Williams dreams of Tangerine

Matt Williams is hoping for another great day at Wembley.

Shaw man Matt on Blackpool’s big day

FOOTBALL: IT HAS been described as the most lucrative football match in the world.

Forget the Champions’ League and World Cup finals. When Blackpool take on Cardiff in the Coca-Cola Championship play-off final at Wembley on Saturday (3pm kick-off), the winners will gain access to Premier League riches estimated at a cool £90million.

An argument can be made that the magnitude of this figure proves how unbalanced football’s finances are in this country, with clubs operating outside the top flight gravy train getting a raw deal.

What is certain is that such sums are in a whole different universe to those the Tangerines have been used to dealing in recently.

The Bloomfield Road club were struggling in the fourth tier of English football as recently as nine years ago.

And Shaw-born Blackpool secretary Matt Williams admits that the club’s amazing success up to this point — his employers reached this stage thanks to a thrilling 4-3 win away at Nottingham Forest in the second leg of their play-off semi-final tie — has resulted in all sorts of best-laid plans being hastily altered.

“The Forest result was a great one for the Blackpool fans, though my wife may not agree,” said Williams (35), a member of Shaw CC who next month embarks on a whistle-stop charity tour of all 18 first-class county grounds (www.challenge6.co.uk).

“It has wrecked our plans for summer as we had planned to be on holiday right now.

“It has been non-stop ever since the build-up to the Bristol City game on the last day of the season.

“From there I drove to Stoke the next day to exchange tickets with Nottingham Forest and after that tie was over there was the small task of selling 37,000 Wembley tickets inside a week.

“I am the press officer here at Blackpool as well and the demand has been incredible.

“From having one man and his dog at every press conference, now we have three or four different camera crews from each television station.

“It has been an amazing adventure.

“We keep hearing that this game is worth £90million — but we are not thinking about all that.

“They are a great set of lads here and we have a first-class man and manager in Ian Holloway.

“Everyone seems to want Blackpool to do well as this country loves the underdog.”

Blackpool’s exploits this season have been masterminded by effervescent and canny Holloway, who has brought together a capable squad of players featuring inspirational ex-Glasgow Rangers midfielder Charlie Adam and former Athletic full-back Neal Eardley, who misses the Wembley final through injury.

Strikers Ben Burgess and Brett Ormerod have both had brief spells at Boundary Park in their long careers.

Holloway’s men have been boosted by the fact that on-loan striker DJ Campbell — scorer of a famous hat-trick in that away victory at Forest — is able to play, due to Cardiff knocking out his parent club Leicester.

For a club averaging home crowds of 8,611, the second-lowest figure in the Championship, it has been a terrific season.

And preparations won’t alter much in spite of the stakes being raised so high. Blackpool are set to maintain their regular matchday routine and won’t deviate from the Wembley arrangements made back in 2007 — the season they gained promotion to the Championship at the expense of Yeovil, after beating Athletic over two legs.

“We are staying in the same hotel as three years ago and will train at the same venue,” Williams added.

“The routine will stay the same. That even goes down to the forfeit for the worst player in training, who will have to go out and buy £10 worth of chocolate biscuits just as in every other week!

“Win or lose, we have done fantastically well to get here and will enjoy the experience.”