Top 20 happy memories from 40 years following football

That was the scene, top pic, that I witnessed at my first ever football league match 40 years ago today. They are Burnley fans celebrating promotion to division one on the pitch at Deepdale in 1973. The 1-1 draw ensured that North End stayed up as well. Although I'm a grumpy old man who rails against so much of what modern football represents, it has given me friendships, experiences, highs and lows and many, many memories.

But any memory of a football match is never just about who scored, what the game was like or what the score was. It's also so much about the sense of occasion and the day out. Here are my twenty best memories from the last 40 years in date order.

Preston North End v Burnley at Deepdale - my first match, with my Dad. There were pitch invasions, celebrations and a stand off at the end as the teams played out a 1-1 draw. I had a bobble hat knicked. Football wise I remember that Burnley team well, Alan Stevenson and Peter Noble and his combover. This was one of many trips to Deepdale, but I never took to supporting North End. However, something stirred in my soul, as I've now published a book by one of PNE's best known fans and I've married a Claret!

Blackpool v Sunderland - 1975 - the day Mickey Walsh scored a wonder goal for Blackpool. My Dad was a milkman and worked Saturdays, so it was rare for him to get a free day in time to get us to a match, but he went to extraordinary efforts to get to games. As he was from Wrexham, but had lived all over Lancashire as a lad, he wasn't a loyal fan of any team he just wanted to go to games. This was a cracker, I remember the Sunderland fans in their thousands, swaying and singing. The Mickey Walsh goal, which you can see on YouTube here, was a belter.

Liverpool v Trabzonspur - 1976 - This was when Liverpool dominated English football, and were about to embark on a conquest of Europe too. The team was brilliant by any standards, Keegan and David Johnson, Ray Clemence in goal, solid in defence. And we sat in the main stand close to 500 noisy Turks.

Blackburn Rovers v Orient - September 1977 - I was friends with an older lad called Kevin Bradley who was originally from Darwen. He took me on the train to Blackburn to this match, though I had been to Ewood before for a schoolboy international and with my Dad. Some other hard lads from Lancaster were Rovers fans as well - Baz Dootson (who I still see), Mark Currie and this nutter from Scorton called Bill Binks. When you're 11, these things matter. But I loved football and desperately wanted to belong. I liked Ewood Park, the walk from Mill Hill, the smell of pies, the accents, the way Rovers played. I have always loved an attacking full back and we had two this season - Hird and Bailey.

Wales v Scotland - 1977 - Anfield - Joe Jordan secured a passage to Argentina with a little help from the hand of whatever twisted God he serves, which earned the visitors a penalty. Except they weren't really the visitors at all. Apart from my Dad I didn't see a Wales fan all night. The Tartan army roared Scotland on. See it on YouTube here.

Burnley v Blackburn Rovers - Boxing Day - 1977. Jim Wilkinson describes it as the best day ever.

Wales v Spain - Wrexham - 1984 - that Mark Hughes scissor kick. We were there. Me and my Dad finally got that night at Anfield out of our system.

Swindon v Blackburn Rovers - 1983 - I missed some of the big, big occasions of the Rovers promotion back to the second division, but saw the majority of matches through the Bobby Saxton years. Some fun memories of London trips with the Accy branch, Simon Garner hat tricks, some giant killings, being scared witless at Wolves, getting battered at Newcastle, but this was great. Rovers rarely took big followings and it was often a bit tasty back then. But for Swindon in the Cup we had what can only be described as a 'mob of lads' out for this, which was rare. It certainly was an oddity to be part of the gang the police were tracking and who were dishing out the random acts of bullying that constitutes a hooligan day out. Me and my mates went in a transit van. Rovers won 2-1.

Bury v Blackpool - 1984 - I've never been involved in a riot before, but this was like something out of the wild west. Some good pals of mine are Blackpool fans - one is now married to my sister - and this excursion was one of a number of crazy days out with them in Blackpool's third and fourth division days. I took a reel of photos that day too which are now on the Lancashire Lads website and included in Peter Walsh's book Hooligans.

Millwall v Rovers - 1991 - two reasons. Minor reason, we won. Main reason, I was writing as a stringer on Rovers for the Lancashire Evening Post and met Jack Walker after the match. He gave me a quote, so we had a bit of a scoop on Kenny Dalglish joining the week after. It was great fun in the press box, but my heart was on the terraces.

Barcelona v Sampdoria - Wembley - 1992 European Cup Final - incredible. Me and John Dixon were in the Samdoria end. Epic, that Barca team with Koeman, Stoikov, Laudrup and that Sampa team with Vialli and Mancini. Not the only European final I've been to, but the most memorable. Can still picture that Koeman goal now.

Blackburn Rovers v Derby County - 1992 - play off semi final. Two nil down, won 4-2. Speedie. Scotty Sellars, Mike Newell's amazing curling shot. Just brilliant. The second leg at the Baseball ground was great too, the play off final at Wembley v Leicester was so tense I felt sick. But this game was just incredible for drama, noise and intensity. Drove Pat Whittle's BMW up from London

Blackburn Rovers v Arsenal - 1992 - first home game in the top flight in little old Ewood for me and I was there. Shearer scored. Enjoyed sending a fax from my Mum's office to Arsenal supporting workmate Nick Masters the next day. Technologically driven football banter ain't what it used to be.

Blackburn Rovers v Queen's Park Rangers - 1994 - on the way to the Premier League title Rovers took QPR apart 4-0. Shearer was on fire. This used to happen all the time, it was what we expected every week and I have to pinch myself that it actually happened at all. This one stands out as it is the only game my Mum has ever been to.

Arsenal v Blackburn Rovers - Highbury 1997 - with Roy Hodgson as manager we beat Arsenal 3-1. It was brilliant. I don't think Arsenal lost another game that season. It was a defining moment in football as Arsene Wenger turned it round. I remember Peter White telling me in Terry Neill's pub the night before that he thought Hodgson was up his own arse and that the players didn't like him. I used to love away matches in London when I lived there. The London branch was a lively scene at the time and I made lifelong friends.

Preston North End v Blackburn Rovers - 2000 - secured promotion. See those Burnley fans dancing on that pitch (above), that was me that night, jogging on to the pitch to celebrate with David Dunn, Matt Jansen and Garry Flitcroft. I went corporate with Alec Craig, Ian Currie, Kenni James and Roland Horridge who I have got to know much better since. A top top night. Dropped my phone on the pitch when I ran on. When I eventually retrieved it I had a text from my sister - "who's the hoolie in the suit?"

Tottenham Hotspur v Blackburn Rovers - Cardiff - 2002 - Winning any cup is just brilliant, this one was a truly epic victory of endeavour over arrogance. Still laugh about it now when ever I see my good friend Steven Lindsay. Oh such a perfect day, so glad I spent it with you.

After qualifying for Europe we experienced an away trip to a bleak European concrete hell hole. But that was Celtic, first we had a trip to Bulgaria to enjoy.

CSKA Sofia v Blackburn Rovers - 2002 - Although Rovers won the tie, it was only on away goals. A great trip with the lads. I can genuinely recall hardly anything about the game at all as we had been on it all day. Tour rules apply. Still laugh thinking about it now.

Manchester United v Porto - 2004 - United went out. Porto had Benni McCarthy playing for them and their manager was Jose Mourinho. I remember going corporate with my good pal Neil Tague and enjoying a good snigger at this behind our hands. And we both thought that the bloke in the Matalan coat seems to be quite a character.
 

Blackburn Rovers v Arsenal - 2010 - I've really enjoyed taking the kids to Rovers, until recently. We had season tickets in the Riverside, then the Family Stand, but this match in 2010 is the pinnacle of those days. It was Joe's 11th birthday and we went back to the player's lounge after the game for a drink with David Dunn, who was man of the match in a 2-1 win. Happy days.

