Friday 29 May 2015

Return of the Lawman


Welcome back Marcus.

When Imraan let you drift off to Tamworth you left a club trying to recapture former glories, with some of the most fickle, unimpressed supporters in the World, at a club living on borrowed time at a stadium they didn't own.

You'll be pleased to hear we've moved on greatly since then.....



Marcus Law - stock photo until
we can locate one with a Poppies
scarf above his head.


Thursday 28 May 2015

Spot the Difference?

The Gambino "Family Business"





Fédération Internationale de Football Association 





Monday 25 May 2015

Size - still important?

As a club we may well be a shadow of our former selves.  Playing far below Conference level.  Sharing a ploughed field as a pitch.  Rudimentary off-field facilities.  Treating an away support in double figures as something noteworthy.  Lauding players who previously wouldn't have got a sniff of playing in Poppies red.

And yet, there are still signs that others still consider the Poppies as a club of note.  One only has to recall the scenes of Bacchanalian excess amongst the opposition fans who's teams even looked like taking a point off us.  It was sometimes curious to see just how opposition players overreacted to taking a point from the Poppies.  Yes, I'm looking at you St Ives! 

And you know what?  I was never really bothered.  To me it demonstrated that success against Kettering Town still counted for something.  I would have been more worried had our rivals started to see doing well against the Poppies as something commonplace.

Another sign that we are still a club of note is the way people with some sort of sway over us continue to try to screw us over financially.  Our recent history is a catalogue of "businessmen" queuing up to fleece the club.  The owners of Rockingham Road, Nonce Park, former owners of Cambridge United and now the big knobs at Burton Latimer have seen KTFC as a bottomless pit of readies.  They all believe our stature is such that they can treat us like a personal piggy-bank.

If it wasn't for the tragic state of Rockingham Road it would have been hilarious to see the greedy Pickerings failing dismally to turn our former home into a multi-million pound pay-day.  Their unbiased estimation of the tiny site's worth being so hideously out of touch with everyone else's.  It's also tragic for the greedy bastards that forcing us out of our home has cost them rental income in the region of a quarter of a million quid.  Shame....

And the thought of Nonce Park being ploughed back into the Irthlingborough swamp it grew out of gives me nothing but happy thoughts.

Now, the owners / leaseholders / landlords (delete as appropriate, and when we actually know the facts)  of Latimer Park have lined up to drip their bread in the Poppies gravy.  Really?  It's not enough that our using their shoddy facility has kept their f*cking place going?  Not enough that we have improved their cabbage patch beyond recognition?  Or helped their club keep limping on for at least another season?

No.  Now they'd like to screw us over for all the supposed benefits of running a dismal facility if not in the middle of nowhere, one that at least shares the same postcode.  More "businessmen" seeing us as some sort of big club cash-cow to be vigorously milked.

Ritchie seems to have at least bought us another season's grace with our current landlords.  Another 12 months for them to start dreaming up plenty more charges and levies to separate us from our assumed millions.  Ritchie's performance off the pitch next season will have to surpass anything we do on it if we are to continue to put the Poppies back on the right path.

Sunday 24 May 2015

Note to BBC.....

.......if you want to engender any sort of tension on Match of the Day on an afternoon that Newcastle United could have been relegated, please don't start the programme showing twinkly-eyed Alan Shearer desperately trying to stop grinning like the Cheshire cat.

Bit of a give away guys......


"Howay the lads!!!
We're a big club still.
Never won anything, mind...."

Monday 11 May 2015

Whatever happened to Mark Cooper?

 
 

5-5?  Wouldn't have happened
with Guy Branston in defence!

Who are you, and what have you done
to the real Mark Cooper?


 

Friday 8 May 2015

Wanted - New Manager for rather demanding role

(1) The Club's Expected Qualifications /Talents

  • No specific qualifications required, but any official Coaching Badges would be appreciated
  • Looking for an applicant who can source good quality, locally based footballing talent

(1A) The KTFC Forum Expected Qualifications /Talents

  • Must have at least 25 UEFA Coaching Badges
  • Ideally some Champions League experience.  Preferably as a multiple winner
  • Must be Marcus Law.  At least.  Or any Manager who has beaten the Poppies.  But basically Marcus Law

(2) The Club's Requirements regarding Style of Play

  • Solid off-field organisational skills
  • Ability to engage players
  • Qualities of adaption with regard to formations
  • Comfortable with local media

(2A) The KTFC Forum Requirements regarding Style of Play

  • Only full Internationals to be considered for selection
  • Style of football to be exact synthesis of 1970 Brazil / 2010 Spain / Barcelona (since Messi joined)
  • Always make substitutions that have an immediate and positive impact on the game
  • Never have the ball leave the floor during play
  • Never drop any player we like

(3) The Club's Expectations

  • Year of consolidation

(3A) The KTFC Forum Expectations

  • Win every game by at least 5 clear goals
  • Humble every opposition team
  • Always make every tactical decision exactly how we'd do it.  Or else
  • Be practically perfect in every way
  • NEVER EVER PLAY ANY PLAYER OUT OF POSITION.  EVER.  EVEN IF IT MIGHT BENEFIT THE TEAM.  EVERY PLAYER MUST BE PLAYED WHERE THEY HAVE DECIDED IS THEIR FAVOURITE POSITION.  FOREVER.  OR ELSE.
  • And don't think winning the league will be enough!

(4) The Club's Application Method

  • Please drop your CV into the Club, or give Ritchie a call

(4A) The KTFC Forum Application

  • You must apply in grovelling person to each and every member of the KTFC Forum
  • If any member of the KTFC Forum is dissatisfied with anything to do with the applicant they can be blackballed
  • The KTFC Forum reserves the right to criticise any facet of the applicant be it approach, tactics, quality, performance, looks and weight


Best of luck to everyone.  Really.  You'll need it.



Pep - good.  Prettier than Baillie.
But no Marcus Law....






Wednesday 6 May 2015

Championship Match defeat to Merthyr more damaging than originally thought....

Baillieaving

The news has broken today that Thomas Baillie won't reapply for the sole Manager job.  This time last year Ritchie decided that joint managers was a good idea.  Baillie, along with Scott Machin were given the task of delivering the league title.  This they did.

12 months on and Ritchie has decided that a single manager is the best for the club.  Seemingly delivering that title hasn't helped Messrs Scott and Baillie convince him otherwise. 

We hope that Ritchie's decision is both his own, and proves to be the right one.  We'd hate to think the decision was in any way influenced by a handful of online malcontents.  We can't easily believe Ritchie would be so easy swayed by whining Kettering fans with a wireless connection.  If he was, PATGOD might become a far more demanding organ!

We send our best wishes to TB, who has done a good job in various capacities for the club over the past three, turbulent seasons.


Scott and Baillie in happier days

Friday 1 May 2015

Moon ZERO Two


Well, that's all the games played.  Zero left.
So long North Greenford.  Hello Corby Poole.

Except, the Southern League, in it's infinite wisdom, has
decreed that the Champions of the Midland and Western Divisions
should play each other for absolutely no reason whatsoever. 

No matter how few people want to see the game.
Or how many players are already ogling the ladies in Ibiza.

A completely superfluous game.
Totally unnecessary.
Pointless beyond measure.

Much like the movie, Moon Zero Two, which offered
the thrill-starved 60's public a lacklustre view of man's exploration
of the moon, at EXACTLY the same time Armstrong
and the boys were doing it for real.