Town's Worthington Cup semi-final second leg may be about to move due to worries over crowd trouble. According to Birmingham sources local police are unhappy that both Birmingham City and Aston Villa are playing matches on the same night with worries about hooliganism to the fore.
The game is currently scheduled for Wednesday January 24th when Villa are also scheduled to play Leeds at Villa Park. Police are concerned that four sets of fans in the city at one time might lead to problems, particularly given the reputations of Birmingham City and Leeds. Birmingham match-day commander Supt Howard Roberts said: We are concerned there is too much potential for disorder. We are not comfortable with having the League Cup semi-final and Aston Villa's game both on the same night in the city."
We are told that discussions are currently ongoing between concerned parties with there being a strong possiblity that Town's game may be moved to the Tuesday a week before, January 17th. Tuesday 23rd seems out of the question as Birmingham are playing Blackburn on the preceding Sunday in a Sky game. Thursday 25th may be another possiblilty if the game is moved.
National newspapers are today linking Matt Holland with Claudio Ranieri's impending Chelsea revolution. Town's skipper is claimed to be a target of the Londoners as the new manager seeks to get rid of players he sees as either past it or not fitting in with his style of football.
The story continued to add that Ranieri is expected to make a firm offer for Holland in the near future.
Matt Holland joined Town from Bournemouth for £800,000 in the summer of 1997 and has been ever-present since then. He is contracted to Town until 2004 and has repeatedly stated how happy he is at Town. Over the last couple of years transfer rumours have been fairly common with Matt usually quashing them fairly quickly. He has previously been linked with Fulham, Leicester, Manchester City and Spurs amongst others.
Marcus Stewart's stripy ITFC gloves seem to have become a bit of a hit with fans. The gloves, worn with a short-sleeved Town shirt by the striker, have flown out of club shops since Stewart took to wearing them.
Town's Retail Manager Michael Brooks said: "We'd just had a new delivery of gloves when Marcus wore them for the Chelsea game and they sold out straight away."
Town are now planning similar marketing ploys for other club merchandise, although the rumours claiming that Bam-Bam may be forced te wear the ITFC branded Romper Suit seem wide of the mark.