Yesterday hasn’t happened yet, but when it does we’ll bend reality. Or ignore it.

By Tony Attwood

A couple of years back I took up an opportunity to add a bit of variety to my working life by joining with a friend in setting up a small house restoration business.  Since my previous employment has involved the theatre, lecturing, and running an advertising agency, a training organisation, a publishing house and a record company, this was a bit of a step in the dark.  For a start it involved stuff like bricks and cement, wiring, paint and gardens full of weeds which the other ventures had not prepared me for.

A bit of a learning curve, but nothing so much as when I started to deal with estate agents.  Of course I’d dealt with agents before, and had recognised that whenever I wanted to move to a new village it was always the “most sought after village” in the county, but when a few years later I came to sell the house the village suffered from the fact there was “not much call for houses in that area”.

But doing my little bit to run the building firm, I found that in reality all estate agents want are new instructions so they can keep their shop window busy.  Once they have your house in their window that’s it, they are just chasing new property.  Selling hardly comes into it – houses sell themselves – or at least in the area where we work.

I divert into the above because I increasingly get the impression that many newspapers are in the same business.  All they want is a headline.  It doesn’t matter what follows, or whether it has any relevance to the headline, or even if it is several days out of date, it goes up on the web site and maybe in the paper, and that’s that.

So on the Guardian’s web site at around 7.30 this tuesday morning (in what is laughingly called British Summer Time – there being an almighty gale blowing outside as I write this) we have Match previews Arsenal v Liverpool: match preview.

Now of course you get this on a blog where (as with this blog) we keep on view all the past stories, so we can all be reminded how silly we’ve been in the past.  A newspaper’s web site though ought to be a little bit more avant garde.  A little bit “new”.  The clue is in the word “newspaper” I feel.

And yet such old time stories are everywhere.  Here’s one from the Standard picked up at the same time

Oxlade-Chamberlain expects vocal Arsenal crowd for Liverpool clash

One from the Independent on a much more serious note says

Bradford chairman never questioned over spate of fires at his businesses   Untold covered that on April 15.   Still I suppose the internet runs a bit more slowly in Derry Street.

Anyway, a few of the papers have awoken and realised that we are actually playing the Tiny Totts in the League Cup for the fourth time in the past ten years.

  • 2007: We beat them in the semi-final
  • 2008: They beat us in the semi-final
  • 2010: We beat them in the third round.

So the speculation is what sort of team we put out.  Tottenham will presumably put out their first team, given that this trophy is a major item on their agenda, but I suspect we’ll give games to the squad players who are not getting much exposure at the moment.  That will test their mettle.

There was however a rather amusing piece in one paper about the draw where the writer said, “League Two Carlisle’s reward for upsetting QPR 2-1 was a glamour trip to Anfield to take on Liverpool.”

A glamour trip to Liverpool?  Now there’s a thought.  I hope someone was in Carlisle telling the fans to Kalm Down Kalm Down Kalm Down.

As for Liverpool themselves there is a view expressed that, “They remain a team in transition but this draw [against Arsenal] was arguably more promising than their victories against Stoke and Bournemouth.”

And really we should consider that.  Liverpool won against Bournemouth with an offside goal so offside even PGMO had to abandon its North Korean approach to conversation and say something.  They beat Stoke and drew with Arsenal with a legitimate Arsenal goal disallowed by a very strange linesman.  And this combination of events is “more promising”?   More promising than what, one might ask.  More promising than not getting an offside goal given, and not drawing a match in which a legit goal is wrongly disallowed, I suppose.

Elsewhere in the papers there is the “familiar calls for the addition of one more sturdy defender during the window” in the Guardian or rather the Guardian is reporting that others are making the familiar calls.   So if they are elsewhere and familiar, I guess that isn’t really news.

