Category Archives: Football

That Was The Year That Will Be

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It’s that time of the year again where every newspaper, website, magazine, pamphlet, TV show and idiot-with-a-keyboard in whatever field produce their end of year awards or lists.  You know the sort of thing- ’50 Best Albums of the Year’, ’25 Best Movie Scenes of 2009′, ‘The Top 10 Shows Which Are A Bit Like Flash-Forward, But Aren’t Flash-Forward’ and, being a decent sort, I’ll sum them all up for you right now and save you the time of actually reading them.
The Resistance by Muse, Jade Goody R.I.P., Roger Federer’s French Open Final, That Scene From ‘Bruno’ On The Talk Show, Roy Cropper in a Canal, Michael Jackson, Thierry Henry’s hand, Michael Jackson, Barack Obama, Michael Jackson, The 4th Series of 30 Rock, House is in a Mental Asylum!, A Creeping Sense of Existentialist Dread, Michael McIntyre, Jedward, Jedward, Does Anyone Else Feeling This Gnawing Emptiness?, Fucking Bono.
There you go.  Done.  That was 2009 which, if it had a unifying theme, was essentially 2008 with more resonant celebrity deaths.  And now that it’s out of the way and I’ve summed it all up for you we can get on to job of dishing out next year’s awards- a process rendered infinitely more fun that for 2009 as it’s based on a combination of idle speculation, crackpot brainstorming and desperately chased hunches.  And so, ladies and gentleman, 13 months early, I present The ItSaysHere 2010 Awards…
Album of the Year- ‘Susan Boyle’s Second Album By Susan Boyle’- Susan Boyle:  Boyle won 14 Grammys, 8 Brit Awards and sold 47 million copies of this, her 2nd album, on which she presents a stirring collection of touching but powerful cover versions of her favourite touching but powerful Leona Lewis cover versions.  Bonus Track:  Leona Lewis and Susan Boyle cover Will Young and Gareth Gates’ cover of ‘The Long And Winding Road’.
Film of the Year- ‘Paedophil’- Sascha Baron Cohen trawls across America’s deep south in the guise of a convicted child sex offender called Philip.  Spends all his time making incredibly insensitive comments about any children in his vicinity and offering to buy an hour of delirious sexual pleasure with any passing kids by negotiating with thier parents in a thick Belgian accent and outrageous hat thereby making a point about the reactionary nature of many Americans but actually just proving that Baron Cohen can do funny voices and is happy to risk getting his head kicked in.
TV Show of the Year- ‘The X Factor Election Special 2010′- Hosted by Dermot O’Leary and David Dimbleby, the nation goes to the polls to decide who will occupy 10 Downing Street next year with a mandate to ease Britain through difficult economic times and increasing European intergration as well as a 1 year record deal with Simon Cowell.  The public vote and Peter Snow’s ‘Swing-o-meter’ will decide the final two before they go before the judges panel (Cowell, Louis Walsh, Cheryl Cole, Diane Abbott MP, Ian Hislop) for a vote-off.  They both get to make one final impassioned speech to the nation, highlight 3 manifesto policies of their choice and perform their favourite Rod Stewart song before the winner is announced and the Queen joins them onstage to plug her latest single and ask them to form a government.
Sportsman of the Year-  Thierry Henry- Redeems himself for his handball against the Irish by not only guiding the French to World Cup glody but also winning Strictly Come Dancing- beating Greg Wallace from Masterchef in the final foxtrot round- and also starring in the greatest Gillette advert ever with Tiger Woods who everyone’s been looking at a bit funny since that car crash.  Not that anything happened in that car crash, you understand.  I’m just saying.  I mean, they don’t crash themselves do they?  And what was he doing out at that time of the night anyway?  Two words- Geroge Michael.  That’s all I’m saying.  Just that.
Fiction Book of the Year- ‘Flags and Giraffes’ by Eileen O’Murray- Utterly pretentious load of shit which features no discernable plot whatsoever, has hardly any interesting or likeable characters, is sprinkled with swear words and descriptions of drug taking to try to seem edgy, and is mostly told from the perspective of a narrator who is needlessly cryptic and moany.  Is easily battered in terms of originality, ideas, interest and sheer story-telling ability by every single comic produced this year but everyone on Newsnight Review is terrified that they’ll be struck of the list of pretentious clever-clogs for even admitting they’ve heard of Superman.  Throughout 2010 comics will remain so hopelessly uncool that not even Will Self will pretend to like them ironically to annoy The Guardian.
Non-Fiction Book of the Year- ‘Battered in the Pants’ by Jim Hell- A publishing milestone as, after years of misery memoirs clogging up the nations’ bookshelves and being bought by an apparently multi-million strong population of unsettling voyeurs, this represents the first book to be written by someone who actively set out to get abused as a child knowing the lucrative career that would follow as a writer in later years.  This particularly harrowing tale of constantly going to the vicars house in a tight shorts and a vest top to take showers while asking for help in finding the soap will move even the most hardened psychopath to tears.
Celebrity of the Year- Robbie Williams- Scores a major hit in all the celebrity magazines and websites by finally reuniting on stage with Take That.  His decision to patch things up with Gary Barlow was, he says, a really special moment for him and not in any way to do with the fact that they now sell more records than him and is entirely unconnected to the reality that he’ll suddenly get a bit of an attention spike in a career that was rapidly plummeting downhill while his former bandmates about whom he’d not shown the slightest interest in the last near-decade were suddenly the biggest act in Britain again.
News Event of the Year- The End of the World As Gabriel’s Trumpet Sounds, The Rivers Run With Blood and War, Famine, Pestilence and Death Stalk The Land.  All in HD on Sky News!

