Ice Station Lincoln

Todays article for givemefootball

Footballers fall victim to the weather like everyone else.


As your correspondent sits in his snowbound study thoughts are of anything but football as unseasonably early snowfall grips the City and it's environs, buses were not running on Wednesday and with no trains out of Lincoln Central, it's difficult to see much of a football programme outside of the gilded stadia of the Premier League and those recently departed from it and therefore equipped with undersoil heating. Even then public areas have to be cleared and made safe and if the next game were a home fixture then it would be a good bet that it would not take place, however the Imps next fixture is away at Cheltenham so we must wait and see. The Robins were themselves the victims of the weather when their last home fixture against Southend United last Tuesday was called off.


Football league clubs were required to invest in their own pitch covers for this season much to their chagrin in many cases as the money to buy them had to be diverted from the playing budget, certainly in the case of Lincoln City. No amount of pitch covering could protect the ground from the sort of low temperatures experienced recently. Cheltenhams ground staff reported that temperatures locally had dropped to minus eight on Sunday night, well below the level at which covers are effective but having lost the Southend fixture will now concentrate their efforts on the Lincoln game. Temperatures in Cheltenham were forecast to remain low in the run up to the match although there is the possibility of beter weather towards the weekend.


The news from Lincoln City on Thursday was, well, there's no news. The usual press conference was abandoned. The Imps do not have the luxury of an indoor training facility and even if they did with players not always living locally travel is a problem so manager Steve Tilson put the welfare of his players first and cancelled training meaning those not based in and around Lincoln would not have to venture on to the roads. Cheltenham, for their part, in conjunction with the police promised a decision early on Friday as to whether the game will happen. Readers can check on http://www.redimps.co.uk/ and all the usual sources. In addition the Lincoln correspondents blog is now open for business on http://hykehamwriter.blogspot.com/ where fans can read current and past articles from give me football together with other musings on life as a Lincoln City fan and in general. News of the Cheltenham game will be posted on there as soon as it happens.


Lincoln fans will want to congratulate Delroy Facey, establishing himself as a bit of a cult hero with the City faithful, on surpassing Gareth McAuley's record of international appearances when the Grenadians qualified for the semi finals of the Digicel Carribean Cup in Martinique. Grenada will play favourites Jamaica on Friday and after that either the final or third place play off. Well done Delroy, come back safe and sound where a frosty welcome awaits you. This time though it's not the gaffer wanting to know where you've been!



Delroy, you can go but be back soon

Huh

Russia will host the World Cup in 2018 and Quatar in 2022. What a stitch up. Don't think I'll ever see the WC in this country in my lifetime now. Last time is a very distant memory, I was 13.

Are we really that bad as a footballing nation that no one wants us? The last Euro Champs we held were a great success, it's highly unlikely that we would trouble their precious Spain Germany Italy and Brazil, we're passionate about the game isn't that enough?

It's all his fault

Relaunch!

I got out of the habit of updating the blog and in fact never went public with it but something went wrong with give me football last Friday and although the publishers assure me that my build up article for the FA Cup tie against Hereford did go on line on the Friday I didn't see it and I know others didn't see it either but strangely some people did as they had put facebook "likes" on it. I made up my mind then that I would restart the blog and start to publish the address so that people could still have a look even if the article was late or failed to appear. I'm hoping that people will get in the habit of visiting the blog and making comments on it and we can get a bit of dialogue going on it

I did a lot of soul searching after the last article failed to appear, even to the point of thinking I would pack up writing for give me football but I don't want to do that at all. I had an exchange of e mails with the sub editor and that was very encouraging. I was described as one of their best and most reliable writers, which bucked me up no end. The reliable bit refers to a habit some of the other gmf writers have of criticizing players. This is the PFA and that sort of thing is strictly forbidden. You'd think they would know that they are not writing for a fanzine.

It's the Wednesday before the Cheltenham match and I would be extremely surprised if this one went ahead. I usually start a Friday build up on a Wednesday but I feel a bit like Cliff Richard at Wimbledon, nothing much to say and plenty of time to do it. I'm at home although this isn't a snow day I dont think I would have been able to make it to work in Boston. As it happens I was due to go Christmas shopping with my daughter but there are no trains to Nottingham today.

So here we go with the relaunch. I've left the old stuff on, have a look if you like and from now on I'll put all the give me football articles on in their original form, certainly the headline will be different as they always alter that.

A good evening

It was a little bit late but the article went in gmf without any amendment including, for the first time my headline and teaser. Perhaps I'm getting better but it was the most dreadful pun in fact two puns but I got an e mail saying they liked it.
I e mailed back making a carry on joke. Then the best bit, was looking through the tweets on my new twitterdeck and my article was featured not once but twice on npowerleague2.
Sent an immediate tweet to them to thank them for the plug. Would be really brilliant if they're going to start highlighting me.

Just watched the one o'clock news. Tony Blair was on.
I liked Blair although I'm hardly a leftie but he reminded me of Cliff Richard for some reason. What do I think of Cliff Richard? That he's hiding something.

Shane Clarke and Chris Fagan

Well they've now gone and I wanted to say that personally I'm sorry.
Shane in particular has bourn the brunt of a lot of critiscism and I'm not going to add to it. I thought I saw a lot of promise in these two young players but I'd be surprised if I heard much more about them. I hope I'm wrong unless they pop up against City scoring goals and generally letting us know what we missed.
I think one thing you cannot accuse Clarke of is lack of effort. He could make a good living playing part time football and working at the same time.
For some reason home grown players come in for a lot of stick, Paul Mayo was another.
Good luck to both of them.

Ready to go live

I have now decided that there is sufficient content on here to give out the address of the blog so anyone can come on and have a look. I hope people will. Please feel free to say if you've been on here and I'd like to know what you think.
I just want to say if you are venturing on here, presumably you are an Imp and you have got the link from Give Me Football or Twitter. The articles I write for gmf are for the Professional Footballers Association and that I have to write in accordance with the parameters set out for me by the pfa namely that I must show LCFC and indeed all players in a positive light. You may disagree with me, I'd be surprised if you didn't but you will not find overt critiscism of players. That's what I have to do in gmf and it is not in my nature to criticsise City players in any event. It's not a fan site I'm writing for.
I think it would be a good idea for me to stick to that philosophy on my blog too. That's not to say I don't sometimes think that so and so is a donkey or wonder how someone became a professional footballer of course I do.
I will not get involved in detailed discussion on formations, tactics etc. I don't know enough technically to do that. My son Matthew certainly does and has offered to help me with advice but I have decided it will be all my own work, a fans perception of the goings on at Lincoln City and life as a supporter. As Denis Thatcher once said "I'd rather be thought of a fool than open my mouth and remove all doubt!"
Finally the articles on here which appeared on gmf are, generally ,in their original form. Sometimes they are altered by the editor, usually the headlline is different. I suspect they will be shortened in the future as there seems to be a bit of a tussle between the pfa and Sports New Media who I report to so for the full unexpurgated version check on the blog.