Don't know how to 'Live blog' so just kept regular updates of the day. I make no apologies for inaccurate reporting or factual errors.
August 30th
23:52 - Just got in from work
23:54 - Check Facebook. Nothing of note
23:58 - Check Twitter. Nothing football related grabs me. Am momentarily sidetracked by a well known DJ doing a Q&A with his followers. It's not particularly interesting...
August 31st
00:06 - The @BBCNews account tweets the headline "Land Rover confirms new defender" with link. I become slightly confused as I wonder if Land Rover have signed Gary Cahill.
After clicking on said link, I discover the car manufacturer is actually releasing a new version of it's Defender model. The news doesn't have much impact on me. One of my great insecurities as a man is the fact I cannot drive nor do I have any great knowledge of cars. It's quite emasculating when pub conversations turn to engine sizes and "horsepower" and other such things I ought to know about. Instead, I gaze quietly into my pint. Feeling inferior...
00:09 - Check Newsnow - Only eye-catching but totally unsurprising news is that Tony Pulis might try and buy Hugo Rodellega from Wigan. If, 24 hours from now, Stoke haven't signed a big lumbering striker, I'll eat my hat.
00:12 - I become distracted. I'm now watching a video of two women doing very unhygienic things with apples. All of a sudden it's quarter to 2 in the morning. Better get to bed.
03:37 - I am awoken by a drunk crying woman outside my window. She is on the phone, clearly distressed. I wonder if she's an Everton fan.
08:00 approx - I toss and turn and find myself awake. Naturally, I check early transfer news. On Twitter someone says Mario Balotelli's page has been removed from the Man City website and Rio Ferdinand informs us that he has a toothache.
09:00 - I'm still struggling to get back to sleep. The news now is that Luka Modric will remain a Tottenham player bringing joy to the White half of North London but also an anti-climax to one of the most tedious transfer saga this summer.
Rumours suggest Japanese star Keisuke Honda is on his way to Arsenal prompting a number of car puns and gags that once again mock my lack of knowledge in this field.
11:20 - Managed to get back to sleep. Wake up, Check Facebook. Someone posts about spotting Alan Hutton somewhere or another. Someone else posts the joke that "Arsenal interested in Belgian defender Mark de Man. Apparently, they are also interested in his compatriots, striker Skor de Gaulle and goalkeeper Bloek de Schott." - I giggle.
11:45 - The hilarious @AnnieEaves on Twitter posts this hilarious tweet highlighting how crazy people get on days like this. I can't tell if this was made up, lost in translation or the after continuing effects of a Bank Holiday magic muchrooms session.
12:00 - In the absense of a big name move thus far, the Wesley Sneijder rumours begin to gather pace. "Spotted boarding a private jet", "Spotted in Manchester" "His dog's hairdresser has relocated to Stockport" etc.
12:15 - Honda not going to Arsenal. I breathe a sign of relief. Joe Cole apparently in talks with Aston Villa? Earlier rumours were that he was gong to France to play for Lille. Be a real shame if he bottles the chance to go abroad. I must sound like a stuck record given the number of times I've said English players need to broaden their football knowledge by playing in other countries.
12:20 - I post one of my best ever jokes on Twitter: "TRANSFER NEWS: In a last minute U-turn, I've opted for a Chicken and Bacon Sarnie for lunch instead of Fish. The fish said to be gutted." - No-one reads it.
12:23 - Apparently Carlos Tevez is staying at City. Another saga that concludes with an unsatisfactory dribble...
12:28 - There we go! Stoke look to increase Big lumbering striker quota by two as Cameron Jerome and Nik Bendtner are supposedly set to sign.
12:35 - The real beauty of Transfer Deadline day! Sky Sports' BREAKING NEWS ticker announces that Joe Cole is having a medical at Aston Villa. Just at the very moment everyone else discovers (via Lille + Liverpool's offical websites) that Cole has actually signed on Loan at Lille. Oops!
This is getting fun. I'm tempted to call in sick. Will they really need me at work?
12:40 - I finally see the Paulo Di Canio video where he goes at it with one of his players - I'm now wondering what possessed me to believe he was going to be a great manager who would take The Robbins up at the first attempt. What a wasted bet. May as well have just set fire to my money instead.
13:02 - Looks like Anton Ferdinand is off to QPR. The most tragic thing about this is that if/when they get relegated, he will probably leave and join another Premier League team. I actually mildly respect him for being able to blag a career in the top flight for so long.
13:50 - I arrive at the gym before work. Wearing an Ajax shirt was an error. 712 journalists stop me on my journey from Tufnell Park to White City to ask me if I'm joining the Amsterdam club. I'm forced to make a statement reaffirming my commitment to my Saturday team and explain my choice of shirt is strictly down to the fact I've done no laundry this week.
15:20 - A couple of actual confirmations from North London. Scott Parker signs for Spurs and Andre Santos joins Arsenal. I like Parker but as I've questioned before, do his good performances only ever come at poorer clubs? Can he hack the step up? Time will tell.
I know next to nothing about Santos so I asked a Brazilian friend if he will be any good for Arsenal. this was the text response I received:
"Worse than Clichy even Traore better. Only God knows how he is Brazil first choice..."
Let the good times roll
15:54 - More craziness. The BBC's always reliable Dan Roan starts commenting on fruitless speculation regarding Kaka and Sneijder.
16:30 - Apparently Arsenal and Everton are in talks over Mikael Arteta. Interesting move for Arsenal. He's hardly Fabregas but they need something. Craig Bellamy is set to rejoin Liverpool. I could insert some generic joke about a golf club here but I won't.
16:40 - West Ham are apparently taking David Bentley on loan from Spurs. Also Henri Lansbury from Arsenal. Pretty much the same player though, right?
17:15 - More Big lumbering striker news from the Potteries. Bendtner deal fallen through. Pulis turns attention to Peter Crouch instead.
17:42 - Jermaine Jenas looks like he's joining Aston Villa on loan. Deadline day insanity looks to have plagued even the best of us as arguably the country's most respected football writer Henry Winter tweets the following:
"Jenas for #avfc. Could be one of the best deals. If he plays week in/out, & McLeish makes him believe, Jenas could be a cm star again"
I'm sorry, AGAIN????
