Bye bye Bluebirds - The Last Post

What makes a football club a football club? This is a serious question about identity - not an examination of what a football club does. I have supported Cardiff City all my life - since my dad took me to my first game some time in the 1960s. So that's nearly 50 years supporting Cardiff City, the Bluebirds. How serious have I been in this endeavour? I've never lived in Cardiff, yet have had a season ticket for at least 2 of those years, I have gone to about an average of ten away games a season, sometimes more, sometimes less, travelling all over the country to godforsaken towns to watch Cardiff get beaten in the pouring rain. I have been a member of the Cardiff City Supporters Club, a member of the 1927 Club and of the Cardiff City Trust. I have watched Cardiff City in all sorts of situations - from being third from bottom of the old 4th division away at Kidderminster, to a Wembley FA Cup Final. I even had a regular column in "The Thin Blue Line" Cardiff City fanzine for 13 years. I've bought scarves, shirts, footballs, mugs, badges and key rings, and countless programmes. What a waste of time? What a waste of money? I don't really think so - they gave me great pleasure over the years, and I have made a number of friends and generally enjoyed this strange masochistic pass time or obsession or whatever you want to call it.

But it really seems to be all over. The Bluebirds seem to have gone and have been replaced by the Dragons. Yes, it seems from next season Cardiff City will become the Cardiff Dragons. The name is different, the nickname is different, the ground is different, the kit is different - actually the only thing that's still the same is the city of location - Cardiff (for the moment?). There is some continuity with a few ex-Bluebird players - Marshall, McNaughton, Hudson, Whittingham and Bellamy - but with the manager (it has been announced today) being given an extra £25m if Cardiff Dragons get promoted for new players, this won't last long (with probably only the last two of these remaining). There are many (the majority it seems) prepared to put up with all this for the sake of success as defined by promotion to the premiership. My dad (90 this year) is happy because he can see them on TV instead of having to go to games, others (many relatively new supporters) happy that they can get to watch the likes of Manchester United, Chelsea, Arsenal and Stoke at the "Cardiff City Stadium" - I presume to be renamed to the "Dragon's Lair" or the "Malaysia Stadium" or the "Vincent Tan Arena" or something.

But for many - around 20-25% of supporters as Vincent Tan, Cardiff's owner, admitted today - it just isn't their club any more. It isn't just a "rebrand", as Tan calls it, it's a much deeper change than that, because a football club isn't just a "brand", and supporting a football team is more than "brand loyalty". This kind of reminds me of Maynards wine gums. What? Stay with me, there's a point here. About 10 or 15 years ago they changed - but it wasn't the brand that changed - Maynards had already been bought out by another sweet firm (Rowntrees? Maybe, I don't know), but they kept the "Brand". The packets look the same, the logo's still the same, the shape and the colour of the wine gums is the same. So what's different? The flavour - they don't taste the same. Which is kind of the main thing about food. Now some people stuck with Maynards wine gums - but many real, hard core Maynards wine gums fans (I should probably say "addicts") knew things just weren't the same. The new wine gums were ok, quite a pleasant sweet chewy confectionary - but they weren't the same as they used to be. So (like 20-25% of other wine gum lovers I'd guess) I stopped eating them. They weren't my wine gums any more.

So that's it with the the new Cardiff Dragons. The fundamental thing has changed - the taste has gone. Cardiff City has had a range of unpleasant owners over the last 10 years or so - not least Sam Hammam and Peter Ridsdale. But no one has done what Tan has done. Tan has succeeded in making Hammam look reasonable. (Well, nearly). Hammam had all sorts of weird and sometimes ambitious ideas for making Cardiff "Bigger than Barcelona", but he thought he could do that whilst the club retained its core identity. He listened to some fans, and even cosied up to some of the "hard" elements that he liked to identify with. He has a huge ego and for a time believed that he could become the saviour of Cardiff City, "the Man Who Made Cardiff Bigger Than Barcelona", a hero. Tan isn't interested in that. He doesn't want to be a hero because in his eyes he is one already. After all he's a billionaire, and if you don't agree with him you can fuck off. Everyone around him tells him how wonderful he is, he doesn't need  the adulation of Cardiff fans. He simply wants "Vincent Tan FC" - he wants to choose the identity, and then have the club's success directly reflect his glory. He wants Vincent Tan to be bigger than Barcelona - no screw that Vincent tan is already bigger than barcelona in his mind, so he wants a club that reflects that. Hammam starts to look like an amateur in the game of egomania.

Whatever.   So what's left then is "Vincent Tan's Dragons". Very little to do with the club formerly known as Cardiff City, the Bluebirds. Tan doesn't care, it isn't important. What;'s important is success and money. Fans? Who are they? 75% will keep coming, so fuck the rest of the idiots who are "misguided young people" like 54 year old me. It's sad but I think it's all over. RIP Cardiff City - thanks for the memories.

I don't much like red

With thanks and acknowledgements to Peter Haswell

"Don't mess with me..."

