AH, THE USUAL
Occasionally, The Fiver is made aware, often through another Tin-inspired fug of regret and recrimination, that there is such a thing as Other Sport. Let’s see now … there’s ‘cricket’, a sport where people wearing silly clothes hit balls with sticks, ‘golf’, a sport where people wearing silly clothes hit balls with sticks and ‘rugby’, a sport where people wearing silly clothes drink 14 Toby jugs of Bombardier through someone’s jock strap, rake each other in the face with some studs but it’s all OK because they have another Toby jug of Bombardier together afterwards and shake hands because they’re all such bloody good blokes.
There’s also ‘boxing’, a sport where one man who has been arrested or cited seven times for violence against five different women and a bloke who’s composed and sung his own theme tune are paid absurd amounts of coin to belt each other round the head for a bit. You’d have to be even deeper in a Tin-inspired fug of regret and recrimination than The Fiver not to have noticed that there’s quite a big boxing thing happening this weekend. Frankly, the deafening hype has already made us bored of it but worry ye not, because there isn’t just one pugilistic encounter between a wily campaigner and an arguably more talented but undeniably less pleasant opponent. In football, though, scraps are not contested for anything as gauche as money or a shiny bauble, but respect. R.E.S.P.E.C.T. Arsène Wenger knows what it means to me, but according to him and his finger-wagging, José Mourinho is runnin’ out of foolin’.
“I think I just told you that the biggest thing for a manager is to respect other managers,” whinged Wenger today. “Some people have to improve on that,” he continued, before flouncing off to the Chelsea training ground to pin a note on the fridge warning “some people” to put the lid back on the milk and asking why “some people” couldn’t rinse out the sink after shaving their dreamily handsome face. Wenger was miffed about Mourinho’s declaration that going more than a decade without a league title was boring, rather than Chelsea’s style of play, a clear nonsense because, as The Fiver knows all too well, more than a decade of frustration, failure and multiple Tin-inspired fugs of regret and recrimination is many things, but not boring.
Of course, like weary tattle-tales who’d rather be writing that novel than plastering on a fake smile and ploughing through this mire one more time, the hacks of the nation were obliged to scuttle back to Mourinho and ask him whether he thought he hadn’t given Wenger any R.E.S.P.E.C.T, grimly hoping the Chelsea man would sock it to him. Alas and alack, they were silently and airily dismissed by José with a tired shake of the head and an irked waft of the hand, like an ageing viceroy in the Raj shooing away a waiter who’d served him an unsatisfactory bowl of mulligatawny soup.
A manager unwilling to perpetuate a continuing argument like this shouldn’t really be surprising, and indeed should be welcome for the cloud of guff it saves us from, but this is José Mourinho, for heck’s sake. This is a man who thrives on conflict, who feeds off the slinging of mud, who lives on beef. When even he’s tired of a public spat, then we know it’s become truly tedious. Perhaps, like the Other Sport of boxing, we’ve now come to a point where we’ve reached maximum hype, that there is no further we can go to fuel two men’s dislike for each other. Or perhaps the only thing left for them to do is don some gloves, get in the ring and decide this whole thing via the method of the sweet science. We’re taking José in seven.
QUOTE OF THE DAY
“At the end-of-season dinner the other night I was stood in the toilet and a guy went through every scenario: ‘But we’ll win and then we’ll play Norwich and then we’ll win and we’ll get in the Premier League!’ It was a nice bit of positive mental attitude, but I think he might have had a few sherbets as well. I said: ‘I tell you what, standing in a toilet on a Tuesday night having a slash is not going to work it out for us. It’s not going to make it happen. We might just have to do a little bit of work on the training ground’” – Mick McCarthy, er, rains on an Ipswich fan’s parade.
FIVER LETTERS
“Due to a wondrously misspent youth I have a condition (self-diagnosed – let’s call it Champ Man syndrome) whereby whenever I read or hear the names of players of a certain vintage, rather than picturing their face, I picture their Championship Manager 93-94 player profile (see Big Website’s very own quiz). Anyway, David Lambert’s mention of Ruel Fox and Andy Sinton (yesterday’s Fiver letters) got me daydreaming again about that glorious game. And then things got all spooky on me; I don’t always click on your final link, but today I did. Lo and behold, in among all the games was that Ron Atkinson-esque chap pointing his finger at me, daring me to make that daydream reality. Well, there goes my long weekend” – William Beckingsale.
“Yesterday’s letter from David Lambert re: the Daniel Sturridge-shaped hole got me wondering … could you fit the entire Wise, Spencer, Stein-era Chelsea into a Neville Southall-sized hole?” – Mike Pinnock.
“For reasons too boring to share here, I am nearly half a year behind on my Fivers, which is why I just this week read the 4 December 2014 edition in which Manchester City boss Manuel Pellegrini is quoted as not having said: ‘Wake me up in May, we’ll see where we are then.’ Even noting that this was an authorial flourish and not an actual quote, can someone nudge Manny from his nap?” – Ryan Jones.