18:00 - The transfer window shuts in Italy. My dream move to Parma is scuppered. I fire my agent.
18:30 - While discussing Henry Winter's insane tweet, a friend points out the rumour that former Spanish international and two time La Liga winner Vicente could be on his way to Brighton adding "I still assume he's awesome because of Champ days."
18:32 - Curiously, I discover that another Champ favourite of mine Zdenek Grygera has signed for Fulham.
18:33 - The BBC as doing a Football Focus deadline day special. My favourite part is when Dan Walker throws to Mark Bright at Loftus Road who informs us that Shaun Wright Philips is sat in a nearby hotel waiting for the go ahead to sign for QPR. I imagine poor Shauny bored out of his skull sat on his own playing Angry Birds and watching Hollyoaks.
18:56 - Martin Keown makes the bold statement that Everton won't miss Arteta because they have young Ross Blakley who will go on to be one of the best players in English football. No pressure then, Ross.
19:15 - Back to Sky Sports.
19:16 - Arteta deal off! It seems as though thrifty Arsenal aren't prepared to stump up the cash. Can't say I'm shocked.
19:18 - Anton Ferdinand still not a QPR player. The Superhoops are also in for Sebastian Bassong as they attempt to fill their defence with the most mediocre players imaginable.
19:42 - Twente attacking midfielder Bryan Ruiz is supposedly having a medical at Fulham although Mike Ashley is said to be sending down a helicopter to literally hijack the deal. When did football become an episode of 24?
19:44 - Big talk that Yossi Benayoun is joining Arsenal on loan from Chelsea. Reaction of Arsenal fans isn't exactly one of excitement. Looks like Yossi is going to have to score a hat trick on his debut in order to get gooners onside. Hardly a marquee purchase.
20:30 - I see Jeremy Paxman walking the corridors at work. I don't ask him who he is signing for.
20:47 - Bolton sign David N'Gog from Liverpool. Bolton fans weep. After a year playing out of his depth for Everton, Jermaine Beckford signs for Leicester in the Championship returning to a level where he is more comfortable.
20:53 - Rio Ferdinand tweets to inform us he has had two teeth removed.
20:54 - Sky Sports News' Jim White almost explodes as he brings us news the Spurs are linked with a move for Kaka.
Wait, WHAT???????
21:02 - The excitement doesn't last long as Harry Redknapp is stopped leaving the Spurs training ground to deny the Kaka story. Well, that was an excitable few minutes, wasn't it?
Redknapp says Spurs failed in a bid for Gary Cahill which leads me to wonder, given Arsenal's failure to sign him and little interest from elsewhere, what sort of crazy money Bolton were demanding for a player they are likely to lose for nothing in 9 months?
'Arry also says Spurs turned down a £40m bid from Chelsea for Luka Modric. I know it's very easy to over-simplify these things but surely £40 would have more than enough to reinvest and sign the striker and centre back the team are desperately crying out for?
@Ghostgoal quickly tweeted: "Ironic that the one manager who speaks to Sky Sports News is also the one guy I wouldn't believe a single word from. Straight-talking 'Arry."
21:12 - Heading out of Tottenham is Wilson Palacios who joins Stoke along with Cameron Jerome. Peter Crouch still in talks. Pulis seems to be building a pretty formidable side at the Britannia and could lead them comfortably to a top half finish this year. Who would have thunk it?
Unfortunately, an improving team will never change the nightmare-inducing ugliness of the Stoke fans behind the Sky Sports reporter tonight as the deals are announced.
21:20 - Arteta to Arsenal back on! The player himself seems hellbent on joining the Gunners and asked to leave Everton. - The Blues themselves look to have landed Real Madrid's forgotten man Royston Drenthe.
21:23 - The Sky Sports reporter at Sunderland makes a joke about chamomile tea. I die a little inside as the absurdity of this day reaches a nadir.
21:51 - It looks like Yakubu is joining Blackburn. I still haven't forgiven the fat oaf for his miss against South Korea at the World Cup last year. I expect the bloater has got an unlimited supply of Venky's chicken written into his contract.
22:13 - Vicente is not going to Brighton unfortunately but Shefki Kuqi is going to Oldham.
22:29 - Wow! Raul Meireles has handed in a transfer request half an hour before the window shuts! Has he been asleep all day?
22:35 - Another BBC Football Focus special. A comedy moment as DAN Walker in the studio throws to DAN Roan at the Emirates.
"Over to you Dan"
"Thanks Dan"
The farce is complete as the next story is about the signing of Scott Dann from Birmingham to Blackburn.
22:47 - Over at QPR there are more surreal moments as both Anton Ferdinand and Jason Puncheon and filmed sprinting into the club attempting to seal their respective moves. This is followed by Shaun Wright Philips giving the most unenthusiastic interview by any player joining a new club after his move to the hoops is confirmed.
23:00 - Home from work as the window shuts to the news that Peter Crouch is probably going to be a Stoke player, Mikael Arteta will be wearing Arsenal colours from now on and Raul Meireles has swapped Liverpool red for Chelsea blue. Nik Bendtner goes to Sunderland on loan.
For the next hour I sit and listen to Dave Bassett and Iain Dowie talk nonsense. My housemate points out the irony that for all their extensive coverage, Sky have made the two worse signings by getting Bassett and Dowie in. Listening to them rabbit on makes me consider how much more fun it would be if Morbo from Futurama was presenting on Deadline Day.
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Showing posts with label Transfer Window. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Transfer Window. Show all posts
Thursday, 1 September 2011
Tuesday, 5 July 2011
"Breaking" News
As far as football is concerned, this summer has been a tedious one. One of the most tedious ever. In fact, if gongs were handed out for sheer strength of tedium, a three hour award ceremony featuring speeches from Gordon Brown broken up by musical performances from Celine Dion, still wouldn’t be as tedious as the sole award winner: the summer of 2011.