Vinyl Vision by Hazel Jones

Isn't this great? It's by Hazel Jones, partner of my pal Jeremy Smith (financier and musical genius).
It's called 'Vinyl Vision' and is available in limited edition prints:

High Quality Giclee Print - £89
Print mounted and framed - £225
Box stretched canvas - £195

If you are interested let me know, there are a few still available. Mine is on my office wall and always attracts interest.
 
1 – Born In The USA – Bruce Springsteen
2 – Dark Side of The Moon – Pink Floyd
3 – Bat Out of Hell – Meat Loaf
4 – Tubular Bells – Mike Oldfield
5 – Never Mind The Bollocks – Sex Pistols
6 – Aladdin Sane – David Bowie
7 – Abbey Road – The Beatles
8 – Layla and other assorted love songs – Derek and the Dominoes
9 - Who’s Next - The Who
10 – Teaser and the Firecat – Cat Stevens
11 – London Calling – The Clash
12 – The Velvet Underground and Nico
13 – Aqualung – Jethro Tull
14 - Foxtrot – Genesis
15 – A Wizard, A True Star – Todd Rundgren
16 - Live Under A Blood Red Sky – U2
17 – Close To The Edge – Yes
18 – Weasels Ripped My Flesh – The Mothers of Invention
19 – Deep Purple in Rock – Deep Purple
20 – Queen II – Queen
21 – Innervisions – Stevie Wonder
22 – Exile On Main Street – Rolling Stones
23 – Blood On The Tracks – Bob Dylan
24 – Live – Bob Marley & The Wailers
25 - Off The Wall – Michael Jackson
26 – Aja – Steely Dan
27 - Electric Ladyland – The Jimi Hendrix Experience
28 – In the Court of the Crimson King – King Crimson
29 – Graceland – Paul Simon
30 – Pet Sounds – The Beach Boys
31 – The Bends – Radiohead
32 – Parklife – Blur
33 – 4 Symbols – Led Zeppelin

Rovers - staying up, for now. But we are bust

Raped by agents, led by idiots, owned by people who have been taken for fools, but who are too arrogant and proud to admit when they are wrong. Today is the false dawn. Staying up in the Championship offers no new turning point, just catastrophe delayed.

I can't make the numbers stack up for Blackburn Rovers, I really can't. If the wages to turnover ratio was nudging 90 per cent in the Premiership, then it must be 130 per cent now. Big signings on decent money. And long contracts too. There is a funding requirement way over what the depleted income streams can match. It is bust. But it is worse than that, it is beyond rescue. It is unsellable.

This summer there will be a fire sale of Rhodes, Olsson, Hanley. Others will be allowed to drift off, like Dunny and Robinson. The big earners, the Portuguese, Murphy, Etuhu, Best and Kazim-Richards will be will sit it out and pick their cheques up. The football liabilities and obligations to football creditors (players) required to remain a football club are simply too big to carry on.

Venky's London PLC, and whoever owns that, will just turn the tap off. It's coming folks. It is as well we are prepared to hold it together as fans, but we may have to fall very far before we rise again.

Why I'm in a grumpy mood today

This Friday catches me in the grumpiest of moods. I can't particularly identify why, but here is a list. Think of it like an in/out list. These are all out. "In" is "just not being a dick".

Seeing McDonalds wrappers at the side of the road - obviously chucked out of cars.
Boy racers slaloming round the useless speed bumps on Hibbert Lane in Marple.
Boys racers in Marple generally.
Trying to drive anywhere between Bredbury and Marple between 8-9am and 3-5pm.
Getting stuck behind a bus on Brabyns Brow or Compstall Brow.
Platform 1 at Manchester Piccadilly station. Chaos.
The callous indifference of Northern Rail staff at Piccadilly.
The aggressive stone faced G4S/Northern Rail ticket inspectors.
Blame cultures.
Lack of accountability cultures. 
The rubbish offers from WH Smiths vouchers.
The number of extra questions the poor staff have to ask at WH Smiths.
Chocolate on sale at the counter.
Late payers.
PPI texters.
Unknown numbers calling you.
Misuse of the word "yourself". eg "Will you be wanting a bar of chocolate for yourself?"
The kid who punched kid2 in the bollocks.
Twitter noise.
Twitter boasting.
The stand off of ego between competing businesses.
Fault lines and petty rivalries in business.
Saying "I don't believe in censorship but...".
Not knowing.
People who don't show at events.
Printers.
Liverpool fans on Suarez.
Everyone else on Suarez.
Suarez.
Football.
Being expected to be pleased that Blackburn Rovers will probably stay up.
Lists.
SEO people who think they can be copywriters.
The Daily Mail.
The Guardian.
Jumping to conclusions.
Party politics.
The sudoku in the Metro.
Car parks where you have to key in your number so you can't pass it on to someone else even though you've paid the rent on the space.


Ah, that's better.

More than ever, business needs a revolution in banking. Thoughts on the Co-op, Lloyds, FLS and JLS.

I was lined up to go on BBC Radio 5 Live on Wednesday to talk about the Bank of England’s announcement that it was extending the Funding for Lending Scheme (FLS). The news was all a flurry when two other events jumped up the agenda – the break-up of JLS and the collapse of the Co-operative Bank’s deal to buy 632 Lloyd’s Bank branches.

When Andy Verity, the business reporter leapt from his chair, breaking the peaceful hum of the Five Live newsroom at that early hour, I knew something big was going down. For preparation I was checking through the Bank of England press release and had just read Luke Johnson’s excellent column in the Financial Times where he called for more competition in the sector.

My initial thought was that this is a disaster. It looks like a real kick in the balls for Peter Marks, outgoing CEO of the Co-operative Group, who was offloading assets and clearing the decks to integrate a large business into the bank in order for it to become a real player. He’d been positively crowing about it and had been given the highest level endorsements possible from George Osborne.

Robert Peston claimed the withdrawl from this deal was an indication of the Co-op’s possible exit from banking altogether, a remarkable and dramatic reversal if proved true. I’m not so sure.

Clearly then, it’s also a bit of a blow to any of the government’s ambitions (and of the Labour Party) to encourage more competition in the banking sector.

Pretty quickly, Lloyds announced that the branches would be floated as the Trustee Savings Bank (TSB). A swiftness of foot that rather exposes the tardiness displayed by Royal Bank of Scotland when its deal to sell branches and customers to Santander fell apart. For all his skill in shrinking RBS, Stephen Hester clearly had no Plan B up his sleeve.

Though if a bank doesn’t want the branches and £25bn of deposits, why should anyone buy shares in TSB? That’s one to ponder.

All of this starts to scream for urgent action for a properly funded bank that can lend to smaller and medium sized businesses. One too that is closer to the heart of the regional economy and one less concerned with City issues. One that will be part of a Northern Revolution of policy, planning and economic management.

My own view for what it’s worth is that the lack of lending at the moment is as much about demand as it is about supply. Confidence is the biggest barrier to any business taking out a loan.

But there are a few other interesting trends in the emerging economy. For a start there are signs of growth from the fast growing “gazelle” companies who have grown in the last year, the FT, quoting Experian data, said there has been a ten per cent increase in medium sized businesses to 4,353. These are the companies targeted by the Goldman Sachs 10,000 Small Businesses programme and by GrowthAccelerator. These businesses get good advice and are well served by banks. Funding for Lending has reduced the cost of money for these businesses, it has not made money available to more companies.

The issue is new start-ups and businesses who are constricted in what they can do. They may have the idea and the ambition, but don’t know where to turn. The UK small business market deserves a banking service that can be their friend.

