News Round Up

Stadium heckles have got to be short. The bloke next to me, besides constantly clearing his nose, reverts to a very simple (and annoying) “OyOy!” when expressing, well, just about anything. Heckling is completely different communication tool to a blog or messageboard, where the analysis can be more considered and verbose, if you’re lucky. I’m not expecting anyone in the heat of the game to scream “SMITH, PUT IN PLACE AN EFFECTIVE ACADEMY SYSTEM BUILDING A TEAM AROUND YOUNG LOCAL TALENT COMPLEMENTED WITH A SELECTION OF MORE EXPERIENCED PROS” but I do hate; “SMITH, SORT IT OUT”.

Perhaps recent machinations is Smith sorting it out. The eviction of Time And Relative Dimensions In Football – Chris Tardif, is not really a surprise. The only surprise is that he’s hung around as long as he did. In fact, he was beginning to irritate me. He seemed to be a ‘Lovely Bloke’ who seemed happy helping out where he could. But was also another wage and he’d made it fairly clear he couldn’t really be arsed with the club – a veritable Winston Bogardes of the lower league. When there’s a wage cap and a struggling team I’m afraid being a lovely bloke didn’t work for me.

Robinson’s loan to Cambridge is more of a surprise. Only days ago Smith was heaping praise on him, what he lacked in ability he made up for in effort was the argument. Nobody else was scoring, so you can’t say that his selection was wrong on that basis. I agree. Robinson had a rum deal from the fans. Players of his size always look lumbering, especially when there’s nobody to capitalise on the knockdowns and knock-overs.

But then, he’s off and to all in tense and purpose he’s out, given the terms of the deal. Why the U turn? The Twigglet’s return to fitness has solved all our goalscoring problems? Is Robinson’s influence off the field taking its toll? He does have previous in this area. Or is another striker being lined up, one which will eat up Robinson and Tardif’s wages?

And why has he gone to promotion rivals? Because they’re not really perceived promotional rivals? Because whatever the bigger picture is, it was serious enough to take the opportunity as soon as it presented itself? Because Robinson is sick of Oxford? Because Smith is feeling the pressure?

Time will tell, I suppose, it’s got to start paying dividends; otherwise there’ll be no more ‘Smith, sort it out’, just ‘Smith out’, which would be a terrible shame.