English Premier League - Part 2: Winners of the first weekend
People have a tendency to write off teams due to their past or the absence of strength in their starting line up on paper. However such behaviour can be regarded as amateurish because this is exactly what everybody did with Blackpool before the season even began. Blackpool is thought off as a holiday destination in England. A coastal city with a lot of eye candy and a healthy amount of salty water, Blackpool are represented by their football club which is called Blackpool F.C. At the end of the 2009-2010 season, Blackpool F.C qualified through the Championship play-offs to play in the English Premier League.
As soon as the under dog’s secured their spot in the 2010-2011 English Premier League season, the media machinery started to work against them. Reports came out in the media ridiculing their manager, Ian Holloway. The various news features stated that he was destined to leave the club because of a lack of transfer money which would allow the men in orange to compete against the Premier League’s big boys. Ian Holloway immediately rubbished these reports and confirmed that he will be staying with the newly promoted club.
The fact of the matter is that no one took Blackpool seriously even after they had earned their promotion after beating Cardiff City in the Championship’s playoffs. The fact is that because Blackpool are seen as a tourist resort with no thirst for proper football, everyone took their probable relegation from the Premier League come the end of the present season, for granted. Nevertheless, after the first weekend of the English Premier League, experts will have to reconsider their predictions and fans will have to think twice before making a judgement on Blackpool.
The Seasiders took on Wigan Athletic, who themselves are a well established English Premier League team in their own right. No one predicted the outcome that followed; Blackpool not only dominated the Latics but also capitalized on their large periods of supremacy in the match by scoring four goals without conceding a reply. The eventual result of four goals to nil did not flatter Blackpool in any way as the previous Championship side not only played effective football but also provided the English league fans with an excessive amount of entertainment.
After the win over Wigan, Blackpool’s manager said that, I can just take a picture of the league table right now and retire. Maybe these words ring true in this age of commercialism, where clubs like Blackpool not only face competition on the field but off it too.
Indeed Blackpool were one of the massive winners of the first English league weekend of the season. One should not forget that they are in their first top flight league season in over thirty nine years. Regardless of what happens in the coming matches, Blackpool have made a mark already. They have made it clear to their opponents in the English Premier League that no one should be taken for granted, even if you haven’t played first division football in three decades or even if you are based in a tourist resort of a city.
The first weekend of the English League also provided an opportunity to Marlon Harewood. Marlon has been around more than Paris Hilton at the mall during his career at the English Premier League. He started off his career at Nottingham Forest, in 2003 and then he moved to West Ham United. At the end of the 2006-2007 season, Marlon switched clubs and transferred to Aston Villa. While at Villa, he was spent on two consecutive loan spells to Wolverhampton Wanderers and Newcastle United. Now before the start of the 2010-2011 season, Blackpool gave Marlon another chance to save his dwindling career in the English Premier League.
It appears that the deal between the ex-West Ham player and Blackpool has been a win-win for both the sides. In the opening league match of the season for Blackpool, Marlon scored two goals out of the four that Blackpool scored in their victory over Wigan. Harewood has not only paid back the trust that Blackpool exhibited in him but he has also answered his critics who thought that the powerful centre forward was a spent force at thirty years of age.
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