THERE’S ONLY ONE ROB STYLES?

Here is the news. Football is already a ‘limited-contact’ sport. It is not about to become a ‘non-contact’ one just because the Phil Neville tackle on Ronaldo during the recent Everton/Man Yoo game was punished with a booking, despite what Neville himself seemed to suggest in his post-match ‘Match of the Day’ interview.

By definition, a ‘non-contact sport’ is one where “players are physically separated such as to make it nearly impossible for them to make contact during the course of a game.” Tennis and bowling are examples (on Wikipedia, admittedly, but I think we can trust it on this one).

How Phil Neville sees football being turned into bowling by officious officials isn’t remotely clear. And anyway, limited-contact sports like football (and netball) “are sports in which rules are specifically designed to prevent contact between players.” So football is already supposed to be what I think Neville fears it may become.

Contact or no, referees must know all the tricks by now. As soon as defenders point to the ball after a tackle, the referee knows it’s a foul (Titus Bramble against Villa being the latest example). Any defender throwing their hands in the air has just used them to push someone over (the referee himself on one memorable Paolo de Canio occasion).

And if Ronaldo doesn’t dive, roll and grimace after being tackled, it’s a foul. So Rob Styles was unlucky, during the Man Yoo/Bolton game, to be confronted with the exception which proved that rule. Of course, the old-fashioned among you may consider a Bolton boot kicking the ball might have influenced Styles’ decision the other way. But refs can’t always be expected to notice such incidentals.

Perhaps Styles was less unlucky at St James’s Park when Habib Beye clattered into Robinho and pointed at the ball (although his tackle stretched the definition of ‘limited contact’ to its limit). On my first viewing – the newsflash highlights at the start of BBC’s ‘Inside Sport’ – it looked like a penalty. But this was a superficial glance at the issue, without depth or proper perspective…so unlike the rest of the programme.

The fact that Beye played the ball wasn’t in itself a reason not to give a foul. Just as Tottenham’s Michael Dawson getting “a bit” of the ball at the Britannia Stadium wasn’t enough to avoid a merited red card.

(There are supplementary arguments that the referee did well not to be distracted by Dawson getting anywhere near the ball at all for a change, and that Spurs would have been harsher punished by Dawson being left on the pitch. But we’ll leave them for now).

So Styles got a Football League game, Tuesday’s goalless draw between Bristol City and Sheffield United. A ‘demotion’, yes (although top-flight referees often preside over Championship matches). But a “humiliation”? The Times’ Martin Samuel seemed to think so: “Referees should be considered accountable but not…subjected to a procedure that imposes public humiliation” was his take on Styles being given a game at Ashton Gate in front of 17,000 people – fans who will have a view on their game being regarded as a “public humiliation.”

Samuel seems to think he’s already writing for the Daily Mail, such has been the one-eyed, little Englander nature of his recent output (the only context in which Samuel could be described as a “little” Englander). Bristol City v. Sheffield United is only “humiliation” if you consider the Premier League to be the only football in the country worth bothering with at all. Sadly, too many ‘top’ football writers are being sucked into this view. Samuel used to be a lot better than this. Maybe the sooner Samuel ****s off to the Mail the better.

It’s not even as if Styles would win any ‘worst decision of the month’ award for October. The two key factors refs have to consider before awarding a penalty – or waving strong penalty claims away if you’re Mike Riley – are: “Is it a foul?” and “Is it inside the box?” Thus does the award go to Lee Mason, almost at the last minute, for his nought out of two in the Middlesbrough/Manchester City game at the Riverside.

Arsenal fans of a certain age – those old enough to still care about FA Cup finals – still bang on about being robbed of one Wembley triumph after the winning goal came when the ball was crossed from some inches over the end line. Arsenal’s potential winning goal at Sunderland was scrubbed out by a flag-happy referee’s assistant making the flip side of that mistake, waving for a goalkick when the boy wonder Theo Walcott had done enough to prevent one. At first sight, the ball looked miles out but it turned out to be a case of things evening themselves out over rather more than a season – the FA Cup winners above were…Newcastle United. Yes, that long ago.

Days when goals were given even if goalkeepers hit the back of the net before the ball – Bobby Smith scored thirty keepers a season in Spurs title-winning days, which makes this a history lesson and a half). The stuff of sepia-tinted memories, which were brought back at Ewood Park earlier this month by Manchester United’s opening goal, Nemanja Vidic in the Bobby Smith role, Rovers’ second-choice goalkeeper Jason Brown in the role of hapless custodian (keepers were known as ‘hapless custodians’ in the days when Bobby Smith was scoring them).

The Guardian memorably described Blackburn as “radged off” by the decision. I have absolutely no idea what “radged off” means but it sounds about right.

Spurs current centre-forward Darren Bent is no Bobby Smith, of course. Indeed, for much of his Spurs career he’s been barely recognisable as a Darren Bent. And his goalscoring record in a ‘struggling’ Spurs side (there’s understatement for you) would be more mediocre still if it wasn’t for the Britannia Stadium referee’s assistant.

Bent doesn’t need bent decisions from officials any more, of course, now that the Spurs manager is such a diamond geezer. Mind you, if certain aspects of British justice should take one of the courses open to it in coming months, leaving Clive Allen in charge at the Lane, Bent might need a few more blatant offsides to boost his tally.

