December 2008 Archives

WITH a temporary lull in the bizarre off-field activities at the club over the Christmas period, it's been nice to concentrate on just watching the football with the games coming thick and fast.

And in a reversal of fortune when compared with recent seasons, it has been successful football on Chester's part - or at least it was until yesterday's defeat at Macclesfield. The change in management appears to be paying dividends and, all of a sudden, the team looks highly motivated and competitive.

Watching a vibrant Bradford City side kept at bay in front of 12,000 of their own fans was refreshing, especially on the back of the early season capitulations at Dagenham and Rotherham.

It's important for Chester to produce some of their own players through youth development, so to see Kelly and Roberts prove themselves in this game (with a bit of help from Danby and Linwood!) was a joy to behold for the 200-odd in the away end.

The victory over Accrington Stanley was by no means a perfect performance, but it was a vast improvement on earlier in the season when you feel City would have contrived to draw or even lose the game.

Mark Wright insisted in his programme notes that he is already looking forward to next season. A few more wins and he will have the luxury of mid-table security, an achievement within touching distance now but which appeared a million miles away not long ago.

Following Chester City is sometimes like a well thought-out panto. Sometimes, you might argue, it's like a tragedy or, if you were to be unkind, a farce. But at this point in the season, with the Christmas season in full swing, surely it's a panto.

Especially with none other than recent villain of the fans, John Batchelor, and his persistence in trying to buy the club put up for sale by Stephen Vaughan.

And Batchelor's vision of a TV fictional team playing at the Deva stadium in an attempt to make the club profitable and sponsor-friendly has not gone down well. "Boo!" "Hiss!" shout the fans, as an undeterred Batchelor nonetheless makes his way to witness the home game against Notts County from within the stadium.

"I'm going to buy this club," says the resilient Batchelor.
"Oh, no he isn't!", shouts Stephen Vaughan from the director's box.
"Oh, yes I will," retorts Batchelor. "We've met on a number of occasions regarding the sale of this club."
"Oh, no we haven't."
"Oh, yes we have."
"Oh, no we haven't."

And so forth.

Meanwhile, a group of overseas investors, led by former City player David Jones, stand outside the stadium, looking puzzled, and shuffle their feet despondently as they walk away from making their own club buyout bid.

They, sadly, have not been entertained. Whether they actually attempted to make a genuine bid or if they really had the financial clout to run a club such as Chester City isn't so relevant now, but their fan-friendly ideas on how they'd run the club were commendable, and made for a more savoury vision of the future than the Dream Team idea.

Because fans are an integral part of the club, and indeed every football league team. That's why it's so gratifying to see City's attendance swell by more than 150 with a visit from children and parents of AFC Waverton (and they picked a good match to go to- a rare convincing home win!). Initiatives like that make the club more popular, and it doesn't take too much time, effort or money if dealt with correctly.

Another bit of positive publicity was generated when ITV reporter 'The Gloryhunter' briefly supported this club as part of his season-long tactic of supporting whichever league team wins the match at the ground he attends. He had been a supporter of Darlington until Chester unexpectedly earned a hard-fought 2-1 win there.

Sadly, his journey with Chester did not last long, as City lost the next game to Bournemouth, but his brief period of gloryhunting at Chester did result in him producing a couple of video blogs on his website (external link).

These videos were largely complimentary affairs and he was able to meet more committed followers of the Blues than him. All good stuff, and can only help raise the profile of the club. Particularly when it's still on the market...

The win at Darlington was as welcome as it was surprising.

After a game against Aldershot where it appeared as though City could have played all day and night without scoring, an early Darlo goal seemed to signal inevitable defeat.

But for the 50 Chester fans who made the midweek trip to the North East, an unforeseen comeback was around the corner. It's probably too early too judge whether the new manager was truly behind this change in fortune. Could Chester have come from one down to lead, and then hold that lead for 40 minutes under Simon Davies?

Possibly, in a one off game. The upcoming fixtures against fellow strugglers Bournemouth, Notts County and Accrington will give a clearer picture of the extent to which Wright's formula, which brought mostly good results across his first two spells at the club, is being successfully implemented this time around.

Certainly in these games, Chester won't want to be conceding any last minute winners, as the Chester City darts team managed to do in losing 6-5 to Bolton this week. Just like the football team, the darts team have been eliminated from the cup and are now left to concentrate on the league for the rest of the season.

It's been another fascinating week for Chester City, and as usual, the main interest comes from off-pitch matters.

Since Stephen Vaughan slapped a £2m price tag on the club (which by my maths makes it worth about one million Woolworths companies plus one million Honda F1 teams), one interested party has attracted more attention than any other.

Step forward John Batchelor, a man who this week has struck terror into the hearts of all City fans with his frank comments on how he'd run the club. You can read them here in the Chronicle interview (not for the faint of heart).

Doesn't exactly come across as very endearing to the fans, does he? Deep down, beneath my disbelief at the concept of trying to resurrect a Sky TV series which ended last year and erect a real-life Harchester Utd, I admire his brutal honesty, if little else.

Just to detach from him admitting he doesn't "give a monkey's about" Chester City's 120 years of heritage, the idea of Harchester Utd seems flawed to say the least.

OK, there are 27,000 registered 'fans' of the Sky TV series 'Dream Team', but that will not correlate to 27,000 fans of a real-life Harchester Utd.

A recent motor racing concept called Superleague saw teams drive around with liveries of football teams including Liverpool, Tottenham Hotspurs, AC Milan and Rangers, but the grandstands at the tracks they raced on (including the season-opener in British track Donington) were practically empty, because supporters of these clubs didn't much care for the idea of supporting a car which had their team's logo on, and a driver they'd probably never heard of.

I used to watch a cartoon on CITV called The Hurricanes, but would I have supported a real-life football team called that, if they played anywhere up to 600 miles away? No!

And what of the Harchester Utd football team? A look at their (fictional) history says they fought relegation (hm, maybe this club isn't so different after all), qualifying for the Champions League (ah, that's different), and being found guilty of match-fixing and corruption and therefore being demoted a division.

Oh, and then to finish off, an explosion at the club killed many of the players.

I think Chester City's history has enough drama already, thanks.

Stephen Vaughan met Batchelor earlier this week, then said in an interview "under no circumstances would he sell" to him, adding Vaughan had "more chance of taking over at Liverpool than he (Batchelor) has of taking over here," much to the relief of City fans.

Batchelor remains undeterred, but given his ideas and his...questionable past with previous ownership/interest in football clubs (a number of Stockport, Mansfield and York City fans have unmistakable views on what they think of Batchelor), it seems unlikely the 'Dream Team' will be playing at the Deva Stadium anytime soon.