But once the boot is on the journalist’s foot so it goes in, and in, and in.   According to Arsenal no bid has ever been made for Benzema, and he has never been offered.   To which reality the Independent replies

Arsenal ready to switch attention to Cavani after Benzema snub

So, it seems, a “snub” can now be a non-event.  You make no offer, they make no suggestion of a sale, and that is a snub.  In which case I was snubbed by Theo Walcott this morning.  The fact that we don’t live anywhere near each other makes no difference.  Snubbing is now a quantum phenomenon a bit like entanglement (Einstein’s “spooky action at a distance”).  It can happen when two entities are no where near each other and have nothing to do with each other, but might have been close to each other once (I was in the same stadium as Theo on Monday).

Although the Telegraph remains on another planet much of the time it does tell us today that Koscielny to miss Newcastle trip but Mertesacker should return and then helpfully continues No Benzema – but here are 10 strikers Wenger could target

The notion, as always, is that Arsenal is incompetent, and that having invested everything in trying to get Benzema (which they didn’t) they haven’t even started to think about another player (which of course they have – they are working on it all the time).

[I’ve just realised, I’ve been snubbed by Boris Johnson who was once in the same TV news studio as me, although we were being interviewed on totally different subjects.  I did say “good morning” though, and he nodded.  I wouldn’t have said it if I’d known he was going to snub me in this way.]

44 Replies to “Yesterday hasn’t happened yet, but when it does we’ll bend reality. Or ignore it.”

  1. There’s far too much snubbing going on in t world today.
    For instance, some years ago my wife and I were passing through LGW Airport when the late Cilla Black walked by. My wife said “Hi, Cilla” to which came the reply “Hiya”. No mention of my wife’s Christian name, see. A total snub.

  2. @ nicky – Maybe snubbing might sometimes prevent grief or embarrassment ?

    A little boy was on a bus eating a chocolate. Then he took another one , and then another…
    A man next to him said , “Do you know that too much of it will damage your teeth ?”
    The boy replied , “My grandfather lived to be 132 years .”
    The man asked , ” Was it because of eating chocolate ?”
    The boy replied , “No , he was always minding his own business !”

    They start very young these days !

  3. Scandalous Nicky. 😉

    In order to create “news” and “headlines” it has to be spectacular. It has nothing to do with reality at all. They link players and when their lies comes out they pretend that someone snubbed when in fact nobody snubbed anybody. If this still makes sense… 🙂 But doesn’t really matter as their lies also don’t make sense

  4. Great article. Made me laugh.
    I believe quantum entanglement can operate over vast distances and even back in time, which means right now we could all be being snubbed by Elvis Presley.

  5. What a great article Tony…very cleaver way of describing how the LIERS who call themselves NEWS outlets try to cover their continual misinformation by trying to belittle our GREAT CLUB!!!

    There must be a law against this type of publicity!!

  6. They call it RUMORS – in actual fact its MISLEADING the public for their (news outlets) financial gain!!

  7. its a problem Tony when people or these journalists writes stories with an agenda.of course we know they do have one on Arsenal which spans as far as from before the time of Le Prof Wenger so we know what to expect from them
    its like those journos who works or writes for dictatorship
    the articles are repetetive and monotonous that you can predict what they will write tomorrow
    i live in such a community so i am used to it and i can tell you these guys will continue to spew cabbage until their agenda is fulfilled- and we all know what it is
    the good part with our magnificent club is they have learned people who are running it- if it was run by some kind of Mafioso type of leaders Arsenal would have been relagated by now
    Liverpool will win nothing because they are fake and they Will be exposed bad time in the near future
    promising my foot 35% in possesion is promising? then England is doomed as a football nation-Ooh just because it is a team in transtion and Arsenal is a team in ……(insert)

    ps.please Tony is it possible you can write possible newspaper\websites headlines for the following day after every Arsenal game because they are so predictable just for fun of it

