The Five Grand Sexist Song Scandal

The Daily Stevenage’s work experience investigative equalities reporter Richard Keys gets to the root of the issue

It’s a story that has divided the fanbase right down the middle*, the #SexistSongScandal, as we’ve decided to label it to create a meaningless #hashtag (they’re all the rage even on clothing) and an even more meaningless debate that really shouldn’t exist, so we have despatched our best (gender neutral) reporter into the town to see what the Boro fans on the street, make of it.

 

Using all of our investigative experience we popped out of the office for a fag vape, tracked down a group of average Stevenage lads to JD Wetherspoons just before lunchtime, in 1973.

 

We knew they were lads because they shouted “LADS-LADS-LADS”quite a lot, made gurning faces and cheered whenever a female walked past. That and the fact most of them had half finished badly drawn generic sleeve tattoos depicting a shit stag-weekend, where they didn’t get any, in Magaluf and wore espadrilles.

 

Roy C. Brown (not his real name) wiped the runny egg yolk off his patchy moustache before launching into a passionate defence of one of the amendments to the American constitution, we can’t be arsed to check which one because in all honesty it’s not that relevant and The Comet wouldn’t bother so why should we.

 

“First off, Lisa Rashid has got tits, she’s fit, I like tits so why shouldn’t I ask for a gander? She can always say no, so I’m respecting her right to free speech as well as my own, and she’s probably foreign with a name like that so we’re not racist either, its equality in action”

 

“And another thing, why can’t we ask Kenners to get his pocket rocket out if we like, that’s us demonstrating more equality that is, puppies for the ladies, sausage for the blokes…. not that we like willies, we’re not gay – make sure you print that – we’re normal geezers with a high sex drive and no outlet for it just having a laugh and not hurting anybody, especially not lefty types like you get on Twitter sticking up for nooftersand snowflakes”

 

Not afraid to push the envelope our intrepid reporter suggested that they wouldn’t like their mothers or sisters or aunties being subject to public abuse.

 

Bernie Manning (not his real name either) veritably frothed out the mouth at this suggestion and stood up to his full 5’6” height, almost lifting his knuckles clear of the floor, sucked in his baby pot belly and bellowed; “No-one disrespects my sister! No-one, she sacrificed every under 18 party night at Pulse and Vogue to breast feed me for nearly 6years while my real mum was doing time for twatting Lindsey De Paul at a Eurovision song contest tribute gig in Brighton”

 

It was suggested that perhaps they could just sing about football, this was met by a chorus of ‘LADS LADS LADS’ before Stevie Bannon (not his real name) shushed his mates, picked a piece of bacon rind out of the sizeable gap between his front teeth, dabbed his cold-sore and responded;

“Look, its just a laugh, they, the stuffed shirts at the FA, and the girls, especially the girls, need a sense of humour, first they stopped us blacking up, then they started wearing rainbow laces and had a whole month to themselves, did they stop to think how emasculating that is for us, where’s our Pride day? As if that wasn’t bad enough they stopped us bringing incendiary devices into football, but this is the last straw, its political correctness gone mad, no-one moaned when we asked Andy Drury and Ronnie Henry if they wanted a go on our sister-wife”

 

At that point the shift manager, doubtless working his arse off on a zero hours contract, brought the interview to a close by age-checking the group (because he’d caught them pulling wheelies on a scooter upstairs earlier it transpired) and asked them to leave despite Bernie pulling out a fake Hawaiian state driving licence in the name of Christopher Charles Mintz-Plasse with a photo of Lenworth Henry on it.

 

*When we say divided down the middle, what we mean is about 99% of the social media responses think such language and behaviour rightly belongs in Mansfield, in the seventies,alongside (Neil?) Morrisey, Nigel Fuhrerage and Andrew Gray, but hey, lets stir the pot and sensationalise it, we’re serious journalists but clickbait is clickbait, just look at that targeted advert at the bottom of the page for bored Latvian housewives, it pays our wages and reflects your search history not mine…

Terrace Culture

Drackers and Ben Nugent, purveyors of sartorial elegance, pictured in TK Max yesterday

By Gianni Von Scrotum, Daily Stevenage Fashion Editor and newly appointed Baldock Neighbourhood watch style guru

Terrace culture? Not a laboratory analysis of the crust that steadily builds around the lid of the ketchup on the East Terrace burger bar between July and May like a tangy stalagmite, but a dive into the petri dish of sartorial elegance that is the East Terrace, peering into its frankly disturbing roots to prove definitively that Boro fans have a style all of their own. A style that the club have paid a stunning tribute to with the latest psychedelic away shirt offering.