Only twelve short months ago, no-one knew the ‘new’ offside law. Now even Tony Gubba’s got the hang of it. He knows all the old laws too. He may be inches away from a telegram from the Queen and might even have been looking on when the offside law was changed in 1925. But he knew Andrew Johnson was onside for Fulham’s opener against Wigan.

The BBC graphics department hasn’t quite got the hang of things, showing Johnson to be ahead of Wigan’s last defender but ignoring the important point that he was behind the ball. Still, one step at a time, eh?

Assistants continue to get the basics wrong, though, Middlesbrough’s Tuncay being denied a ‘goal-of-the-month’ contender by an errant flag against Blackburn. But never mind Gareth Southgate. These things even themselves out over 76 years (above) and “over a season”, so the cliché goes.

And sometimes, as you now know to your benefit, within a matter of days.

‘MotorMurph’ is written by Mark Murphy

BOLTON WANDERERS v EVERTON - Bolt for the Blues

Wednesday 29 October 2008

Although Everton have surprisingly struggled at Goodison Park this season, their considerable away points collection seemed to have been further boosted by Marouane Fellaini’s last-gasp winner at Bolton Wanderers. However, in the move directly leading up to the goal, Steven Pienaar had marginally advanced in to an offside position when Phil Neville passed the ball in to his path before the South African went on to produce his telling cross.

The Right Result is a 0-0 draw.

TOO GOOD TO GO DOWN

I drafted the following while “events, dear boy, events” overtook the final two paragraphs. These ‘events’ will, IMO, ensure Spurs survival, despite Harry Redknapp’s mixed record in relegation battles (my support for Spurs, for the duration of his tenure, will not survive, although he is, of course, an innocent man, of course). If his overall track record is a guide, it’s just as well Spurs are massively profitable, as that money will soon go on ‘wheeler-dealing’ and exorbitant wages.

Sacking Gus Poyet IS a mistake on any level, especially if Redknapp brings his Portsmouth assistant manager with him. You can only hope Tony Adams would rather be on the dole than the White Hart Lane payroll.

I pen this introduction rather than amend the last paragraphs as, especially with regard to Gus Poyet, I stand by what I wrote.

Mark Murphy, 26 October, 8pm.

It’s the time of the season when pundits tell us that, this year, Liverpool have got a chance. Some succumb to this foolish temptation before others – hello, Alan Hansen. And in the wake of Liverpool’s various comebacks this season, especially at Eastlands, guess what?

A couple of insipid away performances usually see this off. Mind you, so do the appearances of Manchester United and Chelsea on the fixture list. So, this year, maybe…no…NO! Daniel Agger, title-winning centre-half????

Then there’s a wait until the first cuckoo of spring for the first “too good to go down.” So it was amazing to find both species of cliché on ‘Match of the Day 2’ the other week. Bloody global warming, eh? Or just an indication of just how bad Spurs are so far this season.

It’s rare that a relegated team is “too good to go down” after a 38-46 game-season in all weathers. Unless another relegation-threatened team blatantly cheats its way through it all, its strategy blatantly working over the last, say, nine games, and stays up by three points on the last day of the season after an away win at the already-crowned, demob-happy champions, thanks, blatantly to said strategy. And when has THAT ever happened?

That pundits mean is the club, by reputation/history, is “too good” to go down, regardless of the muck donning the shirt that particular season.

If you were Rip van Winkle’s stunt-double between 1978 and 1993, you’ll be surprised to find Nottingham Forest in this category (note to Forest: PLEASE take Michael Dawson back. PLEASE!).

They were ‘TGTGD’ in 1993 because Brian Clough was manager, yet went down because he was. At the risk of speaking ill of the dead, there was a reason why, shortly after Forest’s relegation, the joke ran that the City Ground’s new stand would be named the ‘Can hardly Stand’ in his honour.

Young readers may be equally-amazed at the phrase “when Manchester United got relegated.” But it happened. And it was amazing in 1974, too, six years after they won the European Cup. Imagine them relegated in 2005; except that England’s top-flight had, in modern parlance, sufficient “competitive balance” for that to happen then – the 70s weren’t just a golden era because of Micky Droy.

Oh…and Arnold Sidebottom, Ryan’s dad, who was a better cricketer than footballer but didn’t play test cricket for 13 years, was in that United side, while Denis Law was famously playing for City – scoring the only goal in the Old Trafford derby which mythically relegated United (even if Law hadn’t scored United would have gone down anyway).

AND United arrived at Spurs in November with goalkeeper Alex Stepney as top-scorer with two penalties.

Which brings us neatly to Spurs, who are this year’s ‘too-good-to-go-downers.’ Perhaps ill-advisedly, I expect pundits are right. For every Michael Dawson, there’s a Jonathan Woodgate to make up the deficit. For every Darren Bent there’s…oh ****. In 1976/77, the pundits were wrong.

Spurs would have been relegated in 1975 but for a fraught 2-0 home win over Chelsea, who went down instead, and a 4-2 home win over a distracted Leeds, themselves days from being robbed in a European Cup Final. In 1976, though, Spurs finished 9^th and in August 1976, they genuinely looked ‘TGTGD.’ Keith Burkinshaw was manager, Pat Jennings was goalkeeper, a certain G. Hoddle graced the midfield and striker John Duncan averaged a goal every other game, whether Spurs were 19^th or 9^th.

