GRIMSBY ANGLING FOR A BRIGHTER FUTURE

Printed in the National League South game v Ebbsfleet United Saturday 25th March (the first ever NLS game to be televised). We lost 1-0 in front of 1,211 

It was one of those football kissed weekends that come from having boys that support a different team. The Slough hoards descended on the tranquil town of Eastbourne. We made some noise, drunk the odd thimble of beer but went home pointless against a decent Borough side whose fans continue to hit the mute button during games.

Then Sunday it was the FA Cup quarter final.

Brighton’s AMEX stadium isn't the best place for atmosphere – probably cos it has lots of people like me who don’t support the club but get dragged along by their children.

But the football they play is unbelievable. A homeless car-crash not so long ago on the brink of losing their football league status. Rescued by former chair Dick Knight who worked with the supporters to fight for a new ground and launched Albion in the Community to hook the youngsters into being fans of the future. Then came the cash and strategic brains of Tony Bloom, building the infrastructure, and a player recruitment system that finds endless gems while bigger clubs flail around like beached whales throwing good money after bad.

At Slough Town we know a run in the FA Cup is like nothing else and 5,000 Grimsby Town supporters bought a joyful, playful atmosphere to the city. They had swarmed over Brighton, taking over pubs, and the Pier with everyone saying what top people they were.

They had got just back to the football league, but there’s much more to it than just a football club having a run in the FA Cup. They are lucky they have a Grimsby born co- chairman whose vision will transform not just the football club but the town. Jason Stockwood gets what a football club could and should be – without that pompous Premier-League-in-five-seasons guff you get from so many.

This was evident from the fact that the new sports minister chose their Blundell Park ground to announce that the launch of the long awaited Football White Paper which includes a new independent regulator.

Grimsby Town are one of the original members of the Fair Game initiative, a group of 33 clubs who have been making the arguments for regulatory changes to shore up the football pyramid. Facts like that nearly every club in the Championship spends more on players’ wages than it earns. That the parachute payment given to one relegated Premier League club is more than is given to all the clubs in the next five divisions of the men’s game and the top two tiers of the women’s game put together. That since 2000, more than a third of clubs in the top four divisions have gone into administration while clubs like Bury and Macclesfield have gone bust. Things badly need to change.

But the Grimsby chairman isn’t stopping with what happens on the pitch but is harnessing the power of the football club to change the fortunes of the town.

They have joined forces with Emily Bolton, a social entrepreneur, in forming Our Future a project creating a new and extremely green economic model for England’s post-industrial communities. “Grimbarians have great ideas,” she says. “But we need something better than the same old model where a little money comes in but is controlled by people outside the region without a long-term commitment to the town.”

The club’s shirt sponsor is Myenergi, a local green business whose innovations include the Zappi, a solar electric vehicle charger and whose owner has rejected several offers to relocate the business abroad or elsewhere in the UK. “The talent in Grimsby is amazing. Other companies might manufacture overseas but if you invest in your local area you get so much more back. I love this town and the football club is its heartbeat. The Cup run is typical of the Grimsby underdog proving the world wrong again.”

The clubs chief executive Debbie Cook, strives to ensure the area’s young people can access enhanced opportunities. She is a big supporter of East Marsh United, a community housing scheme purchasing rundown, privately rented houses in a particularly deprived area and turning them into refurbished, affordable homes. “If you live somewhere substandard it affects your whole outlook on life,” says Cook.

Kristine Green, a club director and member of the Common Good Foundation is responsible for the community organising that is instrumental in creating the ties binding the team to town. “Grimsby’s full of strong, intelligent people and the club helps them build trust and collaborate,” she says. “There’s no easier way of bringing people together than football; it gives them a voice.”

All these plans are now coming to fruition in Grimsby. “You get a sense this is your moment,” says Bolton. “We’ve got to seize it.”

Which brings us back to Slough. Former chairman and successful businessman Steve Easterbrook who dragged us from the abyss and sent us back up the leagues had a vision. Sensible, prudent, hard working and humble he put the Rebels back to where we belong.

