Blues Insider , livre ebook

Pitch Publishing Ltd - Keith Dixon

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130 pages

English

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Description

Blues Insider is an alternative history of Birmingham City; a fascinating personal collection of behind-the-scenes stories from the past 25 years - straight from the pen of a man who's been on the inside. A lifelong Bluenose for more than 60 years, author Keith Dixon has written about the club he loves since the 1980s - and it's a career which has taken him on a fantastic journey. This isn't a trawl back through the glory years: Birmingham are a club which has never won the league championship, never held aloft the FA Cup, not qualified for the Champions League. Forget the match results, player appearances, goals scored, transfers and loan deals, this book takes a fresh approach and looks back at the period and gives a fresh perspective on the club, and gives new insight into the key events. With forewords from two Blues legends from the era, Trevor Francis and Barry Fry, the book draws on the author's dealings with the key characters at the club as he sheds new light on a quarter of a century at St Andrew's to life.

Sujets

Midlands Occidentales

West Midlands

Warwickshire

Midlands de l'Ouest

Informations

Publié par	Pitch Publishing Ltd
Date de parution	11 mai 2017
Nombre de lectures	0
EAN13	9781785313394
Langue	English

Informations légales : prix de location à la page 0,0500€. Cette information est donnée uniquement à titre indicatif conformément à la législation en vigueur.