But Burkinshaw was new to the job, Hoddle was a feather-cutted teenager and Jennings was near retirement, leaving the following summer to spend only SEVEN…YEARS…AT… ARSENAL, winning the Cup and playing in a European final and two World Cup ones as his career cruelly petered out. Spurs got £35k for Jennings, not a pittance for a goalkeeper back then…though nothing would ever be enough and it remains the sort of transfer-business which inspires chairman Daniel Levy to this day. And, yes, I’m still bitter.

And Duncan was crocked. He played a dozen games before succumbing to a back operation. But he kept up his goals-per-game-ratio, including an equaliser against Arsenal at the Lane and finished third top-scorer alongside penalty-taker Osgood. KEITH Osgood.

Odd long-forgotten names like Micky Stead and Andy Keeley and never-to-be-forgotten names (and believe me, I’ve tried) like Terry Naylor, Willie Young, Don McAllister (the shakes are returning) and forwards Ian Moores, the perennial-hippy Chris Jones…and Alfie Conn.

Conn’s sideburns have a place all their own in Spurs’ hall of fame, which their owner certainly doesn’t – even in 1977 people they had people saying: “God, they’re ridiculous.”

All-in-all, you wonder how pundits considered Spurs TGTGD until mid-April, when their belief almost audibly evaporated after a draw at…er…Stoke.

There had been shafts of light in a season of brown. Spurs’ first win came at Old Trafford – United winning the Cup that year, denying Liverpool a League, Cup and European Cup treble 22 years before Manchester United themselves managed it.

Liverpool themselves were felled at the Lane. One of the few memories I have of the scrapbook I haphazardly kept that season is of the Mail picture of Ralph Coates, in full Bobby Charlton comb-over mode, grabbing the winner in full Geoff Hurst 1966 World Cup winning goal mode.

Other memories, though, are remorselessly bad. My first memory of the BBC teleprinter writing out a team’s score was Derby 8 (EIGHT) Tottenham H 2 (never ‘Spurs’, what a waste of licence-payers’ ink), the Beeb not trusting us to believe that Derby could rack up a baseball score at the Baseball Ground, even against Don McAllister.

I think they printed out every score of six or more. Had their limit been nine (which Spurs scored against Bristol Rovers almost exactly a year later), the emotional scars may have long healed.

My first memory of ITV’s Brian Moore NOT waxing lyrical at the wonders put before us on ‘The Big Match’ was after a ghastly 1-1 draw at home to Sunderland, the point salvaged by the only goal I ever remember Glastonbury-reject Jones scoring from more than eight yards. Moore was the Jonathan Pearce of his day and, being a Gillingham director, marvelled at old first division football, often at dog-whistle pitch.

Moore both commentated on and presented ‘The Big Match’, London Weekend Television’s pale Sunday afternoon ‘Match of the Day’ imitation. And, as presenter, admitted that while the game looked good in the highlights it was, in fact, dreadful – an admission he made neither before nor since.

(Some years later, ‘When Saturday Comes’ printed a letter: “Dear Brian, have there ever been bad games on television?” ‘Brian’s’ response was: “Yes, but only on the BBC.” I assume, without total conviction, it was a spoof).

The Sunderland and Stoke games virtually did for Spurs (similar results this year would have doubled Spurs’ points tally at the time of writing). Peter Taylor – yes, Leicester fans, that one – justified his £250k transfer-fee from third division for about the only time in a 3-1 home win over Aston Villa – Spurs thereby beating the champions and both domestic cup winners. But a 5-0 capitulation at second-placed Manchester City (different days!), finally turned logic and mathematics against them.

Fans none-too-peacefully invaded the pitch after the last game of the season, defiantly chanting “We’ll be back.” They were. They and Southampton both needed a draw on the last day of the following season to edge out Brighton on goal difference. Spurs got their draw, 0-0 at…Southampton (so, no funny business there). And from that day, Spurs have gone from…transition to…transition.

A glance at this year’s team sheet suggests that, yes, Spurs ARE too good to go down – even when Dawson is on it. Admittedly that feeling has rarely lasted two hours beyond kick-off. Yet Juande Ramos has too good a record, including last season, to be sacked by anyone sensible. And exactly the same goes for Gus Poyet, a refreshingly honest and entertaining post-match interviewee, even in such troubled times.

So you hope that Levy is as sensible with managers as he’s been with balancing the books (you could yet see Spurs avoiding relegation thanks to the bankruptcy of others). And that, as with Howard Kendall at Everton and Ferguson at Manchester United in the 1980s, such sense, and patience, is rewarded.

LUCKY LEEDS

As ideas go, it ranked alongside “that canoe guy.” To discredit Russian oligarch Michael Cherney during his dispute with fellow-oligarch and friend of the Tories Oleg Deripaska, PR firm Mirepco planted stories with accommodating journalists (a story there itself) that Cherney wanted to buy Leeds United in May 2007. With the media focus on Cherney, more smear stories would appear entirely discrediting him.

