If Jaaskelainen has been our best ever keeper who has been the second best?

T.R.O.Y. wrote:Presumably you mean demeaning* - Christ if you can’t be bothered reading your own posts why should we

I see your point on Hopkinson - and you are right about height it would be incredibly difficult. I suppose my point is more general about the obstacles faced when judging players of such different eras.

FFS don't start on Sluffy's spelling again! 

As regards height being a disadvantage, surely that is negated if you have a better jump. 
And Hoppy was like the proverbial leaping salmon, commanding his box against much taller and physically robust opponents.

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...and he still holds our all-time record for appearances.

T.R.O.Y. wrote:Presumably you mean demeaning* - Christ if you can’t be bothered reading your own posts why should we

I see your point on Hopkinson - and you are right about height it would be incredibly difficult. I suppose my point is more general about the obstacles faced when judging players of such different eras.

Thank you you are right I did mean demeaning and even read it as such when I did read my post before posting - that's part of the issues I 'suffer' with, with dyslexia. I often see what I want to see, even when the wrong word (or even no word!) is staring back at me.

Hard to believe but never the less true in my case.

I've learned over time to specifically check a few things - for some reason if I'm writing something 'isn't' or doesn't' or even the word 'not' itself, I for some inexplicable reason often omit the 'not' part even though I'm utterly convinced I haven't when typing the sentence.

Often many of my errors are picked up on spellcheck and underlined in red, so it's easy to correct them but as on this occasion and no doubt many future ones I will make mistakes due to my dyslexia.

Many a time I will write something, read it back before posting and then even after posting re-read it and still see errors that clearly have been there from the start but which have been 'blind' to me up to then and I go back and edit the posts before others have commented on what I'd posted.

Once someone has posted though and even though I notice errors in my post afterwards I will not go back and correct them as a rule as I don't want to be accused of cheating and changing my posts after the event.

It's just something I've always lived with and never known anything different.

I highlighted the word suffer above but I don't mean it in the same way as someone suffering illness, loss, persecution or the like, more in the way of it being like a fly say buzzing around you at times that you have to keep swatting away - more of a nuisance than anything serious.

It's caused me a few problems over the years but has never held me back, indeed no doubt it's helped formed part of my character.

Can you remember what grade you got in O-Level English Language, Sluffy?
 
Teachers wouldn't penalise you for being dyslexic. Nor would examiners, but I'm not sure yours is wholly a spelling problem. There are other issues too.

 Interesting that you write, "I often see what I want to see".

There are some poor souls who can't remember or see  where the "stick" goes on a "p", "d", "q", "b".....

Just a suggestion...
I often get ads for "grammarly" popping up, especially on YouTube and it seems to me that it would be more useful to you than spellcheck as it apparently reads the "sense" of the sentence as well as checking for spelling errors i.e. if you write the wrong word or a word is missing or misspelt it would highlight and correct for you.
If it does what it says on the tin it would sort the issue out for you however (disclaimer) I've never tried it and it may be full of americanisms but I think that it may be worth looking into if you're interested.

My mate is a bit frustrated with his iPhone. When he dictates a text to his mother, he always refers to her as mam.
His phone always replaces this with mum. Not a big thing, but he can't understand why.

I've seen much worse spelling in Gammon magazine so let's lay off Sluffy shall we? 

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Personally I think the answer is that this is a football forum and so long as the post is written well enough for us to understand the point (as yours was Sluffy, and as was BTID’s) - then bad grammar/spelling is not an issue.

Grammarly isn’t bad if anyone is interested though I use it at work.

wanderlust wrote:
FFS don't start on Sluffy's spelling again! 

As regards height being a disadvantage, surely that is negated if you have a better jump. 
And Hoppy was like the proverbial leaping salmon, commanding his box against much taller and physically robust opponents.

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...and he still holds our all-time record for appearances.

Possibly, the shortest top class keeper I can think of is Barthez - take top class with a pinch of salt. 

He was 5”10 from what I just read so maybe Hoppy would have had a chance at just a couple of inches shorter.

ANYWAY point stands, can’t compare different eras and Jussi is the best for last 30 years.

Sluffy wrote:

Great to hear from you again Bob, hope you and yours are all keeping safe.

Clearly I am outnumbered on this one but I still stick by what I've consistently said above in that a Eddie Hopkinson in his prime would be physically unable to cope with the game in the modern era.