As a ‘new’ town, Stevenage has always had a touch of the slum about it, (just ask Lewis), but through the football club a new, classier identity has been formed, it’s not the usual terrace uniform of knock-off Burberry and smoke-bomb stained Stone Island, finished off with a dash of Eau de Cannabis, but something a bit more informed.

Look back into the washing baskets from the past 10-15 yearsand you can see where the unique Boro style might have first established its roots, nourishing itself on the diaspora of ‘mix and mismatch’ casual wear seeping into the consciousness of the discerning football fan.

Was it the shiny silver ankle boots first spotted at an away ground on a diminutive (but in all honesty quite gobby) young man with quite an odd taste in hats? Was it Robbo’s ‘Shirley from Eastenders’ experiment? Was it the first time our Graham decided to own the Miami-vice T shirt/suit combo? 

Or is it perhaps a hangover from even earlier, the nineties? Indeed you can still find a few examples of the ‘bucket hat and anything with 3 stripes must be cool’ brigade.

In truth all of these, as well as the vests, Staffordshire bull terriers on strings and fatty vapers in leggings from the cultural vacuum that is the town centre, informed the style choices on the terraces of today in Stevenage, encouraging us all to squeeze a pot belly into a muscle t shirt bearing the name of a band we don’t even like.

You can see how the cool kids have influenced our fanbase, there’s that bloke who dons a frankly quite nice pair of well-cut drainpipe jeans of exactly the right leg length, but styles them by putting pointless turn-ups on them so that you can see he’s not wearing bloody socks, finishing the look with turn-ups on his T shirt. He’s even too cool to come to footballanymore, perhaps it’s the new sponsor tweaking his vegan conscience? It was that or the fact he got himself a life and realised his Saturdays would be better spent decluttering the garage before returning to work on a Monday to manufacture WMDs at BAE for the Saudi’s to drop on schools and hospitals.

So turn up the collar on your Hackett Polo shirt, get a shit tattoo or 3, grow an embarrassing beard, wear things a size too small, designed for people half your age, don brown socks with your blue Crocs (its comfier than you’d think) and strut your stuff, safe in the knowledge that whatever you wear, it’s better than anything any Mansfield fan has ever put on, even that time they had to appear as a character witness in a Steve Evans court case.  

Barry Webber was asked to contribute to this article but we couldn’t hear him over his shirt and tie.

Hitchin Town – the A602 Derby

World exclusive preview by our resident northerner, Ivor Whippet

As an immigrant to Stevenage (please don’t kill me with sticks) I  find our relationship with Hitchin very confusing. During my time in the town the two clubs have never been closer than two divisions apart and have barely played each apart from the odd friendly.

Hitchin frequent the levels of non-league where you need a logarithm book to work out quite where they are in the pyramid and a telephone directory to look up who the hell the sponsors are (unless of course you are younger than me and thus can remember that google exists). They currently sit the division below the division below the conference which is where they have been for most of the last 20 years.

The club was formed in 1928, so I guess must have been our big, established local rivals at one point until we got confident enough in ourselves to decide that was now Luton. I wonder if their fans ever treated that derby as Luton fans do (i.e. disdainfully without any seriousness what-so-ever because we’re just some tin-pot new town side with no history what-so-ever). If so I bet the periodwe were pulling past them was a fun time for our fans!

Hitchin itself is a quaint, over-priced market town with a high opinion of itself. Like Stevenage its house prices are artificially inflated by commuters, but this effect is doubled by the concentration of hipster drinking establishments the town had to offer. Douglas Adams was almost on the money with the “shoe event horizon” but it turns out it was the “civet-macchiato double IPA event horizon”.

A lot of my colleagues moved to Hitchin because “it’s so much nicer than Stevenage” and as I make my way to visit them past the sloping park fields covered in 100 15 years olds getting off their tits on cheap cider I can see their point. At least Hitchin keeps its reprobates in a few concentrated spaces and doesn’t sprinkle them a few at a time throughout the town’s many underpasses like we do. 

Hitchin play at Top Field, which on my first visit appeared the have approximately 17 parking spaces (although that may be because Lock’s giant beamer was taking up 6 of them…). Thus I’d advise public transport (well of course I would, I’m a lefty, liberal traitor). Although be warned, the bus to Hitchin cost a ridiculous amount of money for a five minute tootle down the A602, it’s more than twice as much as an hours train ride cost me in Berlin! The train to Hitchin is cheaper, and it bloody should be because Hitchin station is only about half-way between Hitchin and Stevenage and you still have about a 45 minute walk to get to the town itself. I assume it modelled itself on Cambridge in this regard, or possibly “London” Stansted airport.