However, Cherney WAS interested in football, via Bulgarian club Levski, and football and its fans were busy welcoming money from criminal Thai ex-PMs. So Cherney could have ended up hugely popular.

Fortunately, the plan was overtaken by events at Leeds. Otherwise they’d have ended up with a borderline egomaniac with a dodgy financial past as chair…ah, hang on…

‘MotorMurph’ is written by Mark Murphy.

BLACKBURN ROVERS v MIDDLESBROUGH - Drawn to the punch

Saturday 25 October 2008

Blackburn Rovers continue to attract the attention of the Right Result concept with Paul Ince’s new charges now subject to seven judgements in their first nine games of the 2008-09 campaign. Initially they came out on the plus side of Middlesbrough’s visit to Ewood Park when a superb first-half effort by Boro’s Tuncay was incorrectly ruled out for offside. The balance was quickly restored though when Andrew Taylor inexplicably punched - rather than headed - away a dangerous Rovers cross without the punishment of a home penalty.

The Right Result is a 2-2 draw.

NEWCASTLE UNITED v MANCHESTER CITY - Unhappy Beye

Monday 20 October 2008

Is the tide turning on the Tyne after ten-men Newcastle United put in a spirited display against Manchester City to zoom up the Right Result league table. The Toon got off to a terrible start when a superb tackle by Habib Beye was very harshly adjudged to have been a penalty that was duly converted. Despite referee Rob Styles being in a poor position to make such a vital decision, with him being the last defender, the former Marseille defender was also sent-off. The penalty that wasn’t should have turned a hard earned draw into a valuable victory.

The Right Result is a 2-1 win to Newcastle United.

Footnote: Following his subsequent claim for wrongful dismissal, Habib Beye’s red card was withdrawn.

STOKE CITY v TOTTENHAM HOTSPUR - It can get worse

Sunday 19 October 2008

The question of the moment is can things get any worse for Tottenham Hotspur? Well, they can and they have. Having suffered their worst start to a season since 1912 (apparently, the Titantic sank that year), Spurs endured an horrendous day at Stoke City with another defeat, two dismissals and a sickening injury. The consolation was Darren Bent’s first-half goal…. except we’ve ruled it out as the England striker was in an offside position.

The Right Result is a 2-0 win to Stoke City.

(B)LEADERS IN FOOTBALL

We’ve been here before. FA bigwig calls for independent football regulator while the Premier League (PL) tells everyone who wants to know – and many who don’t – that everything’s lovely. Football’s partying like it’s 1999.

New for 2008 is an overly-nationalistic response to foreign owners (its depressing that nationality is dismissed as an issue merely because English owners can be crap too…Thaksin Shinawatra? Keith Haslam…), a global financial crisis (nee credit crunch) and a “Leaders in Football” conference at Stamford Bridge (and what better place to talk about football debt?).

Newspaper headlines about the conference focused on independent FA chairman Lord Triesman, in the bete-noire role perfected by FA CEO Adam Crozier back then, Richard Scudamore, in the ‘blind-monkey’ role perfected back then by…er…Richard Scudamore…and those pesky kids UEFA, especially that meddling…gulp…FRENCHman Michel Platini and his fancy…er…financial common-sense.

This press focus was understandable – two big English football organisations going head-to-head in public, the FA and UEFA “ganging up” on “our” Premier League, although there was plenty more to the conference – speakers and workshoppers from all parts.

A worrying percentage of these seemed well-equipped to lecture on “how not to do it.” Wembley National Stadium Ltd spoke on “building a commercially successful national stadium”, their fee doubtless helping pay the bills from their commercially dismal building process. MasterCard’s recent FIFA experiences weren’t a case study for “How football can deliver a return for its sponsors.” Chelsea’s Frank Arnesen didn’t use any ‘Panorama’ footage to illustrate his “developing the best talent” presentation, either.

He did use footage of Michael Woods, though, a player ‘developed by’ (i.e. ‘nicked’ from) Leeds and costing £5m compensation as a result (handy money for Leeds, or they’d have ended the season in administra…ah…). Leeds CEO Shaun Harvey had questions for Arnesen and the spat would have been Triesman/Scudamore-esque if Bates had attended. Fortunately for the conference’s credibility, he didn’t.

Bruce Buck spoke, putting paid to staple pub quiz question: “Who is Chelsea’s chairman?” which Chelsea fans everywhere get wrong. He opposed salary caps, because they wouldn’t allow Frank Lampard to be obscenely over-paid, and banged on about “soft, internal” debts, like they weren’t spending £1.35m A WEEK more than they were earning and weren’t praying Abramovich doesn’t die in a freak yachting accident.

The “Doing Business in India – the do’s and don’t’s” workshop needed following-up with “correct use of apostrophes.” “Understanding the soccer revolution” afforded opportunities to “create excitement in the brand.” Americans, naturally, one of which was Soccer United’s vice-president Will Wilson, whose parents might have benefited from an “imaginative first names for kids” presentation.

“Keeping the past for the future”, about archiving football material, was presented by a German company whose broadcasting software was called “Viz”, maintaining the comic-book theme of the PL’s financial policies. An intriguing hour covered “What can football learn from F1’s commercial programme?” (lesson one – ‘bung the PM a million quid…especially if his political party is broke’). “How to attract global sponsors irrespective of performance” would have attracted Donna-Maria Cullen…Tottenham’s delegate. Oh…and Charlton’s three delegates were all called Steve.

