West Ham - back at the top again- well, in a manner of speaking.

 West Ham- back at the top again- well, in a manner of speaking.

The autumnal yellowing leaves are scurrying, scampering around, chasing each other, always together and in unison, scudding and eddying in the wind, rustling and then whispering into each other's ears. The trees are holding on to their green foliage with admirable tenacity, refusing to accept the changing of the seasons. And at the London Stadium in London's East End, West Ham are also getting pretty excited since it's that transitional period of the season whereby you can almost feel a frisson of excitement in the pit of your stomach. Slowly but surely, though.

This hasn't happened for ages now but it isn't every day that West Ham have found themselves at the top of any division. The cynics are doubting, sniggering because they'll never believe in the impossible dream until it hits them between the eyes. And yet all the signs are deeply encouraging and not before time. Finally, West Ham are looking upwards rather than downwards. This may be the second tier of the Football League pyramid but what a joy it is to be among the exalted company of those who used to be our most loyal allies. 

Already this season West Ham have been beaten soundly by Charlton Athletic in their only defeat so far but then they managed to overcome recent Premier League rivals Bolton Wanderers, Wolves, Derby County and, on Saturday, top of the Championship Swansea. It was rather like a reconciliation of old friends, a renewal of acquaintances and that rich rapprochement of loyal buddies, good, old fashioned chums who, rather like West Ham, never really had a head for heights. But what goes around comes around. 

Finally though the bells are ringing, bubbles are blowing and there is a sense of mounting anticipation, the season that was always destined to be because for West Ham it can never be permanent, settled or stable. At some point dysfunctionality is bound to set in, mayhem and bedlam crashing into each other, the revolving door syndrome making its presence felt, going around in ever increasing circles. This time the feelgood factor lasted for 14 seasons which may represent a mini lifetime in the eyes of  those passionate West Ham fans who always want to believe. 

But then you somehow knew that it would all go belly up, completely to pot, rack and ruin, crumbling like parchment dust from the 13th century. When West Ham were promoted back to the Premier League in 2012 it almost felt like a false dawn. Under Sam Allardyce, their football had often been business like, workmanlike, earnest, occasionally attractive and exciting but, for the traditionalists, it wasn't the West Ham way. So although the club could hardly contain their joy and exultation, it all felt a bit anti- climactic, not quite the way it should have been but then there was a realisation that this was way it would have to be. 

Three years ago though Scotsman David Moyes moulded together an attacking West Ham unit to be proud of. European football had arrived at the London Stadium for the first time since Mafeking or the Crimean war and West Ham were dancing the night away. At the end of that momentous 2022-23 season, West Ham had stooped to conquer with a spectacular victory in the UEFA Conference Final against Fiorentina. 

Suddenly the chapel bells were echoing across Stratford, the shoppers buying and selling at the adjacent Westfield shopping mall were driving up the British economy to unimaginable heights and all was rosy in the garden. Their old Upton Park was now some ramshackle fringe theatre in desperate need of a lick of paint and renovation but, still the anxieties remained on the surface. There were underlying fault lines, kinks in the armour, loose nuts and bolts in the general mechanism. 

There were still, apparently, dirty stains from the Allardyce era, none more broadly highlighted than the famous Premier League victory at home to Hull City. But Allardyce was, and is, a nice guy, a good, honest and conscientious coach, one of the game's fire fighters, an expert in the field of salvation. But West Ham fans boos had now reached their loudest crescendo. This was dreadful, the lowest common denominator. It was atrocious football, football that belonged to the prehistoric period, where dinosaurs met huge, ugly monsters and it was all about kick and rush goalie, three and in at school. 

We bowed our heads in shame and disgust and tried to pretend that it was just an illusion, quite possibly a delusion, some nightmarish apocalypse that couldn't get any worse. So we endured and tolerated, wished Sam well and hoped it would all come all right on the day. It did for a while and eventually the club returned back to the Premier League in 2012 thanks to that unforgettable late spring day when West Ham beat Blackpool at Wembley in a Championship play off Final.

On Saturday West Ham hinted at yet greater achievements to come. Back in the second tier, the surroundings may have been unfamiliar and less than glamorous but don't tell the fans of Swansea that their ground should never be fit for a grandiose Premier League stage. Not for nothing are Swansea top of the Championship and on Saturday, West Ham summoned the Dunkirk fighting spirt, a resilience that hadn't been seen for quite a while, a backbone and vertebrae that was strong and sturdy. Happy days are back for West Ham.

The spine was upright and there was something nicely proportioned and balanced about West Ham. They were standing up and ready to be counted. West Ham are beginning to look like the finished article, the side who had so flourished so sparklingly under their former player and manager Harry Redknapp and, stunningly, under the late Glen Roeder. The golden generation consisting of Joe Cole, Frank Lampard, Michael Carrick and Jermaine Defoe had long gone but the heartbeat was still throbbing. 

This latest claret and blue edition are showing encouraging signs of  solidarity, a team bonding together and finding common ground, kindred spirits, brothers in adversity, marching to the beat, carefree, bubbling with bravado. Their local midfield player Divine Mukasa is only 19 years old but there is a troubling fear that so good has Mukasa been so far for West Ham that Manchester City may want him back come the end of this season. He has that spatial awareness and those visionary qualities that remind some of a Joe Cole and the loyalists at the London Stadium are consumed with worry. 

Before the start of the season West Ham had filled the gaping hole in their midfield left void by Matheus Fernandes who jumped ship for Tottenham. Arne Engels is slowly settling his roots into the West Ham family and although there have been one or two tentative wobbles at times, Engels is a Belgian philosopher, always thinking, plotting and scheming. Celtic reluctantly let Engels go but the signs are that eventually he'll come up with the goods at West Ham. There is something about a West Ham midfield that always feels creative and something that is culturally satisfying. 