Another process that could unlock dormant capital in the economy is the large numbers of companies who were missold complex interest rate swap products as a condition of a loan. These are anchors on growth and profitability and need sorting out.

But here’s an alternative thought. The Co-operative backing out now is a blessing. The previous evening I’d attended a very useful event at the new group HQ in NOMA where Ruairidh Jackson talked passionately about the best strategy for members, about creating great places in Manchester city centre that contributed to the life of the city. The board has a responsibility to members, that the Co-op is different. It was Chatham House rules, so I can’t be too specific, but maybe what we have just witnessed is an act of great bravery that could just be the best decision the Co-op have taken in a decade of bold moves.

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A view of Margaret Thatcher, not from the left or the right, but the North

There will be plenty of people on the left drifting into a fantasy world of what life would have been like with no Margaret Thatcher, now that there is no longer a real living Margaret Thatcher to despise, just a grave to dance on.

If you want to properly assess the legacy and the impact of the so-called Iron Lady then start with the words she chose to use when she’d won the election of 1979. Twisting the beautiful words of St Francis of Assisi she said: “Where there is discord, may we bring harmony. Where there is error, may we bring truth. Where there is doubt, may we bring faith. And where there is despair, may we bring hope.”

The reaction to her death – more disharmony, no consensus over what the truth is, plenty of doubt, it rather points to a failure on all fronts. And for many communities, the only hope came from successive governments.

As the brilliant sociologist Stuart Hall said, “Thatcherism” was defined by what it was for and what it was against: “the virtues of the market, competition, elitism, individual initiative, the iniquities of state intervention and bureaucracy… and against trade union militancy, national aspirations, permissiveness, women’s liberation.”

It’s all very Manichean* – if you know what that means fine, if you don’t, then that’s fine too, but you probably need to read more.

But to make things easier, I believe you have to separate what she said and what the government did. In fact, a lot of what she said was errant nonsense, ill thought through and arrogant. Such as that breathtaking baloney about there being no such thing as society, just collections of individuals and families.

But let’s for a moment concentrate on her quest for the truth.

For me the biggest failure of Thatcher and Thatcherism is that it was never really true to its revolutionary rhetoric. There was never any attempt to create new models of co-operative business, genuine shareholder democracy, or to forge a revolution in home ownership beyond selling off council houses. It remains a challenge now.

I don’t come at this from the left or the right, but from the North. I have always suffered from an excess of civic pride.

There are proud intellectual traditions in the north. Like mutuality, the co-operative movement and free trade liberalism. Instead the anti-Thatcher and pro-Thatcher camps have painted us all into a nasty form of rampant capitalism pitted against a dismal protectionist socialism.

There is a myth too that the North stood strong in 1984, but was defeated, that the brave miners led the struggle against her mighty state armoury; that they were the vanguard of the enemy within, who took her on. No they weren’t, they were pretty much on their own. I was active on the left in the 80s. I supported the miners (see above, with Rik Mayall), marched for Derek Hatton and his cronies in Liverpool, peacefully picketed Padiham power station, danced at Red Wedge gigs and bought Billy Bragg records (the revolution is just a t-shirt away, comrade).

It was a debate that was hopelessly lost. The miners were defeated, not just because they weren’t united, but were led by a tyrant to an unpopular strike that divided communities with rhetoric and tribalism. As a supporter, you rattled collection tins in working class areas and were as unpopular as a Tory. People didn’t want to know. The coal industry was a pawn in a politically motivated class struggle – by both sides.

As for her battle with the local authorities, Manchester City Council only began to be in a position to make the city a better place when they accepted the new rules and engaged. Former leader Graham Stringer deserves a lot of credit for this.

Society had changed, Thatcher provided a mood music for a generation of entrepreneurs, 11 per cent of the workforce in 1989 were self employed, made up of people like my dad, who had his own milk round. Yet that was against a backdrop of high interest rates and no real attempt to remove red tape. Instead, just the unchallenged march of the banks and their concentration of power.

I dispute the view that this created a culture of selfishness that made the world a harsher place, but something clearly snapped.

Only by attempting to govern from the centre, by taking the country with you could any politician ever hope to govern again. And a new language of business engagement has taken root.

Neil Kinnock partly saw this, but Tony Blair grasped it fully, and so too we now see the leaders of every political party today occupying familiar territory. Thatcher even said that her greatest success was New Labour. And I have always held that David Cameron is truly Blair’s heir. It all rather drives home the point that no other politician could ever expect to win one election, let alone three, by declaring war on an ‘enemy within’.

And let’s remember that. The left has been properly marginalised and defeated. The supremacy of post-Thatcherite politics for the last 23 years has been the killing of the idea that there will ever be another Thatcher of the right, or the left. For all of the talk of the triumph of neo-liberalism, most western countries have a state that produces over 40 per cent of GDP.

Finally, I can’t let the week pass without a nod in the direction of the grave dancers. I can’t personally celebrate the death of anyone. As a good mate of mine, Simon Sinclair, said this week in response to an invitation to a party to mark her death: “I’d be very sad and think less of you if you actually celebrated the death of another human being. I don’t remember anyone celebrating the death of even Fred West or Osama Bin Laden. And nobody danced for the death of Stalin or Mao Zedong. So why anyone I respect might do a childish jig over the death of someone who took an immense popular mandate to fight a huge national decline in the way she understood the country would want to, and repeatedly elected her to do, makes me feel a little diminished as a member of the human race.”

*Manichean – the belief that everything can be reduced to a fight between good and evil.

This club is our club

At Hillsborough today I ran into Rovers fans who I've been through a lot with.

There was Kevin Bradley, who took me, aged 11, to Ewood Park in 1977 as his mate. I didn't know whether to thank him or not.

Outside the ground I met Andy Carruthers and Margaret Reid, the first time I'd seen them since our friend Mark Wastell died. I first met Andy when he drove us to Ipswich in 1983 and I got chased all over town for my Fila top. Margaret even ran our London branch football team in the 1990s. They travel everywhere following Rovers. We had a memorable trip to Lyon with a gang of us in 1998, Mark included.

A more recent acquaintance is Mushtaq Khan, who I'm very fond of. We've been threatening to meet at a game ever since we met on a project we've been trying to get going last year.

I also had a nice day with one of my lads, Louis. I love how his understanding of football is growing and how he's developing a dark ironic sense of humour for a 12 year old. He'll need it.

Everything else about the day was rubbish. The performance was abject. Cowardly and inept. Lacking belief and passion. Only David Dunn had the ability and the hunger. Some had neither. Most have the ability but just don't seem to care.

It was depressing seeing the Leppings Lane stand with its narrow gangways poor stewards and no memorial to the 96 Liverpool fans who perished in 1989. They may have won belated justice, but the lack of a memorial to them at Hillsborough is a disgrace. If I blinked and missed it, then I'm sorry, but I didn't see it.

Supporting a football team is about more than the halfwits on the pitch, or the owners (wherever they may be). Our bond is also to each other, to what we have shared, the places we've been and to the highs and the lows. Venky's will go one day; maybe not as soon as we'd like, but there will be a Blackburn Rovers in our hearts forever more. This club is our club.  

Crocky Trail, a brilliant place the Daily Mail probably thinks has been banned by the nanny state

OK, I'm not thrilled that of our five sons, three picked up minor injuries. I don't welcome it. But I am pleased they had a brilliant time at Crocky Trail. They took risks, they rubbed up against older kids who pushed and shoved up the Titanic and scrambled up the climbing wall without harnesses. I liked it that the rides were rough and ready. I liked being able to take our dog for a walk around the trail while the younger lads went on rope swings and chain walks across a dyke.