But if the conference is remembered at all, it will be for the FA v PL battle. In my youth, golf’s Ryder Cup was a one-sided Britain and Ireland v. America affair, only nominally a contest, until the Europeans (Spain…and Bernhard Langer) joined in. In 1999/2000 the FA v. the PL was as one-sided as pipe-smoking Brian Barnes v Jack Nicklaus, FA fuddy-duddies Graham Kelly and Geoff Thompson no match for David Dein, Bates or Scudamore. Enter Adam Crozier.

Crozier was of his time. Style-over-substance, if not overwhelmingly so. Little wonder, really, that he came up with Eriksson as England boss. He was an idea’s man and if he shunned the hard work that came with that territory, the PL still needed a strategy to sideline him as they marched towards dominance of the domestic game…and its money. Thompson, you suspected, could no more spell ‘intellectual challenge’ than present one.

Fresh from Saatchi-&-Saatchi and having reportedly left the Telegraph’s advertising department under a cloud, Crozier was an easy-ish target for a PL PR-machine with friends in high press places…and the Mail. He wasn’t “a real football man” – not attending enough games for some tastes – and accusations of waste were strengthened by a rising FA wage bill.

It mattered not that Crozier’s reform proposals were mostly financial and regulatory and didn’t require in-depth knowledge of Arsenal’s midfield. Nor that accusations of waste were coming from football business failures like (Sheffield Wednesday fans look away now) Dave Richards, who themselves set Crozier’s ‘excessive’ salary in their roles as FA Board members.

Where the PL were accustomed to an FA asking “how high?” when told to jump, Crozier often said: “er…no.” But without time to implement reforms that would strengthen him enough to battle the PL, he had no chance. His vision didn’t mean more money for PL chairmen, so out he went. As David Conn memorably wrote: “Crozier (wanted) to use the power of football to build a better future. No wonder he didn’t last long, coming out with crazy talk like that.”

The FA is now older and wiser, while the PL is just older. Two disinterested parties in 1999/2000, UEFA and the government, are now anything but. And the press are more divided, chastened by PL excesses and foreigners coming over here, taking (over) our football clubs.

The government’s new position is key. Football appears party-apolitical, and with Thatcherite Lord Mawhinney overseeing a laudably reformist Football League, rightly so. Culture Secretary Andy Burnham chaired Supporters Direct, an organisation encouraging and facilitating good governance and supporter involvement in club ownership. Through their influence and that of journalists like Conn, supporters are more financially literate than ever.

Scudamore hasn’t noticed and was caught unawares by Triesman’s ‘Leaders in Football’ conference address. His jaw-dropping comment about delegates “having to” listen to Triesman when they were there to hear him was codswallop. The conference programme titled Triesman’s ‘keynote’ address: “Governing the game (and) building a sustainable future for football,” undermining Scudamore’s portrayal of Triesman as hi-jacking the event.

Scudamore was clearly distracted, defending PL ‘fit-and-proper-persons’ regulations as responsible for removing Thaksin Shinawatra – Thailand’s Supreme Court might not concur – and suggesting that the regulations “may not have the correct name,” as if calling them ‘Eric’ would be an improvement.

The tactics employed to discredit Crozier are being re-employed, e.g. attempts to make an issue of Triesman’s political history. Triesman only left the Communist Party in 1976 but his politics then are as relevant as mine – I was 10 and only hated Thatcher because she resembled a horrid dinner-lady at my school.

The otherwise-laudable Gabriele Marcotti wrote in the Times: “It makes you wonder how well he understands business…I doubt he’d get far on ‘The Apprentice.’” Further than Scudamore and his PL business-plan, I’d venture.

Triesman may understand business better than Marcotti understands politics. “Lifelong trade unionist” isn’t the insult it was in Arthur Scargill’s day. And opposition to UEFA general-secretary David Taylor’s comments on European football governance has barely risen above grubby Francophobia.

We’re told that France’s club-licensing system has led to Lyon winning seven league titles in-a-row, though we’re not told how. And, apparently, UEFA are “bluffing” when they threaten Champions’ League expulsion, which will be news to CSKA Sofia, expelled this season for unpaid debts to the Bulgarian DSS. “They wouldn’t expel Chelsea” the critics add, unwittingly acknowledging the “competitive imbalance” UEFA are trying to eradicate.

The FA and UEFA “ganging up” on “our” Premier League boys is all down to UEFA president Michel Platini’s inherent anti-Englishness, apparently. And Taylor is Scottish, so he and Platini are just reforming the “Auld Alliance”, as 14^th-century European geopolitics guides their every move.

The general financial crisis has quickened football’s financial debate and Scudamore’s faith in clubs’ survival may be tested sooner than later. He told the conference: “It is my view that clubs are managing debt responsibly” (imagine if they weren’t) and he’s consistently believed in football’s ability to attract ego-driven moneymen to ensure against any clubs’ financial demise.

