Sat 11th September 2010; 15:00, Emirates Stadium
Archive for Pundit Diatribe
Stop The Bitching And Get Behind Almunia Already
Posted by: | CommentsI was quite bemused earlier on today when listening to my morning dose of sports news. To be honest, I don’t know what I expected considering that Arsenal was allegedly plunged into meltdown after the transfer deadline handed Almunia the Arsenal No.1 shirt by default.
“How stupid is Arséne Wenger? Can he not see that the fans want a decent keeper? Why does he not listen to the pundits?”, asked a comically exasperated Mr. Alan Brazil.
Even my cornflakes cringed on hearing Brazil demand that Wenger listen to the pundits.
You have to wonder though, whether the Samaritans were intentionally forwarding calls from so called Arsenal fans to Talk Shite radio. Someone has to have a word with the bosses at the Samaritans for gross dereliction of duty. These Arsenal fans are hurting and desperate – and they need proper counselling, they don’t need to be sent to a bunch of Anti-Arsenal retards who have perfected the art form of xenophobia.
For the record, my position is that the Arsenal coaching staff have the responsibility to ensure that we’re best equipped for the new campaign. Perhaps the mass hysteria misses the trick here in not identifying the issues that Arsenal has to address to defend better as a unit.
So far, I think they’ve done that job satisfactorily with the personnel changes made and the application of a more coherent defensive strategy. The misguided and and somewhat amplified perception that Almunia is the problem to Arsenal’s trophy drought is a red-herring of the highest order.
I’m amazed that the anti-Arsenal brigade and the punks in the media didn’t notice the 2 fingers Wenger stuck up right in their faces. Almunia was the match day captain every single time he was on the pitch, and deputized for Fabregas when the Spaniard had finished his shift at Ewood park. If there was ever an implicit vote of confidence, then what better way than doing something that obvious.
“But Wenger made a bid for Schwarzer. Doesn’t that show that he wanted to change things?”, I hear the heckling of the depressed and crazed fans with blood shot eyes holding the “Wenger Must Go!” placard on Holloway Road.
In between the chants of “Bring me the head of Arséne Wenger”, they summarily accuse the club of lacking ambition and failing to listen to pundits who clearly have the answer.
Yes, Wenger dipped his toe in the goal keeping transfer market, and many will accuse him of not trying hard enough.
What’s to say the Arsenal manager wasn’t lighting the mother of all bonfires under Manuel Almunia’s ass to make sure the Spaniard keeps on his toes? It’s worked so far, hasn’t it?
Wenger has an M.O that is impossible to ignore. He always signs essential players in the first week of July. These are the players who are identified as being critical to the season, changes that need to be made immediately. Koscielny, Nasri, Rosicky, Sagna, Chamakh et al, all came within a week of the transfer season opening.
If Wenger really wanted a new keeper, Arsenal would have got a new keeper. Schwarzer would have been nice to have around, but more importantly, Almunia was never on a transfer list. Fine, he might have left on his own volition, but Wenger never said he wants him out.
The best thing that has happened is that the transfer window has been nailed shut and boarded up. Enough of the Arsenal needs a new keeper madness.
It’s time to get behind Manuel Almunia and show him the love. There is no excuse in my view for not supporting him once he crosses that white line.
And by the way, I thought Almunia’s performance against Blackburn was stellar. If that had been Cech or Van Der Sar, everyone would be waxing lyrical about the performance and the reason why Chelsea and United are ‘Champions material’.
The rest of the team didn’t do badly for themselves either. So far, so good.
Jermaine ‘Defraud’s’ Hand Job On Young Boys: Where Is The Outrage?
Posted by: | CommentsLet’s face it – on any other day, the title of this article would be on a docket at the local Magistrate’s court down Seven Sisters Road.
The arraignment session in Court 14 will be filled by lawyers of Jermaine Defoe, Tottenham Hotspur, the FA, UEFA and the various media companies who have a reputation to defend.
“Motion for separation, your honour”, the £700 an hour bespectacled lawyer for Sky Sports would demand. “This perverse charge has nothing to do with us and my client resents being kettled into the position of defending our reputation with this group of uncouth defendants”.
“But he’s British and that’s why it’s no crime”, you can here another lawyer shouting from 4 deep.
