Interesting interview with Robbie Blake

This Forum is the main messageboard to discuss all things Claret and Blue and beyond
Post Reply
Falcon
Posts: 3210
Joined: Fri Jan 22, 2016 1:40 pm
Been Liked: 892 times
Has Liked: 1161 times
Location: Proudsville

Interesting interview with Robbie Blake

Post by Falcon » Thu Sep 05, 2019 12:36 pm

In the Athletic

https://theathletic.com/1183708/2019/09 ... ley-twice/" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

Falcon
Posts: 3210
Joined: Fri Jan 22, 2016 1:40 pm
Been Liked: 892 times
Has Liked: 1161 times
Location: Proudsville

Re: Interesting interview with Robbie Blake

Post by Falcon » Thu Sep 05, 2019 12:37 pm

Copied (if you have no free articles left this month) below:

It was 5.15pm on Wednesday August 19, 2009. Burnley were welcoming Manchester United to Turf Moor that evening.
Stood in the queue of a KFC a few miles down the road in Colne was Robbie Blake.
“My pre-match meal, I was in KFC getting a two-piece variety meal!”
It is the night of, arguably, the most historic match in Burnley’s modern history as the plucky underdogs toppled Sir Alex Ferguson’s Manchester United thanks to Blake’s goal and a penalty save from Brian Jensen.
“On the way in, I thought, ‘I’m not going to have pasta at home, so I might as well have a KFC,’” he says.
“I score that goal and we win 1-0, and I went and had supper in KFC too. This time I had a fillet burger meal with a Pepsi and the woman serving me said, ‘Great goal by the way, Robbie.’”
Just over 10 years on, Blake is now a coach at Bognor Regis Town and settled and living with his girlfriend Lucy and his one-year-old son Zach.
Blake arrives at The Old Customs House, a pub in nearby Portsmouth’s Gunwharf Quays in shorts and a t-shirt, relaxed. The talk about that night and the goal continues.
“When the ball came over from Stephen Jordan, I’ve seen Martin Paterson go behind (Patrice) Evra so I’m reading that he’s heading it. Because he was stretching, I knew he wasn’t going to be heading it far,” Blake recalled.
“As he headed it I can remember thinking, ‘I’m just hitting this.’ It was coming at me at a good pace and height and it was all about the connection.
“It was the best atmosphere I’ve experienced at Turf Moor. It was frightening. I remember scoring and not feeling anything. I couldn’t hear the crowd because my adrenaline just kicked in. Only when you watch it back you realise how incredible it actually was.”
Blake originally moved to the south coast after accepting a position from Paul Cook to join the coaching staff at Portsmouth. After two years at the club, which included a promotion, Cook departed for Wigan, but Blake chose to stay.
A year later he was released, but after speaking to Bognor manager Jack Pearce, Blake took the step down to non-League level and joined the club in 2018 as a first-team coach.
“It’s just my way of gaining more experience and I’m loving it. I really enjoy it,” explains Blake. “There was a situation where I could have gone to Wigan but I felt with Cookie, even though he is a great guy and manager, I might not have got the opportunities to better myself by staying under his wing.
“It was hard adjusting at first because I would get frustrated with certain situations of the game and certain decision-making and that’s probably been the hardest thing to adjust to but I’m getting there it just takes time.”
Bognor play in the Isthmian Premier Division, a far cry from the Premier League which Blake first tasted with Bradford before he made his move to Turf Moor in 2002.
Bradford had fallen into financial difficulties, a common theme for clubs which run throughout Blake’s career and they needed to ship players off their books. One of those was Blake, and Burnley’s £1 million offer was accepted.
“In the second season,” he explains, “(chairman) Geoffrey Richmond started bringing loads of big hitters in and putting them on astronomical amounts of money compared to what the other lads had been on. In the end we couldn’t sustain it.”
A big part of moving to a new club is the desire to make a good first impression. Unfortunately for Blake, the opposite happened as he arrived with a hernia injury which left him unable to properly move. For a player whose game was largely based on having a low centre of gravity and twisting and turning, it severely impacted him.
Then-manager, Stan Ternent, who Blake has plenty of praise for, wanted as many bodies fit though so Blake didn’t have the operation he needed to address his injury. Despite telling everybody he wasn’t fit, he was handed his debut against “of all teams” Bradford.
“It was very difficult because everything in the press and all my team-mates were saying it was amazing that we could attract a player of this potential, someone to take us to another level and I literally couldn’t move,” Blake admits.
“I remember being sat in the changing rooms before the Bradford game thinking, ‘I can’t believe I’m actually playing.’ I lasted 15 minutes, I got brought off and Stan said to me, ‘I’ll tell the press you’ve got a calf strain.’ Typical Stan,” he says with a smile.
“In the long run I don’t know whether Stan was thinking, ‘I’d brought him in for a million pounds, if we’ve bought him injured or he’s had to go under an operation it looks terrible on us.’ I remember groans and rumbles in the stand thinking, ‘What have we signed here?’ but obviously it turned out to be a little bit better.”
Blake returned for his second season fit and fresh and in that campaign and the next he scored 38 goals in 100 appearances. The following season, 2004/05, saw Ternent replaced by Steve Cotterill and he appointed Blake captain, something the player was ‘apprehensive’ about. But he grasped the opportunity.
