Imagine my shock last night (seriously, don’t laugh) on the way back home after watching the Champions League games with a few friends in town. “Be careful what you wish for” is the age old maxim that should have bitch slapped me in the face when I asked the taxi driver to put some football on the radio.

With the BBC’s exemplary equal opportunity employment policy that allows mentally retarded presenters like Robbie Savage to become an “expert”, it usually is a coin toss between 5 live or Talk Spite radio as to which is capable of coming up with the most faecal matter that can be legally allowed in one production.

Unfortunately for me, it was BBC’s Mark Pougatch who gave me the urge to ask for the sick bag, and it wasn’t because of the alcohol I had consumed while watching the Manchester teams’ adventures in Europe.

As conspiracy theories go, Pougatch was banging on about how cynical it is for United to have 6 home Premier league games immediately following Champions League ties, while Manchester City had 6 away games. Not that I wouldn’t put that past fixture mandarins with the propensity to kiss Alex Ferguson’s rectal anatomy, but it was Pougatch’s next remark that made me wonder why it is again that British people are held at gun point to pay licence fees for public service broadcasting.

This apparently reputable BBC presenter then went on to say that he did some research on Monday before the Champions League games and found out about the conspiracy in favour of United. He also did Chelsea who had 4 away games, but didn’t bother with Arsenal.

“Why bother, they’re useless anyway”.

This is the thing. If Arsenal were useless, I have no problem accepting such an observation. But Arsenal are not useless. Notwithstanding the fact that we had a positive result in a very difficult game at Dortmund, the expectation was that United and City were going to sail through their match day 1 fixtures like the other teams didn’t exist.

But no, they didn’t, and it was fairly obvious that City in particular have a fight to make it through to the next stage. Napoli away won’t be a walk in the park, and they can wishfully think about how to beat Bayern Munich.

The thing that stood out most with this “Arsenal are useless anyway comment” from Pougatch was not what he said, but how he said it. You could feel the absolute contempt and disdain in his voice, and I was half expecting him to spit in the microphone next to complete the triangle with some illustration of disgust for Arsenal.

The worst kind of venomous people are the ones who hide their spite under a cloak of niceties and professionalism. But it eventually comes out and last night left me seriously questioning why I even bother to pay a licence fee to contribute to the salary of presenters who have this sort of contempt for their listeners. It’s no point writing to the BBC to complain, they’ve already got a statement prepared about professionalism and reputation and that they will review – yada yada yada.

My friend Consols Bob still has the e-mail they sent him about his complaint on Robbie Savage – suggesting that they have rigorous recruitment policies designed to root out the assholes an Savage passed with flying colours.

Mr Mark Pougatch – if you’re going to pretend to be professional and thorough in your presentation, then please do your job and research all English teams with the same vigour and intensity. The fact that you can spout out such venomous nonsense about a team that you clearly hate while on a public service broadcast to millions of people who pay your salary is an indictment of your professionalism and character. You’re are disgrace to the profession of journalism, but then again, you really don’t have a high threshold to beat in this respect.

It reminded me of a story that Mark Saggers, a former BBC presenter who’s now at Talk Spite radio once confessed to on air about the treatment he received from a colleague at BBC they regularly presented with. My money is on Mark Pougatch being the colleague Saggers was referring to and the contempt, disdain and disgust I witnessed last night is indicative of what was being suggested about this “mysterious” colleague who forced another to change ranches.

But then again you ask, what’s different from what Pougatch is doing to what the punks at Sly Sports do or what the cretins at Talk Spite do.

Indeed, why bother with Arsenal – we’re useless after all.

I think the most amusing thing about all this is that even though we’re useless (has anyone noticed my cynicism yet?), Tottenham are still beneath us. ‘Tis true what they say – A cannon will always destroy a cockerel.

And by the way, if you haven’t yet, follow me on twitter. I’m now getting the hang of it. We might even get @markpougatch to defend his disappointing comments last night. Although he’s already told an Arsenal fan that the fan was being flippant about his comments.

