Football Crazy

by Terry Ravenscroft

  “They had sexual intercourse in 1935, didn't they Mr Proice,” inquired Stock.

  “T' Town players didn't. So tha won't be having it either, leastwise not when I say as tha shouldn’t.”

  Moggs raised his hand. “Mr Price, I always keep goal a lot better when I've had the legover the night before.”

  “Well tha must have gone bloody short last season Moggs, is all I can say, because tha let a hundred and twenty two goals in.”

  This brought the usual round of cheers and jeers that always prevailed whenever a fellow player had been embarrassed.

  “It's right what Moggsy says though, Mr Price,” said Higgs, when the laughter had subsided. “I play a lot better after I've had sex.”

  “How the hell are ye going to have sex if ye've got they barrel between yer legs, Higgsy?” asked Cragg.

  Briggs was inspired. “Perhaps....perhaps he's hoping to get a bleedin' midget in the barrel and give it one through the bunghole!”

  This brought the house down. Price quickly put it back up again.

  “Shuttup, t' lot of you! Childer are less bother! Now listen up. I've had a good look at thee this last day or two. And I don't like what I've seen. Tha'rt unfit, lot of thee. So tha'll all be going on a special diet, with immediate effect. T' special diet will consist of....”

  Briggs cut in. Price had strayed onto hallowed ground. “Er….I'm already on a special diet, Mr Price.”

  “I'm on the same diet,” Higgs chipped in. “It's been specially formulated for me and Darren by a sports nutritionist.”

  “Sports nutritionist my arse,” thundered Price. “When t' Town won t' Cup there were no such things as sports nutritionists. Good plain food, that's what footballers ate. And better for it. Why, Billy Fentonbottom could dribble all day on a slice o' dripping toast. Oatcakes and savoury ducks, haslet and brawn, sugar butties and black puddings, that's t' sort of food tha wants down thee. Ernie Craddock used to swear a pair o' black puddings afore a match put ten yards on his goal kick.”

  “I shall have to try some of them,” said Moggs.

  CHAPTER SIX

  Nowadays the price of watching football on satellite television has become such highway robbery that Sky TV might just as well be called Reach for the Sky TV

  When editions of the Frogley Advertiser were published it could hardly be said that they 'hit the streets', as that flamboyant journalistic expression suggests the newspaper contains important news about to be revealed to the newspaper-reading public. For the Advertiser was not a newspaper filled with accounts of wars and famine and earthquakes and disasters and uprisings in unpronounceable African countries, but of local weddings, funerals, meetings of the town council's Ways and Means Committee and stories about the local fire brigade being called out to rescue old ladies’ cats that had got themselves stuck up trees. At best then, rather than hitting the streets, the Advertiser might be said to give the streets a gentle shove.

  This week however, when the Advertiser gave the streets a gentle shove, it did for once carry copy that was a little more contentious than the usual fare. For contained within its pages was Martin Sneed's first piece of the season on the fortunes of Frogley Town. Sneed was particularly pleased with his effort, and felt that it could well get him another nomination for 'Provincial Sports Journalist of the Year'.

  His name had already been put forward for this prestigious award on a previous occasion, in 1992, for his account of the Waterloo Cup, the principal hare coursing event in that crude sport's calendar. His article had been an attack on what he described as '....this sorry event, in which the hare stands about as much chance of emerging unscathed as does a competitor in a catching the javelin competition; this blot on the golden landscape that is northern sport; this, the most despicable act perpetrated by man on animal, a pastime any decent-minded soul would refrain from touching with a bargepole.'

  To Sneed's great chagrin the article had only been placed second; however his disappointment in not scooping the prize had been tempered by the fact that whilst he had been writing his article on the Waterloo Cup he’d had a tenner on the winner.

  On reading Sneed's latest article Joe Price had not been best pleased. The new Frogley Town owner’s first thought was to immediately ban Sneed from the press box for life, and not only from the press box but from the ground also. However he soon dismissed the idea as unworthy of himself. After all, to ban Sneed from the ground altogether wouldn't necessarily silence him. Then again, the fourth estate could be a useful tool, something you wanted on your side, not waged against you.

