Football Crazy (6 page)

Stanley was utterly gobsmacked. “Buy t' Town, Mr Price?”

“
I've only ever had two ambitions in my life, Sutton,” Price went on. “One was to be t' biggest and t' best pie manufacturer in t' country; and I achieved that long since. T' other is to own my hometown football club. Well now I'm going to. Now as I've time to run a football club t' way as a football club should be run. Let me tell thee summat, Sutton, and for nothing. It’s this. I don't intend to rest until I've taken Frogley Town right to top of t' Premiership.”

Stanley hugged himself in pure joy. “Oooh, Mr Price!”

Price offered the photograph to Stanley. “Look at this see.”

Stanley took the photograph off Price and glanced at it. If hearts really do skip beats Stanley's heart now skipped one, maybe two, for it was a photograph of the Frogley Town football team of 1935, the year they won the FA Cup. To a man, the players on the photograph had close-shaven heads, save for a fringe at the front, and droopy moustaches. Their baggy shorts were way past their knees, their shirts were the round necked lace-up style that were in vogue at that time.

“
It's a photo of t' Town in 1935 Mr Price; when Billy Fentonbottom were centre forrard,” said Stanley, in awe.

“
Aye, 1935,” said Price. “A very significant year that, Sutton. Frogley won t' FA Cup and my father opened t' very first Price's Pie factory. A pie factory as is still going strong to this day, using t' same ingredients and meat pie making methods as it did in 1935.” He looked keenly at Stanley. “Any idea what I'm getting at, Sutton?”

Stanley thought for a moment. “No, sorry Mr Price.”

“
Old fashioned values, Sutton. What were good enough in 1935 is good enough in 2006. Nay, better. Because since 1935 I could name thee a dozen pie makers as has gone bust, what with their new-fangled methods, while Price's Pies is a strong as what it ever were. And I reckon as what holds for pie making holds for football team making. Now does tha see what I'm getting at?”

A terrible thought struck Stanley. “Tha'rt not going to make t' players into meat pies, are tha Mr Price?”

“
I am going to turn 'em into t' finest team in t' land, Sutton! And as President of t' Supporters Club I'll be looking to thee to get me some new supporters.”

Stanley hadn't felt so happy since the last time one of the Town's players had scored a hat trick back in 1978. “Thee just try and stop me, Mr Price.”

“
And when tha gets these new supporters tha can tell them from Joe Price that when they come to see t' Town play they'll be in for a bit of an eye-oppener!”

Six department store mannequins were lined up in the Frogley Police HQ yard. They had been dressed up as Frogley Town football supporters, and wore scarves, hats in club colours, and Frogley Town football shirts with players' names on the back. Watched by Superintendent Screwer, Sergeant Hawks at his side, six police constables armed with truncheons were laying into the 'supporters' with some gusto. Already two of the supporters had lost arms and a third had only half a head left. Screwer, however, was far from happy with the performance of his underlings and after watching for a moment or two more impatience got the better off him and he stepped forward and snatched the truncheon off the nearest constable.

“
Don't namby pamby them, Balfour,” he barked. “Get stuck in! Like this see!”

Screwer laid into Constable Balfour's supporter, raining terrible blows on its head with the truncheon. Then he stopped for a moment, glared at it malevolently, and fetched it one in the groin with the business end of the truncheon. Then he kicked it in the same place. It fell over. He kicked it round the yard for a minute. Finally he jumped on its head a couple of times with his size twelves.

Watching his superior officer, Hawks cringed. He looked at the six constables, all of who had been watching Screwer, transfixed, mouths hanging open. Hawks had seen awe on the faces of people lots of times. And fear. But he had never seen it as plainly and of such a magnitude as he now saw it on the faces of his compatriots.

“
Pass the mogadon would you, I’m on the air in two minutes” - Gary Lineker.

The buying of Frogley Town by Joe Price meant different things to different people.

