GIANT POUND SIGNS ILLUMINATING THE SKY
When Tottenham Hotspur line up tonight in a bid to win at Old Trafford for the first time since cartoon rabbit Jive Bunny was top of the charts and scampering Welshman Gareth Bale was five months old, they will have to do so without one of their best players, Luka Modric. "He's got a little bit of an injury. There's a possibility he could have played through it, but at the moment his head's not in the right place," said his manager 'Arry Redknapp, who we're fairly certain was alluding to the Croatian's state of mind, rather than the literal whereabouts of his head, which the Fiver presumes is still perched on his shoulders, possibly spinning like that of the girl in The Exorcist having been turned so often by the lure of the giant pound sign illuminating the sky over Stamford Bridge.
"For the sake of ['A]rry Redknapp's health, I hope we can avoid the kind of controversial goal that last season had him understandably jumping up and down in rage and frustration," wrote Sir Alex Ferguson in United Review, referring to an opportunistic goal from Nani, a member of that select band of footballers who actually know the rules of the sport they play for a living. Not content with getting their title defence off to a winning start against West Brom last weekend, Manchester United go into tonight's game with an extra reason to celebrate, having gulled logistics firm DHL into sponsoring their training kit for an unconfirmed number of millions that should buy no end of tracksuit tops, shorts and woolly hats, not to mention letters of the alphabet to iron on them.
In other news so excruciatingly dull it makes the Fiver want to stab itself repeatedly with a sharp pencil, United are also on the verge of signing a sponsorship deal with - no, stay with us - with a Malaysian snacks maker to promote a brand of crisps called Mr Potato, a turn of events that would normally prompt a feeble Fiver gag about Wayne Rooney, but we can't be bothered this afternoon, as we're too busy pondering who'd win a fight to the death between the luxuriantly moustachioed man on the Mr Potato tubes and his suspiciously similar Pringles counterpart. As contests go it would probably be more evenly matched than recent Old Trafford set-tos between Spurs and United.
QUOTE OF THE DAY
"The second game was Chelsea against Wibby" - Fabio Capello makes a valiant attempt to remember West Brom's name. Fails.
UEFA: AGAIN MAKING ABOUT AS MUCH SENSE AS THE POPULARITY OF JEDWARD
At a time when the odds have been slashed on Arsene Wenger becoming the first managerial casualty of the Premier League season, and many in the media are actively willing the Arsenal's board to jettison the most successful manager in the club's history by portraying him as an idealistic fool, a stubborn old git or both, Uefa has decided to charge a-windmillin' into the affray by issuing Wenger with a 10,000 euro fine and a two-match touchline ban for communicating with his bench during last week's Big Cup qualify between Arsenal and Udinese.
Wenger was in the stands for correctly noting that the decision to send off Robin van Persie in last season's Big Cup bout against Barcelona made as much sense as the popularity of Jedward - but instead of bawling about being unclean or, indeed, concealing himself in a laundry basket, Wenger watched the Udinese match from the stands alongside his first-team coach, Boro Primorac, where he was convicted of occasionally putting words into the mouth of the ventriloquist's dummy that is Pat Rice.
"The Uefa control and disciplinary body has suspended Arsene Wenger from carrying out his duties at Arsenal's next two Uefa competition matches," dribbled a Uefa mandarin before belching, taking another chuck of Lobster Thermidor and adding: "Today's decision was taken in relation to the Arsenal manager not abiding by the decision of the control and disciplinary body during the [Big Cup] play-off game against Udinese." Wenger complained last week about being unaware of precisely what a touchline ban entails - "Frankly, you don't ever know what a manager's ban is," he scoffed - but reports that he has taken the prohibition on him "carrying out his duties" to mean that he is not allowed under any circumstances to properly strengthen his squad are, unlike Wenger, to be treated with contempt.
DOUBLE YOUR MONEY WITH BLUE SQUARE!
FIVER LETTERS
"Is anyone else sickened by the criticism Arsene Wenger is getting from Arsenal fans? He might not have won anything for a while, but he's had far less to spend on players than any team in the Big Six over the past few years. His teams play great football, have suffered a shocking run of injuries, and if he's hounded out of English football, we'll soon miss him" - David Priestley.
"As a native of the Spanish part of the Iberian peninsula I feel I have to point out that Getafe may well be competing with Real Madrid for the hearts of local madridistas, but not with Atletico. Madridistas is the collective name for Real Madrid fans. People from Madrid are called Madrilenos" - Enrique Nespereira.
"May I be the first pedant-with-no-plans-on-a-Friday-night to express my disappointment with your reference to "a suicidal koala bear?" As our friends in the southern hemisphere would be quick to point out, the koala is an arboreal herbivorous marsupial, and not a bear" - James Bothamley.
"Re: Friday's fiver. May I be one of doubtless 1,056 other wine pedants to point out that Riesling is not "usually sweet", and that the majority of wine produced from this grape is in the classic bone dry style of the Alsatians (the region of France, not the dogs)" - James Kirk.
"Having just seen the Getafe advert (Friday's Fiver), can I request that you do not stop Spanish football!" - Steve Hill.
Send your letters to the.boss@guardian.co.uk. And if you've nothing better to do you can also tweet the Fiver.
BITS AND BOBS
Barcelona sport director Andoni Zubizarreta says the club will not lodge a formal complaint after Real Madrid coach Jose Mourinho helpfully offered to remove the speck in Barca coach Tito Vilanova's eye. "I've never seen anything like it in my career," Zubizarreta added of The Special One's opthalmic assistance.
Stan "Steve" Staunton has joined Sundireland's coaching staff as a match assessor. "I'm sure he will be a great acquisition for us," whooped club manager Bernard Cribbins.
Milan have confirmed they are in talks to sign 'Liverpool midfielder' Alberto Aquilani. "I like him a lot, he's an interesting player," bunga bungaed Milan owner Silvio Berlusconi.
Supporters watching Santos' match against Morelia in Mexico were forced to take cover under their seats after a gunfight outside the ground led to stray bullets hitting the stadium causing the match to be abandoned.
Galatasaray have seemingly had enough of ute-driving, barbecued shrimp-eating Aussie gallahs, Harry Kewell and Lucas Neill, with the knack-prone one heading back to Melbourne Victory and the greedy one off to the UAE to trouser Al Jazira's millions.
STILL WANT MORE?
Raphael Honigstein got so hot and bothered about Werder Bremen's eight-goal thriller against Freiburg that the first sentence in his Bundesliga round-up is an exhausting 67 words long. Take a deep breath then dive in here.
"I'm not here on holiday," said Robbie Keane after scoring on his LA Galaxy debut. One man who is on holiday in Los Angeles, though, is Steve Busfield, who went to see the Irishman's soccerball debut for himself and filed this blog.
Guardian Towers collectively learned five things from the Premier League this weekend. One of them was that Man City's Edin Dzeko is actually brilliant and not a lumbering galoot. You can find out what the other four things are here.
AC Jimbo and co discuss swazz, whistling, zombies and even some of the weekend's action in a bumper Football Weekly.
And Michael Cox fills his tactical chalkboards with a zillion red dots and blue arrows to prove, among other things, that there is hope for Everton after all.
SIGN UP TO THE FIVER
Want your very own copy of our free tea-timely(ish) email sent direct to your inbox? Has your regular copy stopped arriving? Click here to sign up.
No hay comentarios:
Publicar un comentario