Blake started the following season on fire and attracted interest from Birmingham. The opportunity was one he couldn’t turn down, joining them in January 2005.
“It was tough to leave because my affection for the club was immense,” says Blake. “Birmingham City came in for me and at the time they were sixth or seventh in the Premier League, had a really good team and it was difficult, but you want to better yourself. It was important to take that opportunity. Steve didn’t want me to go and the club didn’t want me to go. It nearly ended a bit messy, but it got resolved in the end.”
Blake moved to St Andrew’s, but only spent half a season there. Blues had received an offer from Leeds and Blake went in to speak to his manager Steve Bruce. Blake told Bruce he wanted to stay and fight for his place but when he turned up for training the next day, he had been left out of the pre-season squad.
Blake felt the only option was to move to Elland Road, a compromise of sorts as he admitted he expected the club to be back in the top flight soon enough. It nearly happened but a play-off final defeat by Watford was followed by relegation the next season as Leeds fell into financial difficulty.
After returning for pre-season, he was called in by Dennis Wise and, with the club needing to sell, Burnley had an offer accepted. Blake knew that he would be under the microscope returning to Turf Moor.
“I understood the Burnley fans’ frustrations because they didn’t want to see one of the better players leave and I accept that and respect that. Supporters are the bread and butter of any football club and have every right to voice their opinion,” says Blake.
“What a lot of people don’t realise is the levels of pressure that were on me. I got a lot of stick for leaving and if it didn’t completely work out, people would have been saying that I shouldn’t have come back. But for it to go full circle and actually be the complete opposite, I would say I was more loved second time than I was first time.”
The second spell brought more success and more memories, particularly in the 2008-09 season.
Burnley beat both Arsenal and Chelsea on their way to setting up a League Cup semi-final with Tottenham.
Despite opening the scoring in the first leg, the Clarets were beaten 4-1 at White Hart Lane. By full time in the second leg, Burnley led 3-0 and extra-time beckoned. Blake had started the comeback with a stunning free-kick.
“The run was unexpected but it was incredible. Sometimes when you beat an Arsenal or a Chelsea, it happens once and then you’ll get turned over by a smaller club,” recalled Blake.
“When the first goal went in against Spurs, the conditions were bad. It was windy, it was raining and collectively we had a team where we felt if we got another one and all of a sudden the crowd got involved and it just happened.
“We seemed to just take control of the game and we had them on the ropes. We scored at the right times and I still believe if we would have had another 10 more minutes, we would have won the game because they were absolutely gone.”
The game went into extra-time but goals from Roman Pavlyuchenko and Jermain Defoe in the 118th and 120th minutes saw Tottenham progress. The result only served as a determination to achieve more later on that season.
“The defeat in the semi-final as gutting as it was, it actually brought us all closer and we had a conversation after. In the changing room we said, ‘Make sure we are in the play-offs and we will go and win the final.’”
Get into the play-offs they did and they secured their place in the final at Wembley with a 3-0 aggregate victory over Reading in which Blake won a penalty in the first leg. He admits now it “could have got him a job in Coronation Street”.
Before the big day though, the squad flew out to Portugal for a training camp and Owen Coyle allowed the players to have one night out — but with the knowledge that they had training the next day.
“We were all absolutely hammered, and I remember there was me, Stevie Jordan, Michael Duff and Steven Caldwell in a four-dorm. The next morning, me and Stevie were up and next minute there was a knock. ‘Duffo, get up.’ He said, ‘I can’t.’ I told him to get and up and he’d be fine,” Blake remembers with a smile.
“Well, it was the worst performance I’ve ever seen, he couldn’t kick a ball. He was in the circle and he couldn’t kick the ball, so Coyley told him to get in and get to bed and all of a sudden, the lads started fainting so the session got stopped.
“I remember we were sat upstairs in the canteen and Coyley said, ‘Listen, I’ve let you have your one night out, from now on no one is drinking, everyone needs to look after themselves — we are preparing for the biggest games of our lives in 10 days’ time.’”
Around 40,000 Burnley fans made the trip to watch their side return to the top division. Wade Elliot scored the only goal of the contest as Burnley defeated Sheffield United 1-0.
During the celebrations, Blake’s infamous ‘Bad Beat Bob’ underpants (below), which had first appeared in a match against Coventry in 2008, emerged.
Blake was part of the card school at Burnley and recalled how his luck would always run out when it came to the river (the final card) even when his opponents had almost no chance of winning.
“Clark Carlisle used to call me Bob (short for Robbie) so when I lost a hand he’d shout, ‘Oh, Bad Beat Bob again’ so it was the going joke. ‘Bad beat’ is a phrase that refers to a card player who loses a hand he looked set to win.

