The Michael Wood Column

Thursday 16 May, 2002

Why I will not cry when the P45s are handed out

I will be sad to see Benito Carbone walk away from Valley Parade. It will break my heart to see David Wetherall, hero of the hour in arguably our finest hour against Liverpool in 2000, leave the Bantams. I would not like to see the back of Gary Walsh or Wayne Jacobs and the news the Lewis Emanuel would like to jump ship for double his money at Huddersfield Town is alarming. Nicky Law's core of young players seem set to be kept by the club if only because they do not get much folding money in the brown envelope at the end of the week.

However I will not feel sorry for the rest of them. Geoffrey Richmond once described City squad as a bunch of over paid under performers. In most cases he is damn right and I will not feel sorry of them if they are out of work on Tuesday morning.

For a moment, forget the legalities of the situation and the fact that employment law seems to govern this aspect of football while ignoring many others and look at the ethics of some of the players who will be shown the door tomorrow.

We have Andy Myers, player of the season who only starts to perform when he found his level in the lower half of the First Division.

We have Andrew Tod, the very picture of a cannot be bother professional. If he is sacked on Monday then it is over due payback for the disgraceful and selfish lack of professionalism that he showed when he threw away a win over Rotherham. Unwritten law says we cannot compare football and real life but who could get away with such a blatant two fingers at their employees as Tod did at Millmoor and expect to keep his job?

Eoin Jess? Robert Molenaar? Both players who could, no should do better. You can go though the City team and point at players who were signed to do a job in the Premiership and do all right coasting away in the First Division. Juanjo, so skilful when he can be bothered by so often disgracefully lazy. Ashley Ward, an imposture pretending to be a £18,000 football. All credit to him for getting the deal in the first place and yes if someone offers him it then he has a right to take it but that £18,000 has come out of our pockets. Are we going to get upset because he cannot scam up anymore? Because in the harsh real world light that the Administrators have brought he stands out as a many getting Premiership wages to put in half decent First Division displays.

I will not feel sorrow for such people.

City have a core of around half the current playing squad at the club worth keeping. Walsh, Wetherall, Jacobs, Emanuel, Tom Kearney, Michael Standing, Danny Forrest, Claus Jorgensen, Danny Cadamarteri and a few of the juniors. The rest can go. They all signed up for a promotion challenge that as a direct result of a series of uncommitted and inept displays did not materialise. They have done well enough out of Bradford City, taken the club for everything it had, now they can go and no one will even point a figure at them, no one will ever say that Bradford City might not be in this mess if Andy Myers could keep concentration up for 90 minutes or if it had not taken Ashley ward 31 games to score a Premiership goal.

It is not the sole fault of a collection of players that City are in administration but they have to take some of the blame for the season on the field. If they had put in the performances that they were capable over the last season then they would not be out of work.

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