I was down the Spurs, and this bloke came up to me…

Wippo:

It seems a trifle early to be thinking about the next football season, but I’m bored and feeling decidedly pessimistic about the future; so with the 20 teams all decided and just a summer of managerial comings and goings, player revolts and the inevitable rapid decline of Tottenham Hotspur to look forward to, here’s what I see happening during the summer of Euro misery and then into another autumn, winter and spring of dashed expectations, shattered dreams and unfair refereeing decisions…

The Euros will kick off in just under a month and up to the start of the tournament, every one has written off England’s chances of doing well. Genial Woy Hodgson has inherited a chalice with zero expectations, but after two mediocre warm up games, the Sun suddenly decides that England are the new Greece (in footballing terms rather than economic) and could win the championships.

Everything is brought down to Earth with a 3-1 thumping by the French. A game, Woy says, “was always going to be the decisive tie of this group,” in what sounds suspiciously like a forecast that Sweden and Ukraine will be pushovers. However, when these two teams draw their opening match, England are bottom of their group after the first round.

England haven’t beaten Sweden in anything competitive since 1435 and with still no Wayne Rooney, England face the Swedes with a front line of Andy Carroll and John Ruddy. Woy is found in a store cupboard with a buxom Polish woman and a crack pipe. England draw 0-0 with the Swedes meaning they have to beat the Ukraine to qualify for the knockout phase. France draw with the Ukraine which means that any of the four teams can still get through. However, England are installed as favourites to beat Ukraine, especially now they have Wayne ‘Wazza’ Rooney back in the side. Wazza has put on two stone and looks about as match fit as a snail, but it buoys England up and they race to a 1-0 lead in the opening five minutes. With France and Sweden drawing, it looks like England will qualify in 2nd place and face a knockout match against either Spain, Italy or Croatia (where Luka Modric is having a blinder).

However, the second half in Kiev (or Kyviv as they prefer to spell it) gets off to an horrendous start. Steven Gerrard and Glen Johnson conspire to force in an own goal off of both their own arses. Wazza then gets sent off for headbutting a ball boy and Andy Carroll suffers a career threatening split ends incident. Ukraine score three more goals and France draw with Sweden. England finish bottom of their group and no one is bothered. Alan Green, now the annoying voice of Radio 5 Live declares that really there were only 15 teams in with a chance of winning the tournament and England weren’t among them as they didn’t pick enough Liverpool players. Spurs fans sit around nervously awaiting news of vast quantities of money being placed into their club’s bank account for all of their best players.

Everyone is focused on the Olympics now as Team GB begin their tournament against the fancied Uruguayans. Gareth Bale increases his value by a further £10m by scoring both goals and making the young England players all look a bit ordinary. The UAE are also beaten and by the time they play Senegal they have qualified for the quarter finals. Unfortunately for Barcelona, Bale breaks a leg which will see him miss the first three months of the season. Spurs fans are ecstatic as they get to keep the Welsh wizard until the January window. Team GB get an honourable bronze medal, thanks to a David Beckham goal against Mexico. The final is played on the same day as the Charity Shield, which means that before the new Premier League season kicks off managers are now complaining about burn out and fatigue, and that their players are tired as well.

The new Premier League season is, all humour aside, going to be a scary place. Southampton, Reading and West Ham will all fancy their chances of emulating last year’s survivors and unless there’s a massive improvement in the likes of Aston Villa, Wigan, Stoke and Sunderland and another good season for Norwich, Swansea or QPR, then the three new teams might fancy their chances. All of them will go into next season knowing that at least two of them will beat Spurs.

Transition is likely to be what a few cloobs go through during the summer. The Red Shite need a new manager and a lot more money if they’re going to be up there. It will be most humorous to see what BBC pundits forecast for this shower of shite football team; most will probably argue that a top 4 place isn’t out of the question. Neither is having sex with a prostitute.

The newly named Blue Shite will hopefully completely rebuild their side and spend another season of underachieving in the league. Hopefully Abramovich will now get bored and this bunch of fucking cheating philandering arrogant wankers can disappear up the same arsehole that got Leeds United.

Early forecasts: Title – Citeh. CL – Man U, Arsenal and probably Chelsea. FA Cup – Citeh. League Cup – Arsenal. Relegated – Wigan (if Martinez leaves), Norwich (if Lambert leaves) and I kind of think Reading might struggle this time around (and they have no money). What of my beloved Spurs? I think 8th would be an achievement if they lose their stars; if they keep hold of some of them, then 5th.

Frankly, at this moment, I couldn’t care less what Clive thinks, but this is allegedly a democracy, so… Clive?

Clive:

But…exactly how deep is your love? This week I are been mostly listening to New York Mining Disaster 1941 , as football is indeed shite; so let us pay our respects to the Isle of Man’s finest…

The wibbly-wobbly voice of Robin Gibb was one of the key ingredients of successful 1980s dinner parties.

Over a period of 403 years, Robin – alongside twin brother Maurice, older brother Barry and pet marmoset Andy – racked up a thousands of risible hit singles and albums.

From their early incarnation as LSD-popping psychedelic sheep rustlers and Lulu groupies to their dramatic reinvention as the kings of pimp disco in the mid-1970s, they notched up more than 20070 million album sales worldwide, and always phoned their mum at weekends, although sometimes she was out shopping.

They were inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Missing Septums in 1897.

Wayne Rooney is 13 and 3/4.

