The view from the South

[Redraine]

Rod Liddle in this week's Sunday Times, about next season's div.2 relegation teams:-
"Cheltenham, largely because I don't like them. Plus some team from the north west who manage to attract only nine people to each home game will most probably join them - Macclesfield, perhaps, or Accrington".

I have replied to the editor with the following;-
"Rod Liddle's sarcastic comments on Accrington Stanley had me fuming. He may not be aware that our small town has a Premier League club only 5 miles to the west, plus a newly relegated one 5 miles to the east. Is this the same Rod Liddle who once praised isolated Torquay for surviving in the Football League on gates of under 2000? His credibility would have been better served if he had mentioned manager John Coleman's unique record of improving our position in the leagues in every one of the 11 years since his appointment, on practically zero resources, and in spite of practically rebuilding his squad every season at a total historical cost of around 50 thousand pounds in transfer fees. The cartoon which accompanied his article showed the obligatory smoking factory chimneys , which disappeared decades ago. Now we have the wonderful fresh air of the Lancashire moors starting 2 miles from the town centre, and the beautiful Ribble Valley also on our doorstep."
Won't get published, of course, but I feel better now.

[ukcowboy]

Good for you Redrain.

[lancsdave]

Some southern journalist who thinks it's funny to mock smaller clubs, probably hacked off because he has to try and earn an honest living when he had his list of mobile numbers taken off him

[Haggis316]

Don't be bothered by him.

Back in Autumn 2005 he wrote a piece on Sheffield Wednesday where he described them as though they were the worst team in the Championship by a mile. He was not popular with Wednesdayites after that.

Wednesday had the last laugh. Couple of days after we celebrated promotion to the League at Woking and Sheffield Wednesday secured safety at home his team Millwall suffered the fate he had predicted for Sheffield Wednesday and went down to League 1 themselves. Wednesday remained in the Championship for as long as it took Millwall to get back and flirted with being promotion outsiders on a couple of occasions.

[Wynonie Harris]

Good on yer, Redraine! A classic piece of lazy journalism from a self-regarding London hack.

[Exile on Spencer St]

Rod Liddle is Julie Burchill without the balls.