  After giving it a little more thought Price knew exactly how to get it on his side, which is why he now burst into Sneed's office brandishing a copy of the Frogley Advertiser.

  “Is this thy doing?” he demanded of the newspaperman, pointing at the offending article.

  Sneed, Mr Cool personified, looked up at him. The likes of Joe Price didn't scare Martin Sneed. He said, “Yes, I'm Martin Sneed, The Man They Can't Shut Up.”

  Price read from the article. “'The Town have about as much chance of finishing in the top half of the league as a blind epileptic has of stuffing butter up a hedgehogs behind with a red hot needle.' ” He looked at the newspaperman. “Not very flattering to t' Town, is it Sneed?”

  “I just print the truth,” said Sneed. “And the truth, however unpalatable it may be to you, is that I can't find anything flattering to say about your pathetic excuse for a football team.”

  Price regarded Sneed with the same contempt that Henry the Eighth might have had for ‘Loose Women’, then reached into his pocket, took out a piece of notepaper and handed it to the newspaperman. “Then try this for size.”

  Sneed took the notepaper and looked at it briefly. “What's this?”

  “Thy next article.”

  Sneed read off the notepaper. “ 'The coming of Joe Price can only serve to fill the Town players with a new confidence, and is in my humble opinion the key that will unlock their undoubted potential.' ” He screwed up the piece of paper, tossed it into his waste basket and said, “Martin Sneed The Man They Can't Shut Up doesn’t put his name to rubbish like that.”

  Price pointedly tapped his copy of the Frogley Advertiser. “This rag is owned by Amalgamated Newspapers. Last year Price's Pies placed over two million poundsworth of advertising with Amalgamated Newspapers. One word from me in t' right ear and tha'll no longer be Martin Sneed The Man They Can't Shut Up, tha'll be Martin Sneed The Man Who Is Out On His Arse Looking For a Job.” He paused for effect for a moment, then continued, “On t' other hand, a few favourable articles about t' Town and tha could find theeself on Fleet Street.”

  Price offered this as a titbit, not the royal banquet Sneed perceived it as, and was therefore a little surprised when Sneed immediately threw himself to his knees and started to feverishly search through the contents of his waste bin. Gratefully he fell upon the piece of paper he had just crushed and thrown away. Now he opened it out, studied it for a second or so, then said, “I've got just the headline for the piece, Mr Price. How does this grab you? 'Yes, the Price is right for Frogley Town!’ By Martin Sneed The Man They Can't Shut Up.”

  “Shut up, Sneed,” said Price.

  “Yes, Mr Price,” said Sneed.

  “And think on to do just as I tell thee in future.”

  *

  Sergeant Hawks was typing up a report. Superintendent Screwer popped his head round the door. “How are we off for riot shields, Sergeant Hawks?”

  “Riot shields?” Hawks crinkled his brow in thought. “I don't think we’ve ever had them here, sir.”

  “Then what do you do if you have a riot?”

  Hawks smiled. The superintendent had been stationed at Leeds for too long. Now if he'd been stationed at Frogley as long as he himself had been he wouldn't have wasted his breath. “We've never had a riot in Frogley, Sir.”

  Screwer regarded his sergeant with a mixture of contempt and pity. If naivety were the only prerequisite to being a po
liceman Hawks would surely have been a chief constable by now. “Were you ever in the Boy Scouts, Sergeant?” he asked.

  “The Boys Brigade, sir.”

  “And what was their motto, 'Do Fuck All Until Something Happens?' ”

  “Beg pardon, Sir?”

  “Because the Boy Scouts motto is 'Be Prepared',” Screwer went on, quite amiably. Then, much less amiably, “It's no use getting riot shields after a fucking riot, is it Sergeant!”

  “Well like I say sir, we've never had a riot in Frogley,” Hawks said, although he suspected this excuse would cut very little ice with Screwer. He was right.

  “No and you've never tackled the football hooliganism problem either, have you! Order fifty riot shields. Now. And a water cannon.”

  “Sir.”