In my youth we had similar fun for free, it was called "the woods" but this was a brilliant collective experience.

This review is also on Trip Advisor.

Manchester at MIPIM - the appliance of science

I have really enjoyed MIPIM this year. Mostly because I’ve been following the news there from Manchester, London and Liverpool. I left Cannes to the liggers.

Joking aside, there are worse places to be than the French Riveria at this time of year, but if you go to MIPIM then you have to work hard to really get the most out of it.

It’s one of those events that plays to Manchester’s strengths. Working the event and providing strong intelligent leadership.

Manchester uses the presence at MIPIM to wisely partner with four other European cities with complementary agendas and areas of co-operation. There is also a great deal to be learned from Hamburg, Lyon, Barcelona and Amsterdam.

It was also exciting to hear that New Economy Manchester’s chief executive Mike Emmerich wants the city to be a world science city, providing solid support for enterprise and investment in science across the city region and explain how it can be achieved. The University of Manchester’s professor of physics was also on hand to position the city globally. He’s Brian Cox, by the way, you may have heard of him. Other cities I could mention would have been content to roll out a celebrity and press the flesh.

At the heart of Manchester’s Science strategy is Graphene, the wonder material, discovered at the University by Russian born scientists Andre Geim and Konstantin Novoselov.

I have heard the criticism that hundreds of patents have been filed in China and Korea, while Manchester has just a few. This is to misunderstand both the value of patents and what Manchester’s research base is capable of.

I’ll defer to Clive Rowland from the University to explain that as he does here.

Anyway, my good friend Andrew Spinoza has been good to his word and compiled a terrific blog from Cannes, which you can read here.

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Amazing - Manchester’s Graphene video. Very exciting.

Amazing - Manchester’s Graphene video. Very exciting.

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Downtown Show Me The Money seminars – February 2013

Downtown in Business held three seminars in different cities – Manchester, Preston and Leeds (pictured) where we discussed how businesses can access finance in a world where the banks aren’t lending like they used to.
Off the agenda was bank bashing, not because we’re sucking up to them or anything, but because it’s counter productive.
Here was my challenge as an event host – cover quite technical subjects and keep everyone in the audience onside.
Sometimes it’s a tricky line to tread. Finance professionals – like any professional group – have their own acronyms and jargon. You assume the audience know something of balance sheets, factoring, fixed charges and VCTs, because they run businesses and want to learn something new. That’s why they’ve come along. But equally you can’t lapse straight into all this because some speakers know what’s what. As a journalist I always tried to present information in a clear way – always explaining acronyms and terms of reference. Same goes for events. You can’t stop speakers every two minutes to clarify a basic point. You can’t present this kind of material in a Ladybird style either.

All the panellists at all three events were top drawer. Some of them I’ve worked with before – Mark Fahey of the London Stock Exchange, and Paul Taberner at Enterprise Ventures are both really compelling speakers, as is Steve Charnock of Seneca Partners. The really pleasant surprises were Helen Clayton of Deloitte and Melanie Hird of Seneca, not just because the latter two are super smart women leading the way in a man’s world either. Both had excellent delivery and a real understanding of finance from everyone’s point of view – banks, businesses, suppliers, investors in a business. My job is to give them the time and space to explain themselves.

How do you judge whether the balance was struck right? Sometimes people tell you, but sometimes you have to read the expressions and body language. A couple of very young journalists from Huddled came along and gave the Manchester 4 stars out of 5. They weren’t too baffled by any jargon. And the more experienced finance people gave us very positive direct feedback that they’d got a lot out of the event.

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Silicon Valley one year on

It’s March and now close to a year since I went on a trip to Silicon Valley in California to see how one of the world’s most dynamic business region’s works.

In a couple of weeks I’ll be marking the anniversary when a few of the folks who made the trip will be catching up on how they’ve done since. I already know that since the visit some in our delegation of 18 have had frustrations and setbacks. We were told to expect that and embrace it, to be fair.

Indeed, much of what we shared and enjoyed could pass for common sense: follow your passions, ride the waves, iterate, innovate, change, measure everything, create dynamic workplaces and treat collaborators with respect and a generous spirit. I find all of these messages relevant each and every day.

I returned from that trip with a messianic zeal to do what I can to edge my home city of Manchester towards being one of the leading entrepreneurial regions and at the forefront of digital business.

Added to that, two of my friends who I’m involved in different businesses with have also been over on a recent trip, and Downtown is hosting an event with them in Liverpool.

Our Downtown agenda this year embraces all of that: our recent events on new forms of finance have been very well received – but the next stage is to broker quality conversations and actions to put the city’s tech business ideas on a proper springboard for the future.

My good pal Gareth Burton has really thrown himself into this too. As well as building his family accountancy practice in Cheshire he’s embedded himself in TechHub Manchester, a vibrant incubator space in Carver’s Warehouse in the Northern Quarter.

This week Gareth introduced me to a remarkable young man called Doug Ward, who worked with journalist Martin Bryant to persuade TechHub to add a Manchester franchise to the bases in London, Riga and Bucharest. There are some great plans underway for events and projects in the building, but also from the businesses which are taking root there.

Doug wants to promote all of the United Kingdom’s tech clusters and foster greater links between them. He’s also a technology advisor to the Cabinet Office and to the University of Manchester Innovation Centre. His aim is to see Manchester be a top 5 European startup cluster.

There’s always been a danger that Manchester talks itself up in anything it does. Now is the time for delivery and a recognition of what we have, rather than moaning it isn’t Google. I like this piece by Telecity founder Rob Coupland on Manchester’s technology resurrection. Yes, we can point to successful local tech businesses like NCC Group, ANS, UKFast, Melbourne, LateRooms and 2Ergo that operate globally and successfully, and yes, we have the legacy of Alan Turing and the spirit of Tony Wilson.

But there are edgy urban tech communities in many cities around the world – great products and new applications are being written everywhere – not just in Silicon Valley. Manchester has an immense challenge here. I was pleased to see Barclays name above the door – and that a few VCs have signed the visitor’s book – but awareness from the serious business finance providers that needs to stimulate this sector is the most important next step. The ideas are there. The connections are in place. The worldview is mature and open. It’s important that people with the right skills and the same ambitions share all this and then buy into that vision with investment. That single truth has been as vital for Silicon Valley’s past as it will be for Manchester’s future. 

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The Englishman who transformed Benfica. The strange tale of Ted Smith.

Who was the English manager who triggered a revolution in European football, and transformed a club side that became one of the giants of the modern game? Terry Venables? Nope. Sir Bobby Robson? Nah! Roy Hodgson? Come on!

No, the name Ted Smith will hardly register, but his extraordinary story is as dramatic for the gaps and mysteries as it is for the affect a journeyman Millwall footballer from Grays in Essex, had on the Benfica team he coached from 1948 to 1952 and challenged Real Madrid’s hegemony in the subsequent decade.

Indeed, while this football revolution was underway, the man who planted the seeds had quietly retired from football and was running a pub in Lancaster, having only occasionally dipped back into football with Workington in the Third Division North from 1953-54, before the great Bill Shankly took over, and later with the local non-league side Lancaster City in 1967.

I stumbled across this story by accident. My grandfather, Stan Taylor, had been a Commando in the war, served his country heroically and was a man of some stature in the community in Lancaster where he had moved to be the manager of Woolworths. He became friends with Ted Smith, pictured above, who at the time was the landlord of the Red Cross pub in Skerton, just over the River Lune from the city centre.

