Nothing to celebrate now
Having been responsible for conceiving (and painting) the tram now on display at the Pleasure Beach terminus - to celebrate the long history of Blackpool Football Club - it is more than depressing to witness the relegation of the Club to the bottom division of the FA leagues. Especially so when you consider that neighbours Fleetwood Town FC are now above Blackpool in the FA League Table (as are many if not most northwest teams once fearful of playing Blackpool FC at Bloomfield Road).
The Trust's tram (641) remains for the moment in its tangerine colours with memories of far better times. A black shrouding is now more appropriate given the latest fall in the Club's fortunes and I'm happy to hear from any help with a 'rebranding'. The team are one thing - the ownership is another; as is the management. In neither case is there any optimism or belief on the part of Blackpool's Supporters that things will be sorted out for the better in the next season to come. If this was a commercial enterprise the Board and management would have been fired long ago by a vote of shareholders.
Having seen famous 'names' play at Bloomfield Road - and travelled to Wembley for two critical matches which saw the Club promoted to the top tiers of the FA - it is tearful to be witness to their decline and now the ever present turmoil surrounding Blackpool FC. It has become worse than an embarassment; not only for supporters of all ages - but for the entire town, given that the Club carries the Corporation Crest as its official team logo. The lack of political and civic engagement in this ongoing soap opera at Bloomfield Road is just as depressing. The efforts of one Councillor to broker discussions in recent weeks seemingly fell down under incomprehensible intransigence of BFC's Owners, among other hurdles.
Like Pontius Pilate - our political leaders wash their hands of the problem, wishing it would go away; but depressingly it will not. BFC has become a canker (along with many other ills besetting Blackpool) to remind all of us with genuine concern for the town's wellbeing, of what is now a national disgrace at professional footballing level. One hopes for just a ray of sunlight in which the principal players in this saga are literally struck as it were, on the road to Damascus (read Bloomfield Road) - and converted to rational thinking for the greater good - not just their own pockets or their political futures.
Blackpool's Council leadership - read Simon Blackburn- really needs to get a grip on this whole sad and sorry business - and not simply collectively bury heads in the sand as if it was little or nothing to do with representation of constituents' interests and the entire town's wellbeing. Do I detect honking overhead?
