Blue Moon: Down Among The Dead Men With Manchester City Page 4

  This season has been typical, painfully typical. Pundits foretold that they would storm through the division, scoffing at the cloggers at their heels, chuckling in their laser blue. City fans remained silent. They know that Maine Road is Heartbreak Hotel, or, better still, Bates Motel, a place where the strange is commonplace.

  Among their supporters, nothing is taken for granted. Too often City feels like the kind of place where cursed skulls are tossed around like frisbees and black cats are culled on a weekly basis. If City lined up against the Red Lion Second XI they would create 47 goalscoring chances, miss them all and concede a goal, an own goal at that, in the 90th minute.

  A month into the new season, they have played five league matches, won two, drawn two and lost one, which, sad to say, is patently not the form of league champions elect. They beat Walsall with ease on Wednesday night, but they are still only in eighth position. In short, it is not going to be a stroll, but more of a brisk walk with a stone in your hiking boots.

  Once more, a litany of fiendish ironies has beset them: different division, same curse. They lost heavily against Fulham, so thousands decided to sit-out the next match against Notts County – admittedly it was in the Worthington Cup – when they went on a goal frenzy and won 7–1. Seven-bloody-one, and two thirds of City’s following missed it. Fists were pounded on tables, ornaments hurled across the room.

  Never mind, they cried, for another home game loomed, against Wrexham, just three days later. Oh, such fun; poxy Wrexham, a team containing Ian Rush, the only player in the league older than the Queen Mother. This was a case for the League Against Cruel Sports, a lurcher let loose in a hen coop. Dutifully, 27,677 skipped merrily to Moss Side, calculators in their rucksacks. Oh, such pain – a 0–0 draw. Now we know why Ken Barnes from Ashton-under-Lyne sent the club a photo of himself by the Wailing Wall in Jerusalem for inclusion in the match programme. Move along Ken, there are another 27,676 jostling for space.

  Perhaps the proposed move to a new £90 million stadium in east Manchester will allow City to rid themselves of their famous ill-luck. Fans have been asked to vote on the move, pencilled in for 2003. Club officials have already declared their support. ‘I believe this is a unique opportunity for the club as we go into the 21st century,’ said David Bernstein. He strenuously denied that the stadium’s site was chosen merely because a four-leafed clover had been discovered in a nearby field.

  Since the departure of Georgi Kinkladze, City fans have become restless in their pursuit of a new hero. Their rush to deify young players such as Nicky Weaver, Gary Mason and Nick Fenton is rash, and inadvertently reveals their desperation. ‘I got my first glimpse of not one, but two raw youngsters who are going to make the whole of English soccer sit up and take notice,’ sang Paul Hince of the Manchester Evening News. Steady on, haven’t we been here before?

  Three years ago, Martin Phillips, then 19, joined City from Exeter City. ‘He will become Britain’s first £10 million player,’ said Alan Ball, the City manager at the time. In the week that Fenton, Mason, et al, were prematurely acclaimed, Phillips, quietly, was sold to Portsmouth. The fee? Just £100,000, one per cent of the amount predicted by Ball. The teenagers in the present City side are promising, but they need time to gel as a team. Great players emerge from good teams, and good teams take time and patience to build. Joe Mercer would have confirmed as much.

  Monday, 7 September 1998

  Gerard Wiekens, City’s Dutch defender, revealed that a reunion with his dog, Joey, might have been behind his return to form. The golden retriever had been in quarantine for six months in Crewe where Wiekens had travelled to see him four times a week. ‘I don’t know if it affected my football but I do know I’d have felt a whole lot better if I’d had Joey with me,’ he said.

  Tuesday, 8 September 1998

  Manchester City 2 Bournemouth 1

  Danny Allsopp, making his full début, scored a headed goal before half-time. Steven Fletcher equalised for Bournemouth before Paul Dickov scored his fourth of the season.

  City legend Colin Bell was introduced to the crowd who as told he had returned formally to the club in an ambassadorial role.

  Friday, 11 September 1998

  A survey conducted by the club revealed that supporters were overwhelmingly in favour of a move away from Maine Road. A Manchester Evening News phone poll among supporters was four-to-one in favour of the switch. ‘I am delighted that the response has been so positive. The new stadium is a very exciting development,’ said David Bernstein.