The prosecutor, acting on behalf of the interest of the fair minded football loving public and for the interest of the integrity of the game tries again to stipulate the charges amidst the jeers and commotion in the gallery caused by the press corps.
“Your honour, all the defendants are accused of a systematic, calculated and deliberate attempt to show bias, prejudice, xenophobia, favouritism and breath-taking hypocrisy. They have brought the game into disrepute by continuing to mask the cheating that is blatant in the game, and by continuing to turn a blind eye when that cheating is perpetrated by an Englishman”.
“But your honour, my client challenges the jurisdiction of this court on the grounds that Southwark Crown court is already dealing with my client’s business” interjects one goateed and shaven headed lawyer from within the group as the gallery erupts in cheer.
“order, order, order”, the magistrate bellows as he hammers the plank by his side to try and recapture the sanity of his court room. “Who on earth are you representing?” he asks the goateed lawyer with a firm but bewildered look.
“The Tottenham manager your honour”, the reply follows.
“Can someone tell this idiot this court doesn’t deal with tax matters”, the magistrate demands as he looks for the court clerk as if to remind her to make sure those in front of the bench understand why they’re actually in court.
“So let me clarify this”, the magistrate continues while facing the prosecutor. “So who among these defendants actually benefited from the hand job against the Young Boys?”
“Your honour”, the prosecutor responds. “We submit to you that The Tottenham no. 18 Mr. Defoe was the primary culprit who used his hand to shaft the Young Boys, and the co-accused media defendants are all collectively responsible for colluding in that crime by refusing to be fair at the reporting of such heinous acts against association football”.
“Are the people able to meet the burden of proof?”, the magistrate enquires.
“We have comprehensive footage of the crime your honour”, the prosecutor replies with a tint of a smile, “both from the broadcasters as well as the official Tottenham match DVD which is already on sale at the club shop and website. Your honour, we also have precedence to illustrate the systematic and breath-taking bias shown by the English media in favour of English players, especially the divers like Mr. Rooney and Mr. Gerrard who are referred to as being ‘very clever’ instead of the cheats they are. The people will also be submitting crucial evidence against the media in the cases of Mr. Thierry Henry and Mr. Eduardo Da Silva who the media treated like the anti-Christ after similar offenses”.
“But Talk Sport is the no. 1 commercial radio station in the country”, a voice shouts from behind the throng of lawyers. “Surely, we have the right to create controversy in the interest of the English game when the player is not an Englishman? Enough with the bloody foreigners we say. They have caused the English national team to become a laughing stock around the world”.
“Order, Order” the magistrate shouts amidst the cheers and clapping from the gallery. “Bailiff, throw that ginger haired man and his Talk Shite out of my court room”, the magistrate demands in fury.
“But your honour”, the legal aid lawyer acting on behalf of the BBC demands. “We have done nothing wrong and our commentator even challenged the fairness of the situation and pointed out that if the Young Boys had had the helping hand, there would be absolute fury across the country for an English team being denied a chance at European football at the hands of a foreign team and a foreign referee”.
“Save your nonsense for the jury”, the magistrate barks back at the BBC lawyer. “Clerk, set the date for trial. NEXT!”
“Docket number EFJ21468 – the crown vs ….”, we hear as the camera fades out.
I forget what this post was about….LOL! Yeah! Cheating and the blatant disregard of this supposed crime against association football.
Where is the outrage, or didn’t we just see Jermaine ‘Defrauding’ the Young Boys with a blatant hand job.
I wonder what would happen if it was Thierry Henry or Eduardo on the end of that shot. Or if it was Arsenal playing Celtic for a place in the group stages of the Champions League.
Of Red and Brown Nosing, Sycophancy And Misguided Punditry
Posted by: | CommentsIt’s been a long time since the regular dosage at Stone Cold Arsenal Towers, and I trust all has been well. Like many, I still find myself in that strange place of being ecstatic about the fact that proper football is back, but being apprehensive about the sheer amount of media shit stirring being peddled about in the name of selling copy. When is that transfer window being bolted shut?
So the last couple of days while commuting to and from work I decided to do the unthinkable and find out what the usual suspects are up to in sports radio. Kills the down time in between and I thought that maybe they’d talk about you know – football.
Red nose seemed to have picked his moment by accusing old Mancini and his paymasters for Kamikaze spending. Part of me smiled sheepishly as I thought “you sad bastard, you’re just broke and can’t afford those wild player purchases you used to make”.
