It takes me quite a bit these days to get so incensed or passionate by something to want to write about it. Sorry if this comes across as incoherent rambling, but if I say everything that's been pissing me off today then maybe I'll feel better, and for reading all this you might feel worse (which secretly makes me feel even better).
From the outside it might seem easy to point to one single issue at the moment as to why I'm letting my fingers let out a lot of rage, but the fact is that there are many issues and I think these past few days have been the tipping point.
Where to start? How about the stuff on the pitch?
This rant is not just about yesterday. Yesterday was shit, and it's never nice to get beaten by United but I've seen us lose to United plenty of times before. Having said that, I've never seen a poorer United team and as one of my mate's said, there's been plenty of times in the last few years where you've seen them play and thought 'De Gea is keeping them in this', but they could have had either Andy Goram's in goal and and it wouldn't have made any difference.
Yesterday was typical of the season we've had so far. We've not turned up at all against any of the clubs doing well this season and we've looked the complete opposite of how we started this season and ended last season. Yeah sure there have been injuries to key players, something which Arsenal and United have both had to deal with. But gone is the reliability of a lot of players. Aguero won the player of the year award last year because of being the league's top scorer, but I think it's hard to argue that since his dip in form in the Autumn of 2013, Joe Hart has been our most consistent and reliable performer. Especially in the big games.
When we won the title in 2012 we had a first 16 that were reliable and relatively fresh. Since then we've given Kompany more centre half pairings than calf injuries, we've played Silva and Yaya constantly without a sufficient break and we've gone from Tevez to Bony.
A question I asked a fair few times last night before I sloped off home was; do we overrate our players? Ask many and they'll tell you that Fernandinho has been the best player in the team this season. And although I'm not disagreeing with that as such, is he really the best in the league in his position? Sagna too has had a great season after few and far between performances last year, but when Zabaleta has been fit we've looked a lot more dangerous attacking wise.
And the players we don't rate; Otamendi, Mangala, Fernando for example - are they really as bad as we think? These three have been the long term replacements for Kolo Toure, Lescott and Barry/de Jong (arguably Garcia, who was sold as soon as he looked half decent). Since we won the title in 2014 I can only think of a handful of great performances from the team and individuals. And what does that tell you?
The manager.
Now I still feel uncomfortable and maybe a bit ashamed that I see so many people saying some really bad things about Manuel. I know people scoff at "well Chappy thinks he's a nice guy" or whatever, but the fact is he's just a football manager who is massively out of his depth and out of ideas. That shouldn't mean that you hate the guy or wish death upon him. It's not like he's the bloke in La Rosa takeaway on Great Ancoats Street who takes the chips out too early despite me telling him every fucking time that I like my chips crispy. No but seriously, no one cannot deny that Pellegrini has massively over stayed his welcome and he should resign/be sacked but I couldn't bring myself to hate him. This club has only ever won the league 4 times and he was there during one of these times, no matter how much you could now argue that we won it in spite of him.
He's lost it. Properly. I think the turning point for a lot of people including myself was Burnley away last season. But I gave him a second chance as we ended the season well and got off to a flyer. I was stood in the away end at Stoke a few months ago luckily only 2-0 and the combination of the cold air, my hangover and the Brittania playing "You're my Waterloo" by The Libertines at half time made it hit me once again. What are we doing with this guy? He's not got us organised and we seem to be absolutely shitting it every time the opposition go forward and there's not enough creativity when attacking.
I can't really think of ever feeling this way about a manager of City. I backed Pearce and Hughes right til the end. But this guy has been a caretaker manager for three years. No City player has improved in the time he has been here. Pep has got a proper job on his hands next year. And if you think there's any correlation between the announcement of the new manager and our form then you're wrong. We've been shite for 18 months, take away about 10 games.
Is he solely to blame? Of course not. Fair thing to say that some of the investment into the team hasn't been the best, with the aforementioned poorer players looking like huge amounts of money squandered - but is that down to the manager's coaching? The decision to sell Negredo, Dzeko and Jovetic within a calender year and only replace them with Bony is staggering when you think about it. We actually paid more for Bonehead than any of the three other strikers that fired us to the title 2 years ago. The club from the top seem to view this season getting through to the quarter finals of the Champions League as a great success. Semi's will be a good achievement, no doubt, but it doesn't stop the fact that despite some bad luck in groups and draws we've hugely under performed in Europe.
Which brings me on to the 2nd half of this rant. Ticket prices.
I've written before about City and the Champions League and how we didn't really "get" it. Well whether I get it now or not I want to win it as it's the only thing left for us this season. One of the issues I touched on was the empty seats at games. City not selling out home games is topic of much joy for people throughout the social media wank world. I see people I know who support other clubs mocking ours or other teams support. "Haha look at Stoke, they only took 1,300 to X" Barold McMongathon likes this post and also comments on it saying "shit club, shit fans". I can't even be arsed going in to these twattish shenanigans.
This time last year I was working in Trafford Park and I had to drive past Old Trafford every day. I turned right off Chester Road and used to drive past a school. You're in a proper red area here and anyone who went to that school is well in their rights to support United. But I can only imagine how many of these kids will ever get to go to a live game watching their club. Not many I would think until they were over 18.
This is happening all over the country. A sport which has it's traditions in working class areas of England is no longer affordable. This isn't new news. It's been like this for years. But it has been getting worse.
But then there's a reason to celebrate. The Premier League has enforced a cap on away tickets to £30. Great news. Especially for someone like me without the greatest income who goes to at least 15 away games per season. You're seeing it everywhere now as well that clubs are either freezing season ticket prices or making reductions. The penny must have finally dropped at all the clubs.
Silence from City. The richest club in the world, no longer bound by FFP restrictions, famous for having to give away tickets for some games, are staying silent.
They have a great opportunity to show us what we can expect from next years prices by publishing the Champions League quarter final prices. And they don't only drop a bollock, they kick you in the bollocks first. We can't be expecting it to be £10 to get in for such a big game, and yeah I have paid £60 to watch us play at Stamford Bridge and The Emirates more than once in the past few years, but £40 being the cheapest adult ticket for a game which might not mean anything is so out of touch with the fanbase.
Better wordsmiths than me have already written articles about how City should remember that Manchester is one of the most deprived areas of the country and that's bang on. There's a lot of people a lot worse off out there than myself as far as income goes but I'm getting to the point now where I can't really justify it. City do so much in so many areas of the club but they've done nothing for years to try and maintain the culture and traditions of City fans. What does an emotional video of Kinkladze and Colin Bell to dramatic music before kick off mean when the stadium is full of people who don't even know where Claremont Road is?
City have not let us down on replacing this current clown with a much greater manager. They cannot let us down by squeezing us harder financially before August rolls round.
Anyone reading this that knows me knows that I have had two major passions in my life; football and music. For 10 months a year I have a plan for every weekend. I know what I'm doing. I know how much money I can spend during the week and as you despairingly clock watch throughout the early stages of the week, you know you have something to look forward to. I saw plenty of people comment in April saying that they just wanted the season to be over for the year, and "roll on August", feelings which I've probably said myself over the years. But the truth is, life is quite hard to adjust to when you haven't got football around in the summer. It's quite a hard feeling to describe, almost like having months of driving through a tunnel, but getting out of it and suddenly you haven't got a roof on your car either. That probably makes no sense, but it's how it feels to me.
People who don't really do football might find it hard to understand. After all, there is round the clock reports and updates about the most insignificant matters to do with football. And the summer months brings to social media and forums the worst sorts of people in the world - the transfer speculation pervs. I can't claim to not get a little bit excited at the potential signings, but it's more the impatience of people when these signings aren't done straight away which annoys me. Fast food culture, instant gratification society etc. you know what I mean. Also, the constant use of the word "fraud" to the point that I think it's lost all meaning now.
So without football, I rely on music to give me something to look forward to in the summer months. I went to quite a lot of good out door gigs last summer, but there's not been as many announced this year by the bands that I like. A few weeks ago I noticed that The Libertines were playing a gig in Dublin, so I and a few friends booked flights to go out there and see them. I saw The Libertines last summer at their Hyde Park gig, and I'd gone to Dublin last summer for an Arctic Monkeys gig - so I knew that I'd probably enjoy the combination this time round.
