THE VILLANS OF THE PIECE
The Fiver can think of no better way to usher in the weekend than engaging in the literary equivalent of pootling down to the local undertakers to steal the pennies from a dead man’s eyes, while kicking the sticks of any blind people we happen to pass along the way. And it is with this in mind that we line up the lame, Championship-bound duck that is Aston Villa in our crosshairs, to greet the news that, far from being punished for going on an ill-advised holiday where he was pictured sucking on a shisha pipe in Dubai during the international break, Gabby Agbonlahor has been rewarded with the prize of having no place in the Aston Villa squad set to have further humiliation heaped upon them by Chelsea tomorrow, while the club launch an internal investigation into his behaviour.
Should the investigation in question be staged in the same ruthlessly efficient manner as everything else at Aston Villa, Agbonlahor has every right to feel confident that those conducting the investigation will decide the photographic evidence of one of their players having a good time in Dubai at this difficult time is inconclusive and what looks suspiciously like Agbonlahor sucking on a shisha pipe, an entirely legal activity, could conceivably be a member of the Birmingham Philharmonic playing the oboe. Micah Richards, who in a perhaps-unintentional-but-comical-nonetheless demonstration of the complete absence of morale that is the hallmark of this Villa side, was also in Dubai but on a different holiday to his team-mate, and has not been so lucky and will have to front up against Chelsea. “I’ve taken the decision from the footballing side to remove him from the squad just for this game, purely because I don’t want anything to distract the players and their surroundings for the game,” said caretaker manager Eric Black, who has been in his new role for less than three days but already sounds incoherent and at the end of his tether.
In other news pertaining to Villa, mild-mannered long-time local lad, Villa fan and former player Stan Collymore has launched his manifesto [Stanifesto? - Fiver Ed] for immediate change at the club he loves. Weighing in at 1,817 words (although considerably shorter if you take out the bits where he admits to understanding why some people might not think he is the ideal person for the job of getting wayward young lads to behave or helping to whip a badly run football club back into some sort of shape), Stan’s blueprint for a better Villa is chock full of bright, if fairly obvious, ideas that shouldn’t really have been beyond the wit of those being handsomely paid to run the club in the first place. Whether or not Stan is the man to help usher the club into a brand new Championship dawn remains to be seen, but it’s inconceivable that he could do a worse job than the bunch of dunderheads currently doing their damnedest to run the club into the ground.
QUOTE OF THE DAY
“[Everton] shouldn’t be afraid about losing players because financially we can compete against anyone in world football” - Bobby M shouts LOOK AT MY WAD! in the face of Sheikh Mansour, Roman Abramovich and the whole of Qatar.
FIVER LETTERS
“Re: Football Weekly Live at the London Palladium (yesterday’s last line): The first time I set foot inside the London Palladium was to see Edward Woodward, Derek Nimmo and Rod Hull & Emu in pantomime in 1972. However, I can see no resemblance between a bunch of people you half recognise from the telly making fools of themselves in front of an infantile audience and Football Weekly. Nope, none at all” – Matt Emerson.
“I hate you all …” – Sam Carpenter.
“Nice to see my beloved Bury FC get a mention in yesterday’s Fiver. It could have been for posting the biggest win in an FA Cup final, for being the only club to score over 1,000 goals in all four professional tiers in England, or for being the first European club to sign a player from the Indian subcontinent. Alas no, it was a brief joke about that season we got relegated under Neil ‘Colin’ Warnock, which was in itself a brief joke. Keep it up!” – Darrien Bold.
• 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 … Darrien Bold.
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BITS AND BOBS
Diego Costa has been banned for an extra game for his reaction to being sent off in the FA Cup match at Everton. His apparent attempt to give Gareth Barry an impromptu hickey went unpunished, and unrewarded.
Yaya Touré will miss Manchester City’s match at Bournemouth and is in a race – sorry, an amble – to be fit their Big Cup match against PSG on Wednesday.
Arsène Wenger thinks Union Jack Wilshere could be Mr Roy’s wildcard at Euro 2016. “When you’re a national team coach, you can take a gamble on one player but certainly not on five. You can certainly take a chance on just one player,” he philosophised.
Angel Di Maria has blamed the fact he was played in various positions for his inability to play well in any of those positions for Manchester United.
And Liverpool are looking into the possibility of playing a potential hugely underwhelming Big Vase qualification game at Plucky Wigan or Blackeye Rovers due to summer building work at Anfield.
STILL WANT MORE?
A humdinger at Anfield and Jamie Vardy back to his best for the title run-in? The Premier League is back – and so are our 10 things to look out for.
Caution? Pfft, says Daniel Harris, Leicester must be bold to secure the most unlikely title since Bob Hope’s knighthood.
Hugo Lloris grew up admiring Pete Sampras, Weird Uncle Fiver and Peter Schmeichel, and he is as determined as they were to be the best in the world, writes Paul Doyle.
Yeah OK, Gary Neville’s Valencia stint was a disaster but at least he had a go, cheers Barry Glendenning.
Baggies striker Salomón Rondón gets his chat on with Stuart James and explains that he has to be smuggled in and out of the family home in chaotic Caracas.
But don’t be downhearted Latin American football fans, for football is thriving again in Mexico’s Ciudad Juárez, the former murder capital of the world.
Peep! Eric Dier stars in this week’s You are the Ref.
Oh, and if it’s your thing … you can follow Big Website on Big Social FaceSpace.
