WE'RE WORTHLESS RUBBISH

Simon Grayson's jibe comes back to haunt him

26/09/2008

JOHN BURRIDGE - legend

WE had a great result against Birmingham last weekend and then our manager, Simon Grayson, called us 'a team of free transfers and rejects from other clubs'.

Luckily, we're all pretty thick-skinned so we've taken the charitable view that the gaffer was just trying to make a point about how much the Birmingham side had cost!

But the jibes came back to haunt him this week in training.

Ian Evatt and Gary Taylor-Fletcher stuck strapping tape on the backs of some of the shirts to spell out some home truths.

Things like 'Prem cast-off' for ex-Spurs player Joe Martin; 'Part-exchanged, faulty parts' for Daniel Nardiello, who's had a few injuries in his time; and, for quite a few of us, 'unwanted', 'unloved' and 'freebie'.

Luckily, the boss took it pretty well and wasn't too hard on us.

Crazy

It's always good to have a laugh in training and we've certainly had that this week because of the legend that is John Burridge.

Budgie, as everyone knows him, is living and coaching in Bahrain but has been helping us out. Even at 56, he still does his weight circuits and joins in with training.

He's got a huge fund of brillliant stories, including the time he was playing in goal for Aston Villa back in the 1970s.

They were up against arch-rivals Birmingham and Budgie didn't have much to do because the Villa were 3-0 up pretty quickly.

To beat the boredom, he decided to climb up the post and sit on the bar while the ball was at the other end.

Then Villa boss Ron Saunders went crazy, especially when Birmingham broke quickly. But 'Budgie' dropped off the bar in time to smother the incoming shot.

Budgie doesn't really coach strikers but his enthusiasm certainly got me going - I scored a goal in the 1-1 draw with Coventry on Saturday AND it was from outside the area.

I don't get many of those, so Budgie is welcome back any time!

Your comments

This article has 4 comments

You played well on Saturday despite it being at Bloomfield Road. You always seem to play better away from home (away from the knockers?) so try and bag a brace on Tuesday against QPR. I'll be there cheering you and team on.

By 1974Seasider. Posted September 29 2008 at 8:48 AM.

Ben, I grew up near the training ground in the 70's and me and my mates would go and watch the 'Pool at work. At the end of a couple of training sessions Budgie let us take penalties against him and we had a real laugh with him..... a great bloke way back then.

Good luck at Loftus Road.

By Aspy. Posted September 28 2008 at 11:40 PM.

Big Ben; You are an absolute legend!
Great player! Keep up everything you do for the club, your work rate, passion and heart is amazing!

Hopefully Kabba will stay too in january!

Let's get a couple on tuesday ;)! Let's beat the r's!

By Tom Mayne. Posted September 28 2008 at 9:29 PM.

i was at the game ben and had the best view of your goal as my girls and i were returning from using the "facilities" just as you stroked it home! unlucky with the header as well. keep up your good work

By simon shuter. Posted September 28 2008 at 8:10 PM.

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