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Blog: Sign of the times
Wednesday 8th July 2009, 5:00AM BST.
I have felt compelled to write this blog since hearing that the Express & Star’s Saturday Sporting Star is no longer going to be available in its printed form, writes Jarrod Hill.
When I was told the news a few weeks ago I was shocked, I felt like I was not only losing an old friend, but also losing something that had become part of my very fabric of being a local football fan.
My own shame comes in the form that I recognise that people like me have contributed to the decision not to keep it going..
The amount of information and fans blogs now found on the internet is huge and growing all the time, you can find gossip, rumours, match reports, and anything else your thirst for information may desire. But the Sporting Star somehow felt different.
I realise that my feelings towards the demise of “the pink”, are sentimental.
It was a given that if your team had played away and won and you had not been able to attend the game you would buy a pink to get the full match report, even if you had listened to it on the radio.
Some weekends if we had won a big game I would still buy a pink even if I had been to the game, watched the highlights on TV, and listened to the local radio phone in on the way home.
I suppose on the flip side of that statement of unflinching support I should also admit to the days of not being able to bring myself to buy the pink if we had suffered a particularly bad result.
But in the main I am sure there are many of you who on a Saturday would put your lottery on and buy a pink.
Some weeks when Wolves and Albion have lost I have walked into my local shop and the pile of Pinks have remained virtually untouched, yet at other times I have even seen people waiting around newsagents at 6pm for the E&S van to turn up!
I suppose it has become like so many other things in our lives that we take for granted right up to the point it disappears forever, just ask milkmen!!
Do not get me wrong I am as guilty as anyone else; I use my laptop as a constant means of feeding me news and would feel completely lost without it. But the “pink” feels like a Black Country institution all of its own and I have many memories connected to it.
I know all the information will still be available on here via the Express & Star website but the fact is the paper version was easier to take with me in the car, the pub, and dare I say it, the little boy’s room.
Things move on and things are always changing, but it doesn’t mean we have to be happy about it, and it doesn’t mean I can’t mourn the loss of something I will miss greatly . . .
Especially on those Saturdays when we win.
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Agree entirely Nathan another sad day for football/sports lovers all over the black country.Not everyone has a pc or indeed is pc friendly therefore they will surely miss the Sporting Star.Also seems an unusual decision bearing in mind Wolves new found lease of life.On a personal note living here in Malta i do miss the daily read of the E&s as it is not the same online.Looking forward to the new season keep up the good work.
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It served its times very well but it has become another victim of technological advances.
As a boy, it was a rare treat to get a copy of the pink. You’d get 95% of the match report detailing the first half and then three goals squeezed into the final paragraph. Throughtout the week, I would ask myself why angling was so popular. I could check to see what pubs were doing well in the local football, and it sometimes (although my memory may be playing me up) would have dominoes or cribbage leagues in there as well. A part of growing up I would imagine for a lot of boys in the area.
A shame but times change as you say Jarrod.
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I used to buy the Sporting Star when I lived in Wolves. The Birmingham pink, the Sports Argus, stopped a couple of years back and I still miss it. Great company for a 6pm Sat evening beer! Reading from the net just isn’t the same.
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I agree with every word said. I used to buy the sporting star and the argus every week so did half my family. Even though we have the internet now they should not let the pink go, they even used to sell them in pubs when I was younger and people would read them while having a pint, the things a shame.
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What about those of us who are now grown-up but whose mom’s still send them the pink each monday in the post! Eh?!
E.P.
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Its weird how gutted I am at this news. It was always exciting to get a pink after a good victory. I remember after an away game, getting off the coach and being given a free pink.
How brilliant is that!
The E&S really knows its readers, which is what makes it so different to any other paper, and such a big part of being a wolves fan.
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this is the first i have heard of the pink going… as a child of the 80′s i feel like i did when MJ died. E&S, make sure you bring it back when we win the FA cup!
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so the pink has gone now what next sad day lovely read win draw or lose
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The internet has changed our lives and the Sporting Star isn’t the first publication to disappear, nor will it be the last. I remember, as a kid, waiting outside the local shop for the van to arrive and then watching as the string was cut from around the bundle of ‘pinks’ and they were put on the counter. People coming to buy them would all have their views on the match. It was like a fans’ forum inside the shop!
They probably didn’t sell quite so well if we had lost. Maybe the Express & Star have made their decision based on how well they think Wolves will do in the Premier League.
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Very sad day indeed. The pink was a must read as a kid – very little comment – just a written kick by kick commentary on the big games and great coverage of junior football as well as local fishing!
Have lived all over the world and my airmail subscription to the pink was a lifesaver – and raised the odd eyebrow as I read it in pubs in Chicago, Prague, New York, Delhi etc etc. Will just have to make do with the Black Country Bugle now!! Not the same though!
UTW!
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Really sad news. I have a 1949 and 1960 pink from my dad when we won the FA Cup, also have what now is going to be one of the last i.e. the day we clinched promotion against QPR. Guess I should check out how much they will be worth now, not that they will be for sale I might add. This was part of my fabric growing up in Bentley, I was a paper boy, delivering the morning papers before school, then the Express and Star after school, then back at 18:00 on a Saturday to deliver the pinks, I think by the last delivery I had just about read every article, mind you it was about 21:00 by then…!!!!
