Ken Bates, all the charm of a mass grave, Dennis Wise, a bong eyed arse of a player

PS

You would think Ken Bates could:-
A) Afford false teeth
B) Put them in

Blind prejudice not worth column inches.

"I've never liked Wise" (clearly)

"This is a man who is so sure of his own greatness, that he promised the Leeds fans he'd stay even if they were relegated, not seeming to understand he was the main reason for their relegation. (Leeds may have been at the wrong end of the table when Wise took over, but so were Sunderland when Keane was brought in), less than two months before Wise's appointment" (oh yes, identical circumstances - money etc at makems/need to sell at LUFC).

Believe this tripe if you like but my god this fella needs to grow up.

Tell you what if I wrote this kind of stuff about you on here you would respond that I was a typical conceited Leeds fan/arrogant/etc. And that's why nobody likes you . . . . Not worth the paper its written on. I assume he's one of yours? A sad man.

It may be 'tripe' but Dennis Wise was/is and no doubt always will be an arse, or does his twin brother with the same name manage Leeds now?

In your view talbot maybe - he has like many in football done things I would not try to defend but to use Keane's short term achievements at makems as a comparison is absolute tosh. Make a proper case author or keep your opinions to yourself. Next year we may find ourselves above Keane (possible rather than probable) - will the author pop back to apologise. Keane was the second biggest thug ever to play football in the Uk. He ended Alfie's career and said he set out to do it but he is now a role model to your correspondent. Guy's a joke (or simply throwing out some bait cos he knows how much we dislike this guy for what he did). Move on.

ps biggest thug - Souness

In fairness we don't put great store in the Rivals board, that's one of the reasons we exist at all.

I don't, never did, like Dennis Wise to be honest. A case in point why, is his behaviour in the Cup Final against Manchester United when clearly hopelessly outclassed, Wisey went running round the pitch trying to kick people. Now that wasn't going to win Millwall the game, least of all with 10 mean and no skipper on the pitch was it?? However I always disliked him, and still do along with Roy Keane. Some people like Pearce are described as 'uncompromising' some are simply malevolent and Wise and Keane fit that category. Either was always the first up to the referee whether wronged or encouraging cards or whatever.

Horrible fookers.

I'd still take some persuading, I think I'd be in 'prepared to tolerate' mode if that was the case, I'm sure I'd have difficulty in coming round to liking him. Chances are if he was with us, in the long term he'd shit on us like he did Swindon anyway. Horrible player, horrible man.

Great editorial, love it, i can smell his fear

I cant get onto Rivals from work, could somebody copy and paste please!

Excellent Post

Manager of both team DIRTY, DIRTY LEEDS

By David Stringer
Date: 6/9/2007

QUITE often the soul of a football club can transcend the individuals involved. Ideologies and styles of play introduced in one generation set the standard that successors will be judged by, players and managers are appointed partially because they fit the idea of what that club's player should be.



Liverpool from Shankly to Dalgleish, playing smooth, creative incisive football, the Arsenal teams from Chapman to Rioch based around hardworking, well organised journeymen, and on the other side of the scale, there's plenty of clubs, (including Pools up till about a decade ago) who believe they're going to fail simply because that's what they do.

One of the most infamous examples of this is Leeds, judged in relation to the team of Bremner and Giles, footballers who could play a bit but often chose not to. The Chelsea of their day, in effect.

Of course, the soul of a club can change a little over time, leaving the next generation of fans a little confused over a club's reputation.

Being a relatively young fan, the first Leeds team that made a strong impression on me was David O'Leary's; the fast paced, tough and skilful team made up of young British players. There were plenty of televised matches where I enjoyed their successes, was downhearted at their failures, and enjoyed their play.

For this reason I've always quite liked Leeds, while some older fans will have rejoiced in the financial collapse brought on by Ridsdale, my feelings were that this was a shame, not something to celebrate. They were always a team I liked.

However, that's changed over the last year or so; ever since the unholy alliance of Bates and Wise was reformed at Elland Road.

I've never liked Wise.

As a player he was a thug and a bully, and in interviews he's always struck me as someone who just loves to be praised, probably more than he loves the game itself.

This is a man who is so sure of his own greatness, that he promised the Leeds fans he'd stay even if they were relegated, not seeming to understand he was the main reason for their relegation. (Leeds may have been at the wrong end of the table when Wise took over, but so were Sunderland when Keane was brought in), less than two months before Wise's appointment.