It’s that time of the year again where every newspaper, website, magazine, pamphlet, TV show and idiot-with-a-keyboard in whatever field produce their end of year awards and lists.  You know the sort of thing- ’50 Best Albums of the Year’, ’25 Best Movie Scenes of 2009′, ‘The Top 10 Shows Which Are A Bit Like Flash-Forward, But Aren’t Flash-Forward’ and, being a decent sort, I’ll sum them all up for you right now and save you the time of actually reading any of them.

The Resistance by Muse, Jade Goody R.I.P., Roger Federer’s French Open Final, That Scene From ‘Bruno’ On The Talk Show, Roy Cropper in a Canal, Michael Jackson, Thierry Henry’s Hand, Michael Jackson, Barack Obama, Michael Jackson, The 4th Series of 30 Rock, House is in a Mental Asylum!, A Creeping Sense of Existentialist Dread, Michael McIntyre, Jedward, Jedward, Does Anyone Else Feeling This Gnawing Emptiness?, Fucking Bono.

There you go.  Done.  That was 2009 which, if it had a unifying theme, was essentially 2008 with more resonant celebrity deaths.  And now that it’s out of the way and I’ve summed it all up for you we can get on to job of dishing out next year’s awards.  Yes, just for you, I’m going to get the jump on absoultely everybody else on the planet and give you the highlights of 2010 before they even have a chance to happen.  Doing this is a process rendered infinitely more fun than doing it for 2009 as it’s based on a combination of idle speculation, crackpot brainstorming and desperately chased hunches.  And so, ladies and gentleman, 13 months early, I present The ItSaysHere 2010 Awards…

Album of the Year- ‘Susan Boyle’s Second Album By Susan Boyle’- Susan Boyle:  Boyle won 14 Grammys, 8 Brit Awards and sold 47 million copies of this, her 2nd album, on which she presents a stirring collection of touching but powerful cover versions of her favourite touching but powerful Leona Lewis cover versions.  Bonus Track:  Leona Lewis and Susan Boyle cover Will Young and Gareth Gates’ cover of ‘The Long And Winding Road’.

Film of the Year- ‘Paedophil’- Sascha Baron Cohen trawls across America’s deep south in the guise of a convicted child sex offender called Philip.  Spends all his time making incredibly insensitive comments about any children in his vicinity and offering to buy an hour of delirious sexual pleasure with any passing kids by negotiating with their parents in a thick Belgian accent and outrageous hat, thereby making a point about the reactionary nature of many Americans but actually just proving that Baron Cohen can do funny voices and is happy to risk getting his head kicked in.