I 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.
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• Arsenal: Room For Optimism And Concern In Equal Measure

Let’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.

It’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….
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• Media Sycophancy And What Football Must Learn From Arsenal

Ever 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.

So 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.

On 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:

Last 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.

In yesterday’s article, I laid out the first part of a coherent argument against what I feel ails English football.

Read: Anti-football, Anti-Arsenalism And The Misguided Self Preservation Of English Football – Part I.

In today’s final instalment, I want to address the role played by different parties in perpetuating this insalubrious culture of thuggery disguised as commitment, grit and steel.

3. It’s Not Just a Hill Of Beans, It’s a Very Big Deal

3.1 The Role Of Players

I mentioned yesterday that when it comes to players, there are two key underlying factors that have contributed to this decay:

• The issue of technically inferior players substituting technique with excessive aggression and thinking that this caveman approach to football is acceptable.
• The culture and environment that these players have been brought up in and continue to work in. It’s a culture that promotes the virtues of English football as being that of the physical ”blood and thunder, leg breaking, gut busting, full contact aggression” – that is typical of the ancient ‘Chuck Norris and Van Damme’ one man hero mentality that conquers all.

  When these players cross that white line and get on the pitch, they are wired to unleash the cocktail of systematic violence as a deliberate strategy to slow down the opposing team – whether by physical or psychological means.

  They have been programmed to believe that their physical attributes are a shoe in for the lack of technical prowess, and that it’s acceptable to endanger the careers of other professionals by being reckless and aggressive.

  These players are conditioned to believe that brawn has more equity than common sense, and apply most of their energy implementing the tenets of this stone age approach to football. Aided by the collusion of weak and incompetent referees who let them get away with murder, the players feel justified as the inaction of the referees are an implicit validation of their strategy.

  Such players cannot be absolved from taking responsibility for their actions. It’s inevitable that this systematic rotational fouling coupled with tackles made with excessive force that are supposed to send a ’statement’ to the opposing player will end up with a horror show on the pitch.

  Each and every single player has a duty of care to their professional colleagues. It’s unacceptable to think you can go around doing your Chuck Norris or Van Damme impressions and thinking this makes you a footballing cult hero. It makes you a thug.

  3.2 The Role Of Managers

  In a lot of ways, the managers who deliberately or subtly sanction the use of systematic thuggery by their players are more culpable than the players themselves.

  They are in a position of influence and should be held accountable for their actions or inactions in perpetuating the culture of brute force being accepted as part and parcel of English football.

  They provide sickening excuses that their only way to survive in the Premiership is to use this brute force for it is their only strength. They spend their resources recruiting gladiators who have little or no technical ability and unleash them onto the world to show that they have that good ‘ole fashioned grit and steel to graft their way through the season.

  They pump up their players on and off the pitch with team talks typically including tactics of stopping the opposition by any ‘legal’ means – not caring whether they understand that once their gladiators are on the pitch – there is no controlling what will happen when that brute force is unleashed.

  They use euphemisms like ”Let’s get in their faces and up their noses”, “Let them know you’re there” or “Let him feel you and see if he has the appetite”. They publicly extol the misguided virtues of their insalubrious tactics openly contributing to its validation as the warped principles of English football.

  3.3 Football Administrators and Referees

  The corruption and incompetence within football administrations world over is legendary. The English FA is no exception. Their main concern is to focus on self preservation and to try and sell to the world the only things they have – English football and the FA cup.

  The incompetence of the administration is so breath-taking, they don’t realise the damage that this thuggery disguised as the English brand of football is doing to the game. They deliberately go out of their way to mask the seedy and ugly side of English football as it’s not in their interest to address the issues and make things more public.

  I’d like to use the Carling Cup game between West Ham and Millwall in August 2009 to illustrate my point. There were shameful and ugly scenes reminiscent of the hooliganism that was the scourge of English football in the 80s and early 90s.