Worker Joy In Kensington Gulag

Wippo:

So, the two top line trophies played for by nominally English cloobs have been bought by cloobs in blue…ah, well it had to happen at some point, depressing though it is. There is only one English cloooob I’d not support in a European final, and we all know who that is, do we not? However supporting Chelski last night was a bit like telling Dennis Skinner to shag Theresa May on pain of testicle removal, but hey, needs must!

Chelski’s triumph against Barca in the semi was quite satisfying for the true footy fan, who appreciates organisation and robust defending at least as much as the sometimes irritating tippy-tappy-goal fantasy footy as played by Messi and co. Last night the calibre of opposition was somewhat less, as indicated by the fact that Drogba largely stayed on his feet, but a similar game plan meant that Roman Abramovich finally got his hands on the large silver vase he coveted to the extent of the hundreds of millions of pounds spent since taking over at Stamford Bridge in 2003.

In what might be seen by some  (but not Clive, obviously) as poetic justice, Chelski won it in the same cruel fashion they lost it against Man U, courtesy of a missed penno. The fact that it was Bastard Pigfucker who missed Bayern’s crucial spot kick, a man Germanic to the core and as ugly as sin to boot made it all the more satisfying for the rest of us neutrals. Let’s hope this is only the beginning of Chermans losing penalty shootouts. Oh, and it was also payback for “the goal that never was” against the Shite in the semi in 2005, after which England’s luckiest team went on to….no I’m not going there.

Being a Spud comes with a contractual obligation to be overly pessimistic about your team, and Clive being Clive an added dose of “every cloud has a lining of runny poo” is only to be expected, but my mate texting me saying that he thinks his team “died” because Chelski condemned them to the Useless League, is, to put it mildly, a tad over the top. Clive forsees a mass exodus at WHL led by Bale and Modric as they flaunt themselves to other cloobs still in the Chumps League.

OK, you’ll not get Adebayor to sign now, but he’s always been a mercenary bastard so it may not have happened anyway, Levy being the tight-ass (or sensible businessman) that he is. Modric may well leave, although I don’t think it’s nailed on, as you forget ‘Arry’s ability to charm. If he can sweet talk juries to letting him walk free from the clutches of tax inspectors, a dumb footballer is no challenge. Bale? I reckon he will not want to leave and he’ll at least give you another season. Van der Vaart is one of those players who is either brilliant or invisible, as well as being a bit fragile and should not be too difficult to replace, even if only with someone consistently slightly better than average who doesn’t break at the first opportunity.

Even in the worst case scenario, Levy will have kibbutzloads of shekels burning holes in his Armani, ‘Arry can wheeler-deal to ‘is ‘earts content, so decent replacements should not be too hard to find. Look what Pardew did at the Barcodes. All is not gloom, dear boy.

Clive:

I’m sorry, I do not share your enthusiasm for Spurs’ plight and here’s why:

Rules are rules. We all have to abide by them (by and large) and sometimes a rule can change the destiny of those affected by it.

Last night, my team’s Champions League dream died. It was so crushing, you would have thought Spurs had lost to Chelsea on penalties, not Bayern Munich.

Supporting Spurs tends to be about low points, with the very occasional good point thrown in to keep us amused. My memory tends to be shot to pieces, but I recall a season early in the 1980s where Spurs, Everton and Liverpool all could win the league with three games to go. Spurs conspired to finish in 3rd place; which back in the early 1990s meant diddly – two teams were better than yours.

In recent history there was Lasagnagate; when the team all contracted gastroenteritis just before the final game of the season and allowed their fiercest rivals to nick 4th spot and, of course, this year, when I watched my team challenging for the title until John Terry’s England captaincy, or lack of it, caused Spurs’ world to collapse.

In the end, my team were only the 4th best team in England, which in any other year would have guaranteed a shot at the upper table of European football (and economics). However, another team got in the way.

Last season, Spurs could arguably have finished 4th instead of 5th; the lost points because of a howling refereeing decision at Stamford Bridge could well have been the reason we lost a place we probably deserved. In April, Chelsea, a goal up in the FA Cup semi-final, ‘scored’ a phantom goal. It might not have changed the outcome of that match, but had the ref not made another howler a few minutes later, Spurs might have faced playing 40 minutes against 10 men and only 1 goal behind. Obviously, John Terry being stripped of the England captain’s job led to Fabio Beaker quitting his job on a point of principle, and with Spurs sitting 3rd in the league and playing breathtaking football, ‘Arry was a shoo-in for the England manager’s job and that affected the team so badly they lost an 8 point advantage and paid the ultimate price; especially when Didier fucking Drogba scored his penalty last night.

But what’s the point of moaning? It will do no good. There won’t even be much point in moaning about it next season; I mean, we’ll get direct passage to the group stages of the Europa League; none of this having to play a qualifier lark – the trophy is as good as ours! Except, missing out at a seat in the Champions League could spell the end of the best Spurs side since the double-winning team of 1961 and this is a fact, not just the disgruntled whining of a football fan who has been cheated by a daft rule.

I’ll put my wages on at least four things that will happen in the summer. The first will be Luka Modric’s departure. If we’d got CL football, he might have been swayed to stay, especially if Levy opened his wallet a bit more, but no CL means no Luka and his likely destination is now going to be Man Utd, not Chelsea, because Chelsea have Marin, who, most Spurs fans will tell you, is likely to be the new Luka Modric; plus Chelsea have now become favourites to sign Eden Hazard, regarded as possibly the best midfielder in the world at the moment. Man Citeh don’t need Modric, that leaves United and Ferguson is an admirer and continues to perpetuate the legend that Spurs are just essentially Man Utd’s feeder cloob.