I was quite late to the party with The Libertines. As said in a past blog (http://liamwright1987.blogspot.co.uk/2014/12/my-generation-nu-metal-forgotten.html) I spent my teen years listening to the heavier aspect of rock music, and I wasn't interested at all in the era when they were releasing their only two albums to date. Although in that said blog I went into what appealed to me so much about that type of music, it's worth factoring in that a lot of the bands that I grew up listening to from being a young child weren't doing anything particularly great. Oasis and Blur in 2000 weren't the same band of 1995, and all the British bands that were in their place like Travis and Stereophonics never really appealed to me. I'd say the first song that brought my tastes back to British rock music after only listening to American metal for four or five years was "Cutt Off" by Kasabian. By the time I started university in 2006, I was really into the indie scene in the UK. But again, apart from a few tracks, I never really got into The Libertines for reasons I can't seem to put my finger on. Anyway, I finally got onto Up The Bracket and their self titled album a little while later and realised that they were and are the best band to come from the UK since the turn of the century. Songs which flirt between energy and beauty whilst all the time well thought out lyrics sung by two vocalists that perfectly compliment each other.
Their music is one thing of course, but it's the dynamic of the band which a lot of people find so fascinating. Pete Doherty is probably the last great rock star we've produced. Being a great rock star isn't just about writing great music and being a tortured soul, heroin addict; it's about being effortlessly cool too. Yeah, since he's stopped the smack he's put on a bit of timber and isn't looking as fresh as he was a decade a go, but he's still such a presence on stage. Earlier today I watched a 2006 interview with Pete on the Jonathan Ross show, he seemed deeply sad about how at that point nobody in the band wanted to speak to him at the time due to his drug addiction. The Libertines definitely had unfinished business and I can't imagine anyone being disappointed when they first got back together for the Reading/Leeds weekend in 2010.
Dublin is a great place, if not a little bit expensive. When travelling around Europe watching City I try to avoid going to the Irish Bars in the different cities we go to as it's not a real experience of the place you're visiting. I think with this in my mind, I've been put off the idea of Irish Bars, however, in Dublin these are obviously just bars, and a lot better than The Jimmy McMahon Shamrock in Rome, or whatever. Good weather always helps too. We landed on the Thursday at about 10 and got some breakfast down us before getting on a full session of Guinness. I think throughout the day we probably went to about 10 bars before getting to the gig, so we had a decent walk around.
Living inside the M60 gives you a distorted opinion on the size of the band who were supporting The Libertines on Thursday; The Courteeners. Have a conversation with a 22 year old in 42's about The Courteeners and I'm sure they will tell you all about how they're the greatest band out there at the moment, that Liam Fray is a great lyricist and their gigs are the most mental experiences ever because people let flares off. Everyone is entitled to their opinion when it comes to music as it is a very personal experience, but I don't get the appeal of this band (perhaps because I never had a job as a paper boy?) and judging by the amount of people in the arena to see them when they played their set, I don't think they've taken Ireland by storm yet. I think the last chord of their first song had just finished by the time I decided it was time to go back to the bar for more refreshments before the main event.
The set The Libertines played was spot on. They played a good mixture of singles, album tracks, new songs coming from their album set to be released in September and the odd b-side. The chemistry on stage between Pete and Carl is still something that you don't get with any other band that I've seen. The variation in their song writing gives you so many different emotions too. Playing the anthemic, sing-a-longs of "What Katie Did" and "Music When The Lights Go Out" back to back to ending their set with an incredible encore of the more punky songs, "Up The Bracket" "What A Waster" and "I Get Along" was a pure manic adrenaline rush in a mosh pit of sweat and Beamish. My personal highlight was "The Good Old Days". Leaving the gig in this euphoria made me and my friends continue to sing "I Get Along" down the street as we walked back into central Dublin. Nothing in life can quite compare to that feeling of the ball hitting the back of the net, away from home, with your mates, celebrating wildly. But what I experienced on Thursday night came close.
It's a shame really that the state of the British music scene is that bad that we're relying on bands from a decade ago to write and release music that is relevant. As long as I've been alive we've not had a drought of talent like this for so long. But I hope that a band like The Libertines releasing this new album can get young people in this country to write exciting rock n roll again, because we are long overdue something like The Libertines.
I've thought about this topic quite a bit over the past 18 months, and after reading Clive Martin in Vice recently talking about youth culture (or lack of it) in today's society, it made me think about my early teen years.
Before I begin, I should make it clear that I really do love British culture. It's a shame in a way that as I hit my teens there wasn't really anything going on of any note to latch on to in this country, whereas the U.S. did.
I always have and always will be into rock music. I remember being young and travelling in the passenger seat to football matches with my Dad listening to a Beatles best of tape. I remember my sister letting me listen to "Whatever" by Oasis and being blown away by it. There's probably not a lot of people my age who can say that they were at Knebworth for what was possibly the defining moment for British music post-1960's. Whilst other boys my age might have wanted a new bike I wanted to own Blur's Great Escape.
I've dabbled in other genre's throughout the years. I can't think of many people my age who were into music in their pre-teens who didn't know the majority of "2001" by Dr. Dre, and as I got older and started going out drinking at the weekends, there were plenty of upbeat dancey songs which became the wallpaper in becoming an adult. I've been to Ibiza plenty of times, I've been to EDC, I've been to Warehouse Project, I've been to Global Gathering. I still follow Deadmau5 on Twitter. But it's rock music which has always been the constant.
I can imagine when journalists from the British music press document the trends in music for young people in this country it tends to go: Stone Roses, Nirvana, Oasis, The Libertines, Arctic Monkeys. Every few years, a band's breakthrough effort would go from being nothing to all of a sudden being the biggest thing in the rock planet. Definitely Maybe signified the start of the Britpop era, as morbid as it sounds, timed to perfection after the suicide of Kurt Cobain, thus ended Grunge's time on top for the young people of Britain (despite Grunge's finest hour, Superunknown by Soundgarden being released a month before Cobain's death). Another Oasis album and death represents the end of Britpop; Be Here Now and Princess Diana. But I'm not going to bang on about this, but if you're interested and haven't seen it, I'd encourage watching this:
There's five years between Be Here Now and Up The Bracket. But no one ever seems to speak about the music which filled the void for the youth. It certainly wasn't Toploader, Savage Garden or similar radio friendly shite. We're now heading into the very late 90's and the new millennium. Around this time, more and more families were switching to Sky Digital. Only five years earlier, most families in the UK only had four channels. All of a sudden we had hundreds. There was now more options and music channels which catered for certain genres of music. Also there was more sport channels. Around this time, what was the WWF (now WWE) was experiencing a golden era. For someone like myself in my pre-teens in those days the macho, charismatic, aggressive action on display for two hours at a time was the highlight of your week. I have always enjoyed sportsmen with a bit about them, I think a lot of people do. I'd idolised footballers up until this moment. Now I had people like Steve Austin and The Rock using bad language, insulting people and providing televisual highs; highs I certainly weren't getting from watching City! Accompanying this weekly masculine soap opera was distorted guitars, heavy riffs and aggressive vocals. This, for a lot of young people in Britain was a first chance for our ears to hear metal.
The only way I had really heard of metal as a kid was Iron Maiden and thinking of old hairy men dressed up like bikers. Nu-Metal was different to real metal. There was not the emphasis on guitar solo's. You didn't have to have a ballad. It was OK not to wear leather and have long hair. You could have more than just the simple drums, bass and guitars in a song. It was fine to have a crossover of music styles and genre's. Considering the popularity of the collaborations of Run DMC/Aerosmith on, "Walk this way" and Beastie Boys/Kerry King on, "No sleep til Brooklyn" it's amazing that this hadn't happened a lot earlier. The artists knew that there was benefits to cross over. I'm sure those that liked Limp Bizkit probably gave DMX and Method Man a listen. I'm sure people who were a fan of Ice Cube wanted to hear how Korn and Chino Moreno would cover, "Wicked".
Of course Nu-Metal had already been around for a few years before it registered to us. At the same time as Definitely Maybe filled the Nirvana shape hole in the UK, Korn had been there for the kids in America releasing their self titled debut album. At my age we didn't have exposure to this style of music until MTV2 existed. The American bands of a heavier persuasion would have been covered by magazines like Kerrang! or Metal Hammer, but I, and I'm guessing a lot of others of my age had no idea of these mags. To be honest, I don't think I would have been ready for their heaviness yet. Korn were and are very successful. Their first album more than anything else they've ever done showed a Grunge influence (especially on tracks like "Predictable" and "Lies") but their bassist, Fieldy, gave them an almost funk sound amongst the heavy, downtuned guitars. It was unique, and lyrically Korn was more personal than anything Cobain had done. Jonathan Davis didn't really tip toe around subjects, as you can hear on "Daddy" or on the follow up album Life is Peachy with the song "Kill You". Nu-Metal was darker and heavier than Grunge, and clearly appealed to young people.