Manor Solomon, the Israeli winger, is a work in progress and although there have been flashes of liveliness and impish brilliance, Solomon has yet to sell himself to the grumbling, disgruntled West Ham fans. On Saturday Solomon darted then drifted before running purposefully at Swansea's slightly disconcerted defence. Jarrod Bowen, the club captain, can never do anything wrong, taking his defenders on an epic journey. 

And now there is Mohammad Kante, a French stylist from the West Ham academy. To all outward appearances, Kante looks awkward, unsure of his footing, clumsy sporadically. He rumbles forward like a steam locomotive, puffing and panting, almost resigned to losing the ball without intentionally doing so. But there is an imagination stirring inside Kante, a willingness to explore different options, a technically skilful player more than capable of dismantling a defence rather like a mechanic stripping down a car.  

At the back Konstantinos Mavropanos, a Greek defender bearing gifts but never smashing plates is accompanied by Max Kilman with the Brazilian Morato overlapping positively on the flank. Mavropanos looked totally out of his depth as did Kilman in the Premier League. But the Championship is much more to both  players liking. Mavropanos has scored some vitally important goals from set pieces, both corners and free kicks so this could be West Ham's trump card. 

With Pablo, the Brazilian ploughing a lone furrow up front, there have been occasions when it all looks too slow and cumbersome, the ball travelling up and down the pitch like a beach ball and then treated like a hot potato. There can be nothing wrong with the intricate passing game at all but for West Ham  the possession based game is not the template set by Manchester City. It was rather like watching somebody who had pressed the stop button on an old tape recorder. The music could still be heard but it was all over elaborate and not really audible.

But West Ham are now a point behind Swansea at the top of the Championship. The Premier League is still a distant lighthouse and there is a great deal that can still go completely wrong. Christmas beckons and that's normally the festival West Ham used to dread. The music hall comedians always parodied West Ham as the team who came down with the festive decorations after Santa had paid his traditionally fleeting visit.

This Saturday Southampton are the visitors at the London Stadium and the Saints are still paragons of virtue at times. Their football is perhaps too well behaved and mannered, a side though still stuck in treacle, once of Premier League stock but always unpredictable. Right at the beginning of the season West Ham went to St Mary's and pulverised Southampton with a 4-1 victory that may have been the starting point for West Ham's season. `

Some of us though are quietly content with a job well done so far. But the stormy seas have yet to be negotiated and we are talking about West Ham. This is a team that flatters to deceive, whose history and heritage is too well established but quite often questionable to all and sundry. The fast, free flowing, fluent West Ham can wipe out the opposition in no time at all. But then the wheels may come flying off, tyres punctured and within the bat of an eyelid, it could all become very painstaking and too deliberate for words.

We are now accustomed to where this season may take us. Still, let us that hope that by May our worst fears have not been confirmed. Premier League football for the happy Hammers still sounds like a jazz classic but then all they may need is a couple of melodious saxophonists. The vibes though sound very promising and we will watch this space.  

My personal blog's 10th anniversary.

 My personal blog's 10th anniversary.

We love personal milestones, notable landmarks, anniversaries that you can't help but celebrate with a modesty and fulsome gratitude. Sometimes you reach a point in whatever project you happen to be undertaking and wonder whether it's worth going on. But not this time or any time in the future. You just keep going on and on, relentlessly clocking up the miles, doing the hard yards at times and just writing because this is what you've always done so there's no reason to stop now but just look to the future. 

Here and now Ladies and Gentlemen, this is my personal appreciation to you whoever you are and wherever you may live. Today marks the 10th anniversary of my personal blog. May I thank you so much for supporting, reading, passing on valuable feedback and comments and just being there for me. This blog, my blog, my perspective on everyday life and the rich tapestry of life, has been a pleasure to write wherever you are in the world. I feel enormously privileged and honoured to have written for so long on a blog that has been the most rewarding, and most joyous experience any writer can have. 

Of course from all small acorns grew big oaks and my regular commentaries and instinctive reactions to the news and all manner of topical issues, have just filled me with enormous delight. Writing, I think, was carved indelibly into my veins and arteries and my DNA from an early age. Of course there are millions and millions of bloggers and writers who are far more accomplished, far more interesting and enlightening than I'll ever be. They are masters of their craft and they know far more about, let's say, science fiction, mechanical engineering, politics, art and music than I'll ever know. I'm but a humble little contributor to the worldwide agenda and simply hope that you enjoy my personal interpretation of global developments. 

For instance there is the wonderfully absorbing bluemoment.com blog as written by the legendary music writer Richard Williams. His encyclopaedic knowledge of jazz, all genres of music, all art forms and, more recently sports writer, for both the Independent and, at the moment, the Guardian, is quite astonishing and has to be vastly respected. His descriptions of jazz musicians, concerts, exotic musical instruments and the untouchably peerless Miles Davis are quite breath taking. So thankyou so much Richard. 

I briefly sat next to him at the Independent sports desk and felt very much like the rookie student sitting next to the maestro. The bluemoment.com is brilliantly enjoyable and Richard Williams is so enormously knowledgeable that I was quite overcome, dumbfounded and with little to say to him. But thankyou for being there, Richard. I think you were researching a piece on Nicholas Anelka at Arsenal at the time. 

For me personally, journalism, although a lifetime ambition at school, was not quite the career path I thought it would be and the trajectory took me in other directions. Having left school with no qualifications, I resolved immediately to knuckle down to the business of reading the classics in my local library. So Dickens, my all time literary hero Thomas Hardy was followed by Henry James, Joseph Conrad, DH Lawrence, HG Wells, Proust, Tolstoy, Trollope, Kipling, Michener, Hemingway, Orwell, F. Scott Fitzgerald and Faulkner have been my constant reading companions for many a year now.  

