INVITING THE FOOTBALL FAMILY TO HOUND YOU INTO RETIREMENT WITH POOR GRAMMAR
This being the digital age, access to referees has never been easer. While bullying and abusing them in cyberspace might not be quite as satisfying as slashing their tyres or effing and jeffing at them from the stands, it is the sort of cowardly, infantile behaviour that suits those keyboard warriors who love their clubs so much that they’ll do absolutely anything to support them. Just so long as it doesn’t involve making the effort to step away from the computer, leave the spare room of their parents’ house and actually go to a football match.
Angry, cursed with a small IQ and the feeling your team has been hard done by a certain match official from St Helens? Simply log on to Twitter and bombard former Olympic cyclist Chris Hoy with abusive tweets about his outrageous bias. That’ll show him! Got the hump with a respected Swedish referee for sending off your star striker during a Big Cup match against Barcelona? Just hound him into retirement by flooding his inbox with emails containing poorly spelt and punctuated death threats: “Ur a ded man, Anders Fisk!” Burn!
Now it seems one of the aforementioned Mr Fisk’s (sic) compatriots has rolled out the red carpet for any pike-and torch-waving cyber hoodlums, as the Fiver’s herring-eating, super-trouping, shoe-removing, flatpack-assembling cousin, Den Femer brings us news of referee Mohammed Al-Hakim, who has set up a Big Social FaceSpace page to discuss his job with interested fans, explain the logic behind controversial decisions and enable supporters of various clubs to question his parentage by admitting when he has made a mistake. Yes, the Fiver knows what you’re thinking: “this really won’t end well”.
“I know there’s an interest for the role of the referee and I think the football family can benefit from having an insight into it,” said Al-Hakim. “But most of all, I want to increase the accessibility and the dialogue within the football family.” Of course, while the Fiver applauds the 30-year-old’s spirit of openness and accountability, we can’t help but feel that he has surely been around for long enough to know that, more so than any other family, the football one has no shortage of members that really shouldn’t be given access to anything more than the tray of food that’s passed daily through the hatch of the reinforced cellar door that prevents them from interacting with polite society.
While over 3,000 fans have already “liked” Al-Hakim’s Big Social FaceSpace page, it seems quite a few of them don’t actually like the man who set it up, as he’s already received pelters for admitting that he should have awarded a penalty in a game between Norrkoping and AIK. “There has been a lot of positive reaction, but obviously there have been some negative voices,” confessed Al-Hakim. “I have a responsibility to make the page interesting, but readers also have a responsibility to maintain a decent level in the discussion to keep it alive.” Good luck with that, Mr Al-Hakim. We’ll give your admirable new wheeze until the end of the month. At best.
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QUOTE OF THE DAY
“I am a very difficult person to work and live with. My wife deserves the biggest of trophies” – clearly the Professional U21 Development League winners’ gong Víctor Valdés picked up with Manchester United last season wasn’t cutting it back at home.
QUOTE OF THE DAY 2
“It was 27 January, there were still four days of the transfer window left and there were lots of calls, movement. Another team phoned. They were prepared to lay on a private plane for me to go and sign for them. But I said to my brother: ‘No, I’ve given my word to Sevilla’s president … and I’m going to marry that waitress’” – Barcelona’s Ivan Rakitic gets his chat on with Sid Lowe and explains how a quality late-night coffee in 2011 led to him signing for Sevilla and meeting his wife-to-be.
FIVER LETTERS
“I would just like to say how impressed I am that all of Queen’s Celtic’s players were able to complete their match at Partick Thistle without having their souls consumed by the demonic force seen lurking in the background” – Dan Davies.
“I don’t want to sound like a bourgeois, middle class, woolly liberal Big Paper reader (© Toby Young) but am I the only one who is joyfully happy to find out that Deportivo Merlo, who lost 5 - 1 in the Copa Argentina yesterday, play in dark red (away kit only)?” – Noble Francis (and no other joyfully happy bourgeois, middle class, woolly liberal Big Paper readers).
• 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: Dan Davies.
BITS AND BOBS
Thibaut Courtois will not be available to stop any deflected Yaya Touré shots when Chelsea face Manchester City after he lost his appeal against the red card he picked up against Swansea.
Four months after the Fenerbahce team bus was shot up by Trabzonspor fans, the club’s midfielder Mehmet Topal’s car was shot at when he was returning home from training. Fortunately for Topal, his car is bulletproof and he was uninjured. “This armed attack is a terrorist act,” said a club suit.
Peter Schmeichel is so angry that Manchester United have not sorted out the David de Gea situation that he has spent the last few hours smashing plates and throwing frozen chickens at doors. “If the player is not happy, his [Mr 15%], himself and the club that want him should have sorted this a long time ago,” he ShoutSported. Although United reckon he’s staying now anyway.
Rumour Mill regular Will Hughes has been ruled out by Derby for six months after suffering severe knee-knack.
Speaking of knack, it is going to be an unspecified amount of time before Everton fans get to see Leighton Baines charging up and down the pitch. “We hope that Leighton’s ankle reacts well but it’s not good news,” sobbed Bobby Mártinez, looking into the distance and seeing his club’s hopes of improving this season making a dash for it.
And despite Petr Cech quite obviously being the most unreliable keeper this side of Fabian Barthez, Arsenal have allowed Wolves to borrow Emiliano Martínez for the season. “We are delighted to have brought Emi to the club,” cheered Kenny Jackett.
STILL WANT MORE?
Bournemouth’s Tyrone Mings gets the treatment in this week’s Gallery, with predictable results.
Jamie Jackson has taken time out of his full-time job of being biased against [insert your Manchester club of choice] to write a proper book about David Moyes’s time in charge of United. You can read an extract here.
Need something to distract you from all the problems in your life? Paul Campbell’s roundup of this week’s best goals should do the trick.
Have you’ve been lying awake at night wondering if the USA! USA!! USA!!! is ready – or even willing – to host the 2026 World Cup? Well, lucky for you Caitlin Murray has the answers.
Martin Laurence spent the weekend wondering which Premier League debutant performed best in the opening round of games so you didn’t have to.
Oh, and if it’s your thing … you can follow Big Website on Big Social FaceSpace.
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