  8. Good morning Chief Tony. How is the morning doing with you, hope fine? I am disappointed to note the l don’t care attitude of the Gooners and those of the football pundits over the wrong cancellation of Arsenal goal of Aaron Ramsey against Liverpool by a Pgmo linesman, who flagged Ramsey offside. Whereas he was onside. Even pundit like Gary Neville did not see anything worth talking about the cancelled Ramsey’s’ goal. Instead, he choiced to castigate the Boss as being naive or arrogant. Is that the way to advice the Boss? By slandering him? By the way, have Arsenal registered a protest before the Pgmo? If not, why leaving such a daylight robbery unreported which might have cost them 3 valuable points? I think it’s about time the FA embrace video technology to enhance their referrers officiating performances on the field. The Boss should not be forced into panic buy any player to appease anybody, save who he has the original intention to buy. Ozil was signed in 2013 to pacify the Gooners who were on the neck of the Boss to strangulate him into suffocation. A repeat of such signing should not be repeated by the Boss. Ozil has been good and he gives some sublime performances for Arsenal erratically. He hasn’t been great yet for Arsenal. And Arsenal paid too much money to Real Madrid to get him. Arsenal are not in dear need of a striker, but will certainly do with a natural right winger and a left back. Needles to say they must be of top quality. A natural right winger is the missing link in Arsenal forward line right now. The Boss knowns that, his lack of a natural right winger is forcing him to adapt Jack Wilshere and Aaron Ramsey to play as right wide men. The former is more adaptable to the role than the later is, but he’s often missing in action. Therefore the Boss has to address this unavoidable requirement before the window closes. In this regard, it has been taylored in the media that Chelsea is likely to sell Victor Moses to West Ham or Spurs. In this wise, I want the Boss to highjack the possible deal to any of the club to solve the lacking at right wing. He will not likely to cost Arsenal more than £ 7-8m for a very good quality that can cover the Gunners need. Let the Boss starts acting on the deal now if he believes my scouting for Arsenal. He is good and the Boss knows it. I known Jose Mourinho will refuse to sell him to a direct rivals Arsenal. More so their relationships are not in the best of terms since that Wembley episode. But still, the Boss should try by all means to get Moses if he wants him. As for the left back, I don’t have a name right now in head that I can tell the Boss. However, let the Boss attend to the issue internally or in the market in this window or January window as the case maybe. Thanks.

  9. As daft as it may seem G Neville has a view of defensive midfielders as being huge ice breakers. He should have been directed to the Barca midfield (Iniesta & Xavi) giants in the world of small people.

    His opinion of Wenger is just his arrogance showing through his lack of vision & his poor intelligence. Physical attributes of a player are only important when they make up for intelligent short comings. A player with everything is rare.

  10. ‘Super supporter Claude is here to reassure fans that they will get the striker they deserve.’
    It is quite incredible how this Claude character, who is nothing more than a loud mouth buffoon of limited intelligence, has become the default option when an Arsenal fans opinion is required by the media. He is now the go to voice of Arsenal fans on Talk Sport for example as well it would seem the Evening Standard. For anyone who has not had the misfortune of listening to him he could be described as the archetypal voice of the (non existing) AAA. He shouts his anti Wenger vitriol at over 100 decibels FACT. At this rate he will soon have his own column in the Daily Mail alongside Adrian Durham and a slot as co-commentator on Sky Arsenal matches.

  11. “This is very IMPRESSIVE that in this modern day where everyone speaks of and desires transparency and substantiating ones claims/publications – your OUTLET pays ‘jurnos’ who are in turn paid by you through advertisers GOOD MONEY – so that readers are exposed to continual lies!!!! what a perfect SCAM!!”

    My comment on Metros’ Facebook page on several of their posts re we are signing this and that guy 🙂

  12. A thousand curses, gullible fool that I am, I just got ‘done’ by the Star headline…

    ‘Confirmed: Arsenal target completes stunning medical’

    Its true, he has, but…

    ‘REAL MADRID midfielder Asier Illarramendi has completed a medical with Real Sociedad.’

  13. Just a thought, what’s the difference between a ‘stunning medical’ and an normal medical.
    Maybe Brickfields could tell me?

  14. @Mick,
    You’re not the only one to get caught by the irritating headline composers.
    The worst thing about it is that we readers simply have no means of retribution.
    And come next Tuesday, it all starts again leading up to the January Window…grrrr.

