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Part Forty-One of the Sensational Shrimpleton Saga: Fearless Freddy Spills the Beans…
We now return to Cumberside Island on the eve of the hastily re-arranged Summer Gala of Shrimpleton Town AFC.
We have already learnt about the way the self-appointed `Editor’ of the island’s only newspaper – Fearless Freddy Fazackerley – had been basically bribed by the leader of the Khalistan Warriors to portray their ownership of the club in a positive light.
And the latest edition of Freddy’s Shrimpleton Bugle had just hit the news stands…
Shortly after the key conversation between Fazackerley and Chopra had taken place, Skip – the Captain of Shrimpleton Town Football Club – could be discovered out of breath and seemingly quite agitated on the streets of the largest town of Cumberside Island.
Usually – because it was Saturday – he would be with the football team on their way to pre-match preparations or actually on their way to whatever away game was on the calendar.
But today’s fixture against Black Rock Vikings had been postponed due to the discovery of anthrax in the volcanic ash which served as the pitch on their treeless, desolate island somewhere west of the Bristol Channel.
So the team unexpectedly had the day off.
Skip had bought a copy of the local paper to read at his leisure over a Full English breakfast in his quay-side cottage.
But – having done this – he was now hurrying towards the Shrimpleton Arms in order to spread the bad news he had just read in it.
“Have you seen the Shrimpleton Bugle?” he exclaimed as soon as landlord Amos showed his face, shoving a copy of the latest edition of the local rag into his hands.
“Have you ever read such rubbish?” he exclaimed.
In truth, Amos had because he read the only local newspaper on the island every time it appeared. But the rubbish in this edition threatened to out-do anything else editor “FFF” had ever invented in the past.
There was a banner headline followed by a short article written by `Editor-in-Chief and Senior Sports Correspondent’ Freddy `Fearless’ Fazackerley himself.
“Freddy Fazackerley’s off his nut!” said Amos. “He…”
“We all know that!” said Skip. “Is Jay about? Get him down here now – he will go ballistic when he reads the Match Report!”
“I don’t know where he is” replied Amos; “He said he was going for a boat trip a couple of days ago and he won’t be showing-up today because he told me that your next game has been postponed. But what’s all the fuss about?”
Skip passed Amos his copy of the Shrimpleton Bugle. This is what he saw, plastered right across the front page::
BRIBERY SCANDAL UNEARTHED IN THE OUTCROPS LEAGUE.
Shrimpies Flounder at Flookburgh.
By Freddy F Fazackerley.
After thorough and painstaking research over a number of months by our crack sports team, The Shrimpleton Bugle can exclusively – albeit with a heavy heart – reveal that there is bribery and corruption alive and well at the heart of our beloved national game.
Last Saturday, the island’s favourite football club – mighty Shrimpleton Town – played a vital relegation match against rivals for the drop Flookburgh Flounders at their Cark Central ground near the airstrip. The result was never in doubt. For we have uncovered irrefutable evidence that the Northern Counties Islands and Craggy Outcrops League hierarchy had fixed the game prior to kick-off.
West German Referee Kurt Hitler and his Russian linesman Igor Dzhugashvili had already been induced to make sure that the home team won, regardless of what actually happened on the pitch by an offer of as many frozen flounders as could be stowed in their cars after the game by Flookburgh officials who were in cahoots with the League’s Bigwigs.
The key moment of the game arrived when a shot by star striker Beryl the Tea Lady (who was playing her first game for the Shrimpies this term) hit the underside of the Flounders’ crossbar and bounced over the goal-line; not in front of it as Linesman Dzhugashvili ruled to be supported by the bent referee.
Without this key decision, the mighty Shrimpies would have won the game and with it, the three precious points that could still save them from the humiliation of re-election this season at the bottom of the Second Division.
This outrage follows hot on the heels of another scandal engineered by tainted League officials last week when the Shrimpies’ match at Cockerham had to be abandoned as the incoming tide flooded the sandy arena favoured by Cocklers FC to play all their home games.
A spokesman for the Northern Counties Islands and Craggy Outcrops League said that all three points had been awarded to the home side given that they had been winning the game by nine goals to nil at half time. They added: “Time and Tide wait for no man and the fact it actually came in was probably a blessing from Shrimpleton Town’s point of view. Their goal difference is already a record number in arrears and they should see the intervention of nature to be a blessing, given that it saved them from a further drubbing in the second half”.
But The Shrimpleton Bugle has exclusive evidence to prove that the failure of Referee Verner von Gelb to arrive on-time (and thus making the flooding incident inevitable due to the immutable nature of the Tide Tables) was not due to mechanical problems with his car as outrageously claimed by himself and corrupt League officials – but due to an inducement which may or not have involved the gift of certain marine bivalve molluscs for which the Cocklers are world-famous.
This is an outrage.
