Category Archives: Football

In The Bleak Midwinter

“Nani and Anderson having good days, Cleverley buzzing around like the anti-Gibson, Young looking instantly comfortable on the OT stage and Rooney back to his imperious best…it’s hard not to sound giddy.” This, dear reader, was me getting a little bit carried away in this column back in September – caught up in that early season period where we fleetingly looked untouchable and the possibilities seemed endless. It was a brief foray into positive thinking and it won’t happen again. So tonight (Matthew), we’re going to party like it’s 2005. Dooooom is back.

Even during those carefree days of our autumnal bloom, things didn’t feel quite right. Although the midfield was stringing some delightful, intricate passing manoeuvres together (think Bolton away), at times (like Arsenal and Chelsea at home) it resembled an ever-widening chasm. It just seemed churlish to dwell too much on that back then, as new faces appeared to be bedding in nicely and the team took on an air of free-scoring invincibility.

I expressed certain reservations to a mate post-Chelsea that if we didn’t make some changes, big problems might lie on the horizon in the shape of Liverpool and City. As it turned out, another lukewarm Anfield showing gave no hint as to the horror of what would unfold a week later in the derby. I’ve still not seen the last three City goals, nor will I ever – sitting through several first-hand accounts from traumatised friends and relatives was bad enough.

No apologies for leaving at 3-1, either. I suffered every second of the 5-1 back in ’89, slumped in the rapidly emptying Platt Lane as City celebrated. It wasn’t pleasant and isn’t an experience I’m intent on ever repeating. Top tip: the bar in the Cornerhouse makes for an effective, non-football, post-match hiding place.

Doom-laden United fans have had a tough time of things since the unexpected return to title winning form in 2007. 4 league titles in five years and 3 European Cup finals was much more than papering over cracks, it was the most sustained period of success in the club’s history. It’s hard to make a case for imminent disaster when your team is hoovering up silverware and (depending on if you can make sense of the financial reports) seemingly making inroads into paying off the mountainous debt our lovely owners saddled us with.

Yes, us doom-mongers have been quietened to some extent in recent years. Ongoing gripes about the gaping hole in central midfield have provided some respite but Green & Gold campaign aside, continued success on the pitch has neutered widespread complaint about overall lack of investment. We just sound like spoilt bastards when we moan. Other clubs would kill to be in our position, surely? Just look at the pretty, silver trophies and shush…

Failure to qualify for the latter stages of the Champions League, however, means that questions are going to be asked. A favourable draw should have secured an easy passage into the last 16. So is it complacency, arrogance or lack of personnel that’s led us into the footballing purgatory of the Europa League?

It’s probably a mixture of all three. Qualifying year on year has seen the group stages reduced to something team and fans alike have started to sleepwalk through. People trot out the cliché about CL nights at OT being ‘special’ and possessing some sort of unique atmosphere. What atmosphere? The second half of the Benfica fixture was played out in virtual silence. I met up with a mate in town prior to that game, a home and away red for many years – and he genuinely thought we were playing Crystal Palace in the League Cup that night. Amusing in itself, but indicative of the disregard many of us hold for the group stages these days. Once upon a time, any participation in the European Cup was something to be cherished – early finishes from work and a lengthy session pre-match were de rigueur.

Of course it’s not just in the stands where malaise has been evident. On-pitch performances have veered between slack and shambolic, particularly at home. I’m never slow to criticise Nani, the guy infuriates me and his decision making makes me despair – but the decision to leave him out of the Basel home game was a shocker, particularly with Rooney being out injured. Although erratic, at least he’ll try to make things happen – even if they don’t always come off. Where others are ponderous and instinctively look to consolidate, he’s CREATIVE. Basel arrived at OT and for 20 minutes looked absolutely terrified, an hour later they were playing us off the park. They should have been smashed out of sight.

