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Every Day’s a cup final for Mark Halsey….!

Thursday, April 22nd, 2010 | BWFC Goals, BWFC News, BWFC People, Football Association, Ivan Campo, Jay-Jay Okocha, Nicolas Anelka, Owen Coyle, Phil Gartside, Premier League, Premiership referees, Sam Allardyce, Youri Djorkaeff | 11 Comments

"The support from football fans and ordinary people in the street has been inspirational"

The support from football fans and ordinary people in the street has been inspirational

Click the link to listen to Mark Halsey’s Exclusive  interview.

http://www.zshare.net/audio/751463426e948768/

Despite hailing from Hertfordshire, Mark Halsey has firmly established himself as one of Bolton’s favourite adopted sons. After spending 12 years playing non-league football for Cambridge City and Hertford Town he began his refereeing career in 1989 and a decade later refereed the famous 1999 Football League One Play-off Final between Gillingham and Manchester City at Wembley. The same year he was promoted to Premier League status and shortly after the FIFA List of referees. He quickly established himself as one of the most popular referees in the League.

Mark was kind enough to take time out of his schedule to speak Exclusively to Manny Road & bwfcforum’s Andi Walton. He started by asking him about his current health:

MH:      Yeah I’m feeling very good, I seem to be getting stronger with every game I do and it’s a bonus for me because I never thought I’d be back refereeing again, so every day is a cup final and it’s really great to be back and the reception I’ve received from the two games I’ve done at Rotherham and Port Vale and Oldham and Bristol Rovers, the fans have been absolutely fantastic and it’s been very emotional and overwhelming for me.

AW:      It must have been the furthest thing from your mind getting out on the football pitch when you were in the midst of your treatment but now you’ve got to that stage, it must be a real thrill.

MH:      For me to come back and, you know, I suppose…for what I’ve gone through with all my chemotherapy and my radiotherapy…I mean if you saw me at Christmas, I was nowhere near the Mark Halsey of old, you know, but I’ve worked hard and a lot of people have helped me and it’s been great.  The support I’ve received from people around the country – just ordinary football fans and ordinary people in the street.  They’ve been inspirational to me and they’ve got to really pat themselves on the back for the way they’ve helped me and it’s down to them that I’m back where I am now.

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Bolton Wanderers opinions you won’t read on the BBC

Monday, January 25th, 2010 | BWFC News, Mark Davies | 4 Comments

Alan Wiley gets in the mood for another balanced performance (via cliff1066)

Alan Wiley gets in the mood for another balanced performance (via cliff1066)

This post, the first by our second new guest blogger Stephen McClusky, was originally posted on the BBC 606 message board, from where it was swiftly censored on the grounds it would ’cause too much controversy’. In the interests of free speech, here it is…

I know we are probably sick of hearing about the HORRIFIC challenge on mini-Davo; however I need to express my sheer anger and disgust at what was, in my opinion. A VERY cynical (even malicious) tackle on a player who was a massive part of the game.

So here is my honest opinion…

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Time to ‘get real’ about Bolton Wanderers. Here goes…

Wednesday, January 13th, 2010 | BWFC News, Gary Megson, Owen Coyle | 10 Comments

Keeping it real, unless youre a journalist of course (via nimish gogri)

Keeping it real, unless you're a journalist of course (via nimish gogri)

Football fans will ‘get real’ when journalists do too…

Disliking Bolton Wanderers has become default mode for most journalists and pundits these days. Their main problems with us are that we bullied Gary Megson out of a job and have ideas above our station when it comes to what we think our team should be capable of.

The first point has been covered at length on this site, but I will just link to a comment I left on this article, which repeated the misleading argument that results had nothing to do with Megson’s sacking. I added a bit of realism.

On the second, am I the only person who finds it incredibly ironic that Sky and the  newspapers, who have spent the last 15 years hyping the ‘promise land’ of the Premier League, are now telling us that we should ‘get real’?

