Mission impossible

Christmas presents for all the family are sorted folks. A new publication is coming soon commemorating the club's second ever league championship trophy. Titled "Mission Impossible", the book celebrates Berwick Rangers' Championship success last season and hits the shelves on Monday 3rd December, just in time for the Christmas shoppers. The book covers two contrasting seasons at Shielfield Park, where fans had the disappointment of missing out on the Championship Trophy on the last day of the 2005/06 season but finally had something to celebrate a season later when their team lifted the title for the first time in 28 years.

To get your copy of this limited-run, 128 page publication, written in author Chris Sanderson's own unique style with reports, quotes and colour pictures (some from theducket.com I believe) read on. The book is priced at £9.99 and is available to pre-order online at www.berwickrangers.co.uk from Monday 5th November. It goes on general sale on Monday 3rd December from the Supporters Trust Shop at Shielfield Park; Tyne & Tweed, West Street; Berwick Tourist Information Centre; Bridge Street Bookshop. Other stockists are listed on the Supporters Trust website. There will be an official launch on Saturday 8th December at the Black & Gold from 12.30pm. The players that were involved in the Championship season will be signing copies of the book and the Supporters Trust are organising other events on the day.

Tough times ahead?

Welcome to Michael Renwick who has replaced John Coughlin as the manager of Berwick Rangers. The former Hibs player has taken up his first managerial post after a stint at Cowdenbeath as a coach. An unknown quantity clearly (although every manager has to start somewhere) & with a small squad and a number of players older than he is - it will interesting to see how he imposes his authority on the squad and starts to mould it into his squad.

He's taken over at a very difficult time - the league table doesn't lie - we are adrift at the bottom and conceded three goals or more for the ninth time this season at the weekend and arguably the most talented player at the club about to leave for pastures new. Renwick is quoted as keen to bring loan players in before the Ayr game this weekend.

The next set of games are crucial and in fact they could well come at a good time. There is maybe an "easier" spell ahead with many of the games against the clubs immediately above us and the very ones we need to close the gap on. Ayr (6th place) are next as I mentioned then Peterhead. Then there is the international break followed by the cup match away at either Forfar (in a similar position to us at the bottom of Division 3) or Dumbarton before the run up to Christmas starts with Brechin (9th) and Queen's Park (8th).

Good luck to Renwick as he takes on the new mission impossible.

New blog

It's always nice to welcome a new Berwick Rangers related web site to the scene and this one is well worth keeping an eye on. The ducketblog webmaster, Paul Smith, is promising to say on his site what others are not able to say, if you get what I mean.

Personally it's great, because I guess this is what I'd wanted to do when I relaunched theducket.com last year but have never been able to do it justice. So far, so good - with daily updates and an interesting mix of posts. Good luck Paul.

Coughlin

A sad day, as the man who orchestrated only the second league title in our history resign his job as manager. Rumours abound about exactly why - however for now let's just remember the football, players, results and trophy that he gave us. My thanks go to John and good luck for where ever you go next.