GITG | GIT OF THE WEEK #6

Each week GITG acknowledges persons in and around football for their services to being a git.

This week the award goes to FC Midtjylland director, Cliff Crown!

Cliff Crown defended his decision today to charge Manchester United fans £71-a-ticket to watch tomorrow’s Europa League last-32 first leg.

Crown blubbed: “We’re a small club…we have to make the most of our opportunity.”  Yeah fuck it charge £200, make the most of it you cunt.  This selfish move would almost be understandable if Crown was a simple Scandinavian longboat craftsman who didn’t know any better, but he isn’t.  Crown is also a director of Brentford FC, joining Midtjylland’s board only recently when Brentford owner Matthew Benham became majority shareholder of the Danish club in 2014.  

In other words, Crown, who looks like what you'd get if you mix Mr Potato Head with a Spanish politician, knows exactly the amount English fans are reluctantly willing to pay to watch their favourite clubs week-in-week-out and is fucking his own people like a mad king to make a quick buck.

This cynical and ill-timed move comes on the back of recent fan protests in England against rising match day ticket fees.  

United fans intend to hold a protest of their own against the £71 ticket price by buying all the tickets and then waving a few banners around.  Yeah that’ll do it. 

So congratulations Cliff Crown, not only do you sound like a mundane topographical occurrence, you are this week’s GOTW!  

GITG

GITG | THE STRIFE AND TIMES OF A. CUMULATOR #2

                     

In this new weekly feature our resident gambling addict keeps us up to date with his hilarious affliction.  

14/02/16

As Sky were building us up to a genuine ‘Super Sunday’ involving the top 4 teams in the league, gamblers (as well as normal people) were struggling to predict how it would all pan out. Would Leicester shit in everyone’s mouths and win again? Can Spurs turn up for the big games? Will Arsenal buck the trend and actually resemble a football team in February? And is Mr Nice Guy Pellegrini deliberately and hilariously going to stitch Guardiola up by dropping out the top 4? ‘Where’s your money?’ I kept being asked*

(*) Not a single soul asked me this question.

So where was my money? Keep reading and you will fucking well find out.

Match 1: Arsenal v Leicester – Arsenal to win or draw

So here we go. What is going to happen here? Lunatics across the country are saying Leicester are the title favourites after they turned up and turned over City last week. I am still not having that and pre game I convinced myself that Arsenal would win it, albeit narrowly. Since I am a coward, I went for Arsenal to win or draw. Wenger is a fascinating creature, giving off the scent of someone very intelligent but also ridiculously naive. I was backing him here to have watched the way that Leicester beat City last week and not make the same mistakes. Sure enough, he brought back Coquelin to presumably kick lumps out of Kante and Mahrez whilst Vardy would be marshalled by the excellent Koscielny. A slow start to the game with Arsenal dominating possession put me in a rather confident mood. They may have gone ahead had it not been for Huth and Morgan being shits and blocking a few decent efforts at goal. All was looking well until, right on half time, geeky full back Nacho Monreal brought down Vardy and the referee excitedly pointed to the spot. No doubt that Vardy bought it, but here at GITG we applaud anybody who is willing to cheat for the sake of winning. Anyway, it was old Vardy himself, probably smelling like piss, to take the penalty against Cech. 1-0 Leicester and here we go again.

At half time I was feeling down I must say. Finding out that Koscielny had been replaced by Hollyoaks character and part time calamity defender Chambers did nothing to change that. However, my thanks now go out to one Danny Simpson. Even in a side that is playing well, he hasn’t been able to trick people he is a good footballer and he picked up two yellows in quick succession to be sent to have an early bath. I often wonder if players who are sent off sit in the massive bath tub in the changing rooms and slowly drift under the water only to be rescued by the kit man. I would have forgiven the Leicester kit man in this case to have turned a blind eye. Back out on the pitch the Arsenal team, unaware that Simpson was topping himself, were applying the pressure and with 20 minutes remaining, Walcott profited from a Giroud knockdown to finish nicely. The poor lad was pushed over by Giroud whilst trying to celebrate but he bounced back up like a little deer and Arsenal had the scent of Leicester City blood in their nostrils. My bet was all but won and Danny Welbeck’s goalscoring return to win it was a nice moment for all to savour, but inconsequential to my bet.