But John Edward Smith, to give him his full name, had a back story. While he was pulling pints and smoking full strengths Capstans in a fairly draery concrete riverside pub, the Benfica team he built were lifting the European Cup; first in 1961 and then again in 1962. The captain of the team was the legendary Jose Aguas, the lynchpin of a side that went on to break Real Madrid's dominance of European football in the 1960s, then doubling the triumph by defeating Barcelona a year later.

Smith had brought Aguas, from a poor white colonial family in Angola, to Portugal and the two had a strong bond. I know this because my own Dad witnessed their emotional reunion outside the Park Lane Hotel in London in 1962 when Benfica were in town for the European Cup semi final at White Hart Lane against the double winning Spurs side.

As a player Smith had been decent full back with Millwall, playing 143 times and scoring just once. Small pieces of Pathe news archives show him training in 1938 and introducing the Millwall team to King George VIth, a sight which his son Harvey has delighted in watching since, as he was too young to see him play in person.

After England stuffed Portugal 10-0 in May 1947, with Finney and Matthews starring, it was decided to search for an English coach.

How Smith came be in the right place at the right time is a mystery, or just a piece of good timing. But almost as soon as Smith moved to Lisbon in 1948 he quickly made changes. As well as attracting players from the Portuguese colonies, like Aguas, he also introduced a form of health service between the local people in a poor area of Lisbon, and the club.

On the pitch he worked wonders too. Benfica broke the dominance of Sporting, by winning the 1949 Cup. He then built on that and won the 1951 championship, added 2 more cups and Benfica’s first international title, the Taca Latina, the ancestor of the European Cup, featuring clubs from France, Spain, Italy and Portugal. The record books show he retired for ‘personal reasons’ and though skipping his job as coach, he kept a link to Benfica as youth coach.

Another side to his character was a jealousy as his attractive wife proved the centre of attention from the Portuguese players and hangers on at the club.

Smith sent his family back to England, tried to go it alone for a while, but eventually followed them home. His life appeared torn, though he fell in love with Portugal its people and its culture, especially the music of Fado, it became a burden to him.

He briefly returned to football in the unlikeliest of jobs - a newspaper cutting from the Lancaster Guardian rather nonchalantly reports how "Mr Ted Smith, the former Benfica coach," became the manager of Lancaster City FC in 1967, as if that achievement was on a par with joining from Barrow or Bamber Bridge.

He returned briefly to management at Portuguese side Atletico from 1971 to 1973, but it seems remarkable that so little is known of his life and his achievements.

Even Harvey has told me only the sketchy details he has learned; his father passed away in 1993 and is buried in the English cemetery in Lisbon, where Benfica looked after him in his final years, respect and love from a fine club who remembered a hero of their history. But there are huge gaps in his life.

These gaps add to the mystery and the sadness that lies behind a torn character unable to settle in one place or anoher. Even his own son, Harvey, has bitter sweet memories.

“My father went missing in the early 70's a great man manager but pretty crap as a dad, I never saw him again I found out he had gone back to Portugal ending up in the Acores where he again proved his talents as a football coach.”

Running a pub in the north of England, and later in the Lake District, could never capture that romance in his life again.

Harvey has told me: “There is so much that I don’t remember and most of the medals and trophies my dad acquired over his time in football have gone, lost or been stolen, however, everything I read from his time in Portugal assures me that he was most highly regarded. There are quotes of him as being part of the club’s history, the layer of the club’s foundations and a beloved son of a great club.

“On a recent visit to Benfica I was returning to Lisbon Airport and a taxi driver turned out to be an ex Atletico player who my dad had scouted for the club, he refused to take the fare. So, I guess he had some uses, the old bugger.”

Decision on ASDA & Kirkland planning applications

The ASDA planning application is due to go before our local councillors at Area Committee tonight, Wednesday 27th February, Marple Cricket Club, Bowden Lane at 6.00pm

The doors will open at 5.00pm and as numbers are limited you are advised to get there early.
The Area Committee is requested by planning officers to recommend that the Planning and Highways Regulation Committee refuse planning permission.

Both ASDA and Kirkland applications will be referred to and decided by the Planning and Highways Regulation Committee on:

Friday 1st March - Venue: Stockport County Football Ground, Room TNT 2 Suite, Edgeley Park, Hardcastle Road, Edgely Stockport SK3 9DD at 6.00pm

Doors open at 5.00pm and as numbers are limited to 210 people you are advised to get there early.

Growth Accelerator – partner event in Yorkshire – February 2013

I was delighted to don the purple GrowthAccelerator tie and get back on the road to promote this fantastic business service. The first event was in Rotherham, the next day I was back on the road and up with the lark in Leeds. Both events had a real energy about them and a real rapport between the panel members who I did interviews with. I’ve added insights from them to a blog on the GrowthAcclerator website on international trade tips.

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Kloot - the band Elbow could have been

We went to see I Am Kloot on Friday. I find lead vocalist and front man John Bramwell so enchanting and his music capable of such stirring, despite such heavy dollops of melancholia. I wonder whether this new album Let It All In will be their breakthrough, certainly it deserves to on the basis of the first few listens. I was happy for Elbow when they achieved great success, but as I've got to love Kloot I've felt a nagging frustration that they are better. It's not a contest, but I wish it more than anything. A new video released this week may help, there's another one up there too (above). One of them will have to be this album's One Day Like This, though I'm not sure which one yet.

Another observation. The audience at the Ritz was a real mix. Usually a musical style like this would be more suited to the Bridgewater Hall or the Lowry, but Kloot appeal to people who like a drink and may have been to the Ritz on a punk might many eons ago. The mixture of drink and quiet moments leads to frequent chit chat during the show. Really annoying.

Anyway, enough of that. Go and buy the album. Piccadilly records are stocking it, but HMV aren't.

The real Harpurhey

Really, don’t bother watching The Estate set in Harpurhey on BBC3, it sounds exploitative and boring, the worst kind of poverty porn. It’s one of those TV programmes that seeks to portray the people of a poor area as freaks for the entertainment and amusement of the rest of us. In the process it upsets the locals and frustrates those who agreed to appear when they come out of it badly. Frankly it sounds exploitative and boring.

If you are interested in understanding the tough north Manchester neighbourhood then may I suggest instead that you take a trip to the Factory Youth Zone.

I went there this week and had a good look round with energetic fundraiser Claire Griffiiths and the CEO Paul Bird.

Up on the wall is plastered the mission statement of the Zone - “Somewhere to go, something to do, someone to talk to.” The three things the kids wanted from the new facility when it opened, following the lead of Bolton Lads and Girls Club.

The sports, social and education facilities are top notch, but it’s the passion and commitment of the volunteers and the enthusiasm of the kids that really set me alight. I think they’ve struck a remarkably successful balance between learning and leisure. Yes, there’s table tennis tables, which we all remember from our youth clubs, but also some incredible courses and projects. Plenty of business people have been through the Zone to talk to the kids about what it’s like in the world of work.

The Zone is our charity this year and we’re going to be doing a few things that bridge entrepreneurship of young Mancunians with the community of Downtown. Please get in touch if you’d like to help us.

On a totally different theme, another story that has loomed large with me this week has been the resignation of the Pope. If you’ve ever been to Rome, you’ll know what I mean when I say it feels like the global headquarters of a major international corporation. A real company town. One of the many ways in which the Roman Catholic church differs from corporations however is that it’s CEO tends to die on the job, rather than gracefully retire.

It annoys me that football managers refuse to resign as they seek a big payout, so many business leaders stay on too long in search of that payoff and the stubborn desire to build a legacy. I have rather a lot of admiration for those who genuinely step to one side and get out of the way of their successor – Sir Terry Leahy did it. Tony Blair wanted to, but was grumpily pushed out. So you have to rather admire Pope Benedict’s precedent-setting move to retire the Papacy. He sees the enormity of the task of leading such a complex organization and is restating what is expected of the role in future years.

