More About Luke Beckett
We wait, us connected with Bradford City, and we wait.
We have been waiting for Luke Beckett and Michael Boulding to decide who they fancy joining next season and Stuart McCall begins to tire of waiting. The move for Beckett is on hold but one of the player’s other options - Chester City - have been knocked out of the running for the player. It says much about the power of footballers in the modern game that guys on the bench at third tier clubs can keep everyone waiting. Nevertheless Beckett can.
McCall is growing tired of waiting for Michael Boulding but the former Tennis professional turned footballer who went out of the league with Mansfield last season seems awash with options for next season and the ball is very much in his court. He has knocked back City before back in 2001 when he joined Aston Villa rather than opting for to sign with Nicky Law. Within a week the Bantams were in administration and 19 players were redundant. One wonders how much this plays on the players mind when he deals with Rotherham agianst the stability seemingly offered at Valley Parade these days.
We wait for Boulding who has his pick of Yorkshire sides near his home and we wait for Darren Moore who is to talk with Leicester City before deciding his future. In essence The Foxes are offering the same deal as the Bantams - to end his career in promotion - but a division higher and nearer to his home.
This waiting is a good think for City and the people trying to bring Moore to the club. Without McCall, Wayne Jacobs et al then there is little reason for Moore not to dismiss the club in a division below out of hand. The waiting is tribute and shows that Moore is taking City’s approach seriously.
The waiting is hard. The waiting is torture as scribbles on bits of paper with “PA” and “CB” joining “PT” and “JC” in positions in elevens crop up on the desks of City fans everywhere. The waiting is hard.
We wait for Rob Burch the goalkeeper McCall has talked to and we long to do as he did and pop the question in public view to get a binding yes or no. Do you, we would ask Darren Moore, take this hope and manifest it in promotion?
The word is that Luke Beckett has agreed terms with City and is our second capture from those strange lot down the road in two days as Stuart McCall starts making a City team that can go up two divisions.
31 year old Beckett has been on his holidays with a contract in his back pocket that will run a year with another year if either side thinks things have gone well which usually means he is being paid a fair price and shows City’s aims this season. Promotion or rip it up and start again.
Beckett joins Chris Brandon in making the short but glorious trip from Huddersfield and as with Brandon he has been linked with City before with Colin Todd opting to sign Eddie Johnson rather than Beckett two years ago.
Beckett’s role in the team can be summed up as Barry Conlon with goals and we can expect to see him partnering Peter Thorne up front next season with Conlon and Billy Topp fighting for positions. As Conlon showed this year this is a league where scrapping is needed and Topp might have to wait 12 months until League One before he starts to be a regular.
Brandon is a hard working midfielder but he is not Stuart McCall’s new Stuart McCall so he has to be balanced with another box-to-box midfielder like which might be Lee Bullock but Hartlepool fans consider Bullock an attacking midfielder. Brandon could join the midfield on the left flank tucked in to balance out Joe Colbeck as a flying winger on the other side but perhaps Stuart will go with Bullock and Brandon with Kyle Nix on the left and Colbeck on the right.
It seems that as Stuart starts his signings City are getting options and perhaps the gaffer is going to go for four quality forwards, six quality midfielder and let the pieces fall into place rather than fixing his team in his mind in June as he has had to last year because of having too few quality players.
Observing from a distance, it’s often felt there are two sides to City’s potential new signing Luke Beckett.
On the one part is his undoubted goalscoring ability, which sadly we’ve suffered from too often in the past. 163 goals from 346 career starts (+49 sub) is a phenomenal record and the majority of City fans will be licking their lips at the prospect of a Beckett-Peter Thorne partnership next season.
Yet there’s also an impression that Beckett is a player who struggles to settle anywhere. There are no hints of a disruptive character or stories of any bust ups, indeed some supporters have fought to keep him in the past, but since been released from Barnsley a decade ago Luke has been the subject of eight permanent or loan moves. At most clubs he has flourished, but he doesn’t seem to stick around for too long. The exploits of Dean Windass and Thorne may be helping City build a reputation as a place for ‘mature’ strikers to flourish and, if Beckett can replicate that success, it’s to be hoped he’ll consider Valley Parade more the happy home that he appears to have found elsewhere.
City’s unfortunate habit of conceding goals to Beckett began in March 2002, where his 10th minute strike for Stockport proved enough to inflict one of the most embarrassing defeats in recent history. Three years later the now on-loan Oldham striker struck the decisive goal that kept the Lactics up on the final day of the season, their claret and amber opponents fortunately having nothing to play for. Beckett was back on loan at Oldham the following season, his move to Sheffield United in November 2004 proving a major disappointment, and his temporary employers continued to prove City’s bogey team. 6-2 aggregate home and away victories were recorded - Beckett grabbed three over the two games.
That following summer manager Colin Todd infamously spurned the opportunity to sign Beckett in favour of Eddie Johnson. History could argue it was one of his worst decisions, but while Beckett ended up at Huddersfield he didn’t really set the place alight. Peter Jackson used his entire transfer budget securing Beckett, but his preference of playing 4-5-1 regularly left Beckett on the bench. Town’s number 18 still enjoyed a decent scoring record over his two seasons at the Galpharm, but the club’s progress has stuttered and his third Town manager in that time, Stan Ternent, has allowed him to leave.
The challenge for Stuart McCall, as it is with every player, will be to get the best out of Beckett next season. Their paths have already crossed at Sheffield United, so Stuart already has a good idea of the type of character he is. The season that has just finished felt familiar to recent others in the problems encountered up front. We seem to be able to get one regular goal scorer, but getting two fit and firing together is one reason why City failed to challenge for promotion again. Stuart needs to get the midfield supplying the ball to both strikers in areas they can hurt the opposition and work on discouraging performance levels dropping off.
With Barry Conlon, Willy Topp, Luke Medley and Omar Daley all capable of playing up front, Stuart looks more spoiled, relatively, in this department than any other City boss in years. A scenario similar to how his mentor Neil Warnock managed his strikers, heavy rotation, is easy to imagine. If this works, fine; but it can be a dangerous game and lead to loss of form and confidence.
Disregard an injury-plagued 2003/04 campaign and Beckett’s 12-goal haul this season is the worst of his career. Looking set to drop down a level and with a point to prove, we look set to finally be able to cheer at the sight of the Sheffield-born forward hitting the back of the net.