They’re selling faster than Bradford City season tickets! Boarding passes to the famous HMS Piss The League are growing in popularity among a number of Bradford City supporters. Many seem blissfully unaware of its less than illustrious history. Its maiden voyage was captained by Gary Bowyer in 2019 but tragedy stuck when it hit iceberg and sank, fortunately all of the passengers survived and still flock to it every year. In 2020 when memories from that trip faded they returned to the liner with Stuart McCall, however, again it sank having barely made it out of the harbour. And only last year exactly the same thing happened again, this time under the guidance of Derek Adams. Luckily HMS Piss The League has been dredged from the bottom of the shallow sea and dragged by back to shore and restored for the fourth time.
However, the fact remains that HMS Piss The League has never reached its destination. In fact it has barely ever made it out of the harbour. Yet for some reason many of the same people are clamouring to get back on board and set sail again. This time there is believed to be another reason for its popularity. It is the outbreak of a new epidemic called the Mark Hughes Effect (MHE) that have lead to demand for places on HMS Piss The League hitting an all time record high.
According to the World Health Organisation MHE is an infectious disease caused by excessive optimism based on the name of the person managing your football club. It is known to attack the parts of the brain that allow objective thinking. In most cases it can be mild to moderate, but in more severe cases can lead to delusional thoughts and long term amnesia.
An early symptom of MHE is believed to be mild amnesia. This would explain why the unreliable HMS Piss The League is again so popular. Fans are expecting it to reach its destination of League One when the ship has failed to even make the League Two Play-Off’s.
The Mark Hughes Effect can be so severe that the World Health Organisation (WHO) have major concerns about it. They have published advice to help the public look out for the tell tale signs of the disease. Previously MHE has been mistaken for healthy optimism, but the public should be on the lookout for symptoms that fall into the category of “delusional”.
In the UK the NHS have advised people to be on the look out for two or more of the following signs:-
- An unfounded belief that Bradford City will ‘piss the league’ based purely on the fact Mark Hughes is the manager.
- An inflated belief in the ability of a new signing based purely on the fact Mark Hughes has signed them.
- A belief that an objectively poor footballer will turn into a good footballer because Mark Hughes is coaching him.
- An unfounded belief that every footballer in the world wants to join Bradford City because Mark Hughes is the manager.
- A belief that any footballer who does not wish to sign a new contract with Bradford City is a shit and easy to replace.
Although this is not an exhaustive list, if you are concerned that somebody might be infected with MHE you should immediately contact the NHS Helpline, and they will provide a free MHE test. For anybody that might come into contact with somebody infected with MHE, you are advised to immediately stop listening to them as MHE is highly contagious, especially through social media.
Studies have found that some infected supporters appear to think Mark Hughes is a kind of super human godlike being. Often when asked to justify wild claims that appear to have no supporting evidence, it was noted that participants always concluded that Mark Hughes is the answer. At the University of Bradford, scientists recently carried out an experiment on 100 Bradford City supporters and found some clear differences between optimism and irrational, delusional thinking that confirmed the presence of MHE. When a rumour recently appeared on Twitter that George Miller would be joining Bradford City, participants were divided into three groups. The control group, Bradford City fans that did not show symptoms of MHE, and Bradford City fans that have symptoms of MHE.
Bradford City supporters in the experiment were asked the same question. Do you think George Miller will become a 20 goal a season goalscorer if he signed for Bradford City?
In the control group there were two trains of thought. One was that based on the fact Miller had never scored 20 goals in a season before, and that he had only previously scored 3 goals in 39 games on loan for Bradford City, they felt that it was highly unlikely he would achieve this target. There were supporters across both the control group and the non-infected group that did feel it was possible given that Miller had scored 12 goals in the previous season with Walsall. But all agreed that they wouldn’t be prepared to commit to saying he definitely would.
However in the group that was suspected to be infected with MHE all of the participants were 100% certain that Miller would easily score more than 20 goals if he signed for Bradford City. Asked what evidence they had to support this claim, all responded with the answer “because Mark Hughes will make him a much better player”. When tested after the experiment, all of the people who gave that reason tested positive for MHE and were immediately quarantined.
The biggest concern for medical experts is the potential long-term effects and serious health implications of MHE. Experts have pointed to concerns that should Bradford City find themselves mid-table by January, high levels of cognitive dissonance may lead to serious and permanent amnesia that lead to even worse symptoms in severe cases.
The most severe cases are expected to be found onboard HMS Piss The League if people suffering from the Mark Hughes Effect once again notice that the ship is still nowhere near its stated destination. In the past, symptoms have been alleviated by chanting for the manager to be sacked and the manager getting sacked. However, if they are still infected with MHE, medical experts world wide have serious concerns about what having two simultaneously contradictory beliefs will lead to.
The World Health Organisation has already gone as far as asking medical organisations world wide to be on high alert for head explosion injuries but are hoping instead there will be a repeat of what happened with the milder Derek Adams Effect.
That time, spontaneous amnesia kicked in without any significant side-effects. Many of them began to forget they were overwhelmingly in favour of the appointment Derek Adams as manager. This resulted in a therapeutic campaign of abuse aimed at Bradford City CEO Ryan Sparks for his decision to give such an “obviously inept manager” the job in the first place.
However, the amnesia seemed to cause a situation where supporters were no longer able to find any posts on their Twitter timeline welcoming his appointment to the club. It would appear that all comments had been mysteriously erased, along with memories of ever being impressed with anything Derek Adams ever said or did. Experts believe this is a natural defence mechanism providing protection to people who have been infected, in order to prevent them ever being proved wrong. On the down side it increases the possibility of more serious variants of this disease spreading faster and further in the future.
The WHO are now concerned that should Mark Hughes fail to deliver a team that is in the top seven of EFL League Two by January, people with MHE could face major medical complications should they attempt to scapegoat Ryan Sparks again. This can happen when people who have tested positive for the Mark Hughes Effect begin to convince themselves that they knew all along that Mark Hughes was the wrong man for the job. There are major concerns among experts that these people will suffer from their head exploding. In most cases this is believed to be fatal.
The WHO are advising people who are not currently infected with the Mark Hughes Effect to screenshot any unfounded delusional claims made about Bradford City and capture any evidence of anyone boarding HMS Piss The League. This is to prevent people who still have some level of objectivity overwhelming the NHS with the mistaken belief they’re the ones who have lost touch with reality.
The government are expected to debate in the House of Commons later next week whether to introduce special measures to prevent the spread of the Mark Hughes Effect, as during the transfer window the “R” Rate is expected to be at it’s highest and there is a fear that the exponential growth of people being infected with it could end up at record highs.
In the meantime, since there is still no vaccine and no known cure for MHE, it is believed that showing people who test positive the 2021/22 EFL League Two Team of the Season and letting them compare it to the current Bradford City XI might in rare cases might prevent some people travelling on board HMS Piss The League.