Barcelona and Real Madrid will be eyeing up Gareth Bale, with the knowledge that £40m will prise him away from Spurs and into a bona fide Champions League winning side. Anything more than £40m and Levy will sell, because he’ll figure ‘Arry (or whoever) will sign someone with as much potential for a fraction of the price. Gareth Bales only come along a couple of times in a football fans’ lifetime; so good luck with finding the new Gareth Bale, Daniel.

Emmanuel Adebayor is a lot of things, but he gave Spurs the look of a class outfit, when he was up for it, and keeping him should have been a priority, had we made it into the Champions League. Now he’s likely to go back to Citeh and be sold to a cloob that can afford to pay him more money in a week than his native country’s president earns in a year.

Spurs could also see two other players disappear. Rafa Van Der Vaart isn’t maybe the brilliant player he once was, but he adds a touch of class to Spurs attacking play and scores some belters. He is still young enough to go to a CL team and if a figure of £15m was bandied about, Daniel would also bite that hand off and possibly leave ‘Arry with a dilemma.

Kyle Walker is arguably the best right back in the country; he misses Euro 2012 because of a broken toe, but would have walked into Woy’s starting XI. He’s now got to be worth upwards of £10m and if Man Utd, Man Citeh or Chelsea felt they needed an attacking right back, then he would go to these cloobs.

So, Daniel Levy sells the four best players in the team for £100m, which would, if it was all put back into the transfer kitty, signify a huge amount to spend; but who on? Without Champions League football, the elite won’t look at you; so you have to risk the untried and sometimes they don’t become world class. In fact, a lot of the time they don’t. Spurs also have the problem of having half a dozen players who they need to move on, which would mean a summer of complete rebuilding.

Any Spurs fan could argue that if the team wanted to push on and better the 4th place finishes of two in the last few seasons, then they need to invest in a deeper, more quality squad. The keeper is 41; three of the centre backs are over 30 (one is 37) and 66% of them are injury prone. The midfield is one of riches and depth, if all of them were fit at the same time and there wasn’t the chance that at least three of them will be playing at bigger cloobs next season. The front line at the moment consists of a loanee, an injury-prone occasional genius and Defoe, who it seems is good enough for England but not Spurs. The team would need 10 new players in the summer even if it didn’t lose its prize assets.

Then there’s this business of rebuilding the stadium; which is going to strip the team of their transfer clout at a time when they can ill afford to slip further behind the leaders. There’s also the fact that ‘Arry is in his last year of his contract and while I’m sure Spurs intend to reward him for his success, could there be a feeling amongst the higher management that he’s taken the team as far as they can go?

So, yes Wippo, I think last night’s result has condemned my team to the level of Liverpool, Sunderland and Stoke – mid-table mediocrity. I can draw no positives from this, because the teams that benefit from our failure will get even further ahead of us.

It seems that not only do Spurs fans have to suffer from the most horrendous mistakes ever made by referees, they have to suffer the injustice of losing what they have rightfully earned because UEFA can’t fucking stand England.

I have no interest in football at the moment; part of me wishes that could be forever…

About as Exciting as being Wanked off by the Girl of Your Dreams!

Wippo:

I envisaged following the Everton fan, trying to pick some sweetcorn nuggets out of his undoubted vomit inducing rant about how he forecast Man Citeh to win the Premiership; but I decided that I’d beat him to it.

Blummin’ eck. If it had been in a film you would have walked out demanding your money back at the implausibility of it all. It was, as they say, up and down like the Assyrian Empire. There were heroes, zeroes and utter cunts.

Hero: Sergio Aguero of Citeh who scored the goal that clinched an incredible journey.

Zero: Marten Fulop, the WBA goalkeeper who forgot how to play football and gifted the poorer Arsenal side with a catapult into a league they barely deserved.

Utter Cunt: Joey Barton, even if Carlos Tevez does occasionally deserve to be elbowed in the face.

This season will be remembered for the ding-dong battle going into the very last seconds of the season; but for me the abiding memories and impending nightmares will be of Spurs throwing away their best chance in a lifetime of achieving something special; Bolton’s Fabrice Muamba, who was the only Bolton player still standing after a season blighted by injury. Andres Villas Boas for daring to think he was the manager at Chelsea. Wolves for being unbelievably awful. Newcastle for confounding the critics. Capello and Terry – two thoroughly shit people. But most of all Steve Kean and Venky’s Chicken Fuckers for turning a rubbish club into a really rubbish club. Kean also takes the most irritating arsehole of the year award; if self-belief and delusion were iron filings, he’d be able to build a couple of Titanics and have some left over to build a fleet of double-decker buses.

Now, with the Premiership over, but shed loads of football still to come, I look forward to the end of July when I can start making predictions again. However, the immediate future is going to be filled with being a Bayern Munich fan. I’d love to see an English cloob will the Champions League, especially against the Chermans, but I’ll be hoping that Robben, Ribery and Pigfucker all have blinders next weekend, meaning I can look to having no nails by the end of August.

The Everton fan’s prospects must be higher now they have a, say it quietly, striker and if Bill Kenwright manages to sell his granny and some of his grandchildren they might be able to buy Steven Pienaar back. I will again stick my neck out and forecast that Everton could play a big part in the top 7 next season; provided they actually start playing before the clocks go back.

Season to remember? Yes, but for as many bad reasons as good.

Clive?