Biscuit Boy

Very strange behaviour by my step daughter's father. He has a new girlfriend apparently, and whilst she was spending some time with him, he told my step daughter that the new girlfriend was coming on holiday with them to Spain. My step daughter objected to this, and after a lot of rows he decided to bring her back to Montpellier rather than give in. He clearly had told the new girlfriend everything would be ok, and (as usual) he refused to back down. I think he has some severe problems with ever admitting he is wrong, and our experience is he deludes himself into believing he is always right and everyone is conspiring against him. Especially my wife, and by extension, me. Past insane actions include deliberately forcing me and my step daughter to miss a train back home from Paris, refusing to hand her over to me in Paris, calling the police in the UK when my father in law died to say his daughter was missing, lying in court about that (and other things), making endless complaints to the french police about my wife when his daughter has refused to visit him (can you blame her?) ... And so on. Anyway, this time he brought her back to Montpellier airport, refusing to communicate with us, but sending messages via my step daughter that they would be arriving at 9.05 this morning. Oh yeah, and adding the bizarre and not completely sane demand that I "wasn't allowed" to be at the airport. Sorry? No really, he truly believes he is entitled to issue these orders. O course we ignored this nonsense and I went with my wife and our dog to the airport to pick my step daughter up. I decided it was sensible to stay in the background in order not to provoke him, yet he saw me there, and came up to me and said "Don't cross me, biscuit boy, or you'll fucking regret it". Now I'm sure this must have sounded great when he rehearsed this in his head, but, frankly, it just sounded completely bonkers. "biscuit boy"? - what was he on about. I've done some Internet research on this assuming that it had some meaning I wasn't aware of, but the only references I can find relate to a no longer living reggae musician, a band formed by Paul Heaton, and an urban dictionary definition which says it is a slang term for a "teenage pill popper". Somebody who likes to take a lot of "disco biscuits". Any way I look at it, it is rather a shit insult, and to be honest, I quite like it as a nickname - after all, like most people, I like the odd hobnob.

What a strange man!

Shearer says no, thousands celebrate. Then he does a nazi salute...

I suppose it could get worse, we could appoint Paulo di Canio.

Nooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo!

No to Shearer

I have generally been ignoring all the talk about different names being put forward as the next Cardiff City manager. Like many others, I was glad to see the back of Dave Jones, who had clearly done as much as he could do, who, despite the resources and team he had, could get us no further than the play-offs - whilst down the road the Jacks showed us how it's done. No star-fucking celeb signings with big egos - just good football played by well coached players. And Alan Tate.

Anyway, I figured all the talk of Martin O'Neill, Chris Hughton, Malkay Mackay, Billy Davies et al would soon peter out, and someone or other this week would be appointed. Never in my wildest dreams did I even think of the name "Shearer". Fucking Alan Shearer - Jesus that's all we need. A man who has shown he has no deep understanding of football each week on TV, a man who managed a team for eight games - how many did they win? - just the one, and got relegated. A man who hates our hero Bellamy, a man whose experience is as an England star, and is not loved - nor even liked or admired - by the welsh public.

You couldn't choose anyone more likely to piss people off. So here's what I'm hoping - it is all some elaborate joke dreamt up by some Swansea fans with media influence, and a Proper manager gets appointed this week. Shearer - god no, not him. My cat could do a better job. At least he's got a name the fans like: Earnie.

Earnie looking out of the window - hoping it's not Alan Shearer he sees coming up the road.

Meanwhile back in the atelier...

I have managed to complete two paintings (Just like buses, you wait for one then two come along). Well actually what happened was I had left a painting I was unhappy with last week and started something new. This led me to re-examine the first painting, change it - a lot. The end result is two paintings completed at roughly the same time.

Here they are:

This one is called "Porte des Remparts" - it depicts the eastern entrance into the medieval village of Les Matelles.

This one is "Ancien Chemin du Triadou" - which is the street my atelier is on, and this is the view looking out of my front door.

These two are more painterly than recent paintings, but I am quite happy with them both.

Smashing iPhone

Well, smashing a FAKE iPhone to get my money back from PayPal.



Bizarrely I have discovered there is an entire YouTube genre on destroying iPhones. People are weird.

Virtual Art Gallery

Take a look:
http://3dvas.com/galleries/gallery.php?ex=3266

Cool?

Silly names

I think it is time to come up with a team made up with silly names. For no reason at all other than I've got a headache. Obviously I should start from a Cardiff City perspective, and obviously that means my team has to have Billy Woof up front. Unfortunately, City is pretty short of other silly names in its history - and believe me I've checked. I have found T. Witts from a 1913 team, who I guess will have to go on the bench because I don't know what his position was but others with silly names aren't as good as some others I've found:

Andre Muff - Swiss striker (a bit of a diver, allegedly)
Johnny Moustache - Seychelles player who clearly wants to be a city manager in the future
Two Boys Gladstone Gumede - South African footballer
Bongo Christ - from the Congo
Danny Boffin - genius Belgian footballer
Ars Bandeet - Algerian (can't be real but it is)
Norman Conquest - Aussie keeper (better than Peter Zois)
Harry Daft - who played for England
Steve Death - Who I remember seeing in goal for Reading
Hilario - hilarious Chelsea keeper
Stefan Kuntz - less hilarious German
Yapi Yapo - Nantes player



and of course, David Ginola.

Try running that through an anagram software programme....

New employment reform proposals threaten workers' rights

According to reports in the Daily Mail and the Telegraph, Prime Minister David Cameron and Business Secretary Vince Cable are due to announce fundamental reforms today to the employment tribunal system today. Whilst the details remain unclear, the article asserts the following reforms are proposed:-

• a fee to lodge a claim. The Daily Mail states this is believed to be £500, other sources suggest a fee of one week's pay
• compulsory mediation for all tribunal claims
• increase in unfair dismissal qualifying period from one year to two years
• employment judges to sit alone (presumably meaning in all cases, not just the jurisdictions where they currently can/do)

They will also introduce an Employer's Charter, which will remind employers of their 'rights', such as the right to ask an employee to take annual leave at a time that suits the business, the right to ask staff to take a pay cut and the right to dismiss poorly performing staff.

RedBubble - Artists' site profiting from genocide

See http://matelles-art.blogspot.com/2011/01/more-redbubble-hijinks-they-are-nazi.html

for the full story.