  MUIR THE MERRIER FOR STORMY 30-YEAR AFFAIR

  (The Times, Saturday, 12 September 1998)

  A family portrait, of sorts. The camera homes in. Faces are picked out from the grainy monochrome. Middle row, centre: middle-aged man, suit, glasses, benign expression. Front row, far right: stocky, fair-haired sportsman, steely, ‘up-for-it’ look. At this point, the film director spatters blood over the picture and we recognise the code: family at war; along this way will pass hostility and cruelty.

  The photograph, a team shot of Manchester City taken in 1969, hangs in the living room of Chris Muir’s home. Muir, now aged 69, is in the photograph. He is the man in glasses and the fair-haired man is Francis Lee. ‘Do you know what is unusual about this photograph?’ he asks. He embarks upon a story about the silverware placed conspicuously in the foreground. He is, of course, missing the point. What is unusual is that it depicts a football club with the capacity to make the rise and fall of the Roman Empire seem like a toga party that turned nasty.

  Muir was a director of Manchester City for nearly 30 years. He has a silver salver to commemorate the fact. A war medal might have been more apt. ‘I can tell you a few stories,’ he begins. And he can. A theme will soon fall into place – of manipulation, betrayal, egotism, vanity, rashness, bloody-mindedness. ‘All this stuff that’s happening at United [the ill-fated takeover bid by Rupert Murdoch’s BSkyB]. It’s been part of football for years. It’s just that the stakes have got higher and the media profile so much greater.’ Indeed, in the week that United are valued at £623 million, City have an overdraft of £10 million.

  United. Always United. For Muir, and indeed City, they were there in the beginning, there at the end. ‘When I first came to Manchester from Scotland, everyone told me United were the greatest football club in the world. I was a rebel looking for a cause. I found it at City.’ Born in Leith, his work in the stationery business brought him to Manchester and, in the early ’60s, he was attracted by the sullied charm of City as they withered beneath the bloom of United. He formed a pressure group designed to oust the old guard at the helm. ‘They were very old-fashioned, a group of freemasons who had fallen behind the times,’ he says.

  Back then, City’s share issue ran to just 2,000 and Muir started to buy as many as possible. Most were kept as quasi souvenirs by fans, tucked away in cupboards and shoe boxes. ‘I have a nice smile and a pleasant Scottish accent. They thought if I was mad enough to buy them, I must have the club’s interest at heart.’ He became an agent provocateur, goading supporters to campaign against the board. In his own grand terms, he was a ‘swordsman of the revolution’ and, such was his drive, sentiment did not impede his progress. He probably knew, even then, that one day he too would be put to the sword.

  In 1967, he duly became a director. Joe Mercer and Malcolm Allison were two years into their managerial reign and the club was entering a successful era. ‘If ever two people needed each other, it was those two. Malcolm was the man of a thousand ideas, many of them born from fantasy, but some were sheer genius. Joe had the ability to pick out the gems,’ he says.

  Muir was the Mr Fix-It. He fixed it for the club lottery to make noteworthy profits and he oversaw the youth policy. His brief also ran to the unusual: remonstrating with a player who thought it was a good idea to urinate over the side of the open-top bus as they paraded the League Cup in 1970; explaining to office staff why a member of the coaching team required numerous guest tickets for young, attractive girl
s. He will put a name to a story, but he would rather it did not appear in print. He is discreet, a wheeler-dealer of the old school. He says that in and around the club there were ‘phenomenal womanisers, bloody lunatics – all manner of life’.

  In the early ’70s, another power struggle saw Muir briefly lose his position. He formed an alliance with Peter Swales, then the chairman of non-league Altrincham. The public image of Swales was later cruelly lampooned – small man, crimson complexion, hair intricately weaved to conceal an obvious baldness. Muir saw him as ‘a man who could lead City to greatness’. He admired the tact, the sleight of hand, the charm and the cunning of Swales. He was a master of well-placed gossip, a schemer, always out for the best deal. Whether this was for City or himself, well – ‘that was a matter of opinion, but he had the blue blood of City in his veins,’ Muir avers.