Here were the eminent classical authors who, unknowingly, changed my life completely. As a kid I'd always been a reluctant reader because that's what kids do because they'd rather have been out there playing with their friends on their bikes or playing football in the park. Reading was boring and something adults did when there was nothing worth watching on the TV or listening to Radio 4.

But the writing bug gripped me from early on. Inexplicably I was drawn to writing badly written football match reports as a young teenager. On an early family holiday, I sat down next to a pool in Majorca and the year was 1975. I can remember this vividly because it was the year England thrashed Scotland at Wembley in a Home International, 5-1. There was a ferocious thunderbolt from England skipper and midfield architect Gerry Francis and goals from Kevin Beattie, Colin Bell and David Johnson if memory serves me correctly. 

At the time, I didn't really think a great deal more of this simple piece of creative fun. Then in an old First Division match between Arsenal and Newcastle during the mid 1970s, Malcolm Macdonald, a prolific goal scorer in those days, clinched a hat-trick at Highbury, Arsenal won 5-3 that day, and were the pioneers of undersoil heating. This had been the first season that this wondrous innovation had been tried in English football.  By November, normally the time when football pitches begin to resemble allottment sites, the pitch was in impeccable, billiard table green condition. 

Once again I wrote a very primitive report of the game and felt rightly proud of my achievement. I sent it to the local London evening newspaper Evening Standard for their opinion. Now as a callow 13 year old at the time you never quite knew what kind of an impact your literary endeavour would have. But the sports editor Michael Herd was suitably impressed and told me to persevere with my school studies. But sadly the five O' Levels never materialised. And writing went on the back burner for years and years. 

I left school deeply embarrassed at my lack of any scholastic qualifications and the unreasonable amounts of time that I thought had been wasted in meaningless subjects as technical drawing, woodwork and metalwork. There remains a deep rooted annoyance with the whole educational system. Of course the children of today should have an aptitude for any number of subjects but personally the aforesaid subjects were a complete waste of time and more of a hindrance. 

But for the last 10 years blogging has excited me, galvanised me, driven me forward, opened up my mind with perfect clarity. With every blog has come a new angle, a new variation on a theme, something I hadn't really thought of at the time but had now thought utterly appropriate. It is rather like giving an artist a blank canvas and telling them to paint the most memorable landscape or portrait. Once you've picked up the brush, there can be no stopping you. Writing has given me space, time, moments to pause and deliberate over before stitching together very descriptive words, carving out delicate patterns in every sentence. 

Now let me make it perfectly clear I'm a very ordinary writer and have yet to write the definitive novel, short story or thrilling crime best seller that sells in millions. I have no illusions about my writing simply the hope that I might put a smile on your face at times or just give a revealing insight into the world or the people who make the news. I have no desire to emulate the literary brilliance of Lee Child, James Patterson, JK Rowling or indeed Richard Osman. The likes of Stephen King and the late Terry Pratchett hold little no fascination for me but their style of writing has captured the attention and imagination of the whole world for years. But I write about what I know and that's the most fundamental quality for any writer, I think. 

So thankyou once again everybody, whoever you are, for reading, dipping into perhaps or just showing an interest in little old me. Rather like my wonderfully loving and supportive wife and family, you, too are my extended family. Blogging is the best fun any writer can possibly have apart from the five self published books I've already written. Your dedicated following has meant the world to me and this blogger would like to say thankyou very much.   

Oscar Wilde's 172nd birthday today

 Oscar Wilde's 172nd birthday today.

So today would have marked a very significant birthday in classical literary circles. For today Oscar Wilde would have been celebrating his 172nd birthday and he may well have seen the funny side of any recognition of his prodigious talents. The life and times of Wilde have been heavily documented and, to those who may have thought him so cruelly misunderstood as an author, this may not be the time to dwell on his private life, the life of a tortured soul who never really came to terms with his homosexuality. 

Born in the poetic city of Dublin, Wilde rapidly raided the local libraries for more and more information about not only his background and family ancestry but the joys of Victorian literature and purple prose. There is still a vast cross section of the literary community who hold Wilde in such high esteem that it does seem a crying shame that Wilde was hounded, ridiculed and lampooned for some of his more outrageous antics. 

Of course Wilde was a gifted poet, playwright, short story writer and the most brazen of all exhibitionists. Wilde loved to be in the esteemed company of his literary contemporaries, showing off his extraordinary talent for writing and a penchant for the unusual, unconventional and unorthodox. He could never be remotely considered as dull for Wilde played to the gallery, drinking, carousing and cavorting the night away, a bon viveur, elegant raconteur, vivid and vivacious story teller, boisterous host at wild parties and then scandalising the world around him with even greater acts of excess and debauchery. 

And yet Oscar Wilde will sadly be remembered for all the wrong reasons. He was vilified and stigmatised as both gay, a dandy, a rebellious law breaker, and a convict who did time in a prison he might have thought to be the lowest point in his life. Society and most of the national newspapers were so terrifyingly unforgiving that perhaps Wilde had every right to feel both persecuted and victimised by those who simply had no time for him.

In the Ballad of Reading Gaol, Wilde describes all of that pain and suffering, the sense of being an outsider, a pariah, a parvenu, somebody who never really felt loved and respected by his reading public. Of course Wilde was a genius, a writer of outstanding gifts and there was an inherent belief that the written word was both true and honest and that a command of language and grammar had to be admired. Which indeed it was.

But it was the Picture of Dorian Gray that launched him to the highest plateau of literary excellence, a masterwork of purity and tenderness, possibly autobiographical but nonetheless aesthetically pleasing. Here Wilde gazed into the mirror of his soul and saw nothing but confusion and a loss of identity. Of course Wilde saw the younger image of himself and, quite positively loathed what had become of him in the present day. 

