CROWS ON THE PITCH AND A SLOUGH SOCIAL MEDIA SENSATION

Printed in the National League South game v Taunton Town Tuesday 13th September 2022  We won 1-0 in front of 452

While VAR is doing its best to suck the life out of Premier League football – unbelievable Jeff, his nostril hair was a millimetre offside - in the lower leagues we have far bigger problems to contend with. Grantham’s pitch has been ripped up by crows, trying to get to the chafer beetle grubs that have infested the soil beneath the turf. There is now a CROWfunding appeal to get it fixed. In other news Selsey’s game got done by sewage

Rabbits dug up Andover's pitch at the beginning of a disastrous season they never recovered from. They shipped 100 goals and picked up just 11 points and called it a day at the end of the campaign.

Then there’s the Blackfield keeper was sent off in their FA Cup game last week against Shepton Mallet for urinating in a hedge.

At Bath many of us witnessed a first, when the Rebels had to change into the home teams blue kit after the game had started and we were already one nil down. Still that was the least of our problems as we lost 5-1 with stewards patrolling our every move in case we made some noise. We should have sung ‘Is this a Liberal Democrat constituency’ to the tune of ‘Is this a Library’ but in the end Scotts ‘Biggest Trading Estate in Europe’ flag won out and became a social media sensation. Baths biggest home league attendance since 1972 was bolstered by lots of league fans who pine for simpler footballing times and they loved it. Why Slough Estates can’t see a marketing opportunity and properly sponsor us is anyone's guess.

The last home game against Hampton was like a Jazz ensemble behind the goal. And bobble hats off to the young girls who managed to learn to play ‘Slough Town are Massive’ on a children’s xylophone. We’ve now got a big new robust wheelie bin, that isn’t for putting in rubbish boys and girls but for storing all our kit. So here’s the plan. Raid your children's and grandchildren's toyboxes and bring in musical instruments that we can store in the bin at the club and whip out at home games. Let’s make Arbour Park a musical fortress.

With the World Cup looming and league fans wanting some beer-on-the-terrace action, we need to find ways of getting them to Arbour Park. Infact we need to get anyone with a pulse to Arbour Park as crowds hover frustratingly round the 600 mark. For those who like a deal, I can recommend the £5 pie and a pint in the cafe next to the clubshop. Mind you, I thought I’d stumbled into an old peoples home; maybe we should introduce bingo before the game? (When I did mention this, one groundhopper announced he used to be a Bingo Teller!).

I was collecting these nuggets of info for the club to see how they can increase matchday revenue.

Frustratingly while we are trying to persuade people to buy a few more pies and pints to help with funds, promising defender Edon Pruti went to Brentford B team. While the club don’t want to stand in his way of becoming a professional footballer, it's a bit rum of a self styled community club and near neighbours to only promise cash if reaches the first team.

Still, what do they care. The cost of living never affects those at the top – who tell us to stick on a jumper and mix wood shavings into our mash or put tinfoil down our pants while they dine out on stories about enjoying freezing to death when they were young. Maybe instead of these helpful tips, politicians could have rolled out home insulation and put solar panels on roofs to help cut energy bills. Oh and just maybe, put a stop the energy companies ripping us of. Instead of a windfall tax, the government will help pay peoples bills. Which means everyone will be paying for it in the long term, both financially and climatically.

The big clubs have been on transfer window spending binge that makes your eyes water with Chelsea as usual hoarding players like old people hoard baked beans. Now they’ve asset striped the whole of the Brighton management team – I'm surprised they didn’t take the mascot as well. The top clubs are hoping any football regulations will be now binned by this new government, same as the old government. Because let’s face it they really don’t need regulation. I mean in news just this week, West Ham are being sponsored by a Russian sanctions-busting pyramid scheme, another by a crypto casino which preys on addicts, and a third signed a deal with a non-existent firm.

Reading the derogatory comments about Slough from our Biggest Trading Estate in Europe flags new found fame, could we harness all this hot air to warm our pies? Or what about putting in compost toilets using the waste to make electricity to power our floodlights? That would be a football first and we could add it to the Slough did-it-first list. MarsBars, zebra crossings, Thunderbirds, wheelie bins and of course looking up at the stars and discovering Uranus. No doubt we could then make a song about it and stick it on a flag. 

Slough Town - powered by poo.