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2016/17 Prediction League; Game 13 v Blackpool (home)

Accrington Stanley

Blackpool FC

2016/17 Prediction League; Game 13 v Blackpool (home)

Until season 1977/78, Blackpool FC had only ever played in the top two divisions of the Football League; by February 78 they were 7th in Division Two, and had just done Blackburn 5-2; then Chairman Billy Cartmell sacked the Manager for "personal reasons" (he didn't like him, presumably) .............. By the beginning of April they were eighth, 9 points clear of relegation; by 25th April, with one game to play, they were 14th, 3 points clear; on 29th April, with their programme complete, they had 37 points (2 for a win then, remember) ............ below them lay Charlton (37 from 41 games), Millwall (36/41), Cardiff (36/40), Orient (they’d dropped the “Leyton” in 1966 (restoring it in 1987) when the London Borough of Leyton was absorbed into the London Borough of Waltham Forest, presumably because they didn’t fancy being called “Waltham Forest Orient”) also 36/40, and the already-doomed Mansfield (31/41) and Hull (28/42); three to go down ...............

Millwall won, to move on to 38 points and safety; that left three games; Cardiff v Notts Co, Orient v Charlton and Cardiff v Orient; Orient had only won once on their travels all season, and had lost 6 and drawn 2 of their last 8 away; Cardiff had only lost twice at home all season, and had won 6 of the last 7, drawing the other .................Statisticians (Chimer :D) will tell you that there are 27 possible permutations of results in those three games, and only one of those 27 could possibly relegate Blackpool ....Cardiff needed to beat Notts County and lose to Orient, who also needed a point from the Charlton game, so the odds were still massively in ‘Pool’s favour .... until Cardiff beat Notts Co 2-1, Orient and Charlton drew 0-0 and Orient then went to Cardiff and beat them 1-0 .................... that left Luton, Orient, Notts Co, Millwall, Charlton, BrizzleRov and Cardiff ALL with 38 points, and Blackpool with 37, to be relegated to the Third Tier for the first time in their history ...............and it was 29 years (2007) before they got back into Tier Two! So never sack your Manager in the middle of the season! :p:p:p

Morecambe, as you’ll know, were – until Tuesday gone - freefalling down the table; one win (against Cambridge), one draw and four defeats in their previous six ........... with 16 points from 11 games, they were immediately above ...................Blackpool! The TangoRhinos have six points from their last six games, also with one win (Pompey), but three draws and two defeats ........ and above them both lay .......... the Stanley, with 11 points from six, three wins, two draws and one loss (Cambridge!) .......... On Tuesday, though, Morecambe pulled their socks up, laced up their boots with the dubbin-ed toecaps, and Did It Unto Notts County (2-1 away), to jump back up to 7th .................. Blackpool’s record overall is P12 W3 D5 L4 GF16 GA13 and 14 points, four points above the relegation spots, currently occupied by Exeter and WestleyPortlyCounty (who’s confident he can save them from relegation, apparently) .............

Blackpool FC as we know it was formed in 1887 (at a meeting held in the Stanley Arms pub!) ....... they footled around the Lancashire League for a year or two, and then successfully applied to join the Football League in 1896, becoming part of the 16-team Second Division; their first game was a 3-1 loss at Lincoln; at the end of the 1898/99 season they were kicked out of the League, but came back in 1900, just about the same time they moved to Bloomfield Road ..........not a lot, frankly, happened then, until shortly after WWII, when – in the space of a few seasons – the club signed (1) Stan Mortensen (who would score 197 times in 317 games, and go on to play for Hull, Southport and Bath) in 1946 (2) Sir Stanley Matthews :hothothot (who re-signed for Stoke in 1961 aged 46) and Jackie Mudie, both in 1947 (3) GK George Farm in 1948 and (4) Bill Perry in 1949; the 1950s were their most successful decade by far, including the Matthews Final in 1953 ......... except that in 1953 – for the only time ever – Blackpool had four players (Harry Johnston, Mortensen, Sir Stan and Ernie Taylor) in the England team that got smacked 6-3 by Hungary – and only Matthews of that group ever played for England again!

