Soccer: Tiny Welsh dragon stalks giants of European soccer

STEVE TOUNGE of the Independent shares the dreams of a high-flying village of only 900.


If football in Britain is a seasonal sport, then autumn has come early this year. Bradford City have already begun their adventures in the competition christened by one tabloid newspaper the Inter Two-Bob Cup and, just a few days after the final of Euro 2000, qualification has started for Europe's grandest club competition, the Champions League.

And in the the village of Llansantffraid-ym-Mechain, a few kilometres over the Welsh border from Oswestry, they couldn't wait.

The close-season had already dragged on far too long for players, supporters and officials of the club now known as Total Network Solutions. It is, after all, weeks and weeks (nine to be precise), since TNS became League of Wales champions for the first time.



So for the past month, before and after being drawn against Levadia Maardu, of Estonia, the first-team squad of 22 were reduced to practice matches among themselves and against any scratch opposition they could find.

And their work came to fruition with a gallant 2-2 home draw with the Estonians.

But no one has any illusions about the tough task facing them in the away leg next week..

Surplus to requirements for Euro 2000 they may have been, but this is a team already experienced in Europe.

Four years ago, they qualified for Europe as the Welsh Cup holders and took on Ruch Chorzow.

"The name Llansantffraid has been on the tip of everyone's tongue," wrote a local newspaper, with no discernible irony, after a 0-5 defeat in Poland followed a creditable 1-1 draw at Wrexham's Racecourse Ground, where the first leg against Levadia Maardu was also staged.

Sadly, Uefa's meritocrats do not deem TNS's home ground to be good enough for their high-falutin' Champions League, despite its delightful setting on the side of a hill close to Lake Vyrnwy, with a range of facilities including a bowling green, as well as social club - do Real Madrid have a bowling green?

Using the adjacent local primary school for dressing-rooms presumably contravenes some petty regulation imposed by the governing body.

Work is continuing regardless, with a view to the new League of Wales campaign next month, and last week the club chairman, Edgar Jones, could be found installing green plastic seats in the new, 400-capacity stand behind one goal: "You don't see Martin Edwards [Manchester United chairman] with two spanners in his hand, do you?" he observed with pride as well as justification.

And so to the Racecourse it is, 30km up the road, where 1500 gathered for the Chorzow game and twice as many turned up for the Levadia Maardu clash.

At least the pitch was lovingly prepared; Wrexham's groundsman is the father of TNS's captain Timmy Edwards.

The skipper, a builder by trade, led out the usual mixed bag of part-timers, including a plumber, a British Aerospace engineer and a couple of players with no job at all, though not, alas, one star performer who is detained at Her Majesty's pleasure and likely to be unavailable for some time.

There were also two employees of Total Network Solutions, the parent company that has given its name to the football club since its managing director, Mike Harris, saw a marketing opportunity for his data communications firm when Llansantffraid qualified for Europe in 1996.

Harris, in his late 30s, is an open-necked denim-shirt type of MD, once mistaken for the office cleaner, to whom the description "livewire" does scant justice. He talks as fast as his cables carry computer data and was so taken with the Independent on Sunday's description of him as "Bart Simpson on speed" that pictures of Bart now adorn his office.

Harris is at war with Uefa over its refusal to use the club's new name, and is also exchanging solicitors' letters with the BBC over alleged racist bias in not including Welsh results with the English and Scottish leagues on the Saturday afternoon programme Final Score.

He sounds like a formidable advocate, who has managed to win over the die-hards of a village club muddling along quite happily on "crowds" of 150-300, transforming its prospects without simply dropping huge sums of money into a black hole.

"I've always watched and played football, and I saw an opportunity in Welsh football through Llansantffraid winning the Welsh Cup and getting into Europe," he says. "So I realised that, if we could change the name of the club, it would give us media coverage in places where you can't really buy advertising.

"But the whole crux of the deal was so the village could compete against the towns and cities of Wales, which, when you consider there's a population of only 900, clearly required extra financial investment.

"I believe we've won over the hearts and minds of virtually everybody here and the moment when I took the [League of Wales] trophy into the clubhouse was when the final spectre of scepticism disappeared.

"One of the things we were very conscious of was not to go changing their village enthusiasm and, over a period of time, myself and the company have gained their trust.

"We haven't gone in there and kicked out Joe Bloggs and Mrs Jones who have been doing this or that for years, because we want their support, and in return we've enabled them to attract the best manager and the best semi-professional players within the league."

- INDEPENDENT