TV Show of the Year- ‘The X Factor Election Special 2010‘- Hosted by Dermot O’Leary and David Dimbleby, the nation goes to the polls to decide who will occupy 10 Downing Street next year with a mandate to ease Britain through difficult economic times and increasing European intergration as well as a 1 year record deal with Simon Cowell.  The public vote and Peter Snow’s ‘Swing-o-meter’ will decide the final two before they go before the judges panel (Cowell, Louis Walsh, Cheryl Cole, Diane Abbott MP, Ian Hislop) for a vote-off.  They both get to make one final impassioned speech to the nation, highlight 3 manifesto policies of their choice and perform their favourite Rod Stewart song before the winner is announced and the Queen joins them onstage to plug her latest single and ask them to form a government.

Sportsman of the Year-  Thierry Henry- Redeems himself for his handball against the Irish by not only guiding the French to World Cup glory but also winning Strictly Come Dancing- beating Greg Wallace from Masterchef in the final foxtrot round- and also starring in the greatest Gillette advert ever with Tiger Woods who everyone’s been looking at a bit funny since that car crash.  Not that anything happened in that car crash, you understand.  I’m just saying;  I mean, they don’t crash themselves do they?  And what was he doing out at that time of the night anyway?  Two words- Geroge Michael.  That’s all I’m saying.  Just that.

Fiction Book of the Year- ‘Flags and Giraffes’ by Eileen O’Murray- Utterly pretentious load of shit which features no discernable plot whatsoever, has hardly any interesting or likeable characters, is sprinkled with swear words and descriptions of drug taking to try to seem edgy, and is mostly told from the perspective of a narrator who is needlessly cryptic and moany and who you wouldn’t piss on if they were on fire.  Is easily battered in terms of originality, ideas, interest and sheer story-telling ability by every single comic produced this year but everyone on Newsnight Review is terrified that they’ll be struck of the list of pretentious clever-clogs for even admitting they’ve heard of Superman.  Throughout 2010 comics will remain so hopelessly uncool that not even Will Self will pretend to like them ironically to annoy The Guardian.

Non-Fiction Book of the Year- ‘Battered in the Pants’ by Jim Hell- A publishing milestone as, after years of misery memoirs clogging up the nations’ bookshelves and being bought by an apparently multi-million strong population of unsettling voyeurs, this represents the first book to be written by someone who actively set out to get abused as a child knowing the lucrative career that would follow as a writer in later years.  This particularly harrowing tale of constantly going to the vicar’s house in tight shorts and a vest top to take showers while asking for help in finding the soap will move even the most hardened page-twitching psychopath to tears.

Celebrity of the Year- Robbie Williams- Scores a major hit in all the celebrity magazines and websites by finally reuniting on stage with Take That.  His decision to patch things up with Gary Barlow was, he says, a really special moment and not in any way to do with the fact that they now sell more records than him and is entirely unconnected to the reality that he’ll suddenly get a bit of an attention spike in a career that was rapidly plummeting downhill while his former bandmates about whom he’d not shown the slightest interest in the last near-decade were suddenly the biggest act in Britain again.

News Event of the Year- The End of the World As Gabriel’s Trumpet Sounds, The Rivers Run With Blood and War, Famine, Pestilence and Death Stalk The Land. All in HD on Sky News!

Rotate to Victory

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I bet you don’t like politicians. I don’t. They’re so false, aren’t they? Lying, cheating, swindeling, corrupt bastards the lot of them. Scum, wrapped in tosser, coated in idiot and wearing a suit. That’s what you think of them isn’t it? Well shame on you. Shame. Because that description of politicians I’ve just given- that’s you that is.

Not all of the time, obviously. That’s the difference between them and you. But, like every good politician, you at some point have popped on a nice suit and lied, cheated and swindled your arse off- like you’re a raging diabetic and fibs are insulin. Or at least you have if you’ve ever had a job interview.

