank Taylor suffered multiple injuries and, like Matt Busby and others, underwent prolonged treatment in hospital in Germany. Even he was lucky compared with the other journalists, all of whom died. As FWA Life Member David Meek, who replaced Tom Jackson at the Evening News, was to observe later: “They were from the cream of the sporting press, and very close to Manchester United because of the journey into Europe. Matt must have been devastated to lose them as well as the players.”

Below is the team-sheet from United’s game in Belgrade.

Vanarama National League column – AFC Fylde

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AFC Fylde coasting towards success by Glenn Moore

Eleven years ago Kirkham & Wesham FC, having dominated the West Lancashire League, moved up to the North West Counties League. They marked their arrival at step six in the non-League pyramid by producing a 15-year plan aimed at reaching the Football League in 2022. Few observers took the proposal seriously.

There were around 900 teams standing in their way at the time. Now there are eight. No one is laughing at them these days. Having ensured the name Kirkham & Wesham would be inscribed for ever by winning the FA Vase at their first attempt, at Wembley in 2008, the club changed name to AFC Fylde, reflecting the area rather than two of its small towns. The Coasters are now ninth in the Vanarama National League, having been promoted last season, bang on the schedule laid out a decade ago. After a slow start they sit on the brink of the play-offs and defeated leaders Macclesfield and favourites Tranmere, 6-0 and 5-2 respectively, in recent weeks.

As usual in these tales there is a wealthy backer, David Haythornthwaite, who made his money in animal feed. As the name of his company, The Tangerine Group, suggests, Haythornthwaite is a Blackpool fan. However, having been rebuffed by the infamous Oyston family he decided to put his cash to good use elsewhere.

Haythornthwaite has bankrolled Fylde through the North-West Counties League and Northern Premier League to the Vanarama National League – five promotions. This is not, though, a story of big wages being paid out to former Premier League players, as sometimes happens. The current squad includes plenty who began at clubs such as Manchester City and United, Everton and Chelsea, but none who those clubs’ fans will recall. Lewis Montrose, who won promotion to League One with both Gillingham and Wycombe is the most decorated though the prolific Danny Rowe garners the attention. Rowe, now 28, was a schoolboy prodigy, on Manchester United’s books, but lost his love for the game and became an apprentice joiner at 16. It has been a long haul back.

There is not much celebrity to the manager either, though Dave Challinor was briefly famous for the long-throws that helped propel Tranmere Rovers to the Football League Cup final. Starting at Colwyn Bay he has won four promotions in seven seasons as a manager, finding time to collect a degree in physiotherapy along the way.

The sense of upward mobility is mirrored off the pitch. Kirkham & Wesham had moved into a new ground in 2006 but such has been the speed of the Coasters’ progress that it was soon rendered inadequate. In 2016 Haythornthwaite opened the £18m Mill Farm Sports Village featuring an array of businesses and sports facilities. The centrepiece is a 6,000-capacity stadium. Doubtless helped by disillusionment with affairs at Blackpool, the area’s traditional powerhouse, but by also Fylde’s vibrant community programme, attendances average around 1,700 having hugely multiplied during their rise.

There are echoes in Fylde’s rise of Fleetwood, 15 miles away. The Cod Army made the play-offs for promotion to the Championship last season. Fylde see no reason why they cannot do the same.
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Vanarama National League column – January 24

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The FA Trophy – dealing with expectation

 By Luke Coulson of the FWA and Ebbsfleet United
Losing a football match is hard to take; losing to a lower league team that you’re meant to comfortably beat is simply sickening.
The problem with being the ‘superior’ team in a cup match, in this instance the FA trophy, is that the pressure is all on you. If you win then it’s expected, however, if you lose then eyebrows are raised and questions are asked.
The hardest aspect of playing against a lower league team is not the game itself, but the mental challenge that comes before kickoff. Without realising, an over-confident and complacent state of mind can creep in and affect the team performance.
Also, the lower league opposition often raise their performance for the occasion, playing without pressure or expectation on their shoulders. That is why this year alone, Bristol City beat Manchester United in the Carabao Cup, Nottingham Forest beat Arsenal in the FA Cup and unfortunately, Warrington beat us in the FA Trophy.
A tough 1-1 draw led to a replay three days later against the Northern Premier League Division One North side. After a heavy Christmas period, the extra fixture in midweek was definitely not what we had hoped for. Warrington frustrated us by disrupting our usual free flowing football and deserved a second match at Cantilever Park.
Having lived in St Helens for many years, I was not surprised to be welcomed back to the North by a light drizzle of rain and a strong, cold wind.
We knew that the match was going to be far from a spectacle of football but we prepared in our usual way and focused on the task at hand. Once again cup football proved to be unpredictable and we dropped out of the competition, suffering a disappointing 2-0 loss. The defeat means we are no longer in any cup competition so our attention is now completely fixated on making the playoffs in the Vanarama National League, a campaign that took another step forward at the weekend.
Unbeaten in their last five games, Aldershot lie in second position and over the festive period, managed to close the gap on league leaders Macclesfield. After ending our unbeaten start to the season, we hoped to return the favour to Gary Waddock’s team by halting their recent progress.
The match ended 0-0, but despite the lack of goals the game was an end-to-end encounter, which was fast paced, tactically balanced and a great advertisement for the Vanarama National League. Although we could not quite find the winning goal, we were pleased with another clean sheet and a valuable away point to back up our recent derby win at Maidstone. 
Our shock cup exit undoubtedly added to our motivation and the brilliant performance at Aldershot was definitely the answer to forgetting the pain of the FA Trophy. 