I see the time when Nu-Metal made itself known over in the UK as around the time between Limp Bizkit's albums Significant Other and Chocolate Starfish and the Hot Dog Flavoured Water. There really was a buzz about this band, and I felt like I had already heard of them before I heard them. During the summer of 2000 the biggest blockbuster film from Hollywood was Mission Impossible 2. The two lead songs accompanying this film were Metallica's, "I Disappear" and Limp Bizkit's, "Take a look around". Hearing music like this as a 12 year old was something else. I'd heard of Metallica before, but it was more in a negative way. They were seen as an 80's band who were a spent force (which was true) and Lars Ulrich was painted as a bit of a dick for standing up to Napster. Limp Bizkit on the other hand were something that I'd never heard. It's quite hard to describe them without quoting Ben Stiller on the outro to Chocolate Starfish.
But they did take elements of metal and hip-hop which made them irresistible to people like myself and hated by everyone else. Well not everyone else. The third single released on Chocolate Starfish is probably the worst song the band ever wrote (although I've never listened to anything post-Results May Vary and I'm possibly being too kind to "Head for the barricade") but "Rollin'" made it to number 1 in the UK chart. That's right, the biggest selling song in the UK was "Rollin'" by Limp Bizkit. Within a few months, the Nu-Metal bandwagon had gone from being on the outskirts of the British musical landscape to being the top seller. I know there's been a lot of shit that's topped the chart over the years, but no songs off the aforementioned albums by Stone Roses, Nirvana, Oasis, or The Libertines (Arctics did though). Add to this, Limp Bizkit put a gig on at The Bowl in Milton Keynes. Now, it's perhaps not Knebworth, but you've got to be achieving something pretty fucking special at the time to have the balls to put on a gig at The Bowl. I can think of only the Swedish House Mafia who have released such little material that could pull this off. Whereas the Swedes played MK and was a seminal moment for the house fans of the UK, Limp Bizkit had to pull out due to Fred Durst suffering a back injury. I was gutted at the time as it was only a week or so before the gig that they cancelled.
Another band, or should I say name, which was getting a bit of exposure in the UK was Marilyn Manson. He released the album Holywood in October 2000 and although I don't think you call his music Nu-Metal, his aggressive and dark style struck a chord with me. He was painted as the anti-Christ (superstar) due to his image and because there were a lot of fingers pointed at him in the aftermath of the Columbine High School shooting, as the two murderers that day were known to listen to Manson. His music wasn't like Limp Bizkit or Korn, but his own style would have no doubt influenced some of the Nu-Metal bands who maybe didn't hit the same heights as some but produced some quality albums and songs. He made songs that were rebellious and lyrics that you just wouldn't hear at a time where Britney Spears still polluted the charts; "I'm not a slave to a God that doesn't exist." His popularity increased further when he covered "Tainted Love", to the point of where even the trackie bottom tucked into white sock crowd even knew about it.
Following the success of Limp Bizkit and the exposure this style of music was getting, other bands such as Linkin Park and Papa Roach became very big, very quick. I loved Papa Roach. Infest was a bit more riff orientated than some of the other stuff around at the time. I can even remember a time when you might hear the song "Last Resort" on a night out, when they were playing the more rockier tunes (presumably between "All the small things" and "Basket Case"). I was never really into Linkin Park when they first came out as they seemed a little soft for me, but the album Hybrid Theory is possibly the defining album of it's era. With it's radio friendly sound and massive chorus' at a time when Nu-Metal was white hot, it's not really too surprising that this album has sold 27 million. Yes, that's 5 million more than (What's The Story) Morning Glory. Linkin Park are without doubt the most successful band from this era, but their debut album was probably the only true Nu-Metal album.
These three bands had a lot of kids at my school talking. And eventually as more and more people got into this style of music, people started to dress in a certain way. Every area of the country seems to have it's own term for people who were into this type of music and who dressed in a certain way. Round mine we were known as "grebo's". I have no idea where the phrase comes from, but it basically meant that you wore baggy jeans, had a (fake) silver chain going from your back pocket to your side pocket and usually wore a black tshirt and the most important piece of clothing; a band's hoodie. Glory days.
I can remember quite clearly Ozzfest in 2001 being set in my town of Milton Keynes. Me and two of my friends walked there. We didn't get in (despite the absolute lie we told people for years - sorry) but we stood near the entrance at The Bowl and listened to the band who blew my mind. Slipknot. I can still remember the first time I listened to their first album. I had heard "Wait & Bleed" on the TV quite a lot and really liked it. At that point I thought that this was really heavy. Then I listened to the album and what I considered to be heavy was changed. It had been released in 1999, but I had only heard it in 2001, months before they released Iowa, which for me is probably in my top 10 metal albums written. They had a certain mystique about them which evaporated the second you saw any of them without their masks on. There was something very intoxicating about their lyrics and aggression to a 13 year old. They're a band I still love to listen to now, and I have a lot of time for Corey Taylor. But for me Joey Jordison was a vital part of the group and I can't really imagine seeing them live without his drumming.
Another band who I have a lot of time for that played that day at Ozzfest were Mudvayne. They eventually evolved into quite an established metal band playing more radio-friendly songs, like "Happy". But for me, their album L.D. 50 is one of the great Nu-Metal albums. Similar to hearing Slipknot for the first time, hearing the song, "Dig" was up there. I still love this song, and I even associate it with a night out I had in 2010. They had the mystique of Slipknot too, with their face paint and fake names, and they had more depth to their sound. "Nothing to Gein" for example combines a lot more styles and sounds than the other bands at the more extreme side of Nu-Metal.
After Iowa was released, another band released one of the true great Nu-Metal albums. System of a Down's Toxicity. They were very Nu-Metal, although they sounded very unique. They almost had a bit of comical side to their songs too, which can be heard on the song "Bounce". Their previous self titled album was released two years earlier, and I think I'd maybe heard "Spiders" once or twice on MTV2, and although that song is great, it's not really a demonstration of the band. Toxicity produced three really popular singles; "Chop Suey", "Aerials" and "Toxicity". "Chop Suey" will forever be getting a great response on metal dancefloors with it's heavy verse and melodic sing-a-long chorus. Toxicity was the first album I can really recall listening to which had quite a political content. The opening track, "Prison Song" commented on issues I'd never even considered. I sorta went off S.O.A.D. because of the music being overly directed at George Bush in the coming years, which is something Green Day definitely cashed in on. I'll talk about politics now with anyone as an adult, but at 15 I weren't interested, and I'm not surprised that a load of politicians are nonces, as the lads who I went to school with who studied it were definitely the types. Either way, Toxicity was a great album.
I associate this album a lot with joining a new school and unfortunately it was released around the time of the September 11th attacks. Funnily enough, there's another song which reminds me of this time, "Shinobi vs Dragon Ninja" by Lost Prophets. I probably could write a bit about them, but Watkins being a sick bastard slightly puts me off giving them any credit. This brings me on to British bands which were successful in this era. They weren't. For some reason, we couldn't pull it off. Bands like Feeder, A, Hell is for Heroes and Hundred Reasons were packaged in HMV to be Nu-Metal, but they didn't have the edge or attitude compared to the Americans.
As always, due to the popularity of the genre the market gets over-flooded with a lot of average/dross bands that take the shine off a genre. Probably the last great Nu-Metal album released in it's era was The War of Art by American Head Charge. They had the weird sounds, possibly influenced by Manson, but overall had a very heavy sound combined with some magical melodic choruses. I saw them at Ozzfest 2002 and they were brilliant, one of the best sets I've seen. I can still see myself at school listening to "Song for the Suspect" and being blown away by it.
The Nu-Metal genre has a similarity to Britpop; as previously mentioned the band that started it with a great album ended the genre with somewhat of a let down (I say that although I fucking love Be Here Now and refute the claim that all the songs are too long). Korn released Untouchables and although "Here to Stay" was a great song, the album generally was pretty weak. Actually, some of the songs on it are absolute garbage. I'd quite happily never listen to "Hollow Life", "Alone I Break", "Beat it Upright" and "Wake Up Hate" ever again. The album was ridiculously hyped and they spent a lot of money on the production of it, so I guess we were expecting something really good and it didn't deliver.
The bands that had done alright out of Nu-Metal continued to do so albeit with an altered sound/image, whereas the industry were bored of the sound and what became popular was either a softer sound or a harder sound. Bands like Brand New, Taking Back Sunday, Funeral For A Friend, HIM got bigger after Nu-Metal ended, whereas people like myself who craved something heavier went for bands like Killswitch Engage, Chimaira, Lamb of God and Shadows Fall.