  It was the hooliganism that led to English football being suspended for 5 years from European competitions by UEFA. It was the hooliganism that so badly hurt the image of English football around the world and cost it both in reputation and substance.

  What do the FA do for self preservation?

  By their inaction, they collude with the media to white wash the coverage of the hooliganism at that West Ham and millwall game. For an FA bidding to host the World cup in 8 years time, such scenes have no place in a public forum and so they just do what they do best – cover their arses.

  What is interesting is that in that very week (and a couple of weeks that followed), Arsene Wenger and Eduardo became the anti-Christ according to the media. Eduardo’s alleged dive and Wenger’s defence of his player was apparently more serious than hooliganism. You figure that one out.

  In the same way, addressing the ills of English football with regards to the thuggery being branded as part of the game is not in their interests because it’s a direct beeline to a loss of revenue. It’s not in their interest to take action because it forces the issue to be addressed and the world will see this thuggery for what it is.

  It forces them to address the deficiencies in English football and forces them to deal with the fact that for decades, they have let their incompetence stifle the development of English football by their inability to recognize the need to move from the stone age into the 21st century.

  As for referees – my contempt for this group of individuals is perhaps not worth any more real estate on this blog, but I’ll say a few words.

  Referees have the power to stop this nonsense yet they plead insanity when it comes to using that power as a deterrent.

  Just using the game against Stoke at the weekend as an example, if Peter Walton had done is job before that tackle, and in particular cautioned Stoke players for their continuous indiscipline, the Stoke players would be loathed to enter his book for a second time.

  By Walton’s inactions, the Stoke players felt validated and justified. We all know the result – and what’s even shocking is that Walton was not going to give any card until he saw the actual injury and was duty bound (if that means anything at all to them) to send off Shawcross.

  Walton is not the only culprit. Many of the English referees perpetuate the culture of unleashing brute force by their in-action and their ’play on play on’ mentality.

  They use excuses like ‘letting the game flow’ and are clearly influenced by the misguided media talk about Arsenal being ’too soft’.

  All we ask is that referees do the job they are paid to do without fear or favour.

  The Media

  For the avoidance of doubt – I’m referring to the print media and all their Fleet Street cousins; TV and in particular Sky Sports, the BBC and ITV; and radio – in particular talk Sport and BBC sports radio – together with the internet portals for all these entities.

  There’s a culture where pots call kettles black and certain parts of the media refer to other parts of the media as the bad guys. They point fingers at each other as if they were the righteous section of this media cesspit, and attempt to remove themselves from the faecal matter they collectively shovel in.

  My sentiments are to all these factions of the media who are the biggest culpable entity to the scourge of English football. I see the disastrous influence of the media in several ways.

  (i) Self preservation

  Conventional media is dying the death of a thousand paper cuts. Print media isn’t what it used to be. Newspaper sales have dropped to the lowest levels in our generation. TV and radio haven’t been forgiven as the internet and super fast connection speeds have given consumers a very powerful weapon – choice.

  In order to survive, the media has had to adapt, albeit at a snail’s pace. We’ve seen the explosion of 24-hour news media, as well as the move from print as a medium to internet based portals for sending out news to consumers. There is one common thread in the way the media has sought to adapt, and that is to chase the money any which way.

  The different media houses and companies have bills and salaries to pay and they have gone full throttle into survival mode. Their biggest threat is citizen media, a perfect example being this and many other blogs giving individuals the power of choice and expression that they didn’t have before.

  Sensationalism and hyperbole thus becomes the biggest weapon that the media have as they leverage the global reach that they’ve built for decades to shove their shit down our throats.

  And all this simply to sell advertising. Advertising is a game of numbers, and it’s a game of ratings. The more dependent these media houses have become on advertising revenue (and it is very true that conventional advertising is being over-taken by internet advertising), the more outlandish the sensationalism and hyperbole has become.