When you consider that Leeds had reached the playoff final the year before, that despite their financial situation, have had far greater financial resources than Barnsley, Burnley and Southend, their relegation rivals, and two months to plan for the opening of the transfer window, that, he had a decent amount of prior experience both as a manager and as a presence in a dressing room full of big egos, I can't see how his performance can be interpreted as anything other than gross incompetence. Yet this didn't even seem to cross Wise's mind.

There's the way he organised his Millwall team for the 2002 FA Cup Final. Fortune gave his side a place in the final without having to play a single top flight team, surely a dream opportunity for any aspirational young manager.

Some fierce tackling, a bit of brains, and the flair of Tim Cahill, it could have been one of the great Cup final upsets, at least the equal of Sunderland's three decades earlier. Yet, for some reason he didn't bother.

Then there's all his whinging this season. Talking about the Football League's decision not to allow Leeds to abuse loopholes in the competition's rule book he said "We'd like to know deep down the real reasons…everyone wants to get a head start, so 23 teams in our league have got a very good head start on us."

The idea that the 55 other clubs in the league have a moral objection to their richest member abusing the rules, again, doesn't dawn on him.

In fact, the sixteen clubs that voted in their favour included Bradford, Forest Ipswich and Wednesday, all clubs who are lower than they have been historically, and Darlington, QPR and Wrexham, who have all had financial problems in recent years. Rather than their enemies setting aside their sense of morality in favour of self-interest, it appears to be their supporters who have done this.

In terms of his competence, he managed to alienate his captain (who he appointed to the role) to such an extent that he wanted to return to his former club, in a similar position in the league, and far less long-term potential. And, of course there's the fact that Wise had to go and watch Northern Ireland to figure out why David Healy wasn't scoring many goals for Leeds. Turns out, if you play a striker on the wing, he won't get as many opportunities to score. Who knew?

Ken Bates is hardly any better. He left Chelsea in about forty million pounds of debt, but blames Ridsdale's financial management for events that happened half a decade after he left. He's a man with so little decency that last season he published the address of a former director he was in conflict with, and encouraged fans to bombard him with abuse. And there's his contempt for the fans, claiming the majority of them are behind him, despite the fact that 'Shoes off if you hate Ken Bates' has apparently been a popular chant during pre-season.

Of course, having the two most influential people at the club sharing the same classless egotistical personality type will inevitably influence the rest of the team.

Gus Poyet, someone I always liked during his playing days, has claimed that Andy D'Urso had a vendetta against him and Wise, which influenced his performance in their league cup match, something which is self-evidently stupid. If referees do have even slight biases against players, managers or teams, it's always inevitably because the person in question is a nasty piece of work, and so the referee dreads having to referee them.

And those of us who buy a programme down at Leeds will be treated to the 'real' league table, which doesn't include their fifteen point deduction. (A slightly unorthodox use of the word .)

Some will argue that this kind of attitude is the right way to go; an 'ends justify the means' approach. But the flipside of that attitude is that rival fans will want them to lose, not just out of self-interest, to remove a potential rival, but because they despise what the club stands for.

Pools have beaten Sheffield Wednesday twice in two different competitions in the past few years, and Forest in our penultimate home game of 05-06, which all fill me with pride.

While that sounds like I'm playing into the old cliché that these kind of games are 'our cup finals', it genuinely is an achievement for a club with our resources to beat a much better equipped club. I would feel the same if we beat Forest this year.

With Leeds though, it would be different; I want them to lose. Not out of envy, not because I want what they have, and not because I'm jealous of their history, simply because I don't like what they stand for. At the moment Leeds have a one hundred per cent record, but as Wise seems to be encouraging egotism and self-indulgence, I'd imagine the team spirit won't stand up well to bad results.

My main concern this weekend will of course be on continuing our impressive start to the season, but if we can help sow the seeds of Leeds United's downfall, for a change I'll enjoy another team's failure.

A cracking article...

Cheers Mr Tree!

Just want to comment on a few things regarding the article...

My intention wasn't to bait and provoke for the sake of it, in fact I said



I probably could have been more precise in my opening, concerning the 'soul' of a club, but clubs tend to be judged by the standards of the 'historic' teams; the ones that have made the strongest impression on fans. In Leeds' case this would be Revie's team in most people's minds.

My knowledge of this team is almost entirely secondary; relying on what I've heard from others, and in autobiographies and interviews with those that were there; I've only seen little bits and pieces of footage from that era myself. What I have heard about that team however, is either that they were skillful and hard but fair, or that they were thugs who set out to harm the opposition (and were quite skillful when they chose to be more positive).