It was Enoch Powell who said all political careers end in failure. I suspect that history will be rather kinder to Joseph Ratzinger.

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Liberty 5th birthday party

listen to ‘Michael Taylor on Liberty’s fifth birthday.’ on Audioboo

//

Here’s an audioboo of me at the Liberty Pensions 5th birthday party at the National Football Museum. It was such a terrific occasion, the guest speakers were me and Martin Vander Weyer of the Spectator, who really impressed with his rendition of his poem about the financial crisis. Inspiring stuff.

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Northern Monkeys on BBC Radio Manchester

Finally got round to uploading this interview I did about Northern Monkeys.

Our reservations on HS2

Let’s be honest, successive governments have failed the North of England. A high speed rail line to London is the latest initiative designed to help our economy. But it brings with it some sizeable risks. I think there are four main dangers lurking ahead.

One, and possibly the biggest risk of all to the prosperity of the North of England is that the solution to the economic lag of the North is somehow solved by building a  railway.

Yes, it will help, but it mustn’t be used to tick a box. It is an enormous investment, but it is going to take an absolute age. The time it will take to build the thing is a generation away. It is bold to take such a long view, but much more needs to happen in the meantime.

As I argued on BBC’s Sunday Politics last week – trying to get a word in edgeways between junior Tory disability Esther McVey MP and Labour MP Hazel Blears – Enterprise Zones alone won’t achieve economic growth. The same applies to HS2, Regional Growth Fund and Local Enterprise Partnerships. Too much box ticking is going on in isolation, too little joined up thinking.

Two, it is being built the wrong way round. If the aim is to help the North, then the first phase should be to redevelop Piccadilly station, build the tunnel under south Manchester, connect the airport and provide further connectivity to Manchester Airport, making it accessible from all points south.

Three, something very serious needs to be done to address the transport infrastructure of how the country is crossed from East to West. The expansion of Liverpool docks by Peel deserves fulsome support for how goods are then distributed to the rest of the North. By throwing so much capital infrastructure into HS2, it kicks this urgent need into the long grass.

Four, the shorter journey time to London starts to shrink the reach of the talent pool. As Manchester and Leeds are two hours from the capital then it makes sense to have a physical presence in the North. Cutting journey times to an hour undermines the case for that. I think the flight of senior corporate finance professionals from Birmingham to London has been evidence of this.

As Alex Massie asked in the Spectator this week, is HS2 really for the North, or for London?

Finally though, and positively, the strongest argument for the building of HS2 is that it will relieve capacity on the West Coast Mainline. Yet it doesn’t sound as electrifying as cutting journey time to an hour, but it is the most practical and necessary action that needs to be taken sooner rather than later. Too much freight is on the roads while the line is so full.

Downtown’s CEO Frank McKenna has made a passionate case for nothing short of a policy revolution on all fronts. We hope you’ll join us in continuing to make this case.

This is a crosspost from my Downtown Manchester blog.

Downtown on BBC's Sunday Politics

Downtown on BBC's Sunday Politics:

I was on BBC’s Sunday Politics on the 27th of January 2012 discussing Enterprise Zones.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/i/b01q436g/

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Councils to run the trains?

Manchester Airport Group’s bid for Stansted Airport is yet another example of how the city region leadership is challenging orthodox practice, and applying imaginative and strategic thinking to regional challenges. The next one will be an audacious bid for the regional rail franchises.

Rail franchising is a mess. The usage of rail services is often held as a success, but the customer satisfaction is rating will be poor.

Call it a gut feeling, but the train operating companies don’t strike me as happy places to work. I see too many miserable ticket inspectors and grumpy drivers for whom the general public are an inconvenience.

Notionally, these are private companies, run for profit and in a competitive environment. In reality they are heavily subsidized and tightly regulated.

And yet a major change is now on the cards. Work is already underway for the a consortium of metropolitan authorities in the North to form a new company to run the rail franchises currently controlled by Transpennine and by Northern Rail. The leadership for the project, as mapped out in a report submitted to the Combined Authority board last year, is Manchester.

It may strike many of us in the private sector as odd, that in an era of austerity and cuts that the councils are still able to operate in such a bold and creative way. It also shows how important transport is to the strategic development of the city region - and doesn’t always have to include an unpopular congestion charge. 

There will be risks – for a start they may not win. But as the report stated the upsides are massive and the flexibility offered to a body whose objectives are strategic, rather than simply running it for a subsidised profit are clear.

“Upfront capital investment may be necessary to find ways of delivering long‐run improvements in the efficiency of local services. Examples of such investments might include electrification, smartcard, turn‐around facilities and potentially some tram train conversions. As part of the GMCA city deal central government has committed to define a list of capital investments to reduce the cost base of the railway in the North of England.”

We are once again reminded of how fortunate we are in Greater Manchester to have a local leadership with vision and ambition. As Sir Howard Bernstein said in a national newspaper last year: “Working in a co-ordinated fashion means we can be not only strategic but also, crucially I believe, imaginative - coming up with new ways of doing things which challenge orthodox thinking.”

Finally, a few words on Europe. What if David Cameron doesn’t get a fulsome reform of the European Union and of Britain’s deal with Europe. Firstly, would he even admit it? and if he did, would he then campaign to leave, and what would that do to his personal standing? He’s right to grasp this nettle, but why leave it lingering for so long.   

• Jan 25

When 76 out of 92 means 29 to go

We went to Chesterfield last week to watch Adebayo Akinfenwa, Northampton's massive striker and the strongest player on FIFA13 on the Xbox, or so I'm told.

That was why the kids wanted to go. My motive was to visit a new home ground - my 76th of the current 92. Except it isn't, it was my 63rd. I've lost 11 who have new stadiums, and then there is the Wimbledon situation which I'm not sure how I count that.

So, there we are. On the Punk 92 I'm at 76.

Of the 92.net rules, it's 63.

Of total grounds visited it's 135.

HMV, Blockbuster, Comet - the property challenge

Another dismal chapter in Britain’s economic history. Another series of platitudes and posturing from politicians. It was depressing but predictable this week to see the reaction to the collapse of HMV and Jessops. Banks have been blamed, the lack of an industrial strategy for retail has been cited by Labour’s Chuka Umuna, while no-one seems willing to grasp the self-evident fact that the underlying weakness in retail is rooted in the distribution of land. Simply put there is far, far too much space being used for shops we don’t use any more.

We can all be nostalgic for the local record store – I know I am. We can cherish the experience of personal service. But as the staff at Jessops know to their painful cost, they were enthusiasts for their products and massively helpful, but deep down they knew that every other camera demonstration they performed resulted in someone buying online.

HMV and Blockbuster have been struggling for a while - poor decision making hasn’t helped, but they are businesses being disrupted by the onward march of online retail.

Certain products just aren’t bought in store anymore – music is one. Books may soon follow. In San Francisco last year I struggled to find a decent city centre bookstore to buy some thought leading titles. There was, depressingly, plenty of bad coffee and free wifi, loads of branded stores you could find in any western city (Gap, H&M, Urban Outfitters) – I found City Lights – which didn’t have a business section, but a tantalising range of anarchist poetry. But Barnes & Noble and Borders have long since fled.

The problem, put starkly, is the determination of landowners, and property portfolio managers and their agents, to flog this dead horse as if it could be wished back to life. It can’t be. But equally it would take real bravery to construct policy incentives that encouraged alternative land use in centres and a move away from retail. Free car parking might help, so too could more flexible view of planning.