  Swales became chairman in 1973 and reappointed Allison during the close season of 1979. He wanted the magic of old, but the ‘Hold on, pal’ discernment of Joe Mercer was missing and Allison’s ego, along with City’s spending – most of it ridiculously speculative – went awry. ‘Swales was trying to keep up with Manchester United. Whenever Allison wanted a player, Swales found the money.’ Although City enjoyed qualified success, they began to trail United by some distance and Swales, as the club’s figurehead, was blamed.

  In September 1993 Francis Lee led a consortium determined to seize power. ‘He appeared at Maine Road and was seen as the knight in shining armour,’ says Muir. The ensuing battle was fierce and dirty. ‘Oh Christ, it was savage,’ recalls Muir. ‘They were throwing things at Swales’s house, shouting abuse at his 80-year-old mother. I think it had a serious effect on his health.’ Swales resigned as chairman in November 1993 and was replaced by Lee three months later. Muir, inevitably, was asked immediately by Lee to leave the board. ‘I was completely shattered and heartbroken.’

  Sitting underneath that infamous photograph now, Muir looks across at the silver salver. It seems rather small and insignificant. ‘No, at least it’s some kind of recognition. It’s a memento of a large part of my life, half of my life.’ Beneath the glasses, there is still a twinkle in his dark eyes. It might have been a bloody and breathless life in football, but it was – make no mistake – also fun, a life lived to the brim.

  Saturday, 12 September 1998

  Macclesfield Town 0 Manchester City 1

  A record league crowd of 6,381 at Moss Rose witnessed City’s first ever visit in a competitive match. Just three years previously, five divisions had separated the clubs when City were in the FA Premiership and Macclesfield the Vauxhall Conference League.

  As expected, in the days leading up to the match, the media made great play of the difference between the two clubs. Tickets proved extremely scarce and many City supporters had queued in the early hours when they went on sale three weeks earlier. One die-hard waited from before midnight until 9 a.m. when the ticket office opened.

  Shaun Goater scored in the 87th minute. It was the first time City had won three consecutive league games since February 1997.

  Wednesday, 16 September 1998

  Derby County 1 Manchester City 1

  (Worthington Cup Second Round, First Leg)

  Derby County took an early lead through Rory Delap but Danny Tiatto pounced on a rebound from a free kick to equalise. Jamie Pollock, returning after a one-match ban, was sent off again after an off-the-ball incident with Francesco Baiano. He was suspended once more, this time for four matches. A week earlier, Royle had been pushing Pollock’s case for inclusion in the full England squad. ‘When I look at some of the players in England’s squad, some of them have no more natural talent than Jamie,’ he said.

  FALLEN BENEATH THEIR DIGNITY

  (The Times, Saturday, 19 September 1998)

  Posters for church galas and village fêtes were still affixed to trees and gate-posts throughout Cheshire. Occasionally the sun found a splinter of space between the clouds and set the rain on fire, but more usually the air was cold, thick, heavy and sluggish.

  The summer had dallied a while, but had now finally departed, the rain washing away the detail of the posters. Cars clogged the roads through Macclesfield. Engine fumes drifted across puddles made fluorescent by car headlights.

  Inside their cars, Manchester City supporters had an irksome accompaniment to their afternoon in the heart of darkness. Radio phone-ins were singing the song of Manchester United. The words formed a mantra: success, money, ambition, profit, as if anyone needed reminding. Suddenly, a City supporter was given air-time as he shouted into his mobile phone. ‘I tell you what,’ he told the presenter. ‘There’s plenty of pubs in Macclesfield, there’s one on every corner.’

  They skittered out from these pubs, zipped up their anoraks, dodged the rain, and made their way to Moss Rose, the home of Macclesfield Town. Many had parked their cars in farmers’ fields, the mud already ankle deep. A few years ago, City fans referred to matches against Oldham Athletic as ‘donkey derbies’; this was beyond such a sobriquet, beyond a joke. David Bettany, the chairman of Macclesfield’s supporters’ club, had earlier volunteered the understatement: ‘This is going to be a massive culture shock for City and their fans.’ And some.

