Show of dissent will prove futile
Emnes, who Swansea have long deemed surplus to requirements.
The former Middlesbrough man had a decent Championship season five years ago then sank into that cosy netherworld of sporadic selection, occasional forays as an impact sub and in terms reducing his Celtic Park role to cameos hardly augurs well for someone Coyle has hinted will become a fulcrum of a midfield which has been our Achilles heel since relegation.
Coyle now numbers his squad at 27 in serious contention for first-team action and set out on paper you can make a case for it being a balanced assortment with at least two for every position.
Some have argued, though I would have to disagree vehemently, that it’s a better squad than we began or ended last season with.
Whatever, it’s a squad that, on what I would consider a conservative estimate to be on an average of £8k per week, would cost £216,000 a week in wages. That’s 11 and a quarter million pounds a year, almost a million a month.
Add in directors’ remuneration, manager and coaching staff, general running costs and paying the rank and file office/ matchday staff, you can reckon £20m per annum needed just to open up every other Saturday morning and put a match on. Those who clamour for Venkys to sell need to consider who would likely buy the operation with those kind of costs.
Their unpopularity and unsuitability for stewarding a football club has been obvious to all for six years but with no sign of them shipping out, campaigns to force or embarrass them to into doing so have stepped up and been given a little more prominence than usual in a traditionally slow news fortnight.
But the futility of the multiplying howls of despair is only illustrated by some of the proposed shows of dissent put forward.
“Fans will fly to India to seek a meeting.” “The One Day Cricket international in Pune will be targeted for publicity.” “There’’ll be an ‘1875’ based protest whereby fans will stay in the concourse until the 18th minute of the televised home game against Wolves on a Saturday teatime in October, leaving their seats again in the 75th minute.” (Given the entertainment served up so far this season fans may rue the fact that we weren’t formed in 1922 or something.)
I have to admit I’m actually away on holiday that day but thank goodness. Nothing annoys me more than these shows of grief or defiance in the this-or-that minute. Do those flying to Pune really think they’ll be granted access that the local paper or mighty Sky TV haven’t managed in five years?
And it rather sums the muddled strategies up that people would contemplate spending time and money on making an impact at an event which the very existence of is beholden to the weather!
The campaign to place well-researched and written pieces in the Indian press seems a more cogent strategy and I’ve made my own attempt to contact possibly the bestknown and respected Indian sports journalist.
Two tough away games this week are my immediate concern. Don’t win either and we really do have one foot in League One. And with a loss-making third-tier dud on their hands, Venkys may look to liquidate rather than search for non-existent sugar daddies.
If dreams come true once in your life you’re lucky, twice is asking a bit.