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Piers Pennington  takes on the mysteries of the Didcot triangle, with three teams that lurk around the periphery of the big time

Look at a map of England, go left from London and you’ll come across a footballing desert stretching across Berkshire, Oxfordshire, Wiltshire and Somerset. Only three oases of league football offer succour to the parched lower division journeyman and many a camel towards the end of its career has found refreshment in Oxford, Reading or Swindon. In the middle of the three lies Didcot, the railway junction which links them, and this has persuaded some to call this area the Didcot Triangle.

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Monday 1 “It would be really embarrassing for us to lose it now,” frets Sir Alex as Man Utd’s lead widens to 11 points after their 3-1 win over West Ham, while Arsenal lose 1-0 at Charlton. Quite a day for goalkeeping mistakes, with pride of place going to David James, whose mishit clearance goes straight to Jimmy Floyd Hasselbaink for the only goal of the game at Stamford Bridge. “I gather it was pretty horrific,” says an unsighted John Gregory. Nicky Weaver is beaten from very long range for Coventry’s equaliser against Man City and Tim Flowers lets a shot through his legs during Leicester’s 2-1 home defeat by Bradford. A rare defeat for Fulham – 2-0 at Stockport – allows Bolton, who win by the same score at Preston, to get to within seven points of the top of the First. Cardiff move into the promotion places in the Third with a 6-1 win over second-bottom Exeter, who will be glancing over their shoulders at Carlisle, six points behind but now with three games in hand.

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Saturday 2 The addition of Rio Ferdinand to Leeds’ defence has an instant impact, with Leicester scoring three times in the first half hour at Filbert Street. “One of my central defenders cost us all three goals but I’m not saying who it was,” says David O’Leary. The fact that Jonathan Woodgate was taken off after 37 minutes may be a clue. At Anfield, Alan Curbishley and Gérard Houllier disagree politely about Emile Heskey, who twice downs Richard Rufus. “I try to cool my players down and he tries to get my player sent off,” rages Houllier after Liverpool’s 3-0 win. “Mind you, he is English, so you forgive him.” In the First Division, Huddersfield win at home for the first time this season, beating Crewe 3-1. Wimbledon lose at home again, 1-0 to rising West Brom. “Maybe the players have a rampant sex life when they stay in their houses on Friday night,” ponders knockabout Dons boss Terry Burton. Oxford are seven points adrift in the Second after losing  3-2 at Oldham. “It is time to start kicking backsides because some of these players are looking for excuses and that’s why they are losers,” says manager David Kemp. Which should help boost morale.

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Dear WSC
Matt Nation’s defence of the long ball game (Myths, WSC 167) was a welcome read for someone like me who went to Wimbledon regularly in the Eighties and saw contempt spat at the club from all directions for the no frills style of play that apparently invalidated everything we had achieved. Long ball football, admittedly, can be boring, but only if it doesn’t work. And for Wimbledon in the Eighties it did work – like a dream. In fact the Dons were the League’s top scorers in each of their first two seasons of hoofing it (1982-83 and 1983-84) with 96 and 97 League goals respectively, topping the hundred mark in all competitions.We were also, not surprisingly, promoted in both as well (as champions with 98 points in the former) and again in 1985-86. By September 1986 – less than four years after losing 4-2 at home to Halifax in a Fourth Division match – we were top of the whole League (albeit only for 11 days). In all the excitement I don’t think I even noticed that we were a “boring long ball side” until the media and our disgruntled victims started bleating about it.
Brian Matthews, Sutton

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Maison Urwin explains why Colchester fans hate George Burley but loved the Conference

Obsession with history may be expected from an inhabitant of Britain’s oldest recorded town. Boadicea is now only evoked in the name of a pub, but on the terraces key events are still mentioned. My dad was cruel enough not to take me to see the destruction of Leeds in 1971 when, at the age of two, I was patently old enough to be in a seriously overcrowded Layer Road (more than 16,000 in a ground now limited to 7,300). However, the team we support today is defined by a pivotal relegation rather than occasional cup glory.

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