If he could then it stands to reason that professional football would be populated with goalkeepers at his height and with a similar skill set as he had and the facts are that there isn't and furthermore I doubt you would even have many/any keepers in the top four tiers of our game under 6 foot, most being even taller than that height.

As for all those on ww they seem more keen on Wigan going bust than interested/understanding anything to do with their finances and most clearly never having any grasp on our clubs finances at the time - or quite frankly since!

I've been interested myself as to what has been going on at Wigan (not so with clubs in general with similar problems like for instance Charlton and Macclesfield) probably because I used to work there at the time they were elected to the football league and sort of had a passing interest in them ever since (although if I ever did have a second team it would have been Bury as they were the only other team apart from ourselves who's score I used to look out for).

I tend to view their fan forum site Latics Speyk on a daily basis and even have considered joining it to try and help put them right on a few of their major misconceptions they have but I resist as I know it would only lead to abuse and I've been through that enough times on here and ww simply as a thanks for trying to help people better understand what is happening.

I've shared my views on the thread we have on Nuts and unless something drastic happens in the coming week then I think their future in the EFL is looking very bleak indeed.

Hope you pop back and post again soon

I must admit you were the first thought I had when I read our first league match was against you know who!



Stay safe.

FGR on 12 September, the day after the second anniversary of ED's death.

How many Bolton supporters new or cared that BWFC were never likely to get through the 2017/18 season without more cash from Eddie and that, after his death, administration was a cert if KA couldn't pull in some new money from somewhere else? Nowt KA could do about it unless he had a crock of gold that he and his missus were ready and willing to chuck away.

Disappointing though that BWFC supporters fell hook, line and sinker for the Iles nonsense and Dale Vince's posturing and threats. If Vanity Vince didn't know the financial facts about BWFC, he could only have been living in a mindless bubble.

I was only a kid when I saw Hoppy make his debut against Blackpool in 1956 but knew instantly that he was summat special. He was not much more than a kid himself but just over a year later he made an England debut that he had well and truly earned and deserved. 

Keith Branagan is my second favourite Bolton goalie. Maybe because not too much was expected of him but he turned out to be reliability personified. Just what you need from a goalie.

Almost forgot about the Doidge ‘transfer’, what a shambles that was.

okocha wrote:Can you remember what grade you got in O-Level English Language, Sluffy?
 
Teachers wouldn't penalise you for being dyslexic. Nor would examiners, but I'm not sure yours is wholly a spelling problem. There are other issues too.

 Interesting that you write, "I often see what I want to see".

There are some poor souls who can't remember or see  where the "stick" goes on a "p", "d", "q", "b".....

No, I'm dyslexic.

Apparently it is hereditary although I don't think that's ever been proven as such but I believe it is widely accepted that dyslexia is often found in family's and a number in my family have been tested and found to be classed as being dyslexic.

I don't really have problems with English per se, I've been an avid reader throughout my life and I think I have in my head a larger vocabulary of words than about anybody else I know - I just have problems spelling them!

It's not an intelligence thing as such, nor am I lazy or lack confidence, I just happen to have it as weakness in my armour so to speak.

Back in my infant/junior/senior school days the teachers used to underline misspelt words and you used to have to write them out below ten times or so just so it would stick in your memory for next time - it just never would for me.  

Even today I will constantly spell words incorrectly that I most have written thousands of times during my lifetime.

I don't do it deliberately, it's not as though I'm being careless or not thinking, it's just how it is.

I rather liken it a bit to snooker or golf in that the more I write/play the better I seem to become with my spelling/game but if I don't write/play for sometime my spelling/game has deteriorated - I still know what I want to write/shot to play but it just doesn't seem to be there anymore and I have to work to get it up to the mark again.

As for my 'O' level in English, would you believe in the Grammar school I went to I/we were all, streamed based on ability and i ended up in the top group - this was before the likes of spellcheck technology - indeed even before pocket calculators were allowed in class!  The point being that the teachers had obviously recognised some sort of ability that I had for English beyond just my spelling problems.

My teacher told me that the examiners marking criteria (the JMB as it was back then) was 5% of the marks were allowed for spelling and a further 5% for correct grammar and she told be quite bluntly but honestly that I would get no marks for either category and thus was entering an exam where I already was 10% disadvantaged on a criteria that awarded pass/fail and accordingly grades based on percentages.

I passed and was awarded a C which under later numerical marking schemes that people may be more familiar with equated to a '2'.  