Match 2: Villa v Liverpool – Liverpool to win

Hahahahaha

Matches 3 & 4: City v Spurs – Spurs to win or draw, Augsburg v Bayern – Bayern to win

I was right where I wanted to be. A change of venue whilst Kolo Toure was scoring versus Villa meant I was now in a pub with other desperate men. The game was a rather dull affair as Spurs dominated possession but couldn’t work any decent chances. The Bayern game against an inadequate outfit called Augsburg kicked off 15 minutes into the first half and Bayern went 1-0 within the first 20 minutes which settled me down a bit. As the players came out for the second half at the Etihad, I just imagined how much a Spurs goal would help me relax. When Sterling was adjudged to have handballed in the area by the inept Mark Clattenberg, I could barely believe it. As Kane slotted the penalty in, a man who was sitting near me groaned and said that he had bet on it being 3-0 to City. I was simply disgusted that anyone thought that was going to be the score, but I spared him as I was quite literally the happiest man in the world at this point. I pondered a cash out after City equalized but I stood firm and was left celebrating a memorable win. I staggered back home after a curry (that later sent my guts into disarray) but it felt as if I was gliding. Gliding like a massive gambling duck in a pond of happiness. Upon arrival, I went straight to bed and definitely didn’t bet a small but significant portion of my winnings on Inter Milan to beat Fiorentina. No sir, I went straight to bed.

As a totally unrelated comment, Inter Milan are a pitiful club who I hope disappear without a fucking trace.

GITG | PEP'S-A-COMIN'

Saturday 6th February saw Pep’s four-game win streak grind to a 0-0 halt thanks to a tactically astute Bayer Leverkusen.  This was just the third time Guardiola’s Munich dropped points this season, sitting as they do 8 points clear of rowdy Rurh dwellers Borussia Dortmund.

The future Manchester City manager had his priorities put in to question by journalists in the pre-match conference, an accusation Pep angrily rebutted by announcing: “I am like a woman, I can do two things at once,” before drawing in toothless fashion with their 6th placed hosts.  Like a bitch.

Guardiola’s exasperation isn’t reserved solely for the German press: pitch side he often looks unstimulated, unfulfilled.  So his announcement that he had entered into an open relationship by virtue of his newly attained Mancunian sidechick should hardly come as a surprise to anyone.  Bayern are arguably so well adapted under Pep’s scientific method that they negate the very thing that drives evolution: competition.   

Bayer Leverkusen’s hard won nil-nil with Bayern is significant in that it presents “another way” for those clubs who’ve been thus far obligingly flattened by the Bavarian bully boys.  Roger Schmidt’s high pressing, highly physical tactics were so perfectly disruptive that Guardiola had to admit: “We’ve had a few problems passing the ball three, four, five times in a single move.”  In the end Bayern could muster only a meagre one shot on target.

Schmidt’s gauntlet, though admirable, will inevitably prove little more than a brain-teaser for Guardiola; light tactical titillation while he sees out the rest of the season in the manner of a bedroom FM16 manager - endlessly pressing spacebar in a semi-comatosed and trouserless state.

Premier League teams would be forgiven for thinking the only true way to defeat Pep is the 'just keep your head down for three years, play dead and he’ll go away' approach.   But that isn’t the English way.  As Leicester City have shown us, Premiership sides would rather have a go "for the bants" than lie down: here the bottom can beat the top; the bottom can win the league.  

Furthermore Guardiola will need to come to terms with the sheer volume of games.  In an interview Pep's former adversary Jugern Klopp warned Guardiola would need 35 players to cope with the trials of Premiership life: “That’s the thing, it’s the number of games, football, football, football.  With a perfect pre-season you are prepared for a long, long journey.”  Said the mad bastard.

Premier League glory is by no means assured for the Spaniard.  Guardiola's arrival adds to the long list of world class managerial minds currently plying their trade in English football: Wenger, Hiddink, Klopp, Ranieri, and potentially even that Portuguese git, each of whom will no doubt have a say.

