Premier League Nonsense

Talk about pausing for breath!

Just finished watching the last 30 minutes of Celtic v Rangers. Never a game for the faint hearted, this encounter had all the ingredients that once made the English game so special.

It was full on. As I said only saw the end but just watching the energy levels had me knackered. No one bottled anything, plenty of yellows, a couple of reds, some terrific goalie blunders and plenty of noise rolling down from the packed stadium...most of it of course from the blue part.

I've not seen any premier league this season so far. Damned if I'm gonna put another dish in my back garden...one more and it will be like a marquee.

But if all games were like this my interest might well be reawakened. Instead of grim teams from grim northern shitpots like Everton, Bolton and Wigan we could have Celtic and Rangers mixing it with Liverpool and Manchester United and be honest. Wigan or Celtic? No brainer innit.

What made the game even more fun was the lack of any commentary. No talking heads spoon feeding me opinions and no daft lummox bemoaning the defending.

The score was 4-1. Of course the defending was crap.

But if, and it's a big if for me these days, football is meant to be entertained then I have just enjoyed 30 minutes of mayhem.

Recently I did a post about Sunderland's tendancy to sign one season wonder foreigners over and above some local talent but Roy Keane had the last laugh last week as he went for some genuine quality with the signings of Cisse and Healey to stregthen his strike force.

Add Diouf and you have the makings of a Sunderland side built in the manager's own image. Tough, hard working and never going to roll over and say it's ok, you can beat us even though we play pretty football.

Beating Tottenham just makes it all the sweeter!

There is of course no telling how they will do this season but signing those two strikers and three points at the Lane send out a message.

Last season there were a couple of games where, as an Arsenal fan, I didn't know where to hide. In crucial cup ties against Manchester United and Tottenham we just rolled over and died. I was ashamed but I still believed.

Now? I really dunno.

That performance against Fulham deserves to be called what it was. Shit. There was nothing.

Like many Arsenal fans I'm looking back at names like Pires, Vieria, Henry, Overmars, Bergkamp, Keown, Petite.

Now I look at our team sheet. Bendtner, Eboue, Gallas, Denilson. It's apples and fucking centipedes.

Really, I thought we'd have a chance this season but after two piss poor performances I'm crying in my beer. We don't look like we're going anywhere. Apart from backwards.

Fuck it, every school boy tactician knows games are won and lost in midfield, why take the field without one? What is it with our injuries that means Cesc, Diaby, Rosciky et all are injured at the start of the season.

We sign Bischoff, another crock, to keep them company in the medical room. You know why Gary Lewin left? Too much fucking work to do. He saw more of van Persie and Rosciky than his own missus.

Wenger says Vela isn't ready yet. But Adebayor holds the club to ransom pre season, gets rewarded with an improved contract and carries on like nothing happened?

To be fair he played ok yesterday. The problem was the service. He had none as Denilson and Eboue were brushed aside as if they weren't there.

Arsene Wenger is walking a tightrope this season. Many more pathetic performances like that and things could turn ugly for the coach which would be a shame.

Normally I try and go against the flow. And the flow at the moment isn't pretty but really I find it difficult to be optinistic.

Arsenal under Arsene were famed for rapier like strikes, for piling forward in numbers and passing sides to death. Exploiting space, constant movement. We had Wright, Anelka, Henry, Lightning qucik strikers playing off the last defender's shoulder how many times did we see them go one and one with the opposing keeper?

Then we sign Adebayor and Wenger changes everything. We camp in the opposition half, play pretty triangles, ok not yet this season, then we fall asleep at dead ball situations.

We sign Silvestre who is injured! Why would Fergie let him go? The same reason Chelsea let Gallas go perhaps? Past their sell by date. Yes they have experience, they have been there done that but leaders they ain't. It's not Gallas and Silvestre we need at the back. It's Adams and Keown. Terry and Vidic.

