Dead Kettering

Simon Richardson made the following comments about "The Eve of the War", which turned out to be not so much a war, and more of a walk over....



"And it was all set up so nicely for a goalkeeping howler and a massed chorus of "Oh no Nathaniel"

I'm sure we all wish it was 'forever autumn'; when we looked like a team that not only could win a game but also as thought they had met before.

I suppose the least said about 'The Red Weed(s)' the better and here's to a 'Brave New World' once this season has finally done the decent thing and disappeared round the U-bend"



Couldn't have put it better. All we would add is that it was (Thunder)children against men.

Groan.

The Eve of the War - Tuesday 30th March

"No one would have believed that in the last months of the 2009/10 season that Kettering affairs were being watched from the timeless worlds of East Northamptonshire.

No one could have dreamed that we were being scrutinised by creatures that swarm and multiply in a drop of water.

Few men even considered the possibility of life beyond Finedon, and yet, across the gulf of the A6, minds immeasurably inferior to ours regarded this Kettering with envious eyes, and slowly and surely, they drew their plans against us......"

Mansfield Match Report

Mansfield Player: "AAAGH!"
Ref: "Whistle" Free kick to the cry-baby in yellow.

Mansfield Player: "AAAGH!"
Ref: "Whistle" Free kick to the cry-baby in yellow.

Mansfield Player: "AAAGH!"
Ref: "Whistle" Free kick to the cry-baby in yellow.

Mansfield Player: "AAAGH!"
Ref: "Whistle" Free kick to the cry-baby in yellow."


Etc. for 90 minutes.

Radio Ga Ga

Any Kettering fan who has ever had to rely on BBC Radio Northampton for news or coverage of the Poppies, knows what it is like to be unloved. We constantly put up with the pain of being passed over or ignored in favour of other, flashier members of the Northamptonshire sporting family.

We've no problem with being overlooked in favour of the Cobblers. That's fair enough. The station is called Radio Northampton, and the Cobblers are top of the footballing tree in the County. The Saints get big coverage also, which is more of an issue. It seemed that BBCRN only really discovered the Saints when the were winning every week once they'd been relegated a couple of years back. They certainly weren't getting the wall-to-wall coverage they enjoy now when they were getting turned over every week the season before and suffered relegation. Not that promotion or relegation particularly meant anything to the emotionally dead, sickeningly sporting anoraks who watch rugby. Placid bunch of even handed drunkards that they are.

Our problem with BBCRN stems from how they sort their coverage out once they have finished suckling at the teats of Northampton's sporting giants.

Once upon a time, long before online coverage BBCRN could cover one game on a Saturday. And that was invariably the Cobblers. Occasionally us or the Direones got a look in if the Cobblers weren't playing. Then Uncle Max's Midnight Carnival of Freaks-that-defy-the-will-of-God managed to buy their way into the Football League and the broadcasting goalposts were subtly shifted.

Suddenly, BBCRN covered whichever of the County's two footballing giants was away from home on the Saturday. Even though it left the Poppies even further down the list of teams getting local radio coverage (alongside Braybrooke Old Gentlemen XI, and the Aldwinckle Tossing Society), we could see the point to this. The supporters who's team was at home would presumably be at the home game, whereas covering the away game would bring in the vast majority of fans who didn't fancy Carlisle away on a Tuesday night.

This system worked well enough when there was 2 equally placed teams in the County. This all changed, however, when both we and the Scum found ourselves back in the Conference. The Poppies because we thrashed everyone in Conference North. The Scum because they were too sh*t for the Football League.

Now, alongside radio coverage, there is also BBC online coverage. One would be forgiven for thinking that the situation might now be - cover the Cobblers home and away on the radio, and alternate between us and the Scum depending on who was away from home. What could be simpler?

Very soon it became apparent this wasn't going to happen. Oh, sure, when we had big FA Cup games the BBCRN outside broadcast car was present and correct, once they'd successfully asked for directions to Rockingham Road. But when we were away from home suddenly the online coverage was coming from Non Park. And then, when the Scum went to the very grounds where we had visited, and there couldn't be any coverage of the Poppies due to "technical reasons" these problems were suddenly resolved and the good folk of Irthlingborough could rest up in between bouts of bestiality and incest to listen to coverage of their sporting heroes.