Top Field itself is a nice ground. It feels like a park with some benches and a shed in it. Someone’s mum sells hot-dogs out of the back window of their house, whilst their dad flogs the programmes he’s just printed on his old laser-jet. Trees scenically frame proceedings and the fans watch in polite silence occasionally clapping lightly when something spectacular occurs. It has a very village green cricket feel to it, which I definitely prefer to #SmokebombWankers.

I saw Blair Turgott score a goal at Top Field that excited me so much I picked him in my BoroFives team at the start of the season. I saw a game that was 0-0 after an hour without either keeper having to even wake up at any point which finished 4-0 to Hitchin after they subbed on a man I can only assume was Pele’s great grandson or something the way the opposition defence handled him. Even at 4-0 a man with bronchitis could have drowned out the applause with his coughing. It is a place which generates much confusion.

I look forwards to our pre-season trip to Hitchin. I look forwards to getting no closer to understanding why some people love the place. I look forwards to getting no closer to understanding why some people hate the club. Most of all I look forwards to football. I wonder if we’ll have a squad together by then…

Your Guide to our Visitors – Cheltenham Town

On a recent episode of BBC1 quiz show Pointless, Cheltenham Town FC was the only answer in the show’s history to receive a negative score.  Explaining this, smug arrogant dental disaster Richard Osman said that not only did none of the 100 people that were surveyed name Cheltenham Town as a current League 2 side, but 57 people steadfastly refused to believe that Cheltenham Town FC actually existed as an entity.  Osman then went on to talk about the world cup of biscuits that he routinely oversees on Twitter which, despite being interminably boring, is nowhere near as boring as the fact that Cheltenham hosts a current Football League team.

Nobody knows anything about Cheltenham Town.  We couldn’t name any of their squad or the name of their manager.  Having been informed that their manager is somebody called Michael Duff, we’ve instantly forgotten his name and had to go back to Google to remind ourselves of his name.  And we’ve instantly forgotten it again, even though we’ve typed it out in the last sentence.  

We’ve actually played Cheltenham a grand total of 16 times, yet we don’t remember anything about any of these encounters.  We’ve tried but we honestly can’t.  It’s like trying to remember pi to the 99th decimal point.  It’s like trying to remember the plot of an episode of pretentious wanky detective show Sherlock after you’ve drunk a pint of lighter fuel.   It’s like trying to remember any one of Westlife’s 24 top 10 singles other than Uptown Girl.  Much like Steve Evans’s diet, it’s a fruitless exercise.

One can only conclude that Cheltenham Town is the single-most boring football club in the Football League.  And this in a league that includes Crawley Town, Rochdale and Stevenage.  In all likelihood their away kit will be beige, with magnolia shorts and socks.  They’ll be sponsored by a building society or financial institute that will have T&Cs in small print below the name of the sponsor on their shirts advising how investments are liable to go up or down.  They’ll play in a traditional 4-4-2 formation, leaving one man up front when defending corners.   They’ll grind out a 0-0 draw that will be devoid of any talking point whatsoever.  They’ll take the scenic route back home along the A40.  They’ll have an end-of-season meal at Cheltenham’s 3rd best curry house and all order the chicken korma or omelette and chips.  They’ll then vanish off the face of everybody’s consciousness for the next 12 months until we realise that we have to play them again.  And then we’ll say to ourselves “I didn’t realise there was a football club in Cheltenham.  I wonder who their manager is”.

Bountiful Beer Bonus for Boro Boxing Buffs

Hot on the heels of its £99 season ticket promotion, Stevenage Football Club has today announced the latest range of benefits for its most loyal supporters.

Those fans that have bought tickets to the Billy Joe Saunders boxing match at The Lamex will be rewarded with cheap craft beer next season. A club spokesman confirmed that “we will be reducing the price of Boro Beer from £4 a pint to £3.50 a pint, valid for one drink during a match of your choosing. If you are a lady, a similar reduction will be applied to Carlsberg.

“The promotion is available to the first 10 supporters that have purchased £250 front row seats for the boxing.”

The club’s spokesman continued by confirming that “to allow for this promotion to take place, we will be raising the price of all drinks by £2. Although it’s only a £1.50 rise if you buy your drink in advance of the day of the match. And so long as you’re a member of the Supporters Association.”