I have no direct knowledge of this team, (and as such, no real opinion) but I thought it was a decent hook to open the article.

However, the 'historic' team from my point of view, that I judge Leeds by, would be the team of Smith, Kewell, Woodgate and the rest, and as such I have a fair bit of a soft spot for the club.



My dislike of Wise is because I consider him to be a thug and an egomaniac rather than the other way round (thinking badly of everything he does because of an irrational dislike of him).





I didn't intend to hold up Keane as a role model (certainly not in moral terms; I honestly wasn't thinking about Haaland when I wrote the piece), simply noting that there were quite a few similarities between the circumstances they took over. A big name player, relatively new to management, takes over a fallen giant who were near the bottom of the league, after the season had begun, and obviously in less than ideal circumstances. I thought that was a coincidence that was worth taking advantage of.

I was only using Keane's short term achievements as a comparison to Wise's short term achievements; Keane organised and motivated a dispirited bunch of players (albeit with significant financial assistance), given that Wise had more than two thirds of the season left, he should have been able to get Leeds up into a comfortable mid-table position by the end of the season.



Sorry if I've caused offence; it honestly wasn't written with the intention of seeking a bite, certainly not on the Haaland front. My gripe is with the people running your club, rather than the club itself.

If a more likeable group of people take over the club and start playing the sort of football you have done in the past, I'd quite like to see you rise up the leagues (provided Pools aren't in your way of course ) But it really makes my blood boil seeing the likes of Bates and Wise treated with adoration by the media, and refusing to even contemplate they might be wrong; unfortunately my dislike of those two is stronger than my soft spot for your club, and for as long as they're in charge, I don't want to see anything that would feed their self-indulgent egos further.

Hopefully that should clear up a few things, if you still disagree with me, fair enough, but it wasn't written with the intent of offending.

Leave Davey boy alone, he's BillinghamPoolies son ffs.

He is the only thing worth reading on rivals.

Yeah, we know he is but saying 'I don't like Leeds' isn't going to endear him to Leeds fans is it? Who incidentally on 10th August probably all agreed with him about Dennis Wise and when they lose three on the trot will agree with him again. If Ken Bates sells Leeds again anyway, whoever comes in will probably appoint their own manager and the horrible little get will be on the rock'n'roll.

Don't want to get into a massive debate here but three things:

1. The I hate this club that club stuff always worries me
2. Throughout my life I have had to listen to fans trotting out dirty Leeds/brown envelopes/soul of the club stuff. It's all a bit wearing to be honest. I know what I've seen and what I've seen is arguably the finest English team of all time
3. Wise and Keane's positions were in no way comparable. Keane was brought in by a chairman the fans worshipped to a club on a rising financial curve. Within minutes he had signed god knows how many players. Wise joined a club run by a chairman few people wanted and from a club (Chelsea) that LUFC fans hate (not me by the way) like no other but the mancs (not me again). He had no money - he had to sell. The dressing room was divided (big time) the players were unfit and we were fighting a losing battle against debt. I do not like some of the things denis has done in the past - but he was a very good footballer and he may turn out to be a good manager. I don't especially like Bate's business methods but he was there for us when no one else was, so grudging respect from me. To suggest that wise staying after we dropped = ego lacks any intellectual rigour whatsoever. He stayed to prove a point, maybe, but he stayed and we needed him to stay because we need continuity.

LUFC has been on the wrong end of many decisions over the years - referees being a particular problem. We are now the only club in history I think to be punished for going into admin and punished again for coming out. We are a club defined more by what we've lost than what we've won. A club that seems to be the one the powers that be use to make an example of. A club that can never do anything right. We sing waccoe not because we are but because it sums up for us how we have been robbed down the years - this is not feelings, this is referees who were banned and/or never reffed again after their disgusting (corrupt?) performances in our major european finals.

But my real point, is what was the point of the original - I hate Leeds post on rivals. Surely something more contsructive would have been worthy of the author who has in my opinion made himself look small.

I look forward to his articles on other clubs he hates because he has taken a dislike to the manager/chairman/tea lady as the year progresses.

Now it's time for a shower and then I'm off to watch the mighty white gods. Today should be worth the £25 and if by luck and good grace we find ourselves on zero points at the end of it I for one will find it difficult not to shed a tear because we (the fans) have been badly treated by mawhinney and we will be able to say UNITED ARE BACK.

Enjoy your day (including you Mr Stringer).