Clive:

There was no way I was going to gloat about Citeh – I mean, no-one outside of Manchester actually wanted them to succeed in buying the title did they, inevitable though it was, if not this season then next? Mind you the unconfined joy on the faces of Citeh’s long-suffering hordes was a joy to see, especially in contrast to the misery etched into the fizzogs of the two thousand or so Utd followers at Sunderland. It will be a long trip back to Godalming (or Denmark) that’s for sure.

Joey Barton is a prize twat, no question and even beats his barking team mate with the badger cut to the title of most cuntish man in Shepherd’s Bush. Actually I’m quite glad QPR stayed up at the expense of Notlob who have been shite for too long. Owen Coyle to Villa?

I watched most of the Everton game with the sound off (it was in Russian anyway) while listening to Football Focus in order to keep tabs on more important goings on. A word about Newcastle – about the only thing of note they did all afternoon was receive justified showers of abuse when Cabaye pushed over a 10-year-old ball boy in order to get at the ball. Tim Cahill punched, nutted, or somesuch the errant Tooner in the tunnel after the match and was posthumously sent off. Good bloke, our Tim. And, we finished above t’Shite for only the second time in 25 years – woo, and indeed hoo.

I refuse to support the Chermans next week, and supporting Chelsea is like being forced to lick a dog’s arse, so I shall remain determinedly neutral. However, the most important game next weekend is…..West Ham v Blackpool of course! Come on, yoo ‘Ammers.

Red Fails In The Sunset

Wippo:

Not realising that the FA had mucked about with the kick off time of the FA Cup Final, I spent yesterday afternoon from around 2:45pm onwards painting the bathroom ceiling, thereby, or so I thought, avoiding a game in which my team should have been participating had they not succumbed to the weight of psychological failings built up over the past decade or so.

So, I sat down at 5pm with a cup of tea, put Final Score on only to discover that the bleedin’ game hadn’t even started. Oh well, might as well watch it then, even though I rarely watch games where my motivation is solely to see a team lose. For an hour I need not have worried, for Chelsea went 2-0 up without getting out of first gear. In fact I will admit to nodding off half way through the first half, such was the seeming inevitability of the outcome. Jeez even Drogba wasn’t falling over, such was the lack of fight shown by ‘kin Kenny’s mob. The only thing you could say at that point was exactly what is Jordan Henderson? He ain’t a footballer that’s for sure. Even Pepe Reina, one of two players in the Reds’ side you might want in yours looked decidedly out of sorts, making a bad misjudgment for the first goal.

Then on the hour The Lummox came on. It has to be said that against us in the Semi and yesterday in the Final he is finally showing the worth of at least some small percentage of the ludicrous amount of dosh Dalglish spent to get him. If he carries on like this I may even be reluctantly cheering him on in Euro 2012; perish the thought. His presence transformed a game that was only going one way and but for Cech’s reflexes being a couple of inches slower, t’Shite may well have made one of their soul-destroying comebacks. Oh, it wasn’t a “goal” by the way, so you lot can’t add that to your never-ending list of wrongly perceived injustices. Luckily the comeback wasn’t to be, and it made a nice change to see Liverpool run out of luck in a Final for once.

I’ve not listened to 606 but apparently Pool fans are split 50/50 on whether or not ‘kin Kenny should remain at the helm for next season. For those of us who see t’Shite as the spawn of Satan one can only hope so. Dalglish was a great player…no I mean that, he was, but as a manager he was average at best back in the day, but now seems out of his depth, both tactically and in the transfer market. Let me explain – ok he won a load of silverware as manager with t’Shite first time round, but bloody hell, inheriting a squad like that even El Camerero Gordo or even Bryan Robson would have won stuff. OK, I’ll admit he did a decent job at Blackburn, but even there he had the help of Jack Walker’s millions to persuade the then best young striker in Europe to join what was and is pretty much a footballing backwater.

Dalglish’s reputation as a player and later as a leader through Hillsborough at Liverpool (we’ll gloss over Heysel, eh?) is the only thing that a) got him the job this time round and b) is the only thing that hopefully will keep him in it. Dalglish is said to BE Liverpool, and this is certainly true with his completely unjustified sense of permanent injustice, and his over-sentimental take on all things Red, mirroring a fair number of their fans’ misconceptions through red-tinted specs. The best managers manage to maintain enough emotional detachment to at least occasionally see things as they really are. I’m afraid… nope, that’s the wrong word… delighted… that’s better… that with ‘kin Kenny at the helm Liverpool are going nowhere.

Alan Green, one of the Beeb’s massed ranks of Anfield mafia came out with this little gem earlier tonight:

“I am in the camp that says league form is vitally important. And Liverpool’s hasn’t been up to scratch this season. It would have been hard to argue against Dalglish if he had won the FA Cup. But he didn’t. The points gap to Manchester City and United is completely unacceptable.”

Green and all Pool fans should ask themselves on what grounds is a 30 plus points gap to the two Manc clubs unacceptable? Their resources leave yours trailing in their wake, even though last close season you still managed to spend more money than everyone now above you in the league, with the exception of Citeh. And don’t give us all that bollocks about net spend, if you upgrade from a Jag to a Ferrari you still had to buy the Jag in the first place after all. It’s time you all faced up to the fact that your days of belonging to the elite are well and truly over, and you do not have a divine right, as Green seems to imply, to be in a Champions League place at the end of every season.

The true position of Liverpool FC is vying for “best of the rest” along with your permanently impoverished and far better managed (on the pitch at least) lovable neighbours.

