Harty on MacKail-Smith, Worthing RFC and Ricky Hatton

Being the Albion record seven-figure signing was always going to have its fair share of baggage, and clearly last season had its teething troubles.

Although they have no doubt shrunk away into the shadows, there were a small number of Albion fans who wouldn’t have minded Gus Poyet shipping his record signing out after a first season that returned a disappointing 10 goals.

Thankfully, despite a reported £3million offer from Norwich, Gus saw the bigger picture and six games in he’s already scored six times, and joint leads the Championship goal chart with Tom Ince.

He is a quality striker, who given time could even displace one of my existing front two in my all-time Albion XI. (And Peter Ward isn’t one of them).

The one downside and it’s nothing to do with the Albion, but a gripe at the BBC, watching the 7.25am regional news yesterday morning, the newsreader said “Moving on to football, Bournemouth got a point at Brentford with a two all draw, whilst Portsmouth’s bad run of form continues with a 2-1 loss to Swindon Town.”

No mention of the Albion, in a news bulletin, in Worthing, West Sussex...

Never mind moving on to football, perhaps a bit of movement of the transmitter or even on the editorial front might be the order of the day...

Great news for Worthing Rugby Club with their proposed move to a new state of the art facility at Goring Chase.

There will always be opposition when something like this is proposed, but what I do hope is that we don’t have a prolonged planning battle.

This is, in my opinion, the most exciting thing, up to now, to ever happen in local sport, everyone whether they like rugby or not should get behind it as it will not only benefit the rugby club but the community as a whole.

Part of the proposals will see a banqueting, function and conference facilities to accommodate the kind of numbers this town could have only dreamed about before, and that’s why the whole project must move forward without any of the traditional obstacles.

I know there will be people reading this who are already opposed to the plans, my answer to them would be could you really look your grandchildren in the eye if you were party to blocking such an important project for the whole town?

Ricky Hatton’s proposed boxing comeback has already attracted its fair share of detractors.

For what it’s worth, as long-time fan of Ricky and having been lucky enough to work with him on the after-dinner circuit, I’m in full support of his plans.

There are clearly some unresolved issues in his life and a return to boxing in his opinion will fill those voids.

Despite reports of a much-publicised fall-out with his father Ray, I understand he still has the full support of his family, and with new trainer Bob Shannon in his corner, if things don’t pan out the way they would all like, even before he gets in the ring in November, I know he will be big enough to retire again.

I wonder how many of the people so quick to slam his comeback will still go to the fight in November?