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Another season, another lesson in how to patronise northern football fans

Friday, August 14th, 2009 | BWFC News, BWFC People, Gary Megson, Kevin Davies, Sam Allardyce | 4 Comments

Its like looking in a mirror (Pic: Terry Wha, some rights reserved)

It's like looking in a mirror (Pic: Terry Wha, some rights reserved)

By ‘eck, The Guardian thinks we all wear flat caps and work down mines…

Regular readers from last season will know Manny Road is not a huge fan of match previews. I attempted to hijack the ridiculous notion that stats and facts based on past events have any bearing on upcoming matches with the regular ‘… things you didn’t need to know about Bolton Wanderers v Team X‘ series.

Manny Road won’t be doing that this season, partly because I think I made my point, but mainly because I’ve got better things to do on a Saturday morning (like sleeping off hangovers, for example) than trawling through endless, tedious football fan sites reading anodyne facts about how many times Kevin Davies has used his enormous backside to win a free-kick.You can read this nonsense for yourselves over at NewsNow.

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Reebok Round-Up (28.04.09)

Tuesday, April 28th, 2009 | Ariza Makukula, BWFC News, BWFC People, Gary Megson, Joey O'Brien, Kevin Nolan, Nicky Hunt, Phil Gartside, Sam Allardyce, Sammy Lee | 1 Comment

What Manny Road has been reading (and thinking) about Bolton Wanderers

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13 things you (probably don’t) need to know about Chelsea and Bolton Wanderers

Saturday, April 11th, 2009 | BWFC News, BWFC People, Gary Megson, Gavin McCann, Kevin Davies | No Comments

Guus Hiddink
Image via Wikipedia

Your guide to all the pre-match predictions and Mystic Meggery ahead of Chelsea v Bolton Wanderers

Reasons to be cheerful
1. Only Arsenal have a better record at Stamford Bridge than Bolton in recent years… in fact we have only lost once in our last five visits to Chelsea.

2. Kevin Davies isn’t too disappointed that his rumoured January move to Chelsea never materialised. In fact, he thought it was as funny as everyone else did.

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Is this a good enough reason to keep Gary Megson?

Sunday, February 15th, 2009 | BWFC News, BWFC People, Gary Megson, Phil Gartside, Roy McFarland, Sammy Lee | No Comments

Hangman (game)
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How Alex Ferguson almost changed my mind about the Bolton manager

I’m keen for my view that Gary Megson should be sacked at the end of the season, even if we do stay up, to be proven wrong. Mainly because I want to see my team win and get behind them.

As well as asking my readers for reasons why I’m wrong, I’ve also been actively searching for excuses to change my mind. Here’s the nearest I came last week…

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Are these guys really better than Jussi Jaaskelainen?

Sunday, February 8th, 2009 | BWFC News, BWFC People, Jussi Jaaskelainen | 1 Comment

This is the french soccer goalkeeper Fabien ba...
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Why was Bolton’s keeper not included in best keepers list?

The Daily Mail completed its countdown of football’s 50 greatest goalkeepers on Friday, and there was no place in the list for Bolton’s Jussi Jaaskelainen.

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Bolton Wanderers player of the month: January ‘09

Friday, February 6th, 2009 | BWFC News, BWFC People, Chris Basham, Kevin Nolan, Mark Davies | No Comments

And the winner is… Chris Basham

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Wanderers window shopping dispatch #4: Five questions that need answering

Tuesday, February 3rd, 2009 | Ariza Makukula, BWFC News, BWFC People, Gary Megson, Heidar Helguson, Kevin Davies, Kevin Nolan, Mark Davies, Phil Gartside, Sebastien Puygrenier | 1 Comment

Larsson playing for Barcelona

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The final round of ins, outs and shaking it all abouts at Bolton Wanderers this January

Ins
With the three ins this year – Davies, Sebastien Puygrenier and Ariza Makukula – already in the bag, Bolton barely got a mention on Sky Sports News’ overly-dramatic transfer deadline day coverage (was the countdown of the last 10 seconds, accompanied by pictures from Big Ben, really necessary, especially as the Premier League had extended the deadline due to the bad weather?).

Gary Megson confirmed after the Spurs game that he was targetting two more signings before the window shut at 5pm yesterday, so the Wanderers failure to bring in any more new players has to be seen as leaving Megson short of what he feels he needs to keep us in the Premier League.

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