Some of us would loved to have been a fly on the wall in those august literary salons from the late Victorian period when gossip was both fruity and malicious. What did Wilde think of William Yeats or George Bernard Shaw, fellow Irishmen who could spin a yarn with consummate ease? Did he really think that only the Irish could write sweet and honeyed verse and stanza, only the Irish had the wit, humour, badinage and bonhomie to charm the socks off everybody they met? Wilde was somehow the poster boy, the respectable role model whose gift for phraseology was matchless. 

In years to come we'll look back on today and remain awe struck at both the ornateness and simplicity of Oscar Wilde's writing. We may care not to recall his lewd excesses, the Bosie and Marquis of Queensbury shock, horror story but most of us can really appreciate the flamboyance of his personality because the rest of his literary masters were also burning the candle at both ends. They didn't give a damn, not two hoots about the consequences of their own actions because they were having far too much of a good time to care for a second.

We acknowledge the profundity of De Profundis because it was thought provoking and philosophical. Wilde's vast repertoire of plays and comedies are legendary. The Importance of Being Earnest has been shown so many times on the stage that some can almost memorise every line without thinking. The Importance of Being Earnest was essentially, Wilde's masterpiece, a phenomenal work of satire and mockery, an amusing attack on the landed gentry and the social mores of the time. 

Then there was Lady Windermere's Fan and a Woman of No Importance, a clever observation of late 19 the century manners and morals.  The dichotomy drawn by the wealthy bourgeoisie and the so called common peasants who lived below stairs was something only Oscar Wilde would have achieved with such impressive force. 

So Oscar Wilde would have been 172 today. To be honest you wouldn't dream of being a considered authority on the subject about everything to do with Wilde. You know that the comedian and hugely intellectually brilliant Stephen Fry once took the role of Oscar Wilde on the cinema silver screen. You also know that Wilde, on his death bed, took one look at the wallpaper and snootily disapproved, allegedly saying that he neither liked the design of the said wallpaper and wished it would be removed as soon as possible.

 But the man with the neat cravat, shirt and moody, velvet jacket with what looked like a carnation, lives on in the hearts of his huge appreciation society. Happy Birthday Oscar. Put up your feet in the Garrick Gentleman's club, sip a fragrant brandy in his hand, light a cigar if the fancy takes you and read the Financial Times because those oil companies are bound to be up to no good. What on earth would he have made of  Mrs Brown's Boys or the BBC for that matter. Maybe something quite objectionable and offensive. But then whoever listened to Oscar Wilde. You apologise for the Mrs Brown's Boys comment but surely you can take a joke. Besides, Mrs Brown's Boys has a lovely Irish theme and Wilde adored the Irish. 

National Dessert Day.

 National Dessert Day. 

You've been longing for this day. It's been one of those days you've been looking forward to for ages. In fact it's mouth watering, immensely pleasurable and palatable. Your taste buds have been waiting for this day. So here we are Ladies and Gentlemen. It's a day of glorious culinary satisfaction, the pinnacle of pinnacles. It won't get any better because we do love this indulgence. It's our guilty pleasure and we make no secret of the fact. 

So today is National Dessert Day. Oh yes it is. It could hardly be anything else. It's a day of gorging on gorgeous puddings, the kind of sweet confections that you might have thought some of us had completely forgotten about. It followed  a well balanced meal full of proteins, heavy cholesterol and loads of naughty calories that we shouldn't really eat but know will make us feel good about ourselves. We'll pile on the pounds and stones and the bathroom scales will reveal the embarrassing truth.

School days were your reference point on this subject. After a huge lunch which was admittedly delicious,  you were now faced with the wondrous temptation. Do you devour a spotty dick, a currant based pudding that still remind you of what it was like to be a kid. Then that same spotty dick would be submerged by gallons of custard and you were transported to the land of pleasure. Little did you know it then but you were subconsciously adding several tyres of fat to your waistline and you were carrying too much timber.  And then there was the richly celebrated jam roly poly. What a stunning idea. 

We all love to eat desserts whether it be a tasty chocolate cake in a plush five star restaurant, that famous Black Forest Gateau so synonymous with the 1970s or something that may remind you of those fabled school dinners. What on earth was semolina about or rice pudding ? What possessed the great nutritionists or food scientists of the time to assume that either of those desserts would leave you smiling and exhilarated. 

And yet all those years later desserts of every kind and variety are still regarded with all of those contradictory emotions that some of us are scratching our heads over. On any given day, all desserts and puddings are fabulous and too good to be true. And yet all desserts should be banned and forbidden now because all of that sugar can only lead to the road to ruination. We are still reaching the same conclusions but, in essence, desserts give a boost to those whose spirits may well have been dampened by a sad or unfortunate event in your lives, the answer being widely known as comfort food.  

But whether you're out with friends and family in the local Toby Carvery, pub, hotel, guest house, restaurant, or a seaside cafe next to the amusement arcades, desserts are far too tempting. Could somebody pass the menu because that apple pie or coffee cake with nuts has to be consumed immediately? We all love desserts, the bigger the better, vast quantities of dessert or pudding. Somewhere though in our minds lurks the lingering fear and suspicion. Is it good for us or not. And yet none of us care because we vow not to have another one since our stomachs will slowly expand and you'll pay the penalty for it later. 

Back in the old days, sweet trolleys in restaurants would glide around the aisles of soft carpet which were like chariots of glorious cakes that even Marie Antionette would have approved of. There was baked alaska, huge slabs of marzipan, magical meringues with oceans of cream, strawberry cheesecakes and then the desserts so evocative of childhood and perhaps adolescence. You really shouldn't be devouring them with relish but you do because you love them and can't really get enough of them.