It’s understood that Stevenage FC was due to announce this remarkable supporters’ offer straight after the 3-0 defeat to Notts County, but then thought it best to do it after a 5 game unbeaten run. “We’re not fucking stupid” said Phil Wallace. Allegedly.

Your Guide to our Visitors – Exeter City

According to the internet, the three most famous Exeter City supporters are that annoying wanker out of Coldplay who was once married to vaginal steaming advocate Gwyneth Paltrow; that annoying patronising wanker with a tidy beard who hosted Deal or No Deal; and Eddie Hitler out of Bottom. We know which of the three we’d most like to go for a beer with. We also know which of the three we’d most like to steam the genitals of.

Do you remember the time when Michael Jackson was brought onto the pitch at Exeter after being made an honorary director? It’s rumoured he joined The Grecians’ board having learnt that there were no vacancies at Crewe Alexandra.

‘Grecians’ is probably the strangest nickname in the Football League as, other than Exeter City’s failure to manage its own finances, there’s very little similarity with the Greeks.

The most famous member of the current Exeter squad is Chris Wagon Weale, the only footballer named after a chocolate covered biscuit. Most people say he’s not as big as he was back in the 1970s.

Let’s be honest, we don’t know anything about Exeter and we don’t really care. But our OCD obliges us to finish this report so we’ve resorted to checking the Devon Live website (surely that’s a contradiction if ever we’ve heard one) to check out the 16 most interesting facts about the city. One of which is that the roads in Exeter are over 50% safer than the rest of the country. Presumably because tractors rarely go over 20mph. Another is that “Exeter has seen a decline in the volume of texts sent from mobile phones in 2013 as web based messaging services take over“. Wow. Apparently 75% of WhatsApp messages sent from the Exeter area consist of farmers sending each other photos of misshapen root vegetables. The other 25% are of farmers sending each other photos of their penises shaped like carrots.

Did you also know that “homes built in Exeter are now six times more energy efficient than when a home was built in 1900”. Bugger it. I’m off to live in Devon’s county town, even if I’m unsure whether Stevenage homes are also six times more energy efficient than they were 119 years ago.

That JK Rowling used to live in Exeter, before she wrote the Indiana Jones books. We’re not sure of the energy efficiency of her former house. Or whether she also used “on average, 160 litres of water every day” just like the average Exeter resident. We’re unsure how many litres of water it would take to steam your vagina, which is the sort of fact that Devon Live should have been coming out with.

The more we think about it, whoever’s behind the Devon Live website is a fucking idiot.

Your Guide to our Visitors – Carlisle United

Notts County supporters. They’re a salty bunch ain’t they? Well let’s see how salty they are when they’re playing away at Chorley on a Tuesday night. Wankers.

Which brings us to Carlisle United. Yeah, I know what you’re expecting. But no. For the first time this season we’re not going to troll our away supporters. We’re going to extol the virtues of a good old-fashioned, unpretentious football club from a decent unfashionable town that has no airs or graces or need to be something that they’re not. A town whose most famous product was the Ipswich Town and England footballer, Kevin Beattie; a player who possessed such natural footballing ability whilst simultaneously managing to be the most hapless accident-prone player of his generation who, on one occasion, poured petrol on a garden bonfire and managed to take half his face off in the resultant inferno and, on another, missed pre-season as a result of putting too much effort into defecating and subsequently strained his stomach muscles. For football should be innocent and timeless, full of characters and escapades and apocryphal tales. It should be about Nobby Stiles dancing on the Wembley turf with the World Cup in his hand. It should be about Paul Gascoigne donning some novelty breasts whilst on England duty.

But Gazza’s fake tits opened Pandora’s box and is the cause of every football-related atrocity post-1990. All-seater stadia. Exorbitant ticket prices. Kick off times dictated by television executives. David Baddiel pretending to like football and writing a (admittedly good) song about Nobby Stiles dancing on the Wembley pitch. The Europa League. The Checkatrade Trophy. Trevor Kettle. Piers Morgan pretending to like football. Soccer AM. Jamie fucking Rednapp and his one fucking skinny black suit. The Premier League. And Tony Blair pretending to like football.

Nigel Farage may be a total cunt but at least he doesn’t pretend to like football. He may be a Gillingham season ticket holder for all we know (and that would be quite fitting) but he doesn’t go on about it if he is one. So kudos Nigel. Just stop pretending that you like to drink beer, you snivelling weasel.

