A glowing endorsement from jacmac

After reading one of your recent issues (via a Google Alert) I applied for registration with Vital Football and have read through your informative welcoming message. I applied because, for the first time, I was able to read civilized intelligent opinions from contributors – without spelling mistakes, blasphemy or downright gutter language. I believe you are the website that I have been looking for.

As an introduction, I suppose I am an old fogey – a supporter of Blackburn Rovers since God (I hope that’s not blasphemous) knows when – I used to attend at Ewood Park with my father when I was about 5 years old, crawling under the turnstile of “A” stand, and have been a shareholder since 1936 when my father bought for me the shares that had been held by an uncle who had just died. (I don’t have enough shares to outvote the Venkys). My father was co-founder along with a Mr Haslam, of the Blackburn Rovers Supporters Club and my uncle Jack Caton was Chairman of the Rovers for several years. I attended the last match of the Rovers (at Villa Park) at which we were able to drag Aston Villa down with us – so that we were the last two clubs of the original Football League to be relegated from what ultimately became the Premier League. I was also over in England to watch that last exciting week when we became the only club apart from the big boys to be Premier League champions (I am now resident in Canada) and I would have been at Wembley in 1960 when the Rovers reached the Cup Final and when I was living in Australia. Fortunately, seeing that we were clobbered 3-0, I didn’t go – mainly because my wife was pregnant and we needed to finance a structural addition to our house. I also attended, with my father, the 1940 Cup Final (renamed the War Cup if I remember correctly) at Wembley, which was memorable for the fact that the crowd was limited to 40,000 because of the possibility of air raids, and a significant number of the spectators were dressed in hospital blue, being wounded soldiers rescued from Dunkirk.

With this sort of pedigree, I am sad about the current state of the game in the UK – especially as it affects clubs such as the Rovers – and am glad to be able to read some rational, non-abusive, relevant comment.

John McLeod (jacmac)

P.S. I am not a betting man, but I checked today the odds offered for a bet on relegation from the Premier League. For the Rovers it is 7-2. Given the current turmoil at Ewood, I think that, by Christmas, these might be seen as attractive odds.