Championship side cancels pre-season Spain games

[Old Master]

Blackpool: Championship side cancels pre-season Spain games

Blackpool have cancelled a scheduled pre-season trip to Spain this week to concentrate on player recruitment.

The Championship side has only eight contracted professionals after 27 players departed the club this summer.

Jose Riga's team were set to play two fixtures during the warm-weather camp, but the manager will now spend that time aiming to complete transfers.

"Our time is better spent preparing here than going to Spain," chairman Karl Oyston told the Blackpool website.
Blackpool's eight contracted players

Defenders: Gary MacKenzie, Tony McMahon, Charles Dunne

Midfielder: David Perkins

Forwards: Steven Davies, Bobby Grant, Sergei Zenjov, Tom Barkhuizen

The Seasiders were due to face La Liga side Granada on Saturday, 26 July, before taking on Murcia-based outfit FC Cartagena two days later.

Blackpool begin their Championship campaign on 9 August against Nottingham Forest at the City Ground.

Former Charlton manager Riga was appointed as Blackpool boss in June on a one-year rolling deal.

The club finished 20th last season, two points above the Championship's bottom three.

Latest news is that 2 of the eight have left the club in the last 24 hours!

[Ned]

Very proffessional.

[Beyond Blue]

Like your spelling

[wizard]

Blackpool: Championship side cancels pre-season Spain games

Blackpool have cancelled a scheduled pre-season trip to Spain this week to concentrate on player recruitment.

The Championship side has only eight contracted professionals after 27 players departed the club this summer.

Jose Riga's team were set to play two fixtures during the warm-weather camp, but the manager will now spend that time aiming to complete transfers.

"Our time is better spent preparing here than going to Spain," chairman Karl Oyston told the Blackpool website.
Blackpool's eight contracted players

Defenders: Gary MacKenzie, Tony McMahon, Charles Dunne

Midfielder: David Perkins

Forwards: Steven Davies, Bobby Grant, Sergei Zenjov, Tom Barkhuizen

The Seasiders were due to face La Liga side Granada on Saturday, 26 July, before taking on Murcia-based outfit FC Cartagena two days later.

Blackpool begin their Championship campaign on 9 August against Nottingham Forest at the City Ground.

Former Charlton manager Riga was appointed as Blackpool boss in June on a one-year rolling deal.

The club finished 20th last season, two points above the Championship's bottom three.

Latest news is that 2 of the eight have left the club in the last 24 hours!

Hopefully their signings don't come through before then. I wouldn't mind going into this game with Blackpool having 8 players and no GKs!

[Old Master]

Blackpool: Championship side cancels pre-season Spain games

Blackpool have cancelled a scheduled pre-season trip to Spain this week to concentrate on player recruitment.

The Championship side has only eight contracted professionals after 27 players departed the club this summer.

Jose Riga's team were set to play two fixtures during the warm-weather camp, but the manager will now spend that time aiming to complete transfers.

"Our time is better spent preparing here than going to Spain," chairman Karl Oyston told the Blackpool website.
Blackpool's eight contracted players

Defenders: Gary MacKenzie, Tony McMahon, Charles Dunne

Midfielder: David Perkins

Forwards: Steven Davies, Bobby Grant, Sergei Zenjov, Tom Barkhuizen

The Seasiders were due to face La Liga side Granada on Saturday, 26 July, before taking on Murcia-based outfit FC Cartagena two days later.

Blackpool begin their Championship campaign on 9 August against Nottingham Forest at the City Ground.

Former Charlton manager Riga was appointed as Blackpool boss in June on a one-year rolling deal.

The club finished 20th last season, two points above the Championship's bottom three.

Latest news is that 2 of the eight have left the club in the last 24 hours!

Hopefully their signings don't come through before then. I wouldn't mind going into this game with Blackpool having 8 players and no GKs!

They'll probably scout the local parks looking for anyone that can kick the ball without falling over and sign them up.

Blackpool's biggest problem is their owners, the Oyston family, Keith Oyston runs the club on a day to day basis but it's his father Owen, he was jailed for kiddie fiddling a few years ago, who pulls the strings.

They used all the EPL Parachute money to pay off their own debts and to invest in new business interests instead of investing it in the club and then blame everyone else for the state of the club.

They think they can run the club as an amateur set-up in a professional environment and still stay in the Championship.

[Old Master]

Jose Riga: Blackpool set to decide manager's future by Saturday
By Steve Canavan BBC Sport

Jose Riga's future as Blackpool manager is likely to be decided by Saturday.

The former Charlton boss, who took charge at Bloomfield Road on 11 June, is locked in a dispute with chairman Karl Oyston over transfer policy.

Riga is understood to have refused to make any signings unless Oyston brings in three particular players, whose identities have not been made public.

With three weeks to go until their opening Championship game, Blackpool have just eight contracted players.

If Riga agrees to start bringing in players and is in the dugout for Saturday's opening pre-season fixture at non-league Penrith, he will remain in charge.

However, if the transfer stand-off between Riga and the chairman continues - or if the manager does not show at Penrith - it is expected to spell the end of his reign.
Blackpool's eight contracted players

Defenders: Gary MacKenzie, Tony McMahon, Charles Dunne

Midfielder: David Perkins

Forwards: Steven Davies, Bobby Grant, Sergei Zenjov, Tom Barkhuizen

With their opening league fixture to be played at Nottingham Forest on 9 August, the Seasiders - relegated from the Premier League in 2011 - have no goalkeeper and will have to rely on youth-team players and trialists to play Saturday's friendly against their Northern League Division One opponents.

A pre-season tour to Spain, for which the squad were scheduled to depart on Sunday, has been cancelled at the manager's request.

But Riga has been told the Penrith game will go ahead, with the boss - as far as the club are concerned - in the dugout.

The 56-year-old, who had a 16-match spell at Charlton at the end of last season, was appointed as successor to interim player-manager Barry Ferguson, under whom Blackpool narrowly escaped relegation to League One last season.

Riga has not spoken to the media since he got the job 37 days ago.

Michael Appleton currently holds the record for the shortest Blackpool reign - he was manager for 65 days during the 2012-13 season, before leaving to take over at Blackburn.


I can see that record being broken unless the Chairman opens up his wallet and releases the money to actually BUY some players instead of his usual strategy of signing mainly loan players!

I really fear for the the future of the club I have supported since 1953.

[Katy Perry's Tits]

Did you jump on the FA Cup bandwagon?

[Old Master]

Did you jump on the FA Cup bandwagon?

Of course I did - I was three and a half years old at the time and we had just got a B&W TV, the first in our street, and we had almost everyone in the street crammed into our lounge-room watching the game.

What a day, the greatest in Blackpool's history and it is forever burnt into my memory.

I'm a 'Sandgrownun' and proud of it.