When the question of us struggling was raised in the press conference following dropped points vs Benfica, Ferguson was incredulous and dismissed the notion out of hand. Although a perfectly valid point given our laboured performances, to him the suggestion was ridiculous, insulting even. He obviously has continued faith in our enduring ability to do just about enough to get over the line as we’ve managed to do time and time again…only this time we fell short.

It’s only taken a couple of injuries for the known problem area of the squad to be exposed once more. Cleverley has proved a huge loss, one far greater than should be the case for a player with only half a dozen appearances to his name. Carrick, Park and Fletcher continue to labour through most games, in turns low in confidence/form, ability and fitness. Pogba and Morrison are presumably not considered quite ready yet – so consequently Phil Jones now finds himself a first choice central midfielder.

Fergie’s position on the matter is maddening. I mean, we all love the guy for what he’s achieved here and congratulations on doing 25 years and getting a stand named after you and all that… but what the fuck? Are we seriously supposed to believe that he’s truly content with this midfield? Under previous regimes he’s always spent big when necessary – the (spit) ‘value’ line trotted out in recent times just doesn’t add up. We are Manchester United and have always had to pay above and beyond the perceived market rate, whether that be £2.3M on Gary Pallister or £31M on Rio Ferdinand – both astronomical fees at the time. There was no mention of value then, it was ‘we needed this player, this is what he cost’.

If Fergie/Gill played a straight bat (ha!), simply held their hands up and said ‘look, we can no longer afford the going rate for the player we really need anymore’ (you can guess who I’m alluding to – the one beginning with ‘S’, always injured, allegedly after a private jet…or someone like him) then we could deal with it and at least there’d be some acknowledgement of the elephant in the room. It’s absurd to try and put a figure on ‘value’ in modern football anyway – it recently cost £40 or so to watch the reserves play Palace. That doesn’t strike me as particularly good ‘value’ either but we’re still expected to pay it.

So there we have it. Vidic out for the season, City top of the league, midfield still fucked, we’re in the Europa League and Darron Gibson’s available for selection. Merry Christmas.

Photography copyright Ian Bramham www.ianbramham.com

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Uwe Rosler>>>Maradona

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In recent seasons, it’s become customary for us to reach the first international break of the season and see a league table with United sitting a few points off the pace. We’d bemoan the lack of investment (which remains a net figure of ‘minimal’ since the Glazers took over), Fergie would say ‘it’s all about staying within reach’ and remind us that we never get going until after Christmas anyway – a fair point I suppose. Not this year though. Nine points out of nine and a goal difference of +10…and it was us who had the difficult start apparently.

West Brom was pretty much last seasons’ away performances encapsulated within 90 minutes. United start brightly, go a goal ahead and look like adding to it…the opposition equalise and then it all…sort of…fizzles…out. Except this time we managed to sneak one and fortunately got away with an undeserved 3 points.

The story during the aftermath of course, predictably, was David De Gea’s error. It was obvious the kid was going to make gaffes during the course of the season, but the relish with which pundits and commentators lined up to pen his obituary after one game was laughable. It’s good he’s subjected to this level of scrutiny early in his United career and gets these mistakes out of his system – get the realities of the job ahead and a bit of ‘siege mentality’ instilled in him early and he’ll be fine.

Next it was the visit of florid-faced fuckwit Harry Redknapp’s expensively assembled underachievers. Spurs’ downward trajectory looks set to continue given the evidence on view, with European footballer of the decade (November 2010 award) Gareth Bale especially quiet. It’s perhaps unfair to judge Spurs on their early season showings, as Harry’s mind has been no doubt been elsewhere during the summer. He’s had his ongoing (and strangely, largely unpublicised) tussles with HMRC to contend with as well as gearing himself up for the real highlight of Harry’s year: briefing that toothy SSN reporter on deadline day whilst hanging out of his Merc. “Yeah ee’s a smashin’ player innee…ooo wouldn’t be interested?” etc, etc…

That Spurs game, particularly the 2^nd half, hopefully give us a glimpse of what we might expect this season. Pace all over our team now, particularly in defence. Phil Jones looking anything but a 19 year old taking his nascent steps as a United player and Chris Smalling filling in effortlessly at right back. With Nani and Anderson having good days, Bratfud Tom buzzing around like the anti-Gibson, Young looking instantly comfortable on the OT stage and Rooney back to his imperious best…well, it’s hard not to sound giddy.