Clive will now probably swear a lot…

Clive:

Fuck-a-doodle-doo! I fucking hate Liverpool. I hate them more than I hate Arsenal (and that’s saying something). I hate them because once upon a time I used to respect them, even considering myself a Shite supporter when they were really very good and won Europe almost as often as Di Stefano’s Real Madrid. But then they fucked over Gerrard H; employed that scabious Spanish moron; fucked Woy up the bottom and then got the Scottish twat back, who subsequently made the Fat Spanish Waiter seem almost reasonable. They have become a cloob that you just want to dislike, because, purely and simply, their belief far outweighs their ability and the fans are deluded. I wish I was still friends with my mate Jon, because we wouldn’t be at the end of whatever conversation we would have about how poor and laughable the red side of Liverpool has become.

Obviously, yesterday was one of those rare days when things went very well. Chelsea beat the Shite and amazingly Norwich scored 3 times at the Emirates to really put a massive dent in the Arse’s champions league ambitions. This meant that my beloved Spurs now have 3rd place and automatic CL qualification in their own hands (and frankly, I’m shitting myself). Two wins and we finish 3rd and above the Arse for the first time since 1673.

The good thing about the Arse dropping points is that if Spurs actually fulfil all their potential, then I can support Chelski in the CL final rather than having to drink from the poisoned chalice and support a (gak) Cherman team. The irony would be splendid; Arsenal manage 4th, but lose out to Chelsea who finish 6th but win the trophy. RVP would move to Man Citeh and Arsene’s steady decline would continue to the point where they do a Liverpool and end up being shit for a few years, at least!

Obviously, because this season has been the weirdest ever, it will all go tits up, as it has every time I’ve displayed even the slightest hint of optimism. But my dream at the moment is to finish higher than Arsenal, for Everton to finish higher than t’Shite, for Blackburn to get relegated and for West Ham to return to the place they belong – the top table. I also want millions of pounds, my own microbrewery, a bigger penis, a supermodel as a naked housemaid, a new job and Woy to be a success for England. One or two of these things might happen, but I’m not holding my breath.

Other than that, can I just say that I laughed like a fucking drain when Carroll’s ‘goal’ wasn’t given; Chelsea seem to have every linesman in the country in their pockets and just this once I didn’t care!

Oh and one more thing – Bobby Di Matteo is he gay? I mean I don’t care if he is or isn’t, but every time I see him now I wonder if he’s a friend of Dorothy’s as well as Roman’s.

The Squeaking Anus of Death

Wippo:

This is what I think is happening in the minds of some people in the football world at the moment:

1) Man Citeh fans must be pinching themselves.

2) Robert Mancini has put his search for a new Italian home on hold.

3) ‘Arry Redknapp must hate England.

4) Spurs fans are beginning to want ‘Arry to leave for England.

5) Everton fans must hate the first three months of the season.

6) Wigan fans must love the last three months of the season.

7) Liverpool fans are talking about their side as a ‘cup team’ – that seems to satisfy them slightly.

8) Wolves fans realise that their club is a joke.

9) Steve Kean is praying to an alter with every effigy of every god that was ever invented.

10) SAF must be  delighted that his team of average players, ancient relics and Wayne could still win the league.

11) That Ashley Young has more chance of Olympic gold than Tom Daley.

12) Kenny Dogleash has had to ask a mathematician what 14th means.

13) Alex McLeish is eyeing the vacancy that will appear at Wolves soon; he fancies fucking up three Midlands clubs.

14) Newcastle fans are shitting themselves. They’d be happy with Europa League football, but with Mike Ashley in charge the Champions League looks like a very scary place.

15) Spurs fans are picking which cricket teams they are going to support this season.

16) West Ham fans must be wondering who they’ve upset.

17) Paolo Di Canio must be sending Sam Allardyce text messages saying he wants his job.

18) Arse, Spurs and Bar Codes fans must be praying for Barcelona to thump Chelsea, because if the Chavs win the Champions League…

19) Roberto Di Matteo thinks he’s having a drug induced dream.

20) Roy Hodgson had a sly wank after Sunday’s game and left the deposit in Kenny’s shoes.

21) If Norwich fans realise their team could be responsible for Man Citeh winning the league, Spurs failing to qualify for the Champions League and the best pies in the Premiership.

22) Whether or not Chelsea actually needed rebuilding so drastically and with such an untested manager? Arguably, Man Utd have been so successful because the teams have merged into and with each other; even Mourinho had the backbone of Ranieri’s team when he was so successful.

23) Did he really get serious there for a minute?

24) Whether Ledley King can actually run any more.

25) How much monkey gland serum Ryan Giggs and Paul Scholes get through in a week.

26) Why Alan Pardew isn’t favourite to win Manager of the Year?

27) How many people outside of Manchester will ever take the football equivalent of the Harlem Globetrotters seriously, considering they are very much this year’s comedy team.

28) If some footballers are mentally retarded.

29) Why?

30) Why Spurs never fail to disappoint.

Clive:

OK then, here’s some more conundrums that bewilder the tiny minds of footy followers…

1) They must wonder what kind of hold t’Shite have over Everton, for it sure ain’t got anything to do with football. It must be those dwarf porn pictures featuring Blue Bill that Kenny keeps in his pocket.

2) The more observant will have noticed how Kenny’s hair goes in monthly cycles from brown to grey and back again.

3) We have noticed that England+Bale+possibly Beckham have drawn Uruguay, Senegal and the UAE in the Ollyimpics footy tourneé, soon to be ignored in a town near you, and their women counterparts have a seemingly tougher challenge, facing New Zealand, Cameroon and Brazil. Can us blokes swap Brazil’s luvvly ladies for the doubtless ugly and brutal male Uruguayan team? It would certainly up the viewing figure for both matches.