“In 2008, Clark told me he had got me a present, so we got to the Ricoh Arena and I’m looking thinking everyone has got white slips (pants) and I’ve got red slips and then as I looked closer they had ‘Bad Beat Bob’ in big letters written on them.
“The players said I had to put them on, so I did. The lads were saying if I scored, I should whip my shorts down and just start doing a little dance. I did. I must have scored about eight or nine, maybe 10 goals in about 15 games and that was it then the ritual. So they had to be on show at Wembley!”
Inevitably, Preston North End come up in conversation. Blake earned himself a reputation of scoring against Burnley’s local rivals and they were often spectacular. He netted three stunning free-kicks against them.
“I scored against Preston all the time. My favourite was when we drew 1-1 at Deepdale (in 2009). I’d just come on five minutes before. I remember warming up in the bottom right-hand corner and I was getting absolute pelters and so I remember scoring and celebrating with our fans and then running over to that corner and giving them some back.”
Sometimes things can end in ways you don’t want and Blake reflects with a heavy heart on his second exit from the Clarets.
The 2009-10 season, which had started so promisingly with victory over Manchester United, ended in relegation. Coyle left the club midway through the season for Bolton and was replaced by Brian Laws. Blake did not see eye-to-eye with Laws including one incident where Blake learnt he had missed a game because of injury, something which was news to Blake himself.
“I remember some directors saying to me, ‘You’ve been injured haven’t you?’ and I said, ‘No, I haven’t been injured’ but Brian had said I’d missed three days, which was why I wasn’t playing,” Blake said.
“It just wasn’t good. It was a recipe for disaster, and I’m not being disrespectful, in my own humble opinion, I just think he was a little bit out of his depth, it was too big for him.
“We played Manchester City and we were 4-1 down at half-time. He came in ranting and raving, and he said, ‘There’s only two players who’ve got any sort of credit out of this, it’s him’ — which was me — ‘and Kevin MacDonald.’ He said, ‘I’m going to make two changes’, and he brought me and Kevin off.”
It eventually led to a one-hour conversation with co-chairman Brendan Flood at the Worlsey Marriot in Manchester. Blake was in a situation where he didn’t feel he could work with Laws any longer but knew he wasn’t going to be sacked and therefore wasn’t going to play. Yet he also didn’t want to leave.
“I never, ever wanted to leave Burnley. After I’d left and come back, I wanted to finish my career there. It was gut-wrenching to leave. They were both my decisions, but the second decision had to be made.”
They were not the terms Blake wanted to leave on, but in his two spells there he left his mark on the club and is thought of very affectionately to this day.
Time has moved on and with his transition into coaching, family and friends have become more of a focus with Blake finding himself with plenty of free time as Bognor only train on Tuesdays and Thursdays.
Golf is, as with most footballers, the preferred sport of choice in his downtime and there might even be a KFC on the way home from a round… or before.
These 6 users liked this post: ClaretTony giveusaB Frenchclaret Quicknick theroyaldyche BertiesBeehole

duncandisorderly
Posts: 2443
Joined: Wed Feb 17, 2016 8:58 pm
Been Liked: 970 times
Has Liked: 232 times

Re: Interesting interview with Robbie Blake

Post by duncandisorderly » Thu Sep 05, 2019 12:45 pm

Good article, but it was 5-0 down at half time wasn't it?