As a kid your lovely and late mum and dad would take you that famous food and drink restaurant known as Lyons Corner House in Marble Arch, London's glittering West End. At the time it must have felt as if you were going to tea with the Royal Family. The Lyons Corner House was a magnificent and swanky, five star restaurant with all bells and whistles. You didn't need a special appointment to be there and your opportunity to enjoy the whole eating experience just seemed far too good to resist. 

As soon as you walked into the Lyons Corner House, the sounds could almost be heard at nearby Oxford Circus. There was laughter in abundance, steam pouring from the kitchen, voices bellowing  and often melodious. Then there were the pots and pans, crockery and cutlery rattling, clattering, echoing before another set of spoons were accidentally sent crashing to the ground. But that kitchen was like a paradise of  foodie surprises, gastronomic feasts which were lovingly prepared and then delivered to your table. 

You were told that before you were born, the Lyons Corner House would play host to gentle orchestral music, small groups of musicians who entertained their diners with piano keys rippling across the dining room with both delicacy and decorum. It was another age of course, of fine wines, waiters and waitresses pouring out Beaujolais wine that had been matured in a French vineyard for ages. There was champagne if you could afford it but we did for both birthdays or anniversaries because that seemed appropriate and quite elegant. 

Then you remembered your late and lovely mum whose speciality was either a profiterole or rum baba oozing the most beautiful aroma. To this day people still eat profiteroles because it used to swim in a river of cream, pastry and chocolate with perhaps a couple of raspberries for good measure. It didn't really occur to you why your mum was so deeply enamoured of both these desserts. It was always her preferred choice of sweetness and none could possibly argue the point. Mum was always right and indeed she was. 

Then there was your favourite dessert at Rosh Hashanah, the Jewish New Year. Ultimately, it became an established favourite because it was just divine and sent wonderful messages down to your digestive system. It was honey cake. Now honey cake was first sampled at school dinners. The irony was though that you counted yourself quite privileged if you were on the right table to get double helpings of honey cake. Invariably this was never the case so you would sigh with despair and just grumble away in deep frustration.

Now honey cake at Rosh Hashanah was just the most exquisite of all desserts because by the time Yom Kippur and the Fast had finished you knew what to expect. Having gone without food or drink for 25 hours, honey cake was the perfect medicine, the best antidote to stress or hunger pangs. You would come rushing out of your synagogue and there they were, plates of honey cake which would send a surge of relief and electricity through your body. 

And finally there is sticky toffee pudding with chocolate custard or rhubarb and custard, anything that sings on your mouth as soon as you take a spoonful. What about fruit cake, Dundee cake, birthday cakes, chocolate eclairs, or your barmitzvah cake which if memory serves me correctly, was full of icing and ornate designs around the bottom tier of the cake? This cake towered majestically over everybody and you can remember some of the cake being donated to charity, so enormous was it. There were four or five tiers of cake and nobody was ever going to eat all of that in one sitting. 

So there you are Ladies and Gentlemen. Have a wonderful National Dessert Day. Just embrace the day as if it were one of those chocolate fountains at parties or barmitzvahs. Desserts are, quite literally, the icing on the cake, something we like to finish off our main meal with because it would be terrible not to and you'd never forgive yourselves if you didn't. You'll regret it and know it.  So go on treat yourself. Desserts are meant to be savoured,  salivated over, digested carefully before that first crunch of biscuit in the cake. Oh what a taste sensation. Have that last fondant or tiramisu or even that ice cream sundae with hundreds and thousands and don't forget to order the trifle. Life is indeed sweet.        

Manchester City- the ultimate basket case.

 Manchester City- the ultimate basket case.

There are times when football really does need to take a long, hard look at its moral conscience. The recent events at Manchester City are  a stark illustration of what happens when you forget who you are. City have always had a clear identity but then the lines become blurred. You conduct your business as sensibly as you can but then find that something went missing. There were the glaring discrepancies in the accounts, not everything seemed to add up and suddenly the auditors and creditors begin to sweat anxiously. 

For the last two years or even more, Manchester City have become the ultimate basket case, a team tormented by evil spirits. After notching up four consecutive Premier League titles with football from seventh heaven, City stand exposed, disgraced, discredited, rumbled and, above all ashamed of themselves. But this was never the way it was intended and the lesson to be learnt is a salutary one. City of course, have done something wrong and the accusations of cheating, deceit and financial skulduggery look as if they may stick for a long time to come. 

The charge sheets that now seem to be haunting City are innumerable and complex. There were dodgy transfer deals and sponsorship agreements that might have been above board at the time but now look like criminal documents. You can almost see both players, management, coaches and psychologists being interrogated everybody in a police cell with a light bulb hanging ominously from the ceiling. If they didn't know it at the time, they do know now. City have become notorious swindlers, being economical with the truth and, above all, dishonest. 

Now the 100 plus charges that are stacking up against them may be a case of what goes around comes around. All football clubs have been forewarned that if they refuse to keep the game within respectable boundaries, then their sentence could become both nasty, ugly and deeply damaging to the club for many years. In the modern game, the head spinning and phenomenal sums spent on multi million pound players, just beggars belief. The Greed is Good League, a now very apt description for City's behaviour, has consumed the Beautiful Game, poisoning its soul and creating havoc with the club's financial infrastructure. Brian Glanville remains one of the most perceptive of social commentators and we have much to thank him for. 

But now things have got out of control and are spiralling downwards quite dramatically. When Pep Guardiola took over at City, the club had already claimed its first Premier League title since 1969 when the old First Division swapped shillings, tanners, old sixpences and fivers the size of a small country. Then the likes of Malcolm Allison embraced all the wealthy trappings of the time by smoking massive cigars and drinking champagne as if it were going out of fashion. Now though the metaphorical guillotine is about to fall on the Etihad Stadium.

