THE HANGOVER
Filthy ill-groomed vermin who become less dignified and scrupulous the closer they get to extinction. That, The Fiver infers, is pretty much how concerned friends described the English media to Jürgen Klopp before he agreed to become Liverpool manager. Rather than suggest that Klopp immediately appoint such shrewd judges to the club’s floundering transfer committee, The Fiver will now try to rise to the challenge laid down by the manager himself when he declared at his inaugural press conference that “it’s up to you to prove that [those people] are liars”.
Which means that, much as we enjoy exposing liars, and lying profusely, we are not about to suggest that Klopp has spent his first week in Liverpool smearing the walls of his rented home with ordure and tearing up the furniture with garden shears. That would be the sort of conclusion that the representative of a sensationalist and mendacious press might jump to upon learning that: a) Klopp is said to be living in one of the 100 homes that Brendan Rodgers pitched up in while seeking to ingratiate himself with the fans of a club with proud working class roots; and b) Klopp’s first week of training at Anfield has coincided with ruinous knee-knack to both Joe Gomez and Danny Ings, two of the most impressive performers this season under Rodgers and now seemingly ruled out for the remainder of the campaign. So far resisting the temptation to make up guff about destruction to Rodgers’ property and legacy, all your fair-minded Fiver is saying is that those losses are wretched luck for player, manager and club. That magic wand Klopp was supposed to be waving could do with a splash of glue on it.
OK, OK, Klopp himself never claimed he was a wizard. That, too, may have been an overzealous deduction by the hackery. All Klopp promises is that he’s going to get his new charges to work their rocks off: “We have to run and fight together,” trumpeted Klopp at his second press conference (yes, folk’ll be counting them). “I want to see more bravery, more fun in their eyes. I want to see that they like what they do.”
Klopp will make his Premier League debut on Saturday against Tottenham, whose manager reckons he knows what to expect. “We’ve analysed Dortmund and the way that Klopp plays and there are similar concepts that we can take,” confided Mauricio Pochettino. “We have some references – in the first half that Liverpool played against Arsenal at The Emirates [in August], they played in a similar style that Dortmund played last season.” Oh Brendan, if only you’d stopped flicking through the catalogue when you hit on that page!
QUOTE OF THE DAY
“Do you know who Sam Allardyce is? Do you know how many trophies he has won? Well that’s my answer. It is what happens when someone has a book to sell. His opinion does not have a lot of value” – Rafa Benítez offers some choice words in response to a fellow grown man’s proclamations, albeit cruelly overlooking Limerick’s 1992 League of Ireland First Division title.
FIVER LETTERS
“Re: football headlines (Fiver letters passim). Should a leisure-wearing Jürgen Klopp be dismissed after an unprovoked assault on a mounted policeman you can have: Flip-Flop Klopp Strop: Clips Clip-Clop Cop, Cops Kop Chop” – Steve Gaw.
“When Manchester United owned the Chinese striker Dong Fangzhuo they went on a tour of Asia taking in Hong Kong, and I thought at the time that if only Mr Fangzhuo had contrived to spark a fight in a karaoke bar it could have produced the headline: ‘Dong’s Wrong in Hong Kong Sing Song Ding Dong’. Alas, as with the rest of his United career he made no impression on the back pages” – Jason Tew.
“Re: Stephen Yoxall and Destiny (yesterday’s Fiver letters), the similarities between The Fiver and Destiny don’t end there. In Destiny you regularly receive packages at your postmaster which more often than not turn out to be complete junk and are quickly deleted. Also, Weird Uncle Fiver may already be in-game. I wouldn’t be surprised if he was moonlighting under the name Xûr, Agent of the Nine who turns up once a week sounding confused, lost and under the influence of something entirely beyond his control” – Ian Johnson.
“Two weeks now and I still can’t get that sodding Reading song out of my head. Cheers Fiver” – Mark Jelbert.