Job interviews are ridiculous things. Think about it, none of the important jobs ever have them do they? Optumus Prime never sat down in front of a committee of three Autobots in suits and interviewed for the top job did he? He never had to answer endless questions such as “Optumus, could you give us an example of when Unicron eating someone’s planet has caused conflict with members of your team?” and he never had to do a role-play based on using the Autobot Matrix of Leadership to improve productivity in the fourth quarter.

However, if you want to do something trivial and unimportant, like working in a call centre, in a shop or as the England football manager, then you’ll be familiar with the hell that is the interview process. In the latter case, the footballers you’ll be in charge of will never have had an interview in their life- other than those conducted in front of a board of sponsors logos by a commentator armed with a microphone and platitudes- which probably explains why they’re the way they are.

Think about it- most people nowadays find footballers to be about as trustworthy and wholesome as a Russian nuclear reactor, and with good reason, but they can’t all be like that just because they have the ability to propel a sphere around some grass with a degree of accuracy. Maybe it’s because they never have to look over their shoulder and worry about the next time that they’re after a transfer and they have to tell their prospective employers a steaming pile of horse-poo about working in a team and having never had a sick-day since primary school.

That’s my main bone of contention with modern footballers really- sure I envy the job and the money but what I’m really jealous of is the fact that they don’t have to give a monkeys about anyone or anything beyond whatever they wish. And if you think that’s a disgraceful attitude for them to have then I absolutely guarantee that if anyone reading this was to swap places with a Premiership footballer they’d be just as pampered, whiny, self-absorbed and mollycoddled as them within a fortnight. Admittedly, a large part of the population would hate you but who cares? I wouldn’t. I only like people because it’s easier and more practical than not liking people- if I had to count the number of people I unequivocally like in this world I’d struggle to reach double figures- but as a footballer I’d have far too much money and ego to bother with any of that.

By the way, everything I’ve just said about Premiership footballers can also be applied to Morrissey. And I bet he didn’t have to have an interview to be a pop star either. That said, if things were to turn sour for Moz and he had to get a proper job and have an interview, wouldn’t you love to be a fly on that wall?

Personally, I believe interviews and recruitment should be scrapped and replaced by a part-rotation, part-lottery system. The simple fact is that most people could probably do most jobs if they were given a chance. Some jobs which require a specific talent and which don’t usually have an interview process, like pop star or poet laureate should still be filled in the current way but everything else should be assigned completely at random to everybody else. Then we could all do them for a year and have another lottery and another big swap around.

Imagine spending a year as a forensic detective then suddenly getting the call to spend 12 months feeding the chimps at Longleat. Then after than you could have a year on the bins before going on to be a tanker captain for Shell or a television bowls commentator- all assigned at random. Life would be so much more fun and exciting and I reckon anyone could pick up any new job in about three weeks if thrown in at the deep end. Plus no-one would ever know what they’d be earning in the next year so no-one could have a mortgage or invest in anything so financial crises like the one the world currently finds itself in would be impossible! We’d just have to live for today and make life up as we went along.

This system would certainly help me out as I currently find myself in an employment doom loop- basically, I need experience to get a lecturing job and I need a lecturing job to get experience. This, clearly, is a situation that could only exist in a world that doesn’t work properly and makes a mockery of me spending a year getting my teaching qualification. If my system was imposed, I’d just have to take my chances and see what came up- which I wouldn’t have a problem with as that would be the way of things- and if any of you out there became a lecturer then, trust me, you wouldn’t need the qualification I wasted time and money getting. If you were good within two weeks, you’d be good for the rest of the year and love every minute of it- so much that you’d be the best educator your students ever have. And if you were rubbish after 2 weeks then, trust me, you’ll always be rubbish but at least you’ll know you’ve got less than a year left in the job.

And just think what it would do to politics! And sports! Football would definitely have to be brought into this system as then there’d be no more closed shop at the top of the Premiership as the players are randomly expelled and introduced to teams every 12 months. No two seasons would ever be alike as Chelsea, for instance, could go from a strong team one year to a squad entirely comprised of elderly, blind women the next- and who wouldn’t want to see that?

