Very much behind The Times. ‘He’ doesn’t support us, does he?

Almost there. Monday morning. Brentford v Fulham in the Championship play-off final is little more than a day away. Tomorrow night we walk out at Wembley to see if the most incredible season on record, one which has seen us play the last ever game at Griffin Park alongside the campaign interrupting global pandemic, has the happiest of endings. Yet with the game almost upon us, the age old question as to celebrity fans has reared an ugly head once more. Specifically, the allegation that Phill Collins supports The Bees.

This, the suggestion doing the rounds on Twitter yesterday after the GPG shared  the below.  Utter gumph.

Indeed, it was territory covered in the matchday programme for the final Brentford game played out in front of fans – the 5-0 trashing of Sheffield Wednesday back in early March (how long ago does that feel now?).

It appeared in response to the same allegation being made by Cardiff City in their publication the previous game.

We all know who our celebrity fans are. Adam Devlin, guitarist for popular music’s The Bluetones. Natalie Sawyer. Richard Archer from Hard-Fi / newly formed pop combo ‘Offworld’ (do check them on Spotify et al). Rhino from the Quo. Likewise comedian Nathan Caton, Rick Wakeman and  Dean Gaffney (Wellard from Eastenders). Amongst others. 

Sadly, Cameron Diaz is not amongst their number. Or, certainly, wasn’t unless she has since paid a clandestine visit. A popular urban legend finally debunked with those fatal words a few years back after a tip off from, errr… The full story on that one is here.

Yet like the ever popular Charlies’ Angels star, the Phil Collins story is one that pops it’s head above the parapets every now and again. A story based on nothing more than his youthful visits to Griffin Park. A story that has been clarified by the singer himself. Apparently. 

First glance at his autobiography – where the locally born slush-merchant notes that as the closest big club to Hounslow he used to attend our matches – suggest this may have been true,

Yet scratch below the surface and a different story emerges. In an interview, the Groovy kind of love singer has been quoted as saying that he “used to support Brentford when I was a small boy as I lived not far away. I moved closer to London and lived close to Queens Park Rangers, and had a season ticket for a few years during the great Stan Bowles, Phil Parkes years. I have to say though that I always had a soft spot for the Spurs team of the 60’s with Greaves (a real hero of mine) and Mackay etc….(I could name the whole team but I won’t !!! ) However I lived in West London and Spurs over in North London was too far to go as a lad.

More recently (70’s!!) I’ve kept a close eye on Liverpool and befriended Kenny Dalglish, David Johnson and Ray Clemence. In fact one year they one the championship, we played in Liverpool the same day as the deciding game, and we all got together after the show and had a few drinks. So as you see I’ve spread my affection around a bit !!!”

As the aforementioned Bluetone would opine on Twitter following the Cardiff City publication, “So basically he supports any team that accommodates his current geographical location and touring schedule. There’s a proper fan.”

“I support Brentford you say? ” But seriously,  no fan would wear this..

Instead, Phil would seem to have more clubs than Nick Faldo and the loyalty of a half and half wearing snake.

As for Fulham, it’ll be interesting to see who comes out of the woodwork tomorrow night. Their own list is hardly a galaxy of stars. Lily Allen. The pointless chap. Hugh Grant. Brian Guest. 

David Mellor used to support them in the 70s (to the extent of even writing programme notes) before committing the lowest of low acts, that of a grown up cheating on their own team, and transforming into a Chelsea supporter. Nobody deserves that – not even Fulham. Well, almost nobody deserves that.

Brian Guest – Fulham note him as a fan despite the pain inflicted by the Bees

Nick Bruzon

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Is bruised banana the worst of football’s rotten bunch? Or just unfortunate?

Apologies in advance for a headmasterly (is that even a word?) introduction – we will get to the football shortly. However, it’s all been a bit lively on these pages in the last few days. And by lively, I mean really quite sad – certainly in terms of the commentary being posted by a couple of, alleged, Brentford fans in response to several of the columns and the subsequent opinions of other supporters who had taken the time to write in.

I know things are frustrating on the pitch at present but I’m absolutely baffled by the motivation of these two brave keyboard warriors dripping nothing but poison, schoolyard insults and unquantifiable jibes. Are they really that bored?

Actually, and you may not believe this, it doesn’t bother me personally. I’ve heard a lot worse over the years. But it may upset others. More importantly, I detest bullying and people whose agenda seems nothing but setting out to antagonise or try causing upset whilst hiding behind the facade of a false name and computer screen. Jealousy? Bitterness? Problems at work? Small penis? Who knows?

