Football in turmoil, Villa rumbled, Liverpool as Emperors

There was a moment in the Villa game yesterday where one of their players went down holding his head and the ref looked, and then played the game on.  The commentator said “that’s not right” or something like that, and eventually several minutes later the game was stopped.

I thought this a heart-warming moment.   I’ve never really wanted players to be injured (well except for Ince, I suppose, and Souness.  Oh and Keane, and…  )  Well, ok, I’ve not wanted that many players to be hurt, and that’s not what I was after this time.  It was just clear that the ref had rumbled the Villa game: “if you go down son, and they are attacking, hold your head.  It will get the game stopped”.

We saw it at the Arsenal Villa game where a player did exactly that and then came off for treatment on an ankle injury – and maybe the refs have caught on.

Which is good, because the rest of football is upside down.  Arsenal board are, according to the Observer, talking to Usmanov not, (as the headline claims) to get him on the board, but just to try and stabalise the club.  I’ve only been in one company where part of the shareholding was out of favour with another part, and believe me it does not make for stability, so maybe this is good.  Maybe this is the shakeout that has been needed  for some time.

(Or maybe it is like that moment in “1984” in which we are at war with Eurasia, and then half way through a sentence everything changes and Eurasia is our ally and we are at war with Eastasia.  If you haven’t read it for a few years, read it again – you’ll be amazed how close we are to what Orwell was talking about – and he wrote it in 1948).

What was interesting was that our man in Switzerland did emphasise that the sustainability financial model of Arsenal is at the core of everything, Usmanov or no.  The problem of course is if Usmanov wants to use the club as Liverpool and Manchester have been used – as a way of playing with debt.  On that score we have no knowledge and that of course would be a disaster.   But if he sat there like a good boy, and stopped issuing writs to people who say nasty things about him (for God’s sake Mr Usmanov, a lot of supporters call me a total tosser, and I don’t go round suing them) then maybe its all right.

Still, it is good that after weeks of the JIBs (“journalists in bars” in case you have not been paying attention) not talking to the PAs (“players agents”) we are back to business as usual.    So we are going to buy Arshavin (Mail on Sunday) and Tevez (Mirror), Wenger is going to Real Mad (News of the world, so it must be true), and we are being taken over by a consortium from the Middle East (Sunday Times – ditto).

As for Chelsea, that Scolari fella has “branded” (press word) “liars”  some other fellas he calls “unscrupulous individuals” (PAs talking to JIBs), whom are “leaking untrue stories to newspapers in a bid to unsettle players and the club.”   Oh my whatever next.  I’ve never heard of such a thing.

The Observer says, “The statement comes at a time when there are concerns at Chelsea about players’ representatives and their relationship with the media”.  Goodness.

So finally on to the truly odd Liverpool Insolvency.   We know that the Yanks who own the Insolvents have got a £350m loan they have got to restructure by 25 January 2009, and they have no money to do it, and those awfully nice bankers who have just wrecked my pension fund won’t give them any money.

Well, on today’s BBC teletext it says, “Liverpool boss Rafael Benitez will have to sell before he can buy next month”.

I thought at first they were talking about players – but then I realised, that is not how Liverpudlians think.  To them the north west is the centre of the universe, rather than a run down port that was once part of the slave trade.  What that sentence actually means is that Liverpool want to buy January.  That is they want to buy the month.

Just like the emperors in Rome used to rename months after them – and then extended their month to have more days than another month named after any other emperor (August is named after Emperor Augustus etc), so Liverpool want to rename January as “Liverpool” thus making the year “Liverpool, February, March etc”.

You don’t believe me?   Shame on you.   And yes, to the gentleman who wrote in and said, “that wasn’t you on LBC on Friday afternoon was it?” yes it was – so there.  If I am on LBC, I must know about Roman emperors, Liverpool and months.  Stands to reason.

Right.  Into the Cortina and off to the Ems.