As domestic football around the continent came to an end, I scrambled around like a hungry scavenger trying to find any morsal of footballing action to keep me sane. As a result, I have found myself attempting and struggling to even get a tingle out of the predictable Euro 21s (won by Spain), the insipid under 17s World Cup (England eliminated by Germany), the I-don’t mean-to-sound-sexist-but-genuinely-cannot-find-it-in-myself-to-give-a-shit-about Women’s World Cup and most insignificantly of all, the CONCACAF Gold Cup where Mexico triumphed in a competition featuring football heavyweights Grenada, Guadeloupe and El Salvador!
The Copa America did pique my interest initially but the turgid nature of the opening matches seems to suggest that like the rest of international football it is suffering from a terrible case of crippling impotence. At the time of writing, four of the opening six games from the opening round of fixtures have finished in a draw with just 7 goals scored.
But alas, in my desperation, I live in hope that these competitions will keep me satiated and prevent me from going batshit insane from the unbelievable amount of nonsense and lies written and reported by supposed respected sources of football news regarding player transfers and the like.
Yes, this is a summer filler piece deriding pointless transfer guff. Sue me.
Is there any other sport where more column inches are dedicated speculating about the movement of the participants than to their actual athletic achievement? The amount of time journalists and bloggers dedicate to the continued perpetuation of bullshit coupled with willingness of the fans to nuzzle their collective snouts into the metaphorical trough of said bullshit, all the while lapping it up and repeating it with literally no reason to do so makes you wonder if they actually care more about this ridiculous summer sideshow than the game itself. How different is this to pornography? Getting a cheap thrill from something that you want to be real but in actual fact remains nothing more than a hollow fantasy.
The comparisons don’t end there. Like all your favourite interracial BBW triple-penetration gangbang videos featuring that woman who looks a lot like your favourite primary school teacher, the main source of all these transfer fables is found on the internet. All you have to do is go to the football section of Newsnow during this period and you will find literally hundreds of thousands of desperate, hit-seeking blogs trying to entice you in with titles such as “New Chelsea boss eyes £20 million defender swoop”, “Liverpool eye highly rated French midfielder” or “United prepared to break bank for Cambodian wonderkid”. It doesn’t take long for some lonely loser with a laptop and an overactive imagination to cobble together a piece ‘suggesting’ that a team ‘may’ be interested in signing a given player. These qualifiers of uncertainty should be enough to warn readers off ever clicking on these sites but unfortunately I fear I’m giving football fans far too much credit.
Waste Paper
Things get worse when ‘proper’ media outlets get involved. It’s no secret that newspapers are a busted flush. Since the internet strolled into town like some sort of rabid wolfit has just been sat there in the corner of the room waiting patiently for the print media to breath it’s last breath. The internet wolf will then take the opportunity to feast on it’s rotting corpse. The Papers are, however trying to go down fighting. Having been beaten to a story by the internet before they have the chance to go to print, editors sweat buckets over how they can stay fresh and otherwise respectable scribes become afraid of re-printing what people have already heard about before they went to bed last night. So, as a result, we are then treated to EXCLUSIVE (upper case lettering mandatory) stories in the morning editions. These are ridiculous tales of transfer ‘bombshells’ which end up being about as genuine as Katie Price’s body. These stories tend to make bold claims about individuals ‘demanding’ to leave and how ‘furious’ managers are and such like. Yet one brief look over the article in question and the number of quotes that are actually attributed to a human being rather than an ‘insider’ or ‘someone close to the club’ are minimal if there at all. I understand the need to protect sources in most situations but come on. One might think the author simply plucked these quotes out of thin air...
NB: This kind of thing isn’t merely restricted to tabloids. The posh papers are more often than not just as bad at indulging in fruitless speculation, albeit in a more eloquent manner. These otherwise respected writers also do major damage to their own credibility by regularly peddling lies.
Twatter
One of the greatest, and at the same time, one of the worst things to ever sprout from the internet dung heap is Twitter – the ‘microblogging’ site where people publically broadcast the first thing that enters their head, true or not, in just 140 characters and are not required to substantiate any bogus claim they may make. God bless freedom of speech…
How does this relate to football transfer speculation? Well, let’s take fan. He might, for whatever reason, tweet that “My bro is tea lady at Upton Park and swears Leo Messi has just walked in”. All his ‘followers’ ears prick up. This is big news, albeit not even true! Regardless, they can now ‘retweet’ it and before you know it, millions of people around the world are giving more millage to an obvious lie. Then, as above with their printed stories, actual credible journalists, absolutely desperate to remind everyone that they are ‘in the loop’, will pass comment on the rumour. Even if they do so dismissively and claim it “unrealistic that Messi will ever get the District line”, all their followers will see it and they have given yet more legs to the fabrication.
TV Tuner
Caught somewhere between the avalanche of shit on the internet and the shit in the papers, is the broadcast media. TV and Radio, although also in competition with the internet still probably retains its position at the top of the media food chain. For all the immediacy of the online world, there is still a level of distrust thanks in part to the reasons outlined above. One is more inclined to trust the warm, welcoming, Colgate smile on TV rather than the collection of faceless words flashing up on their computers and smart phones. As a result, the rise in popularity of Sky Sports News has been borderline stratospheric down the years. When nothing else is on the old idiot box, you almost guarantee that every football fan instinctively punches in 405 on their Sky remote.
The merits of 24 hour news can be debated another day. Repetition can most certainly add to the tedium but one thing for sure is that when something significant does transpire, a channel on air at all hours of the day can report this news, no matter how trivial, in greater detail than some clown on twitter and far quicker than our friends in the press.
Unfortunately, this frantic need to be first also gives rise to the great promotion of transfer claptrap. In a scene arguably more ridiculous than Twitter, Sky Sports News will often insist on breaking a story, regardless of relevance, importance or quite worryingly, truth. Once again, the mythical unnamed ‘Sky Sources’ or even better, ‘Sky Sports Understands’ are the flimsy but legitimate defences for making these uncorroborated announcements. They can literally put whatever they want on their famous bright yellow ticker...
SKY SPORTS SOURCES: TOTTENHAM LINING UP A £45 MILLION BID FOR THE FAST SHOW'S FICTIONAL STRIKER JULIO GEORDIO
...and they can get away with it too.