We have irrefutable evidence that the Northern Counties Islands and Craggy Outcrops League is deliberately conspiring at the highest level to both undermine the brilliant strategy of Shrimpies’ Manager Amandeep Singh of `4-3-3 Minus Four’ football – and the actual integrity of the football club altogether. We at The Shrimpleton Bugle will not stand for such blatant skulduggery. We are not intimidated by the shadowy actions of the corrupt elite who control football in this country. Chief among these are the latest bunch of Establishment stooges who are plying their diabolical trade in Manchester: Football’s Independent Regulator (the “FIR”) who are currently directing the latest totally baseless campaign of hate to undermine our club and its wise and wonderful leadership. We urge all Shrimpies’ fans to adopt a similar stance. Truth has always been the central pillar upon which everything The Shrimpleton Bugle has ever campaigned about. Because remember: Sat Sri Akal: Truth is Eternal.
Full Match Report Page 8.”
Having read this, Amos didn’t have to be asked to ring FFF – Freddy F Fazackley – to summon him to a meeting at the pub. He picked the phone up immediately and told Freddy in no uncertain terms that if he didn’t get his ample posterior down to the Shrimpleton Arms right there and then, he would personally frog-march him there.
Not long afterwards, Amos led FFF into the Dining Room, and shoved him into a seat facing Skip across a table, the latest edition of his local rag staring up at him from the tablecloth. Then he walked over to the door, paused to hang the sign `PRIVATE FUNCTION’ on the outer handle of it to make sure they would not be disturbed – and then sat down next to Skip opposite the editor of the local rag.
“How do you account for this nonsense?” said Skip to Fazackerley, turning the paper over and pointing to the match report.
“Are you disputing it?” replied Freddy, looking suitably defiant. “Were you there?”
“Of course I was there – I was on the pitch leading the team, you moron!” yelled Skip in response. “Where were you?”
FFF was reluctant to say. But the truth is that he was involved in a clandestine phone call at that precise moment with a wealthy individual who was in the process of offering him a new job.
“Let’s look at this drivel line-by-line!” said Amos picking up the paper. “You’ve said here: “Without this key decision, the mighty Shrimpies would have won the game.””
“It’s true, isn’t it?”
“They were losing thirteen-nil at the time!”
“A mere technicality…”
“A mere technicality? And how about this: “West German Referee Karl Hitler and his Russian linesman Igor Dzhugashvili.” This might come as news to you mate, but West Germany doesn’t exist anymore – and the names you have invented don’t either – and never have! The Ref was Carl Hiller from Westhoughton but currently working in Barrow and the linesman was a sheep farmer called Douggie from somewhere near Askham! They are both English – and they weren’t bribed!…”
“…Hitler – Hiller; Dzhugashvili – Douggie. It’s near enough…”
“Near enough? The real Hitler was Austrian, not German or from near Manchester – and the most famous Dzhugashvili of all was from Georgia, not Cumbria – he was better-known as Stalin!”
“Mere technicalities once more. I’m not familiar with Russian footballers anyway” said Freddy looking suddenly a little more unsure of himself. “But…”
“But nothing!” snapped Amos again. “Stalin wasn’t a footballer, you idiot! But let’s look at some more of the drivel you have written! What‘s this piece of Purple Prose?: “The key moment of the game – when a shot by star striker Beryl the Tea Lady (who was playing her first game for the Shrimpies this term) hit the underside of the Flounders’ crossbar and bounced over the goal-line.” “
He sat back as Skip took over the diatribe:
“That is absolute, hundred-percent rubbish! The ball was headed against Beryl the tea lady as she was serving some Flounders’ fans next to the home goal. She wasn’t playing and she knew nothing about it. It went nowhere near the crossbar let alone…”
“Again, that is a mere…”
“If you say `mere technicality’ even once more, I will stuff this useless rag of yours somewhere you will definitely not appreciate it! How do you justify this further piece of utter gobbledegook?: “Without this key decision, the mighty Shrimpies would have won the game and with it, the three precious points that could still save them from the humiliation of re-election this season at the bottom of the Second Division.” Well?”
“Er… Stranger thing have happened…”
“Stranger things have not happened – not ever, anywhere! We were losing seventeen-nil at the time; seventeen-nil! This was not a result of a conspiracy to undermine our Manager’s brilliant `4-3-3 Minus Four’ formation! For a start, the Manager has never shown his spotty face at the club and we are forced to play `4-3-3 Minus Four’ because only seven players ever turn-up – as has been the case for nearly all of this season! It has absolutely nothing to do with Amandeep Singh. It is…”
Skip stopped this rant mid-sentence as a very large penny suddenly dropped in his head.
“Hold on a second…” he said, staring right into Freddy F Fazackerley’s shifty eyes and watching the editor of the local rag fail to meet his gaze as he wriggled uncomfortably in his seat.
“I get it! This pack of lies isn’t about football at all, is it? Someone’s put you up to this, haven’t they?”
“Haven’t they?” Skip banged his fist on the table as he yelled the last two words again, causing Freddy to almost literally jump out of his seat.
“Of course they have!” exclaimed the Landlord of Shrimpleton Arms, as the truth dawned on him as well. “The Khalistan Warriors have, haven’t they?”
