As I write this I am still not sure it will ever see the light of day beyond my own laptop. I have toyed with the idea of starting a blog over a number of seasons; buoyed by the #mcfc camaraderie of Twitter and dismayed at how little positive coverage my club Manchester City receives in the media. However there are already some great blogs on t’interweb already covering City, and a huge amount of sound bites seen through NewsNow, so it’s unlikely anything I write will be anything more than personal catharsis whether I upload it or not.
I am also not sure what name to give a blog? There are some great names already; “Blue Moon” (obviously), “Bitter & Blue” (again obviously), “Down the Kippax Steps”, “Read but Never Red”, “Standing Alone”, “View From a Blue”, and my personal favourite (though now long defunct) “The Lonesome Death of Roy Carrol”. For now I’ve gone with “Promise of Magic”, part of the well-known quote from Malcolm Allison in 1972, made whilst explaining his reasons for purchasing Rodney Marsh. I’ve chosen this somewhat for the obvious reasons (it’s well documented that Big Mal’s instinct together with Joe Mercer’s nous transformed City’s fortunes, and gave the club its greatest period of success between 1965 and 1971), but also for what the words conjure in my mind.
Big Mal’s success was already an ebbing memory when I first really became aware of the beautiful game during the 1974-75 Season. I had unwittingly chose not to follow my old man down the glory laden path to Old Trafford, but to follow City (via Videprinter and The Kick Off Match). That season City finished in 8th place in the old First Division, seven points behind winners Derby County, having initially looking like contenders in the first three months of the season.
So as much as I admire Big Mal’s achievements and ambition, it’s actually his second period between 1979 and 1980 which has had a bigger influence on my experience as a Citizen. This second period, and the profligacy which came with it, was one of the causes to a truly awful 30 years of Manchester City history. Ironically this “Promise of Magic”, spoken of by Allison seven years previously, is surely all that kept City fans of the subsequent era infatuated by the club despite the disappointment and the heart ache. This is the period where I became hooked, my formative years; a period of false dawns, sleeping giants, inflatables, gallows humour, and above all “hope over experience”. This is the period when I fell in love with Manchester City Football Club and its fans. For me then “Promise of Magic” sums up nicely the addiction that is Man City.
@l0ngwayfr0mh0me
