New season, same old Sky

Some things never change. Ten things I hated about Sky's opening day coverage of Arsenal vs Liverpool.

I hated that they opened ‘Super Sunday’ with a lovely, warm, heart-felt, sycophantic piece about “what a lovely bloke Roy Hodgson is” and how he’s “one of the very best”… before Hairy Hands launched into Arsenal with: “No Fabregas today. We haven’t heard the last of that saga have we Paul Merson?” Probably not if you keep stirring it up.

I hated the badly mocked up “chance meeting” between Roy Hodgson and Jeff Shreeves that started with a surprised “hello Roy”, as if to suggest they weren’t expecting to see each other – despite being on the pitch, the cameras rolling and them both being mic’d up.

I hated that Joe Cole is “Joe”, Gerrard is “Stevie G”, Red Nose is “Sir Alex”, Allardyce is “Big Sam” and Paul Scholes is “Scholesy” – while Wenger is “Wenger” (or sometimes “Whinger”), Fabregas is “Fabregas” and Eduardo was “a cheat”.

I hated that they genuinely tried to claim: “Incidentally, Wenger has committed publicly to the club… isn’t that just a move to try to persuade Fabregas to stay?” Hmm, that makes sense.

I hated that Hairy Hands said “Wenger’s got it wrong not picking van Persie hasn’t he, because if you’re fit enough to be on the bench, you’re fit enough to play”, only to also say: “You can understand Torres being on the bench – he hasn’t had a lot of game time.”

I hated that, on seeing Koscielny come back out, Jamie Redknapp was allowed to say “Look at that, he’s come back out. Now you have to wonder”, implying 1) that Koscielny pretended to nearly have his knee snapped by Joe Cole, and 2) that he should only get a red card if he actually puts him in hospital.

I hated that Joe Cole was “not that type of player”, which presumably makes it alright then. Ryan Shawcross and Matt Taylor also weren’t “that type of player”.

I hated the endless stats. The best, not from this game, but the Forest game just beforehand: “If Leeds lose here today it will be the club’s 800th away league defeat – no-one will want to be a part of that”. Really? And, who worked that out anyway?

I hated that Andy ‘we said that might happen’ Gray still knew everything that was going to happen before it happened… but didn’t say so ‘til after it happened.

And, most of all, I hated that I had to listen to them endlessly telling me I can watch the game in HD, 3D, 2D, Big D, Maccy D, Double D, Jack Dee, Kiki Dee, Dave Dee, Dozy, Beaky, Mick and Tich. I was half expecting Keys and Redknapp to be replaced by Richard and Ju-‘d’. Never been more bore-‘d’.

Welcome to the new season.

Sack Wenger, win some shit

Unless you've been holidaying with Terry Waite's old associates or staying with the Fritzls, you'll know that Arsenal haven't won anything for five years. You'll know because every lazy football writer and commentator mentions it every five minutes.

My worry is that people believe the hype – with some idiots even calling for Wenger to be gone for failing to bring ‘silverware’ to the Emirates. Time for a reality check:

No divine right to win the league
To begin with, and despite what the red scousers and the bare-chested idiots from Newcastle might tell you, no club has a divine right to win the league. It’s really hard to do and requires luck as well as momentum. The league invariably comes down to a few points (one point last year, none in ‘89), so a couple of bad games can put paid to your title hopes pretty quickly – in our case it used to be in November, but now seems to be March. So even if you’ve got the Chelsea open chequebook or the £60m-a-year the Mancs spend on players, you’re not guaranteed to win it anyway.

Shit cups are like chocolate teapots… pointless
Although Liverpool listed the Charity Shield among their 'five cups' and Spurs still boast of their success in the 1947 Norwich Hospital Charity Cup (click here if you don't believe me), the Champions League is the only other trophy that really counts. But the Champions League is a cup competition. Any of the top sides can win it – which is why Porto did and we nearly did – and any side can lose it, which is why Chelsea, despite all their cash, never have. My point is that, however much you spend, there are no guarantees.

