The military lost its appeal and he spent the latter half

The military lost its appeal, and he spent the latter half of the Sixties scuffling on the Nashville breadline. Then, while working as a janitor at Columbia records, he landed a helicopter in Johnny Cash’s backyard to deliver the demo tape of the man in black’s future No1, “Sunday Morning Coming Down”. He was the poet laureate of the one-night stand (“Help Me Make it Through the Night”), rogue philosopher (“Best of All Possible Worlds”) and social activist (“The Law is for the Protection of the People”). In the years since, booze and drugs may have taken revenge on his boyish good looks but his songbook has grown to encompass multitudes.And yet the 67-year-old man with silver hair and beard wrapped up in a trench coat looks exposed and nervous with only a lectern, acoustic guitar and harmonica holder for company. Kristofferson is a both a self-effacing and engaging performer. The songs engage but his voice and musicianship barely reach the foothills of the majestic heights he scales as a writer.

With no musical support his aged vocals are more strained than ever, so he gives a comical running commentary on the more glaring shortcomings.And yet it is possible to forgive him anything as the songs filled with deadpan humour, tender insights, wry wisdom and deep truths tumble forth. The pitch is decribed as “85 per cent playable”, but the problem lies with the section in the shadow of the stand.Chorleywill be without their suspended full-back, Lee Patterson, and have two of their close-season signings, Rob Smyth and Danny Barton, out injured.Trinity, who showed some encouraging signs in their defeat at Warrington in their first Super League match, have their half-backs, Jamie Rooney and Ben Jeffries, back from knocks and have added Olivier Elima and Paul Handforth to their squad.Union Treiziste Catalane, the French club earmarked for Super League in 2006, have named Steve Hall and Russell Bawden, who both joined them from the London Broncos this winter, in their side to play at Castleford tomorrow.Castleford are also anxious over the weather. Chorley Lynx’s attempt to reach the last 16 of the Powergen Challenge Cup for the first time in their history could be put on ice if their Victory Park pitch does not thaw in time for tonight’s tie.
The Lancashire side are due to play Wakefield, of Super League, but have organised a pitch inspection for 1.30 this afternoon to decide whether the match can go ahead. The original plan has been to sign off the deal this April based on a costing of £2.9bn for the two 65,000 tonne carriers and an in-service date for the first vessel of 2012. The company made an underlying profit in December.Better still, it has £72m of cash left, having gone through £30m this year. It expects to finish 2004 with about £50m and is predicting it will be cash flow positive next year.Two other issues have also been cleared up. A legal dispute with Viatel has been settled while the Marconi stock overhang is also a thing of the past.But it is worth remembering that analysts aren’t forecasting Easynet to make a profit until 2006 at the earliest.

Abbey National is turning out to be more of a long-haul, J Sainsbury-type turnaround than the short hop back to former glories the City had hoped for. To be fair on Luqman Arnold, the chief executive, he’d never pretended otherwise, repeatedly stressing that it would take at least three years for the magic to work. Yet one year in, and the red ink is still flowing freely and the underlying business seems to be in a state of continued deterioration.
Yesterday’s “surprise” was that the company has had to put aside an extra £373m to meet stringent new FSA solvency requirements in its life business. Abbey freely admits that it has no idea whether it will be enough, but in any case the move is bound to limit Abbey’s ability to pay a half-promised special dividend from the proceeds of asset disposals.