Carlisle remind us of a time before all this nonsense. If there’s any team that visits Broadhall Way and deserves to take away all three points this season, it’s them. This is irrespective of the fact that we’d much rather see Carlisle in the playoffs than those Exeter wankers.

We’ll finish with a quote from a famous ex-player of Carlisle, who later became their manager:

“If you are first you are first. If you are second you are nothing.”

Bill Shankly didn’t elaborate on what Notts County would be in 24th place in League 2. Other than a bunch of salty pricks.

Incidentally, Shanks once tried to sign a teenage Kevin Beattie for Liverpool, but nobody from the club picked him up from Liverpool Lime Street and he caught the train back to Carlisle. Hapless indeed. But a great loss to the game nevertheless. RIP Kev.

Your Guide to our Visitors – Notts County

You know when you festoon your stadium with signs and ephemera that proclaim that you’re the oldest Football League club in the world and you’ve built your whole existence and image around this solitary fact. When do you have to take the signs down? When you’re mathematically relegated before the end of the season? When the whistle goes at the end of your last game in League Two? Or on the day of your first ever game in the National League? This is the conundrum that Notts County currently face, together with trying to broker a deal to sell their signs and associated tat to Stoke City.

You’ve actually got to feel sorry for County. Due to the presence of Sheffield FC in the Peek Freans Biscuit Assortment Northern Backwater League Division 7, the Magpies won’t even be able to claim that they’re the oldest club in non-league. We haven’t seen such a fall from grace since that time the County chairman got his sausage out on Twitter. As a club that’s always revelled in their ‘big and historic’ status, we’re not sure what they’ll make of playing Bromley and Boreham Wood next season. Actually, they’ll probably remind the opposition supporters on social media that they are much bigger and much more historic than they are, which they always tend to do after getting turned over by the minnows. Then again, we’re reminded that we once saw Arsenal play the Magpies in the old first division back in January 1984 (that’s right kids; there was actually top flight football before the Premier League. It’s just that nobody could be bothered to market it to within an inch of its life). We’re reminded of this because we did a head count of County fans on the Clock End ten minutes before kick off, counting a grand total of 26 supporters. And yet their fans have the audacity to call us tinpot. Even though they got a creditable draw in that match, they actually won the contest – and the argument – by being the oldest league club in the world, even though there were more Stevenage fans on the North Bank than County fans in the away end.

Famous supporters of Notts Cunty consist solely of somebody called Jake Bugg and the mass murderer Harold Shipman (seriously: it’s on Wikipedia). It’s a widely held conspiracy theory (not on Wikipedia) that Shipman communicated with Sven-Goran Eriksson from beyond the grave, recommending that he sign Lee Hughes for the club.

What was it with Eriksson? As England manager he’d regularly check up on the form of his players by attending Premier League matches whilst accompanied by his girlfriend. That’s like me taking my wife to work so that she can watch me answer phone calls from pissed off members of the public whilst I stick a pen up my nostril. Or watch me spend 30 minutes making a cup of tea whilst chatting bollocks about Premier League football that I have absolutely no interest in, other than an intense dislike for David Luiz. Cut your hair you fucking weasel, and stop defending with your arms behind your back. You look like when they made us do country dancing in our pants in primary school. Or was that just me?

On the basis that more is less, County managers this season have included Kevin Nolan, Steve Chettle, Mark Crossley, Neal Ardley, and the husband of Tricia Dingle out of Emmerdale.

In all seriousness, we’ll miss playing Notts. It’s a decent away trip, so long as you don’t end up in Hooters. And there is something quite depressing in seeing the heart ripped out of one of the bastions of the Football League. Then again, what are the odds on us getting the charity buckets out and giving County 3 points on Saturday? It might all be worth it if Yeovil go down in their place.

Your Guide to our Visitors – Swindon Town

“So, who’ve we got tonight?”

“The Swindon lot.”