Freddy looked panic-stricken but he didn’t answer. So Amos followed-up with another guess:
“Ranjit Singh Chopra has got to you, hasn’t he?”
Finally, Editor Fazackerley’s resistance was broken.
“I cannot tell a lie!” he admitted – even though this was probably the most outrageous thing heard in the Dining Room so far. “Chopper has offered me a new job. Pension. Car. Even a club suit and tie. You are looking at the new Director of Communications for Khalistan Warriors. He’s convinced that his brother Baban has jumped ship and is plotting against him. So I’ve got his old job!”
“And the first thing you need to do is sow a seed in the minds of the islanders that someone other than the Warriors and their disastrous stewardship of our club is responsible for the likely demise of it when we end up bottom of the table for the third year in a row!” yelled Skip in an admittedly quite long sentence but with an absolutely furious expression on his face.
But Amos was thinking even further ahead:
“It’s more than that, though, isn’t it? You are trying to blame the hierarchy of the Craggy Islands League – and clubs like the Flounders and the Cocklers for our demise, aren’t you? Knowing full well that we need their backing at the Re-Election vote which will be automatically triggered when we inevitably come bottom of the table yet again in a very few weeks’ time. If we antagonise them anymore; our fate is sealed, isn’t it? We’re already in the Second Division of the Northern Counties Islands and Craggy Outcrops League. We can’t drop any further because there is no other league or division to fall in to! So what are the Khalistan Warriors really up to?”
Freddy’s lips were sealed but the smug expression he was unable to suppress told both Skip and Amos that he was clearly not letting-on everything he knew about what was in Ranjit Singh Chopra’s mind.
He said – in a manner both provocative and clearly intended to indicate that he was now part of an exclusive elite from which simple souls like Skip and Amos were very much not privy to:
“All enquiries about the future direction of the Khalistan Warriors and Shrimpleton Town Football Club should be addressed to their Chief Operating Officer, James Churchill Proudfoot.”
“I see!” said Skip, getting up and then sitting down again right next to the editor of the local paper and looking him squarely in the eye.
“You have a choice, Freddy. Either you tell me precisely why the Khalistan Warriors have invested in Shrimpleton Town Football Club of your own accord. Or I’ll knock it out of you!”
Freddy knew how many Red Cards – and why – Skip had accumulated over his extraordinarily long career. As a result of this, he really didn’t want to be the subject of his undivided attention now – or ever.
Freddy turned in desperation towards Amos.
No help was clearly going to come from him either as the Shrimpleton Town Captain continued to stare at him with a positively murderous look in his eyes.
However, the Landlord said this:
“You’ve just mentioned James Churchill Proudfoot. And that’s got me to thinking: who in their right mind would appoint such an obvious devious pieces of detritus like that to be the so-called Chief Operating Officer of anything? What football club on this planet would even think of offering a key job to a man who has been banned from operating in the financial sector on the Channel Islands and has a proclivity – albeit unproved – for having wandering hands as far as young women are concerned?”
It was a very – very – good question.
Skip answered it:
“It would never happen! No football club worth its salt would ever do such a thing! The reputational damage it would cause on its own in the first place would be insurmountable!”
True enough – surely. But Freddy just stared back at him blankly and said nothing. Maybe he could think of an example – as I can – when it actually has happened. But there again…
Whatever, in that moment, even more jigsaw pieces were beginning to fall into place in the Club Captain’s mind as he started to grasp the bigger picture of what the Sikh ownership had always planned:
“Ranjit chose him for precisely that reason, didn’t he? Proudfoot couldn’t run a you-know-what even in one of his favourite places: a Brewery! Once the most incompetent and dodgy Chief Operating Officer known to the world was in place, the demise of our club – which is what your pals in the Khalistan Warriors have always intended – was assured, wasn’t it?”
Skip paused for breath and waited to see if anything he had said had resonated with the Island’s only newspaper editor. Realising that nothing had – which made him even more furious – he continued:
“I love my club, Freddy. I’m not going to just sit here and see it die. So if you don’t want to end up in Shrimpleton Surgery tonight on a drip, you had better start talking – and doing so right now!”
So not-so-fearless Freddy Fazackerley finally spilled the beans.
And at long last, Skip and Amos finally understood the reason why a group of Sikhs with no obvious affinity to soccer in general or Shrimpleton Town Football Club in particular were so eager to be associated with it…
Back on his huge yacht, though, the boss of these people, the Khalistan Warriors – Ranjit Singh Chopra – was totally oblivious to the fact that his schemes for the future of the club had been discovered by parties who did not intend to allow them to develop unchallenged.
And if he had even the slightest idea of the forces who were massing on Cumberside Island behind his back – none of whom wished him well either – he might have had second thoughts about what he was planning to do not just in the future but the very next day as he addressed the large crowd gathered at The Black Pool to celebrate the Shrimpies’ delayed Summer Gala.
But will Chopper change his mind?
Find out in the next umissable episode of the Sensational Shrimpleton Saga…