  *

  Donny had almost had a heart attack when he'd heard about the players' new diet and had tackled Price about it immediately, before his players definitely started having heart attacks and no almost about it. Price might know a bit about pie-making but when it came to the dietary requirements consistent with producing healthy and alert footballers you were playing on Big Donny Donnelly's home ground.

  “My footballers can't eat rubbish like that, Mr Price,” he told the new owner of Frogley Town, in no uncertain terms. “It will ruin them. Spoil them for life if you like.”

  “From what I've seen of 'em they're already ruined and spoilt for life,” observed Price, dryly. “What I've told 'em to eat from now on will unruin 'em.”

  “But black puddings, Mr Price?” Donny protested. “And dripping toast and sugar butties. I mean what sort of diet is that?”

  “A gradely one. T' sort of diet as t' team were eating t' last time as they had a decent side, in t' fifties.”

  “Yes but things have moved on a little since then where footballers' diets are concerned, Mr Price,” argued Donny. “It's a whole new kettle of fish and chips nowadays. I mean it's all pasta now.”

  “Pasta?” Price almost spat the word out.

  “What the Italians eat,” Donny explained. “Your AC Milans and your Juventuses and your Fiorentinas. That's what they eat all the time out there. And what the more enlightened coaches in England also encourage their players to eat, I might add.”

  “Oh it's enlightenment we're talking about, is it,” said Price, raising an eyebrow. “Well let me enlighten thee about summat then. Between 1939 and 1945 this country were at war with Italy. T' Italians ate pasta and our lads ate bully beef. Who won t' war?”

  “Well....we did,” admitted Donny, “At the end of the day. Obviously. But pasta, and chicken, is....”

  Price interrupted him. He had strong opinions on the merits of chicken too. “Babby food!”

  “Beg pardon, Mr Price?”

  “Chicken. Babby food. Food as what tha feeds little babbies and childer on.”

  Donny flew quickly to the defence of the ubiquitous fowl. “Well I'm sorry to disagree with you Mr Price, but it is received wisdom that red meat is bad for you and that chicken is good for you.”

  “Well it’s wisdom as hasn't been received by me,” replied Price. “What has been received by me is that chicken is good for nowt unless it's mixed half and half with ham in a chicken and ham pie, and even then it isn't good for all that much.”

  Donny felt that he just couldn't let the matter drop. “But sugar butties, Mr Price? Surely sugar butties can't be good for you?”

  “They never did me any harm,” said Price, “And I were weaned on 'em.”

  “Yes but....”

  But Price had reached the end of his patience. “Are thee arguing with me, Donnelly?”

  Donny bit his lip. He had been down this road before, it was the road to nowhere, and he had no wish to go down it again. “No, Mr Price.”

  “Because if tha are, might I remind thee that th'art an employee of mine now and that I will treat thee exactly t' same as what I treat t' rest of my employees.”

  Donny didn't doubt it for one moment. “Well obviously, Mr Price.”

  “And that I sacked t' last employee as argued with me.”

  “Very much so.”

  Satisfied there would be no further objections on the subject of the players’ diet, Price moved on to another, equally important matter. He produced a brown paper bag about the size of a two kilo sugar bag.

  “Put a teaspoonful of this in t' players' tea from now on.”

  “They don't drink tea, Mr Price. It's on my no no list. Mineral water and sports drinks only are what I allow my players to drink, for their energy levels.”

  “Well get it off thy no no list and onto my yes yes list, and smart about it, they'll get all t' energy they can handle and more besides from sugar butties. So they will drink tea. What will they drink, Donnelly?”

  “Tea, Mr Price.”

  “And make it good and strong. I want to see t' teaspoon stood up in it.” He indicated the brown paper bag. “And put a teaspoonful of this in each cup, mind. Heaped.”

  “Yes, Mr Price.” He took the bag off Price. “What is it?”

  “Bromide.”

  “Yes, Mr Price. What's bromide?”

  But Price was already on his way out.

  *

  For their part the players were quite happy with their new diet. None of them had had the slightest idea what a savoury duck was and Crooks, having now tried one, still didn't know what one was, but had pronounced that it certainly wasn't duck, nor was it very savoury. However the rest of the players, whilst leaning towards Crooks' opinion that it certainly wasn't duck, had considered it to be quite savoury indeed; with the exception of the Scotsman, Cragg, who said that it minded him of haggis with the taste taken out.