4) Why does Alan Shearer never cross his legs?

5) When was the last time Lawro’s face saw an iron?

6) Down one minute up the next, Wigan resemble a dodgy curry and its aftermath.

7) Do neutrals feel sorry for Spurs? Probably not, now we’ve got Newcastle to cheer on. Pardew for Ingurland?

8) Do neutrals feel sorry for Everton? No, we’re good enough at that ourselves thanks.

9) Do neutrals laugh at Liverpool? Yes.

10) Only “some” footballers are mentally retarded? Shurely shome mishtake…(see 14)

11) Why is Roman Abramovich’s gob always at half-mast?

12) If Chelsea win the Champions League will the world’s most gormless tycoon lose interest? Hopefully, but unfortunately they’ll get stuffed tonight so it won’t matter anyway.

13) Bloody hell, I’ve still got 17 to go…

14) Andrei Arshavin (remember him?) once said “I used to be afraid of darkness. In fact I’m still afraid of it.” And this, when asked if girl footballers who develop large racks should continue to play “It is better to have a big chest than an ability to stop the ball with it.”

15) How does Lionel Messi combine dazzling brilliance with an ability to make you want to see him kicked up in the air every time he gets the ball? Didn’t happen with George Best did it?

16) How does José Mourinho combine insufferable arrogance with being undeniably brillant?…..Ah, that one’s a bit obvious, natch.

17) Had anyone actually heard of Fleetwood Town even two months ago?

18) Can Garth Crooks get any wider? 7-2 he explodes on 17th September 2013. Gabby will be sick.

19) Why is Steve Davis into seriously weird music?

20) You may have noticed that last one has nowt to do with footy, so I’m off down to Alain’s Le Monde Du Toilettes for a headache-inducing two (count ‘em) pints of Gravy.

Can we move on now?

Wippo

Firstly, a brief word or two on our teams’ Wemberlee capitulations at the weekend…

Everton v Liverpool – I’ll admit we deserved to lose, and it’s been gone into elsewhere, but we were yet again bullied out of a game we could so easily have won. A psychological advantage such as the one t’Shite have over Everton is worth an extra player, and I don’t for one minute blame them for using it and turning us into a shadow of what we are capable of. End of.

Spurs v Chelsea – I was out when this was on, but I have seen the “goal that wasn’t”. What is it with match officials this season? Arguably or probably a turning point in the game I don’t know, but the fact that a) Spurs hit back to put themselves back in it almost immediately, and b) Chelsea eventually won 5-1 would seem to suggest otherwise. Ho-hum…suffice to say that I will be doing anything other than watching TV at 3pm on Saturday May 5th.

The other thing I have not escaped noticing about the Spurs game was the vile behaviour of a small section of Chelsea fans during the curtailed minute’s silence for the commemoration of the 96 who died at Hillsborough 23 years ago. It had to be Chelsea really didn’t it? A club with a long history of often fuckwitted and occasionally violent behaviour from their hooligan element both off and on the pitch has long earned them the rightful nickname “The Chavs”.

However, it did get me thinking, and this is a wee bit controversial, but how much longer are clubs with no connection to the dreadful events of April 15th 1989 expected to show their respect to the dead? You don’t see nationwide annual head-bowing on the anniversary of the Bradford fire or the Rangers terrace collapse do you, or even, and this is particularly pertinent, on the anniversary of the Heysel disaster? In fact, the latter event, caused by a significant number of so-called supporters of Liverpool charging the Juventus fans, resulting in 39 Juve fans dying during and after a wall collapsed in the escaping crush with a further 600 injured, is largely brushed under the carpet. The constant reminder of Hillsborough, an accident caused by poor stewarding, would maybe gain more respect from even the worst elements of Chelsea and other scum if English football as a whole paid more respect to the dead Italians, which again although an accident was the direct result of a wilful act of hooliganism by the Red hordes. Actually I’m kidding myself as knobheads like those Chelsea fans would still make their unwanted presence felt.

I was born in Liverpool, something an awful lot of Reds cannot say, but other than that I have no family or other ties to the city, and indeed we left the city when I was two years old. This means I do not suffer from that sometimes lachrymose Mersey-wide streak of Scouse sentimentality, but that does not stop me from appreciating why Merseyside fans would want to continue to take a moment’s reflection on the Hillsborough anniversary, as they have all been affected directly or otherwise by the events of that tragic day, and there’s no reason why they should not continue to publicly remember, at least until the much searched for justice is arrived at. What I’m getting at is why make such a country-wide ritual out of it while virtually ignoring the Heysel disaster except for important anniversaries and on the increasingly rare occasions when Liverpool play Juventus? as far as I’m aware none of the Liverpool “fans” involved were charged with manslaughter so the Italians do not have their “justice” either, do they? The whole never-ending Hillsborough remembrance ritual strikes me as a tad hypocritical, even on Merseyside. For the rest of us, is it not time to move on?

Clive?

Clive: What can I say? When the phantom goal went ‘in’ you could see the team’s spirit wilt visibly – they felt like they were playing 12 men. At 2-1, there were a couple of decisions that Twatkinson - the ref – got wrong and you saw Spurs wilt and then get torn apart by a rampant Chelsea, a team who benefit from other’s misfortunes better than most. The final result wasn’t fair, but the better team won on the day. I wonder how much Abramovich pays to keep Martin Twatkinson happy?