Now with new Rebel owners I get the feeling of something exciting stirring again. There’s a spring in our step and different initiatives – helped of course by those two wins on the pitch against teams below us. And it’s the little things that make a difference, that make people feel listened too and part of something. Clubshop Sue told me about upgrades to the shop with the new owners asking her opinion at every step. It’s so easy in the day to day relentlessness of running a football club to forget these conversations but they are so important to keep everyone on side especially those that do so much for the club.

And now I’ve got the possibility of watching Brighton at Wembley, but much to the disbelief of my children, I’d rather be cheering on the Rebels in Weymouth. Maybe it will be another double header weekend.

Whatever happens I will continue to admire Grimsby Town and see how far their football club can shape and regenerate the place they call home.

THE SLOUGH TOWN TWITCH

Printed in the National League South game v Hungerford Town Saturday 11th March 2023. We won 4-0 in front of 687

When we re-opened the Bevy Community Pub one of the things we insisted on was making anyone who walked in – whever it was their first time or five hundredth – feel welcome. Because well, that’s what pubs should do. Non League clubs should also always have that same mindset and I reckon Slough are a friendly bunch (well apart from those two hooligans on the turnstiles) who lay out the red carpet and will even lend you a tambourine to join in the songs like some Rebel Gospel Choir.

At clubs like Hungerford with a population of just 6,000, you get this friendliness in bucketfuls. The first time I went there I got lost in a pub backing off onto a forest. They served me a beer, called me a cab (or something like that) and the driver turned out to Hungerford's kitman. The chairman is always there to greet you and they’ve an impressive amount of deals to entice people in. I went for the £20 ticket which got me entry, a programme, a meal and a drink.

I missed the corker of a game last week. While Brighton were demolishing West Ham I was refreshing my phone in disbelief that Slough came back and grabbed a point against high flying Worthing with just 9 men for over half the game. I also missed the food truck that got everyone drawling. And I also missed the visit from a twitcher; not the sort who goes birdwatching, but the sort who plays interactive computer games.

When 31 year old primary school teacher Callum pulled out a Slough Town top from a magic box, it was marriage at first sight. Callum lives on the Welsh borders so Slough probably wouldn’t have been his first choice.

So what is twitch streaming and football manager. Callum explained

“Twitch streaming is when you play a game, in this case Football Manager and people watch you live with the ability to send messages that I respond to in real time. It’s a bit like interactive television.

“Football Manager is a football management simulation game which is played on computer. You manage a football team making transfers, sorting tactics, training and of course managing the matches.”

So why Slough Town?

“I chose Slough through chance with a mystery kit box. I stated that

whatever shirt it revealed would be my next club on the Football Manager game and within it was a Slough top from 2020 (I believe). I have since bought this seasons away shirt!”

Who do you support

“I am an Evertonian so try to get to games when I can. I have been to Non League games before, I used to commentate for Chester FC and have also been to Salford and Wrexham.”

What were your expectations?

“I honestly didn’t have any expectations from the game. I had been talking to Connor McNeish (Rebels Radio) and Ade via twitter for a while beforehand and we’d discussed a few things. I just wanted to come down and get the Arbour Park experience but I got that and so much more. Meeting Scotty and the team in the changing room, being interviewed by the club, working on the turnstiles with the chairman and even choosing man of the match. That’s without talking about how welcoming all of the fanbase were, some thought I was a potential new owner as I turned up in a suit jacket and Slough tie!”

How would you describe the day?

“Surreal! I felt like a celebrity for the day which was so bizarre but absolutely magical. I’m just a man who plays a video game that people watch on the internet. Thank you so much Slough. I will be back!”

It’s heartening to hear about people feeling welcome at the club. Even a Worthing away fan said ‘Enjoyed my visit as an away fan yesterday despite the result. Fantastic set up and very welcoming.”

With the TV cameras heading to Arbour Park for the first ever live National League South game - which also happens to be on Non League Day - let’s get those surreal songs into everyone's living rooms, and make them all want a piece of the Rebel action.

* If you want to catch Callum's twitch streams he streams a couple of times a week over on twitch.tv/WhyCallum 

TURNIPS AND SEWAGE FARMS

Printed in the National League South game v Worthing Saturday 4^th March 2023  We drew 1-1 despite being down to 9 men for 50 minutes. Attendance 633

Government ministers might be telling us to eat turnips, harvest tomatoes from sewage and add sawdust to our porridge to help with the cost of living, but when it comes to foraging we were ahead of the game.