  Everyone had tried sugar butties, and to a man had experienced great difficulty eating them, principally because as soon as they lifted them to their mouths to take a bite all the sugar fell out from between the slices of bread. Hanks, elected as spokesman, had pointed this out to Price, who in turn had asked Hanks how much butter they were spreading on the bread first. Hanks had told him they weren't spreading any butter at all on the bread, they were just putting the sugar directly onto the bread. Price had asked him how the bloody hell did they expect the sugar to stick to the bread if the bread hadn't first had a generous dollop of best butter spread on it. Once the correct way of assembling a sugar butty had been determined there were no further problems, and sugar butties were now being enjoyed by all.

  Haslet, which the people at Perry's Pork Butchers (Frogley) Est. 1928 had informed the players was a loaf of cooked minced pig's offal, had been sampled, as had brawn, which the intellectual of the team, Crooks, whose sister had a dictionary, had discovered was the jellied meat from a pig's head. Both Haslet and brawn had been well received. Jacks was particularly enthusiastic about brawn, and had pronounced, probably because its main ingredient was brains, that it had definitely made him brainier as the day after he'd eaten it he’d got to a thousand pounds on 'Who Wants to be a Millionaire', whereas previously he’d never been beyond five hundred.

  Dripping toast had been tried by one and all. Some had tried toast dripping with honey, some had tried it dripping with syrup, some had tried it dripping with condensed milk, some had tried it dripping with butter, and some, which had he been aware of it would have undoubtedly have received the whole-hearted approval of Joe Price, had tried it dripping with chips. None however had tried dripping toast dripping with dripping, simply because none of them had ever heard of dripping. Until on a visit to his native Salford to visit his sick grandmother Hooks had said he fancied a piece of dripping toast and had proceeded to spoon condensed milk on the toast. His grandmother had put him right as to what exactly dripping toast was, and now all the players had tried dripping toast with dripping on, and very nice it was too with plenty of salt and pepper.

  Despite his being a son of Lancashire Moggs had never tried black puddings, his mother being more into the delights of take-away chicken tikka marsala and piece-a-pizza. But now
that he had tried them, and although there hadn't yet been any evidence that the consumption of this northern delicacy had put any distance on his goal kicks, he had pronounced them to be one of the nicest things he had ever 'chucked down his gullet', his only criticism of them being that he could only have one on his plate at a time, as if he had two it reminded him of Ashley Cole's bollocks and took away his appetite.

  *

  Dave Rave was about to interview Superintendent Screwer for his Dave Rave Show Pre-Season Football Special. In addition to the Frogley Town players Briggs and Moggs, and the mental hospital patient Oakes, Dave had interviewed a total of twenty residents of Frogley, from various walks of life. Screwer would be his final interview, and then he could begin to put the show together.

  He had asked each of the interviewees, with the exception of Joe Price, the same question: “What is your reaction to the news that meat pie magnate Joe Price had bought Frogley Town?” He had also started to ask Joe Price what was his reaction to the news that meat pie magnate Joe Price had bought Frogley Town when he realised that this sounded stupid, so instead, and with the forthcoming Dave Rave Show Pop Princess Special in mind, he had asked him whom he preferred, Kylie, Britney or Beyonce? Amazingly, well amazing to Dave Rave, Price had never heard of any of them.

  Demonstrating once more the poverty of language skills common amongst some football people and lovers of football, four of the interviewees, including Donny Donnelly, when asked what was their reaction to the news that meat pie magnate Joe Price had bought Frogley Town had replied that they were over the moon about it. When Dave had asked them to think of some other suitable comment one of them, after a great deal of thought, had said that he was the opposite of under the moon about it, and another, an amateur astronomer, had said he was higher than the pockmarked and crater strewn lunar surface of a satellite three thousand four hundred and seventy-five kilometres in diameter and three hundred and eighty-four thousand kilometres distant from Earth, that rotates in the same time as it revolves around the Earth. Dave hadn't a clue what the man had meant but it had sounded really impressive, so he had left it in.