Right, I had my rant the other day. The club appears to have unnecessarily hoodwinked its fans over these “money off vouchers” (to be fair, they never said whose money would be ‘off’ I suppose) and it’s left a bit of a sour taste, but that can’t dampen my enthusiasm for the start of the season. With less than a week to go to the start of the new season, I can’t want!
Everything has been building up to the new season at work. Our Fantasy Football entries are being carefully considered in my office (in defence, do you buy the solid Gabriel Heinze of Man Ure or the goalscoring Jon Arne Riise at Liverpool? I plumped for Riise) and I’ve also done my football predictions for the coming season. At work, we run the two free-to-enter competitions side-by-side with £100 up for grabs for the winners of each competition. If you win both, you get a cool grand. Nobody’s ‘done the double’ before, so I’m hoping to have a good crack at it this season. I had a bit of a mare last season. I missed the deadline for the Fantasy Football, and as for my predictions, well, most of them weren’t too bad, but who’d have predicted Everton would finish in the top half of the table, let alone in the Champions League? Not me, evidently. Still. “Headley’s Eleven” has been selected for the Fantasy League and my predictions (including
I’m lucky in that my job involves doing what I love – writing about sport – and the new season means I get to do plenty of it. I regularly write Football League tips and have already written my first tipping article of the season, dealing with the Top Goalscorer’s markets in the Football League. A certain Mr. D. Byfield happens to feature as one of my tips, too. Not because I’m a Gills fan but because the bookies are foolishly offering stupid odds on him (and
I’ve penned a preview of League One for this site too. I’ve gone through each club, quoting what the bookies think, and then giving my own prediction on where they’ll finish. I’ve got the Gills pegged as 9th placed finishers this season, mainly because I don’t think the squad is quite strong enough to stay the pace in a promotion battle. Playoffs certainly aren’t out of the question, though, but I think 9th is realistic - and I’d be absolutely delighted if Neale Cooper can lead us to a higher position than that.
Back to the Gills then, and while we’ve lost a lot of long-serving, experienced (i.e. old and expensive) players we’ve plenty to be excited about this season. We’ve a new manager who wants us to play some entertaining, attacking football this season – and he’s recruited some hungry young players to help him achieve that aim. Up front, Darren Byfield looks like a new man – and as an interesting subplot to our season, watch for his form once his other half Jamelia has given birth to their first baby together.
We’ve investigated sporting performance for our magazine at work and discovered that on many notable occasions, there is a definite upturn in a player’s performance after the birth of their first son. We’ve called it The Nappy Factor – and it’s helped Phil Mickelson break his Majors duck by winning the US Masters, it helped Tim Henman find his career-best form and, in the most amazing occurrence, it helped Bournemouth’s James Hayter smash the Football League’s fastest-ever hat-trick, moments after coming on as a substitute two seasons ago. With Jamelia expecting her baby sometime in October (if I remember correctly), we could see Bye-Byes go goal crazy in October and November. Watch out for it – and if it happens, remember who told you!
A quick note on Byfield if I may. I was one of the people who heavily criticised him last season, going as far as saying that he was lazy and bone idle. I believe that criticism was fair, but I also believe that everyone deserves a second chance. It seems Darren was as disappointed with his form as we all were – and it was refreshing and encouraging to see his comments to that effect this past week. Having seen him in action in pre-season, he looks sharp and very much up for the challenge this year – and I think our new style of play under Neale Cooper will suit Byfield’s game to a tee. As far as I’m concerned, he starts with a clean slate this season – and I’m optimistic of a good year in front of goal for Darren, hence why I’ve tipped him to finish high up the scoring charts this season.
Seeing as this column is on something of a predictions theme, I’d also like to thank those of you who’ve registered your predictions for The 365 League. Last year’s competition was good fun, but once Guffie hit his mammoth score, nobody was ever likely to catch him. This year, it’s an altogether tougher challenge. You’ve got to be consistently on the money throughout the season. Miss a week, or have a bad week – and you’ll have it all to do to keep up with the league leaders. If you’ve not already registered your predictions, then why not join in? It’s easy to play and I’m putting up a crate of beer each for the winners of the League and Cup competitions. It should be good fun. The site has grown rapidly since the mid-point of last season and it’s now beginning to look like the sort of site I’d wanted it to be when I built the original site over two seasons ago, so thanks for supporting it.
Please do keep checking the official Gillingham site, however, as they do have the considerable advantage of having access to the players and the manager, but throughout the coming season I’ll be bringing you a mix of news and opinion from not just me, but from you as well. If you ever feel the urge to write an article, simply email it to me at headley@gills365.co.uk and if it’s any good, we’ll run it on the site.
Gills365 is a fans site first and foremost, so its success depends entirely on whether the fans use it. So, whether you’re joining in with The 365 League, posting messages on the forum, writing articles, or just reading and enjoying the site, your support is much appreciated. Also, if you think of any ideas that might be good for the site, please do contact me on the above email address. It’s been good fun running the website, especially as it’s now established among the Gills fans as a reasonable site to visit.
Talking of fun, I can’t wait for Saturday. I know we’ve been relegated and we’ll no longer take on the likes of Wolves, Sheffield United and West Ham this year, but there’s always something special about the opening day of the season – and I’m looking forward to the
If we were fortunate to start off with something bonkers like a 5-0 win (wouldn’t THAT be nice!), it would still only be worth three points to us – and it doesn’t mean we’re going to run away with the title. Far from it. We’ve a long season ahead of us and there will be a lot of twists and turns before we know where we’ll end up. It’s sure to be a more entertaining season than last year, so get behind the team, get behind the new manager and raise the roof on Saturday.
See you in the Cricketers…
Headley