I agreed with most of what Mary Portas said about how high streets can be animated and empty shops brought into different use. It’s actually so obvious it shouldn’t really need saying. But landlords won’t or can’t accept that their high yielding assets won’t continue to bring continued rent roll. In many ways they are reaping what they have sewn. Upward only rent reviews, poorly maintained estates, covenant protection, risk aversion, quarter days, regular yields. Game over guys, and the problems haven’t even begun to be addressed.

Looking around Greater Manchester some regional town centres are dying – Bury got its scheme away before the banking crash, Stockport didn’t. And the squabbling now over how their Portas pittance is distributed sounds horribly like the passengers on the Titanic putting their towels down on the best deckchairs (were Germans on the Titanic? Maybe not). No, the draw of a confident and colourful experiential Manchester city centre as a place to enjoy a day out is always going to outstrip the concrete wasteland of a regional town centre with arcades, pound stores, pie shops and the depressing long lines of charity outlets which all tell a tale of inexorable decline. Much as it baffles me, even the Trafford Centre is a preferred destination to that.

Before anyone pipes up with the example of Manchester’s Northern Quarter just bear in mind how microscopic it is on the overall map of the wider city region. Much as I love the likes of Oi Polloi, Piccadilly Records and Soup Kitchen, it’s a minority pursuit in a handful of streets in a city region of 2.5 million souls. There’s been talk of economic rebalancing in the air for the last five years. Urban land use is the hardest and most urgent one of all.


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A voice for business

Business has a voice in the narrative of Manchester. It may sometimes jar with other stakeholders, but this is a city that seems to embrace enterprise and commercial innovation.

It was with a certain sadness that we recorded the last BBC Radio Manchester business programme before Christmas. The format, where two private sector people, drawn from a rotating group of about 12, comment on the issues of the day and interview a couple of guests with interesting things to say.

I thought we were properly getting into our stride over the last six months, especially since we moved to a new shorter half hour format with no music. Interspersing the items. There was something quite comical about finishing an interview with a business owner about a new invention, or arguiung the toss over tax policy with a great business voice like Steve Falder of HMG Paints, and then the presenter elegantly calling time for a bit of Phil Collins.

But, all good things come to an end and I just hope the station is serious about the claim that they are keen on maintaining the level of coverage of business issues throughout their output.

As a city Manchester continually demonstrates a great maturity in the level of debate about where the city is heading. Growth, ambition for our young, opportunities for all and having the chance to showcase what we’re good at is important. Some BBC local radio has resigned itself to talking about nostalgia, last night’s TV and having phone ins for moaning football fans. Having a city radio station with the reach of BBC Radio Manchester is a real asset and I hope he vibrancy of the city continues to have a voice on it.

One of the other great achievements of the programme has been to coach and nurture a cadre of business people in the skills required to be good broadcasters. With BBC Radio5Live and the BBC1 Breakfast programme now produced from Salford Quays.

At Downtown we have good connections with the production teams on both of these national programmes. Both me and Frank have been on television at ungodly hours of the day and night to make the case for all manner of issues from banking reform, tax policy, transport and making a northern balance to the metropolitan agenda.

These are also opportunities for members to come on the radio and tell their stories. The team are never happier than when they get their wellies and hard hats on and visit the kind of grafters on a business park in the sticks that is bucking the trend. So, the more you tell us about what’s important, the better we can help you.

It’s a frequent complaint from business people that the national narrative doesn’t reflect the difficulties that businesses face. We may have lost one opportunity to make the case, but there are plenty more.

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2012 in review - looking forward

Here's something of a review of the year based on the most used topics and tags on this blog. A lot has changed this year, a new business, no booze, a book, travel, new horizons, important projects. Anyway, here's a review, and all in Twitter form.

Blackburn Rovers - The. Worst. Year. Ever. But under Venky's things will get worse. I trust in the Trust.

Manchester - you can read all about my views on civic matters and business issue on my Downtown blog Taking the Michael.

Marple - the day of reckoning approaches. Two new supermarkets planned. Please don't let Asda build on Hibber Lane.

Football - really enjoyed watching the rise of Hyde FC and some other local encounters. Love real football. Against Modern Football.

Friends - since my career change I've really found out the value of true friendships, and false ones. You know who you are (happy face).

Politics - Disappointed that the people of Marple South re-elected our dismal councillor Shan Alexander.
 
Commuting - Don't do this quite as much as I used to. Doing the London trip a fair bit, avoiding the 19:05 from Euston.

Telly - Obviously Match of the Day doesn't hold as much interest as it once did. But last night on MOTD2 I loved the dissection of two games by Pat Nevin. Shearer, get your coat.
 
Best day of 2012 - it's been a brilliant year, shared a stage with inspiring and brave people - but this day takes some beating. Getting my honorary fellowship from UCLAN.

Blogging - Going to do something very different on this blog from now on. Thanks for bearing with me.
 

The very last BBC Radio Manchester business programme

It was a privilege to be involved in the BBC Radio Manchester business programme over the last 8 years. We recorded the very last one on the Monday before Christmas and I was proud to be the last voice on there. It's a shame it ended, but hopefully there's a proper sense in the station of the role that the private sector plays in the life of the city.

I was also on the BBC Breakfast News this year, not bashing the banks and on BBC Radio 5Live a few times. I have to say the BBC is a brilliant institution full of fine people. The move North was a stroke of brilliance.

Pictured are: Andy Crane (presenter), me, Steve Saul (producer), Brian Sloan (Chamber of Commerce), Jacqui Hughes Lundy (business team), Tim Murphy (Seneca Partners) and Reverend Pete Horlock (business chaplain).

Sasha Baron Cohen's great new character - "Shebby"

Confidential memo from agent representing Sasha Baron Cohen, to head of comedy at Unamed Hollywood studio.

Hank,

Great to see you at the last Vanity Fair party. I mentioned to you that Sasha has been pretty busy lately. He revived Ali G at the Britsh Comedy Awards, which was a reminder of his genius. After two character roles in films, which he was pleased with, he is now ready to unveil his latest deep cover project.

The success of the whole Borat character was remarkable, Bruno has done pretty well too and we're  sure you will be delighted he is looking to the same format of spoof character. For this Sasha has had to go further and deeper in his public deception than anything he has ever done before.

I am telling you about his latest comic creation: "Shebby".

We started out as a football (soccer to you) summariser on TV in Malaysia. Unbelievably, people bought into his phoney past we created for him. We thought this was good enough, right up there with Ali G at his cheeky best, but a couple of Bollywood guys over in Pune, India, decided they wanted to get out of this crazy deal they'd struck to buy an English soccer club. Long story short, it had all gone horribly wrong, they wanted to get out and agreed to invest in the next film as long as we could stretch the character in a role as "global adviser". They expected it to last a week or two, but do you know the craziest thing? He has been on Sky TV, he has met the fans, he has even fired two coaches. The first quit and sued the club because of some of the things "Shebby" suggested. We have all this on film, hidden cameras are great.  We've got shots of him in the pub talking to fans. Some of them are totally into this guy. And get this, right. He did this public meeting where they were firing questions at him, and they actually applauded and cheered.

We're going to get this in the can pretty quickly now as the rest of the fans have turned against him. He's going to get lynched if we're not careful. I love Sasha's bravery, but he is properly messing with these guys.

Now, he's done this lame radio interview with some ex-soccer player, Robbie something, and his cover is like totally blown now. I mean, it was comedy gold - making up his role with each question, agreeing with the questions, dodging questions, getting aggressive. Our next move is to get his sidekick in as coach, this other character we've created - Judan Ali. Then the fun really starts, a new strip, a dwarf playing as goalkeeper, the appointment of a guru. Changing the strip to saris. But the clock is ticking.

