Recently by Sean Makin

Nearly a week on and I'm still quite shocked and surprised that Lee Clark has been giving his marching orders by Huddersfield Town. The chairman Dean Hoyle has come out and stated that he had been thinking about this decision for a few weeks, I know many Town fans that have lost faith in Clark as the season progressed and I have to admit I was one of them. Would I have sacked him? Personally no, I would have given him until the end of the season and like many football fans I never saw this one coming. If you look at the table at this moment and time we are 7 points behind 2nd place Sheffield United, realistically there is still all to play for and I don't think there is any danger that we will slip out of the play-off positions. By all accounts Hoyle and Clark had a good relationship, it has been said that they used to spend time together outside of the office but for whatever reason this relationship has turned sour and Clark has supposedly got the boot in a two minute phone call with one of the directors. Suddenly people outside of Huddersfield Town are asking why has been sacked when he has only had 3 defeats in 55 games?

Let me start by saying what a game at Hillsborough last Saturday! Jordan Rhodes is on fire at the moment and we all know the big guns will come knocking as soon as the January transfer window opens. Both Lee Clark and Dean Hoyle have said that the striker is not for sale at any price but we all know money talks and football is a short career and you can't really stand in his way in playing at the highest level but obviously with saying that I really hope he does stay with us. I heard a funny comment coming away from Hillsborough on Saturday with one Sheffield Wednesday fan saying that Rhodes "is punching well above his weight" I detect a bit of jealously from our rivals that we have the best striker outside of the Premier League! The equalizing goal from Rhodes was pick of the bunch for me, he had pace and the strength to hold off the defenders before hitting the ball with the outside of his foot just sheer class. Credit to Wednesday they look of more sterner stuff than they did last season, had they gone 2-0 down within 20 minutes last season they would have crumbled but give them credit they came back (albeit with some help of our non-existent defending). Whilst the defending wasn't the best the overall play was an improvement from the very disappointing defeat at home to Bournemouth a week earlier. For the first 20 minutes at Hillsborough it was Town as its best for me, we totally dominated and our play was excellent. Against Bournemouth we couldn't have played pass the parcel never mind pass a ball!

If I can recommend a Christmas present to any Town fan reading this I would recommend Andy Morrison's autobiography. It is a superb read and a real honest account of his life and his career in football. It was a pleasure to meet him at a recent book signing in Huddersfield and I would recommend his book to any football fan.

The recent implementation of the Elite Player Performance Plan (EPPP) for me just shows the greed of the clubs in the Premier League. For anyone who hasn't read what it means it means that under the EPPP a selling club will be paid £3,000 for each year of the player's development between the ages of nine and 11. Then the selling club will receive between £12,500 and £40,000 per year from ages 12 to 16 depending on the buying club's academy status. Basically what the Premier League have done is hold a gun to the Football League's head saying "if you don't accept this new proposal we will withdraw the funding". That meant that £5million per club per year would be withheld if the clubs didn't agree to this proposal, large fees for young kids will be now the thing of the past. It seems as though Premier League teams can just walk into any academy in the Football League and take their best youngsters for peanuts, a club like say for instance Crewe, make their living out of selling their young stars for large profits now they can picked off at will by the big guns for less than half their price as tribunals will no longer be needed replaced by the structure of the EPPP. Some kids will be potential will be bought by the bigger teams but won't be nurtured as they would have been at the club they came from and most likely their potential will be wasted. It is quite possible that some teams will close their academy's or centre of excellence as it will not be financially viable for them to continue if their best talents are picked off for peanuts. If anything is to change about the EPPP it will only be when if it effects one of the big clubs.

Anyway that is my mini rant over I hope you all have a good Christmas and get down the Galpharm on Boxing Day to see us face Chesterfield.

First of all I've been thinking for the past couple of days what to write in this blog, I've only written a blog once before as part of my coursework during my first year at university but being a typical student at the time I left the work till the last minute and made up a three month blog in about an hour. So I thought I'd vaguely talk about the current dismay at the ticket pricing for Huddersfield Town fans to visit Sheffield United's Brammell Lane. I'm not going to talk about it too much as it has been brilliant put by both fellow bloggers Marco and Luke so its really a hard act to follow.

The boycott of the game by Town fans is looking strong with the last time of looking at the Down At The Mac thread it was over £7000 in total (please correct me if I'm wrong). I agree it is wrong and a huge difference between Bury fans paying £14 and Town fans being asked to pay £28.50 to sit in the exact same seats but it seems these days that categorizing games for the visits of the supposed "bigger teams" is favoured rather than charging the same all across the board which would be fairer to everyone. If fans choose to go or not that is their choice and we should respect that but it seems as though clubs are playing on fans loyalty. Attending away matches myself I find myself roughly spending between £40-£50 per away match when you count together the ticket price, travel, food, drink and a programme. I seem to remember a similar boycott a few years ago when Oldham Athletic hiked their prices up when we were due to visit Boundary Park which lead to many Town fans not making the short trip and if I remember rightly Town won 3-0 that day!