  City were supplied with just 1,600 tickets, and such is their masochistic streak that many were bartering for more on the streets around the ground. Inside the club office, Harry Armstrong, a director, was patiently issuing complimentary tickets. The bundle was getting thinner, the queue at the window thicker. A City fan pushed his way through and jabbed his mate in the ribs. ‘Look, you could just reach over and grab them, couldn’t you?’ He kept repeating this to himself, thinking aloud, unable to believe that a football club could be so naïve, so trusting. Next time he visits, there will be reinforced glass across the office.

  With a certain inevitably, my ticket was missing. Harry wrote me a note which I was to show to the person in my seat. In fact, there was no one sitting in it, just a puddle of water. The steward, resolutely uninterested, pointed vaguely towards the soaked seat and watched to see if I was stupid enough to sit directly beneath a leaking stand.

  On the terraces, supporters mixed freely. It is widely accepted that Macclesfield contains more Manchester City supporters than followers of its own home-town club, so the support was roughly divided into two equal halves. The game’s historical significance, which had been proclaimed to the point of numbness beforehand, was lost in the downpour. The grave business of trying (but failing) to stay warm and dry on uncovered terracing tended to wash away any sense of disbelief that this game was actually taking place.

  Moss Rose, though it might be a fond home to a certain sector of the Cheshire sporting public, is a place from where only misanthropists would want to send a ‘Wish You Were Here’ postcard. While some lower league grounds are neat and quaint with a certain pleasing symmetry, Moss Rose fits perfectly into the Heart of Darkness theme. Admittedly, it’s not quite the Belgian Congo, but it has a distinctly portside feel with its squat, angular stands dotted around randomly like broken teeth; grey portable caravans; matchstick pylons; seats covered by billowing canvas roofs – City will have left the engine running on the team coach.

  A football club, of course, is fundamentally about its people, not its architecture. Macclesfield fans were granted a long, long time to prepare their big-match repartee. In fact, they have waited a lifetime, and a forebear’s lifetime, to play City on an equal footing. Under the circumstances, then, we might have expected a better standard of insult. ‘Shitty City!’ shouted one. His friends roared. Paul Dickov, City’s diminutive striker, was caught off-side and let fly a disgusting volley of swear words to the referee’s assistant. ‘Hey, Dickov, stand up, we can’t see you!’ responded a middle-aged man who was himself of no great stature. The same man, round-shouldered and hunched, spent the rest of the game chunnering in the rain. ‘City . . . ’ he bellowed, ‘You’re crap.’ More riotous laughter.

  At least the programme editors were
subtle in their mockery. ‘You did not have to support Man City to appreciate the skills of Ball, Lee, Summerbee and Colin Bell,’ read the introductory notes. Bell, Lee and Summerbee, are, indeed, bona fide City legends, but Ball? There has never, in the club’s 104-year history, been a first-team player with the surname of Ball. There was, however, in more recent times, a chap fond of combining flat caps and track suits, a certain Alan Ball, who was briefly a manager at Maine Road. His ‘skills’ are still the subject of much discussion in many parts of the north-west.

  The game was as wretched as the slow soak of dampness through your clothes or the ache of pushing your car through squelchy, clinging mud in some cut-up farmer’s field. City won, just, and there was a hearty cheer, but as the City fans trudged from the terraces at the end, many will have muttered: ‘We won’t be coming to a place like this again.’ Whether their team secure promotion or not, they should remain true to their word. Sometimes, it’s a question of dignity.

  Saturday, 19 September 1998

  Manchester City 1 Chesterfield 1

  David Reeves scored for the visitors before Lee Bradbury, the subject of much transfer speculation, equalised. Thereafter, stand-in goalkeeper Andy Leaning frustrated City with several excellent saves. Chesterfield’s Jamie Hewlett was sent off for handling the ball on the goal-line. Leaning saved Shaun Goater’s penalty.

  After the match, Joe Royle said he was looking for another striker to bolster the attack: ‘We have got to be more clinical up front.’

  Wednesday, 23 September 1998

  Manchester City 0 Derby County 1

  (Worthington Cup Second Round, Second Leg)

  A deflected shot by Paulo Wanchope settled a closely fought cup tie. Steve McClaren, Derby County’s coach, said afterwards that he had been impressed by City and had put a £50 bet on them to gain automatic promotion. Later in the season, McClaren left Derby to become Alex Ferguson’s assistant at Manchester United.