Sky Sports News is no longer on free to air TV. This means we now have to pay to for the privilege of being patronised by a bubbly blonde woman dressed like she are about to hit a West End club telling us that she ‘understands’ something that is quite clearly not the case.
The worst things that results from all these nutty transfer stories is the fact that we, the watching fools actually bother to engage. We run around, send texts, emails and ring each other to tell each other about Messi to West Ham like it is fact. Even when we know most of it is crap, we are still fall into the trap and end up having absurd and inane conversations discussing, rather pointlessly with one another, how David Villa would perform alongside Elmander at Bolton when we know full well such a daft thing would never occur. September 1st cannot come soon enough...
Make up transfer stories with me on Twitter
As domestic football around the continent came to an end, I scrambled around like a hungry scavenger trying to find any morsal of footballing action to keep me sane. As a result, I have found myself attempting and struggling to even get a tingle out of the predictable Euro 21s (won by Spain), the insipid under 17s World Cup (England eliminated by Germany), the I-don’t mean-to-sound-sexist-but-genuinely-cannot-find-it-in-myself-to-give-a-shit-about Women’s World Cup and most insignificantly of all, the CONCACAF Gold Cup where Mexico triumphed in a competition featuring football heavyweights Grenada, Guadeloupe and El Salvador!
The Copa America did pique my interest initially but the turgid nature of the opening matches seems to suggest that like the rest of international football it is suffering from a terrible case of crippling impotence. At the time of writing, four of the opening six games from the opening round of fixtures have finished in a draw with just 7 goals scored.
But alas, in my desperation, I live in hope that these competitions will keep me satiated and prevent me from going batshit insane from the unbelievable amount of nonsense and lies written and reported by supposed respected sources of football news regarding player transfers and the like.
Yes, this is a summer filler piece deriding pointless transfer guff. Sue me.
Is there any other sport where more column inches are dedicated speculating about the movement of the participants than to their actual athletic achievement? The amount of time journalists and bloggers dedicate to the continued perpetuation of bullshit coupled with willingness of the fans to nuzzle their collective snouts into the metaphorical trough of said bullshit, all the while lapping it up and repeating it with literally no reason to do so makes you wonder if they actually care more about this ridiculous summer sideshow than the game itself. How different is this to pornography? Getting a cheap thrill from something that you want to be real but in actual fact remains nothing more than a hollow fantasy.
The comparisons don’t end there. Like all your favourite interracial BBW triple-penetration gangbang videos featuring that woman who looks a lot like your favourite primary school teacher, the main source of all these transfer fables is found on the internet. All you have to do is go to the football section of Newsnow during this period and you will find literally hundreds of thousands of desperate, hit-seeking blogs trying to entice you in with titles such as “New Chelsea boss eyes £20 million defender swoop”, “Liverpool eye highly rated French midfielder” or “United prepared to break bank for Cambodian wonderkid”. It doesn’t take long for some lonely loser with a laptop and an overactive imagination to cobble together a piece ‘suggesting’ that a team ‘may’ be interested in signing a given player. These qualifiers of uncertainty should be enough to warn readers off ever clicking on these sites but unfortunately I fear I’m giving football fans far too much credit.
Waste Paper
Things get worse when ‘proper’ media outlets get involved. It’s no secret that newspapers are a busted flush. Since the internet strolled into town like some sort of rabid wolfit has just been sat there in the corner of the room waiting patiently for the print media to breath it’s last breath. The internet wolf will then take the opportunity to feast on it’s rotting corpse. The Papers are, however trying to go down fighting. Having been beaten to a story by the internet before they have the chance to go to print, editors sweat buckets over how they can stay fresh and otherwise respectable scribes become afraid of re-printing what people have already heard about before they went to bed last night. So, as a result, we are then treated to EXCLUSIVE (upper case lettering mandatory) stories in the morning editions. These are ridiculous tales of transfer ‘bombshells’ which end up being about as genuine as Katie Price’s body. These stories tend to make bold claims about individuals ‘demanding’ to leave and how ‘furious’ managers are and such like. Yet one brief look over the article in question and the number of quotes that are actually attributed to a human being rather than an ‘insider’ or ‘someone close to the club’ are minimal if there at all. I understand the need to protect sources in most situations but come on. One might think the author simply plucked these quotes out of thin air...
NB: This kind of thing isn’t merely restricted to tabloids. The posh papers are more often than not just as bad at indulging in fruitless speculation, albeit in a more eloquent manner. These otherwise respected writers also do major damage to their own credibility by regularly peddling lies.
Twatter
One of the greatest, and at the same time, one of the worst things to ever sprout from the internet dung heap is Twitter – the ‘microblogging’ site where people publically broadcast the first thing that enters their head, true or not, in just 140 characters and are not required to substantiate any bogus claim they may make. God bless freedom of speech…
How does this relate to football transfer speculation? Well, let’s take fan. He might, for whatever reason, tweet that “My bro is tea lady at Upton Park and swears Leo Messi has just walked in”. All his ‘followers’ ears prick up. This is big news, albeit not even true! Regardless, they can now ‘retweet’ it and before you know it, millions of people around the world are giving more millage to an obvious lie. Then, as above with their printed stories, actual credible journalists, absolutely desperate to remind everyone that they are ‘in the loop’, will pass comment on the rumour. Even if they do so dismissively and claim it “unrealistic that Messi will ever get the District line”, all their followers will see it and they have given yet more legs to the fabrication.
TV Tuner
Caught somewhere between the avalanche of shit on the internet and the shit in the papers, is the broadcast media. TV and Radio, although also in competition with the internet still probably retains its position at the top of the media food chain. For all the immediacy of the online world, there is still a level of distrust thanks in part to the reasons outlined above. One is more inclined to trust the warm, welcoming, Colgate smile on TV rather than the collection of faceless words flashing up on their computers and smart phones. As a result, the rise in popularity of Sky Sports News has been borderline stratospheric down the years. When nothing else is on the old idiot box, you almost guarantee that every football fan instinctively punches in 405 on their Sky remote.
The merits of 24 hour news can be debated another day. Repetition can most certainly add to the tedium but one thing for sure is that when something significant does transpire, a channel on air at all hours of the day can report this news, no matter how trivial, in greater detail than some clown on twitter and far quicker than our friends in the press.