We need players who stand up on the field and take control. Not troop into the manager's office after a few games and demand a pay rise.

In Indonesia fans are having to go without seeing their favourite teams in the Premier League. The reason? Because of cack handeness and the Olympics!

Apparently, with little fan fair or advance publicity some new satelitte operator has bought the rights to show the Premier League but they have limited array of channels, 14, and four of them are being used for the Beijing crap.

So when that stuff finishes then fans can get their weekly dose. All they have to do is sign up with the new operator. And buy another decoder, another dish.

Just like they did 12 months back!

I'm a firm believer in the free market. At it's heart the customer decides what they want to buy. The Premier League is expensive and people who buy the rights should see a return on their investment.

At the moment I have two satelitte dishes in my back garden. This new company, bereft of marketing savvy at the moment would obviously like me to add a third.

Well, it ain't gonna happen.

The cost isn't the issue here. It works out about 12 USD a month. No. I, and many others, are fed up with being yanked around like this. We've been there before.

12 months back we went through the same shit and I succumbed. I bought the new package. And it has lasted 12 months!

Now they want me to buy a new package and I just can't be arsed. No one tells me they're changing supplier. No one tells me shit. They just wanna yank my leash and I roll over and give them the money.

Bollocks to that. I don't value the product highly enough. The Premier League is boring apart from my own team. I just can't be arsed to contact the new company, arrange for them to install, have them instal, go through the whole damned learning curve again. I have other things to do.

I lose nothing. I can see the games on the net, I can go to the pub. I can learn Serbo Croat or Madurese.

The people who lose out will be the Premier League. Football is a mass spectator sport. In Indonesia there is no pub culture, if people can't watch it in the convenience of their own home well they won't watch it and not worry too much about it. Plenty of highlights being shown.

Manchester United could only manage a 1-1 draw against Newcastle United yesterday at Old Trafford. Last season Fergie got lucky managing the season with hardly any serious injuries. Yesterday, without Ronaldo and Rooney, sworry Tevez, he struggled.

Expect someone to sign soonest.

As for Spurs! Ha ha ha! All that money and they lose 2-1 to Middlesboro and their goal was an og.

That bloody Rafa...apparently he threatened to quit because nobody would give him the money to buy Gareth Barry. One day he'll threaten to quit and no one will notice.

Yep, the Premier League is back and nothing has changed. Prices have gone up, salaries have gone up, players tsill play too many games but off the field it's still the same old nonsense!

Former Chelsea striker has been ordered to pay the Blues somewhere in the region of 13.8 million quid.

Apparently this is because they signed a Colombian marching powder inhaling striker and they deserve being compensated for this.

Which is baloney.

Never heard of buyer beware? Obviously Chelsea haven't. No background checks done?

According to my sauces close to the club they are now scouring the world looking for more doped up footballers to sign then sack in a puff of self righteous holier than thou morality with a view to later suing them. I understand the board believes this is one way the club can be run on a firmer financial footing.

It remains to be seen how much money the Romanian Mutu can afford to pay though and he will for sure appeal.

So one of the most over rated players in the English game snags himself an alleged package worth 33 million quid over five years.

Frank Lampard and his agent must be laughing all the way to the bank. 6.6 million quid a year! And you can bet he won't be paying top rate tax on that sum will he?

It does make the abominable Peter Kenyon's claim that Chelsea will soon be operating in the black as ludicrous as the man and club. What kind of business invests that kind of money in someone with a shelf life of two, two and a half years tops and no resell value?

Add him to Ballack, Deco, Shevchenko and you have a new breed of Chelsea Pensioner sitting on the neatly manicured lawns swapping yarns about how no one has it as good as them.

It's financial lunacy of course but in a way I'm dead jealous and would seriously like to have slap head Kenyon have a look at my books and see what kind of conjouring act he can do with my few pennies.*

Seriously though why is it we hear so much about how much players earn yet so many transfer fees are for undisclosed sums?