Building for the future...
To many, Wenger’s tighter than Beth Ditto’s waistband and needs to spend to win trophies. But the decision to build the Emirates has put massive constraints on Wenger. I honestly don’t think he’s got anywhere near the money people think. The board says there’s money to spend, but they would… otherwise clubs would target our players with even lower bids than they already do. That doesn’t mean the decision to build the Emirates was wrong. The 9,000 seats in the posh bit in the middle generate as much income as the whole of Highbury’s 38,000 seats used to. Once the stadium debt is paid for, we will have one of the world's finest sporting arenas generating enough income to ensure our future for years to come. Around the same time, other clubs will hopefully be paying for the irrational management of their finances during the global financial crisis, and we will be in a position of most clubs’ envy - alive. Until then, the money is not available to take on the likes of Man U, Chelsea and, more notably, Man City in the transfer market. So the goalposts have moved.

The new goal
Our target during this period of paying for the stadium is to keep achieving Champions League football. Anything else will be a bonus. Wenger is spot on that 3rd or 4th in the league is better than winning the League Cup or the FA Cup. Anyone can get lucky and win a cup - Millwall made the final and Portsmouth won it - but a full season sets the men from the boys. The main thing, of course, is that the rewards are so much bigger. Would you really want Wenger fielding his best eleven in the Carling Cup on a Wednesday away at Wigan if there’s a six-pointer for a Champions League spot on the Saturday? Sack Wenger and you might just end up winning some shit... and missing out on the good stuff.

Show a little faith…
Wenger’s record speaks for itself but, if anyone thinks someone else could have done a better job on his watch, (including the idiots who have suggested Jumpy-up-and-down Martin O’Neill should be brought in to replace him), here are a few pointers.

For starters, what do Tottenham, Newcastle, ‘Boro, Sunderland, Villa, Everton, the Mancs, Liverpool, Chelsea and Man City all have in common? The answer is they all have a higher net spend than Arsenal since 2004. Where are their championships, FA Cups and Champions League finals? Newcastle, Boro and Sunderland have been relegated in that time. I don’t hear commentators banging on about their lack of silverware every two minutes.

Chelsea’s have spent £248m since 2004, recouping just £100m. Wenger’s net spend per season since 2004 has been £4m. He’s achieved Champions league football every year on that budget. Every year.

Before moving to the Emirates, we were no bigger than Leeds, Villa, Everton, Newcastle, Man City, Tottenham, West Ham, Liverpool and many others who had stadiums as big as ours and therefore the same income. Arsenal have been in the Champions League for 11 seasons running. Where have the others been? Newcastle have been to Bristol Rovers for league games. Leeds have been to Cheltenham, Hereford and Yeovil.

In summary, Arsenal made a decision some years ago that, rather than stand still with our peers, we would take a punt on building a big stadium to generate long-term higher income and the chance to compete at the very top. What they saw in Wenger, a man who had already revolutionised British football with his views on fitness, training, diet and tactics, was a man who could not only steer us through the period in which we would have to pay for that plan, but who had the foresight to begin a youth policy which would also give the fans something enjoyable to watch and the chance of success every year without spending money – even if that success doesn’t always materialise. I’ll take security and hope over trips to Cheltenham, Hereford and Yeovil, Carling Cups and the Norwich Hospital Trophy any day. But the commentators aren’t interested in that, are they?

Arsene Wenger... tight.

Can't believe all you read in the papers

Slow news day on the Sun yesterday resulted in the need for a good made up story on the front page.

The Sun triumphantly told us in its 'Crouch on the couch' story: "HEARTBROKEN Abbey Clancy hurled off her engagement ring yesterday and fled to a woman who knows EXACTLY what she's going through - John Terry's wife Toni. Abbey poured out her heart to Toni after storming from the house she shares with England striker fiancé Peter Crouch over his romps with a 19-year-old hooker. Furious Abbey banned 6ft 7ins Crouch from the bedroom and made him spend an uncomfortable night on a sofa. A source [which doesn't exist, obviously] said: "She was livid. She screamed at him to get out of her sight and banned him from their bedroom. She told him to sleep on the couch."

What is it about this that just doesn't ring true? It's not that I don't believe he spent some of his £70k-a-week in the back of a cab with an Algerian hooker. Or that Clancy raced home from filming and threw her £20k ring at him. But do they really expect me to believe that a £70k-a-week footballer lives in a one-bedroom flat and doesn't have a spare room?