Plus, with a bit of luck, I’d get the call to be a Premiership footballer myself. Then I could just stop caring.

It Ain’t What You Do…

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I like Bentley. Note, if you will, that I didn’t just say ‘I like Bentleys’, seeing as the cars themselves are now entirely the preserve of blinged-up rappers and Sheikh’s with more money than The Vatican. However, I do like Bentley- the company itself- mainly because of the way they went about the gentlemanly pursuit of motor racing in the 1930′s.

When Bentley participated in Le Mans 24 Hour race between the wars, their drivers would start the race at 4pm on the Saturday in the usual racing overalls. However, as the sun set they would pit in and change into suitable evening attire- suit, bow tie, the works- and carry on into the early hours where they would promptly change back into their freshly cleaned and pressed overalls. And on one tremendously debonnair occasion, a driver was called in for an unscheduled pit stop and when he asked what was up was told “sorry, Sir, but the champagne’s running out and we just wondered if you wanted the last glass”. He accepted and still finished second. He was beaten by a fellow Bentley which was actually pulled into the pits just before the last lap so it could be cleaned and polished and look appropriately gleaming as it sauntered over the finish line. Now THAT’S motor-racing.

After the 1930s, Bentley didn’t win at Le Mans for over 60 years and didn’t even participate for a good few decades yet still remained utterly synonymous with the place. Why?

Simple. Because people may remember an achievement- but what they’ll REALLY remember is the way the way you went about it. For example- it’s very possible that this season Chelsea could achieve the same treble that Man United pulled off in 1999. But there’s no chance of them receiving anywhere near as much adulation- simple becuase their football is brutally effective where United’s was cavalier and attacking and they’ve gone and shopped their way round Europe whilst United has a strong core of British players, many of whom came through the ranks.

In a nutshell, we could call this Michael Schumacher Syndrome.

And it’s not just sport, but the world of music where it can be seen in action too. It’s why Keith Richards is Keith Richards and Pete Docherty isn’t. Both have filled themselves with enough chemicals to comatoze China and both style themselves as dandyish outlaws. However, Keith Richards has the good grace to make his job look like the best in the world and permanently has a look on his face thattells us he’s the luckiest bastard on the planet and he knows it. Docherty, on the other hand spends all his time in Southwark Crown Court explaining why he’d not kicked the skag and been caught shoplifting.

In fact, the more you think about it, achievement is pretty much irrelevant compared to how you go about things, particularly in Britain. We are, let’s face it, the only country in the owrld that could produce both the biggest empire the world has ever seen AND Eddie “The Eagle” Edwards.

To prove my point, let’s turn to space exploration.

In recent year’s, both Britian and the USA have sent probes to Mars, and promptly lost them. NASA’s effort was put together with immense effort and cost by the finest minds money can buy. It was loaded with delicate scientific equipment, put into a nice big rocket, fired into space and monitored from Mission Control in Houston right up until someone realised that the computer controlling the descent onto the red planet had been programmed in metric but fed instructions in imperial and proceeded to hit Mars with the speedometer showing five figures (in metric and imperial).

Britian, on the other hand, had a probe assembled in a University by a mad professor with huge sideburns which was christened ‘Beagle 2′. It was loaded with a Blur CD and a spade, strapped to a kite, flung into space and monitored by people with binoculars squinting a bit. It also made it as far as Mars before going quiet and deciding to knock off work early.

The world mourned ‘Beagle 2′, the plucky little space explorer that was made out of recycled cans of Tango and held together by blu-tak but fell just short of the finishing line. The NASA probe was never meant to go wrong and only did so because one of the boffins had made the sort of balls-ups that people with title ‘boffin’ really shouldn’t. The planet, as one, gloated.

And that’s why America will always be America, why Chelsea won’t be Arsenal, and why there’s always a part of you that hopes the next time you watch ‘Die Hard’ Hans Gruber will actually get away with it.

And take Pete Docherty out in the process.