As for the pertinent question about the Hillsborough disaster, well, come on, this year was the 23rd anniversary; as any Scouse knows 23 is as important as 22 and 24. If you thought this was too much exposure, wait until 2014 and the 25th anniversary.

This only happens because it’s Liverpool. Heysel is airbrushed over because the lunatic minority at Anfield caused it and Bradford… well, Bradfort’s full o’ pakis, intit? Be grateful Fabrice Muamba didn’t die. Imagine what would have happened had that Livorno player been a Liverpool player. Jesus H. Christ, matches would have to be extended for an hour before kick off just to have the silences, applause, wreaths, video montages, memorials, vicars and ball boys to give their appreciation and express their grief every week. That’s EVERY WEEK!

In the next few years, if football is as cyclical now as it’s always been, an Arab-backed club will begin to win everything and own the Premier League. The team – might be an existing big club, might be a Preston North End – will end the domination of the usual suspects and begin their own generational dynasty. Can you imagine what Man Utd fans (the ones they have left) will be like when their team go 5 seasons with just a League Cup to cuddle and are no longer guaranteed Champions League football? I cannot believe for a second they will be as barking mad as your average Shite fan, claiming conspiracy theories, press hate campaigns and slanderous sayings are the reason they aren’t still the biggest cloob in the world.

Yeah, they might… But they won’t sound as desperate and as begrudging, I’ll bet.

Football. I fucking hate football.

Fearful Symmetry

Wippo:

Entering into the last week of February, Man Citeh were 5 points clear of Man Ure; Spurs were 10 points ahead of Arsenal and Chelsea and closer to the top two than ever before.

Since then Man Ure now have a 5 point lead over Citeh and Spurs are behind Arsenal on goal difference. Chelsea, still spluttering a touch, are not far off and it seems all the big results are yet to come.

But screw that; lets do a bit of gloating, mainly because what you see at the moment is probably what you’re going to get at the end of the season. Man Ure 1st, Citeh 2nd, Spurs or Arse 3rd and one of those two teams fighting it out with Chelski for 4th. Newcastle will qualify for the Europa League on the back of an impressive season that has been one of vast over-achieving that neither Clive or I saw when we did our predictions back in July.

I suppose we both should have egg on our faces for suggesting Wolves would finish mid to low table, when they now look like they’re going to go down and not on some large breasted woman with a clunge like a used wallet.

I should like to crow about Steve Bruce. I told you so! Nah nah nah nah nah. Also the optimism shown for suggesting Spurs would finish 3rd; they haven’t, but if there’s any justice in the world…

Clive and I were dead wrong about Norwich and it’s at this point I want to talk about our three newest additions into the Prem Executive Bogs. Yes, we all knew Brendan Rogers had turned Swansea into an attractive footballing team, but we all knew that Ian Holloway’s Blackpool had one game plan – to attempt to score more goals than the opposition and after 4 months of befuddling everyone, they sank like a stone painted with lead paint and hidden inside a diamond dropped in a deep lake, possibly Wastwater. No one really expected the Swans to actually be any good and yet they sit 11th, which is actually a little lower than they deserve.

I can’t think of anyone who thought Norwich would do anything else but impress travelling fans with their enthusiasm, even if the memory of ‘Come on. Let’s be ‘aving you’ is still fresh in the mind. The only other way you’d remember Delia in such a way would be if she was straddling you naked, smacking you in the face with her droopy tits, demanding another hard on! But Paul Lambert, a dour Scot no less (what is it about dour Scots?) has turned Norwich into a better team than at least 8 others in the league. Norwich will be favourites to go down next season, based purely on the fact that the club’s spending for the next season will be geared entirely to the number of pies Delia can make. I’m betting if she… Nah, we’ll leave that in my twisted imagination.

And there’s QPR. I like Colin Wanker, but he’s pretty much a shit Premiership manager. If you want to win a skiing gold medal, you do not put Eddie Edwards in charge of the team. QPR have more money than Croesus, yet have consistently looked like a shit team full of overpaid Nancy boys (and Joey Barton) who don’t understand that QPR once had a rich heritage – they got to an FA Cup final in the 80s and were, for a while, being hailed as London’s top team! Can you imagine that? Ahead of Arsenal, Chelsea, Spurs, Fulham, West Ham, Brentford, Orient, Fisher Athletic… Someone must have been having a laugh.

Of course, everyone will be hoping that Bolton avoid the drop because of Heart Attack Boy and because Owen Coyle, in an alternative reality, would become Everton’s manager when David ‘Defensive Midfielders R Us) Moyes leaves to turn Spurs into a mid table team who have two good spells a season. Coyle did wonders at Burnley and looked like the right man for the job at the Reebok Stadium, but injuries, suspensions and the loss of a couple of his best players have seen the Lancashire club struggle like a thalidomide man attempting to have a wank. I actually think they’ll pull clear, leaving a four-way between Blackburn (who deserve to go down because Steve Kean is such a twat), QPR, Wigan and Wolves. I can’t help thinking that with the Latics facing 4 of the top 5 in their last 9 games that they will somehow avoid the drop, yet again; but it would be good to see WBA have a real dip between now and May, so that Wolves, Wigan and West Brom all go down. Ws don’t deserve a place at the top table if they’re going to be so consistently shit.