Pele Tribute night

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The Football Writers’ Association paid tribute to Pele in a star-studded evening at the Savoy Hotel in London on Sunday.
Although the great man was suffering from exhaustion and unable to travel to the event as planned, a host of star names from the world of football and football writing paid tribute to the Brazilian legend, arguably the greatest player of all time.
Gordon Banks, England’s World Cup winning goalkeeper from 1966, spoke about ‘that save’ from the 1970 World Cup, when he kept out a header from Pele that the player – and the watching world – thought was a certain goal. It is still regarded as one of the greatest saves of all time, and Banks said: “When I saw Pele in London some time ago, he said: ‘Gordon, I go all over the world and people talk about the goals I scored, but when I come to England, all they talk about is that save!”
Gareth Southgate, in his toast to the FWA, said Pele had created so many iconic moments in football history. “To have watched his performances, to see the impact he had on the world stage was incredible. You could see the enjoyment he took from the game, as well as
the ability that he had.
“To have gone on to have been an incredible ambassador for the game in the way he has as well speaks volumes for the impact I think he has had, not only on football community, but right across the world as one of those rare iconic figures. You can travel to any part of the globe and people know who he was.”
Cliff Jones, the former Tottenham and Wales winger, talked about facing Pele in the 1958 World Cup, when the Brazilian was an unknown 17-year-old. “Our manager Jimmy Murphy had warned us about the great players we’d be facing, such as Garrincha. But we had no idea who this 17-year-old kid Pele was. We soon found out. He scored the goal that beat us, three in the semi-final and two more in the final. We knew then we were watching someone special.”
And Pele’s former New York Cosmos team-mate Steve Hunt spoke about playing alongside the great man in the final year of his illustrious career. “I was 20 years old and playing for Aston Villa reserves when the chance came to play in America,” he said. “When I was told my team-mate would be Pele, I said ‘Where do I sign?’ When I met him the first day, I was greeted by a huge smile and the biggest hug imaginable. He was the warmest, friendliest guy I could have hoped for.
“I played in his last competitive game ever, and after we won 2-1, we carried him on our shoulders, which was the greatest moment of my life. He was a genius as a player and also one hell of a human being.”
Hugh McIlvanney, who covered the great Brazil sides when Pele was at his peak, made an eloquent case for the 1970 World Cup winning team being the greatest side in the history of football and said: “There can be no failure to recognise that the very incarnation of the glories of Brazilian football then, and forever, was and is Pele.”
Patrick Barclay, FWA Chairman, paid tribute to Paul McCarthy and the national committee for their work in organising the evening, thanked our title sponsors William Hill for their support, and gave thanks to Boadicea the Victorious for their table gifts of luxury perfume.
We were also joined by members from the National Football Museum, who brought along some precious artefacts from their Pele exhibition, including the shirts he wore in 1958 and 1970.

Pele – important notice

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In the early hours of Thursday morning, Pele collapsed and was taken to hospital in Brazil where he has undergone a series of tests which appear to point to severe exhaustion. He remains on fluids while doctors monitor his recovery.

Thankfully, there is no suggestion of anything more serious than exhaustion and everybody at the Football Writers’ Association wishes Pele a swift and full recovery.

Understandably, his medical situation prevents him from travelling to London for the Football Writers’ Association Tribute Night on Sunday evening at The Savoy. But after discussions with Pele and his team, he has insisted the event should continue, not least because many of Pele’s friends are travelling from overseas to be with us on Sunday.

While it is incredibly sad Pele cannot attend the function, the FWA are grateful that all those who have been asked to pay tribute on the night – Gareth Southgate, Cliff Jones, Gordon Banks and Steve Hunt – are determined to help make the evening a memorable one.

Pele’s team have also asked that we film the event and send a copy to Brazil in the knowledge it will lift the Great Man’s spirits to see his friends are thinking of him and sending their best wishes. With that in mind, we want to do Pele proud and make Sunday night as memorable as possible.

It goes without saying, Pele has an open invitation to any of our functions once he regains his health and we are already discussing the possibility of him joining us in May for the Footballer of the Year Dinner.

Paul McCarthy
Executive Secretary

Chairman’s message

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Dear Member,
I’d like to wish you a very happy 2018, and to pass on a few personal – and private – thoughts from the Football Writers’ Association chair.

We promised to increase the FWA’s size and diversity and, while the latter was always going to be the greater challenge, the growing influence of women is reflected in Vikki Orvice’s election as vice-chair and the lively committee presence of Carrie Brown. I would still like to improve the racial balance of the committee and hope that before the AGM in May we will do that.