ClaretTony
Posts: 67435
Joined: Thu Dec 24, 2015 3:07 pm
Been Liked: 32242 times
Has Liked: 5255 times
Location: Burnley
Contact:

Re: Interesting interview with Robbie Blake

Post by ClaretTony » Thu Sep 05, 2019 12:45 pm

Falcon wrote:Despite telling everybody he wasn’t fit, he was handed his debut against “of all teams” Bradford.
“It was very difficult because everything in the press and all my team-mates were saying it was amazing that we could attract a player of this potential, someone to take us to another level and I literally couldn’t move,” Blake admits.
“I remember being sat in the changing rooms before the Bradford game thinking, ‘I can’t believe I’m actually playing.’ I lasted 15 minutes, I got brought off and Stan said to me, ‘I’ll tell the press you’ve got a calf strain.’ Typical Stan,” he says with a smile.
Blake's debut was against West Brom as a substitute. His only start that season was against Norwich and he was withdrawn after 58 minutes. That was the day Glen Little was kicked in the head.

bodge
Posts: 1576
Joined: Sun Jan 03, 2016 6:04 pm
Been Liked: 725 times
Has Liked: 474 times

Re: Interesting interview with Robbie Blake

Post by bodge » Thu Sep 05, 2019 12:52 pm

Cheers Falcon great read that.

Fretters
Posts: 2534
Joined: Thu Jan 21, 2016 7:56 am
Been Liked: 1037 times
Has Liked: 544 times

Re: Interesting interview with Robbie Blake

Post by Fretters » Thu Sep 05, 2019 12:54 pm

duncandisorderly wrote:Good article, but it was 5-0 down at half time wasn't it?
We also lost at Preston in 2009 :lol:

Thanks for sharing, Falcon.

Falcon
Posts: 3210
Joined: Fri Jan 22, 2016 1:40 pm
Been Liked: 892 times
Has Liked: 1161 times
Location: Proudsville

Re: Interesting interview with Robbie Blake

Post by Falcon » Thu Sep 05, 2019 1:14 pm

There's a few factual errors in there. Seems like Robbie misremembered things and the writer didn't think (or want) to double-check, but a good read nonetheless.

cricketfieldclarets
Posts: 21464
Joined: Thu Jan 21, 2016 9:59 pm
Been Liked: 8585 times
Has Liked: 11285 times

Re: Interesting interview with Robbie Blake

Post by cricketfieldclarets » Thu Sep 05, 2019 1:19 pm

Remember the comment from stan about Blake in divers boots.

Problem was as we had already spent £1m on Ian Moore, Stan probably wanted to show that Blake was a better investment. But at the start he looked even worse, playing injured.

alls well that ends well, turned out a great player. Arguably even better second time round.

ClaretTony
Posts: 67435
Joined: Thu Dec 24, 2015 3:07 pm
Been Liked: 32242 times
Has Liked: 5255 times
Location: Burnley
Contact:

Re: Interesting interview with Robbie Blake

Post by ClaretTony » Thu Sep 05, 2019 1:43 pm

cricketfieldclarets wrote:Remember the comment from stan about Blake in divers boots.

Problem was as we had already spent £1m on Ian Moore, Stan probably wanted to show that Blake was a better investment. But at the start he looked even worse, playing injured.

alls well that ends well, turned out a great player. Arguably even better second time round.
The divers boots game was the first game of the following season against Brighton.

Hipper
Posts: 5683
Joined: Fri Jan 22, 2016 1:33 pm
Been Liked: 1176 times
Has Liked: 918 times

Re: Interesting interview with Robbie Blake

Post by Hipper » Thu Sep 05, 2019 2:32 pm

I thought my earlier interview offered a more complete view:

http://www.uptheclarets.com/messageboar ... or#p833324" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

At the moment Bognor are not doing very well, lying fifth from bottom after five games.

Cleveleys_claret
Posts: 3042
Joined: Thu Jan 21, 2016 7:58 am
Been Liked: 956 times
Has Liked: 583 times

Re: Interesting interview with Robbie Blake

Post by Cleveleys_claret » Thu Sep 05, 2019 5:18 pm

Follow Robbie on Twitter and seen Bognor have not been doing well. All the while though he engages with fans when he could ignore them as he has at times got abuse off them. Always respectful and positive. Hope he achieves what he wants as I think he is one of the good guys

Post Reply