A little artistic licence to make the headline fit, I think.

Once bitten, but not twice shy, it seems

There's probably some old proverb about the more you hit a dog with a stick, the more it comes back for more. Or something. Anyway, loving the boundless optimism of the scousers re the proposed takeover. No doubt it's fuelled by the following talk...

"Agreement has been reached on all major terms including the purchase price, repayment of the existing bank debt and financing of a new stadium in Liverpool’s Stanley Park."
Takeover contender Yahya Kirdi, 5 August 2010

Great news. Except that sounds a bit like this: "We have purchased the club with no debt on the club. We will provide capital for a new stadium, with work due to start on that within the next 60 days. We understand the importance of investing on and off the field."
George Gillett and Tom Hicks, 6 February 2007

The scousers are missing what the bidders do for a living. Yahya Kirdi looks after "oversees investments in Europe and North America on behalf of his investor group". Another bidder is the China Investment Company (CIC). Another is Dubai International Capital. And another is Rhone Capital.

'Investment' and 'capital'. Their business is to invest money in things from which they will gain more capital. In football, you do not achieve profit by paying off £300m debts, building a stadium and buying loads of players. You do it by stripping out the assets, lumping the debt on to what remains and moving on.

That's why Hicks and Gillett's parting shot when putting the club up for sale was to say: "Owning Liverpool Football Club over these past three years has been a rewarding experience for us and our families." I'll say.

The really sad thing is that this will probably be us in a year or two. God forbid.

"He loves a foreigner, that Wenger"

The BBC says: "Despite the Premier League being hailed the world's leading domestic competition, that success has yet to be transformed into an improved England national team. Critics have pointed to the high number of overseas players, denying home-grown talent a chance to play."

Perhaps I'm being more Jade Goody (thick, not dead) than Stephen Hawking about this, but I honestly don't understand the link. Is the premise that reducing the number of good foreign players so less-good English ones can play will make the English ones better? How does that make sense? Surely it will just result in a false sense of ability, so England rock up at a tournament thinking they're good because they've only been exposed to each other - only to find they're crap compared with the rest (a bit like the recent World Cup, but on a bigger scale).

This brings me on to the new - and mental - Premier League squad rule. In short: maximum squad of 25 players; seven or more must be 'home grown'. The aim is to reduce the size of the rich clubs' squads and to give the English players a chance to play. Except that's badly thought out too. Take Jack Wilshere, for example. He will stay at Arsenal so Wenger can include him in his 'home grown' contingent. But he won't play nearly as much as he would out on loan at, say, Bolton. So that's backfired.

The real issue to be tackled is how English kids are developed. The best players will always rise to the top, wherever they come from. The fact that not enough English ones are rising to the top is because development in this country is not good enough. It's because clubs pick up big, strong, powerful kids and, when they reach 16, realise they can't play football and so release them to a life of working at Morrison's because they gave up on school thinking they were "gonna make it".

Wenger also gets a lot of stick for not signing English players. And it's true he's only signed six Englishmen in 14 years. That's partly because the English equivalent of a £10m defender will probably cost £25m to buy and Wenger is astute. But it's also because when he's had English players, he's had his fingers burned: Bentley (over-rated, under-talented, has to walk everywhere), Jeffers (more pox than fox, released by Ipswich), Richard Wright (couldn't catch), Theo Walcott (doesn't have a trick), Jermaine Pennant (over-rated and a wanker), Matthew Upson (no pace, can't turn, found his level at West Ham), Sol Campbell (obviously a success but went home at half time because we were losing, hence mentally unstable), Justin Hoyte (Middlesboro).

The point is that it's easy to blame the lack of English talent on foreign players or, quite simply, Arsene Wenger not playing or buying English players. However, 42% of the players who played in the Premier League last years were eligible for England. But were 42% of the best players in the Premier League English? No. That's because simply giving them a game doesn't make them the best. They have to be good enough in the first place.

Bets, Cesc, sense and no sense of tatse

Tittle tattle...