There is one band I've omitted from mentioning yet, and it's a case of saving the best til last. The one band who have time and after time released quality albums from the Nu-Metal era to the current day with constantly evolving whilst keeping a sound which is absolutely them is Deftones. Arguably the greatest Nu-Metal album is Around The Fur, released in 1997. This album is everything about that time and is a perfect representation of what Nu-Metal is all about. Similarly the follow up album White Pony is also one of the great Nu-Metal albums, "Passenger" in particular, featuring Tool's Maynard James Keenan, and "Change (In the House of Flies)" are both classic songs of the era.
They changed their sound as time went on, but occasionally released something which harked back to Nu-Metal, like "Mein" off Saturday Night Wrist. The album Diamond Eyes was so refreshing when it was released as it showed that there was still some great music being released by bands that I grew up listening to after Korn and Slipknot had released albums which could be called their weakest (Untouchables aside).
I saw Deftones play in Birmingham last February and they were excellent. Their last album Koi No Yokan is the last metal album I bought, and could probably find itself in my top albums I own. They're probably the only band of the era that I loved so much that I will rush out to purchase their latest offer. I usually buy Slipknot's album as soon as it comes out, but over a month later and I've still not got round to buying The Grey Chapter, although what I have heard of it sounds good.
The speed in which the Slipknot/Korn tour in early 2015 sold out is an indication that the era has a legacy, but one which rarely gets spoken of outside the world of metal, but it is still an important genre in the history of youth culture.
I've had a few brief looks across social media since Tuesday, and the none-footballing side of Manchester City seems to have been spoken about quite a lot over the past 48 hours by lots of different sets of supporters.
At around lunchtime on Wednesday I saw a tweet from Jamie Jackson, or it could have been Mark Ogden, one of the usual journalists which cannot hide their loyalties. One of the replies to this tweet which eluded to the -8,000 in the ground on Tuesday night was, "they have dreamt about this and now they can't be bothered." It got me thinking about City's relationship with the Champions League and possibly, football all together from a City fans perspective. I'm not claiming to be the voice of the fans, but this is just the way I see it...
"They have dreamt about this..."
Do you know what? I don't ever really recall "dreaming" of playing in the Champions League when growing up. I have been going to City since 1994 and had a season ticket since 1999. City weren't even in the Premier League in a lot of the time in these years, let alone in contention to qualify for the Champions League. Maybe it's my own ignorance to football outside of City which I keep to this day, but I can't really remember the Champions League being as big a thing when I was younger. I remember watching United win it, but to me, Sky didn't ram it down my throat until about 2003-04. Maybe that's because round then English football was beginning to be back at the top of the European game. Over the next few seasons we saw many huge battles between Chelsea and Liverpool and of course the latters famous night in Istanbul, Arsenal got to the final in Paris a year later, and over the next five seasons United only failed to make at least the semi's once, getting to the final three times, then the following year Chelsea won it.
But back to City. For so much of my life, Champions League football wasn't ever even a thought. There was no way we'd ever qualify, unless some billionaire pumped a load of money into of course, but how unlikely is that? The City around the time of the takeover in 2008 can be compared a lot to the club that Sunderland are today. Big ground, good fanbase, terribly mismanaged, millions squandered on journeymen, and go through managers and false dawns like you wouldn't believe. Also, after a few years of being a yo-yo club, they have had a good run of years in the top division. I'm sure if you asked a lot of Mackems, "what do you dream of?" the answer will be something a long the lines of, "six points against them bastards and a cup win." Because that's exactly how it was for me. As a Mancunian being brought up in a pathetic southern town full of them, I was, to misquote my favourite new Vine, "bantered off for 19 years with shithousery", which therefore entitles me to be a bitter blue. Growing up, I just wanted to be better than United and if we could win a cup then that would be incredible. The Champions League was never a thought.
Even when the takeover happened and we bought Robinho, I still didn't really think about the Champions League. I can remember Alan Green on 5Live chuckling at the thought of Manchester City in the Champions League. The knowing we had to be in it, and the wanting to qualify for it came around Spring 2010. I was really gutted when Tottenham beat us to 4th place that year. A year later, when we beat Tottenham to qualify for it, I was delighted and relieved in equal measure. You shouldn't take the jibes to heart, but looking back it would have been nothing short of a disgrace if that team in 2010/11 didn't get in the top four. I've had debates with people in the years that have passed that we could have won the league that year, but probably lacked self belief.
Getting away from my feelings on the Champions League in the years before we qualified for it, I think people/camelfaced dickheads need to remember a few things before they start preaching about empty seats. As previously said, I got my season ticket in 1999. It wasn't until 2006 that City got to the quarter finals of a cup competition. So for many years, you had your 38 league games, and without exaggerating, you probably had 4 cup games at most. 5 if we scraped a draw away at Villa (cheers Micah). All in all, about 42-44 games a season. And this was when City were category C for most clubs and football all round was a lot cheaper. Compare all this to how many games a season we have now, and how many times we're the category A game. Was over 50 last season, and probably will be the same going forward. I know people moan about it a lot, and I tend to keep quiet on the subject because I go to virtually every game every season regardless, but it really is shocking. At home to Sheffield Wednesday last week, I went in without having my tea and had a hot dog and chips. £6.50. Robbing bastards. And for me, one of the saddest things on this subject is when people deem the £43 that x are charging a fair price. I remember being horrified in 2006 when Wigan charged us £35. I can hear fans of other teams saying, "you're paying for the price of success" and perhaps we are, but the amount it's changed to be a regular at City is obviously going to have an effect on our fanbase. City are very fair on kids prices, and quite good on 18-21's. But there's a lot of blokes I've met over the years who are the same age as me, and they just don't go anymore, because it's too much money, and for someone who used to have a season ticket and go to 6 or 7 aways a season, they're now looking at two or three, as with everything else, travel and beer has gone up too.
I used to love the days when I was a kid and my Dad would take me to an away game, they're probably the best and most clear memories I have of my childhood. If (God forbid) I ever have children, I'd like to be able to ruin their lives, too. But by then, how much will it cost to watch your club? Probably best not thinking about it.
I have a lot of time for Garry Cook, but his idea to categorise each stand at City was nothing short of a blunder. The North Stand becoming a crèche was a mistake as far as atmosphere goes, and you always see empty seats there. The North Stand was fine as it was, but moving people who had been there since the move from Maine Road, and those that had sat with the same people in the Platt Lane was just not on, really. I'm not sure if it's still the same rules, but I'm pretty sure the there needs to be an under 16 within a group of 6 adults to sit in the North Stand. No wonder why we see empty seats there.
And of course, there's the constant discussion on the atmosphere. No one really knows the answer to this. I have attended meetings at City before discussing this topic. The club tried moving the away fans but didn't advertise the blocks which are usually taken by the away fans for people who want to sing. For me, the issue is the stadium itself. The noise doesn't travel well, and it would be a lot better if the tiers one and two were just one. There's times where the ground does get going, but it's not really enough.
I think it's fair to say that the group games are a bit of a damp squib anyway. The knockouts give a whole different edge to the game, and I'm sure if we had played Roma in the last 16 then we would have had a completely different experience to Tuesday night. We've got one point from two games, but there's nothing to say that we can't be going out to Rome in December with ten points and needing only a draw to take us through to the last 16.
Bit of a controversial one, but I also think the songs we sing must play a part too. Hear me out. Not the songs for individual players, because they're fine. But songs about the club. Blue Moon is a great terrace anthem, but I'd suggest it's strength is that it sounds great as being defiant when there's despair on the pitch. A lot of our songs are. "We never win at home and we never win away" for example, is a great song, and it's part of our culture. But our culture for so many of all our supporters life has been the ability to laugh at ourselves, to show that we're loyal to our club despite what's going on. We haven't got much beyond "Come on City" which you feel raises the expectation from the stands and has an effect on the players. You can tell I've spent a lot of time thinking to myself in a van this week, can't you?
I'm hoping that with time I and many others start to get and enjoy the Champions League. I've seen what winning it has meant to my mates who support other teams. But right now, it's just another cup competition which we seem to be shite at. Like the good old days.
I've been talking about doing a blog about this year for sometime, but I kept on losing my motivation once I had started... and it took about 4 or 5 sittings to actually get through it...