Unfortunately, this frantic need to be first also gives rise to the great promotion of transfer claptrap. In a scene arguably more ridiculous than Twitter, Sky Sports News will often insist on breaking a story, regardless of relevance, importance or quite worryingly, truth. Once again, the mythical unnamed ‘Sky Sources’ or even better, ‘Sky Sports Understands’ are the flimsy but legitimate defences for making these uncorroborated announcements. They can literally put whatever they want on their famous bright yellow ticker...
SKY SPORTS SOURCES: TOTTENHAM LINING UP A £45 MILLION BID FOR THE FAST SHOW'S FICTIONAL STRIKER JULIO GEORDIO
...and they can get away with it too.
Sky Sports News is no longer on free to air TV. This means we now have to pay to for the privilege of being patronised by a bubbly blonde woman dressed like she are about to hit a West End club telling us that she ‘understands’ something that is quite clearly not the case.
The worst things that results from all these nutty transfer stories is the fact that we, the watching fools actually bother to engage. We run around, send texts, emails and ring each other to tell each other about Messi to West Ham like it is fact. Even when we know most of it is crap, we are still fall into the trap and end up having absurd and inane conversations discussing, rather pointlessly with one another, how David Villa would perform alongside Elmander at Bolton when we know full well such a daft thing would never occur. September 1st cannot come soon enough...
Make up transfer stories with me on Twitter
Tuesday, 1 February 2011
How much??? Deadline Day Observations - 31st Jan 2011
And so another Transfer window draws to a dramatic close. January 31st has come and gone, clubs have concluded their transfer business for the season (emergency loan nonsense aside) and will have to make do with their lot from now until the end of the campaign.
Is Deadline day is fast becoming one of the most significant dates of the entire year? Ask a lot of football fans and you'll probably find it means more to them than Shrove Tuesday or Boxing Day or Valentines.
This particular day in the footballing calender tends to stir up a mix of emotions as supporters feel everything from excitement, to anger, to fear and even confusion as teams desperately and recklessly throw around their cash trying to strengthen their squads in a manner not dissimilar to shopaholics on the last day of some department store sale. Like these shoppers, football clubs often find that they have not invested wisely and end up going home with ill-fitting and unwanted items they cannot return.
Cynicism toward the whole idea of a transfer window is widespread and totally understandable given the limits, restrcitions and pressure it places on clubs, managers and players. However, I've decided that it is time to embrace the madness. I love days like this because of the unpredictability and insanity - even if they do serve as a reminder of how much of a ridiculous circus the 'sport' of football has become.
A whole day spent sat glued to Sky Sports News with my MacBook by my side as I constantly refreshed the BBC website and obsessively trawled through Twitter for any nugget of vaguely relevant transfer gossip was probably not the most productive use of my time. Some might even say it was a complete waste of a day off. A day that could have been spent doing something far more fulfilling. Tragically, there are actually very few things in the world not involving Megan Fox and a Jacuzzi that I would have rather been doing...
Why does the deadline time change every window? In the past it has been 5pm, Midnight and on this occasion, 11pm. There's probably a simple explanation that I am unaware of so if anyone can enlighten me, I'd be rather grateful.
People talk about inflated transfer fees and and paying over the odds for individuals but in truth, who are any of us to judge how much someone is worth? Footballers are worth exactly what a team/Chairman/Cash-rich Arab can (hopefully) afford and is prepared to pay. There is no official valuation criteria for players to meet so not one of us can justifiably say that "x is a waste of money" or "y is a bargain".
Having said that, for the sake of argument, I'm going to ignore this completely...
Without a shadow of a doubt, the biggest story of the day was dedicated, badge-kissing Liverpool diehard Fernando Torres swapping his red armband for a blue one as he joined rivals Chelsea for something like 50 million quid of Roman Abramovich's fortune, breaking the British transfer record in the process! The blues also spunked £22m on David Luiz from Benfica but I literally know nothing about the Brazilian defender to say whether this transfer is worthwhile or not so I'll move on.
Amidst all the hype and hysteria surrounding the Torres deal, people seem to have ignored the fact that 'Nando' has actually been quite rubbish this season. Imagine how much he would have cost in he hadn't been playing like some kind of Spanish Chris Armstrong for the past 5 months. He also spent so much time on the treatment table that Liverpool physios were actually charging him rent.
Of course, when fit, firing and on form he is arguably the best striker in Europe and if Carlo Ancelloti can get him to form a half decent partnership with Didier Drogba then quite frankly, the rest of us are doomed! To completely bastardise the famous Mark Twain quote, rumours of Chelsea's demise have been greatly exaggerated.
Naturally, the move has led to widespread calls of disloyalty and betrayal from dismayed Liverpool fans, some of whom even took to making the extreme gesture of burning replica shirts as a means of expressing their displeasure. Talk about taking things too seriously.
It was not all bad news for the scousers though, especially given the fact that someone, somewhere in Liverpool decided that Andy Carroll was worth 35,000,000 pounds Stirling and paid Newcastle this very amount to bring take him to Anfield. Seriously, £35million? Did they forget to add a decimal point in there somewhere? Who sanctioned this transfer? Fred Goodwin???
If a player with half a season's top flight experience and less than a hundred professional appearances to his name is valued at that price then we may as well all just pack up and go home. Forget women linesmen, THIS is the sign that the game has gone mad. If we were to say that Mr. Carroll is 100 times a better footballer than me then the would still place me at about £350,000! If anyone is looking for a clumsy, bumbling Saturday league centre back, I'm your man! Darren Bent all of a sudden looks a snip.
The most curious thing about this was that Newcastle had apparently initially turned down £30million. Why? Fair play to them for holding out for more but anything above £10m is surely too much for Carroll who has now become the 8th most expensive player in world football despite not even being one of the top 20 best players in the Premier League.
The 'experts' on Sky tried to justify the transfer, by suggesting that 'King' Kenny was trying to sign players that fans could identify with. It would be too easy to make a joke about Carroll's criminal record so I'll leave it well alone.
