A Game of Two Books.

I’ve noticed recently that a lot of football clubs have had their appeals turned down by the FA. Liverpool’s Alexander Doni had his wrongful dismissal claim turned down yesterday and QPR’s Shaun Derry lost his appeal earlier in the week for his red card against Manchester United where he fouled an offside and diving Ashley Young. If you can’t get let off for that, when can you?

This has made me wonder: why are clubs still bothering with appeals?

Seriously, I can’t actually remember the last time the FA overturned a decision. The ratio must be close to 500/1.

An Expensive Mistake.

Fabio Capello has resigned as England manager, a whole 592 days late.

Yes, it was 592 days ago when England were knocked out of the World Cup in South Africa by the Germans in what was a wholly embarrassing experience for the England team. Capello should have gone then, but he lingered on, until now.

It’s been a very forgettable reign for the Italian when you actually look at it. He was appointed manager way back in December 2007 holding the position for just over three years. In that time England have progressed from being a bland, under-achieving international football team to being a bland and even more under-achieving international football team.

Been there, done that, bought the T-shirt.

Racism has reared its ugly head in the footballing world on a few occasions this year. Most notably with Luis Suarez and England captain John Terry.

Last week Suarez was charged by the FA for using “insulting words in reference to Manchester United defender Patrice Evra's colour” and was given an 8 match ban alongside a £40,000 fine.

This has caused people to react in two different ways. Many people are glad he’s been given such a severe ban as there really is no place for it in society let alone football. But there have been certain sections who’ve reacted in support of Suarez, obviously the majority of them are Liverpool fans.

Manchester United - A Class Apart.

Manchester United played in the Champions League against Otelul Galati on Wednesday evening at Old Trafford, and I went along to watch it.

It was my first game for a long while. I seem to average about one game a season with United these days which, for a lifelong fan, is pretty poor. Unfortunately I’ve been priced out, I just don’t love the game enough to turn up week in week out and pay through the nose for the privilege.

What's the going rate for a World Cup?

I think it’s fair to say it’s been a torrid year for Fifa. First we had the World Cup bids that resulted in one tournament going to the largest nation in the world and one going to a nation the size of a postage stamp; then we had the whole Andy Gray sexism debacle leaving a huge question mark over who will partner Martin Tyler on the upcoming Fifa 12; and then we had the inevitable questioning of corruption within the octual organisation of Fifa.

This really is one of the most obvious statements in the world: Fifa are corrupt. It’s right up there with: oil is a valuable resource; Hitler wasn’t very nice; and Badger loves mashed potato! For some reason the world has only just realised this and several members of Fifa have been hauled in front of Fifa’s own ethics committee to answer to these charges of corruption. The very fact Fifa have an ethics committee is actually quite amusing.

It's just effing inconsistent.

What a weekend it was for Manchester! Manchester United made history by securing the league title for the nineteenth time at Ewood Park and Manchester City kept the Manc flag flying high by winning the FA Cup at Wembley!

It isn’t every day you’ll find both sets of supporters celebrating in the city of Manchester but this weekend showed it was indeed possible. And it could be a sign of things to come. We could be entering an era where English football is dominated by Manchester!

35 years.

So today is the big day: the FA Cup final! I don’t know about you but this year’s final just isn’t doing it for me. I honestly don’t care, and that’s really quite sad as it’s a competition with such great memories for me.

I know I’m a Manchester United fan, and Manchester City are in the final, but that isn’t the reason I’m not interested, heck I couldn’t actually care less if City won it or not. What the hell is wrong with me!? I am letting the red half of Manchester down big time.

Sepp's pointless tea party.

The International Football Association Board met up earlier this week to focus on the pressing issues currently occupying the minds of everyone in football. No issue is bigger at the moment that that of snoods. Are they okay, or are they made of a terrible evil?

Well it’s of the opinion of Sepp Blatter and his henchmen that they can't make any money out of this fad so I’m afraid it’s going to be banned. That’s not the official reason of course, apparently it’s too dangerous to be wearing them. Expect our lads to be donning the old American football gear from next season then, as if safety is an issue perhaps they should just ban the likes of Wayne Rooney, Jamie Carragher, and Mathieu Flamini from playing football full stop.