  The end result is the clamour for ratings and traffic at the cost of journalistic and professional integrity.

  Like I said, they have bills to pay.

  (ii) Incompetence

  The worst thing you can do to the quality of any professional discipline is to take a former footballer, shove a Top Shop suit on them and put them in front of a camera to provide an opinion.

  I believe they call it punditry, but these cretins have taken football through the eyes of the media to a whole new low. Is it too much for the paying public to ask for these media houses to employ competent people who have actually been educated to a level that qualifies them to communicate with a modicum of professionalism to the viewers?

  Perhaps they should implement some sort of City and Guilds or NVQ (anything more is asking too much) qualification on basic communication and presentation skills – and the need for a grasp of subject matter before one becomes a pundit.

  The end result is that the misinformed views and incompetent judgements of a select few platinum idiots who are morally bankrupt are allowed to taint the landscape of football as – wait for this – ‘expert opinion as pundits’.

  It’s unbelievable that out of the entire population that has played and followed football, we’re stuck with this bunch of incompetent and openly biased cretins being prostituted around the world as experts.

  As regular as clockwork, these punks have crawled from the woodwork in the last few days to do what they do best – unleash their diatribe about how Arsenal is soft”, “How Arsenal are too quick and that’s why they get injured”, “How Arsenal need to get with the program and develop a spine for that is the blood thunder and guts way football is played in England”, “how Shawcross or Taylor are nice lads who have no nasty bone in their body and regularly give to charity” – yada, yada yada.

  Some even suggest that if Wenger doesn’t like the ‘physical game’, then he should go and coach in Spain or Italy where they appreciate the ‘beautiful’ football more. They even go ahead and try to justify their xenophobia masked as honest debate. I’ve never heard so much intellectual masturbation in my life.

  (h5> (iii) Bias and Xenophobia

  I’ve covered this extensively in the How ‘English’ Is the English Premier League series – and I’ll just mention a few issues around this here.

  1. The media has continuously sought to find reasons to portray anything they don’t comprehend as not good enough for English football. In the global world we live in – variety is the spice of life – unless of course you develop an ignorant perception that your way of life and your way of football is in imminent danger of extinction.
  2. The media has constantly sought to turn a blind eye when it comes to the ills of English football – and as a counter action, have relentlessly highlighted aspects involving foreign players and managers as a deflective tactic. A good example is the demonization of Arsene Wenger as a whinger and moaner – and the praising of Harry Redknapp as a success story of English managers; despite the fact that 4 of the clubs Harry has managed have either gone into administration or close to administration. Coincidence? I tell you it’s easier to find a 21 year old virgin in Sodom and Gomorrah than for that to be coincidence. Redknapp has a breath-taking ability to leave debris wherever he goes yet no one chooses to raise this as an issue.
  3. The application of selective amnesia when it comes to issues that highlight the ugly side of English football – whether it’s blatant diving by Rooney or Gerrard, or whether it’s the unsavoury tactics of the English golden boys off the pitch.
  4. The constant peddling of the misguided truth and convenient lie that foreigners have significantly hampered the development of the English game. In truth, the EPL wouldn’t be what it is without these foreign players. The millions of fans around the world who pay to watch the EPL and generate the billions for the Premier league coffers will not be paying to watch Bolton play Stoke City week in week out.

  4. Conclusion

  Take any event in isolation, and you could possibly make a respectable argument about it being a freak event. That’s not the case though.

  Take the players’ attitude and conditioning, take the culture engrained in the establishment about the reckless and wild blood and thunder brand of English football, take the collusion by the administration and referees, take the shovelling of all this shit by the media – and mix it all up as part of the same collective problem and ladies and gentlemen, you have a hell of a lot more than a hill of beans.

  Enough is enough and something has to give.

The horrific injury to Aaron Ramsey has left a bitter taste in the mouths of Arsenal fans and football enthusiasts ALIKE. Predictably, an unsavoury side of the English football establishment bore its ugly head for all to see.