Signing overrated jailbird Geordies wasn't the only business Liverpool did on deadline day. The NESV owned club also completed the deal to bring in another striker in Uruguayan Luis Suarez – yes, he of notorious World Cup handball fame – for a cool £23m.
Suarez has one of those frightening goal-scoring records in the Dutch league but as we've seen in the past an Eredivisie golden boot can prove to be about as valuable as shares in BP this morning. For every Ruud van Nistelrooy, there's a Mateja Kezman, or even worse, an Alfonso Alves!
Liverpool fans will be hoping their new man will be more like the former (as well as letting his feet rather than hands do the talking). Taking Suarez' international record (16 in 38 to date) into account as well, it would suggest he won't turn out to be as much of a footballing misfit as the latter two. If he can adapt, he will be just as deadly in front of goal as the departing Torres.
With two high priced new strikers making up what would be one of the most expensive forward lines in the league, the burning question on everyone's lips is what will become of Nabil El Zhar?
The fact that the new owners have not been shy in allowing 'King' Kenny to splash the cash so frivolously would suggest that they are looking to keep him for the long haul. No temporary manager would ever be handed such a warchest with which to rebuild and remould the team if he was expected to sling his hook in the not too distant future.
For me, the big winners on deadline day were Blackpool. Aside from singing two fairly useful players (and James Beattie) Ian Holloway managed to prevent Liverpool from increasing their spending even further after he dug his heels in and refused to sell the club's best player Charlie Adam to the reds.
The continued interest in Adam is a curious one. I make it no secret I'm a massive fan of his. He's a very good player and is playing to his potential at the minute but I can't see him improving much beyond his current level. Admittedly, he is still better than what Liverpool have already.
How will he react to not getting his dream move? By all accounts, he's going to still put in the effort but he might have trouble displacing new signing Andy Reid... in every sense of the word!
Spurs also came in with a late bid for Adam that was either turned down or too late depending on whether you trust the word of 'onest 'arry or not. There seemed to be something of a desperate panic at Spurs Lodge in the hours after their 4-0 humping at the hands of Fulham in the cup as bids went in for what seems like every striker in La Liga with little success before time ran out. Tottenham were unable to repeat their magic of the last window when they bought Rafael van der Vaart for just £8m (Again, Andy Carroll = £35m!!!).
Mrs. Sylvie van der Vaart - anytime he gets a mention, she gets a picture!
White Hart Lane wasn't the only place that saw a lack of last day transfer activity. It was all quiet at the top as Manchesters United and City and Arsenal chose to keep their wallets in their pockets. City had already completed a big money deal for Edin Dzeko weeks ago and shipped out their dead wood in Wayne Bridge and Emmanuel Adebayor – albeit on loan – to do some much needed trimming to their squad. United seem to be operating on the "if it aint broke, don't fix it" principle and why not seeing as they are top of the league and still unbeaten etc.
To the surprise of no-one, Arsene Wenger chose not to enter the transfer market despite the glaring deficiencies in his team's defence. Once again, you expect gooners to look back in May after another season of disappoint in the league and wondering what might have been if only they made that one signing that everyone with even a passing interest in the game could see that they needed.
Elsewhere, loan deals were the order of the day. Obafemi Martins returned to the Premier League to Birmingham from Rubin Kazan in Russia where he seems to have found the secret of eternal youth after being listed as a 26-year old despite having been born in 1942.
Eidur Gudjohnson has returned to West London to Fulham on loan after a pointless few months at Stoke. Having spent the most recent years of his career living in Barcelona and Monaco, is it any wonder he couldn't settle in Staffordshire?
Among other late loan deals, Stephen Ireland can now be totally useless for Newcastle after joining them from Villa for the next few months. Paul Konchesky will be relieved not to have to shank clearances in front of Liverpool fans baying for his blood for a while after dropping down a division to shank clearances for promotion chasing Nottingham Forest. The nicest man in football El Hadji Diouf will be renewing acquaintances with the good people of Glasgow after signing for Rangers. Robbie Keane left Spurs for West Ham and may or may not have declared that he has always dreamed of playing for the Hammers having supported them all his life.
Finally, the best named player that moved on Monday was Maximilian Hass who signed for Middlesbrough and will presumably divide his time playing for the Teesiders with his day job of being a Marvel comics supervillian.
Who says the transfer window was no fun?
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Is Deadline day is fast becoming one of the most significant dates of the entire year? Ask a lot of football fans and you'll probably find it means more to them than Shrove Tuesday or Boxing Day or Valentines.
This particular day in the footballing calender tends to stir up a mix of emotions as supporters feel everything from excitement, to anger, to fear and even confusion as teams desperately and recklessly throw around their cash trying to strengthen their squads in a manner not dissimilar to shopaholics on the last day of some department store sale. Like these shoppers, football clubs often find that they have not invested wisely and end up going home with ill-fitting and unwanted items they cannot return.
Cynicism toward the whole idea of a transfer window is widespread and totally understandable given the limits, restrcitions and pressure it places on clubs, managers and players. However, I've decided that it is time to embrace the madness. I love days like this because of the unpredictability and insanity - even if they do serve as a reminder of how much of a ridiculous circus the 'sport' of football has become.
A whole day spent sat glued to Sky Sports News with my MacBook by my side as I constantly refreshed the BBC website and obsessively trawled through Twitter for any nugget of vaguely relevant transfer gossip was probably not the most productive use of my time. Some might even say it was a complete waste of a day off. A day that could have been spent doing something far more fulfilling. Tragically, there are actually very few things in the world not involving Megan Fox and a Jacuzzi that I would have rather been doing...
Why does the deadline time change every window? In the past it has been 5pm, Midnight and on this occasion, 11pm. There's probably a simple explanation that I am unaware of so if anyone can enlighten me, I'd be rather grateful.
People talk about inflated transfer fees and and paying over the odds for individuals but in truth, who are any of us to judge how much someone is worth? Footballers are worth exactly what a team/Chairman/Cash-rich Arab can (hopefully) afford and is prepared to pay. There is no official valuation criteria for players to meet so not one of us can justifiably say that "x is a waste of money" or "y is a bargain".
Having said that, for the sake of argument, I'm going to ignore this completely...