Arsenal arrived as a team in crisis, albeit one slightly buoyed by a decent midweek showing vs Udinese in their CL qualifier. Pre-match talk was still of ‘by how many?’ though, as opposed to the usual ‘will we win?’ No-one could have predicted what lay ahead of course, 8 goals and the kind of walloping we’ve seen on very odd occasions in the past vs relegation fodder is simply not what one expects to see in a United-Arsenal game.

The signs of Wenger’s increasing fragility have been there for some time, though this season he’s taken to frantically scratching his head as opposed to wildly launching water bottles about the dugout. Le Prof has clearly lost it at present – his refusal to accept the inevitable departures of Fabregas and Nasri, even as the former was aboard a Barca-bound aircraft showed the extent of his desperation. You could tell Fergie sensed what lay ahead last season, as all hostilities were ceased and he began talking about the guy in complimentary terms for once.

Wenger doesn’t look a well man at the moment – his team’s spectacular implosion over Easter has clearly taken a heavy toll. Yes, he has numerous annoying traits, (the best usually do) – but I can’t help feeling a bit of sympathy with his current plight. Although they’ve finished potless in recent years, to my mind he’s done a decent job in keeping Arsenal in contention, in spite of the financial constraints placed on him since the Emirates move. Much like Ferguson, he’s single-mindedly carried on with the job in hand, working within a budget of sorts and (publicly at least) claiming to be happy with his lot. Unlike Ferguson though, his recent buys haven’t been the most astute…they’ve been pretty shit in fact.

Growing discontent led to the shackles coming off on deadline day which lead to an uncharacteristic scramble for much needed reinforcements – the unfortunately monikered Mertesacker (sub-editors will have some fun with that name) and another typically Arsenal-esque, inconsistent lightweight in the form of Benayoun. Mikel Arteta might prove a relative steal at £10M, however.

Chelsea have enjoyed a decent start, and in Mata and Meireles look to have addressed the problems posed by the aging Lampard and perma-crocked Essien. Even if Torres returns to the player he was 2 years ago, I still expect them to ship goals this season. Terry has got by on a wing and a prayer for years now and despite winning plaudits last season, Sideshow Bob looked like an accident waiting to happen on numerous occasions. Comfortably top four again, but off the pace as regards the title.

A similarly bright start has been witnessed over on Merseyside, adding fuel to the collective state of delusional euphoria that’s been in place since King Kenny returned to reclaim his rightful throne…la. Last seasons splurging on Carroll and Suarez continued with the arrivals of Adam, Downing, Henderson, Enrique, Bellendamy, Doni and someone called Sebastian Coates from Nacional for another €8M. All of these and he’s managed to get rid of Meireles to Chelsea, who was by some distance their best player last season.

Dalglish has clearly decided to go shit or bust as that’s £100M or so he’s done in since taking over. In preparation for the moment the realisation dawns they’ve spent £35M on Peter Crouch MkII and Adam can’t last 90 mins, they’ve devised a genius way to deny they’re still not good enough: if you’ve not heard of it already, please acquaint yourself with the website www.rawkprof.blogspot.com, the home of ‘The Alternative Premier League Table’.

The seeds of this lunacy were sown on the RAWK forum, a place that makes Bluemoon or similar United forums look like MENSA gatherings. ‘Prof’, to much appreciation, came up with the priceless theory that league tables don’t tell the accurate picture of teams’ standings during a season as ‘they don’t take into account the teams played so far neither do they illustrate whether the fixtures were home or away’. In other words, when they are nine points off the pace at Christmas, Liverpool will still be top. I can only urge you to investigate, get the site bookmarked and check it regularly. As far as I can make out they’re being entirely serious.

