Spare A Thought For TUAFC1

Ant was OK about it, but I would have not been to pleased If it happened to me. The club arranged it and Ant was not given any good reason, still, as I said another day will be arranged.

Just be grateful I did not not use a more headline grabbing thread title.

Like sponsored player snubs his sponsor or

Sponsor finds himself all alone.

Its a forum its news get over it.

Having worked with them myself, and only having a conversation on the subject with a club director last Saturday; that's typical of footballers I'm afraid.

Nothing sinister, but they get so self focussed on the game and their own performance they often forget the simplest instructions/arrangements and this applies on the field as well as off it.

I well remember one legendary player of the seventies who came into the office and and asked if we had a record of the address of the house he had just bought but had "forgotten it"!

No I agree Dave, but believe me we're not talking about normal people here. I deal with many people who are so self focussed (sportsmen, musicians, media stars) they (and I refer to players here, not other club employees) just don't function like you or I..............not ALL of them but many- believe me!

It may be that the club has taken steps to rectify this to the sponsors satisfaction......or that Roscoe had a perfectly valid reason for his oversight. If this is the case then fair enough. However, if he did not and I was connected to the club I would make sure the sponsor was treated to a slap up Plainmoor experience (if that is possible in the current climate) at the player's expense. In fact, if the player had any kind of self respect he'd sort this out personally - and for all I know he may well have done exactly this.

Similar things happened under the Bateson regime and he was rightly accused of taking fans for granted. In the current climate, with 1500 of us going through the turnstile we should be given lifts home by players! I agree that some players, even at our level, are precious, egotistical and self consumed, but that is no excuse whatsoever. The reason that some players get like this is because they are allowed to get away with their various misdemeanors. If action is taken, I would put money on Roscoe not missing the next meeting with his sponsor.

The caveat to all of the above is that I do not know the facts so the whole post may be completely unjustified on Roscoe and the correct action may have already been taken - I hope so, because Roscoe actually looked the best I have seen him on Thursday night. Still much improvement needed though.

On a more general point, and as I have said before, Buckle and us fans will learn a lot more about the players over the first month or so of the season than ever before. Maybe this is an example of Roscoe not being bothered when the chips are down.......maybe it is not. Additionally, if the rumours about Nicholson are true then the player needs to take a good look at himself. He waddled his overweight frame around for the second half of last season without the slightest competition for his place. Now the going gets tough and he appears to have thrown his toys out of the pram. Again, all based on hearsay and rumour and probably totally unfair on a player who could well be spending his Saturday night coaching under privileged kids and delivering harvest festival food packs to the elderly.

Having watched a small number of last season's away games in the company of the non playing travelling players, I can vouch that Darren was a "big Man" in a young body - he always took time to chat to my kids and as he, Hilly and Beds were rarely selected it was good to meet up and chat with them periodically.

There was never any sour grapes or negativity from many of them, just positivity of just what contribution they could make to the cause both in training and on away days - to coin a phrase of Hilly's "we've done our bit for the week, next week starts on Monday and who knows....................."

Hilly was just the same today in front of less than 200 speccies at Fisher and even though they (Dorchester) got a four - nil trouncing he was professional to the end. We chatted afterwards in the club house and he is coming to terms with a return to "normal life" - getting up early to work for his brother and training in the evenings and travelling all over the South of England for games.

He began as one of the central midfield for Dorchester today and was then pushed up front as a striker, could have bagged a hat trick and ended up with nish..................missed a sitter, hit the bar and saw a trademark flashing, hanging header go inches wide.

We were royally looked after by a Fisher, a really small club with no ground of their own, no money and a team of local teenagers - they even offered us a buckshee pasta meal with the players!

If anyone wants to go "fishing" (pun intended) for genuine raw talent, this is the place (although a certain Wesley Thomas scorer of a brace today is already on his way to another club tonight- follow that up in the NLP although you read it here first) as five of their nearly successful squad last season signed for Football League clubs before this season began!

Manager Wayne Burnett encourages them to play their way out of trouble from the back and sitting there in the main stand pint in hand with a warm breeze wafting over us was a real pleasure!

I think we'll be seeking Hilly out at Welling next Saturday!

PS "Romford" eventually surfaced at Braintree Town today and he caught up with another former Gull, but I'll leave him to tell you all about that together with some pics no doubt!