Bear with me as I address what I feel are the key issues around the related themes of Anti-football, Anti-Arsenalism, and the misguided defence of the ugly side of English football that has no place in the modern game.

Before I lay my case out in this 2 part article, there is a very relevant sub-context to this topic that I’ve comprehensively covered in another 3 part article series Called ”How ‘English’ is the English Premier league”. If you have the time, check out:

• How ‘English’ Is The English Premier League? – Part I
• How ‘English Is The English Premier League? – Part II
• How ‘English’ Is The English Premier League? – Part III

I’ve covered a lot in the above series relating to the impact and necessity of foreign influence in the EPL – and I believe it’s very relevant as it already answers some of the questions that this two part article on ‘Anti-football’ will pose.

You can also read Part II of this article here.

Arsenal midfielder Aaron Ramsey in action

1. The Systematic Targeting Of Arsenal

1.1 The Context: Technique vs Physicality

It has now become widely acceptable that for some teams, the only way to stop Arsenal is to kick the hell out of them. There are teams that with all due respect, will never be able to match the technical superiority of Arsenal.

It has become urban legend that the only way to play Arsenal is to throw them off their stride with an overly physical game that involves a combination of rotational fouling and a more coherent strategy of ’hard tackles’ to take Arsenal’s creative players out of the picture.

In the Sky Sunday Supplement on 28/02/10 – Patrick Barclay of the Times aptly captures the issue of deliberate Arsenal targeting.

When Barclay is asked whether Arsenal have a case when they say they are deliberately being targeted, he responds:

Some teams simply cannot beat Arsenal at football so they go about it in a different way and it’s down to referees to stop them from things like yesterday.

Tackling in English football is out of control and must be addressed by the authorities before more damage is done to the game. There’s a wildness and a physicality about the English game which I don’t think is healthy.

It’s important to make a distinction here between the teams in the EPL that have resorted to this insalubrious tactic – and the teams that are for most part, able and willing to play respectable football that doesn’t have a seedy element to it.

The teams that usually occupy the top 8 places in the EPL table, as well as other selected teams like Burnley, Wigan, Portsmouth and Fulham are not the issue here.

These teams for most part approach the game with a healthy mindset of playing football. Coupled with a healthy and non-dangerous application of physicality, they are eager to go toe to toe with opposition in not only entertaining, but also in achieving a fair competitive edge.

The argument I have is against Birmingham City, Blackburn, Bolton, Stoke City, Hull City and Sunderland. My issue is also with a cabal of English managers within this group, namely Sam Allardyce, Phil Brown and Tony Pulis.

These 3 managers have anointed themselves as the guardians of the unsavoury brand of English football and excel in promoting the anti-football agenda on and off the pitch.

1.2 The Culture And Mindset of Thuggery Disguised as Good ‘ole fashioned grit and steel

For too long, the inability to play football has been excused by the relentless promotion of physicality and brute force as a virtue.

This ”we’re well ‘ard” culture is typified by constant references to attributes such as grit, graft and steel. They are portrayed as the quintessentially English virtues of the game, and those who choose to approach the game in a different way are ignorantly labelled as weak and spineless.

I see it as a culture that is stuck in a time warp of a Neanderthal approach to football and one that is desperate to retain a dying tenet and brand. It’s a desperate attempt to remain relevant in a constantly changing sporting environment.

It has become common belief that this sort of physicality disguised as the virtue of ‘commitment’ – is one that needs protecting as it is the very representation of a dying breed of what is typically English in football.

It’s a culture that suggest that football is a contact sport and therefore the English brand of physicality is part and parcel. There’s a difference between being physical and being reckless and dangerous.

A common cliché bandied about in the media is that “you need an English spine” to achieve anything in the game. This is coupled with the shameless and unprofessional promotion in the media of teams that are seen as having this so called core and backbone.

