I don't believe that Wigan will improve considerably without him but it was a poison appointment from the beginning, he got sacked from Cardiff surrounding a bunch of insulting/racist emails, then Wigan's chairman appointed him and tried to defend him publically in the media which resulted in him getting an FA charge and stepping down as chairman. I think a fresh start will do them good. Officially we're the Millers, history says there were a bunch of flour mills around Millmoor and our badge has a windmill on it. There's some old footage on Youtube of two of the two clubs that later merged into Rotherham United: I used to play on that Red House field as a kid, they've built a school (Thornhill) on it now though and it might have been bigger originally as there's a dual carriageway running next to it now. Our mascot is Miller Bear although it was originally Dusty Miller (who looked like an old pervert) and during our recent financial difficulties we had "Phoenix the Rotherbird": http://www.themillers.co.uk/news/article/job-advert-official-club-mascot-1126802.aspx http://newsimg.bbc.co.uk/media/images/41500000/jpg/_41500756_rotherbird203.jpg "Rother" is a river that runs through Rotherham, "ham" is old English for hamstead, so Rotherham basically means hamstead on the river Rother. Whilst I'm banging on about local history there's a place called Boston Castle on a mount here in Rotherham, it has a compass constructed next to it pointing to Boston Massachusetts. Apparently some guy built it at about the time of the American Revolution: http://bostoncastle-rotherham.co.uk/
Very cool, that's a great bit of history. I will check the links out when I get a chance later today!
Is that snow or sand in front of the goal? That reminds me of the old school baseball footage of Babe Ruth, TY Cobb, etc. That's definitely one of the best parts of the diamond and the pitch. The rich history they both have!
No idea my guess would be sawdust, they said the game got abandoned so pitch must have been a mess. Found a few photos of Miller bear competing in the Mascot charity race a couple of years ago, it's an annual thing I think: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sport/fo...-League-mascot-race-Doncaster-Racecourse.html Found a video as well:
A bit of trivia for you guys, we were the first ever team to get relegated from the Championship as it's known today, up until the 2003/04 season it was just known as Division 1.. 2004/05 was the start of our meltdown and we got relegated on only 29pts which I believe is still the record lowest points tally in the Championship era. Come on Blackpool!! BTW Forest got relegated with us to League One that year, Wednesday got promoted to the Championship via the League One playoffs.
Another pointless and probably totally uninteresting post but if you look at this image (best image I could find sorry): http://footballtripper.com/galleries/rotherham-united/new-york-stadium-east-stand.jpg If you use Windows magnifier (lol) and look in the top right corner above the blue building and to the right of the floodlight there's a brown building among the trees on the hill, that's Boston Castle. Wow. amazing.
And, of course, Rov'rum also has a bridge chapel! Not as old as Wakey's, perhaps, but still one of best of the very few still around. This may not interest many beyond the most dedicated students of (or geeks for) history and/or architecture ... but for some of us, it's a kinda big deal.
Damn, you must have one of them zooms like in films where the more they zoom the clearer it becomes. Yes it is indeed my castle I use it to cull the local Owl population.
It's been a decent weekend for us result-wise, anything today would have been a bonus and at least we've kept the goal difference to Millwall the same, I feel they are a bigger threat than Wigan as they do look to have improved slightly in recent games and they still have a game in hand. Midweek will be massive with us vs Fulham and Millwall vs Wigan, if we lose it'll probably be panic stations again. Ideally, we want a draw in the latter match preferably with 5 red cards, 10 injuries and then match abandoned with 5mins to go requiring a replay.
You don't think seven points is enough of a cushion? Few good games, teams below you guys lose and you stay up.
Stranger things have happened in football that's why they always say nothing is final until it's mathematically impossible, Millwall have 5 games left and 3 possibly 4 games against teams who have nothing to play for and we've been shooting ourselves in the foot all season. Talking of which I just came here to post this... http://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/0/football/32287991 Our chief officer or whoever it was that ****ed up wants shooting, fingers crossed we only get a fine like Blackpool but from what I'm reading we will likely have the 3pts gained from the match in question deducted. The worst part is even I could have played at centre back and kept a clean sheet against Brighton, they were dreadful in attack.
Our club has declined to comment on any details and have appointed a top lawyer to fight our case, I would've thought if it was a simple administrative cock up from us we'd hold our hands up and accept any charge unless we're just trying to get the punishment reduced. I might be clutching at straws but I wonder if Derby have done the dirty on us somehow in their desperation for promotion? it's funny that he was still with us at Middlesbrough at the weekend (albeit not in the squad so maybe we knew something was up?) and then all of a sudden we're being charged by the FL and Rawson is back at Derby training with their first team. Why didn't they recall him sooner? I can't wait to hear the details although I won't be surprised if it's incompetence from us.
Worst possible result with Millwall winning last night imo, the only positive is they had a player sent off although not sure how important he is to them.
Derby were still monitoring and reporting on Rawson's progress in the Brighton game when he was supposedly no longer our player: http://www.dcfc.co.uk/news/article/loan-report-six-feature-over-crucial-easter-schedule-2384202.aspx So it must be a clerical issue between ourselves and the Football League, either we failed to submit the correct paperwork or the Football League were too busy stuffing their faces with Easter eggs to ratify it in time. I don't think we'll have a leg to stand on either way. Perhaps that is why he is now back with Derby, if we failed to initiate the extension clause before the contract had expired, we then couldn't loan him again because there's a rule that you can't loan a player after the third week in March or suchlike. The best case scenario for us I think would be that if the Football League order the match to replayed, what with it being so crucial to the relegation battle and there being millions of pounds at stake.
Ya know... the mind boggles... in this day and age how does that type of thing happen in professional football? clerical error? surely they have someone who keeps tabs on stuff like that. lawyers? i'm not making fun. just wow. that is costly. the next thing ya know you lot will be wound up because someone forgot to pay the light bill for the last ten years...
I know, if we stay up we'll probably look back and laugh but if this cock up sends us down it could lead to a spiral, we'll lose millions of pounds in TV revenue from being in the Championship next year, players will probably want to leave, Evans might decide he wants another challenge. All because someone (I'm only guessing at this point) didn't file some paperwork correctly. Anyway, another bullet dodged last night with Millwall losing 2-0 to Blackburn, with us now having a game in hand (albeit against Norwich) our future is now largely in our own hands assuming we get the 3pt deduction. Millwall seem to have improved a lot under their new manager though so I'm still terrified they might pick up a win and we won't.
3 point deduction confirmed, the club is going to appeal it although not sure why it's a complete waste of time unless they just want to plant a seed of doubt in the back of Millwall and Wigan players' minds. http://www.football-league.co.uk/ne...s-for-fielding-ineligible-player-2420855.aspx One more win should see us safe imo and I'm a huge Wolves fan for the remainder of the season.
So the three-point deduction doesn't also include a GF-GA penalty, it seems. Sometimes the ruling goes something like "the game is declared a 3-0 forfeit." In such a case, Rotherham would lose four goals, which would be a big difference if Wigan would end up tied with them.