So, Hank, what do you say?

Chuck

REPLY

Hey Chuck,
I love it. I agree that Borat may have jumped the shark, but this is genius. Let's meet for lunch at the Mondrian on Friday. Seems a bit far fetched, but it has promise.
Hank

BRFC Action Group - you don't speak for me

I am too weary and sad about what the witless Venky's have done to my beloved Blackburn Rovers. I am at risk of repeating myself.

Indeed, here is what I said just over a year ago:

This is what Venky's should do now. They should turn round to the protesting fans, and to John Williams, and to Tom Finn, to Ian Battersby, Ian Currie, Wayne Wild and Roger Devlin and say, "Sorry, we just didn't understand English football. We cocked up. Have your club back. We're sorry."

But those protesting fans have somewhat splintered. We had the disgraceful scene this morning of self-appointed fans spokesman Glen Mullan commenting on Radio5Live about the "downward spiral" and saying "someone needs to be accountable", without ever criticising the ownership of the club by Venky's or their appointee Shebby Singh. This is a guy who shared a platform with Shebby Singh.

No, the only serious option is for all Rovers fans to get behind a serious and concerted effort to rid the club of these idiots and pursue a supporter ownership model. It won't get us back to the top of the premiership, it won't attract top talent, but it will restore dignity where currently there is none.  

Shop talk - Marple takes steps forward, and back again

The ever changing range of shops and cafes in our home centre of Marple seem to have taken steps forward and backwards over the last few months. And that's before we even consider the impact of Asda, Waitrose or Aldi opening a new store.

A new ironing shop and the ZipYard franchise near each other on Stockport Road both offer excellent service and are a cut above what I'd been getting in comparable businesses in Manchester.

Interesting dynamic on the Hollins parade. While we loudly praise the efforts of local and independent retailers, the multiples are providing a complementary backbone to the more creative offer, sometimes competing. With the exception of the Wilsons veg shop, all the shops on the Hollins are now multiples - Barclays, Johnsons cleaners, Greenhalgh's bakery, Co-op pharmacy, Greggs, Taylor Made Betting, Costa Coffee, Bargain Booze and soon to be joined by Dominos Pizza. This isn't an objection, just a comment.

Nothing much is going on restaurant wise. Another Indian, solid food in the pubs, rumours of some of the cafe's looking to sell up. All Things Nice continues to impress the new people we bring to work at our office in Marple - don't just take my word for it, here's a great review from Mellor View.

The parade at the bottom of Stockport Road just south of the junction seems to be ready for a new opening of a traditional sweet shop called Granny's. Always a tough location, it will be competition for the Stars and Stripes shop, which seems to be doing OK.

I must admit to a sense of relief everytime I see the Marple bookshop still open, it could do with an injection of life and ideas though. The Bramall shop Simply Books is a good template.

But the biggest groan I have to emit since the demise of Toast Deli is for the news that The Bike Shop - Marple is having a closing down sale. These guys will be much missed. We've bought three bikes here, serviced many others, stocked up on accessories and it's been an inspiration to us to get out on our bikes more. I feared this would happen.  I'll continue to get bikes for our lads from their shop in Heaton Moor and thank them for giving Marple a real go. Good luck, Will.

As for Asda, they have now submitted their planning application. I'll be lodging my own objection and would urge you to do the same.

Revealed: Blackpool's confidential scouting report on Rovers

On my way out of Bloomfield Road this evening I found a piece of paper - it was a confidential leaked scouting report to Blackpool manager Michael Appleton and a briefing for his team.

"Right, I don't know how to brief you to be honest. On paper this lot, man for man, are a top team. But there's such a bad feeling around the club, and you'll know what that's like from your time at Portsmouth, that we just don't know what could happen. There's this clown Shebby Singh gobbing off about tactics - it's caused mayhem behind the scenes, the players don't know what's going on.

"Absorb a bit of pressure in the first 15 minutes and you'll be home and dry. They're bringing a large following - they've sold out - but they'll soon turn on their team, the owners, and that will get to the players.

"If they've got any sense they'll play Jordan Rhodes with another forward just off him. If they do, then we're in for a tough afternoon. Lately though, they tend to play him on his own up front (I know! barmy).

"They have these young lads up and down the wings, a combination of Lowe, one or more of the Olsson twins, this lad King from Man United who doesn't want to be there, Henley. Let them run around a lot, it won't come to much, as long as we keep a couple of big lads on Rhodes they'll have nothing to aim at.

"There's nothing we can tell you about Vukcevic - a bit of a mystery man.

"Stick a couple of early challenges on Etuhu, he's doesn't fancy it, let him know he's in a contest and he'll be useless. Same goes for Kazim-Richards. Test this young keeper Kean - he's going to be bricking it, so keep the pressure on him in one to ones.

"If we get a corner, just float it towards the penalty spot. Don't worry, you'll be unmarked. Givet might be there, but equally, he might not. You never can tell with him.

"The best news I've heard is that Scott Dann is going to be skipper today. Not only is
he hopeless at set pieces, but his confidence is shot to pieces.

"Make sure you patronise them in the programme notes and pre-match interviews, say they're a top top team, but to be honest this will be a breeze."

Olympic gold

One of the great unsung heroes of modern British culture is Frank Cottrell Boyce. I bumped into him at the Hay Festival and asked him to speak at a conference I was involved in at Aquinas College.
 
He is a terrific speaker and responded really well to questions afterwards. He played a huge role in scripting the Olympic opening ceremony with his friend Danny Boyle, which is full of anecdotes and glory. But I just really liked his delivery. He has a warmth and generosity about him and a particularly smart way of communicating the simplicity of Christian values and faith. Just what you need for an event like this as the rhetoric can get quite heavy.

Here he is: "Even so, people are often surprised when I admit to being a practising Catholic. Not that anyone’s ever taken issue with it but there is always that moment of surprise that tells you they had an image in their head, and it wasn’t you. And because people are polite you never quite know what that image is: did they think I was going to be St. Francis – poet, environmentalist, genius – or did they think I was going to be Mel Gibson?"

Here is the full text of Frank’s talk and here is the audio recording.

My mate #19 - Andy Shaw

Dennis Tueart, Andy Shaw and Michael Taylor

The latest random profile of one of my friends and how I know them is my pal Andrew Shaw, a prolific football supporter, FA Councillor, property personality and an all round good sort.

Me and Andy got off to a great start in my early years as the editor of Insider back in 2000. He was a generous informant and good conduit for intelligence and information in the property world when he ran the Jones Lang LaSalle office in Manchester. He moved to another agency and was always supportive. Though we would get together and talk about business and property, he also had a more colourful hinterland as a keen observer of politics, a parent with shared interest in some of the subtleties of how we bring our lads up. And then there's the football.

Football is where we share a particularly anorakish interest. While I like to ground hop and support my team, Andy has also taken his involvement to another level altogether. He joined the board of Altrincham FC about a decade ago, as well as being a massive Manchester City fan, home and away. He's now an FA Council member, looking after non-league clubs, and visiting hundreds of clubs around the country.

He served as the chairman of judges in the Insider Property Awards for a few years and added a real flair to the day. It was a role I was keen to revive for him when he joined me as a judge of the Northwest Football Awards. So, pictured is Andy, with me, and another of his pals from the football world, Dennis Tueart.

Now, the glasses I'm wearing (above) are currently in Andy's possession. I left them on our table at the awards and haven't seen them since. He rescued them - he's good like that - and I thought this blogpost might flush him out and get him along to meet me for a quick drink and hand them over. I mean, they're bloody useless without me.

Andy is not only great fun, he's incredibly loyal and a very considerate. I'm proud to call him a mate.