To Stanley Sutton it meant everything. His football team were rarely far from Stanley’s thoughts but since Joe Price had informed him of his intentions to buy his beloved club he had thought of nothing else. And what thoughts! They could win the league this year and gain promotion to the Coca-Cola League One. Then once they were in League One it was only one step away from the Championship. Then after the Championship the Premiership itself! And that was where they were headed, he was quite certain, no doubt about it, Mr Price had said so, and if Mr Price said something was going to happen it happened.

Stanley had seen evidence of the will power of Joe Price too many times to doubt the resolve of his employer. Perhaps the most memorable example was in 1973 when two weeks of torrential rain had caused the River Frog to break its banks and flood Price's Pies factory to a depth of six feet. Most independent observers had held the opinion that it would be the end of Joe Price; and not without good reason, as the damage to the buildings, the pie-making machines, and especially the ovens, had been of monumental proportions. Not a bit of it! When the last of the flood water had been pumped out of the cellars Price mortgaged his home, Pie Towers, mortgaged his cottage in the Derbyshire Dales, mortgaged the three rows of terraced houses that he owned and rented out to his workers, sold his Rolls-Royce, then rolled up his sleeves and proceeded to coax, beg, cajole, bully, threaten with violence, and do whatever else was necessary to encourage engineers into mending the machinery, builders into repairing the fabric of the buildings, and his staff into performing mopping-up operations and drying out the ovens. The factory was back in full production three weeks later and two years on Price had repaid the mortgages on his properties in full and was riding around in the latest Rolls Royce Silver Shadow.

No, Stanley didn't doubt where the Town was headed for one moment. And
he
had his part to play in this wonderful, wonderful thing that was about to happen! To encourage the townsfolk of Frogley to come along and support the Town. What more could a man ask for? And he would see to it they did, by heck would he!

To Stanley's dog Fentonbottom, although that unfortunate cur wasn't yet aware of it, it meant a new dye job in the Town’s colours. Originally Stanley was going to leave it for this year on the grounds that it wasn't too bad, and anyway last year Fentonbottom had nipped him painfully when he’d lifted its red and yellow tail and tried to dye its testicles green, and he didn't want to risk a similar occurrence. However now that the Town was on its way to the Premiership there was no way that Stanley was going to allow Fentonbottom's livery to be in anything less than pristine condition in readiness for the coming season.

To the previous directors of the club it meant they would never see the Town play again, leastwise not at home. For the simple reason that one of Price’s first moves on adopting ownership of the club was to ban them from the Offal Road Stadium for life.

When he had first made the offer to buy the club Price had made it very clear that he was interested in buying it in its entirety, or not at all, which meant that the incumbent directors had been forced to sell him every last share they owned. The deal done, and with them now having no financial ties to the club, Price viewed them as deadwood, and as he had always been a firm believer in the doctrine of a new broom sweeping clean had proceeded to sweep them right out of the club. Consequently Grant Fielding now had more time to run his three butchers shops, Henry Heyworth could concentrate his mind fully on his printing business, and James Liversedge could take more interest in the firm of Liversedge and Sons, Funeral Directors (much to the disappointment of Sons, who in their father's frequent absences on club business had been running a nice little sideline hiring out one of the hearses to a prostitute who specialized in catering for clients with unconventional sexual preferences).

In an effort to keep their seats on the board along with the excellent seats in the directors box that went along with them, Fielding, Heyworth and Liversedge had proposed to Price that it would be advantageous to the club if he were to keep them on as non-shareholding directors, 'seeing as how they were all skilled businessmen.' However Price had informed them, after going over the club's books, that it was abundantly clear to him the only business in which the three of them were skilled was monkey business, that their further participation in the affairs of the club would only be advantageous if the club wanted to go up shit creek without a paddle farther than it was up it already, and to clear off out of it and bloody quick about it before he brought the law in.