Extrait

First published by Pitch Publishing, 2017
Pitch Publishing
A2 Yeoman Gate
Yeoman Way
Durrington
BN13 3QZ
www.pitchpublishing.co.uk
Keith Dixon, 2017
All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the non-exclusive, non-transferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on-screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, downloaded, decompiled, reverse-engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of the Publisher.
A CIP catalogue record is available for this book from the British Library
Print ISBN 9781785312854 eBook ISBN 9781785313394
--- Ebook Conversion by www.eBookPartnership.com
Contents
Acknowledgements
Introduction
Preface
Foreword by Trevor Francis
Foreword by Barry Fry
Contributor Credits
Sponsoring The Blues
Samesh Kumar s Empire Collapses
The Administrator s Diary
Roldvale Buys The Blues
David Gold and David Sullivan
Karren Brady
Commercial Matters
Blues Magazine
The Bluenose Executive Lunch Club
Former Players Association and Birmingham City All- Stars
An Author
In the Press
Academy Scout
Chinese Crackers
Project Jack
Did You Know That?
Stadium Project
Behind the Numbers
Bibliography
Photographs
Acknowledgements
I DEDICATE this book to my family; Julie, Holly, Harry, Matt, Ben, Caleb and Amy - all my love.
My thanks go to all the people that have helped in the production of this book:
Jane and Paul Camillin of Pitch Publishing for getting it edited, proofread, printed and published. Also thanks to Jane and Paul for showing faith in me as a new writer to their business.
All my friends who contributed to the book, in no particular order: Mike Wiseman, Michael Dunford, Malcolm Page, Colin Burke, Ben Dixon and Colin Tattum.
Special thanks go to Trevor Francis and Barry Fry for writing the forewords. To have the two most iconic Blues favourites contributing this way is beyond my original expectations.
To Bernie Chetwynd, a neighbour and friend, who gave me access to his extensive library of football books.
Thanks to Mike O Brien, my archivist, for the time he spent in his library (attic) searching for some of my illustrations.
Also thanks to Phil Johnson, Paul Woolridge and Tim Mulqueen who during a business trip to Stuttgart in October 2015, spent a hair-raising journey on the autobahn coming up with potential subjects for inclusion in the book.
Introduction
BLUES INSIDER - A Quarter Of A Century With Birmingham City is my fascinating catalogue of what has gone on behind the scenes at Birmingham City Football Club in the past 25 years. A lifelong Bluenose for over 60 years, I am writing about my love for the club which has taken me into a whole host of areas not normally accessed by fans, with the intention to try and improve the club s fortunes both on and off the pitch. Whether I have been successful or not is revealed within the pages of this unique book - which is a personal history and nothing more.
Along the way I have experienced many amazing things related to the workings of the club as well as making friends with many of the club s personalities, on the field as well as off it.
Prior to the writing of Blues Insider - A Quarter Of A Century With Birmingham City, all the revealing stories included in the book have been kept private, either locked away in the files in my home study or at the back of my mind.
After years of standing on the terraces I decided to use my business acumen and knowledge to learn more about the club and its operations. After becoming a corporate hospitality supporter, I persuaded my company at the time to become sponsor of the club.
The details of the sponsorship deal are revealed together with the reasons why Triton Showers wanted to be associated with professional football, the negotiating skills of Samesh Kumar and his family, the chaos surrounding the administration of the business and the characters that were holding it together in spite of everything. If you thought it was bad on the pitch, it was worse in the backrooms.
During this time the Kumars went into administration and as I tried to buy their shares and therefore own the club, I became friends with the administrator and included in the book is his day-by-day diary of the whole process prior to David Sullivan s company buying the shares.
The chapter Roldvale buys the Blues reveals the details behind the sale, including the names of the parties interested in the club, whether they were serious contenders or the equivalent of tyre kickers, and how the sales process culminated in an offer for the club.
My dealings with Karren Brady, David Sullivan and David Gold make lively reading and give an insight into their characters and approach to business and life. The book reveals the early signs of the talent that Karren possessed as a 23-year-old, which has taken her through an incredible career that so far sees her as vice-chair of a Premier League club and a baroness.
Many senior figures associated with Birmingham City have contributed to Blues Insider including Colin Tattum, the journalist who covered the Blues for the local newspaper before becoming in recent times the club s head of media and communications; Mike Wiseman, the current honorary vice-president of the club; former chief executive officer Michael Dunford; administrator Colin Burke; Malcolm Page, an ex-player and Former Players Association committee member; and my son Ben, who worked in the commercial department during the reign of Perry Deakin. They all talk candidly about their involvement behind the scenes.
I will tell you about my contacts with Carson Yeung, Panos Pavlakis and the new owners Trillion Trophy Asia (TTA). I reveal my offer to Peter Suen of TTA to provide a corporate governance team for six months at no cost to TTA.
Through my creation, the Bluenose Executive Lunch Club and my involvement with the Birmingham City All-Stars and the Former Players Association I relate the stories revealed by a number of ex-players including Joe Gallagher, Ian Clarkson, Paul Tait, Tony Want, Kenny Burns and many, many more.
My connection with the playing side of the club is evidenced by getting the two most iconic personalities of Blues history to write forewords for the book; Trevor Francis and Barry Fry.
Get to understand how the academy system worked, as I operated as a scout for several years in the south Staffordshire area. What the recruitment officers were looking for, how the prospective new players were assessed together with how the scouts were trained and remunerated.
Through the writing of a number of books on the Blues, I have become a spokesman for the supporters and the chapter In the Press records my involvement with both the local and national media, commenting on promotion to the Premier League, a 12-point plan to improve the game and a revealing insight into the self-inflicted PR disasters created by David Gold and David Sullivan.
My articles in Blues Magazine resulted in me meeting many of my heroes of yesteryear and they too reveal their inside stories. See my catalogue of tales from Ken Leek, Bert Murray, Fred Pickering, Colin Green, Jimmy Harris, Brian Sharples and a host more.
Raising money for charity resulted in a number of events being organised with legends such as Bertie Auld and Barry Fry and all facts behind the scenes are revealed, such as who drinks lager by the pints before moving on to vodka.
I have been involved in four biographies about the lives of Midlands legends; Gil Merrick, Jackie Sewell, Bobby Thomson and Tom Ross, although only two made the bookshelves with my name as author. Find out the reasons why in this fascinating and insightful chapter.
The book culminates in a significant project as I headed up a consortium to attempt to buy the Blues from Birmingham International Holdings. It was a complicated and difficult process which ultimately failed but the detail behind Project Jack is compelling stuff for a Blues supporter.
Forget match results, players appearances, goals scored, transfers and loan deals as all that information is available online. This book tells tales that are not on the internet because they have never been told before. This is my passion for the club I have supported since I was eight, a club which has never won the league title, never held aloft the FA Cup, never qualified for the Champions League but still enjoys incredible loyalty from its fans, who like me believe that one day things will get better.
Blues Insider - A Quarter Of A Century With Birmingham City gives those supporters, with its revelations of what goes on behind the scenes, even more reasons to dream that dream.

An illustration of myself and my four children by Matt Dixon
Preface
AT THE age of 69 I still get the same feelings as I approach our ground as I did on my first visit which was on Christmas Day 1955 (yes, the players forfeited their festive fayre for a game of football in those days), Blues at home to Nottingham Forest in front of a crowd of 33,500. I remember the crowd more than the match, which was the same for my children Matt, Ben, Holly and Harry when I took them to St Andrew s for the first time just like my father had taken me. Surprise, surprise we lost the Forest game 1-0 in a season when we came first in the Second Division to gain promotion to the First Division. The team that day was: Merrick, Hall, Green, Boyd, Smith, Warhurst, Astall, Lane, Brown, Murphy, Govan.
Being a Blues fan in those days was a family thing. I was a Bluenose because my great-grandfather was one and I was determined that I would give my children the chance to follow in his footsteps.
Matt and Ben experienced a 1-0 victory on 27 March 198