Likely I'll be giving Ebenezer's a miss on Good Friday, it'll be full of ovoid lovers that can never get a ticket for a live game. The views expressed in my posts are not necessarily mine.
Pleased for him he’s always come across as a decent bloke Tranmere’s Nigel Adkins: ‘I still feel like an 18-year-old on the training ground’ Ben Fisher please log in to view this image Nigel Adkins is talking about being back where it all started at Tranmere Rovers, recounting the days when, as an apprentice goalkeeper at Prenton Park, he would clean boots, sweep dressing room floors and even climb on to the roof of the Cowshed Stand to retrieve stray balls. A few years earlier he was looking on from the terrace when Charlie Lindsay, an avid supporter, infamously whacked the Bournemouth goalkeeper Kenny Allen with his walking stick for time-wasting. Adkins carries fond memories of watching his heroes from behind the goal. “At the end of the game I’d run on the pitch – you were allowed to back in those days – and try and get Ronnie Moore’s tie-ups, or Dickie Johnson’s or Stevie Coppell’s, and then scarper up Woodchurch Lane and down Woodchurch Road to try and make sure I got home in one piece,” Adkins says. “Sometimes if there was a bit of a scuffle, my mum would go: ‘You’re not going to football any more.’ But I’d always go down on a Friday night, because it was my team.” The 59-year-old, who was born in Birkenhead and went to Ridgeway high school, a couple of miles from the ground, has gone full circle. He was a boyhood supporter, a player and now is the manager, via a four-month stint as technical director. His assistant manager is the former midfielder Neil Danns, father of Liverpool’s teenage striker Jayden. When Adkins took the reins, initially on an interim basis last September, Tranmere had three points from their first seven matches and non-league loomed ominously. In the past six weeks they have beaten the current top three in League Two and, such has been their form, had the season begun when Adkins took the job permanently in November they would be in an automatic promotion place. Victory at home to Crawley on Saturday, could help them make an unlikely late run for the playoffs. please log in to view this image Tranmere celebrate after Jordan Turnbull (second right) scores in the win at home to high-flying Stockport. Photograph: Tim Markland/PA Perhaps Tranmere’s remarkable resurgence should not be a huge shock. After Adkins guided Scunthorpe into the Championship in his first job in the Football League, supporters sang: “Who needs Mourinho, we’ve got our physio,” a nod to his decade in the medical department, when he would double up as a fitness coach and backup goalkeeper. “I had a key to every room in the building – I’d do all the jobs. You just muck in. Lose your ego, it’s all about the team. You don’t go: ‘That’s not my role.’ I hate that: ‘You’re just the physio, you’re just the cleaner, you’re just the kit man.’ No, you’re not. Everyone is important and that’s stuck with me through my career.” As a player, Adkins’s career took him from Tranmere to Wigan, for the princely sum of £3,000, and then Bangor, where he became player-manager. After leaving Scunthorpe for Southampton, whom he managed in the Premier League, he had spells at Reading, Sheffield United and Hull City. At Southampton he famously recited The Man in the Glass by Dale Wimbrow in a press conference, during lockdown he kept his social media followers’ spirits up by posting inspirational daily videos and last week he went viral after borrowing a philosophical line attributed to Eleanor Roosevelt, the former first lady of the United States. “The past is history, the future is a mystery. Today’s a gift, that’s why they call it the present,” he said after victory over the leaders, Mansfield. Tranmere shared the clip on social media, declaring it “Wednesday wisdom” and supporters quickly flagged the passage was also used in the animated film Kung Fu Panda 2. “I’ve heard of Hong Kong Phooey but not Kung Fu Panda … I’ve been using that quote since I was at Scunny. The other quote I really like is from a speech given by [Theodore] Roosevelt: ‘The Man in the Arena.’ I’ve always picked out quotes from different places to use with the players.” Some Tranmere after a conversation with the chairman, Mark Palios, with whom he played for the club, and started a postgraduate degree in strategic leadership, did he think his days in the dugout were gone? “Let’s face it, I didn’t have any intention of becoming a League Two manager again,” he says. “I love it, but I hadn’t gone in search of being a manager. I’d not applied for any jobs. Sometimes it can be classed as being a young man’s game but I still feel like an 18-year-old on the training ground. It was a logical decision because I care about the club. I’ll always be a Tranmere Rovers fan and I’ll always do whatever I can to help.” It was while a teenager at Tranmere that Adkins got his first taste of management, taking charge of Renbad Rovers, the Birkenhead Sunday League team for whom his younger brothers, Roy and Richard, played. Adkins, while starting his Uefa coaching badges, led them from the fourth division to the first, winning league and cup doubles along the way. Alan Woan, brother of Everton’s assistant manager, Ian, represented Renbad during Adkins’s nine years in charge and the former Premier League referee Mike Dean, a Tranmere fan, was sometimes the man in the middle. “He was starting out as a youngster but you could see he was heading for the top.” Privacy Policy. We use Google reCaptcha to protect our website and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply. Adkins’s attention to detail extended to painting Subbuteo players in Renbad colours. “Before a game I would be on my knees using my Subbuteo pitch to explain what we were looking to do tactically. I’ve still got all of my team sheets from every game, a book for each season; it says who we played, the score, who scored, the formations, who the subs were, what the weather was like. It was a great grounding and a very early introduction into coaching. That was the start of it all.” Upon accepting the position of technical director at Tranmere, the plan was to work a couple of days a week helping to review and improve practices, from recruitment to rehabilitation, and spend time with his parents, who still live on the Wirral, his wife, Angie, and his two-year-old grandson, Ollie. A trip to Japan to celebrate Angie’s 60th birthday last month had to be put on the back burner. “As my wife said to me: ‘So much for two days a week,’” Adkins says, laughing.
Morton always seems to play better for England, does he play in a different position/role compared to when he’s with us?
A similar role, U21's football is rather different to the Championship, so to a degree it is comparing apples with oranges.
Acun Ilicali explains next stage of Hull City plan after Shelbourne move - Hull Live (hulldailymail.co.uk)
How about focus on getting the current club's infrastructure up to standard before pissing money away on clubs halfway across Europe? If he has the cash there, then use it on improving the training ground.. it doesn't count for FFP so he can spend whatever he wants.
Flicking through the channels waiting for Saracens v Harlequins caught a bit of the Man City v Man Utd women’s game. 40,000 there but the atmosphere was so quiet it made a City game seem like a Galatasaray v Fernebahce or Besiktas derby by comparison. 60,000 at Tottenham stadium paying a lot more to watch the Saracens game.
Few thought Sonny Bradley would’ve been a good signing because of his “experience”. Just been sent off for Derby and has been a consistent liability for a league one side
I watched the rugby too, Quins were awful, should have been more the a 50 point victory for the Sarries
Agreed. You wouldn’t think they were close to each other in the table. Farrell was kicking well. Someone like him would make a big difference to rugby league scores. Spurs stadium looked impressive. Everyone was seated but did you notice the section behind one end with railings ready for safe standing?
Even if you are not a Liverpool fan this was a great gesture by LFC for the terminally ill Sven Gorman Eriksson to enable him to fulfil a dream. Very moving. And 59,000 there contributing to charity.
There isn't a summer transfer thread, but found this... https://www.claretandhugh.info/hammers-chase-championship-ace/
From the article: "The origin of the rumor remains unclear and could simply be another instance of transfer speculation."
Scottish Challenge Cup on BBC Alba just now, The New Saints vs Airdrie. if TNS prevail then a Scottish trophy will be won by a Welsh club that play home games in England.
City v Cardiff WHAT IF MY TICKETS DON’T ARRIVE IN THE POST? If you have not received your tickets by 11.00am on Friday 5 April please contact the ticket office on 01482 505600 so we can arrange duplicate tickets for you to pick up from Cardiff City, this must be done by no later than 12 noon on 28 March. so if your tickets don't arrive by 11am on the 5th April you have to let them know by no later than the week before
Twice recently I've had to visit the St Peter Street office to collect my post. They'll be getting another visit soon as I've had no post for nearly two weeks, and I know for a fact I've got post waiting. The first time I went they brought me a neighbours post! What the **** are the bosses doing to 'earn' a four million quid a year pay packet?