Without a shadow of a doubt, the biggest story of the day was dedicated, badge-kissing Liverpool diehard Fernando Torres swapping his red armband for a blue one as he joined rivals Chelsea for something like 50 million quid of Roman Abramovich's fortune, breaking the British transfer record in the process! The blues also spunked £22m on David Luiz from Benfica but I literally know nothing about the Brazilian defender to say whether this transfer is worthwhile or not so I'll move on.
Amidst all the hype and hysteria surrounding the Torres deal, people seem to have ignored the fact that 'Nando' has actually been quite rubbish this season. Imagine how much he would have cost in he hadn't been playing like some kind of Spanish Chris Armstrong for the past 5 months. He also spent so much time on the treatment table that Liverpool physios were actually charging him rent.
Of course, when fit, firing and on form he is arguably the best striker in Europe and if Carlo Ancelloti can get him to form a half decent partnership with Didier Drogba then quite frankly, the rest of us are doomed! To completely bastardise the famous Mark Twain quote, rumours of Chelsea's demise have been greatly exaggerated.
Naturally, the move has led to widespread calls of disloyalty and betrayal from dismayed Liverpool fans, some of whom even took to making the extreme gesture of burning replica shirts as a means of expressing their displeasure. Talk about taking things too seriously.
It was not all bad news for the scousers though, especially given the fact that someone, somewhere in Liverpool decided that Andy Carroll was worth 35,000,000 pounds Stirling and paid Newcastle this very amount to bring take him to Anfield. Seriously, £35million? Did they forget to add a decimal point in there somewhere? Who sanctioned this transfer? Fred Goodwin???
If a player with half a season's top flight experience and less than a hundred professional appearances to his name is valued at that price then we may as well all just pack up and go home. Forget women linesmen, THIS is the sign that the game has gone mad. If we were to say that Mr. Carroll is 100 times a better footballer than me then the would still place me at about £350,000! If anyone is looking for a clumsy, bumbling Saturday league centre back, I'm your man! Darren Bent all of a sudden looks a snip.
The most curious thing about this was that Newcastle had apparently initially turned down £30million. Why? Fair play to them for holding out for more but anything above £10m is surely too much for Carroll who has now become the 8th most expensive player in world football despite not even being one of the top 20 best players in the Premier League.
The 'experts' on Sky tried to justify the transfer, by suggesting that 'King' Kenny was trying to sign players that fans could identify with. It would be too easy to make a joke about Carroll's criminal record so I'll leave it well alone.
Signing overrated jailbird Geordies wasn't the only business Liverpool did on deadline day. The NESV owned club also completed the deal to bring in another striker in Uruguayan Luis Suarez – yes, he of notorious World Cup handball fame – for a cool £23m.
Suarez has one of those frightening goal-scoring records in the Dutch league but as we've seen in the past an Eredivisie golden boot can prove to be about as valuable as shares in BP this morning. For every Ruud van Nistelrooy, there's a Mateja Kezman, or even worse, an Alfonso Alves!
Liverpool fans will be hoping their new man will be more like the former (as well as letting his feet rather than hands do the talking). Taking Suarez' international record (16 in 38 to date) into account as well, it would suggest he won't turn out to be as much of a footballing misfit as the latter two. If he can adapt, he will be just as deadly in front of goal as the departing Torres.
With two high priced new strikers making up what would be one of the most expensive forward lines in the league, the burning question on everyone's lips is what will become of Nabil El Zhar?
The fact that the new owners have not been shy in allowing 'King' Kenny to splash the cash so frivolously would suggest that they are looking to keep him for the long haul. No temporary manager would ever be handed such a warchest with which to rebuild and remould the team if he was expected to sling his hook in the not too distant future.
For me, the big winners on deadline day were Blackpool. Aside from singing two fairly useful players (and James Beattie) Ian Holloway managed to prevent Liverpool from increasing their spending even further after he dug his heels in and refused to sell the club's best player Charlie Adam to the reds.
The continued interest in Adam is a curious one. I make it no secret I'm a massive fan of his. He's a very good player and is playing to his potential at the minute but I can't see him improving much beyond his current level. Admittedly, he is still better than what Liverpool have already.
How will he react to not getting his dream move? By all accounts, he's going to still put in the effort but he might have trouble displacing new signing Andy Reid... in every sense of the word!
Spurs also came in with a late bid for Adam that was either turned down or too late depending on whether you trust the word of 'onest 'arry or not. There seemed to be something of a desperate panic at Spurs Lodge in the hours after their 4-0 humping at the hands of Fulham in the cup as bids went in for what seems like every striker in La Liga with little success before time ran out. Tottenham were unable to repeat their magic of the last window when they bought Rafael van der Vaart for just £8m (Again, Andy Carroll = £35m!!!).
Mrs. Sylvie van der Vaart - anytime he gets a mention, she gets a picture!
White Hart Lane wasn't the only place that saw a lack of last day transfer activity. It was all quiet at the top as Manchesters United and City and Arsenal chose to keep their wallets in their pockets. City had already completed a big money deal for Edin Dzeko weeks ago and shipped out their dead wood in Wayne Bridge and Emmanuel Adebayor – albeit on loan – to do some much needed trimming to their squad. United seem to be operating on the "if it aint broke, don't fix it" principle and why not seeing as they are top of the league and still unbeaten etc.
To the surprise of no-one, Arsene Wenger chose not to enter the transfer market despite the glaring deficiencies in his team's defence. Once again, you expect gooners to look back in May after another season of disappoint in the league and wondering what might have been if only they made that one signing that everyone with even a passing interest in the game could see that they needed.
Elsewhere, loan deals were the order of the day. Obafemi Martins returned to the Premier League to Birmingham from Rubin Kazan in Russia where he seems to have found the secret of eternal youth after being listed as a 26-year old despite having been born in 1942.
Eidur Gudjohnson has returned to West London to Fulham on loan after a pointless few months at Stoke. Having spent the most recent years of his career living in Barcelona and Monaco, is it any wonder he couldn't settle in Staffordshire?