And it’s the truth. Manchester United are damn broke and it’s pointless suggesting that they’re still liquid and can service their debts. In the real world, any company that had debt ratios at the level of the Manure would be lined up along the wall and shot. Gone are the days when winning trophies guaranteed that you’ll actually make some money.
Anyway, laughing at Red nose wasn’t my point; my point was the sycophancy of the media pundits who don’t know when they need to stop kissing Fergusons ass.
Everyone knows that the transfer market this summer has been uneventful. Well, there’s Manchester City, but for the real world, they don’t seem to live on this planet. The fact that their owners have a mint attached to their office block in Abu Dhabi makes including them in a conversation about transfers an irrelevant discussion.
And so the pundits start waxing lyrical about the foresight of Ferguson in seeing the light when it comes to the challenges of the economic environment. Challenges that have led him to take a more realistic and prudent approach to developing a new team with a blend of geriatrics and youngsters.
The sycophantic punks can’t stop to pontificate how Sir Red nose is the best at building teams and that they’re heading the right way. They remind us of how he brought up the generation of Giggs, Beckham, the Neville brothers et al, and how he is already doing the same now.
Do these guys think we walked into this season straight from the cotton fields?
The fool is damn broke, and any financial rookie getting off the milk train at Manchester Piccadilly could have told you that Red nose is damn broke and can’t afford the spending lifestyle he’s been used to over the last decade.
The thing is this though. These punks have spent the best part of the last 6 or 7 years unashamedly bashing Wenger and Arsenal for being a pillar of strength and not succumbing to brazen ‘cheque book’ management. They have continued to bash Wenger for being a tight fisted egomaniac who had only one agenda of proving the world wrong.
They have continued over the years to ridicule Arsenal as being an unambitious club that doesn’t have the balls to spend money to compete with the so called big boys. They have continued to mock and ridicule the comprehensive and visionary youth development policy that will continue to stand the club in good stead for years to come.
And yet when clubs all around Arsenal start becoming basket cases; and when Chairmen and club owners around the leagues start tightening their belts because creditors don’t want to play anymore; when the so called big boys have collective debts that rival the GDP of some developing countries – the punks don’t even have the humility to acknowledge that all along, Arsenal and Wenger have been doing the right thing.
They don’t have the grace to accept that their stupidity in Arsenal bashing over the years and their lack of foresight in understanding and appreciating Arsenal’s vision and why the club chose to go that way – makes them look like fools.
Yeah, go ahead and kiss the arse of old Red nose; but don’t forget – the mighty Arsenal leads the way and others follow.
The ambitious youth development policy that these misguided and miseducated pundits have been trashing in the last few years is clearly been seen as the answer by the establishment up and down the land.
The emerging richness of players from within our youth ranks means that Arsenal don’t have to ‘buy’ the so called big name mercenaries in order to compete. Yes, the team will buy, but we will buy players on our own terms.
Part of the problem with football in this country is that people don’t want or people don’t know how to build things any more. They just want to buy them. If there’s a problem – “who are they buying?”. Come the summer and January transfer windows, “who are they buying?”.
Watch the Arsenal baffle the whole lot of them as they suffocate for air from within Red noses – you know where….
England’s Redemption Can Be Found At Arsenal’s London Colney
Posted by: | CommentsEver since the game between Ingerland and Slovenia mid-week when the 3 Lions scraped through to the knock out stages by the skin of their teeth, I’ve been a bit hesitant to follow the media coverage through the English media.
I suppose one reason is that I’ve reached saturation point with the sycophancy and vanity that impales the coverage of the fortunes of the England team by the media here in the UK.
By the very nature of the beast that is the World cup (emphasis being on the ’World’), I and many other football lovers around the world want to follow the fortunes of the many teams still in the competition, and would highly appreciate a balanced, objective and impartial media to tell us about the other great teams and the other great players also in the world cup.
But Hey!, I also want my council tax bill reduced but that ain’t gonna happen soon.
There was only one way out from the fever pitch madness and media coverage that led to, let’s face it, the mother of all bitch slaps and humiliations that England has ever faced on the international stage. The only way out for England to justify the hyperbole and narcissism that the media and establishment fuelled before yesterday’s game against the Germans was that England win and that they win comprehensively.