Unfortunately our nouveau riche, idiot neighbours do look like challenging this season – a glance at their early subs benches was confirmation of the strength in depth they’ve now amassed. One only hopes that Mancini remains a precautionary pussy when the pressure’s on, Tevez and Balotelli take their fall down the pecking order with the good grace one might expect of them and they collectively struggle to cope with the raised expectations CL football provides.

Talking of the Champions League, a massive ‘cap doffed’ to the monkeys off the Red Issue forum who recently spent an afternoon registering on the official SSC Napoli fans forum threatening all kinds under the guise of being rabid Berties. “Your knives are no match for our bananas. We’ll be doing the Poznan over your corpses.” Heheh. Childish and immature? Most certainly – but very entertaining nonetheless.

A sobering thought in conclusion, though: City’s overall prospects? Top two and our main rivals. I know, I never thought I’d see the day either.

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I’m So Bored With The USA

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You can tell the start of the season is imminent these days because of two key markers. i) The team return from an interminably long, energy sapping tour of North America or Asia and ii) Fergie starts making noises about being ‘happy’ with the players at his disposal, thus preparing us for the grim prospect of no new midfielder…again.

No. New. Midfielder. I’m writing this a couple of days before West Brom so there’s still a good two weeks of the transfer window to go…so plenty of time for Wesley Sneijder to arrive yet. This lad has been the source of that much speculation all summer, I don’t even have to check how to spell his name.

This time last year, Fergie promised ‘no more signings’ and then we made an audacious swoop (why are swoops always audacious?) for Bebe. Given he’s now been sent to Turkey, there’s little or no chance of anything that grim happening again. I’m not counting Gibson staying as I’ve already resigned myself to that.

Paul Scholes, reborn as Mr Chatterbox as opposed to Mr Quiet since the realisation dawned he had a testimonial and book to promote, made the comment that the prospect of schlepping round the states for weeks on end was one of the things he’d miss least about being a professional footballer. I think I understand where he’s coming from now.

It was so dull following the tour from this side of the Atlantic, I actually began to feel pity for some of those trapped within the inner circle. Apparently it lasted for three weeks, it only felt like much, much longer. Three weeks travelling around America with Rio Ferdinand and his kerazy antics would drive most normal people insane.

By the 3rd night of being holed up in some hotel and hearing “alright bruv, after the ping-pong tournament and twitter session…fancy a game of FIFA with me and Wazza?”, you’d be ready to jump out of the fucking window. The alternative to joining in with the lamentable banter would be trying to get through the tour Berbatov-style – this involves developing an appreciation of classical music, chain-smoking Marlboro Reds and learning the rules of backgammon. Possibly.

Any of our American cousins unfamiliar with United and perhaps stumbling across the team for the 1st time, were being fed an enormous, fat lie. The United on show in the states was shamelessly presenting itself as anything but the surly, paranoid beast we experience week in-week out. United US-style were smiling, relaxed and happy – sweetness personified.

Press duties were fulfilled without so much as a grimace, much to the amusement of the British journos following the team out there. Open training days, Premier League trophy being hawked around shopping malls and beaches for impromptu photo-opportunities with anyone remotely curious, at one point Fergie stopped the bus to let a gaggle of Bulgarian tourists onboard for an unscheduled autograph session. You couldn’t make it up.

News of this came as no great surprise but nevertheless, all quite galling for those of us daft enough to dedicate years, rather than hours of our lives following the team. The US charm offensive highlighted the disparity between the club’s attitude to regular supporters and those being courted in new ‘territories’.

A tale often-recounted is that years ago, reds arriving in Israel for a pre-season fixture were met by one much revered director whose reaction was as if he’d just trodden in dog shit. Ditto at Dukla Prague away in 1983, travelling fans stumbled across a markedly unimpressed Ron Atkinson who legend has it, greeted them with an accusatory “what the fuck are you doing here?”