Could it be, just a stab in the dark here, could it be that agents are keen for players to know how much they can secure for their clients hence contract details get revealed yet no one is keen to reveal a transfer fee 'cos people would wanna ask who all the third parties are involved in the deal and how come so much moolah goes missing?

* This will never of course happen as I find the reptilian Kenyon utterly repungnant and he makes my skin crawl. This makes him well suited to the murky finiancial under belly of world football

The Thais are big on 'face'. They hate to lose 'face' and will do anything to avoid beeing seen as 'weak' or 'losing'.

For Manchester City owner Thaksin Shinawatra 'face' is no longer an issue. Refusing to return to Thailand to face charges of corruption he allows his wife to stay there under threat of a jail sentence while he lives it up in England.

His promise of using Manchester City as a vehicle to promote the interests of Thai football (read his own interests back home) have fallen apart as he can't reach much of his money which has been locked up in Bangkok.

He brought in three young Thai players to court popularity with the masses back home but when they were plainly not good enough and didn't qualify for work permits they were quietly shipped off to other reserve sides in Europe.

Thaksin is the man behind a shoot to kill policy in Thailand that eliminated something like three thousand alleged drug dealers. He has overseen an intolerant situation in the south east of the country where Thai muslims seek greater autonomy from Bangkok.

He is accused of corruption by the military junta that kicked him out in a coup last year and is scared to face the consequences. He is accused of denying the state billions of baht in taxes through a sale of one of his companys to a Singapore investment firm.

The Premier League has a 'fit and proper' test in place to assess people's suitability to run football clubs in England. It appears the 'test' has one question.

How much money do you have?

If the sum is big enough then everyone in England rolls over on their back and pants excitedly before saying welcome in a humiliating display of crass greed.

This is the Premier League. Sheer naked greed.

Thaksin, a man who always promoted a Thailand first policy when in power and who gave mixed messages to foreign investors is now begging for asylum in a country that was embarrassingly mesmarised by his wealth.

But while he denied asylum to thousands of poor Burmese he sees no shame in seeking it for himself.

'Face' means nothing to people like this. It's just an excuse to do anything to anyone and sod the consequences.

Do we need people like him running our football?

I was having a look at some of the pre season signings made by Premier League clubs and, umm, well...you know.

Arsenal signed Amaury Bischoff from Werder Bremen. Apparently he only played 16 minutes for the Germans and is injury prone with Arsene Wenger describing him as a 'gamble.' I dunno, he'll be company for Robin van Persie and Thomas Rosciky in the treatment room.

Bolton spent 10 million quid on Johan Elmander who ever he may be. They also signed Mustapha Riga and Danny Shittu. They must be praying fans don't transpose their names. I can handle Danny Riga but Mustapha Shittu would make a great signing for the Premier League's very own comedy club, Manchester City.

Fulham signed Andy Johnson from Everton which begs the question. Why would Everton, with hopes of Champions League football, get rid of their striker? They also signed Fredrik Stoor and Pascal Zuberbuhler. They deserve relegation for that last geezer alone. Just imagine the poor sap who has his name on the back of their replica shirt!

Rarely does a Rafa pre season go by without the goateed Spaniard buying some dross for the Kop to drool over and this time is no exception. Welcome David Ngog (Paris St Germain, undisclosed), Emmanuel Mendy (Murcia Deportivo, free), Diego Cavalieri (Palmeiras, undisclosed), Andrea Dossena (Udinese, undisclosed), Philipp Degen (Borussia Dortmund, free), while 20 million quid for Robbie Keane is a hoot.

Sunderland have been busy buying other team's cast offs including Pascal Chimbonda, Teemu Tanio, Steed Malbranque, all Spurs rejects, as well as the spitting legend El Haj Diouf from Notlob. Yeap, that Roy Keane sure knows a bargain. To be fair he's fighting against relegation but then Sunderland must be safe bets to stay up. Surely he has seen Hull City and Stoke City play?

