Dead cats in the
Andes...
In the high Andes, it is called
the soroche, the mountain sickness caused by oxygen starvation in the rarefied
atmosphere at very high altitudes. There are only three cures. First, the preserve of the
native population, is to stay at those heights long enough for the body to adapt, for
extra red blood cells to develop, and hence to be able to cope physiologically in
low-oxygen surroundings. Second, the course pursued by visitors, is not to stay at such
heights too long, but to retreat quickly down the mountain to more ‘normal’
climes, having had no more than a glimpse of the sights from the peaks. Third, followed by
no-one in the Andes I am sure, is to buy cylinders of oxygen and stay artificially
elevated above one’s physiological tolerance.
Try a second random thought. If you throw an
object – a dead cat, say – into a tidal estuary at mid-tide, it will be carried
up and down river with each successive tidal cycle. Throw it in at Hammersmith Bridge on
the Thames and it will get as far upstream as, say, Richmond, before being washed back
down as far as Tower Bridge. Next tide, it will only go as far up as Craven Cottage, but
as far down as the Barrage. Next time, as far up as the Dome, but down past the
psychological point of no return: the Northern Outfall sewer, say, or a mudflat near
Gravesend. Finally, out to the sea at Southend. The most important feature of the cat of
course is that, being dead, it is buffeted by events and has no choice in its
oscillations.
OK, the parallels are no doubt now obvious.
In the last issue of Something to Write Home About (and that’s my entry for
the competition, by the way: it is a great title), almost every contributor reflected the
utter amazement at what is happening the Burnley Football Club. No doubt the chattering
classes’ bottom line was for us to avoid relegation this season. I’m quite sure
most of us hoped for a bit more than that. And we were getting it. Not prettily, not by
playing elegant football, and certainly not by a convincing domination of other teams.
Failing to beat Gillingham and Grimsby showed that although we had come a mile in status
as a result of promotion, we had not come any distance at all in skill or ability. Some
wins should have been far more emphatic: 1-0 against Huddersfield and Crewe, for example,
ought to have been 3-0 if we were really settling into the top flight. And, in the 1-0
wins over Wimbledon and Crystal Palace we were, frankly, lucky to have met those sides
before they hit their stride. But, however lucky we had been, the business was undoubtedly
being done.
Then quite suddenly and without (so far as I
am aware) any obvious single reason, the soroche hit us. Too long, too high, was
obviously starving us of oxygen. We had a brief but expensive attempt at buying some
oxygen, with Million Man Moore. I wish well anyone who pulls on the Claret and Blue, but
I’m damned if I see what Stan saw in him as a forward. Maybe he is or will be useful
in an attacking midfield role, but I’m not aware that was what we required.
The big game for me would have been not
Blackburn (which so far as the press was concerned was nothing more than an offshoot of
the Labour Party with Alastair Campbell playing Jack Straw), but Watford – which
unfortunately was postponed. That game could have shown if we were floating or sinking, by
beating Watford as their performance deteriorated from automatic promotion a la
Fulham to miserable mid-table. Instead, we achieved an uneasy and very marginal revenge
over Forest. And that, said John, is that. Our pretensions, if we had any, are now
entirely wiped out by five straight losses, every one of them bad. It is not a case of
just losing, of bad luck or whatever, in any of them. As with the Barnsley result, you
would have expected us to lose it much earlier and losing in the 90th minute
only emphasises our poverty.
Instead, the dead cat syndrome is taking
over. So tight is it among the chasing pack that earlier in the season one game won, lost
or not played, caused a considerable rise or fall in the league position. Like the cat
soon after immersion, we washed back and forth between 4th and 8th
position. Then it became 5th and 9th. Now, having just lost to
Wolves, we are stuck at 10th and have lost whatever power we had to swim
against the tide. Had we won, we’d have stayed in 10th, because suddenly a
big bunch has cut loose from us and opened a hefty gap. Even winning our two games in hand
will not, now, get us back into play-off contention.
The statistics are instructive, and worrying.
Although our defence is still quite tight (not tight enough, of course, but not bad), our
attack has vanished. Three points out of the last 18 is bad enough, but we scored just
three league goals in those matches and conceded nine. Our goal difference is now down to
negative (well, it was never better than just positive), though fortunately not quite down
towards relegation standard.
The Cup match against Scunthorpe is just a
pratfall waiting to happen. Last season we shared the honours, each winning 2-1 but with
Scunthorpe being relegated. Mid-First Division plays mid-Third Division is a classic loser
and so it very nearly proves. I have great hope, but little faith, that we will triumph in
the replay, but if we do then Bolton will surely see us out in the next round.
More important, the return Gillingham match
has proved what we are made of. If we could beat them, we do not deserve to succeed in
this Division. No, I’m not surrendering yet. But, the dead cat can no longer be
washed back up-table by a win, which as mentioned would leave us in 10th place.
Anything less than a win and the cat has probably drifted below the play-off zone, down
past the sewage outfall and is about to slop messily around in the nether waters off
Southend. But the oxygen (or at least the ozone) is fine there, so I’m told. Perhaps
it will be more to our liking.
(No animals were harmed
in the writing of this article - Ed.)
Chris Down
January 2001
