Sporting Limburg

I didn't go to the match today. Several reasons including my inherent dislike of Sunday afternoon kick-offs. Anyway, caught it via Mr Internet, and, as usual in these circumstances, looked like a great game and not one to miss. Following on from the awful trip to Portsmouth, it was a good result with a series of good performance. Leon Osman stood out particularly on the 17 inch monitor and I though Fellaini looked decent. I'm starting to develop a theory about Jo being only able to play at home. Yet again he put in a shift and, critically, scored the goals. At Portsmouth and at Newcastle, he'd have been better in the stands.

Before tuning into the Everton match I caught 20 minutes of a Dutch top flight game between Ajax and a team called Roda JC Kerkrade. Of no real interest aside from the romanticism still attached to the Ajax name, and that Roda until recently were managed by our very own Raymond Atteveld. The bit I caught involved a protest as the Roda fans hurled bits of yellow seating onto the pitch. They weren't protesting at yet another defeat, but at the actual death of their football team. Roda are about to be merged with another local regional side Fortuna Sittard, a side with a connection to Everton as they were one of the teams beaten on Everton's run to the 1985 European Cup Winner's Cup triumph.

The deal to merge the sides is not uncommon in Dutch football. Roda themselves were created out of a sequence of mergers in the 1950s. The economics of a small country and a desire to be competitive makes it an attractive and sensible option for custodians. However, it still stands that the fans, having grown up with their local team are going to witness it disappear in the next 12 months and be replaced by a regional 'super team' who will be called Sporting Limburg - Limburg being the Dutch province.

Merging football teams, indeed any sports team, is an emotive subject in the UK. Robert Maxwell tried it in the 80s proposing to merge Reading, Oxford and QPR to create the infamous Thames Valley Royals or Rangers. It failed. In rugby league in the early 90s as the Superleague era was born, the new sponsors and financial paymaster wanted a smaller group of regional super teams and proposed merging the likes of Warrington with Widnes, Castleford with Wakefield. It failed due to overwhelming objections from fans, the connection of the fan to the club is often lost on the financial people. I would imagine there is a tiny seed of this reaction that will ultimately prevent Everton ground-sharing with Liverpool. Club identity will always be more important than success. Just ask the fans of AFC Wimbledon.

Read on in the Guardian