Among other late loan deals, Stephen Ireland can now be totally useless for Newcastle after joining them from Villa for the next few months. Paul Konchesky will be relieved not to have to shank clearances in front of Liverpool fans baying for his blood for a while after dropping down a division to shank clearances for promotion chasing Nottingham Forest. The nicest man in football El Hadji Diouf will be renewing acquaintances with the good people of Glasgow after signing for Rangers. Robbie Keane left Spurs for West Ham and may or may not have declared that he has always dreamed of playing for the Hammers having supported them all his life.
Finally, the best named player that moved on Monday was Maximilian Hass who signed for Middlesbrough and will presumably divide his time playing for the Teesiders with his day job of being a Marvel comics supervillian.
Who says the transfer window was no fun?
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Wednesday, 2 January 2008
Window Shopping
So as the world makes the transition from 2007 to 2008, many people take a minute to reflect on their lives. What they achieved or failed to achieve in the previous year and what they hope to achieve in the coming months.
In the world of football, things are ever so slightly different. The new year signals the middle of the season in most leagues. Across the continent, many countries take a mid-season break depriving their fans of the excessive feast of football we get here in the UK. January the 1st is not so much about new beginnings but rather the resumption of business as usual. However, there is an opportunity for reflection and an introspective look at self-improvement amongst clubs...
In 2003, FIFA, in order to fall into line with the rest of the continent, introduced a mandatory transfer window during the season in which clubs could conduct their necessary transfer dealings. This meant that apart from the summer, top flight clubs only had one month in which to buy, sell or loan players. Lower league clubs abide by the same window rules but also have a separate 'loan' window which operates twice during the season.
This ruling has been heavily criticised. Surely this constitutes some form of restriction of trade? Something the authoriies said they wanted to avoid in their rebuttal of introducing quotas (Not that I'm a fan of this suggestion either).
What we have seen in this country since the window was introduced is a spate of panic buys resulting in a deluge of players that clubs have ultimately found to be, lets just say, not as good as first anticipated.
Desperation is the name of the game and negotiation skills seemingly fly straight out of this metaphorical window. Clubs have the opportunity to over-inflate their asking prices because they know they buying party are willing to pay whatever it takes to get their man. On the flip side, a club that needs to sell will end up only receiving a fraction of a players true value when they are up against the clock. Also, on a time limit, managers have no time to replace players or have to do so with inadequate alternatives.
It is possible to pick up a bargain although these are very few and far between. Good fortune may also find that players, both existing and new buys/loanees up their game in the crucial second half of season in the knowledge that they have to stay put where they are and as such are expected to perform.
If a manager cant shift his dead wood during this time, he's stuck with an unhappy player possibly disrupting the camp for the rest of the season.
Managers only have a month in which to re-shuffle the pack during which time fixtures are still ongoing. Players end up being scouted off the back of individual performances rather than over a longer period of time. For struggling clubs, bad business during the transfer window could see them falling through the relegation trap-door!
The problems are far reaching. There's no telling who, when or how long a player or players may be injured for. If this happens at a crucial time of the season such as in a title race or the midst of a relegation battle for instance, clubs, although they have the money, are prevented from purchasing replacements. I suppose you could say they could draft in a youth team player but is it really fair to throw novices in at the deep end for what could crucially make or break a career? Some managers might do this anyway but I'm sure most others would at least like to have options.
Finally, differences of opinion between board and management over when or who to buy and how much they should pay, could - and often does - lead to in-fighting within the club causing instability and ultimately, a detriment to on-pitch performances.
Transfer window? Many would say just leave it open otherwise, you might wake up on 1st February to find out your club has just signed Nigel Quashie!
In the world of football, things are ever so slightly different. The new year signals the middle of the season in most leagues. Across the continent, many countries take a mid-season break depriving their fans of the excessive feast of football we get here in the UK. January the 1st is not so much about new beginnings but rather the resumption of business as usual. However, there is an opportunity for reflection and an introspective look at self-improvement amongst clubs...
In 2003, FIFA, in order to fall into line with the rest of the continent, introduced a mandatory transfer window during the season in which clubs could conduct their necessary transfer dealings. This meant that apart from the summer, top flight clubs only had one month in which to buy, sell or loan players. Lower league clubs abide by the same window rules but also have a separate 'loan' window which operates twice during the season.
This ruling has been heavily criticised. Surely this constitutes some form of restriction of trade? Something the authoriies said they wanted to avoid in their rebuttal of introducing quotas (Not that I'm a fan of this suggestion either).
What we have seen in this country since the window was introduced is a spate of panic buys resulting in a deluge of players that clubs have ultimately found to be, lets just say, not as good as first anticipated. Desperation is the name of the game and negotiation skills seemingly fly straight out of this metaphorical window. Clubs have the opportunity to over-inflate their asking prices because they know they buying party are willing to pay whatever it takes to get their man. On the flip side, a club that needs to sell will end up only receiving a fraction of a players true value when they are up against the clock. Also, on a time limit, managers have no time to replace players or have to do so with inadequate alternatives.
It is possible to pick up a bargain although these are very few and far between. Good fortune may also find that players, both existing and new buys/loanees up their game in the crucial second half of season in the knowledge that they have to stay put where they are and as such are expected to perform.
If a manager cant shift his dead wood during this time, he's stuck with an unhappy player possibly disrupting the camp for the rest of the season.
Managers only have a month in which to re-shuffle the pack during which time fixtures are still ongoing. Players end up being scouted off the back of individual performances rather than over a longer period of time. For struggling clubs, bad business during the transfer window could see them falling through the relegation trap-door!
The problems are far reaching. There's no telling who, when or how long a player or players may be injured for. If this happens at a crucial time of the season such as in a title race or the midst of a relegation battle for instance, clubs, although they have the money, are prevented from purchasing replacements. I suppose you could say they could draft in a youth team player but is it really fair to throw novices in at the deep end for what could crucially make or break a career? Some managers might do this anyway but I'm sure most others would at least like to have options.
Finally, differences of opinion between board and management over when or who to buy and how much they should pay, could - and often does - lead to in-fighting within the club causing instability and ultimately, a detriment to on-pitch performances.
Transfer window? Many would say just leave it open otherwise, you might wake up on 1st February to find out your club has just signed Nigel Quashie!
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