Remember those cheeky cockney chappies West Ham. Not 'arf me old china, ya met my skin n blister, cor blimey guv, Bobby Moore, Trevor Brooking et all? Yep, the famed West Ham academy is no more as their new signings show... Valon Behrami (Lazio, £5m), Balint Bajner (Liberty Salonta, undisclosed), Jan Lastuvka (Shakhtar Donetsk, loan).

Sorry but are all these imports any better than what's available in the lower leagues?

He flew to Indonesia to see his heroes take on the local national side in Jakarta. He then flew back to Germany to see the Bayern A team win their league title.

Not yet done he flew to India to see the lads play in Kolkota before flying back for a rest.

Last I heard he had gone to Japan to see them play Urawa Reds!

Now he's planning more mundane things like Schalke 04 away!

Players rarely appreciate the lengths fans go to support their team. Which of course explains why fans just support their team and the beadge they play for. Players come, players go. The team will go on.

That bloody Adebayor. he scores a goal then kisses the badge of my club!!!

Son, you ain't worthy of that shirt. Don't insult it, and the fans, by kissing a crest that has more history than your i-pod could handle.

You spend all summer pushing for a move then act like nothing's happened. The fact that the muppets in the stadium are so quick to forgive you says more about them than you and your repentence.

I don't see you in training, all I judge you buy is the 90 minutes every game you play. To convince me you need to improve on last season. And that means a trophy and it means not hiding when the pressure was on. You up for it?

Fact is I don't trust any footballer but at least players like Cesc, who speaks out, and Eboue, who speaks as effectively as he plays, stick to their strengths.

Win us a couple of trophies and then, maybe, you might win this cynic over.

But don't touch the badge till you do.

It's not only me and the whole of the English footballing world laughing at the temerity of the Totts protesting at having players allegedly being tapped up.

Sevilla have their own experience of the way that lot do business.

While still boss of the Spanish side One Day Ramos was spotted meeting officials from the London side. When he denied the meeting ever took place he was shown photographic evidence then he reached for a different song sheet.

The Totts, bless 'em, denied they were looking for a new coach only to sack Martin Jol weeks later and appoint some Spanish senor they'd never met before.

With the amount of money swirling round the game honesty and dignity have become dirty words.

Labels: Tottenham Hypocrites Juande Ramos

Laughing my arse off at that one!

Football clubs treat their fans as mugs. Always have and always will.

But this really takes the biscuit. After spending all summer angling for a move away from Arsenal, a move he intimated at in an interview with a Singapore paper at the end of last season (story now taken down), Adebayor has declared his intention is to stay.

Arsene Wenger goes along with the spin.

“Adebayor is an Arsenal player and will play for Arsenal next season,” said the Frenchman. “For me [there has been] no trouble because when a player is a true professional he goes onto the pitch and tries to play the football he loves.
“What is very damaging sometimes is that the player gets bad publicity against his own fans for things he has not said. That is sometimes difficult to repair. There is disappointment from the fans because they feel the player wants to go.
“But all I can say is that when I was face-to-face with him he always said his priority was to stay at the Club. And I told him that he has got his priorities right.”

Bollocks! He did say he would leave!

Adebayor is staying for one reason and one reason alone. No other bugger would pay his daft wage demands.

His priority is and always has been himself. If he was so set on staying why didn't he ever come out and say so unequivocably? Instead we get a summer of contradictory quotes from the Togolese forward who has had one good season in football but who 'went missing' at a crucial stage.

I have the same respect for footballers as I do for politicians and lawyers. They are a scummy breed, a necessary evil, but still unclean. Luckily I don't meet too many from the Premier League or I would forever be dousing myself with disinfectant.

There are very few players in the modern game I respect. In the past I even respected Glenn Hoddle's ability. But today there are very few.

I pity the poor saps who rush out and get their 'heroes' name printed on the back of their overpriced club shirt.