In truth – this culture and approach has masked a significant deficiency that fails to address the inadequacies of English football. Furthermore, anything that is seen as different is labelled as ’not worthy of the grit and steel’ that is the joy of the English game.

It is a culture that has heavily contributed to the demonization of the foreign influence in football. Arsenal is acutely affected as they are a visible representation of what is ’Not English enough for the establishment.

It cannot be acceptable for physical aggression to continue to be seen as a valid substitute for the inability to play football. It is also counterproductive to suggest that anyone who chooses a different approach to this ugly side of football has no place in the game.

This approach to football is just thuggery – plain and simple.

2. Defending the Indefensible

2.1 The Apologists and Sympathizers for Ryan Shawcross

Stoke City defender, Ryan Shawcross

Take a look at the news wires over the last 48 hours and you wouldn’t be mistaken to think that Ryan Shawcross was about to be anointed as a Knight of the Realm – and Buckingham Palace had asked the football world for a public reference.

I would re-mortgage my house for the opportunity to see how the media and apologists would react if Shawcross had broken the leg of Wayne Rooney, John Terry, Frank Lampard or Steven Gerrard.

The point is simple. Aaron Ramsey is the one in hospital and is the one who’s career has been threatened. This misguided self righteousness that seeks to show plastic support for a professional who needs to take responsibility for his actions is just sickening.

I don’t care if Shawcross was distraught and left the stadium crying to go and lay under his mother’s bosom. The only reason he reacted that way is because he realised the consequences of his actions.

Clearly, maiming Aaron Ramsey wasn’t as he thought it would be like with that “I’ll get in his face and up his nose to see if he can take it” attitude.

Once is a tragedy, twice a coincidence and 3 times in 4 years is just unacceptable. Any attempt by the media apologists to defend the reputation of Ryan Shawcross and the systematic targeting of Arsenal is just bang out of order.

2.2 The Case Against Ryan Shawcross

• Shawcross dangerously tackled Francis Jeffers in 2007 from behind and broke his ankle.
• In 2008, Shawcross deliberately lunged at Emmanuel Adebayor with his studs up when the ball wasn’t even in play. Adebayor was out for 4 weeks because of that rash and malicious challenge.

The media and apologists should stop insulting our intelligence and cease with the sickening wheeling out of Shawcross as the saint of association football. It doesn’t suit him.

The lad has form and if he stood in front of a judge with that form he’d get a custodial sentence that laughs in the face of this “Shawcross is a first time offender and needs a second chance nonsense”.

Instead, he gets rewarded with an England call-up as if in affirmation that his behaviour is the virtue that should be aspired to when seeking to play for the national team.

2.3 Intent Doesn’t Come Into It

Let’s quit this nonsense about whether Shawcross had intent or not in executing the tackle. His apologists can’t get into his head, in the same way they can’t get into the head of any other footballer to selectively determine intent.

The only thing we can go on is the context and environment, as well as the player’s previous form in carrying out malicious tackles.

Whether Shawcross had intent to injure Ramsey is irrelevant. The bottom line is that it was depraved indifference.

When you approach a game against Arsenal with that systematic and strategic rotational fouling and reckless physicality supposedly to put them off their game – there is a viable risk that what happened to Ramsey will happen.

It’s like getting behind the wheel of a car when your drunk and thinking that it’s not possible to injure or even kill someone. No drunk driver goes into their car with the intent to kill or maim someone else.

However, because they constantly drive drunk with impunity, the law of averages suggests that they will kill or maim someone eventually. It’s the depraved indifference of the drunk driver that is the issue and not his intent to kill or maim.

In the same way, we need to stop this talk of ”Shawcross didn’t have any intent”. He was reckless, period.

Join us in the final instalment of this article tomorrow when I address whether the case Arsenal is making is a hill of beans, or whether it’s justifiable. I’ll touch on the role of the players, managers, match officials, administration and the media.
Related Articles:

• Anti-football, Anti-Arsenalism And The Misguided Self Preservation Of English Football – Part II