Despite holding a season ticket now costing upwards of £700 per year, if I had a bang on the head and woke up deciding I wanted a picture taken with the Premier League trophy taking pride of place on my mantelpiece, I’d have to pay to enter the museum then pay another £10 or so for the actual photograph. If I tried to pick the thing up, I’d expect to be escorted off the premises and threatened with arrest.

Had United visited the US determined to charge fans $20 a shot for a photo with the trophy, I’d wager there would have been embarrassingly few takers. In the land that wrote the rule book on global marketeering and public relations, they would be scorned and derided for taking the piss somewhat. The club, as always, continue to demonstrate they know the price of everything and the value of nothing regarding their dealings with fans…fans in certain territories, that is. Those of us at home who’ve been habitually fleeced for that long, most don’t even bother questioning things anymore.

This situation stinks of course, but nothing will change. The club would no doubt claim (if they did dialogue) that security proves less of an issue on tour, and the spirit of glasnost in evidence, though desirable, is impossible to replicate at home. I suppose that’s true to some extent, but then no-one is expecting United to stop the team bus outside Anfield or Elland Road. Though it wouldn’t really kill them to make such a gesture outside OT or Carrington on occasion, would it?

One man probably relieved to be out of the country in mid-July was Bryan Robson, away with United doing his global ambassador bit whilst a (very) minor furore was played out following his unwittingly starring role in Channel 4’s Dispatches documentary ‘How To Buy a Football Club’.

The programme introduced the viewing public to the London Nominees Football Fund, a group that according to its website “provides investors with a unique investment opportunity in a multi-billion dollar industry as an alternative to traditional equity based asset classes.” Robbo was employed in an advisory role, a famous face providing credibility and an easy smile whilst CEO Andrew Leopard waffled on with the usual rhetorical bluster concerning ‘adding value’, ‘return on investment’ and ‘exit strategies’.

There was nothing particularly illuminating or shocking on view at all. Only a group of wealthy, well-connected men happily encouraging another group of what appeared to be staggeringly stupid, incredibly wealthy men (actually undercover, investigative journalists) to invest lots of money in an investment fund. All the talk of buying clubs was clearly instigated by the reporters, “We want to buy Sheffield Wednesday…and another one!” they claimed at one point. “It can be an idea” was the muted response.

The premise of the show was as shaky as the camera-work. “We were being offered a football club” a voiceover gravely informed us – no you weren’t you fuckwits, they just clocked you for the eager buffoons you were posing as, and were happy to play along on the premise you were going to give them that £15M quid you promised. Anything said that could have been viewed as slightly dodgy was repeated 4 or 5 times, multiple slo-mo shots of Robson grinning and putting a glass to his lips, back-rooms in restaurants, fat-cats smoking cigars, betting tips from Fergie, lingering shots of the club crest at regular intervals…it had more than a whiff of ABU about it.

I’ll admit that I’m not exactly impartial as far as matters Bryan Robson is concerned, the man was and will remain an absolute hero in my eyes for what he did during his career at United. True, the programme wasn’t his finest moment and the impact of any potential fallout was lost due to ongoing coverage of the NOTW phone hacking scandal…but I genuinely fail to see what was revelatory about it. The news that financial parasites infest the game is nothing new and as for the shocking findings that player loans and transfers can be dictated by ‘relationship driven’ club managers…well I never.

The most telling moment was the response of Football League chairman Greg Clarke when asked, “Are you confident you know who the owners are of every club in the Football League?” “No, I’m not”, was his straightforward retort. Not calling him personally as he’s only been in the job since March, but demonstrative of the decades of haplessly amateurish management from regulatory bodies that have barely evolved since the pre-war era. Fit and proper person tests? The self-appointed custodians of the game don’t even know who’s in charge of clubs now. That’s the real scandal – and the reason sharks like London Nominees see football clubs as easy pickings to begin with. Maybe the Dispatches team should try again. Oh and it’s Barnsley FC, not Barnsley Town. Do proper research next time, idiots.