The reason why I want to write about a year in my life five years ago? Many to be honest. I look back on that year as a really great year of my life, and as a City fan it shouldn't be forgotten. When people talk about the dark days, they tend to write about 1995-1999, but for a younger generation, the most deflating season of watching City was during 2006-07. That's not to say that the contributors of King of the Kippax and City 'til I Cry didn't do a great job writing about the agony at the time. Probably all the better parts of the season had already happened as Big Ben struck midnight to signal a new year, but no one would have expected the excitement in the Autumn. I've discussed this blog with a few others recently, so you might get the occasional tale from Tom Matley (@OrtusUk) or Andy Green (@ag_mcfc). If you want the full, unedited version of my life events, you'll have to wait for my book (I'm not writing a book. Yet.)
So sit back, relax. Dig out your old Arctic Monkeys/Klaxons/We Are Scientists albums look at a picture of Beth Ditto, and remember how E4 completely over-hyped Skins...
The Manchester City of the mid-noughties were nothing like what we have become. For those not in the know, I'll try and sum it up as quickly as I can. We were underachieving for years, culminating in relegation in 1996. A lot of players came for the wages at a big club in a shit league and we got worse. 1999 started with our rise back into the top league, and although there were a few hiccups on the way, we started the 2003-04 season with a new stadium, new players and a new hope. We truly believed we could kick on from our 9th place finish in the previous season and qualify for Europe. We didn't. We were back being underachieving, players on high wages who didn't care. The soul of the club was left at Maine Road and the momentum of two successive promotions and the best football we had seen under Keegan had run out. Keegan wasted money on experienced players at the wrong end of their careers and Pearce was left to pick up the pieces.
Once we had sold off our most valued players (Anelka, Wright-Phillips) and the high-wage earners had either retired, moved on or just disappeared altogether (did Mills and McManaman ever play for anyone else after their contracts expired?) we were left to begin the 2006-07 with only Dunne and Distin as proven City players with talent. Vassell was injured, Barton was/is/forever shall be an accident waiting to happen, and then there was the likes of Ireland, Onouha and Richards who were still young and inexperienced. As strikers our options were Samaras (yes, and he was first fucking choice!), and the two new signings; returning Paul Dickov and Bernardo Corradi. Dickov must have been brought in as a mascot. Not that he was ever first choice in his first spell at City, but I can't see how his return was ever going to be a good idea. And as for Corradi; slow, really painfully slow, wasteful, didn't really seem to be a goal threat, ever. Good celebrations when he did score though. The rest of the squad was made up of never-really-done-its like Reyna, Sinclair, Jihai, Thatcher, Jordan as well as new signings that were clearly past it like Dabo. Didi Hamann was brought in, but I won't talk about him until a lot later on. And Joe Hart was bought, which is the only silver lining on what was otherwise the darkest cloud of a transfer window for many a year. Sorry, that wasn't a quick summing up.
So the clock struck midnight, and the year 2007 was upon us. I was at a shite house party in the middle of nowhere. Things were very different back then. People had just discovered Facebook, nobody knew what Twitter was, the music charts were full of Indie bands and people still wore blazers and jeans on a night out (not that I ever did). Also, and probably most shockingly, around this time in my life I didn't drink. Yes, me. Liam Wright. Being in my first year at Uni, I spent all the money I had on watching City - plus I didn't (and still don't) like drinking lager, fruity ciders weren't readily available yet and I probably wasn't brave enough to drink Guiness yet. My friends didn't mind it though, I suppose it's always good to have the designated driver. The first few hours of 2007 I spent driving around with my mate Matt as he tried to track down another house party where his girlfriend was. I can't remember what exactly happened but I ended up doing something to my car which made it difficult to drive. When I got up in the morning ready to go to the match (we had Everton at home) I didn't feel safe in it. I was knackered and I'd just seen us beat Sheffield United away and West Ham away, so I thought I'd give the game a miss. Little did I know that the two goals that Samaras scored that day, the first day of the new year, would be the last league goals I saw at City until August.
I too missed those goals scored by Samaras against Everton. I saw the New Year in down in Bow in East London with some old mates, and like Liam's car was something of a write-off on New Year's Day and in no shape to travel. If you'd have told me that they were the last league goals that City would have scored at home that season I probably would have called you some bad bad names. If I'd have actually known that they were the last goals we'd score at home it wouldn't have had any influence on my decision to miss the game. Things were getting pretty bad already by this point watching City.
After Stuart Pearce's first full season in charge of 05-06 ended with 9 defeats out of 10 in the league and bottling it massively against West Ham in the quarter final of the cup it seemed apparent there wasn't much to look forward to in 06-07, and so it was proving to be. John Wardle also seemed sick of it and was desperately seeking a buyer for the club. We'd had the Thatcher assault on Mendes, rumours of squabbles between the players, hammered 4-0 at Wigan, soundly beaten by United. No, the worm had turned here already and it was only going to get worse.
At the start of every season, if you support a bang-average side they'll tell you that their hopes and aspirations for the next 9 months are, "be safe with 40 points by the end of February and have a good cup run". At the time though, City were probably below average, so for me it was "avoid relegation" but if we'd had a good result, I may add the "good cup run" bit. Everyone likes a good cup run, don't they? Not that I'd ever really seen one. We had disgracefully been eliminated from the League Cup back in September (think about what YOU were doing during your freshers week) against Chesterfield (who went on to get relegated from League 1 that season) but the FA Cup gave us another crack at a cup competition. Another away game over the Pennines beckoned, this time away to Wednesday in my lovely new city of Sheffield. I ended up in the Wednesday end because I didn't think we would sell our 6,000 allocation so quickly. The match was a typical shite-Premiership team against a well motivated Championship team, and we came away with a draw. Probably a bit luckily. Nine days later we had the reply which we easily won, Barton back from suspension showed why he was in the England reckoning at the time. I still remain to this day that the Wednesday fans at our ground that night were the best I've seen.
I've never really ever travelled to more than a handful of away games most seasons but early rounds of the FA Cup were ones I always tried to do. I was at Ninian Park in January 1994 when Nathan Blake scored to beat us and I didn't think I was going to get out of Cardiff alive, I've seen David Brightwell snatch a late equaliser at Notts County, seen us get beat at Oldham, and did both Wednesday and Preston in 2007. We had a great day, starting in the social club where The Full Monty was filmed playing bingo with the pensioners, had a couple more in Sheffield, got well oiled and to be absolutely honest don't remember that much about the game except Samaras' penalty was well dodgy and just about squirted underneath the keeper. All I then really cared about was a few cans for the drive home over the Snake Pass (NOT ME DRIVING! Don't drink and drive kids – it's not cool).
Now. I don't want to get all Nick Hornby 'Fever Pitch' here, but there is something to be said about football sometimes reflecting particular phases of our lives, because if ever there was an omen for about just how shite the football was about to get at Eastlands, it was me getting home pissed after that Wednesday game and finding my girlfriend of eight years with her bags packed in the hall. It never rains, it pours. It was quite traumatic at the time (as these things tend to be) but perhaps the main reason I mention this is that alongside the quality of the football being served up, it might help to explain my decision to remain on the concourse for all but one (I think) of the remaining second halves City would play at home that season.
Our next home game was against Blackburn. This is the first instalment of absolute showers of shite I witnessed against these lot this season. I actually don't remember a lot about the game apart from it was a late kick off and despite it being January, it was warm in Sheffield that morning so I wore only a t-shirt and jumper. We lost 3-0 at home and the weather wasn't as kind to me. The last goal they scored will remain in my memory. One of their players went round City fan Stephen Jordan like he was a traffic cone and crossed the ball for a tap in. With Dunne and Distin, we didn't usually allow sloppy goals, but this was shite, and we were shite. The atmosphere was fucking atrocious and I swear half of the South Stand didn't even come back from half time. To add to this misery, I walked back to Piccadilly to find out that the trains were cancelled to Sheffield and therefore I had to wait for a bus replacement service. I stood their in the rain and cold for two hours waiting for this bus outside the front of Piccadilly. The warm glow of Subway was staring at me, but I didn't want to lose my place in the queue, as no one had any idea what time the bus was coming. I was hoping to go out with friends that night, but by the time the bus had gone to Sheffield (via Huddersfield) I was too cold and tired that I stayed in.
Not only half the South Stand not going back for the second half, but this was happening in all areas of the ground. I sit up in the 3rd tier of the East Stand, and I discovered at half time of the Blackburn game that there were literally scores of people who never bothered going back. Usually the same faces getting in a couple of pints before the bar shut and standing/sitting down there watching the game on the TV. And if I remember rightly, at this point City were still doing the “two pinters”. A two pint pot of the nastiest Fosters you will ever taste. Who could refuse that? Not me.
I remember that last goal. Matt Derbyshire. Waiting for the final whistle, watching on the TV screen, pissing it down outside. Horrible.
