December 25, 2011

#41: Festive Cheer

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Dan Moylan, Michael Normanton, Daniel Chapman (Moscowhite), and Paul O’Dowd (Oddy) release episode 41 on Christmas Day, still recovering from the TSB Christmas party at Temple Works in Holbeck — a fundraiser for the Leeds Children’s Hospital Appeal that ended with singing, a Ken Bates effigy head being taken down to the pub, and a naan bread being thrown at it in the car park. Moscowhite did not help take everything down the next morning.

The football has not been festive. White Watching covers two poor performances. The Watford game ended 1-1, but only because a last-minute penalty retrieved a draw from a match in which Leeds barely created a chance. Michael caught up with events and summarises it as a massive pile of shite. The Reading game went worse: down after two minutes, with one shot on target all match, and Oddy — who attended — confirms it was an even bigger pile of shite. The absence of Jonny Howson from both games is noted with something approaching alarm. Without him, the team has ideas about as often as the weather changes in a nice direction.

Ken Bates has announced that season ticket prices will be frozen for next season, which would be more welcome news if he hadn’t simultaneously asked supporters to renew before January 31st. Several of them are still paying off this year’s through the monthly finance scheme. The logic is picked apart at length. Transfer talk covers a wide field: Andy Keogh’s interest in staying permanently, Darren O’Dea possibly becoming a permanent signing, persistent Luciano Becchio exit rumours, Keith Andrews links, Ross McCormack’s uncertain long-term future, Ben Parker’s return from injury (Simon Grayson having joked that everything is wrong with him — “his back, his hamstrings, his hips, his brain, his vision”), and Alex McCarthy returning from his Reading loan.

The half-term report gives the season a C or C-minus. Sixth in the Championship is better than feared after a grim summer, but the football has been largely joyless, the atmosphere at Elland Road is described as apathetic, and the fun that Gradel brought has not been replaced. The discussion of Ken Bates’s regime is honest: change of ownership is preferred, but nobody has a particularly compelling answer about what comes next. Boxing Day brings Derby away, then Barnsley on New Year’s Eve, Burnley in January, and the Arsenal FA Cup tie looming.