The 1980s saw many lower division clubs hang by a financial thread, the iconic image being locked gates at Middlesbrough’s Ayresome Park. They all, just, survived, thanks largely to such moneymen…and remarkably resilient fan-bases. Scudamore believes we are now watching the sequel: “Clubs…today are very similar to the clubs of yesteryear” he claimed (more codswallop, FA rule 34 prevented profiteering out of football clubs). “They are brands,” (very different to clubs of yesteryear), “that persevere and survive,” he added, before his Gordon-Gekko-in-reverse punchline: “Debt is healthy.”

He’s not fooling everyone. Even Football Focus’s Martin Keown (“that well-known financial expert” chortled Pat Nevin in the same programme) called Scudamore “blasé.” While the Sunday Telegraph’s Patrick Barclay made a Titanic analogy last longer than it took the ship itself to sink.

ALL genuine football fans should join in. Triesman may be an ex-commie trade unionist with off-putting specs. But when it comes to “building a sustainable future for football”, he’s right’.

MotorMurph’ is written by Mark Murphy

A POSSIBLE JOB

Memories do play tricks. In the infamous 1994 Graham Taylor documentary ‘An Impossible Job’ Phil Neal isn’t the village idiot. He parroted a few Taylor inanities. But it was their synchronised arm-folding which arrested the attention, all Les Dawson and Roy Barraclough at their ‘Cissie and Ada’ best.

While Neal was occasionally perceptive and Taylor a character you could warm to, it was Lawrie McMenemy’s village left struggling for an idiot on England matchdays. McMenemy’s tactical input focused on shaking stuff (cobwebs, probably) from his FA blazer. And when Taylor is filmed in the programme addressing an FA Committee including the fusty Philip Carter and the bewigged and possibly asleep Peter Swales, you warm to the manager even more.

ITV repeated the documentary, which was originally a strand of Channel 4’s excellent ‘Cutting Edge’ series, and showed Taylor’s follow-up ‘England Expects’ to build-up their first live England qualification coverage since 2000. Taylor’s over-long criticism of ‘media intrusion’ in the latter hardly sits well with the very concept of the former (a whole qualifying campaign spent with a camera, almost literally at times, up his nose). This has been pointed out by the enemies Taylor still has in the press (check Charles Sale’s Mail column for, endless, details). Nonetheless, ‘An Impossible Job’ remains about the best-ever football documentary.

It reminded viewers how unlucky England were in both Holland World Cup ’94 qualifiers. At Wembley, a voiceover refers to Des Walker fouling “on the brink of the area”, i.e. OUTside. Yet a penalty follows. And England were utterly sawn-off in Rotterdam. At one end, Koeman gets a yellow card for a red-card offence and England’s free-kick is charged down by a Dutch defender correctly described as “three yards” away by commentator Brian Moore. At the other end, Paul Ince gets booked for much the same encroachment…and it’s the retake which Koeman scores, Neal spotting this fundamental, and in his case too, career-ending inconsistency.

Bar the oft-quoted “Do I not like that?” and “Can we not knock it?” the doc is best remembered for what follows. Taylor feels he “lost the plot” but actually he was outstanding. “Tell your mate he’s got me the sack…thank him for me” is comedy-classic territory (“Four candles…handles for forks?” Pah!). You sense such dripping sarcasm would be beyond Neil Warnock in that situation and what manager would show the fourth official such understanding – “I know you can’t say anything” – as their career crumbled. Ferguson? Wenger??

Oh…and I’d clean forgotten Paul Merson’s free-kick off the inside of the post, with the score still 1-0. Whoever said it was as important to be a lucky manager as a good one had proof of their wisdom in Rotterdam.

That said, the documentary’s premise, that ‘England manager’ is an ‘impossible job’, withstands no scrutiny. Even the over-promoted Taylor was OK for a bit. Eriksson would have swapped his qualifying campaigns for Taylor’s Euro ’92 one, McLaren would have swapped his brolly for any qualification. The job was only ‘impossible’ with Carlton Palmer in midfield and an out-of-form Des Walker in a back three against Norway, with an out-of-talent Tony Adams and Gary Pallister trusted to clear up any mess.

You still warm to him, though. Supporters would have been taken aback by Taylor answering back in the middle of a vital World Cup qualifier when they tore into an under-achieving John Barnes. Ramsey wouldn’t have sniffed towards the great unwashed, Revie would have kept his answers to four letters each, Greenwood was so meek he might have cried and Robson would have convinced everyone he didn’t know what was going on…even without trying. But Taylor heart-warmingly defended a player he’d nurtured since both their Watford days…though whether the defence worked probably depended on whether they were slagging Barnes for form or colour.

You could almost excuse Taylor’s potty-mouth in Poland, where players did “everything I told them not to.” This raised the question of respect, however. In ‘England Expects’ Taylor blamed his loss of authority on the Sun photoshopping him into a turnip, alongside the ‘Swedes 2 Turnips 1’ headline which accompanied England’s Euro ’92 exit. But if one photo did the trick, how much respect was there in the first place?

None from Paul Ince, to judge by body language – you hope he’s faring better at Ewood Park. It was as if, in Year 2 of English football’s shiny re-birth, Taylor was an old-school Football League manager caught in Premier League headlights (especially in those specs) – a view reinforced when the one tactical innovation featured in the programme, an ultimately successful Stuart Pearce free-kick manoeuvre, was Paul Bloody Gascoigne’s idea.