Clive is on course for an FA Cup prediction; he tipped Spurs, who have a semi-final spot. My choice – Man Ure – got knocked out by Accrington Stanley or someone, so I’m keeping my fingers crossed that Clive is bang on the money. Of course, it does throw up the incredibly interesting scenario of the two of us sitting watching the final between Spurs and Everton and having to be magnanimous to the other when one team turns the other over. If Spurs play in the final and look as good as they have done at times and Everton play to their capabilities, it could be one of the most exciting finals ever. As it stands, the final will be between Chelsea and the Red Shite and 20 million neutral fans will switch over and watch repeats of the $6million Dollar Man.

AVB got fired. He was a bit crap. He isn’t a bad manager, but when half your team is older than the manager there’s going to be a lack of respect. That said, Chelski is a club ran by a barking oligarch and a contingency of senior players who all think they are better than they really are. Isn’t that correct Mr Racist Terry?

In an ideal world, disgruntled fans should be allowed to carry machetes.

At the arse ends of the leagues – both the Cobblers and Kettering have had seasons that could end in disaster. The Poppies are on the verge of extinction – they moved to Nene Park and look like they’re going the same way as Rushden & Diamonds (who have been resurrected as FC R&D (2011) or something like that and play in the league below the UCL – where Rushden Town began life before Max Griggs came along with loads of money, loose women and a penchant for something I can’t say for fear of being kicked to death by errant DMs.

The Cobblers got a manager with pedigree. Gary Johnson was crap. So they got another manager, this one with a small amount of Premiership experience. He faced a big problem – whatever way you dress it up a dog turd is still a dog turd. However, if you need proof that sometimes it’s a manager rather than the players who turn things around, then look no further to 18th placed Northampton; who six weeks ago were bottom and 4 points adrift of safety. Beaten once in eight games, the Cobblers could still go down, mainly because there are 8 teams at the bottom of that league who all seem to want relegation more than survival. Three bad results could see the Cobblers plunged back into the acid bath of terror – an acid bath full of piranhas! (Well, piranhas bones, but you get the idea).

One final point. The Red Shite won a cup. They needed bad penalty taking to win it and since that win the team has played to a relegation standard. I hated the fact they won the cup, but I love the fact that King Kenny Dogleash is even more of a twat than the fat Spanish waiter, that Andy Carroll is now worth about £3.5m – which is roughly what he was worth when t’Shite bought him and that all the vastly expensive recruits are rubbish. You can suggest this team can only get better, but I’d like to think they won’t.

So in a few weeks, we’ll have a proper look at the season that will linger long in the mind for all the wrong reasons. But take heart, things might be poo, but none of you support Rangers!

Clive:

Ah, Wippo, me ol’ mucker, it’s been a long time, been a long time, been a long lonely lonely lonely…time. Let’s take your points from the bottom, fnaar, fnarr…

Rangers – it couldn’t happen to a nicer team. Unfortunately as they one of two reasons Scottish football exists at all they’ll survive, and keep their place in the SPL even if they do so as Rangers Phoenix or whatever.

T’Shite. I’m saying nowt, as to say anything will only result in that pony-tailed lummox getting a goal to go with DJ Beater’s inevitable brace in the semi. If the result goes the right way however, there’ll be no stopping the spleen-venting!

The Cobblers. In my years of being a proper fan of Shoesville’s perenially underwhelming footy team – you know, the sort of supporter who actually goes to matches, home and away – I learned that supporting this team is about as fulfilling as a never ending dry hump. They are still my home town team, so I don’t want to see them relegated which could have terminal consequences if R&D are anything to go by. I reckon Boothroyd will keep them up, but Cardoza faces a dilemma in the close season. Does he actually get his crumbling cracked leather wallet out of the barely explored inner jacket pocket and put the club back in debt with the hope of promotion or is he willing to accept more of the same next season? If he takes the latter option you can’t see Aidy sticking around for long. Everything changes and everything stays the same.

Max Griggs is an anagram of Massive Cnut…yes it is, you’re just not looking hard enough. R&D are back where they belong.

In the 70s disgruntled fans were allowed to carry machetes…oh, hang on, it was actually guns…and look where that got us…

Predictions, schmedictions. Did I really say Spurs for the Cup? Fair do’s, but only if we lose the semi, obviously. If the unlikely Spurs v Everton Cup Final materialises then I can’t see how on earth I could watch it in the same room as you, much as I luv you dear. We shall communicate by text from our respective sofas. I am not going to speculate on our semi, but you’ve every chance with yours as long as ‘Arry lets Christian Bale or whatever his name is play ON THE LEFT. Bleedin’ ‘ell ‘Arry, it ain’t rocket science!

Yup, for the second season running my prediction of Citeh winning the PL is going south, and on that record I think I’ll predict them again next season as none of us actually want them to win it, do we?

Going…..Down – I’ve a bit of a soft spot for QPR and I hope they stay up, but Mark Hughes (the next Steve Bruce?) and his under-performing charges are doing their best to send them down. It has been statistically proven that it takes 66 attempts to get a Trabant started on a freezing morning in Leipzig, the same number of attempts it has taken Adel Trabant (well, it’s close enough) to score a PL goal. Even Chelski’s Lady Boy has a better conversion record. If Wigan escape the drop again it will just go to show that there is no justice in the world. One team I’d quite like to see dragged into the relgation scrap is Aston Villa, whose manager is the permanently gloomy and not very good Alex McLeish, aka The Nadir Of Dour. This man makes our Davey look like one, or indeed both the Chuckle Brothers after dropping a handful of Es.

I had no idea you saw Delia Smith in such a way. I know you’re a veggie, so I think I should tell you that she has been known to use whipped lard to make things slippy. I think you need to make another appointment with the therapist dear boy. Right, I’m off to rub baby oil into Gabby Logan’s glistening tits…