Football Notebook

Martin Chilton13 April 2012

The play-offs are over and every football fan will suffer withdrawal symptons until the new fixtures are announced in late June.

There are big sporting events to keep us enthralled - Tim Henman's battling five-set defeat against the Uzbekestani at Wimbledon; the first hour of the session where we appear to have a chance of avoiding an innings defeat against the Aussies - but Notebook has a thrilling summer schedule as we wait for the InterToto Cup.

The first big one on the horizon was the annual Man versus Horse contest in Wales. Alas, this was hit by the foot-and-mouth crisis and had to be postponed until 13 October. This epic race, in Powys, is over 22 miles of rough ground.

Incredibly, some 600 men (given a half-hour start to even things up) race against horses.

Last year, one man got within 60 seconds of beating the nag. Notebook asked the organisers the burning question: "If it's 22 miles, how on earth do the horses know where to go?"

There was a long pause before the kind Welsh lady explained to the slow Englishman: "They are ridden, of course."

So, apparently, are some of the sheep in that area, but that's another story. In any case, if the horse has a man on its back why not even things up and let the man carry a horse?

Still, with that equine nonsense on hold, you have to wait until 16 June for the World Nettle Eating championships in Marshwood, Dorset. Given what's served at some motorway service stations that sounds an attractive propostion. In an event sponsored by ice cream makers Ben and Jerry - and officiated by "a former Wimbledon umpire" - the self-promoting rural eccentrics eat nettles for over an hour and then presumably vomit for the next four.

A week later comes the World Worm Charming Championships in Nantwich, Cheshire. Contestants from as far afield as Japan have half an hour to get as many worms out of the ground as possible. No dirty tricks, though.

The rules are that it must be done "by fair means" using a fork to vibrate the earth.

The record is 500 in 30 minutes but no chemicals or JCB diggers are allowed. But perhaps after an election contest we've all seen too many worms appearing from underground.

After the World Toe Wrestling championships in Staffordshire - very toedius from the sound of it - comes the summer highlight on 4 August, in Pulborough West Sussex . . . The Lawnmower Derby, an annual 12-hour race. There's something of a counterculture here. The British Lawnmower Racing Association, which has its own magazine and webpage, has been going since 1973 and offers, it claims, "a well organised and inexpensive motor sport". They even socialise, too, at their Grasscutters Ball.

It may sound ripe for big sponsorship deals from the motor-racing backers but the BLRA say sternly: "Commercialism is discouraged."

A shame because the BBC is so short of live sport it might actually show it on Grandstand.

Manchester City fans are very touchy about the word "massive". Rival Manchester United fans take the mickey out of the way that every City manager, new signing and club official uses the word massive (Oxford Dictionary: substantial, impressive) to describe a team that have not won a trophy for 26 years.
Enter Saviour No 135 Kevin Keegan to a fans' forum last Thursday night and the former England manager praises "the massive club" he has joined. Doh! One supporter immediately tells Keegan to refrain from using the word again "for your own good".
They obviously hadn't told chairman David Bernstein, former manager Brian Horton and even ex-player Eddie McGoldrick earlier that day, all of whom said Keegan was taking over a "massive" club.
Suitably chastised, Keegan said: "I will always now call the club huge." See, they know how to think big at Maine Road.

Saturday night viewing may never be the same. According to a front-page headline in Thursday's Independent: "ITV plans an early slot for Saturday's snatch of the day."
It's one show you can bet Dwight Yorke will be on.

John Gregory may not have a proper role for David Ginola but Notebook suggests the Frenchmen moves on to different greens. When Colin Montgomerie was on top form, the roly-poly Scotsman was described as Mrs Doubtfire and told to "Get to the salad bar" by jeering fans.
Ginola would make a marvellous new tubby figure on the golf circuit. In Monte Carlo last week for the Laureus Sports Awards, the Aston Villa winger won the Nearest the Pin prize in a promotional competition during which he landed a tee shot 2.7 metres from the hole.
Golfing great, Seve Ballesteros, also competing, said: "Ginola swings a club very well, and he even scored a two on the par-three fifth hole."
And if that was not enough, £35,000-a-week Ginola's feat also won him the prize of a leather Mercedes Benz golf bag.

When I met the amusing Mike Summerbee, he gave me several of his business cards as a "bespoke tailor". In Colin Shindler's new book Fathers, Sons and Football, about three generations of Summerbee footballers, the author says that former Manchester City winger Mike has also at various times been a deckchair handler, gravedigger and grass-verge cutter.
Shindler's book covers Mike, his father George and the third generation, Nicky.
Football books are usually dull and bereft of good personal anecdotes, but the book is amusing and candid and throws a bit of light on the dysfunctional nature of many of the people in the beautiful game.
Mike's mother, Dulcie, is one of the stars of the book. When Malcolm Allison was Manchester City manager he criticised her son in print. She recalled: "I went to see Allison and he said: "Hello, Dulcie, it's nice to see you' and I said: 'It isn't nice. You're a bugger, you are. Don't say things about Michael that aren't true'."
The account of Nicky in the modern game is revealing, from manipulative managers to cross-eyed City goalkeepers. Nicky played under Alan Ball at Maine Road, whose missus told off Keith Curle, saying: "You should have been tighter at the back." Maybe City should have appointed her.
There's also a sympathetic account of George's time as a player in the pre-war game. Back in 1937, when Dulcie was chatted up by George, then a Preston player, she was warned by her mother: "You've got to be careful. They've a terrible reputation have footballers."
That's true but, going by this book, the game itself should carry a health warning.

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