Fwiw I gained 7 'O' level passes which was joint equal in my school for that year - I only mention this to show how dyslexia had made my life that bit more difficult but it didn't prevent me from succeeding.

I don't fully understand what you are attempting to say in your last paragraph (I'm assuming you mean the perpendicular stroke on the examples you give) but as far as I'm concerned dyslexia as never been an issue to me as I simply don't know any other life without it and that I'm sure there are plenty other kids out there who have been disadvantaged over the years much more with other issues and probably even with dyslexia that has manifested itself to them in a different way than to myself.

wanderlust wrote:Just a suggestion...
I often get ads for "grammarly" popping up, especially on YouTube and it seems to me that it would be more useful to you than spellcheck as it apparently reads the "sense" of the sentence as well as checking for spelling errors i.e. if you write the wrong word or a word is missing or misspelt it would highlight and correct for you.
If it does what it says on the tin it would sort the issue out for you however (disclaimer) I've never tried it and it may be full of americanisms but I think that it may be worth looking into if you're interested.

Thanks but I've managed just fine without it and I simply don't need any help as such at my stage in life.

I appreciate you trying to help though.

Sluffy wrote:



You have been/still are an athlete, if you were still competing at your prime against competitors who are bigger, stronger and with longer length strides, you will inevitably do far worse over time than if you were competing with those with similar length strides to you, it's just a pure physical thing.

Maybe you might be mentally tougher than them and do well/win but when you eventually compete against someone who has the same mentality and a longer stride length - and you both run against each other flat out you will lose - it's as simple as that.

That's interesting because i can tell you what has actually happened and give examples in athletics.

I raced from the age of 17 to 50+ and still race from time to time at the age of 66.

 Three things come to mind i was in my pomp in the 80's / 90's at that time we had two of the countries top distance athletes both ran internationally on all surfaces, one was 5' 8" the other 6' 2" over the 5 years they competed they were almost in seperable on achievments if anything i would say the smaller athlete had a slight edge re impact on our club and achievments.

Another thing of note we regularly compare todays club runners with our era (over a pint) and despite better facilities, better kit and better coaching for some reason they are light years behind our squad back in the day.

For example when i ran London in 2hours 36 in 1989 i was placed 374th out of 25,000 i had 20 team mates capable of the same or much better, today my club has probably two runners who could match my time.
Just pointing out that time doesn't always equate to progress.

I remember so many times seeing a few greek gods warming up and think shit they look good but once the gun went off they where nowhere to be seen. 

Finally i do however concede that if everything is comparable other than height then the taller guy would have an advantage. BUT in distance running height and strength may be a disadvantage try humping a few extra stone around for 26 miles and things soon level out. 

I understand what your saying and yes most of the runners i wanted to beat did have height advantage but there are so many variants in good performances that you can't apply a one size fits all approach, otherwise we could predict every outcome, sport doesn't work that way.

I've always envied distance runners. I think they suffer from it not being seen as a particularly 'sexy' sport, but I take my hat off to them.
If Mo Farah is worthy of a knighthood, what about Ron Hill?

wessy wrote:

Sluffy wrote:You have been/still are an athlete, if you were still competing at your prime against competitors who are bigger, stronger and with longer length strides, you will inevitably do far worse over time than if you were competing with those with similar length strides to you, it's just a pure physical thing.

Maybe you might be mentally tougher than them and do well/win but when you eventually compete against someone who has the same mentality and a longer stride length - and you both run against each other flat out you will lose - it's as simple as that.

That's interesting because i can tell you what has actually happened and give examples in athletics.

I raced from the age of 17 to 50+ and still race from time to time at the age of 66.

 Three things come to mind i was in my pomp in the 80's / 90's at that time we had two of the countries top distance athletes both ran internationally on all surfaces, one was 5' 8" the other 6' 2" over the 5 years they competed they were almost in seperable on achievments if anything i would say the smaller athlete had a slight edge re impact on our club and achievments.

Another thing of note we regularly compare todays club runners with our era (over a pint) and despite better facilities, better kit and better coaching for some reason they are light years behind our squad back in the day.

For example when i ran London in 2hours 36 in 1989 i was placed 374th out of 25,000 i had 20 team mates capable of the same or much better, today my club has probably two runners who could match my time.
Just pointing out that time doesn't always equate to progress.

I remember so many times seeing a few greek gods warming up and think shit they look good but once the gun went off they where nowhere to be seen. 