Not even the clutching of the Frank-Lampard’s-goal-was-disallowed-shame-on-FIFA-for-not-introducing-goal-line-technology straw can hide away from the fact that England has had a woeful World cup campaign and the players, management and the FA should hang their heads in shame.
A Dejected And Beaten England Team Leave The Field Following a German Master Class in International Football
I’ve covered most of my reasons why I suggest that England will never win the World cup until they come out of the Stone Age, so I’m not going to go over that ground and suggest that if you haven’t yet, you should read that article to get a sense of where I’m coming from.
It’s not about the disappointment and anti-climax of the so called Golden Generation. It’s not that Fabio Capello is a dictator who has added no value to the fortunes of the national team at a major competition. It’s not that the solution is to get an English manager like Roy Hodgson or Harry Redknapp who can understand the ‘English’ game in a way that a foreign manager cannot.
It’s not that (this one was a funny excuse by Graham Taylor) international competitions take place in the summer after a long hard season and it’s during a period when England players don’t normally play their games and in hot climates – shame on you Mr. Taylor for even uttering those words. It’s not that the team failed to show ’pluck and spirit’ and that good old fashioned English graft, grit and steel that is the cornerstone of the brand of English football that we’re told drives the best league in the world.
The issue here and something that I’ve preached on several times is that the underlying culture and philosophy of English football is rotten and stuck in the Neolithic age. When even Stand Collymore on his radio call in is asking Arsenal fans how England can learn from Arséne Wenger and the way he nurtures talent who are technically gifted and can cope with the way the rest of the world plays, then you know there’s a problem.
I submit to you that until England starts from the grassroots by changing the culture and moving away from the ’kick and rush’ brand of football that Franz Beckenbauer rightfully mentioned and was harangued by the English media for – Team ‘Ingerland’ have the mother of all mountains to climb.
It’s not enough to be a celebrity footballer, or believe the hyperbole about what ability you actually have. There’s a very big difference between being talented on paper as is suggested by all and sundry, and actually producing on grass.
And can we now draw a line under this nonsense of calling certain players world class. Rooney, Gerrard, Lampard, Terry and Ashley Cole are good and above average players, but let’s not push the envelope. I even agree with Robbie Savage’s (when was it I last agreed with Savage) that a player should only be considered as ’world class’ when they can sit on the same table as Pele, Diego Maradona, Zinedine Zidane, Johan Cruyff, George Best and players of that ilk. Leo Messi is the only player currently warranting that badge of world class.
I was having a discussion with some friends yesterday evening as we explored what it is that ails English football (well, aside from the vanity of the media about the perceived capability of the team).
One of the analogies used to describe England in comparison to say Spain, Brazil, Argentina or Germany was that these 4 teams were like a gourmet restaurant that serves the best food and wine you’ll ever get anywhere on this planet, while England were proving yet again that despite the hype, they were just a kebab shop down the high street.
So many times, Arséne Wenger has been vilified by the English media for not having a team that was ‘English’ enough. This naturally came with the accusation that the Arsenal manager is one of the protagonists responsible for harming English football – as if Wenger is responsible for the cultural and philosophical deficiency of an entire footballing establishment.
Wenger famously stated that he won’t pay over the odds for English players whose price tags are inflated for no justifiable reason, yet they can’t deliver. His alternative was to set on a path that would allow Arsenal to develop their own crop of English players who played the Arsenal way.
The problem for Wenger is that visionaries are rarely lauded, let alone acknowledged and appreciated for many people don’t see the virtues of the said vision until long after the seeds are planted and the rewards are being enjoyed.
Take a look at the results of Wenger and Arsenal’s vision within the youth and reserve team setup at London Colney. Arsenal has the best crop of young talented players who are mostly English coming through the ranks. The youth team that won the double of the youth FA cup and the youth league in 2008-2009 had 9 English players in that squad of 15.
They‘re not just young and English, they’ve been brought together in a way of life since the young age of 11 and they have grown up in a culture that promotes the virtues of total football.
These young players are technically gifted and they can work with the ball with both skill and gusto. It’s also plain obvious to see that the issue is not whether all these players eventually make it to the Arsenal’s first team.
Not all of them will, but Arsenal get’s to decide whether they keep the best of the crop. For the rest, they are sprinkled around the football leagues and they get an opportunity to make their careers elsewhere while still reaping the benefits of the Arsenal way.