“Does the frequent letter writer Steve Hibbert live in Australia? If so, he could very well be an ex-colleague of mine from the Bank of New South Wales (yes, I’m that old)” – John Milce.
• 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 letter o’the day is: Jason Tew, who wins a copy of the Scottish Highland Football League Diary 2014-15, courtesy of these good people.
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Internazionale, the revival of a fallen giant. Richard Hall visits the San Siro and has an exclusive chat with Bobby Mancini in our latest Football Passport film.
BITS AND BOBS
One for all and all for one, Uefasuits are always ready … to back suspended president Michel Platini. “We support Mr Platini’s right to a due process and a fair trial and to the opportunity to clear his name,” howled a Uefa statement.
Kidderminster Harriers have issued a statement after the BBC’s annual report into their pies being the costliest around. “People don’t eat for days before and after a trip to Kidderminster – this isn’t just a match-day snack, it’s a meal in itself, and not one to be taken lightly,” scoffed the club’s Matty Paddock. “Normally, topping a pricing survey of this kind, year after year, would be more of a shame than an honour, but in truth we couldn’t really be happier.”
“I don’t want to talk about it today, it’s not on my agenda and I’m quite happy at Crystal Palace,” blabbed Alan Pardew, before going on to talk about it. “But it’s the England job. If you’re English and don’t want it then there must be something wrong with you.”
Arsenal’s AGM got rather … well, chippy after chairman Sir Chips Keswick threatened to end an increasingly fractious affair when the topic of that £3m payment to Stan Kroenke’s company raised its head. “I’d remind everyone that we have a majority owner who is respectful of our traditions,” he blurted.
Brentford chairman Matthew Benham says he hates the term ‘Moneyball’ being applied to the team. “We just didn’t get it right whatsoever in appointing a head coach,” he trilled in regard to sacked coach Marinus Dijkhuizen. “We did a lot of research, looked at his record, and got a lot of references. And one of the big mistakes we made is we got far down the line, and we were pretty confident that this guy was going to be our man, and then we got a very bad reference. But because it was from an agent of someone who was a sub in his team we immediately discounted it. It was a mistake I have made many, many, times in betting. It didn’t agree with our views so we just ignored it.”
A rough day for Northampton Town, who have been issued with a winding-up petition by the taxman, as well as being ordered to pay back a £10.25m loan to the borough council by the close of play on Thursday. “I fully appreciate that, off the pitch, there only seems to be bad news for supporters at the moment,” chimed chairman David Cardoza.
Prince Ali bin al-Hussein wants in on some of that hot Fifa action again. “The crisis at Fifa is a crisis of leadership. I believe in this organisation. Together we will make it great again,” he parped.
And Milan forward Keisuke Honda reckons he knows what’s wrong with Milan: not enough cash being frittered away [on the likes of him, we presume – Fiver Ed]. “Looking at the past few years, I think it is clear this club cannot start over unless a lot of money is spent,” he sniffed. “You either do that, or you have to re-examine the structure of the club. Management, coach and fans must be aware of the situation.”
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STILL WANT MORE?
Twenty years on from Raúl’s first Big Cup hat-trick, Jacob Steinberg recalls the brilliant forward’s Golden Goals against Ferencvaros.
A brief guide to … Liverpool’s complete failure to recapture their glory days. By Scott Murray.
Awful European Championship songs and the football steam train feature in this week’s Classic YouTube.
Wayne Rooney is living a charmed life to still be in the Manchester United team. It’s high time he stepped out of the shadows, writes Jamie Jackson.
Albania’s history in European football: beards and bad behaviour in the Balkans.
Oh, and if it’s your thing … you can follow Big Website on Big Social FaceSpace.
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‘HE HELPED JOSHUA FIGHT THE BATTLE OF JERICHO, HE HELPED DANIEL GET OUT THE LION’S DEN, HE HELPED GILLIGAN GET OFF THE ISLAND’