This though has never a pleasant watch for all concerned. From the moment Saudi owners arrived in Manchester, there has indeed been a radical transformation. Sergio Aguero was the man responsible for that last gasp victory against QPR and everything changed overnight. Manuel Pellegrini was appointed as the Messiah and happy days would develop into even more prosperous seasons to follow. City now became an all conquering, unbeatable, unsurpassable goal scoring machine. The Premier League was won for the first time since 1969 and City supporters could hardly believe their luck. 

Up until recent seasons City had cruised to the Premier League title almost effortlessly and nonchalantly  and for the next four seasons, Guardiola's daring matadors won four successive Premier League titles. It really didn't occur to anybody that there was anything wrong, that, behind the scenes, large amounts of cash were ending up in the hands of dubious characters. Of course somebody should have rung the alarm bells, that there was something awry, crooked and unsavoury in the air and nobody should be allowed to get away with this one.  

So what to make of this unholy mess for football. In theory perhaps football should be hanging its head in shame, contemplating its navel and wishing a hole could open up for them. This is bad as it gets for any football club. There has always been an air of toxicity and corruption within football but now any punishment City may get for their foul misdemeanours could be unheard of. Even Pep Guardiola must be relieved that he's well out of this psychodrama, this potential football catastrophe.

You looked back to the days when the smartly suited and booted Peter Swales always came out with reassuring comments about City's accounts. Swales was a highly respected accountant who always added things up correctly and even Malcolm Allison must have felt safe in his job as manager. But now Swales would have been horrified and mortified, desperately looking for excuses and explanations. 

What happens to City in the long term is simply guesswork and even now Manchester United could be heard laughing up their sleeves. The noisy neighbours are of course beside themselves with a warped joy they can hardly hold back any longer. In Manchester United's 1-1 draw against Spurs on Saturday there were the usual satirical jokes, the sadistic banners proudly declaring that City are cheats and supporters who rightly believe their Premier League titles, Carabao Cups and Champions League victories should be withdrawn immediately. Cheats of course should never prosper and City now look like armed robbers who may have stolen from too many banks.

Yesterday City thrashed their oldest adversaries Liverpool at Anfield with a handsome 3-0 victory. At the moment City top the Premier League but you do wonder whether what will happen if City do win back their Premier League title. Does this mean relegation to League Two or will the prize remain in their hands. Commentators, experienced punters and radio phone in judges are now deliberating over the worst case scenario for City.

We now watch all the latest developments at the Etihad Stadium rather like lawyers in a court of law, thoroughly scanning and reading every missing pound and then dithering for a while. This is unprecedented territory for City. How do you penalise a hitherto remarkably successful Premier League club even with all the incriminating evidence in front of you? All of that hard work and apparent due diligence had been done but somebody has to be blamed. This story will run and run. 

Meanwhile City can also look forward to another Champions League adventure. You suspect that the whole of Europe is privately chuckling and chortling at City's unfortunate set of circumstances. The rest of the football world now finds itself in a terrible state of shock and it remains to be seen where City will be next season. Trips to Accrington Stanley, Shrewsbury, Oldham, Crawley Town  and Stevenage must fill City supporters with both terror and trepidation. But it can't happen to Manchester City. Or can it? We will closely monitor all of the latest events because this latest episode in their history has so many Greek tragedy proportions that you really couldn't make this one up.  

Prescot- within cheering distance of Liverpool.

 Prescot- within a cheering distance.

In many ways the town of Prescot would hardly if at all, merit any conversation or discussion in the bigger picture of things. Prescot, of course, as we should all know, is synonymous with electrical cables. It is the electrical hub of not only Prescot and Liverpool but also the rest of the world. Without Prescot you'd probably struggle to make a cup of tea in the morning, switch on the TV, heat up your home and just plug in a whole variety of mechanisms so that your day will work and run both smoothly and efficiently. Prescot never hogs the early evening news, never getting the bouquets of praise it so richly deserves and there is no sense of appreciation for its unsung endeavours. Prescot is just there for you all to admire.

Last week my lovely wife Bev and I travelled up to Prescot and found it to be both charming, welcoming, friendly and delighted to greet anybody who just happens to be passing through. Prescot never gets the headlines, nor the seedy or salacious gossip that would probably have attracted the attention of the old Sunday newspaper the News of the World. They are just polite, civilised and well mannered. Nobody could ask for any more. 

Nobody really wants to be famous or indeed notorious in Prescot because it's a gentle and quiet backwater in Northern England that just sits there and minds its own business. So here's the observation. Prescot is renowned for its electrical cables. On a traffic roundabout there are some of the most striking and artistically pleasing metallic objects that look like giant cotton reels but are not quite cotton reels. It took you a while to realise that these were, in fact, the wires and cables most of us take for granted. Prescot is full of electricity and vital connections with the outside world. 

Now in the general scheme of things, you would never have known Prescot was there. It is full of modesty, humility and a lovely looking community centre. Lest we forget it does, of course, boast its own police station and a wide variety of shops, restaurants and cafes. There's nothing unusual about that but it does serve as a reminder that every town, big city, village and suburban idyll does have its accompanying rural jewel in the crown. Prescot could never be accused of being tedious or mundane. Most certainly this could never be the case. 

But within cheering distance of both Liverpool and Everton football clubs. it does represent the heartbeat of one of Britain's lesser known suburbs. During the week, Prescot was never a hive of activity nor was it jammed solid with tourists from around the world. But, there it was, a small, tightly knit community just getting on with the business at hand. Ordinarily, Prescot makes a tidy profit every day and the sprinkling of butchers in the shopping centre just leave their mouth watering hunks of beef, chicken and lamb hanging in their window, like an invitation to a birthday party. 