Those who graduate to the ranks of the first team are already showing the signs that they will be staking their claim to the England shirt come the 2014 world Cup in Brazil and the 2016 Euros in France and beyond.
The Arsenal Young Guns Celebrate In Style
It’s players like Little Jack Willy who has lit up Bolton on his loan spell to the Trotters from Arsenal. It’s players like Jay Emmanuel Thomas who are so versatile and prolific while being technically gifted, you can see him becoming the England midfield general for the next 10 years.
It’s players like Craig Eastmond, a young prospect from Wandsworth in South West London who feels nothing at the prospect of being thrown into a high pressure game for Arsenal and holding his own as a defensive midfielder. It’s prospects like young Kieran Gibbs from Lambeth who is already on his way to becoming one of the world’s best left backs.
Have I mentioned Kyle Bartley and Sanchez Watt? Or Henry Lansbury, Mark Randall or Tom Cruise?
The talent at London Colney is ridiculous and only a fool can’t see that the future is bright in the sleepy village of Shenley that hosts the Arsenal Academy in the heart of the Hertfordshire countryside.
The Folly Of Questioning Arsenal’s Mental Strength
Posted by: | CommentsSo what does mental strength actually look like? If you walked into a supermarket, would you be able to point it out and pick it off the shelf?
The way Arsenal’s mental fortitude keeps getting questioned makes you wonder whether there’s an industry standard ISO 2005 definition of what mental strength is supposed to look like.
What is interesting for me is that those who seem to constantly question Arsenal’s resolve to win the title are those who find it hard to come to terms with how the league table is shaping up. The table doesn’t lie.
The core problem seems to be the intransigence of commentators and pundits who find it hard to fathom Arsenal’s defiance of the establishment. I frequently waiver between sheer bemusement and blood boiling anger at the contempt and disrespect still shown to Arsenal.
I should know better really, but it does still get to me when in lieu of reasoned argument and debate, we’re stuck with prejudicial bile. It’s almost like we’re watching two different Arsenal teams and the Chelsea and Manchester United sycophants are stuck in a time warp that seeks to pigeon hole Arsenal as an ’also-rans’ team.
Watching the grave-digging pundits and hacks squirm about Arsenal’s title challenge
is as enjoyable as anything I’ve experienced in recent years, but the questioning of Arsenal’s mental strength seems to get to me more than normal.
My sense is that I’m getting a bit edgier because we can actually smell the business end of the home stretch. Don’t get me wrong, the next 7 games are the biggest 7 cup finals this group of Arsenal players have to face, and one game at a time, we will chip towards that promised land.
They are by no means easy matches, but in the same token , they are very winnable if Arsenal remain focussed, determined and tenacious.
Watching the games have become harder and harder, and there are times that I’ve seriously contemplated hiding behind the sofa because the stakes are just too high.
The thing is this though – even before a ball was kicked this season, Arsenal was written off as a joke. It was typical of football writers, commentators and pundits to fill the columns and air waves with their customary nonsense about Arsenal’s frailties. They insisted that Arsenal need to wait for this – ’spend big money’ to save Arsenal from the evil of mid-table mediocrity.
Guardian’s football writer Amy Lawrence was typical of the bunch with her cynically titled article, Time For Stubborn Wenger to Change His Youth Policy.
Firstly, it’s breath-takingly naive for a football journalist who brands herself as an Arsenal insider to fail to understand the vision and path Arsenal has taken in the last 5 years and the constraints it has brought.
It’s easier to label Wenger as ’stubborn’, than to take the time and effort to look at the bigger picture and competently analyse Arsenal’s short comings in the context of Arsenal’s bigger success in realising its overall vision.
Amy doesn’t hold the monopoly when it comes to the ill-informed nonsense written about Arsenal – there’s many of them around. What is interesting for me is the shifting of positions through the season by the hacks (including Amy), to position themselves well enough to start lauding the Arsenal team and Wenger in the unlikely event (unlikely for them of course), that Arsenal win the title.
If you collectively take all the negativity and all the dismissal of Arsenal as a title contender pre-season and throughout the season, then you will get a sense of why I’m suggesting the stupidity of questioning Arsenal’s mental strength.
These so called kids from the London Colney nursery were written off like a battered 17 year old banger broken into 4 different parts after a car accident on the M25.