For most of their existence they’ve been in one or other of the top two tiers of the League, but they hit Division Four (or its equivalent) between 1981 and 85, 1990 and 92 and 2000 to 01, as well, of course, as this current season .........as recently as 2010/11 they were in the Premier League (and the fans still want to know where all the parachute payment money went – not that it’s actually any of their business - the owners of the Club, as you may well be aware, being about as popular as King Herod in a creche) .....

Including caretaker managers and repeat appointments, I make it that they’ve had 14 managers in the last 12 years; their longest serving Gaffer was Joe Smith (1935 to 1958) and the shortest tenure in The Chair was Michael Appleton (65 days between Nov 12 and Jan 13); Bosses have included Big Sam Bung-Allardyce, Ian Holloway, Paul Ince, Harry Potts, Alan Ball and Bob Stokoe; their famous players include zillions of household names, one of the best being the classy Jimmy Armfield; they adopted their trade mark orange shirts in 1923/24 on recommendation from a referee who’d ref’d Holland v Belgium (apparently!) ......and seemingly when they score at home the PA system plays Dave Clark’s “Glad All Over” (not sure I believe that!) ................ Oh, and they won the Anglo-Italian Cup in 1971 (remember that?), topping the “English Group” and beating Bologna (who topped the “Italian Group”) 2-1 in the Final.............

With relegation came departures, and ten left in the summer, most of whom you’ll probably never had heard of, and all of whom were released or given free transfers, except for GK Colin Doyle, whom they sold to Bratfud for £1.00 – well, he is Irish :rolleyes: ....................... Eleven arrived, all for free except Armand Gnanduillet, who came from Leyton Orient for £undisclosed; among the freebies were GKs Sam Slocombe from Oxford and Dean Lyness from Burton, defenders Andy Taylor from Walsall, Kelvin Mellor from Plymouth and York’s Eddie Nolan, MFs Colin Daniel from the Valiants and Jack Payne – no longer band-leading, sadly :o – from The Posh, plus strikers Kyle Vassell (also Posh, but maybe not quite as Posh) and Jamille Matt (from nine Jamiles up the Coast at Fleetwood :D:D)

Their League wins have been at home against Exeter (23rd) 2-0 and Pompey (4th) 3-1, and away at Yeovil (18th) 3-0; their away form (league only) is one win (Yeovil), two draws (Barnet and Crewe, each in a half-Desmond) and three losses - Morecambe (2-1), Colchester (3-2) and Crawley (1-0) - 5 points from six games .............. Leading goal scorers are the afore-mentioned Gnanduillet and Vassell (which sounds like a very dodgy firm of Private Detectives) with 3 each, and MF Brad Potts with 4 ............and they’re out of the EFL Cup (having beaten Bolton 4-2 in Round One they lost 2-0 at Palace in Round Two) ....... and they’ve got 3 points in the EFLTroffy, beating Cheltenham 2-1 but losing 1-0 at Bolton – so their progress depends on them beating Everton u21s (u23s?)

We beat them on pens after a 4-4 draw in Round Two of the PaintyThingy in 2006/07, I’m reminded, and we’ve played them in friendlies (and not-so-friendlies), but we’ve never met in the League, apparently, so it’s all to play for!

Deadline for entries is, as always, scheduled kick-off time, which is 3.00pm on Saturday 15th October ................They haven’t got Sir Stanley any more (I saw him play once at Maine Road in the very early 60s – and I saw Billy Liddell as well!) – and Sir Stanley has the (almost unique) distinction of being one of the only two footballers my wife’s ever heard of, the other being Bert Trautmann), nor have they got players of the like of Armfield, Ball et al, but they do have Tom Aldred ............. is there a team in League Two that doesn’t have any of our ex players? And we’ve got more points than them ............So there! :p:p:p

Good luck to everyone! :) .......... Keep the Faith! :) ........ And thanks for playing! :)

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