Blackpool’s strange season has taken another bizarre twist after the midfielder Andrea Orlandi let slip that goalkeeper Joe Lewis was forced to wear an autographed shirt in last week’s match against Reading because the club did not have any spares.
Having begun the season by cancelling their pre-season trip to Spain after being left with only eight contracted professionals, the Tangerines have lurched from one crisis to another and were relegated last week having been bottom of the Championship table since October.
Supporters pelted the directors’ box and main reception area at Bloomfield Road to protest against the chairman Karl Oyston ahead of the match against Reading last week. But little did they know about the chaotic scenes that were taking place in the changing room.
Writing in his weekly column for the Spanish website am14, the former Brighton midfielder Orlandi revealed the lengths Lewis had been forced to go to ensure he was correctly dressed for the match because the club no longer has a kit man.
“Before starting the game I noticed Joe Lewis’s shirt,” he wrote. “It was signed and I thought he was going to do a raffle after the game [a common practice in England]. It turns out that no, he had not even noticed or knew anything about it and when he tried to get another one he was told there were none left.
“It was funny because he tried to put a plaster over the writing to cover it and it looked even more funny. Things like that, however, details without apparent importance, make a difference in a club.
“There are details that should be improved as a club. A small thing? Probably, but still not a normal thing for a Championship club.”
