In fact a certain person who shall remain nameless but works for BFC actually tweeted: ‘wow the world’s gone mad.’ Gotta say I along with many others agreed with him.
And what happened? Well we didn’t actually bid £9million for Gray but the whisper is that by the time any add-ons have been paid, it won’t be far short of that.
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| Andre Gray was the subject of big bids |
And what else happened? Well we forked out something like £12million+ on strikers alone in July and August when we were OUT of the Premier League. But when we were IN it, we had nosebleeds when any price headed north of £5million.
Barton to Burnley said the bookies when the price fell from 25/1 to 4/1. And then came great excitement when a large Range Rover was spotted outside Turf Moor at the front door with the registration B1 BTN. The tweets and messageboards went into meltdown. Smoke and steam came out of the back of desktops. Great player, said many, welcome to Burnley; sign him on, just what we need, worth a punt for a year. Wouldn’t touch him with a bargepole said others and trotted out all his misdemeanours and baggage. Who can forget the time QPR came in the promotion season and the lobbed coke bottle smacked him on the head by the touchline. But credit the guy, he made no fuss, laughed, got on with the game and probably never even felt it.
Anyway the excitement and speculation was instantly quashed when a real spoilsport tweeted that the car belonged to director Brian Nelson. I know Brian, talented man he may be, loves Burnley to bits, a more generous man you couldn’t wish to meet; but assuming the key rough-em-up playmaker role in midfield on a Saturday afternoon is now sadly beyond him.
After the Brentford win most of us were agreed, this team isn’t quite there yet. A Barton figure is still needed, a scuffler, a destroyer, does the ugly work, but who can sling passes around the pitch as well. Could it still be Lansbury, we wondered when someone who knows somebody who knows someone else who knows someone inside the club said that the Forest deal could be back on again. At that point it seemed even funnier than Benidorm – but then that’s not difficult; anything is funnier than Benidorm.
Just when you wonder what to write next and the football world seems to have gone all quiet along comes something that makes you sit up and look twice. I refer of course to the Jermain Defoe advert for an executive gofer that was spotted in Secsinthecity. He won’t be the first or last footballer to need an assistant; a lot of them have au pairs or housekeepers and nowt wrong with that. I pay someone to do the ironing and a bit of cleaning in our house, but Jermain did seem to be taking it a bit too far with duties ranging from looking after the pets, filling the fridge, fixing his lunch, remembering birthdays and simple stuff like that; to creating a global brand, creating his line of perfume and founding his as yet non-existent soccer academy.
The full list: manage diary, deal with calls, emails and post, liaise with sponsors, organise manager and lunch. Run all errands, dry cleaners, gardeners, house refurbishments, select clothes and wardrobe for all events, shop for food. Book all social events, restaurants, spa days and family outings. Plan family birthdays, holidays, individual family members, help plan calendar events such as Mother’s day, Christmas and New Year. Create a global brand for the Jermain Defoe name; grow his website and twitter. Produce Jermaine Defoe phone apps, increase recognition with the media. Grow the Jermain Defoe Foundation charity. Work on selected business projects, arrange all public appearances. Create Jermain’s own clothing line and perfume. Start up a sports mentoring company and soccer academy. Be able to supervise a multi-portfolio of houses managing all household staff, contractors and deal with all bills and gardeners. The successful applicant will work at the Defoe office Monday to Friday, 9.30 to 5.30 but if necessary be available 24/7 or possibly a bit longer to get everything done.
Simple eh: when I was a headteacher yep I reckon I did most of that for a third of what Mr Defoe was offering as salary. Reaction was widespread. Most people fell about laughing. But it did set me thinking. Why didn’t I advertise for something similar? Modest Burnley author with books that have topped the charts in Ramsbottom, Pilling and Bacup seeks PA to:
Develop awareness of brand ‘Dave’. Increase global awareness of ‘Dave’ under straplines such as ‘Everybody loves a Dave’ or ‘Dave a name you can trust.’ ‘A Dave is not just for Christmas.’ ‘You can always buy a used car from a Dave.’ Increase Dave’s book sales, run a Books-by-Dave promotion campaign that will tap into the African and Indian markets. Design and promote fragrances and clothes lines for Dave. Examples – perfumes such as ‘Whiff du Dave’ and men’s clothes under the label ‘Dapper Dave.’ Promote a new wine label ‘Chateau du Pap Dave,’ dog biscuits –Crunchydaves, and saucy lingerie, Peek-a-boobs by Davide. Maintain and organise Dave’s shed, dig the potatoes, run Dave’s bath, empty dishwasher. Take Mrs T her morning cuppa so that Dave can have an extra 40 winks.
Don’t care if he’s a knob, a wind-up merchant or any of that malarkey, Joey Barton, inspired signing by Burnley FC. Much needed central-midfielder, much needed oppo winder-upper, much needed gee-er upper, of teammates. And all round good quality midfield player. Welcome t’ Turf cocker, feel free ter smack me in the head with a Coca-Cola bottle. I personally wouldn’t give a hoot, wrote one fan, Higgy.
It was just one of hundreds of reactions on messageboards and twitter when the news broke that Joey Barton had signed for Burnley. At the beginning of the week local hack Chris Boden had announced that rumours that Barton was a target were wide of the mark when Skybet had reduced the odds from 25/1 to 4/1. 48 hours later he was writing that Dyche had been speaking to Barton for the last 8 weeks, and that signing him was indeed a possibility. By evening Thursday 27, the deed was done, the deal had been clinched. Apparently a clincher was Dyche having Barton to lunch at his home. Stan Ternent used to do similar things when his wife Kath would make huge meat and potato pies. This one was brunch.