These so called kids have the highest goal tally in the EPL, despite not having what these hacks and pundits refer to as a recognized striker. I honestly don’t know why they think Bendtner and Eduardo are defenders or ball boys.
These so called kids have not once, not twice – but time and time again, risen from the ashes like a phoenix and stubbornly refused to give away the title and fade away into oblivion.
These so called kids are blowing away every obstacle placed in front of them as pundits and hacks scramble to look for excuses to explain away what clearly wasn’t in their script.
These so called kids are proving that through the long marathon that is the 38 game EPL battle, they are physically, technically and mentally ready to last the course despite being written off time and time again.
These so called kids are quickly showing that they have learnt the bitter lessons of yesteryear and are determined to build on the excellent progress that they’ve made.
These so called kids are defying the very notion that you have to spend obscene amounts of money to put together a world class team.
These so called kids are putting two fingers out to the doubters to show their class and talent on the pitch as the best in the business. To be fair to the misguided pundits and hacks though, the likes of Alex Song and Abou Diaby have also blindsided many an Arsenal fan who never expected them to become the no-nonsense midfield generals that they have become.
These so called kids have constantly showed a ’never say die’ spirit and have fought to the bitter end to salvage a point or smuggle the 3 points from a very tight game. Scoring 15 goals in the last 5 minutes/added on time is not a feat to be scoffed at.
And yet despite all this, you get discredited punks all over the shop still asking whether Arsenal have the mental strength to go the distance.
Apparently, Manchester United and Chelsea have shown time and time again that they can do this and that they have the mental strength to do it. At least that’s the excuse being bandied about to explain why Arsenal can’t hack it.
Pray tell though, what on earth do you call the defiance beyond belief that this Arsenal team has shown by refusing to go away this season?
If that’s not formidable mental strength, then I don’t know what is.
The Miseducation Of Football Punditry
Posted by: | CommentsOn Tuesday night, I resorted to quietly creeping into bed after a long exile in the living room watching a movie way past my bed time. As much as the Chelsea defeat to Mourinho’s Internazionale planted a smug grin on my face all night, I thought it prudent to stay away from the bedroom until the coast was clear.
If there’s one thing marriage teaches you, it’s the skill of knowing when to compromise for the sake of world peace. My wife had clearly had an unpleasant night, seeing her beloved Chelsea bitch slapped out of the Champions League, and I had to rein in my temptation to shamelessly gloat.
I thought I’d got away with my stealth entry into bed only for her to say ”wipe that stupid smirk off your face”. Whatever happened to ’goodnight sweetheart’.
It was only until yesterday when we got round to talking about football, and the conversation naturally revolved around where Chelsea go from here. I’ve always maintained that it was only a matter of time before the footballing senior citizens from Stamford Bridge reached the point of diminishing returns.
Whenever I get the opportunity, I wax lyrical to anyone who will listen about the virtues of Arsenals youth development infrastructure, and the benefits it is slowly yielding. It’s the antithesis of the brazen ’cheque book’ style of management we’ve come to know in the last 8 years or so.
For many clubs, the ethos and practice of ’building’ a team within your means has become an unfashionable concept. The easy way out for clubs chasing glory is to ’buy’ their way into stupidity, as Chelsea and Real Madrid have spectacularly shown.
The Chelsea hierarchy and fans have been carrying out a post mortem after Tuesday’s dramatic exit from the competition their wealthy owner sees as the holy grail. Not surprisingly, the solutions being bandied about evolve around the need to dismantle the squad and start over.
The Chinese have a saying suggesting that insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results. I couldn’t help but notice the default position that the football establishment and punditry have taken on this issue.
It seems that no one has learnt the fundamental lesson here that you can’t buy success. For one, this short-term mentality is a sure fire way to flush millions of pounds down the toilet.
Secondly, the constant cheer leading by the pundits and hacks for Roman Abramovich to whip out his cheque book is so detached from reality, you honestly start to wonder if these guys live on this planet.
My sense is that one of football’s biggest problems is the fact that pundits are unfortunately given a stage by media houses to spew some serious diatribe that goes unchecked.
There’s an inherent assumption that if someone played football at one point in time, then they have the competence and or ability to form a reasonable, well thought out and researched opinion about footballing matters. Unfortunately for us, we’re stuck with a bunch of folks who I’ve got to tell you, leave me with the impression that they possess the IQ and personality of a fence post.