‘England Expects’ wasn’t a true sequel in that, sadly, we got no ‘camera-up-the-nose’ insight into Steve McClaren’s tactics – there was an hour to fill, after all. Alas, it wasn’t much of anything.

It combined various England managerial variations on “it’s the media’s fault” with unchallenged assertions, for which not a shred of evidence was offered, that the England job was “the biggest” in world football. Bigger than Brazil, where World Cup final defeat equates to national disgrace? Spain, with their history of genuine under-achievement (until this summer), as opposed to Andy Sinton not carrying England to USA ’94? No-one asked.

“One of the biggest” ventured a nervous Eriksson to Taylor, almost by way of correction. Croatian manager Slaven Bilic said English football remained highly-esteemed, what with seven of the England team having played what he quaintly still referred to as the “European Cup Final”, not that Bilic was about to dismiss them as clod-hoppers, the day after they’d won 4-1 in Zagreb.

In “An Impossible Job” Taylor noted, correctly, that “Whether we gave the game to the world is irrespective”, mangling English as only English-England managers can – is it in the contract? This ‘gift’ is the only conceivable reason for the England job to be so vaunted.

Terry Venables might have had a view, which might have been why he wasn’t asked. Hoddle had a view (groan). Taylor claimed Hoddle was hounded out of the job, overlooking the obnoxious Sunday Times interview which released the hounds. Hoddle pushed things by saying quarter-final exits should be celebrated – hardly the winning mentality of a top manager. And his anecdote about journalists praising his “back four”, i.e. defence, (“I had to laugh…we’d played a back three”) displayed the arrogance which made him such a beautiful player and ugly personality. “Judge me on results” he pleaded. OK, then….you were rubbish.

Taylor’s media confrontation was ‘rubbish’ too – an inappropriately chummy affair with three journos he admitted would be the only ones to whom he’d say ‘take care’ if they were crossing a busy street. He amusingly recalled Brain Woolnough being ejected from the Rotterdam referee’s changing-room shouting “cheat” – “yet 12 hours later, in the Sun, it was all the manager’s fault”, but failed to correct Patrick Barclay’s assertion that Taylor himself had been the first recipient of press abuse, airbrushing from history the eight years of bile thrown Bobby Robson’s way.

Taylor ought to have been on firmer ground criticising the Premier League’s impact on the England team. England manager at its formation and therefore supposedly a major beneficiary, Taylor famously derided it as “based on greed.” But he wasted the opportunity in the documentary, wondering if ‘Premier League-style football’ suited the England team, while bemoaning the number of foreigners producing it. AND he interviewed Harry Redknapp.

And there was too much “Thank you Sven/Glenn/Slaven…it’s been very interesting”, even after interviews which were anything but. The documentary’s editor must have missed that meeting.

By chance, ‘England Expects’ answered the question it asked, by insisting that the England manager’s job was the biggest and quarter-final exits on penalties and to mis-hit free-kicks were abject failures. Why does ‘England’ expect? There’s a clue in there somewhere.

Only Eriksson pitched it right. And, of course, he’s not English. “Fifty cameras outside your house every morning” and “club managers who don’t like friendlies” (hello Alex) made his job difficult but not impossible – precisely what the England job is and what any top international job should be. Remember, Ramsey got it right for years…and even Robson got the hang of it eventually.

When Taylor resigned in 1993, ‘When Saturday Comes’ produced a wonderful cover shot of Taylor, with a thought bubble to match his expression: “My God, I was crap, wasn’t I?” Harsh…but funny. And closer to the point than ‘England Expects.’

An ‘impossible’ job? Only if you’re doing it wrong.

OINK

Last week’s ‘Leaders in Football’ conference was, according to the organisers – who ought to know, a “summit for 1,000 leading decision-makers in world football.” Turns out they were wrong. Richard Scudamore said: “1,000 people attended the (conference) to hear about the Premier League’s vision for the future” And he “felt sorry” for those “who had to hear about something else.” Yes, he said that.

What an arrogant pig. Any true football lover should surely back FA chairman Lord David Triesman in all his battles with this superannuated sales rep.

‘MotorMurph’ is written by Mark Murphy

BLACKBURN ROVERS v MANCHESTER UNITED - Ince whinge

Saturday 4 October 2008

Blackburn Rovers and referee Steve Bennett confirmed their early season status as Right Result regulars with both parties involved in RR incidents for the third game this term. Meanwhile, Manchester United can have little complaint with officialdom as they were on the favourable end of refereeing decisions for the second week in a row. Rovers boss and former Reds favourite Paul Ince described United’s opener at Ewood Park as a ‘diabolical decision’. That’s  maybe on the harsh side but it could be seen - from behind the goal - that Blackburn keeper Jason Brown was impeded by Nemanja Vidic’s elbow before Wes Brown netted.

The Right Result is a 1-0 win to Manchester United.

POMPEY PLAYING UP

Harry Redknapp and Peter Storrie, Portsmouth manager and chief executive, have always been a team, for reasons, valid or not, of interest to football people and City of London Police alike. And they were never slicker than when recently summing up modern football’s ills in a paragraph each, about their own club, in response to revelations of their own club’s (lack of) finances.