‘Looking forward to getting amongst it again; tremendous group of people at the club with ambition to be back in the PL,’ Barton tweeted. ‘A football environment I cannot wait to be part of. I wanna be in a place where there’s real progress being made with a manager I can believe in, and a group of men who have got what it takes to consolidate, proud to be here.’ Of Dyche he said: ‘The most impressive guy I have sat in front of for a very, very long time.’
‘I know there is other stuff to his life and character,’ said Dyche and this we all know full well. Whilst the signing was still at the rumour stage there were plenty of critical posts on messageboards and tweets on twitter. It wasn’t too long since Barton had said more than a few unkind things about Burnley on his twitter page, in fairness responses to abuse aimed at him. He comes with a history but some comments made about him were downright offensive.
But the football fan is a fickle creature. Once he was signed different responses emerged; that he was what Burnley needed, the perfect replacement for the injured Marney, a good footballer, a winner, a bold signing, the best high profile signing since Ian Wright, he’ll do for me, one of those players you hate to play against but love to have in your side, wow what a great signing and on a free too, at last we have a player who can referee a game, your signing has just given us real hope, at last give me someone who can take it AND dish it out, Sean Dyche and Joey Barton a match made in heaven, at last the club have got their act together and signed a proper player, what he will bring to the pitch will outweigh his moments of madness, great vision just what we need. The day after the signing, of all the hundreds of messages and tweets, there was only one that truly stood out as being vehemently, angrily and bitterly opposed to the signing.
And the one I liked best; ‘he’s a knob but he’s OUR knob.’ Then there was one from Ian Wright: ‘great move great club.’ ‘He is a top guy and Burnley fans will love him,’ wrote Alastair Campbell.
The buzz it produced was palpable. That this was a clear statement of intent was obvious. No wonder Sean Dyche was so upbeat and optimistic in his press conference of the previous week. He knew things were in the offing, first Gray and then Barton. Hindsight is easy but when I read his interview I actually half thought: hmmm something’s going on here. There was a new tone, this wasn’t bluster; this was ebullience.
‘Can’t wait until next home game,’ messaged the club’s Commercial boss. ‘I think our Turf will be electric.’ He was probably still wearing short trousers when according to legend, in the wilderness years 30-something years ago, the club was threatened one day with having the electric disconnected because of unpaid bills. The ground was locked up to prevent access and re-opened for a game that evening. The game that night paid the arrears. Talk about the jar on the mantelpiece, there wasn’t even a jar.
The day after the signing, by coincidence, Barton was guest presenter on the afternoon Talksport show (don’t knock it they once invited me). The Talksport picture of him on twitter showed him holding the Jimmy Adamson book, his weekend homework he later said. Of course it kicked off with a discussion on why he had signed for Burnley. A move to West Ham had broken down some time ago when West Ham had pulled out. But after two recent defeats they had contacted him again. No thanks he said and signed for Burnley, money not coming into the equation. A Swiss club offered him an outstanding package.
His comments and answers to all questions were lucid and highly communicative. He might well have anger issues but this is one highly intelligent, expressive individual. He had a longstanding friendship with Frank MacParland, fully bought into the Burnley ethic, instantly took to Sean Dyche and walked out of his house thinking I must sign for this man and at that moment wouldn’t have cared if it was for only 50p a week. Yes he regretted some of the stuff he’d put on twitter, but at the time the things he’d written he saw as just silly and in jest, certainly the things he’d said about Burnley, but other people saw offensiveness.
And so to Bristol: people wanting a hotel for the weekend found that most were booked up, it being a Bank Holiday weekend, and those that had vacancies, the price had shot up. There were the usual motorway hold-ups and delays and diversions. Steve Cotterill was finding life in the Championship a bit tougher than Division One from which they had won promotion at a canter last season. To add a bit of spice to the game Andre Gray had turned Bristol down in preference to Burnley. If we’d hoped for a new midfielder to bolster up the middle of the park we’d got our wish although Saint Joey would sit this one out. Sean D said the target was promotion back to the Prem at the first attempt. But we (armchair experts all) knew full well that without midfield reinforcements Burnley could well go the way of 28 out of the last 36 sides to be relegated, and not return to the Promised Land. Now that we had one, there was a new optimism.
Half time at Ashton Gate and 90% of messages and tweets were the same: ‘getting battered but 2-0 up.’ Nobody was grumbling; Heaton so far magnificent against a dominant Bristol and defenders not only defending but scoring with Mee and Keane both scoring from corners. For some reason Gray was getting real abuse from Bristol fans – whoops, of course, he didn’t want to sign for them.
Other comments pointed to the obvious: all this money on strikers and still they couldn’t score and Keane now on track at this rate to score 30 goals this season. Someone unearthed the stat that in the last 50 games they had played, the strikers signed since promotion had scored not one goal between them.
In the second half Dyche swapped the forwards; off went Vokes and Gray on came the Jut and Vossen. But still no goals from the forwards and annoyingly Bristol scored a consolation goal just seconds from the final whistle to slightly spoil the party. Apparently Mee and Keane have a wager as to who will score the most goals this season. Perhaps they can have another one. Who will score more, defenders or forwards?
What a week. Barton signs, a Burnley win and the leading scorer is a centre-half. It’s a mad, mad world. ‘Well done to the lads,’ tweeted Joey to his 3 million+ followers. And still 48 hours to go in the transfer window as we wondered what might happen next?