Carlos Puyol has become the 617th Barca player to come out and openly beg for Cesc's release from the prison cell that is his multi-million pound lifestyle, saying: "He is having to stay at a club where he no longer wants to be. I wonder how intelligent it is keeping a player who doesn't want to be there." I wonder how intelligent it is signing a six-year contract if your dream is somewhere else..? Perhaps Puyol should have been a bit more outspoken then. Or maybe a shorter deal wouldn't have been as lucrative? Either way, what's it got to do with him anyway? He needs to concentrate less on Cesc and more on his 'just been raped in the prison showers' haircut.

In 1990, while watching World Cup Italia, Harry Redknapp had a car accident which left him with no sense of smell or tatse. The second, of course, is evident.

Only three players have won post-war league titles with two different clubs. Henning Berg (Blackburn and the Mancs) is one. Who are the others, including one Gooner?
[There is a lot of false information on the internet and I will not be including quiz questions in the blog again. Nicholas Anelka, Ray Kennedy, Eric Cantona, Henning Berg have all won league titles with more than one club. The one you were looking for, however, and didn't get, was John Lukic. Lesson learned.]

SkyBet are offering 5/6 for Emile Heskey to score four or more league goals during the entire 2010/11 season. Sound like a good bet? Last year, he scored three!

Making an ass of himself

Leading on nicely from yesterday's blog, there really is nothing Harry Redknapp won't do for a bit of publicity. If he's not openly tapping up other teams' players in the press, he's on the phone to Sky Sports News or jabbering away on TalkSport. Standing in the choir on the Venables-singing advert for The Sun was a low point. Today's effort in the Sun eclipses all others though. I'm still unsure as to whether this is a joke or not. It's so ridiculous that even The Sun isn’t running it on its own website.

The best bits are:
"Donkeys, horses, foxes and birds - I'm passionate about caring for them in the right way." Foxes? Really?

"[Redknapp] is known as the Birdman of White Hart Lane by players because he throws bread to birds during training sessions." That's not true.

Sadly, they didn’t run the quote where he says: "It's a great donkey and any manager would want him. I'm no different. But he's someone else's donkey. If he became available then of course I'd be interested. Anyone would." [See yesterday's blog].

On a serious note, would you ever see Arsene Wenger do a piece like this? No. Class is the difference.

Twitching and tapping...

Having seen many Arsenal players tapped up over the years, I always appreciate clubs taking a strong stance against it...

Spurs Chairman Daniel Levy, 18 July 2008:
"Public comments by Manchester United's manager, announcing that he has made an offer for Dimitar [Berbatov] and is confident that the deal will go through, is a blatant example of interference with one of our players.

"Our position has been severely compromised by the club making contact with the player and his agent, without the club's permission. This has shown Manchester United to be in breach of Premier League rules. As a result, we have today made an official complaint."

Although if you do take such a strong stance, you should probably practice what you preach...

Spurs manager Harry Redknapp:
On Robbie Keane: “Robbie Keane is a fantastic player but he belongs to Liverpool. I wouldn't say I wouldn't like him at the football club, but he belongs to Liverpool so it is not an option. As a player and a person I have a lot of time for Robbie. I think he is fantastic.”

On Jermain Defoe: "If the price is right and if Tony and Peter Storrie want to sell him and it's what we consider at our valuation and theirs, then fine, he is a good player.”

On Luis Fabiano: "Yes, I like him. He's a fabulous player and would be a brilliant addition to any team. I am not unhappy with the squad I have, but of course if a special player came along I would look at it, and Fabiano is a special player all right. For sure, he is a class act.”

On Ruud Van Nistelrooy: "He's an interesting player. He was fantastic in England and a great goalscorer. If he was available it could be of interest. It's not impossible... if it was right we could be interested."

On Sandro. “He can play. I'd like to go and have a look myself and, if we do decide to do anything, it'll be up to the chairman to push it on from there."

On Joe Cole: “I'm not saying if he hadn't agreed a deal with someone and he was available and didn't stay at Chelsea that we wouldn't be interested. I'm a big fan of Joe's.”

On Klaas-Jan Huntelaar: “The lad is a very good goalscorer and I'm still interested in him. I know of Stuttgart's involvement but I'm hoping we will still be able to do something. There's a lot of talk about who I may or may not be after but Huntelaar is the one I like."