It isn’t news that Portsmouth are skint. Redknapp, though, isn’t worried, probably relishing the prospect of a transfer-window’s wheeler-dealing in January (with all its, shall we say, ‘attendant benefits’). “You show me a football club that isn’t in a bit of debt,” he cried.

Leaving aside his definition of £60m as ‘a bit of debt’, Redknapp says this like it’s a good thing, or at least a natural part of modern football life. If that is general thinking, pages of football club accounts are explained.

Storrie defended Portsmouth’s considerable expenditure – of (TV) money they didn’t have yet, or money they simply didn’t have at all: “(Wages) collate pretty much to where teams finished in the Premier League.”

The Independent’s Mark Steel wrote in May, jokingly: “Club chairmen should declare how much money they’ve got, and the league table should be based on the results. This will save the bother of playing the games.” And one of the game’s leading administrators concurs. Excuse any typos…my head is being surgically removed from my hands.

But this Laurel and Hardy tribute band masks the point about Portsmouth’s finances. The main thing we didn’t know about Alexandre Gaydamak when he bought half the club from Milan Mandaric in January 2006 was how and where he got the £15m so to do. He claimed: “It is my money from ten years of working in real estate and finance” – the ‘real estate’ being ‘Russian property deals’, entirely above suspicion at the turn of the century, the ‘finance’ from his companies assets. Except that the few with any assets at all, or not owing HM Customs a quarter of a million quid, were earning thousands, not the millions thrown Mandaric’s way.

The suspicion, even among largely financially illiterate football journos, was that ‘Daddy was paying’, which in itself wasn’t necessarily a problem, especially as Daddy owned Israeli football club Beitar Jerusalem and was a phenomenally rich ‘international businessman.’ Except that his ‘international business’ attracted tax he didn’t pay and international arrest warrants from which Arkadi Gaydamak (for it is he) has been on the run since 2000.

We learned from last year’s Manchester City ownership saga – the Thaksin Shinawatra one – that such things wouldn’t necessarily fall foul of the Premier League’s ‘fit and proper persons’ standards. Gaydamak’s only conviction, Al Capone-style, has been for the tax evasion.

Meanwhile, Global Witness, a Nobel Peace Prize-nominated independent organisation investigating big-business ethics, supplied Hampshire Police with a hefty file on Alexandre’s business history, headlining the disparity between his Portsmouth millions and his company’s tuppenny-ha’penny turnovers.

£30m was apparently earned from entirely unspecified property deals and a Moscow-based financial brokerage business, Antanta-Capital Group, whose post-tax profits prior to Alexandre’s Portsmouth takeover were a mere £366,000. It’s ownership structure also raised eyebrows - parent company, Lamda Investments International being 51% owned by nameless ‘physical persons’…as opposed to ghosts, presumably.

Yet these millions never materialised from either Gaydamak. Alexandre neither bought Portsmouth shares nor joined the club’s board, initially giving lie to the Premier League’s claim that he was being rigorously examined under ‘fit and proper person’ regulations. These only applied to directors and not mere owners like Alexandre and, ludicrously, Roman Abramovich (loophole, what loophole?).

Even prize cynics like Private Eye suggested this was “perhaps proof positive that Daddy has nothing to do with Pompey.” Arkadi was about to be investigated by Israeli police over money-laundering allegations just as Alexandre was about to ‘invest’ in Portsmouth. But that was a co-incidence of timing and absolutely…nothing…else.

All Portsmouth’s January 2006 transfer window activity was with borrowed money, Alexandre effectively taking out a mortgage on £15m-worth of players in his first weeks. As Mihir Bose noted in the Telegraph: “Directors lend money by taking a mortgage on club assets or even on TV or season-ticket income.” But Portsmouth had been there and done that. And, as Bose added: “the only thing left were the players.”

Portsmouth have been borrowers ever since. Bankers Singer and Friedlander, hardy football finance perennials, loaned enough to Portsmouth in July 2006 to pay Alexandre back his January ‘spend’, without persuading him to “take any beneficial interest in the share capital of Portsmouth’s parent company, Devondale Investments, registered in hardy football finance perennial number two, the British Virgin Islands, and itself “controlled by Mr A Gaydamak.” Alexandre, naturally.

He did buy Mandaric out completely, shortly after the Singer and Friedlander loan but within a year, Portsmouth were tapping the South African-based Standard Bank for £24m, secured partly on future TV income – as is Premier League clubs’ wont. This brought total loans for 2006/07 to £31.6m, £2.7m of which accrued…ulp…15% interest. This allowed more of the transfer market hyper-activity for which he’s largely taken credit himself.

However, a £30m rise in wages accompanied Portsmouth’s rise to ninth in the league (typical Redknapp, as Bournemouth fans in the 1980s could testify). And £23m losses were posted in May 2007, local newspapers noting that “the (financial) results underlined Pompey’s need to move to a new stadium…to boost revenue streams.”

Ah yes, the new ground, Alexandre’s reason for getting involved in the first place and his only hope of eventually making money out of Portsmouth. But if he does, it will be very eventually. A 36,000-seater development on 13 acres ‘down the docks’ was unveiled in April 2007 “subject to consultation with stakeholders” – normally a pat phrase but not when the stakeholders include the Royal Navy and they want adjacent land for aircraft carriers…

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