On one day though your heart was lifted most noticeably by some memorable revelation. Next to Prescott's shopping mall, an elderly gentleman sat next to the entrance of the building. For a moment you had to stop in sheer wonderment because it was a sight that none of us would have given a second glance to. We'd have been preoccupied with doing our shopping, popping into the shopping mall's charity shops or just browsing the shelves with increasing fascination. 

But here was our old, upright and honourable gentleman. He was just sitting there with his accordion, warmly wrapped in several layers of clothing and wearing  a coat to add extra comfort. The pomp and pageantry of a stunningly warm summer had gone but an autumnal splendour had joined our friend. He sat there cross legged, gently manipulating his squeeze box with a wondrous assurance and dexterity. You couldn't help but notice that the buttons on the accordion were worse for wear. Still, we were there to witness this hugely compelling spectacle and nothing else mattered at all. He was happy and so were we. 

Some of the songs our accordion playing friend sounded ever so slightly familiar, one of which sounded like the soundtrack to an old Western movie from Hollywood's golden age. For a  minute you were convinced that you'd walked into Brussels in Belgium, Amsterdam in the Netherlands or some endearing market town in Switzerland where the day would be dominated by the sound of grand sounding church bells. But this was Prescot near Liverpool in England, a musical haven on that day. Or so it seemed. But this gentleman was determined that nothing should ever get him down. His nimble fingers flickered across the buttons and his only objective was to entertain the passers by.

Meanwhile back in the main shopping centre, there was a strangely comforting silence, a wonderfully spacious grandeur about Prescot that might have gone amiss had you not noticed it. Outside a Wetherspoons restaurant called the Watch Maker, the same men would take up their positions on the bench quietly surveying the scene around them before drinking their first pint of lager of the day. You couldn't help but notice the small array of betting shops near Wetherspoons and the William Hills next to the Watch Maker slowly filling up with contented gamblers who just wanted to win a couple of quid on the horses at York. 

Clearly Northern England is not the stereotype that might have been depicted by the great LS Lowry with his industrial mills and match stalk men, dogs and cats. There are no smoking chimneys or blast furnaces pumping out dirt or repulsive smelling chemicals. There are no young boys trundling their barrows up and down delightful cobblestone roads. Nor are there any whippets whatsoever or flat caps for that matter. But there is Prescot with its reassuring solidity, its air of wonderful permanence and then something else that caught our eyes. 

My wife and I decided to take our beautiful granddaughter to the Shakespeare North theatre. For the last fortnight we've been taking her to one of her baby playgroups. But then we noticed the theatre's association with one of the funniest comedians from way back when. The late and great Sir Ken Dodd had given his whole hearted backing and, quite possibly, financial support for this remarkable building. While walking out of the Shakespeare North theatre you were made aware of just how much it must have meant to Dodd both emotionally and spiritually. 

So there's Prescot. Prescot is straightforward, straight down the line, unpretentious. It is Britain at its most local, regional and comfortable in its skin. There are no private roads where glamorous celebrities live in sumptuous palaces. There are no thick white columns or pillars outside their homes, very few gravelled driveways and no security intercoms situated next to statues of lions guarding the front doors. True, the marvellous Sue Johnson of the BBC's classic sitcom the Royle Family does come from Prescot and she must be enormously proud of her birth place. 

But Prescot is essentially on the outskirts and, just down the road, the legend of Bill Shankly and Bob Paisley can be heard reverberating around the Albert Dock. Liverpool were and continue to be the impeccable standard bearers of footballing excellence. Around Prescot there is a large and significant following for the club. The heroes and idols are always uppermost in their minds because they were part of that surging, swaying throng of supporters who tumbled down the Kop and must have thought they were dreaming.

The local team Preston Cables are now playing in the Northern Premier League Division (West). They are second in this League and this afternoon meet Wythenshawe at the Auto Safety Centre Stadium which sounds like the local car mechanics garage but must have a prominent role in Prescot's social standing. A couple of days ago the Pesky Bulls, to give Prescot their affectionate nickname, were beaten by Mossley 3-2 but approach today's game against Wythenshawe with the same kind of confidence they've always shown. 

A couple of seasons ago our wonderful son and his friends took dad to his first Preston Cables match. Considering their humble non League status, the Cables played moderately well that afternoon. But there is still an old school, old fashioned grandeur about Preston Cables. The stands and terraces are still rickety but magnificently sturdy when the mood takes them. On the opposite side of the ground of where we standing there are a huddle of houses with bright, shiny solar panels while in one small and isolated corner, the youngsters were simply being lively and active, jumping around thick clumps of grass and then watching the game again when it looked as if the Cables were about to score. 

Prescot live easily in the lengthening shadows of Liverpool's Anfield and Everton's Hill Dickinson Stadium. They still do a roaring trade in meat pies and one day they too may be able to compete against the likes of Preston, Bolton, Oldham, Burnley, Manchesters United and City and Blackburn Rovers. At the moment, this is just pie in the sky thinking, some daft concept that will never ever come to fruition. So thankyou Prescot. It was a privilege to be among your company.        

   

Vocational GCSEs at school.

 Vocational GCSE's at school. 

School exams, hey? Weren't they the high point of your academic itinerary? Just when it seemed that things could hardly get any more worrying or tougher, suddenly you were confronted with what seemed like the most monumental and trying of all tasks. For some, exams were simply an effortless breeze, the proverbial piece of marzipan cake with perhaps a small spoonful of custard. And yet for others it was the most difficult challenge we'd ever experienced. And now we find ourselves in another world entirely. Well, not quite but almost.

Now opinions may count for nothing in particular but for some of us exams were terrifying, emotionally oppressive, stiflingly nonsensical and just a glorified set of memory tests. Here we were all gathered in a soul-less assembly hall with rows and rows of tables and chairs and nothing but a few random, haphazard, vaguely memorable facts, figures and statistics whirling about our confused young minds.

