For a nation fairly obsessed with weather, we don’t do it very well. Any slight change in norms or expectations seems to cause havoc, chaos and disruptions to the entire country. The trains stop, the roads break, the valleys flood, the snow is the wrong kind, everything seems to have a rather profound effect.
I’ve never been to South West England. Ok, one weekend in Devon, years ago, but never quite made it to Cornwall and Somerset, two of our most beautiful and beachy counties. Because every time we think to embark upon the ‘long drive’ it seems easier just to jump on a plane and go to Spain/France/Italy/Thailand where the weather is guaranteed so you don’t have to wonder how to spend two weeks indoors at Faulty Towers watching the August rain pound the windows.
And now its gone. South West England has been drowned. Submerged under a sea of floodwater the likes of which haven’t been seen since Noah played for Bethlehem City FC. So I’ll never now get the chance to sit in the 17 hour traffic jams that represent the only realistic way of getting to that part of the world in summertime, to enjoy the ‘English Riviera’. I’ve blown the opportunity. Like Sodom and Gomorrah, I’ll never get a chance to visit. Unless David Cameron gets his finger out, puts his wellies on and goes down there with a big bucket to start dredging the 792,000 acres of flooded plains with the accompaniment of his fellow band of useless political associates.

Its a national treasure down there. And now its gone. Like Jimmy Savile.

Why would Swansea City go and sack Michael Laudrup? He’s a lovely man. A Great Dane. Intelligent. Handsome. Classy. He got them into europe last year (for those lowly enough to consider the Europa League as ‘europe’), kept them in mid-table security, had them playing beautiful football and was the nicest guy in the world who everyone in Swansea thought walked on water.

Now they’ve sacked him.

Because they lost a few matches.

And its all because of expectations. Realistic or not. That’s why managers get the boot. Because the team aren’t ‘where they should be’. But who decides ‘where they should be’? Its typical of most newly promoted teams to do pretty well in their first season (except Watford, of course) but then struggle in the second. By which time, the mediocre success enjoyed early on has caused a mass-spending spree necessary for that ‘push towards the champions league’. Ok. Right. Then panic sets in as league position looks rather tenuous (currently 12th but only 2 points above the relegation zone) and reality deeply digs in to the delusions of grandeur, severing them almost totally.

So sack the manager. We’ll get another one. A better one. A proper Welshman? A proven German?? An unintelligible Spaniard??

As a devotee to a ‘sacking team’ where managers generally last 4 months if they’re good, less if they’re not, I’m saddened that Swansea should adopt this model. Particularly when they had such a prize. Who do they want? Allardyce??

Happy thursday

A xxxx