Its amazing what you remember, if I have indeed got the correct game, Andre Ooijer got a bad injury right in front of the SS. My Dad came with us and we’d had quite a bit to drink between us. This balloon sat near us started singing ‘Let him die’ to Ooijer and for some reason, a very sporting and thoughtful Alan Green took offence to this. Having a major argument with this guy for singing that about poor old Andre, who was receiving Oxygen at the time. Its funny, because I still see the guy he had that argument with at home games now. He’s a proper not right.
Up for the cup again, we had our 4th round tie against Southampton. They went 1 up and we came to win 3-1. A complete non event to be honest, again, probably shouldn't take for granted the goals we scored at home as the third was the last one of the season. Yep, the last home goal of the season on the 28th January. The next week, I will not say any words. Just watch this:
That just about sums up the season in a 4 minute clip. The atmosphere, the empty seats, the passion, the shite we had to witness. Eugh.
You tend to learn a lot about a club by the calibre of player they try to sign in the January transfer window. In 2011 we paid £27 million for Edin Dzeko. In 2007 we were close to landing Mido after being knocked back for Collins John and even didn't want to stretch to the £1.5 million MK Dons wanted for Izale McLeod. On free's we got Michael Ball and Emile Mpenza. I didn't know a lot about Mpenza, but I knew Ball was decent; although I wasn't expecting a lot more than what we already had in Thatcher.
Nil points on the road away to Portsmouth was followed by a return to the one thing keeping us sane; The FA Cup. I missed out on a ticket for Preston away, didn't have the loyalty points at the time. It should be noted that although watching City was pretty horrific, I was actually having a great time at Uni. Although I wasn't getting out of my mind every night, I did meet a lot of great people. And at the time I was very close with my mate Luke from home, who was living in Leeds. The weekend of the Preston game I had been up to see him and we were in a sports bar in Leeds watching it. Early on Ball marked his debut with a great strike, Nugent pulled it back for Preston before Samaras and then this goal from Ireland sealed it:
Its mad what you remember. Went on my own. Was sat on row 2 I think. Literally everybody in our end stood up except these wonkas behind me who wanted me to sit down because ‘my dad here has just had a heart attack’. Why are you bringing him here then I asked. Then some one legged bloke on the front row starts having a go at me, saying its people like me who ruin the game for him, because he can never see. Bizarre day.
So there we were, for the second time in my City supporting career we were in the quarter finals of the FA Cup.
Back to our awful league campaign. We played Wigan and Charlton in the space of a few days. Both teams were fucking shite. Caleb Folan, who scored against us during that horror show at Chesterfield scored again for Wigan to win 1-0. Charlton was 0-0. Which was better than the 1-0 loss at The Valley if I'm clutching at straws.
Back to cup. The City fans were up for this. The 7/8,000 tickets released were snapped up quickly. There's no chance we could see anything as gutless and painful as the home game six weeks ago, is there? In fact it was worse. I don't like to exaggerate, but this final 15-20 minutes of this game was up there with anything for me. When I hear people talk about the Michael Owen goal against us for United in the 4-3 being a painful memory, I laugh at it compared to this. At least that day we showed that we had something about us. The only thing I can try and compare it to is the scene in Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels when Eddy realises he's fucked the card game up. I left Ewood in a similar trance-like state wishing that the day had never happened. The atmosphere was that intense to the point that you couldn't help but feel drenched in hatred. Who or what I hated, I'm not sure. But I knew I hated something. It was like looking into oblivion. It's a moment I will never forget, which can only make the recent good times even sweeter.
I wasn’t convinced we would win, but I thought wed put up a good show. We were awful that day, absolutely gutless. I remember a few coming over at the end, getting only so far and thinking better of it. I remember being stood on my chair booing them, one of the only occasions I can recall doing so. Loads of City fans fighting one another after the game. At one point in my life I had this down as the most intoxicated I had ever been at a football ground, although I think some events over the past couple of years may have overtaken that day.
After Chelsea at home we had three away games. That's us fucked. It has to be. Well Chelsea turned up in second gear and made light work of our shower. But then something miraculous happened. Pearce had promoted young Michael Johnson into midfield and all of a sudden we learnt how to pass the ball again. I didn't go to either Middlesbrough or Newcastle away, but we won both games, new boy Mpenza scored two in two. I went away to Fulham on Easter Monday with some hope back, and would you believe it? We won again. Joey Barton rightly gets abuse off our fans, but on this day he was absolutely brilliant for us. We won 3-1 with Barton, Beasley and Vassell getting the goals. These 9 points in 3 games basically kept us up. Well they did really seeing as from the remaining 6 games we got 2 points.
Watford away was an interesting day. Our last points of the season. Glorious sunshine and the City fans on top form. The pressure was off and it was a great atmosphere. You wouldn't believe that it was only a few weeks previously that we had the awful experience at Ewood. We drew 1-1. I'd have to say that the performance on the day from Ishmael Miller was one of the poorest I've seen in a City shirt. He came on in the 40th minute and had to be taken off again in the 70th. What the previous five games (we drew 0-0 with a good Liverpool team and lost 3-1 away to Arsenal, but were in it right til the end) had taught City is that we do have the potential to do well with some of the players we have, but there was something wrong within the club that isn't allowing us to prosper. Now it's probably OK for me to say this, but it probably wasn't OK for this to happen after the Watford game:
He was right in my opinion, but this was the beginning of the end for Joseph. One week later he missed a penalty against Villa in what ended up being his last performance for City. A few days later, he and Dabo had a scrap in training and he was suspended by the club. I said for a long time that I'd always be fair on Joey because he never let us down on the pitch, but after his shenanigans against us on the last game of the season vs QPR I don't think I can let myself be as lenient.
So, two games left of this dismal season and the two teams I dislike the most. United at home, Spurs away. United had to win this if they were going to win the league. We were so poor that day that there was nothing really to be happy about. I'll try and think of two things though; our fans were great, the atmosphere was top and we really tried to lift the players... but Pearce wanted to play his rigid 4-5-1 system. Another great point of the day was Michael Ball doing this:
Nice one Michael.
I’ve never seen Mary D’s like that, somebody had a load of blue and white balloons and the place was absolutely bouncing. Dave (Mum's husband) was away at the time so my Dad was having his seat and I was sitting in the South Stand. He must have been kegged because I remember him coming out of Mary D’s and just shouting COME ONNNN at a load of reds outside the ground. After United had scored their penalty I remember looking up towards Daves seat in the East stand, to see my Dad fighting with a red in the corporate section (Daves old seat was literally right next to corporate). Grim. He managed to get down at half time and come and stand with me. I don’t think either of us were best pleased when Vassell missed that penalty, so much so that after the game, my Dad had picked up a bottle of coke that somebody had left behind and was ready to lob it into the away end. Sadly, and to my eternal shame, I stopped him and we went home.
And then Spurs away. Lost 2-1, as per. We didn't play well at all, as per. And you could tell that something had to change in the post-season or else we would be looking at certain relegation.
The next few weeks were strange. Pearce was sacked and the initial names to be linked with the City job sent shivers down your spine, as if Pearce's tenure wasn't scary enough. Ex-captain and long term defender Distin had gone to Portsmouth as Redknapp continued to spend money the club didn't have. Barton eventually went to Newcastle after some contract dispute, although things never got better for his career. What a waste...
I'd had a night out with a few mates and decided I'd have a drink. And that was it. I just got back on it from then on. I had to work all summer to make sure I could afford to go to City and drink next season. Oh and go to lectures. Maybe that being my priorities is what holds me back? In other news, it basically pissed it down all summer. Well June and July anyway. And throughout the time it was pissing down the disgrace Rihanna had that shite song about an umbrella. More on umbrellas in November.
I can remember being sat at home on a laptop when there was a thread on Bluemoon about a private helicopter being seen outside City. Loads of rumours about who it was. As time went past, we kept on hearing more and more about Dr. Thaksin Shinawatra (I'm not writing that out all the time, he'll now be known as "Dr. T") whilst the likes of Colin Shindler were moaning about the soul of the club going because we've sold ourselves out to the highest bidder, I was very much of the view that I couldn't give one about who owns the club, and the fans will always be our clubs soul. The part about him being a dictator were in one ear and out the other, the part about him being worth £2 billion was the only bit I was interested in. So a new owner in, and he's got to bring a new manager. In the same way I couldn't quite believe it when we signed Nicolas Anelka in 2002, I couldn't quite believe that Sven was now the City manager.
