BfB

Before the last game at Valley Parade everything seemed good for Peter Taylor and his Bradford City team.

The team had beaten impressive Bury to record back to back wins and Taylor had turned down an offer from Newcastle United. Indeed at half time in the in the Barnet game few would have predicted what the next two and a half games would bring: Nothing at all. Three straight defeats and barely a shot worthy of the name.

As has been perceptively pointed out there has been a shift in attitudes, where we wanted to win at any cost, now we merely want to be entertained. Not on Brazil 1970 level, but perhaps something better than the Bradford Park Avenue 1970 stuff that is being dished up at the moment. Was the Bury game really only a few weeks ago? At times it appears that we have lost all sense of perspective, but then I remember that prior to the heady days of two wins from two games we were hardly steamrollering League Two.

The odds on a chant of ‘we want football’ echoing around Valley Parade on Saturday are undoubtedly shorter than those available for a convincing home win. However, something really has changed. This is not just the usual knee jerk reaction to a defeat, or rather defeats. This is fundamental stuff and I’m not sure Peter Taylor can come back from it. The usual escape route is via couple of victories. Football being the way it is suddenly Peter Taylor would be carried shoulder high down Manningham Lane. But he wouldn’t. A lot more than three football matches have been lost. Stir in faith, hope and even respect. If this is a troubled marriage, then one of the partners has just woken up and shouted ‘I want more than this’.

The ‘more’ not being merely three scrambled points. We want a bit of football; we want to be mildly entertained. If we can’t manage a bit of football then I’m sure we would accept a bit of blood and thunder commitment. Just a bit. We know we cannot suddenly become the Arsenal of League Two overnight – or even the Crewe of the bottom half of League Two. However, during our plunge from the Premier League to League Two the club had, somehow, managed to retain its self-respect. Under the previous manager, whose name I dare not utter, we had hope (however false) and a commitment to playing attacking football (however vain). With our large crowds and pioneering cheap season ticket deals (now being blamed in some quarters as ‘the problem’) we had a sense of vibrancy and purpose. Moral superiority even over the money obsessed game. Now as we grub around with our joyless style of football we are endanger of losing it all.

Fast forward twelve months. City are playing fast attacking passing football. We are surely happy? That’s what we wanted wasn’t it? Rewind to 1983. Jack Tordoff was being shaken by the hand and thanked for saving the club from closure. We were just happy to have a football club. In 1986 he was the man who oversaw the rebuilding of Valley Parade. Before the same decade was out he stopped taking his children to Valley Parade as he didn’t want them to hear chants of ‘resign you c**t’ booming from the Kop.

So remember as we yearn for just a little football that, as in many other aspects of life, once we have it we will always want for a little more. It’s been said frequently that, in the wake of our financial implosion brought on by appalling judgements taken during our Premier League sojourn, our fans do not want City to be a Premier League club again. The Championship is our ultimate goal. I would give it one season in the Championship before eyes were cast to the glittering cash cow of the Premier League.

I moved from ‘just a little football’ to the Premier League in three sentences. There lies the problem. Football, it does that kind of thing to you.

So to Burton Albion’s visit in which Jon McLaughlin is expected to retain his place in goal, Lenny Pidgeley revealing via Twitter that his absence might have been the result of illness not poor form saying “Head feels like babe ruth has put 1 over my canister, slugged my swede out the park 4 a home run!!!”

The back for of Richard Eckersley, Shane Duff, Luke Oliver and Robbie Threllfall seems set in stone for a time with Taylor pointing out after the Aldershot game that the problem is scoring goals, not defending, and so charged with that James Hanson is expected to be partnered with Gareth Evans in a two or Evans and Omar Daley in a three. The midfield has more problems with Lee Bullock out for a month joining Tommy Doherty in the treatment room. Tom Adeyemi, David Syers and Luke O’Brien could make a three although Taylor has said that Michael Flynn may be considered.