10 reasons why... The Mighty vs everyone else

Lets just take stock for a moment. Football is collapsing in on itself in the midst of global pandemic. Teetering, wobbling, swaying in the (potentially infectious) winds of change, the whole structure is on the brink of total catastrophic failure.

When the implosion of football as we know it is about number 89 on a list of 'things that we are worried about' then we know without a doubt, these are dark times.

Dark times call for light .

Here then, is a celebration of the greatest team, the world has ever seen. (the fact we rarely if ever, sing that, just shows how secure we are in our own magnificence) Believers require no explanation - doubters? Well this is your proof.

Blackpool FC - The Greatest Team on Earth:
Reason 1. Tangerine.
No one else plays in it. Not in England any road. We technically don't really need an away kit. It's brilliant. Most colours that only one team could play in would look rubbish. Lilac. Brown. Puce, Magenta. They all look shit. Tangerine is classy, historic and we're unmistakable for anyone else. Is that Burnley or West Ham on telly? Oh, no it's Villa! Is that Preston or Luton? Dunno, they're both shite... Is that Wigan Athletic or just some Tesco value carrier bags blowing around a deserted wasteland? Same difference.

We are Tangerine.

Reason 2: Winning the most famous game of domestic football ever.
The 1953 Cup final is the most famous game in the history of domestic football. Do a little thought experiment. Try to name a famous domestic game before this match. One that neutrals will know. You almost certainly can't. It was the first truly national game of football and we ensured that it would never be forgotten by serving up a classic Blackpool roller coaster (pun very much intended) in which two starring Stanley's wrote their way into immortality and the nation was gripped. This wasn't some tin pot game, it was a titanic battle, played in front of the nation and featured the only man to ever hit a hat trick in an FA Cup final at Wembley. 

Reason 3: 1966:

Only 3 clubs provided more members of the World Cup winning squad in 1966. None of the other Lancashire sides provided a single member of the squad. We are one of only 14 teams to have provided a player to a World Cup winning squad (two players we developed ourselves) and one of only 8 teams to have a player actually winning the World Cup final. 88% of all other English league clubs can't match that. Preston, Burnley, Blackburn, Bolton, didn't even get a player in the squad.

Reason 4: The Ballon D'or

Only 19 clubs in the WHOLE OF EUROPE have ever had a Ballon D'or winner. Only 3 teams in the UK. We are one of them. It goes without saying that the other two do not include them up the road (in either direction)

Reason 5: 2010/11 Premier League Champions

History may read as if we had a brief stint in the sun, won some friends and admirers and then left for the shade. That's wrong.

We ACTUALLY WON THE PREMIER LEAGUE that year. 

How you may ask? Surely that final day saw us relegated and our opponents lifting the Trophy? - Well, that's fake news and a fake trophy. 

Read on to inform yourself about what the mainstream media keep from you...

We all know the Premier League is essentially fixed. There's five or six teams who grossly outspend everyone else and even a Blackpool side not hamstrung (an understatement!) by the Oystons would never break into that club.

What we should be doing, in order to bring back a measure of excitement is weighting each point a side gains according to the wage bill of the club. Only that way, will we be able to judge the league in a sporting manner, rather than as a fight between rich men over whose toys are best. Yes, great, Man City, Chelsea, Man Utd are 'superior' but only because they bought the best and paid them the most.

What would be genuinely sporting would be to see which team has performed the best considering their wage bill. Essentially like handicapping in horse races. So, if we re-evaluated the 2010/11 league table according to the simple, but indisputably fair measure of 'total wages/points' we discover the table looks thus: 

Reason 6: Top of the League and a 100% record for 7 years. 

Some infidels may view this wrongly as a pedantic technicality but the fact remains, that football officially finished in Sept 1939 with Blackpool boasting 6 points from 3 games and sitting atop Division 1.

Proper football didn't resume until 1946 and thus Blackpool boast the above record. It can't be disputed. Blackpool therefore triumphs over Preston and Arsenal's invincibles and mocks Klopp's Liverpool for both losing matches and for moaning about having to wait a few weeks to play again. Try 7 years and a world war. Do you see us crying about 'fairness' on talksport? No. 

'zay von't be going down to Bloomfield Rd to zee ze Blackpool aces now!'

Reason 7: Billy Ayre

Nuff' said really, but in case you doubt me, what other football man is regarded with the reverance of Bill Shankly for his tough, proper football man sensibilities, possessed an innate understanding of what the game means to supporters AND was also a bona fide art teacher? 

Reason 8: We got the Oystons out, like we said we would. 

Other clubs do stuff like turn their back on the game symbolically or get a protest scarf. We waged a 5 year boycott observed by the vast majority of the fan base. We showed the rest of the football world that it's possible to demand change and get it. From self imposed exile to anarchic performance art and everything in between, with no help from the games authorities, we took on our owners and we won. We appreciate the privilege of watching our team like few other fan bases in the whole of the game.

Reason 9: The homecoming

A match against a noone opposition with little to play for, in which we didn't even play especially well. What other clubs have a game like this in their history? A game which ranks alongside, or even above cup finals and play off matches in terms of atmosphere and emotion. One that had next to nothing riding on it and was, aside from the sheer, raw magic of the last few minutes, a total damp squib as a football spectacle but will be forevermore one of 'the great days?' One of the most unique days in football, probably only understood alongside Charlton's return to the Valley and AFC Wimbledon getting to the same level as Franchise FC and the rebirth of Newport County and Accrington Stanley. Most supporters will never understand or experience a day like that. 

Reason 10: The Kop/The Ground. 

The north stand might fill up about 2 seconds before kick off and empty out 10 minutes before half time but it makes a good old fashioned noise that's up there with anywhere in our league and many beyond it. 

The stadium might be a bare breezeblock barn on the inside but it's ours. It's the home of Sir Stan, Sir Jim, that Micky Walsh goal, Jimmy Hampson, Morty, Emlyn Hughes, Alan Ball, Waiters, Charnley, Dodds, the Atomic Boys and so, so many more.

Think about the the name - 'Bloomfield' - it conjures up images of meadow grass and wildflowers. Contrast that with 'Deepdale' - gloomy and dark... 'Turf Moor' - bleak and windswept... 'The Reebok' or 'The DW' - out of town shopping precinct... 'Highbury' - could you not actually think of your own name? 

That's ten reasons why we're the greatest team in the history of the game. There's plenty more and they come in no particular order - the point is - it's a pleasure and a privilege being TANGERINE.

At a time like this, remember, not everyone is as blessed as we are.

UTMP