Sven got quite a bit of shit for the job he did at England. At the time, it seemed warranted that he should get shit because after all we had the "Golden Generation". But what has followed Sven in the six years since he left his post as England manager hasn't exactly been great. The majority of blues were up for giving him a chance though. There wasn't a lot of time between his appointment and the season starting, so what came next was the first time I felt real excitement for transfer activity. Players I'd heard of, players who had played in the Champions League, players who I'd seen and thought they were good. Bianchi, Fernandes, Geovanni, Petrov, Corluka, Garrido, Elano, Bojinov. Granted, in the long term they weren't up to much, but in August 2007, you couldn't believe what was going on. But could they gel?
Before the season started we had the infamous Thomas Cook trophy, this year against Valencia. Like any pre-season game, the game is pretty forgettable to point where all I really remember is where I sat in the ground and I remember the weather being alright. We lost 1-0, some Spanish kid scored for them, don't think he'll ever become much though (it was David Silva). What is most memorable about the day was what happened afterwards. Dr. T had thrown us a "Thai party" in town. What a strange afternoon it was. A few thousand City fans stumbling round town drinking Singha and eating Thai curry, whilst a few sketchy older blokes with their mail order brides watched on as we watched some Thai pop stars sing and eventually the whole squad coming on a stage with Sven and Dr. T and him singing "Blue Moon".
Fair fucks to whoever put this video up:
My toes curled up watching that.
Only with time has this day become more and more absurd in my mind. "Long Live the King of Thailand" it said on the big screens. What the fuck was going on? Everyone was pissed and we'd just spend £40 million on a load of talked up foreigners, so who cared? We weren't getting ahead of ourselves though, we just wanted to feel like we were going in the right direction...
The first game of the season was away to West Ham. This still stands up there as one of my favourite ever away games. We didn't know what to expect as West Ham had also strengthened their team a lot over the summer. It was a glorious day and the away end at West Ham was a proper sweat box. It was a great City away crowd that day. Before I entered the ground, some pleb from Match of the Day was there asking fans if they could name all the players that we'd bought in the close season. I told him to "fuck off and stop trying to take the piss", which I still stand by now. The press trying to make us look like knobs is nothing new, I'm afraid. What we witnessed on the pitch, we couldn't really believe. Players who wanted to get the ball on the ground and knock it about. Breaking and attacking with pace. Looking dangerous. Shooting. Out of nowhere Didi Hamann was looking like the player we thought we were signing. He broke up the oppositions attack and laid the ball off, never giving away possession. Micah had moved into central defense with Dunne and looked like a natural at the age of 19. Elano and Petrov looked unstoppable. We led 1-0 at half time as Bianchi scored on his debut. Second half, more of the same great movement and play. You could tell that some of these new lads were going to be fans favourites. There's one piece of skill which I have talked about for years since it happened, but I've never seen it happen since; Bojinov did a little turn/flick with his first touch and everyone in our end couldn't believe what we were seeing. A great debut for Corluka too, who came off for Nedum, who, with not long left in the match to go made a great run down the right before tackling the ball into new boy Geovanni's feet:
After the match the press were asking Sven why England never played like that when he managed England, "In England, there is no Elano." Which I think summed it up pretty well.
The following Wednesday we played Derby at home. Bear in mind that we hadn't scored a goal at home in the league since 1st January and the Derby game was 15th August. The game wasn't anything special, but from my then vantage point of East level 2 (my pre-South Stand days) I could read the game better than I had from behind the goal at West Ham. There seemed to be an actual pattern of play. Dunne would get it and give it Didi, who would then give it to the ever-improving Michael Johnson who would then give it to Elano and something would happen. That evening we did score, and it was Johnson who got the monkey off our shoulder as we won 1-0.
Only a few days later, the Sunday, we played United at home. Unfortunately, due to the importance and result of the match at Old Trafford the following February this game will probably be over looked by some in the future (maybe even now). At times United were all over us, but some absolutely magnificent displays by Richards and Dunne kept us in it. Geovanni scored midway through the first half to absolute bedlam in the stadium. The goal aside, the most memorable moment of the match was in the dying seconds as United had a corner and Ferguson thought that our mate Carlos had scored, to only have just put it wide. Ferguson's face as the realisation sinks in is hilarious. As the game finished, we were on nine points, and joint top of the league whilst United were on two points and in the relegation zone. Obviously it didn't mean much after three games, but their 1-0 win at our place only three months earlier seemed like a lifetime ago.
A week later and another glorious day in the London sunshine. City in great spirits and good voice as we played Arsenal. It's not my favourite away day, but back when the pricing was sensible at The Emirates we used to take down a proper good City crowd. Out of our three games we had bossed two of them and been a bit lucky in the third. We needed a bit of luck on our side against this Arsenal team as they were looking their best for a few years. We thought that we'd had our luck when Van Persie missed a penalty in the second half, but with not long to go Fabregas scored the winner for them. We left with our heads held high despite the loss - we came out of the game with a lot of credit.
I missed the next two games, Bristol City away in the League Cup (won 2-1) and Blackburn away (lost 1-0) as I was off to Magaluf for a week with my mates on the Saturday. Great times out in the sun at the end of the summer, especially as I was out there with two United season ticket holders just after we had beaten them.
The player who everyone was talking about around then was young Michael Johnson. At 19 he was looking to be a big star for the future of not only City but English football. His performance against Aston Villa where he scored the winner summed up why he was so highly rated. He rarely wasted the ball, he broke up the play and made driving runs forward from deep positions. People comparing him to Colin Bell etc. All seems mad now. Suppose when you give a teenager a big contract and he gets injured he's got to spend his time and money doing something. But I'll still stand by my view that of all the kids Jim Cassell produced, he showed the most talent.
From one youth team player to another, the midweek news was all about Stephen Ireland. He had left an international match with Ireland because he claimed his Grandmother had died. But then it was revealed she hadn't. And then he said it was the other one. And she hadn't. I think that was it anyway. The truth didn't come out for another 14 months, when he finally admitted that it was his girlfriend who had had a miscarriage. It was a strange circumstance with the strange man. He had also just gone from being a balding 20 year old to having a full head of hair. And he'd had some mysterious illness as he missed the derby. Odd bloke.
Great game the week later away to Fulham. We had seen glimpses as to why Martin Petrov had been talked up before he came to City, but on this day he really showed his ability. Top atmosphere at Craven Cottage. Unfortunately we drew 3-3, but there was no denying how much City had improved under Sven. The dross that Pearce served us only a few months earlier seemed like a distant memory. (I'm aware we won the same game a few months earlier.)
I returned back to uni for my second year the day after this. I remember meeting up with a few of my mates that I hadn't seen for a few months in a pub for some lunch. We had been there quite a few times in my first year, but since the last time we visited, it had appeared to become a bit more rogue that it was before. This was shown when someone who worked there walked up to me with my burger and chips whilst helping himself to a few "sorry mate, yer chips are a bit frazzled like". I still have trouble believing that happened, but it did.
"Big night tonight Liam. Are you coming out tonight? Let's see what the new freshers are like. Everyone's out." Er, no actually. I think I'll go and watch City play at home to Norwich in the League Cup. And what a mistake that was. I really don't remember much of this game apart from it was fucking shite. We had witnessed some great football so far in the season and watched a lot of new exciting players, but as we entered the latter stages of the game Kelvin Etuhu slid the ball through to Samaras (yeah, he was still around) and we won 1-0. Many people seemed relieved when the goal went in. The match was that awful that another 30 mins of extra time might have sent people to sleep.
As Fulham the week earlier had really brought Martin Petrov to our attention, this week and the week after highlighted how good Elano was. We went 1 down to Newcastle but then came back to win 3-1, with the third goal being the Elano free kick that many City fans would put down as the best one they've seen.
He scored another two the week after against Middlesbrough at home. It was October by now and the football we were playing was the best we had seen since Benarbia and Berkovic were embarrassing teams in the Championship. Petrov, Elano, Ireland and Johnson all played the ball around brilliantly to one another. It's just a shame that we didn't really have a settled striker to bang the goals in. Bojinov had picked up a bad injury against United, Bianchi was homesick and Mpenza never let us down, but not quite up to our standards now...
The following week we were at home to Birmingham. I remember things around the game better than I remember the actual match. It was some sort of anniversary for the Zulu's, so they had a bit of an old hooligan turn out at City. Still didn't take their full allocation. I didn't see anything go down, but by the sound of it, a few went to escape the police cordon after the match and ran towards Grey Mare Lane, and got absolutely twatted. I'm sure there was more to it, but that's what I remember hearing at the time. Also, it was the rugby world cup final that night, and England were in it against South Africa in Paris. We lost. And afterwards it felt good to go back to being indifferent to rugby. As far as our match goes, Elano scored again to put us one up, despite there probably being a foul in the build up to the goal. Not a lot else happened and we won.