We are forced to endure the injustice of having folks who’s grasp of tactical and general footballing matters such as finance or the evolution of the game across the world is so off the pace, it ventures into the realm of criminality.
Even after Abramovich has spectacularly lit a bonfire with over £700m of his own fortune and watch it disappear with the dying embers of an aging Chelsea squad, the pundits are so far removed from this world to think that the solution is for Abramovich to keep spending more of his personal fortune.
Clearly, the club can’t afford to spend its own money considering they’re still running an operating loss and have a payroll to revenue ratio that beggars belief.
I’ve got to tell you, spending £700m (and counting) is an expensive if not a breath-takingly stupid way to acquire 2 EPL titles and a few FA cups, and at the end of it, you’ve got a squad that is about to retire, and no viable solutions to organically refresh the squad in a sustainable way.
What’s ironic is that in the last 5 years or so, this group of pundits and hacks have totally derided Arsenal and Arsene Wenger for going about their business in the right way. It’s become fashionable to sensationalize and shamelessly laud the virtues of what is clearly the financial doping of football by the injection of obscene amounts of ’artificial’ investment.
The sycophancy around the likes of Chelsea and Manchester City’s unsustainable spending sprees is typical of a culture that has lost any form of reality. It’s a culture that still thinks that football is immune to the impact of the global economic crisis.
My take is that very few if any of these pundits have the capacity to understand and digest the environment that football is operating in. They fail to grasp the fundamentals that affect the dynamics of the game as it evolves, and they fail to understand the impact of their ill-informed and misguided so called ’expert’ opinions shoved down our throats in the media.
This in my view makes them extremely dangerous. I have a friend Kevin, who retired from the Armed Forces, after serving in both Northern Ireland and in desert Storm, the first Gulf war if you will.
The miseducation of these pundits reminds me of one thing Kevin says about combat and how intelligence is important. Going to war without intelligence is bad enough, but there’s nothing more dangerous than going to war with the wrong intelligence. It’s inevitable that people will die.
Pundits have the same dangerous effect on football, in that what they perceive to be their expert opinion about football is actually wrong and misguided for most part.
The constant clamour for Abramovich to spend more money to rebuild the squad is a classic example of having absolutely no grasp about the issue that ails Chelsea. Buying this squad is a fundamental part of the problem because it’s not sustainable.
I think one of the issues that can be addressed is that some standards regarding the basic education and communication skills of pundits are put into place. It’s insulting to pick any Tom, Dick or Harry who has just walked through the ’I used to play football’ door, stick a Mataland suit on them and put them in front of a camera.
I sometimes get bemused that following any news and or football event, there’s always an ”ex…” something available for his 15 seconds of fame in front of a camera or at the end of a phone to provide an opinion.
You do wonder whether it’s impossible for the media houses to get the opinion of somebody reputable who is actually in the game as opposed to a ’used to be’ who wants his name out there.
We can’t do any worse than expect that whoever sits on a sofa and earns his corn as a pundit should at least have a competent grasp of the subject matter, if not a basic education.
What was more interesting and telling though, is that through gritted teeth, some of them have reluctantly started pointing out that the Arsenal way is perhaps the way for Chelsea to go. I get the sense that the tide is starting to turn.
The losses of Real Madrid and Chelsea in the Champions league, despite the urban myth that has evolved to suggest that big money equates to trophies, is a visible indicator of this misguided notion.
My sense is that the success of Arsenal and the achievement of winning titles in years to come will do more for the sanity of football if only to illustrate that you can live within your means and be successful.
Speaking of football punditry, the late legendary Nottingham Forrest manager Brian Clough has to be commended for his shall we say – bitch slap of the hacks and pundits and putting them in their place.
Watch the video here:
Media Sycophancy And What Football Must Learn From Arsenal
Posted by: | CommentsLast night was somewhat surreal as the football on offer left my emotions and thoughts split three ways.
Firstly, there was the reality check being dished out in its coldest and most ruthless form at the Santiago Bernabeu. Secondly there was the shift into the overdrive of media sycophancy about Manchester United’s supposed ’World domination’ and the collective kissing of Alex Ferguson’s and Wayne Rooney’s rectal passages.
The media establishment were so far up the said asses, it was hard to see how the fumes and operating conditions would have allowed them to offer some objectivity.