Regardless, the point remains that any contributor remains welcome. Just please be aware that insulting fellow supporters, accusing them of being a&$eholes (or worse), and making unfounded allegations of racism and homophobia, amongst other things, may well result in such posts being deleted. And I must apologise again for sounding all ’teacher’ but there’s been some pretty desperate stuff these last few days (most of which has now been removed).

But with that out of the way, back to normality. Of course, the International break has caused the cancellation of Championship football for two weeks and, being honest, options are slim for Wednesday night. Personally, I’m fortunate enough in having the Gibraltar v Liechtenstein game to look forward to but, this aside, there is meagre fare on offer.

Even then, the football isn’t a guaranteed. Mrs Bruzon has been threatening to use this perceived gap in the football calendar to catch up on the DVD collection. The thought of having to sit through Colin Firth or Hugh Grant’s greatest hits is one to make even Slovenia v Macedonia seem a more palatable option. The possibility of being force fed the pair’s ‘bumbling romantic’ routine in ‘Four weddings’, ‘Love, Actually’  or ‘Bridget Jones’ (that one’s more Firth than Grant playing the ‘slightly awkward around girls’ role))  is making me queasy.

Likewise, there’s only so much of that nonsense out of ‘Notting Hill’ I can stomach (although if anybody is ever in the area for real, The Porchester has a menu to die for).

Notting Hill – full of drivel. Give me football any day

So, instead, it’ll be a compromise of letting Mrs B. enjoy Hugh whilst yours truly starts work on the next few ‘kit obsessive’ articles for the official matchday programme. But with the Bolton game still two weeks away, there’s plenty of time to get those ready.

As such, I thought I’d look to recreate that column here – as a one time only ‘special’ . And not so much focussing on a specific opponent but, instead, the 91 other clubs that Brentford may find themselves playing subject to promoting or relegation.

With that in mind, just what are the ‘all time best’, ‘the worst’, the ‘classic away’ and ‘the unfortunate design’ amongst football shirts across the history of English football fashion? How do you reduce this down to four shirts and moreso, when the Bees aren’t included (for now).

The answer has to be one of just going with the gut. What is the first one that springs to mind? So without further ado, using no more scientific methodology than my own personal opinion, they are….

The best: Hull City. (made by Matchwinner). Home 1992-1993. Sometimes, words are just not enough. You can only admire the audacity and sheer, unadulterated, genius that saw Hull try to interpret their ‘Tigers’ nickname into the team’s playing kit.

But it wasn’t even discreet – the footballing equivalent of Bet Lynch (kids, ask your parents).

In probably the most iconic of all the Matchwinner designs (and they’re a manufacturer who have had some standouts) Hull went for a full on tiger stripe effect. This was less a subtle nod towards their nickname and more a no holds barred attempt to create one of the most loved/loathed shirts in football history.

Incredibly, Matchwinner’s contract was cancelled midway through the following season and awarded to Pelada. However, with the company refusing to hand over the design spec, their replacements had to produce a new version – a strange, brown affair that was very much the runt of the litter. Then again, how do you top perfection?

The best football shirt of all time

The worst: Coventry City. (made by Talbot Sports). Home 1981- 1984  There wasn’t much that Jimmy Hill didn’t try to innovate in football and his stint as Coventry’s Managing Director was no exception. Indeed, such was his creativity that he made Hull City AFC’s Doctor Assem Allam look like a rank amateur in the rebranding stakes.

1981. Coventry had just announced the football league’s first club sponsorship deal with local car giants, Talbot. Yet in an audacious bid to work around the (then) ban on shirt advertising, Hill tried to get the team renamed Coventry Talbot.

Not surprisingly, this move was rejected so, instead, he simply had a home shirt designed that featured their ‘T’ logo as an integral part of the design. Worse than that, he continued the design onto the shorts. It was immediately banned from television and consigned to football’s home of infamous design.

The worst ever kit?

The classic away: Coventry City. (made by Admiral) 1978-1980  Even now, I don’t know if this qualifies as being touched by the mark of genius or insanity. Whichever, you can’t deny it’s  eye catching.

The Admiral away kit from the end of the 70s shouldn’t work. Indeed, it is often voted as the worst kit of all time in supporter polls. Bedecked in chocolate brown with white piping that continued from the shirt all the way down the shorts, it really is an oddity. Yet one that is so odd it’s stunning. Genuinely . Even that most heinous of kit crimes, continuing the shirt design onto the shorts, somehow works here.

But with the bad also comes good

The unfortunate design: Arsenal. (made by Adidas) Away 1991-1993.  Affectionately dubbed the bruised banana, this mixes the traditional Arsenal yellow with a series of interlocking chevron stripes that make this one seem as though it belongs more at the bottom of a fruit bowl.