Having won the past four out of five, we travelled to Chelsea thinking that we might have a chance of winning there for the first time in about 15 years. I missed the game as the night before it was a mates birthday and we were at Warehouse Project in town. It was good, but I only got about an hours sleep before getting to a pub to watch us. It was one of those games which you try to blank out your mind. We were losing 2-0 at half time, and felt like we could get back into it. We went on to lose 6-0. My lasting memory is Garrido just stopping as Joe Cole ran past him like he wasn't there. I also remember Michael Ball playing in midfield at one point.
No time to dwell, as the next round of the League Cup was only a few days later. It was Halloween, and the mask shops of Bolton must have made some money as I saw some horrific sites. We took the whole end there, quite a good atmosphere. I was on the top tier with my uncle. I remember him buying a pie and it basically fell apart in his hands as he bit into it. Shocker. The game wasn't up to much, Bolton weren't the team they had been two years or so earlier, but they still had some decent players. Elano scored a penalty deep into the second half and we were through to the quarters of the League Cup.
Sunderland were the next team to play us at home. It was the first time that Roy Keane had brought a team to City (do you remember when everyone thought he was going to be a great manager?) and he (rightfully) got a lot of abuse. Into the second half, Vassell crossed the ball over to Stephen Ireland to volley the ball in. After he scored he went on to pull his shorts down to reveal his Superman underwear and pose like Clark Kent. I thought he was a bit of a knob for doing it, but a lot of City fans thought it was funny. He escaped punishment from the FA for doing it anyway. And I suppose the nickname of "Superman" was a bit better than "Wiggy".
I didn't go to Portsmouth as I couldn't afford the travel on my own at the time, plus it was my birthday weekend as I turned 20. Luckily it was a televised game, so I managed to watch it. Could have won, could have lost. Great time out for my birthday though.
Not City related, but you can't speak of football in November 2007 without remembering where you were when Shteve McClaren walked out on to the dugout of Wembley with an umbrella. We had to beat Croatia to go through to the European Championships. Goalkeeping fuck ups and England being poor gave us a 3-2 loss at home and we didn't qualify. It was shocking at the time. I remember The Sun having a deflated football on the front page. England is always good for making glory supporters know how it feels to support a team that always lets you down. All of a sudden people started to realise that maybe Sven wasn't such a fool, and maybe our "Golden Generation" were actually just over hyped knobheads.
The weekend after we played Reading at home. It should be mentioned that although we were still playing nice football and we were great to watch, we were slowly starting to get sussed out a bit. Elano had quietened somewhat, but Petrov's pace made sure that he was always a handful for fullbacks. After taking the lead, Reading pegged us back before half time. The match was petering out and I really couldn't see us scoring. But with almost the last kick of the game, Sunderland's match winner Stephen Ireland volleyed the ball into the top corner and we won the game 2-1. It had seemed like a long time since we scored a last minute winner, so the scenes when the goal went in were pretty memorable. The lad who sat in front of me and my uncle pushed his mum to one side so he could celebrate with us - which made me laugh a lot afterwards. Watching it back on the TV later on, Isaksson has even ran the length of the pitch to celebrate with the team.
Going into December we had only lost three games all season. Things really were looking good for City. We knew we weren't going to win the league despite being only 4 points off the top spot at the time but surely we should be capable of finishing in a European spot? On the 1st December we travelled to Wigan. The only other time I had been to the JJB (as it was then called) was to see us lose 4-0 the season before. Surely we could do better today, as they were struggling and had recently appointed Steve Bruce as their manager. And after about 30 seconds we were 1-0 up. Titus Bramble had made one of his classic errors to let in Geovanni (making a rare start). City fans hadn't even got into their seats it was that early into the game. From what I remember, we were largely the better side, but having Samaras up front was our downfall. Into the second half he was taken off to a chorus of boo's in the City end. I've never been one for booing one of our own, and even that waste of space didn't deserve it on that day, as he didn't have his worst appearance in the blue shirt. We never saw Gorgeous George again as he was soon off to play for Celtic. We drew the game 1-1, which was disappointing but not the end of the world. Back out in Sheffield that night and I was drinking quite a few of some knock off versions of Desperado. I hadn't seen them for years until I went to a night club in Hannover in the summer for the Wolfsburg pre-season game. The reason why I remember the drink is because I was violently sick the whole of the next day. I remember shaking and shivering thinking "why?" when I was watching the FA Cup draw. We were drawn away against West Ham, but that was in 2008, so maybe another day.
On the 8th December the worlds eyes were on Las Vegas as Ricky Hatton fought Floyd Mayweather. I stayed up and watched the fight round another City fans house. We were gutted with the outcome, as Hatton was well and truly beaten by a better opponent, but even more worrying was the fact that we were getting picked up about an hour later to go to Spurs away. I can't recall too much of that morning. The City end all seemed a bit deflated and like everyone had been up all night watching the fight. Spurs away being Spurs away, we lost 2-1. Their first goal was offside. Bianchi scored a great header for us and then after Ireland had got himself sent off, Defoe scored the winner for them. It felt like we were robbed at the time. Not a good omen for when we play them again in the League Cup quarter final...
First we had to play the team we knocked out in the last round of the Cup; Bolton. Quite an entertaining game, this. We went 1 up, then they went 2-1 up. Once we had got it to 2-2 we knew only one team were going to win. A cheeky back heel from Vassell gave us the lead again and in the dying minutes Garrido set up Kelvin Etuhu for what I'm sure was his first and only goal for City. So far we had played 9 home games in the league and won all 9. After so much shit the years before it was great to finally feel like it was worth spending money on a season ticket. I believe that this season was the turning point on making the City of Manchester Stadium a place that teams (apart from Everton) wouldn't want to come to. Not to the extent that Mancini has made it that way, but a huge improvement on previous seasons.
So to the quarter finals of the League Cup. Before the game began we had the exciting (yes, it was exciting at the time) news that much fancied Mexican forward Nery Castillo was singing for us on a year long loan in January. He was on the pitch before the match and everything. The match was one of those which I try to forget. Spurs were a lot better than us. Well not Spurs, Dimitar Berbatov was better than anyone on the pitch. They had a man sent off after going one up and played on the break. We couldn't score and they made it look all quite easy. We didn't play badly, we were just seemingly getting more and more sussed every week. Out of the cup then. Oh well. 32 years and we're still here etc.
I travelled up to Birmingham the following Saturday with my Dad to see us play Villa. We knew that we weren't going to catch the likes of United, Chelsea and Arsenal, so Villa, Liverpool and Everton were all big games for us at the time. Villa fans can really generate a great atmosphere when they want to, and City were also in good voice which played off the games high intensity. Early on in the first half Petrov set up Bianchi to put us 1 up. Villa were a very good side under O'Neill. Before half time they levelled from a John Carew goal. Nothing remarkable stands out in the second half and we had a good away point against a close rival.
Two games left of the year and both of them home games. Blackburn first. This game will always be remembered by me as when Petrov had the game of his life. He absolutely roasted their full back THAT much that they had to take him off at half time. His pace was electrifying. Unfortunately, that arsehole Hughes had a well organised team at the time (which he never ever had for us) and they had a striker who we wish that had. Well, not too long after we bought that striker. Roque Santa Cruz scored two against us as we drew 2-2 and dropped our first home points of the season. I really though Roque was great and I thought he was going to be a top signing when we spent all that money on him in 2009. How he passed a medical, I'll never know.
Three days later we took on Liverpool. Liverpool were pretty decent round then, but as always lacked consistency. Fernando Torres had done OK, but not really hit the heights of the following season. It was a hard fought 0-0 draw on the day, which will probably be best remembered for the image of Richard Dunne putting his body on the line for City. We were happy with the point as it seemed a bit lucky as Liverpool were probably the better team.
We finished the year in 5th place, after getting 36 points from our first 20 games. A year earlier at the same stage we were 10th with 26 points; quite an improvement. What underlines how poor the first half of 2007 was is the 16 points we picked up in the remaining 18 games. Unfortunately for City and Sven our second half of the season in 2007=08 wasn't too much better. We ended up finishing 9th, although we qualified for the Uefa Cup via the Fair Play league. Sven lost his job. And we employed Mark Hughes.
I don't think we will ever see a year with so much change in it as 2007. You could spend a long time thinking about what would have happened if Dr. T never came in, and then after that you could think about what would have happened if he hadn't sold City to our current owners. The new City era will have a lot written about it from 2008-09 onwards, but for me, a far more interesting time was between 2003-2008.