  15. Oh hell! you’ve just made me realise that Cameron Diaz snubbed me this morning. What a b1tch!

  16. I was also snubbed Walter…me too ye by the British Royal family (several of them) while on “The Land of The Long White Cloud” (Aotearoa) – New Zealand. I lived there…they turned up periodically – but snubbed me EVERY TIME! 🙂

  17. May I forecast that Arsenal will get SNUBBED several more times before closing of THE window??

    hahahahahahahahahaha

  18. AFC will develop a HUGE inferiority complex with ALL this snubbing going on – therapists needed – lets sign a couple who won’t snub us 🙂 🙂

  19. Kenneth Widmerpool
    No, i’ve never snubbed my toe but I have sat on the snubs bench for my local football team.

  20. I was just listening to my favourite record by the Who, Snubstitute, when I thought of the old chant:
    Snub a dub dub, three men in a tub, the butcher, the baker the AAA Arsène Wenger hater.f*cking class!

  21. Snub a dub dub, three men in a tub, the butcher, the baker the AAA Arsène Wenger hater.Watching him juggle his hot transfer potata.

  22. Snub a dub dub, three men in a tub, the butcher, the baker the AAA Arsène Wenger hater.Watching him juggle his hot transfer potata when they looked in the murky water and saw a little brown floater which they would gobble up later.

  23. @ Menace – dunno, was thinking maybe they have this guy playing for them, I think his name is Busquets, 6’2″?

    BTW he’s a pretty decent defensive midfielder.

  24. I used to get really angry at dogs when they started barking and disturbing my peace, until i realised it is stupid to get angry at dogs.

    After all that is what they do and have been trained to do.

    So let us treat the newspaper writers as newspaper writers who are trained to create a headline to sell newspapers. 🙂

  25. I think to get the real inside scoop on who is snubbing us and who is not, we should track down the pilot of private jet that is on standby for all the red alerts that he ha (or she) has to respond to. We already know that Cavani and Benzema have flown in for their medicals – the timing of which suggests they were even on the same flight. Oh what a story that pilot could tell!
    I wonder how all the red alerts are passed to him? he must be at the airport 24/7.

  26. Size matters ?
    Women’s response to:
    2 inches – I can’t even hold it.
    3 inches – Never been so unsatisfied.
    4 inches- I’ve had bigger than it.
    5 inches- Good , but I wish a bit bigger!
    6 inches – perfect.
    7 inches – Love it.
    8 inches – Wow ! but can’t have it all.
    9 inches – Painful but manageable.
    10 inches- Too much pressure on stomach.

    This survey was Customer’s Feedback on different SIZES of: Subway Sandwiches!
    But I love the way you think!… and this is why I worry about you lot !

  27. From Educate Inspire Change –

    The media tells you who to love , who to hate ; who to be afraid of , who to trust ; what to think , and what not to think . Do the research . Inform yourself. Free your mind from mental slavery

  28. @ Mick -August 26, 2015 at 11:19 am
    Just a thought, what’s the difference between a ‘stunning medical’ and an normal medical. Maybe Brickfields could tell me?

    Well Mick , for me a stunning medical would be examining a naked 36- 34-36 woman -no way that it ever is going to be normal !
    In other countries the reluctant patient (Player) may be subjected to an ECT ( electroconvulsive therapy ) or in the case of a low cost health programme , the taser would also be considered ‘stunning’ !

    A tuning medical would be getting ‘them’ to change their tune by cupping their nads and squeezing it while getting then to cough ! Oh the high notes they could achieve !
    aaaHHHHHHHHHHH !!!!

  29. @ Walter – I really was hoping that it would show ‘stand up comedian’ , to be a writer is very serious business . I probably couldn’t be able to ‘hack’ it !
    In truth the questions were loaded . May be some one ( hint , hint !) could come of with one where we could find out what type of fan we really are .

  30. Went to see what movie I would be – had a real bad feeling about this , but then….

    Your movie is: Star Wars
    You are a very sincere, serene, and gentle human being. You always spread peace and goodness wherever you go. Whenever you’re around, everything starts to feel like it will work out. Deep down, everyone wishes you were around them more often.

    ( Yes !!! Bringing balance to the farce is right up my alley . And you all know what I would do that light sabre , not to mention sic-ing Chewy on them ! You know just for the roughage ! That’s right fuzzball , lap it up !)

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