They don't all stay in the League

Writing in this morning's Sunday Times on the day Hereford United start their play-off campaign, Rod Little comments on how teams leave the Conference then slip back down again.

A delicious irony could unfold at the basement of League Two. Accrington Stanley have been promoted to the league, from which they resigned membership in 1962 and the team that replaced them the following season, Oxford United, look set to swap places 44 years later. Football rarely entertains such fearful symmetry.

One by one, the comparative newcomers to the league loosen their collective grips and slip back down again, propelled thus by pure economics. Scarborough, Kidderminster, Rushden & Diamonds and Cambridge United have all been dispatched whence they came.

You would not be surprised if, next season, or maybe the season after, Macclesfield and Boston United join them. And the former league clubs - York City, Hereford, Exeter City, Aldershot - sit near the top of the Conference. And there's another delicious irony in prospect.

Given the present trajectory of the clubs, it may be only two years before MK Dons host AFC Wimbledon: now there's a match to savour.

In the same article he writes about how Boris Johnson, the blonde haired Tory politican, became a fans favourite this week when playing for England against Germany. The clip of Boris charging into a German player has proved very popular over the last few days.

It is a sad comment on the state of the professional game when the outstanding moment of the 2005-06 season was the shadow higher education minister head-butting a Kraut in the testicles. Boris Johnson has always been adored by the public; his standing now is stratospheric.

The incident occurred in a bizarre televised game of football between two teams of former German and English internationals and celebrities. England lost, largely because Germany has no celebrities whatsoever, other than that sulky-looking woman who sang 99 Red Balloons, and so were forced to rely upon former international players. That being said, our former international footballers were fat, slow and utterly useless. I never thought I would see Matt Le Tissier and Chris Waddle outplayed by the Verve's Richard Ashcroft. The drugs do work, you see.

Anyway, Boris came on towards the end of the game with England trailing badly. He padded around for a few moments before charging fully 20 yards, head down, towards Germany's Maurizio Gaudino, like an albino bull afflicted with BSE. And he made full and forceful contact with the German's groin area, leaving Gaudino rolling around on the floor, howling in pain, the crowd convulsed with delight and hilarity.

Boris later told the press: "There was no malice. I was going for the ball with my head, which I understand is a legitimate move in soccer."

Ah, yes. The deployment of that horrible word - "soccer" - is the giveaway, isn't it? I spoke to Boris yesterday to confirm my suspicions.

You've never actually played football before, mate, have you? "Um. Ha ha. Think I played in a friendly game a very long time ago. But I take your point. At Eton, I was bloody good at the Wall game - I was captain. And vice-captain of the rugby team."

What on earth were you trying to do to that poor man, Boris? "Rod it was, ha . . . hum . . . my plan was to get the ball with my feet. But, you see, I couldn't get my feet to the ball. It's very difficult."

And did you apologise afterwards? "Yes, yes, of course! He was fine about it, absolutely fine. I had dinner with him."

What did he say to you? "Um. Ha ha. Well. Let me think. Well, actually he didn't say anything to me at all. But I'm sure he was fine about it."

---