It was only yesterday that all and sundry tried to portray Arsenal’s annihilation of Porto as not worthy of the Gunners, citing a supposedly tame dragon that was Porto. This third aspect really pissed me off.
Well, I thought I was pissed off until my wife, an ardent Chelsea supporter, came downstairs remonstrating about how she had been let down by AC Milan. I tried to convince her that Milan weren’t the team they used to be and that their contingent of senior citizens has passed their sell by date.
She was having none of that as clearly, her issue was that in the next week or so, she’d have to cope with the media barrage of ”Rooney this, Man United that, Ferguson this, Man United that”. The thought of Rooney, Ferguson and Man United being shoved down her throat by the media felt like it was going to make her physically sick.
I’ve got to tell you, that when even Chelsea fans complain about the media sycophancy towards Sir Red Nose and his charges, then something is clearly amiss.
Perhaps it’s just naive to expect that the establishment’s darling won’t get its customary treatment – and what, with just around 12 weeks to go to the World Cup – it’s even more naive to think that Wayne Rooney isn’t about to get the media endorsement to become a Knight of the Realm.
Of course, he’ll have to score the winning goal at the World Cup before Aunt Liz and Uncle Phil take the Royal train from Buckingham Palace to Carrington to personally endow the next Knight in waiting with the right to use Sir Wayne on his personal stationery.
I don’t know which is more scary – having to live with Sir Wayne for the next I don’t know how many years, or having to live with the vanity of Lady Coleen.
If you haven’t noticed yet, I was obviously tuned into Sky Sports 1 last night watching the events at the Santiago Bernabeu. Florentino Perez, the Real Madrid president has to be one of the biggest platinum idiots this side of the Mediterranean. I would have had sympathy for him under different circumstances, but Perez has form for breath-taking recklessness in spending an obscene amount of money to try and buy titles.
There can’t be any more spectacular ways to burn 260 million Euros – and what, for the sake of winning the Champions League in your own backyard? He tried it before and it didn’t work, and he should have heeded the famous Chinese saying that suggests that insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results.
The truth is that Real Madrid has just become the perfect case study of the fact that there is no place for reckless and brazen cheque book management of football in this day and age.
Arsenal and Arsene Wenger have been constantly derided and ridiculed for supposedly being tight fisted and anal about not spending money they haven’t got. While this is going on, the recklessness of other comparable clubs like Man United and Liverpool have been hailed as the way forward – only to turn out to be basket cases of debt riddled clubs that are running on the fumes of history and reputation.
Chelsea and Manchester City on the other hand are play toys for sugar daddies who let’s face it, have to be candidates for the lifetime stupidity award for business acumen.
I hear the argument that these folks are billionaires so they must have done something right in business. Actually, they haven’t done anything that spectacular like build a software empire from scratch or something dramatic like that.
Abramovich benefitted from the Russian economic revolution in the 90s by being in the right place at the right time to pounce – and the Abu Dhabi Investment Corporation are pretty much sitting on top of an oil mine that allows them to print the money themselves.
Despite this, the reality that you can’t buy titles, history and tradition by throwing money at middle table mediocrity still doesn’t seem to sink in. Abramovich has already lost £700 million (and counting) – and all he has to show for it is 2 league titles and a few FA cups. If that’s a good return for £700 million,, then clearly we all need to fold our tents and move on.
The new trend seems to be that of shifting the obscene amount of debt from the liability column on the balance sheet to the equity column. Manchester City have followed this pathetic route – but it doesn’t mask the fact that it’s bad business. They’ll of course say they have the money – but if ever there was a definition of doping, then this has to be it.
Heads are rolling this week in the Spanish Capital, and heads will continue to role. One disadvantage for Arsenal of course is that Wenger will now become a target sought after like a nonsense as Madrid try to save face and justify burning the money they’ve burnt in the last year.
Football today couldn’t do any worse than take a leaf from the philosophy and approach of Arsenal’s Professor who holds a Masters degree in Economics. He masquerades day to day as the Arsenal manager, but in Wenger, football has a sage who balances the virtues of football with the discipline of business.
Wenger is the reason why Arsenal leads, and others follow. If the footballing world didn’t learn anything from Real Madrid’s exit out of the Champions league yesterday, then I suspect a bigger tragedy in football must and should happen for our game to be in a better place.
