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Fixtures deal a mean hand to Blades fans
FROM the height of mid-summer – such as it is – it's hard to visualise Preston away on a February Tuesday or a trip to Blackpool in the depths of December.
But fans of all hues will be planning their lives around the new season's fixtures – some with an axe to grind.
Blades have got the hump because the fixture computer has dealt them the same distant hand as last season.
United are away on the first and last days of the season – and on Boxing Day while the Owls are at home for those key clashes – as they both were last season.
Unitedites have a point. Why can't a computer be programmed to realise that a team that was away on Boxing Day last year should NOT be away on Boxing Day this year?
Once again the interests of travelling fans appear to count for nothing.
But while they are opposites on the key fixtures front, that appears to be one of the few current differences.
There needs to be something to separate our big two clubs.
They seem to be chasing the same things in the same way with identikit websites, pressure for season ticket sales, the perennial hunt for players and they're both planning close-season trips to Malta.
They'll also both be hoping that an ordinarily little-used item of office equipment is going ten-to-the-dozen soon.
The Fax machine. Who else uses one of those any more apart from football clubs making and receiving offers for players?
It's interesting that despite all the world's digital technology, the desperate desire to have a signature on a piece of paper means that only a fax will do.
How long before players, managers and club secretaries can use a PIN number to seal deals?
Speaking of which, how about Benito Carbone at the Lane? The club have said that, despite reports from Italy saying United have shown an interest, they are in fact not at all interested in the 37-year-old former Wednesday star.
Surely that could never happen. Could it?
Better check that Fax machine.
Got a view? Add your comment below.
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Friday 10 February 2012
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