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As Peter Taylor signed Shane Duff from Cheltenham Town following the Northern Irishman’s ten years of service at the club one could not help but feel that city had some how pilfered the fixtures and fittings at Whaddon Road rather than just sign a player.
Duff – brother of Burnley’s Michael – has spent a decade with the club going from non-league to league to League One and his exit now in the season after his testimonial season. He leaves them with the best wishes of the club and a fulsome endorsement despite his tenth year being ruined by injury in the 5-4 match against the Bantams last year.
A strong central defender Duff thinks City and Peter Taylor can get his career back on track and one hopes he can. In these days of slightly loyalty in football though a player who spends a decade at a club deserves a great deal of credit for his staying power alone.
The 28-year-old has agreed a one-year contract at City with an option of a further year.
New City signing Jake Speight is not best pleased with the comments from Mansfield Town’s chairman Andy Perry which said the player threatened a strike were he not allowed a transfer saying
There are two sides to every story and it’s wrong to say I would have refused to play. If I’d have been offered a two or three-year deal I would have been willing to sign it. The gaffer (David Holdsworth) pushed for it, but the chairman did nothing and then he left me without pay for three months this summer.
The striker continued
I have a mortgage to pay and family to feed. I’m not a Premiership player and I was not being greedy. I was earning half the amount of some strikers in the division anyway.
Speight started pre-season with the Stags at the weekend, he starts it again for Bradford City today.
After an absence of a good few generations Bradford Park Avenue will return to their former ground to play Bradford City for a pre-season friendly.
Avenue played at Valley Parade just before the club lost its battle for survival in the early 1970s with Bradford City extending the hand to their rivals in those tough times.
City have invited Avenue for a pre-season match at Valley Parade on Tuesday, August 3rd 2010 – the Tuesday before the season starts.
On Tuesday July 13th City will play Guiseley at Nethermoor as a part of the transfer deal that brought James Hanson to Valley Parade.