Ryan Babel #idiot

Upon watching the FA Cup match between Manchester United and Liverpool at the weekend you may have heard the commentator say the following when Ryan Babel came onto the pitch:

“Here’s a real chance for Ryan Babel to impress his new manager, all be it they’re down to ten men and a goal down, but it’s still a great chance for him.”

I’m sure he’s impressed his new manager no end! Because yes, as you might have heard, after the match, in which Liverpool lost 1-0 thanks to a dubious penalty and a stone-wall sending off, Ryan Babel decided to log in to Twitter and take his frustrations out on referee Howard Webb.

“And they call him one of the best referees? That's a joke. SMH”

Along with this outburst he posted a link to a mock-up photo of Howard Webb in an old United kit clearly stating he felt the experienced official was a biased referee. He couldn’t even be bothered to Photoshop the latest kit onto him, what a muppet.

What went through his head? What imbecile writes that on Twitter and goes into enough thought for a picture and thinks they’ll get away with it scot-free. Ryan Babel apparently.

Obviously he didn’t get away with it and the FA have charged him with improper conduct, and rightly so. If you ever find yourself on Ryan Babel’s twitter page you’ll see that he’s been banging on about being sent to Twitter jail. Maybe it will do him some good, if he spent more time actually training than tweeting nonsense all day long he might actually become an average player yet!

But that’s not even the worst thing, what’s annoyed me the most is the fact that the PFA have actually defended him! No! You just don’t do it! Gordon Taylor, a man so out of touch with the game he still thinks managers are allowed to smoke in the dug-out, has come out and said Babel shouldn’t be reprimanded:

“So long as it's not vitriolic, so long as it's taken in the right way and it's a little bit of fun then we've got to be able to smile at these things.”

This guy’s a bigger idiot than Babel. First of all Gordon, a quick definition of the word vitriolic from Chamber’s dictionary: extremely bitter or hateful, especially with reference to speech or criticism. Yeah, I think we can just about say that Mr. Babel had a slight bitterness to his apparently innocuous tweet.

I highly doubt Howard Webb will see the funny side to it to be honest Gordon. He’s a professional referee and calling him biased is pretty much the worse thing you can say about him! That would be like calling a fireman a secret arsonist! I’m sure you wouldn’t like it if someone questioned your professionalism Gordon, how would you feel if someone said you took a bung from a multi-national news corporation? You wouldn’t be seeing the funny side to it would you?

Football is currently the worst sport for showing disrespect to officials. Referees in football get nothing but abuse from fans, players, managers, and journalists, and yet funnily enough without them we’d have no game to play at all. Players show no respect for match officials, swearing at them, surrounding them, slating them before and after games. What message does that send to the young kids out there? It’s alright kids, abusing the referees is just part of the game, according to Gordon Taylor it’s all a bit of fun!

In rugby the referee stands at about half the size of the cauli-eared behemoths running around the field and yet they command more respect than a football referee could ever dream of! Players address him as Sir, listen to what he has to say, and take decisions on the chin, whether they’re right or wrong. So why is football so different? Well youngsters playing football aren’t being taught to respect the referees while young rugby players are. That’s where it has to start, at a young age. Teach them to respect officials no matter what, their decision is final. If it’s gone against you, man up and get on with it. But that’s easier said than done when every Match of the Day interview is filled with one manager praising his team whilst the other bemoans the referee.

Ryan Babel’s tweeting is but a drop in the ocean. But that ocean is made of tiny droplets that over the years have created a mass of water so big it will probably never be able to be drained.

Babel’s not the one to blame here, he obviously thought it was okay to do what he did. He has since apologised on Twitter, it’s unknown if he has apologised to Howard Webb directly though. The people to blame for all this are the FA, who year in year out allow this to happen, and the morons like Gordon Taylor who apparently say it‘s alright.

And they call him chief executive of the PFA? That's a joke. SMH