On Patrick Vieira: “I'm still interested in Patrick and he wants to play here."

On David Beckham: “If the opportunity was there to sign him any club would have to think about it. David Beckham is a fantastic player, but he is also a terrific role model and a terrific professional. I'm not saying I would sign him and I wouldn't want to be disrespectful to him and say I wouldn't sign him. But it's a million to one shot – he'd bring something to the football club.”

My personal favourite...
Tapping up the entire Uruguayan nation: "I like all the Uruguayan players. They’re all good. I think Forlan would have another two or three good years in the Premier League, but his wages could be a problem."

People in glass houses

I love that all footballers have short memories.

Richard Dunne: "I didn't see [France's world cup exit] but I did laugh. Henry admitted afterwards he handled it, but it doesn't make me feel any better. We were cheated."

Strong words. It's a good job he's never handballed it himself:

At Ewood Park, Richard Dunne… deliberately handled in the box in a huge turning point in Aston Villa's defeat to Blackburn.
Daily Mail, 30 September 2009

Referee Alan Wiley seemed to lose control somewhat as tempers flared and Everton were left incensed on several occasions, including when former player Richard Dunne handled a Leighton Baines cross in the area but no penalty was awarded.
Liverpool Echo, 27 April 2009

From Radostin Kishishev's free-kick, Walton ruled that Richard Dunne had handled the ball and awarded a penalty.
Manchester City fans’ website, 10 January 2004

Too many cooks?

Football when I was a kid: A hotdog, packet of roasted peanuts (30 pence a bag), 22 players, a referee, two linesmen and a ball. For more than 100 years it was enough, and football was the biggest game in the world.

But the mentalists at FIFA can't leave it alone. Next season, the Champions League will be home to the ridiculous experiment of six referees in a game.

It seems that it was such a roaring success in the Europa League last season that they want to try it out on the biggest stage of all. Except it wasn't. Anyone who saw the farcical last few minutes of Fulham vs Roma, when the referee tried to send off 9ft 12in(ish) blonde Brede Hangeland for a foul committed in the box by 4ft 5in(ish) brown-haired Michael Brown, will know the extra officials merely caused masses of confusion, a 10-minute delay and made a joke out of a competition which, let's face it, really didn't need any help.

Why can't they just leave the game as it is? Controversial decisions and human error are part of what makes football so appealing. I'm the first to get mildly irritated (!) when we're robbed of a Champions League semi-final place by the scousers thanks to two terrible penalty decisions over two games (still bitter). But we've benefitted from a few bad decisions ourselves in the past, and you shouldn't want to change football's controversies for all the virgins in Steven Gerrard's address book.

And I'll tell you why: it's these things that fuel the talking points after games, get the arguments going among colleagues and friends, give the pundits and the phone-in shows a reason for being. It's also these incidents which give you an 'out' for your team's shite performance. How many times have Arsenal had a total shocker but the only talking point in the boozer has been how we were robbed by a corner that wasn't, a linesman's flag or a sending off? I bet there was many a game where Phillipe Senderos longed for a bit of controversy to take the focus off his game.

More than this, though, it's the current refereeing set-up that gives me those few nano-seconds of hope, that briefest chance of salvation, that glimmer that all is not lost when the opposition pops one into the goal down below me. Just as it hits the net but before the faint sound of the opposing fans' celebrations reaches the North Bank, I always catch myself glancing to the linesman for that signal that he's seen an offside or a handball that just wasn't there - thereby ruling out the goal and preserving our title credentials. It's like a second chance at the lottery... you know it's incredibly unlikely, but all hope is not lost. You still check in hope.

I wish they would stop looking for ways to take that away from us, and leave the beautiful game as it. If you take all the controversy out of football, you might just be left with something that's not very interesting at all. Then people will lose the passion for it, the people at home will stop watching, and Sky might take its money elsewhere. Then where will we be?

If they have to clamp down on something, forget about the one 'goal' a season that did or didn't cross the line, and instead clamp down on Rooney swearing his face off down the camera through which kids are watching, or the players who break other players' legs because they don't have the ability to beat them fairly?

That's a cause much more worth fighting for.