“The Swindon lot? That lot that moved to the Slough office and proved what a bunch of humourless twats they are by misunderstanding Brent and siding with that mongrel Neil? The Swindon lot are little slugs. Little slugs with no personality. They never wanted to take to Brent. They couldn’t handle Brent. They were still loyal to Neil, a man who dripped oil wherever he went, the oily bastard. Give me Brent every day of the week. Even that girl from the Swindon office that copped off with Tim Canterbury looked like she needed a good wash. Saying that, Dawn was far too good for him and it didn’t surprise me when she dumped him and he married that girl off the Maltesers ads. You know, the one that doesn’t pay her taxes. Of course, she paid up eventually, but not until there was a media outcry. You’ve got to be earning a fair old whack to get a £120,000 tax bill land on your door mat. But she’d probably had extraneous expenses like the weekly Ocado delivery bill that had rendered her potless. Come on, we’ve all been there. Fortunately, Tim had earnt millions being a diminutive humanoid living in Middle-earth (sounds a bit like John Coleman at Accrington) so was able to help her out, after the media had kindly let him know about it. He’s a treasure. In fact, when did Tim become such a national treasure? Give it 10 years and the BBC’s poll of greatest ever Britons will have a top three of Tim Canterbury, Richard Osman and Simon Mayo. Which is enough to make you drive a Honda Civic off a cliff. Judging by the Vodafone ads, Tim’s now shacked up with an attractive bird that’s 25 years younger than him. The power of money I suppose. Perhaps if I dress like an extra in Quadrophenia I’ll get to have a go on one of Little Mix. Whoever they are. People often ask me ‘Have you ever seen the Hobbit films?’ I always say ‘No, I’m an adult. And there’s always episodes of Ever Decreasing Circles to watch on the UK Dementia channel instead.’ The lovely Penelope Wilton’s in that. She’s also in that new programme about David Brent on Netflix where she’s grieving for her husband, Richard Briers, and Brent’s grieving for his missus who used to run a care home he was once in. Which is nice, but sad. Then again, Auntie Val out of Friday Night Dinner was also briefly in it. She’s proper feisty on the twitter. So’s Tim’s ex-wife. She certainly doesn’t like people mentioning her tax problems. Anyway, Gareth Keenan was my favourite. Have you seen that he now lives with Diana Rigg’s daughter and goes out metal detecting at the weekend? That’s the life.”

“No, not that lot. I was talking about Swindon Town. You know, the football club.”

“Little slugs. Little slugs with no personality.”

Your Guide to our Visitors – Bury

By our north of England correspondent, Ivor Whippet

Bury has the misfortune of being midway between Bolton and Rochdale (and is therefore closer to Bolton’s stadium than Bolton is), It is only saved from being yet another shit suburb of Manchester by the border wall of the M60, no wonder their fans are so grumpy.

As you would expect from its location Bury is a god-awful hole of a town and as such their fans should have some affinity with us. They don’t though. They hate us. We don’t care. They do however have an affinity with Shrewsbury, both towns revelling in correcting whatever pronunciation of their name you attempt to the other one. Bastards.

The name Bury is thought to stem from the area’s roots as a burial ground for corpses which explains the usual atmosphere at Gigg Lane and the town’s unique aroma (although this may just be down to its location just under Ramsbottom). They claim to be home to a local delicacy known as the black pudding which is particularly disturbing given the town’s history, but doesn’t matter since it’s clearly bollocks.

Bury is the birthplace of Robert Peel, founder of the Police Force and as a result is the subject of the Cornershop song Town Full of Grasses.

The Manchester Metrolink tram has a terminus in the town, a fact which was voted the most boring element of a Wikipedia entry in 2018, Bury’s first trophy in living memory (they did win the FA Cup in 1900 and 1903 but they don’t like to talk about it).

According to Geoffrey Moorhouse no history of Bury is complete without a mention of the Lancashire Fusiliers, but we’ve no clue who either of those people are so we’re not going to mention it.

Bury FC have been in the football league for over 100 years and during that time have established themselves as league two’s West Brom, only without having the highest ground in the country to provide a single interesting fact about them.

They are managed by Ryan Lowe, a player so loved and internationally recognised that he has a hairpin named after him just near Lewis Hamilton’s gaffe in Monaco (presumably because he’s so bent). A notoriously tough player we’ve no doubt Dino will hit his apex if needs be.

Bury FC’s nickname is The Shakers which presumably stems from the knees of their fans given the number of relegation battles they have had to worry through over the years, although it may be from their brush with administration in 2001/2002 when fans had to borrow buckets from local rival Accrington Stanley to stave off the administrators.

We first met Bury in 2011 and have played them 9 times in total as we followed them up and down the leagues like a love-struck teenager. Former Boro’ players Phil Edwards and Jay O’Shea are currently on the books at Bury, we have no idea what they have done to deserve that.

Bury have always been equal opportunity employers, giving job opportunities to mentally challenged players such as Leon Clarke and Jermaine Beckford, as well as Danielle Nardini formerly of This Life. Danielle has subsequently moved on to Bangor City which seems remarkably appropriate so much of this was just some sort of cheese dream on my part.