Judi Online - The renegade striker who complained of toothache in December and was never seen again all season.
The goalkeeper who played in an autographed shirt because the kitman had been sacked and no new jersey could be found.
The players suffering from cramp before half-time because they’d had no pre-season.
The dedicated professionals literally begging to leave to revive their careers.
The owner who had the statue of a club legend taken down and placed in a shed.
The supporters who became so enraged they invaded the pitch and forced an abandonment.
And
the former England captain so upset by the chaos at his beloved club
that the hurt in his eyes convinced the manager to resign.
Lee Clark spent just six months as Blackpool manager - but he could fill a book with the anecdotes from their Championship relegation campaign.
Clark, who resigned two weeks ago,
is a rare modern footballing man - a lifelong Newcastle United fan,
with genuine concern for the way supporters feel increasingly
disconnected from their clubs.
He said: “I’ll probably always
side with supporters because I’m one of them. Players, managers and
owners come and go but fans stay, it’s passed down from grandparents and
great-grandparents.
“Nowadays players are often in a bubble,
they don’t know the man in the street, they don’t understand how
football affects supporters’ lives. Knowing all that is why Blackpool
hurt so much.
“I’ve always tried to have a relationship with
supporters but I got labelled as a good friend of the Blackpool
chairman, who was backing what he was doing, when I wasn’t.
"I didn’t fall out with him, in fact he asked me to stay, but I’d wanted to do a job for the supporters.”
Clark
took the job in late October with Blackpool rock-bottom and after
relegation was sealed, the festering resentment towards chairman Karl
Oyston reached toxic levels when a supporters’ pitch protest forced the abandonment of the home game against Huddersfield.
Clark admitted: “I think 99.9 per cent of people thought I shouldn’t
take the job – but managers need an ego and I thought I could be the
miracle worker.
“I did the due diligence, but I soon realised all
those people warning me off were being proved right. I’d done due
diligence but nothing prepares you for the reality.”
The striker in question was former Newcastle bad-lad Nile Ranger.
Clark
explained: “Nile is an extremely talented footballer, with many issues
away from football – in December, I told him he wouldn’t be in the squad
against Birmingham, he said he was injured and didn’t train that day,
then he had toothache and we didn’t see him again.
Bandar Bola - “Nile was getting paid, then fined every day he didn’t turn up. My advice was for the club not to take up the option of another season for him but they have done.”
Ranger was one of many players signed in desperation before the start of the season, as Blackpool struggled to field a team.
Former Huddersfield and Birmingham boss Clark said: “In my first
game, I had players with fatigue - one going down with cramp before
half-time; they’d had no pre-season.
“They brought in a
bucket-load of players at the last minute. It looked like they’d
recruited players who thought ‘This our last choice, so we’ll sign for
Blackpool’.
“In January, I had disenchanted players - good pros - begging me to leave to further their careers.
“There was always a negative story. The kitman left and the keeper, Joe Lewis, had to play in a signed jersey because we couldn’t find another. Even the pitch was an embarrassment.
“The atmosphere between the fans and chairman was so intense and it only became worse.
“They
had intelligence that the supporters were planning a protest around the
Stan Mortensen statue, then it was gone. Before the Huddersfield game,
we knew a bigger than normal protest was planned.
“I’d had
regular sitdowns with Jimmy Armfield, talking about the club’s great old
days but I saw him while the referee and match commander were trying to
decide whether we would go back on the pitch and could see the hurt in
Jimmy’s eyes.
"That really hit me hard. That probably made my decision to leave.
“To
achieve anything, all a club’s main stakeholders need to pull in the
same direction. Hopefully that can happen at Blackpool – somehow I don’t
think it will.”
Some of Clark’s empathy with Blackpool fans tally with his own
feelings about Mike Ashley’s Newcastle regime – but he believes there
are major differences.
He said: “A lot of people have told me
there are similarities between Newcastle and Blackpool, but Mike Ashley
presides over one of the best run clubs in the Premier League, judged on
sound businesses principles alone - though in football that isn’t
always possible.
“That football club dictates people’s lives in
Newcastle, they will spend their last penny to go to the match. People
say their expectations are too high, delusions of grandeur, but they
just want a team that mirrors their passion.
“When I played under Kevin Keegan, he totally understood that. From what Mike Ashley said before the West Ham game, he accepts having exciting players and playing the Geordie way goes with the territory.
“It
would be my dream to manage the club. People ask John Carver how he
could take the job with the owner not spending, but if you’re a Geordie
and you turn down being Newcastle manager, you’ll regret it for life.
“Having
a relegation on my CV hurts but it hasn’t knocked my confidence. In
hindsight, I regret taking the Blackpool job – but it will help in the
future.”