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sad….. it was not just about reading of your clubs games and stories from with your club, but you could keep up with the other local teams…non league etc….. will be sadly missed.
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This news is a crying shame. The pink is as big a part of Saturdays in Wolverhampton as the mad cowboy, Bonkses in the Clarendon and a punch up outside Revolution.
In Wolves finest hour I emplore the E&S to re-consider, a season of premiership pinks will be worth a thousand championship programmes.
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Unfortunately its a sign of the times. First the Argus and now the pink.There are many such demises due to Technology but not always for the good
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S’ton Wolf I too have the cup winners pinks. They are on my office wall at home along with numerous other bits of Wolves memorabilia. I have the Champions one from last season waiting to go up also. RIP the Pink!
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Will it be online then ???
Will I in London be able to access it.
A friend saves them for me when we win and I read them when I return to the civilised midlands.
I’ve been reading Pinks since i was 10.
Sad day. Bloody computers…
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so sad 2 here the pink has stop..a cracking read when we came back from a away game.just when wolves r in premier league it stops. not happy!!!!!!!!!!
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The net is great for us ex pats of course, but I do despair sometimes, technology is moving so fast, its taking away our way of life.
I used to yearn for news from home, but now I can get all I need and more at the click of a mouse, I sometimes wonder if the changes are for the better?
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Whose gonna be able to do the scrap books of the future ??????
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Guilty as charged. Jarrod has made me look at the demise of the ‘Pink’ from another angle and has helped me realise that bloggers (like myself) are one of the reasons that the printed press is being hit so hard.
Sack the blogger, he killed the ‘pink’!
In all seriousness, it is another part of our collective footballing history that has come to an end. I probably mention ALOB in every other blog last season in the hope that it would continue, and I’m glad to say that it has probably survived.
Technological advances mean that some things are bound to change, but until demand for a product declines then usually it is printed whilst it is still viable. This obviously wasn’t the case with the ‘pink’, but we all be sad to see it go.
Cracking tribute Jarrod.
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Sad news as the pink was part and parcel of Saturday football. I know things have to move on but it’s a shame that football has been affected so much. I loved the whole excitement of my Saturday football. You knew every club was playing a match, turnstile prices were affordable to most people, a good pint or two and the pink to read with a bag of fish & chips. Stark contrast to now with matches played nearly every day of the week for TV, crazy prices to attend matches etc. Great shame.
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Going back to my childhood, and yes I was also a paperboy, we used to sell about three times as many Sports Argus to that of the Sporting Star. We were about half way between Blackheath and Dudley and we used to sell about three ot four times more Express and Star to that of the Evening Mail, so go figure. I didn’t know that the Argus had stopped being printed and with the demise of the printed version of the Star I don’t think Saturdays will have the same feel.
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I remember before the days of Ceefax and all that stuff being on holiday and missing Grandstand results by minutes …. then my dad draging me around Salcombe to every newsagents after some kind of ‘pink’
…. i remember a ‘pink’ paper being very different and not what he was looking for !!! …. funny tho’
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Sad news. I bought it whenever I could when I lived in Wolves area. It was a great read and, like others, I enjoyed keeping up with other local sports leagues, etc. covered by it.
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What about the pub teams and semi teams write ups used to love reading how we had played excited to see my name mentioned still have the cuttings today from the Argus sad news indeed.
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Are the memory returns, the tap tap tap of the compositor typing in the few lines being relayed from the reporter at the game. Collectively coming together as the final whistle approaches, only for everything to change when a team gets either a late winner or concedes. I used to work at the Argus and every Saturday afternoon used to be a joy being an old newspaper ‘comp’. But technology takes over and as my old job disappeared so does the skills associated with it. This goodbye is long overdue to the ‘Argus’ but with demise also of the Sporting Star I bid you both farewell with a wave – and thanks for the memories.
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I’m not worried about the football, but I remember getting the world’s best black country chips wrapped in it. Last night was a new low in chippy history. My local chippy in Perth charged £9.20 for a steak pie & chips, a single fish and jar of cockles. Is this a record? Plus they don’t sell roe in Scottish chippys, outrageous.
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Sad news indeed..
Fond memories of queues outside the newsagents after 6pm on a Saturday night waiting for the paper van to turn up, a mix of Baggies, Wolves and Saddlers fans, all exchanging views and banter on the afternoons events. For the newsagent it would be his last act of the day before closing (a sign of the times, as all shops were shut by tea time back then) When the van finally arrived an almost stampede like charge would ensue. I would buy both the Star and the Argus. If i had travelled to an away game and depending on what time it was when we got back i could usually pick up a copy in the local pub as we had a chap who used to walk on foot around the estate in the evening selling them. Knocker was his name and he would often down a quick pint while selling copies to the lads in the bar, a real welcome sight he was, and was always there, week in week out no matter what the weather!
Like most things, its now sadly a bygone era, a casualty of our own technological advances and never to return i’m afraid.
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Will be sadly missed.
R.I.Pink
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When the coventry pink ceased a way of life went with it.Regular routine go to game then a few pints and read the pink,beautiful.Digressing I see that Bowyer feels right at home at blues.Seem to remember when he joined the Hammers he claimed he was going back to his roots.Should be interesting if Blues sign Barton seeing they both had similar history at Newcastle
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