Now, in some senses this is good news of course. This time last year, the Davids suggested financial Armageddon if we went down; now we can not only afford to take relegation on the chin, we can even afford to remodel a white elephant of a stadium to the tune of £100m! I'm not exactly sure how the business model works though. Perhaps the residents of Newham will find a little surcharge on their council tax in return for the privilege of keeping West Ham in the borough.
On the other hand, it doesn't say a lot about Sullivan and Gold's confidence in Grant and his inherited team beating the drop.
Meanwhile, the athletics heavyweights are laying into Tottenham's plans with a vengeance, talking about betraying the spirit of the games, the Olympic legacy and the promises made to secure the Olympics for London in the first place. I loved the line that Tottenham are only interested in making the move because of poor transport links to White Hart Lane but that transport links to Crystal Palace, where they propose building the substitute athletics stadium, are "as bad with knobs on"! Basically, Tottenham are trying to shaft UK Olympics and UK Olympics aint happy about it.
Meanwhile, I find myself in a very weird place on this issue. I don't want to move to the Olympic Stadium but I'm buggered if I want Tottenham to pip us in the race to win it. Life's a bitch. Head's I lose, tails I lose. A bit like Tory Boy Seb Coe spit roasted by Levy and Redknapp! And that in itself is a singularly delightful and revolting image!
WHU United don't fill their stadium in the premier league...how will they fill 60,000 seats if they are relegated, which the Davids clearly think is a possibility!
ReplyDeleteApparently, the decision will be a financial one, with the most benefit to the taxpayer being the most important criteria....if this is the case there is only 1 winner!
With Wet Spam's projected gate money from the Fizzy Pop league I would think a more sensible plan would be to plan ahead and ground share with the O's. Spurs could then take the white elephant off Newham's hands freeing the tax payer from a legacy and give thousand of future east Londoners the opportunity to watch decent footy for a change. Seems like a win win win scenario to me
ReplyDeleteYou might not like Spurs' bid but you can't really suggest it undermines an athletics legacy.
ReplyDeleteAthletics tracks do not get filled to capacity outside of huge events like the Olympics. Poor transport links to Crystal Palace are really not going to be much of an issue unless we host a World Championships. Compare that to the transport needs of a Premiership club which fills its ground every week.
UK athletics also benefits from getting an accessible track all year round if Crystal Palace is renovated. But if West Ham move to the OS athletics will come second to the footballing calendar.
The truth is west ham and tottenham wont fill the stadium anyway as both clubs are average size clubs. but looking at west ham they have all of the east london to themselves so if they got a good team on the pitch then they would have more chance of filling it than tottenham would. and by the way im a charlton fan.
ReplyDeleteIn reply to the anonymous charlton fan who is obviously bitter at supporting a once upon a time average team .average clubs in England do not break the top four in the prem . Average clubs do not make the knock out stages of the c l at the first attempt tottenham fill whl every week we even get over 10000 at fa youth cup games which is probably more than your average attendance so filling a 60 k stadium would not be a problem we capped season ticket holders at 25000 and a waiting list of over 60000 not bad for an average club you loser
ReplyDeletecan i just say im a tottenham fan and am absolutely desperate u win the bid - for selfish reasons of course...i dont wont my club to die, please help us west ham, please.
ReplyDeleteso so sad tonight as the prospect of thfc dying :(
im not bitter at all. the truth is west ham would have more going for them then tottenham would if west ham had a good team. i dont get any pleasure saying this but west ham could be massive if they were successful. Arsenal have taken all the the fans in north london because they are a much bigger club then tottenham. truth hurts i know but thats life.
ReplyDeleteHe's not bitter, he's an idiot.
ReplyDeleteTo those saying we couldnt fill a 60k stand I ask you to look at our FA cup final appearance. We filled 60% of New Wembley with our support alone.
ReplyDeleteAre we a poor side now? Yes off course. We are terrible but that is football. You are either successfull or you are not. I recall us finishing above you lot a couple seasons ago anyway so swings and roundabouts.
So, according to the bookies, Grant collects his P45 later this afternoon and let's face it, odds don't go from 20-1 to to 1-2 in 24 hours unless someone knows something. I didn't want Grant as manager and I have been unimpressed by his tactics, team selections, transfer activity and general demeanour; surely there is no less inspiring figure in football, unless it,s captain Matthew Upson. But I can't for the life of me understand how Gollivan can justify sacking him now. With one foot in a cup final, good recent results with one notable exception and the bottom half of the table covered by five points. I like O'Neill as a manager, but the big problem at West Ham is the owners; obviously lacking class, but now it appears ,lacking common decency.
ReplyDeleteOn an unrelated topic, looks like today is Avram's last day in charge and that the incredibly overrated, odious twat Martin O'Neill will replace him regardless of today's result, that's right, even a famous win over Arsenal wont be enough.
ReplyDeleteThat's the end of ever seeing the likes of Sears,Hines, Nouble and the other young academy prospects. That's the end of any hope of a side that plays a decent brand of football, O'Neill's sides play an utterly garbage brand of football, a manager that needs an open chequebook and even then squanders most of his signings on shit. Only thing left to say is that Karren Brady is a fucking cunt.
"I have been unimpressed by his tactics": O'Neill's lump it up to the bloke up forward is the hallmark of top tactical and strategical nous.
ReplyDelete"team selections": Not particularly easy when first team players are injured nearly every week, fuck me he has only had 16 fit players to choose from of late and has still gotten results.
"transfer activity": Hard to conduct transfers when the board gives you fuck all financial support and undermines you the whole time.
"no less inspiring figure in football", David James (who has only played under 20 odd managers) says otherwise, but of course you would know better.
Agree with the rest of your post and would add that I would rather go down yet show dignity and proper human decency than act like a bunch of utter cunts.
Careful with the language please guys. I know passions are running high but the c and f words are unnecessary. Fcuk is fine thanks to French Connection and so is cnut.
ReplyDeleteHammersfan, enjoyed the 'french connection' and 'c u next tuesday'
ReplyDeleteeuphemisms, very good and entirely apposite for the current owners - made their fortunes selling 'J Arthur' books and Brady, Alan Sugar's 'assistant and scribe for the noble 'Sun' newspaper'. What a fantastic set of people we have owning/running the club.
Thanks Avram, with what you had, you didn't do so bad.
gateman