Numerically we are up 50 per cent over three years but, having sailed past the 300 mark, are now set on 400. In addition the new category of student member has seen around 40 of the next generation of football writers sign up. One of their number, Luke Coulson, has already qualified as a journalist, but let’s hope his career stays on hold for many years, as he is currently starring for Ebbsfleet United in the Vanarama National League.

Luke, along with Glenn Moore, contributes a column to our website, which Gerry Cox and his team have revamped. All shares, likes and retweets are appreciated. Your committee are grateful to Gerry, and to John Ley for dealing with the extremely welcome influx of new members. But you can help to make John even busier by encouraging non-members to join; all they need to do is go to the MEMBERSHIP section of the website. The more there are of us, the more we can do for all football writers.

Speaking of which, what do we achieve? More than put on our two gala dinners – even though the work Paul McCarthy has put into this month’s Tribute Night in honour of Pele has been phenomenal. Probably our most important function is the largely unseen negotiation with the football authorities and clubs over facilities and access to players. Too often it is an uphill task – but it must be done.

We also, with the extremely generous assistance of our main sponsors William Hill, held a sell-out event after the Grenfell Tower fire which raised £10,000 for the victims of the disaster and I’d like to thank everybody who helped make that event such a success.

Finally to one of our most enjoyable duties; may I remind all members to make their recommendations for Football Book of The Year? Our selection committee is chaired by Mike Collett and he wants to hear from you at mikecol99@gmail.com.

All the best,

Patrick Barclay

Vanarama National League column – January 18

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The Vanarama National League column – stars of the future?

BY Glenn Moore, FWA member and former Independent football editor

Will it be Joe Ward? Will it be Joe Pigott? Will it be Bernard Mensah? Since Jamie Vardy proved potential England forwards could still be found in non-League football, not just back in the days when Ian Wright, Les Ferdinand and Alan Smith were in the part-time game, scouts have been flocking to the Vanarama National League.

This window, a cluster of promising players have moved into the Football League with that trio of attacking players to the fore. Winger Ward so impressed Peterborough when playing against them for Woking in the FA Cup the Posh signed the 22-year-old. Pigott, 24, was snapped up this week by AFC Wimbledon having scored 12 goals for Maidstone United this season. Mensah also went to a League One club in Bristol Rovers after shining for Aldershot.

Like Vardy, who began at Sheffield Wednesday but was released, all three players had been at league clubs earlier in their careers but had struggled to make the grade. Regular football in the Vanarama National League has enabled them to rebuild their confidence, match themselves against seasoned professionals, and gain experience in an environment where results matter far more than in age-group football. 

Peterborough have long scoured non-League for players, a reflection of Barry Fry’s influence at the club. Ward follows the likes of Craig Mackail-Smith and George Boyd, both of whom went on to play for Scotland, Aaron McLean, now back in the Vanarama National League with Ebbsfleet after a decade in the full-time ranks, and current London Road winger Marcus Maddison.

It is Ward’s second attempt at cracking the Football League after joining Brighton & Hove Albion from Chelmsford City at 19. That did not work out but he is now more experienced and is making a smaller step up. “He wanted to play regular football and he took the opportunity in the National League and credit to him for that,” said Posh boss Grant McCann. “”He brings pace, energy and can go past people.”

Piggott came through the ranks at Charlton, where he made 16 appearances, then had a series of loans before joining Cambridge United. One goal in 17 matches led to a further loan, to the Stones, a year ago, but he did well enough at the Gallagher Stadium to win a permanent deal and has continued to prosper. He now joins a club that is no stranger to resurrection stories.

Mensah was a Watford youth product, but only made two appearances for the Hornets. Joining Aldershot in June 2016 he has flourished with regular football.

A pair Vanarama National League South players have also secured moves, Wealdstone defender Ciaron Brown leaping up four levels into the Championship with promotion-chasing Cardiff City. Brown, 20, had only been at Wealdstone 18 months after joining from Combined Counties League side Bedfont Sports. Goalscoring midfielder Dayle Grubb left Weston-Super-Mare for Forest Green. The move means the 26-year-old will have to leave his job as a sports teacher but he feels it is a risk worth taking to follow the dream of a pro career after nine years at Weston.

All these players will be hoping to be the next Vardy, or, if not that, maybe another Glenn Murray or Dwight Gayle, and prove, like those Premier League strikers, there are rough diamonds to be found in the Vanarama League for those that look.

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Cliff Jones to join Pele celebrations

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Cliff Jones, the legendary former Tottenham, Swansea and Wales winger, will join us at the Savoy on Sunday to pay tribute to Pele.

Jones was in the Wales team beaten by Pele’s goal as Brazil won 1-0 in the quarter-finals of the 1958 World Cup, but the flying winger insists it would have been closer if the great John Charles had not missed the game through injury. He said:  “I still say to this day if John had played in the quarter-final it could have been a different result because he would have caused Brazil problems they’d never faced before.”

Jones was part of the famous Spurs side that won the first League and FA Cup Double of the 20th Century and became the first English team to win a European trophy, lifting the Cup Winners’ Cup in 1963.  He retired after scoring 159 goals in 378 games for Tottenham and is still a match-day ambassador at the club’s games.