But then you could be completely wrong because you emerged from your school with no qualifications, wondering why there was this urgent necessity for something that had nothing to do with the outside world. At best they probably give you a basic grounding in the ways of the world and then you're faced by all of those seemingly insurmountable problems you may have to tackle in later life. But do they serve any purpose? That's for you to chew and think about and then another moment of quiet reflection.  

Of course there is a bitterness and bewilderment on your part on reflection. But since when did algorithms, logarithms, calculus, geometry, tenon saws in woodwork and possessing a knowledge of the capital cities of the world have anything to do with being a City trader in high finance or becoming an eminent lawyer in the Highest courts of justice. Not a great deal you would have thought. There are some things that remain beyond your understanding and yet once again the government have come up with some new fangled idea that will blow us away. 

The great educationalists and teachers of the country may be scratching their heads. Yesterday the government announced a brand new set of ideas for the implementation of vocational based GCSE exams. In a sense it sounds like a logical extension of the conventional end of term exams system where the traditional subjects including English, Maths, History, Geography, Art, Chemistry, Physics and Biology are about to be added to with more hands on, practical tests. It is a welcome development but you do wonder whether the equally as taxing apprenticeships that used to follow your first five years of education, will now be either phased out, dumped in the rubbish bin of academic studies or just replaced with more of the same. 

The fact is that the proposed vocational GSCE's will be rolled out for public consumption very soon. The projects consist of qualifications in building and construction, business management, child development and creative media production. Now this does sound highly impressive and well intentioned but the sceptics may well sneer at something they may have heard about a million times. Of course our children are fully deserving of the chance to become expert builders of properties and none should ever be denied the opportunity to become wealthy entrepreneurs and dotcom millionaires but we are in familiar territory. 

Still, we should be fully supportive and totally onside with Prime Minister Andy Burnham. Those first months for Burnham may well have tested his strength of character and mettle to the limit but this one sounds like a winner. We have to recognise and nurture the burgeoning potential of our current generation of schoolchildren for they are the next engineers, lawyers, landscape gardeners, economists and shrewd thinkers in the vibrant high tech industry. 

Our memories of school are now rather embarrassing from a personal point of view. But we did enjoy clambering up those climbing frames during PE lessons, jumping over pommel horses in our vests and plimsolls, shinning up ropes and then finishing the week with country and western dancing on a Friday afternoon. Then we moved onto secondary school where pottery classes were treated with all the amused derision of young kids who hadn't a clue what we were supposed to be doing. You then spent at least two and half years marooned in woodwork and metalwork classes getting all hot and bothered, fashioning miniature bookshelves in woodwork and a shoe horn in metalwork. It now felt like a complete waste of time. 

In hindsight, school days should always be remembered with a fond smile and heartfelt pleasure but, to this day it all feels like some ridiculous exercise in futility. Of course you would have learnt far more of interest and long term benefit in a grammar school but that 11 plus exam in primary school was the pivotal turning point in your early education. You feel sure that the only reason you didn't pass your 11 plus was simply because it was a straightforward Maths and English test. It occurs to you that you passed the English part of the exam but failed Maths miserably which you just detested anyway.

The outcome was simple. You had to pass both English and Maths to meet the required criteria and, in the end you ended up in some allegedly inferior secondary school where the teachers did their utmost to teach you but only ended up shouting at the disruptive reprobates who just created havoc and made their teachers lives hell. Certainly, you began to withdraw so dramatically into a world of who cares indifference that it all feels terribly frustrating. 

You were convinced that becoming a brickie on a building site or working with children in a nursery environment was never for you personally. You could never see yourself setting up your business in the field of any commercial product on the market because the motivation would never have been there. And yet a creative media production course would certainly have suited you so much more because journalism and writing had always stimulated your imagination. 

Looking back through the years, you feel sure that an intellectually demanding degree at university would have proved far more satisfying.  You had thought of going to university to do a journalism degree but then couldn't commit to because it was a three year course and besides you and your lovely wife were far too busy bringing up your wonderful children and the priorities were obvious. But you now realise that nursing, building or becoming a ruthless businessman making vitally important financial decisions would ever have been your cup of tea. 

In fact we had neither domestic science known as cooking, sewing and embroidery of any description but we were required to spend endless lessons drawing up crotchets and quavers in music. It all seems a long time ago and yet the memories are still painful. Why did we have to run around a dark room while lights were switched on and off for this was our drama class? You feel sure that Sirs John Gielgud and Laurence Olivier would never have agreed to undergo such ritual humiliation.

But schooldays still seem so far off location in our minds where the landscape was filled with the rich tapestry of life. We were successfully socialised with kids of our own age and playtimes would be dominated by pulsating games of football. And next to our playground was the adjacent car park where innumerable tennis balls and fully pumped up footballs would be fired into the middle of nowhere or an unsuspecting dinner hut that looked like a wartime Nissan hut. Had your shot been wayward, it may have bounced on the rooftop of a Methodist church hall, where history lessons were conducted. 

And yet one day the legendary DJ Noel Edmonds once paid a fleeting visit to our school, parking a hugely distinctive Land Rover in the car park. Our headmaster was Edmonds charming dad Duncan who was a hilarious story teller, a man with a glorious anecdote to tell his pupils in our assembly hall. Sometimes you are left with the impression that when you did walk out of your secondary school for the last time, it felt like walking straight into a very dark tunnel so marginalised did you feel by the rest of society. 

But vocational GSCE's may be the way forward and we must hope that the children of today can finally make their dreams and ambitions all come true. The next generation are our grandchildren or children of the future and we must never overlook or forget them. AI may have something to say and some of us are ever slightly concerned. But the children will get it right. We have every faith in them.