Finally i do however concede that if everything is comparable other than height then the taller guy would have an advantage. BUT in distance running height and strength may be a disadvantage try humping a few extra stone around for 26 miles and things soon level out. 

I understand what your saying and yes most of the runners i wanted to beat did have height advantage but there are so many variants in good performances that you can't apply a one size fits all approach, otherwise we could predict every outcome, sport doesn't work that way.

I was attempting to oversimplify so you got the point I was trying to make which I think you now at least acknowledge.

As for some of the things you say which I fully accept but also life outside of sport as also moved on over the years and I've no doubt the talent is still potentially there to do the things your club has done in the past, but those with it (or the potential of it) have chosen different paths. alternatives, life choices than what were then open to you and your peers in your day.

Of course there are any number of variables but in general those with the best 'advantages' are more likely to win than those 'without' them - everything else being equal.

I go back to the plain fact that there are no 5ft 8 inch goalies playing at the top level anymore and there is a simple reason for that.

You can level the playing field in many respects, tactics, strategy, greater will to win, gamesmanship, better equipment, even cheating such as using drugs but you simply can't add height and reach to what God as given you (without detection anyway!)

That's just how it is and why there are no longer top class keepers being so small.

I think we've all been conned by modern football. Keepers don't need to be tall, they need to be good at being a goalkeeper. 
Just like playing out from the back is a con. The keeper's ability to pass the ball to a full back seems to mark the coach out as a genius these days.
Then there's 'the press' or trying to get the ball back, as we neanderthals used to call it.
Bolton, under BSA, played the long ball game of course. Unless a top six team did it. Then it became 'missing out the midfield'.

boltonbonce wrote:I've always envied distance runners. I think they suffer from it not being seen as a particularly 'sexy' sport, but I take my hat off to them.
If Mo Farah is worthy of a knighthood, what about Ron Hill?

Nice one Bonce envied in what way ? In terms of Farah and Ron Hill if you ask runners Ron Hill is the most admired runner ever to put on a pair of shorts i could wax lyrical about Ron and yes he should have received a knighthood some are trying to make it happen, Ron now has a form of dementure but is still the King.

Mo Farah received a knighthood but will he keep it? his results make him the most successful GB atjlete ever hence the "Sir" however within the sport there are major doubts has to if these titles could be deemed legal, i would say it's 50 / 50 split within the sport, mainly due to his association with the coach and ex marathon champion Alberto Salazar banned for doping offences.

Going back to Ron he is the "Tough of the Track Alf Tupper" in every way. A true runners runner and legend

wessy wrote:
Nice one Bonce envied in what way ? In terms of Farah and Ron Hill if you ask runners Ron Hill is the most admired runner ever to put on a pair of shorts i could wax lyrical about Ron and yes he should have received a knighthood some are trying to make it happen, Ron now has a form of dementure but is still the King.

Mo Farah received a knighthood but will he keep it? his results make him the most successful GB atjlete ever hence the "Sir" however within the sport there are major doubts has to if these titles could be deemed legal, i would say it's 50 / 50 split within the sport, mainly due to his association with the coach and ex marathon champion Alberto Salazar banned for doping offences.

Going back to Ron he is the "Tough of the Track Alf Tupper" in every way. A true runners runner and legend

I envy them in that they seem to have a spare, lean frame, and, for someone like me, who has to fight to stay at a reasonable weight, something I envy.
Is it the running that keeps them lean, or a combination of running, diet and metabolism?

Sluffy on a similar tak , Height seems to be the benchmark on Goalkeepers, however you only need to see our recruitment this season height again playing a major part, with outfield players the modern game seems to be going for tall athletes so is that going to mean a small player can't be a pro ?

In my life the best palyers have been Pele, Maradona, Cryuff, Best and currently Messi four small men and one Cruyff   5' 11"? against the likes of Peter Crouch lol  or mayne Ronaldo at 6' 2"

boltonbonce wrote:
I envy them in that they seem to have a spare, lean frame, and, for someone like me, who has to fight to stay at a reasonable weight, something I envy.
Is it the running that keeps them lean, or a combination of running, diet and metabolism?

Yep sounds right you now know how i look lol 

I am only 5'6" and weigh 10 stone 4lb thats the heaviest i have ever been, my racing weight was around 8 stone 6lb, i am naturally slim but i ran 60-80+ miles a week for around 25 years. feel better for a bit of weight now. but metabolism and genes are a major thing just so you hate me even  more never been on a diet.