Have I been saved from an evening freezing my balls off worried that Bolton were going to get one over on us or robbed of my pre-Christmas dose of football? Have Latics been robbed of a chance to get their season rolling or have they handily had an important game moved until after they’ve had chance to get some more players in? Frankly, it’s too bloody cold to decide and all I know is that I’m probably better off stopping at home with a bottle of wine and Guitar Hero anyways.
Seriously though, how often do Premier League games called off? Apparently the pitch and stadium are fine for the game, but the surrounding areas are just too icy to have people walking about on them. That’s probably true, if Robin Park’s anything like it is outside our house but it’s been heading this way since last Thursday and it’s hard to imagine that nothing could be done to make things better.
I’d rather stick to blaming the council, you just can’t see the same thing happening if it were Wolves/Villa, Blackburn/Burnley or Newcastle/Boro, (dare I even mention t’Rugby?) but there is another side to this. Things could be made better for now, but as night draws in they’re only going to get worse.
Would the game have happened if it had been scheduled for Saturday or Sunday afternoon? Well a lot of the justifications for calling it off wouldn’t have been there and fans would have been able to get in and out before things got dark and frozen. There’s a certain lack of wisdom in arranging a game for 8 O’clock on the official first day of winter, as great as games under floodlights are, there are reasons that people keep banging on about a winter break.
That bit of stupidity is about all that can save Latics from getting a big fat omelette on their faces, at this level there’s too much global cash riding on it to have games called off and Blackburn and Portsmouth had close shaves with the authorities last season. Fingers have been pointed at Latics’ ability to stage games properly in the past, they might have done all they could this time but it reminds me of Dave Whelan’s favourite question:
Does this town really want a Premier League football team?
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