30 years ago I was part of the Slough free food revolution, getting up at stupid o clock to pick field mushrooms on the Langley roundabout, tipped off by my nan that a mushroom lorry had dropped its cargo years back. Plucking shaggy ink caps in Upton Court Park in the morning dew. I nearly poisoned my hosts with water hemlock; thankfully realising at the last minute it wasn't watercress My hands forever tingled from picking nettles. Nettles are a wonder crop and if they came from the Amazon rainforest they would be gobbled down in pills and potions by people who like to gobble down pills and potions. I still use them in my kids spag bol – just don't tell them. We turned hops into undrinkable beer (we still managed to drink it) and scrumped apples to turn into suicider (totally undrinkable but as you can probably guess we managed). Yep living in Slough was like an episode of The Good Life and to top it all off in late summer we headed to the sewage farm to harvest tomatoes whose pips go straight through the human gut and grow lush in treated slurry. Many a meal I whipped up for friends, only telling them after they'd finished where the tomatoes had come from. The sewage farm also grew enormous puffball mushrooms. We baked one once; one of the most disgusting things I've ever popped in my mouth, and that's saying something.

I always thought that Arbour Park should have had a vegetable bed – growing the salads to go with the burgers, onions for the hotdogs, maybe even some chickens for their eggs. Healthy eating and sport go hand in hand, not that you’d notice it from the food we get served up. I like the £5 pie and pint deal but surely Slough of all towns should also be serving up samosas and onion bhajis to go with a pint?

I run a community garden and spend a lot of time outdoors where we battle with the elements, the slugs and mice, pests and diseases to grow food. I should be the picture of health and but I must have looked so haggard to the young lad on the St.Albans City turnstile that he charged me seniors rate. St Albans are cashless, with quirky beers and even useless-to-hit cotton bins. They want to be trendy but with their ground they are trapped in an old persons body, that locks the gates to the sheltered housing at 5.30

Hampton are trapped in the 1950’s but their new owners have banned cash and set about winding up some of their old support making changes so quick. 

Brighton have done the same. Their pies win awards but everytime I’ve queued for one, they’ve run out by half time. They’ve got self service beer pumps and have added tickets on phones so you can’t pass them on unless you want to pay £20 for the privilege.

Worthing seem to have got it right. Our visit before Christmas netted us a valuable point, and I even got some very decent vegetarian food. You could pay by cash or card. There was the usual beer plus craft. You get a feel of clubs when you visit and Worthing is definitely a club on the up. The even had the most charming head steward who said her job was to make sure everyone had a good time. She even had a go on the bin we had commandeered for the afternoon.

So what of the latest food shortages. Well this was predicted long ago by food campaigners and restaurant critic Jay Raynor who said “In October 2014 I told the DEFRA select committee that we needed to start paying more for our food. If we did not do so, we risked paying vastly more later and experiencing shortages in supply, resulting in empty shelves. For decades the supermarket sector had been given a free run at our food supply chain by governments of both stripes. Just a dozen companies then controlled 95% of UK food retail and used that economic might to force such drastically tight deals on producers that many had gone out of business. Our self-sufficiency had withered. We were now, I said, at serious risk from external shocks disrupting our food supply because we were so dependent on imports.

"I didn’t expect one of those external shocks to be self-inflicted, but then the Brexit vote came along. Anyone with even a passing knowledge of how deformed our food system had become know it would have a drastic impact. And now here we are in 2023, with shelves emptied of salad vegetables and rationing in supermarkets. Is it solely a product of our leaving the EU? No, of course not. Yes, there have been weather issues. But isn’t it curious that the supply problems we have here are not being replicated in France, Spain or even Ukraine?”

Now with rising energy prices and lack of staff, UK growers are saying they can’t afford to grow salad, cucumbers and tomatoes until much later in the year.

So it might be time for Slough and other clubs to dig up that odd patch of grass and dig for victory – on and off the pitch. Unless you fancy turnip burger and chips.