To Donny Donnelly it meant several things. He had heard of Joe Price of course, who in Frogley hadn't, and knew him to be a very rich and powerful man. Donny knew as well as anyone that you didn't ride around in a Roller if you were on the breadline. He also knew that rich and powerful businessmen of Price's ilk bought football clubs as toys for themselves, much as they would buy a teddy bear or a doll for their children, and whilst they didn't bring much in the way of football knowledge to a club when they acquired it what they did bring was even more important; money. As far as Donny was concerned what the arrival of this rare commodity at Frogley Town meant would be new players; a full-time physiotherapist instead of the ten hours a week but I'll have to fit you in when I can physio that was all the club had been able to afford in the past; a proper office where he could hold proper press conferences instead of a portakabin which, judging by the smell of it in warm weather, had been used as a urinal in its previous incarnation; better training facilities, more ground staff, and lots of other things too; but more than anything what it meant to Donny was that he would be able to have a number two.

Nobody in football was more aware than Big Donny Donnelly that all managers have a number two, and the fact that he hadn't got one really hurt him.
Really
hurt him.
All
managers had a number two, that was the way things worked, it went with the territory. He couldn't think of one other manager in the whole of the Football League who didn't have a number two. Some of them even had a number three! Through his dealings in the transfer market he knew that most of the managers in the Nationwide Conference had a number two too. Even the manager of the Unibond League side that had recently stuffed them had a number two. Probably Archbishop Desmond Tutu had a number two too. If they could all have a number two, why shouldn't he have a number two?

When Donny had first joined the club some eighteen months previously he had made getting himself a number two his first priority. On the very day he took over the managerial seat at Frogley he had gone to the board of directors and asked them if he could have one, making it very clear by the tone of his voice that a reply in the negative wasn't an option. The board had agreed to his request unanimously and without argument. Donny had been over the moon. However he had very soon been back under the moon, because having agreed to Donny's request for a number two Grant Fielding went on to say that it was of no concern to the board what style of haircut their manager chose to adopt and that if he wanted a number two he could have a number two; and James Liversedge had added that as far as having number twos was concerned shitting was free and Donny could have as many shits as he’d a mind to.

So eighteen months later Donny was still number twoless. But now he was going to have one!

To the Frogley Town players it didn't mean very much at all. Their job was out there on the park, doing their best for Frogley Town. Trevor Hanks, the ‘you fat bastard you ate all the pies’ of the team - leastwise according to the supporters of whichever team were providing the opposition for the Town that day - expressed the hope that Price might offer the players a discount on his range of pies; Darrel Lock suggested that with Price at the helm they probably wouldn't have to threaten the board with violence in order to get their pay packets, as they'd had to do on more than one occasion last season; and Des Barrel expressed a hope that they would now be able to fill the communal bath with more than the six inches of water they'd been restricted to in the past, on the grounds of economy. But apart from that it didn't much matter to the players who was the owner of the club, be it Joe Price, Katy Price or Our Price.

To George Fearnley it also meant very little. Not because any changes at the club would not affect him, as club secretary they were bound to, but because he was due to retire at the end of the coming season and whatever changes were made would be unlikely to affect him very much beyond then.

He wondered about Price though, and the pie manufacturer's sudden involvement with the club from absolutely nowhere; as far as he could recollect Price had never shown the remotest interest in the club. He admitted though that this judgement might be doing Price a disservice as he himself had only been with the club since 1968 and it was possible Price might have been a regular visitor to Offal Road in the early sixties when the club, if not in their pomp, were still a decent First Division side. Maybe Price's visits, like those of so many other fans of long ago, had dropped off in direct proportion to the team's fortunes on the field?

This was neither confirmed nor unconfirmed when Price had telephoned George the day after news of the takeover broke. After exchanging pleasantries, or as near as Price ever got to pleasantries, the new owner of the club informed George that he would be visiting his new acquisition the following Tuesday at ten a.m. on the button, and that George and Donny were to make themselves available. George had remarked that before the takeover he hadn't been aware that Price was even interested in football, never having seen him at a Frogley match. Price had replied that it was precisely
because
he was interested in football that George had never seen him at a Frogley match as there had been fat bloody chance of him ever seeing any there.