Personally, I think this banana analogy has always been a tad harsh If anything, this looks more like a plain yellow shirt that has been run over by a JCB and left a somewhat unsightly tyre print.

Tyre print? Rotten banana?

And if you’d like to read more… over the next month or so the match day programme still has kit obsessive articles to come on Bristol City, Cardiff City, Bolton Wanderers and, of course, Fulham.

Enjoy. Please. And if you don’t, just remember this is only a bit of fun.

Nick Bruzon

How keyboard warriors missed the point

Forty-eight hours after Fulham were beaten by Brentford in the Championship , their keyboard warriors were still fighting a desperate rearguard action to try and salvage some pride from Friday’s derby defeat.

If it makes the Cottagers feel better then good luck to them. That said, if you fancy a smile then do go and check out some of the remaining comments from Saturday morning’s post game review. Personally, I’ve better things to do than continue trying to reason with opinion so blinkered and out of touch with the current landscape that it would be more suited to a North Korean propaganda leaflet.

If anything it has made me realise, even more, just how much Friday’s win meant. To both sides.

Having thrown away their chance of two local games after last season’s capitulation denied them the Chelsea and QPR showdowns, Brentford were their only hope of winning such a fixture. And Fulham weren’t even close to coming second.

I’m not going to pretend I wouldn’t have been upset had we lost but, at the same time, winning was a sweet, sweet feeling. Especially doing so in such fashion. That said, there’s a lot of hilarious comment on twitter and certain fan sites referring to this as our ‘cup final’.

That’s as patronising as it is bitter. Who wouldn’t want to win a local derby? Who wouldn’t celebrate a win over their neighbours? Who wouldn’t get excited about climbing to just one point off the top of the table?

This is nothing to do with perceived club size or our respective teams’ past successes but, simply, current season form and a fine victory in a local derby.

And it WAS fine, with Brentford having totally dominated the game to the extent that, per the BBC, we had almost two thirds of the possession. In layman’s terms, that just means our opponents didn’t get near the ball for an hour.

Brentford had hold of the ball for an hour. The BBC stats don’t lie

After Russell Slade’s sour grapes last season (also in a local derby) I didn’t think we’d be revisiting this territory so soon. The source may be different but the effect is much the same. And that speaks volumes about what Friday meant.

Anyway, that’s me just about done on this subject. Banter is close to getting out of hand and so, for now, I’ll leave Fulham (who are only one win clear of the bottom three) to whatever ambitions they have.

As for The Bees, I make no apologies for ‘bigging up’ Brentford on this Brentford related site. Billy Reeves nailed it later, noting about those ‘away’ fans who’d got upset: “That’s like criticising an autobiography for being self-centred...”

Well said that man.

BBC viewers got an extra viewing of the game on Saturday’s FLS

Football League Show provides another season highlight

With Brentford having a Championship day off on Saturday after demolishing Fulham on Friday night, our supporters were left to see if anyone would overtake the newly fourth placed Bees. Wolves, next up at Griffin Park, were the feature team on the BBC Football League show whilst Warbs, with time on his hands, was Manish’s studio guest. And as for Clemwatch, it gave us a chance to resume our scientific study as Charlton Athletic hosted the albatross of the roving reporting world.

To read the rest of this article, season 2014/15 is now available to download onto Kindle (and other electronic reading device) in full. Containing additional material and even some (poor) editing, you can get it here for less than the cost of a Griffin Park matchday programme or Balti Pie.

 Thanks for reading and all your comments over the course of the season. For now, I need to make more space on the site for any follow up. However, ‘close season’ will continue in full, further along.

Even the London flood barrier fails to hold back Clem’s deluge of poor results

Brentford 2 Fulham 1. Can it get any better?

Hugh Grant. Daniel Radcliffe. Keith Allen. Possibly Lily Allen. Are you listening? Our Brentford gave your Fulham one hell of a beating.

Like celebrity Cottager Richard Osman, Brentford left Fulham ‘Pointless’ on Friday night as the Bees stormed to fourth place in the Championship, one point off the top of the table, after an incredible stoppage time win.

To read the rest of this article, season 2014/15 is now available to download onto Kindle (and other electronic reading device) in full. Containing additional material and even some (poor) editing, you can get it here for less than the cost of a Griffin Park matchday programme or Balti Pie.

 Thanks for reading and all your comments over the course of the season. For now, I need to make more space on the site for any follow up. However, ‘close season’ will continue in full, further along.