“Thanks to James Thompson for ‘The Charlie Austin Bin Situation’ (yesterday’s letters). I now have a name for my bearded vest-wearing hipster banjo-and-jug band” – Todd Van Allen.
“OK, so I declare an interest: I’m a Leicester City supporter (as if you didn’t know). But the reaction to Nigel Pearson’s ‘ostrich’ argument with that journalist has been so over-the-top it’s unreal – including yesterday’s Fiver. Pearson was asked a stupid question (‘What went wrong tonight?’) within half an hour of the match ending, and he said some stupid things. He apologised – in public and private – and his apology was accepted by the journalist. That should have been the end of it, but it wasn’t. So will you publish a further report on his conversation with Pat Murphy of the BBC, after he apologised in public? When Murphy called him a bully, paranoid, in need of anger management, and making a fool of himself at press conferences? What is that all about? I would love to have seen the reaction if he had asked the same questions of Lord Ferg or Brian Clough. I know you won’t publish this, but just writing it has got it off my chest. Whatever” – Martyn Wilson.
• Send your letters to the.boss@theguardian.com. And if you’ve nothing better to do you can also tweet the Fiver. Today’s winner of our prizeless letter o’the day is: Todd Van Allen.
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BITS AND BOBS
Bournemouth boss Eddie Howe has had a pop at those who think wealthy Russian benefactor Maxim Demin has bought the club’s way to the Premier League. “I find the comments about money ill-judged,” he sniffed. “Our success is in no way attached to money.”
Louis van Gaal reckons last year’s pre-season tour of USA! USA!! USA!!! is why Manchester United are so far behind Chelsea in the Premier League. O … K.
A 16-year-old who was born with no left arm has made his professional debut for Colombian outfit La Uniautónoma. “Nothing stops me performing in a natural way,” said Lorenzo Orellana.
The notoriously publicity-shy Rio Ferdinand has popped up to praise Plain Old John Terry. “It’s no secret that me and [POJT] are not the closest of mates,” he being-the-bigger-manned. “But just because we no longer get on – 2014: “For me the biggest idiot will always be [POJT]” – does not mean I’ve lost my admiration for him as a footballer. His performances for Chelsea this season have been nothing short of outstanding.”
After cooking his Newcastle team’s dinner, sweeping the St James’ Park corridors, cleaning the bogs and manning the ticket office, John Carver took the reserves down to Derby County, where he had a chat with the man most likely to replace him next season. “[Second-Choice Steve] didn’t mention this job, absolutely 100% not, he just asked how I was dealing with it,” said Carver, before getting back to polishing Paul Dummett’s boots.
You’d never guess Big Vote was round the corner dept: Labour reckon the state of grassroots football is ‘a disgrace’, the Tories want cheaper match-day tickets and the Lib Dems want safe-standing but no one listens to them anymore so good luck with that one.
Mauricio Pochettino is trying to lure Marseille’s André Ayew to Spurs when his contract expires this summer with a bit of frantic eyelash fluttering on Skype, according to French football website Foot365, which even the Fiver’s snooty, cheese-eating, white flag-waving, beret-wearing, love-making, Gauloises-smoking, wine-drinking cousin Thierry En Face De La Cinema Fiver hasn’t heard of. But there.
Brendan Rodgers has peered through that Daniel Sturridge-shaped hole in the Liverpool physio table and declared: “I think we have found some underlying issues” with the striker, who has been packed off to USA! USA!! USA!!! for treatment.
And extreme German death metal band (is there any other type? – Fiver Ed) Heaven Shall Burn have become FC Carl Zeiss Jena’s kit sponsor for the final game of the season to try and encourage more fans to support their local teams. “We are not about showing the big middle finger. The point is not to forget the little guys and their meaning to their respective city,” screeech-thunk-wham-eeeeeeeek-gebrüll-grrrrrrrrrrrd guitarist Maik Weichert.
STILL WANT MORE?
Is there a more magnetically appalling sportsman anywhere than the wonderfully handsome, charismatic b@stard that is Sergio Ramos, muses Barney Ronay.
Just the 10 things to look out for this weekend.
Manchester City’s Eliaquim Mangala speaks to Daniel Taylor about how his paralysed brother is his biggest inspiration.
Last-day drama in the Championship hasn’t been completely torpedoed by Watford and Bournemouth. The last-gasp race for the play-off places will get you hot and bothered, according to Jacob Steinberg.
You are the Ref No331, featuring POJT, a penalty ruse and ankle-knack.
If you’re a Hearts fan, look away now. How Albert Kidd became a Hibs and Queen’s Celtic legend without playing for them.
Oh, and if it’s your thing … you can follow Big Website on Big Social FaceSpace.
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ANOTHER BANK HOLIDAY, YOU SAY? BACK TUESDAY, THEN