This season it has been quite galling to see just how often BBCRN have been covering the Inbreds. So much so that when we finally got on their bloody station (obviously when we played at Nonce Park) the commentators, by all accounts, were myopically pro-Scum. Of course they were - this was the team they'd watched all season!

It was all summed up best one Monday morning when during a BBCRN broadcast the previous weekend's scores were being discussed.

First of all the pundits paid homage to their wondrous Saints Overlords with a mixture of fawning and mutual masturbation.

Then they praised the efforts of "Sammo" and the Boys.

The Scum were next up for glowing flattery.

One of the presenters then said, and I kid you not, "Meanwhile, in the Blue Square Conference, Kettering Town....." Whoa! Back up there buddy! I think you'll find that the Poppies and the Scum are in the same division (please God this is still true in a month's time!)

Is it any wonder we are so far down the pecking order? BBCRN don't even know what divisions their teams play in. Are we being sidelined because we are seen as a Club with no future? Has Imraan pissed them off once too often? Is Irthlingborough closer to Northampton?

Or are they doing this to get an online fanzine to bite? If the latter - then, bravo.

More from issue 9!

In a future issue of PATGOD we dedicated an entire issue to the kind of "small town" headlines that the ET trotted out on a particularly slow news day. You know the sort of thing. "Rare Newt Found At Rushden Site", or "Bedroom Badly Damaged By Fire". In fact, these have been lifted from today's ET website. Good to see that things don't change!

Mind you, we weren't adverse to generating such headlines ourselves, as the above piece demonstrates. Oh no. When the local media came calling after we were banned from selling PATGOD inside Rockingham Road by Big Cyril, we happily posed for the local rag's shutterbug. Our sad, cherubic faces were soon plastered on front pages the length and breadth of the ET's circulation range.

The funniest part of the entire affair was that apart from a few issues sold by the Coe Brothers on the Social Club door, we NEVER sold the damn thing inside the ground anyway!

Yesterday, Today and Tomorrow

Many a poor Poppies performance over the years has been described as hopeless but it was never more so than yesterday. Against opposition who are rumoured to be on the brink of administration or worse, there was only one team that looked like dead men walking and it wasn't the outfit in lurid green.

We were literally hopeless, in the sense of lacking any hope. The fans felt it, the players felt it. Not many games go emotionally downhill from a minute's silence, but this one managed to. This is how it feels when there is nothing to play for. Not playoffs, not promotion, not even survival - nothing.

The feeling is taking hold that unless there is some imminent breakthrough in talks with Ben Pickering and/or whoever is advising him, we are condemned to a slow demise - probable expulsion from the Conference next season then a year or two of pointless going through the motions until the lease expires, by which time there will be hardly anyone left watching.

Ben Pickering's position, so far as anyone can know the mind of a reclusive octogenarian, is understood to be that he is not prepared to discuss the lease until it has expired in three years time. If that is genuinely the case, he must be badly advised or utterly indifferent to whether the club exists or not, because by that time there will barely be a club at all.

Not that it will take three years for that to become obvious. Ben Pickering could transform the situation tomorrow by agreeing a rolling 10 year lease, terminable on reasonable notice from the club if we are able to move to a new site. That would satisfy the Conference and the Football League, and suddenly there still be a chance, however small, of qualifying for the playoffs this seaon, and something to play for next season and beyond.

If, however, the 31 March deadline drifts past, it will be clear that Ben Pickering doesn't care whether we go up. Equally, therefore, why would he care when, this time next year, we go down? Or down again the season after that?

But leaving emotion aside, to do that would lack a certain business logic, because if owning Rockingham Road is both an investment and a source of income to Ben Pickering, the value of the site will only increase in the long run, and the income is derived from a 19% share of gate receipts which as things stand will inevitably shrink in real terms next season and beyond.

Assuming he understands the implications, is the landlord prepared to sacrifice personal revenue until 2013, worth potentially many thousands of pounds, just to keep us in limbo? I think we'll know the answer to that question before very much longer.

And if you've read this far without punching the wall in frustration at the paltry sum that the ground was sold for in 1985, less than we made from just the Leeds games this season, well done on your self control.

Patgod Issue Nine - Flying Start to the 1990-91 Season

Although we managed something like a 15(?) game unbeaten start to the League season, you won't be surprised to learn that we faded badly at the end. For a change.

Above is a cartoon where we continued to mock Ernie Moss for still paying at the advanced age of 39...... See if you can count how many war movies we managed to rip-off for this cartoon. We've counted about 20!