If there's anything that Roger Schmidt can teach them it's that with a little tactical consideration even the most accomplished of Guardiola sides can be neutralised, albeit with a little bit, with a little bit, with a little bit of bloomin' luck.  

In either case Manchester City presents the perfect challenge for Pep: under performing and rich with a defence as questionable as Johnson’s, Guardiola will no doubt spend many enjoyable hours and every bit of the promised £150M masterminding Europe's next big thing.  

GITG

GITG | HOW TO SOLVE A PROBLEM LIKE WALCOTT?

What’s wrong with the following equation? 

81 goals in 230 appearances + an average rating of 6.87 = £100k+ p/w 

Show your working out in the space provided:

For some time now something just hasn’t added up.  Here we are ten years after his debut in August 2006; a decade after he won BBC Young Sports Personality of the Year, Theo Walcott stands as an experienced England international and one of Arsenal’s highest earners.  And yet he’s shit.

The same question marks once tempered by youth still hang over Walcott to this day like a bad awning; such familiar sentiments as “he doesn’t have a footballing brain,” and, “he’s a middle class fast spastic.”  And it’s hard to argue against either.  For Theo is a player fast in body but not in mind.  He’s often caught in two minds or no mind at all; frequently dispossessed while thinking of the politest way to say something.  

Walcott misses a chance.

It’s easy to argue that without his pace he would be the worst player to put on an Arsenal shirt.  Which would be true, aside from the inconvenient truth that he does have his pace.  That’s like saying without his limbs he would be a snake.  Obviously he would be, but he isn’t.  The point is he must have something.

So what is it?  Believe it or not Theo is Arsenal’s longest serving player.  And his overall goal tally is more than any other current player, a total that includes four hat-tricks: the most recent being against West Brom in the final game of last season.   

And that’s it: Theo has longevity.  A trait of circumstance but one that denotes a certain level of service and loyalty that should surely be rewarded.  But is mans loyal?  Telling everyone who’d listen he was unhappy and wanted to play as a lone striker.  And don’t forget this pay rise wasn’t prompted by an outstanding season or significant outside interest, Walcott threatened to run his contract down.  In the end Wenger decided his side was better with than without the posh sod.

Theo offered Wenger a directness at a time when his side were so tediously criticised for trying to “walk it in the net.”  Here was someone who would rather run at you (then past you, then off the pitch) much in the blistering fashion reminiscent of the Invincibles.  Walcott’s play is nostalgic but lacking; a reminder of once was but isn’t quite: paying a player £100k+ doesn’t make him exceptional, nor does the no. 14 make him Thierry Henry.  At every turn Theo’s value is forced.  

Even his banter seems disingenuous: in the utterly hilarious ArsenalTV skits Walcott has the look of someone perpetually worried about their GCSEs.

Walcott scores! Only joking.  Walcott misses another chance.

So what’s next?  Walcott had the chance to make an impact when he came on as a sub during his sides’ title-ambition-denting 0-0 draw with Southampton the other week, but managed only to hit a couple tame balls straight at an outstanding Forster.  Walcott is not a striker.  If at 26 you have to tell a manager like Arsene Wenger that you’re a striker, then you’re not a striker.  “I AM A STRIKER MUMMY PAY ME LOTS OF MONEY MUMMY.”

Fittingly the Open Dictionary definition of longevity has the following example: 

If Walcott was on £50k he would have every chance of a big club coming in and taking a chance on him with the promise of doubled wages.  Liverpool would have been the perfect fit for Theo, a club with hospice-like ambition for overrated and overpriced English talent (and if they’re any good they go on to bigger and better things, like Raheem Stirling or Neil Mellor.)  Instead he’s done himself in.  At League 1 or possibly Championship level Walcott would have every chance of becoming a leading goalscorer, or at best an eyebrow raising but hit-and-miss striker for a newly promoted Premier League side.  Instead he’s going to sit on the bench as an impact sub, burning a hole in Arsenal’s pocket until he’s 29 and gets shipped to the MLS.  Trust.

I'll answer the question at the top of the article, 'is Theo Walcott worth £100k+p/w?’ in the only way one can really:

Jamie Vardy is on £40k.

GITG

GITG | GIT OF THE WEEK #5

 Hassan al-Thawadi, left, alongside the former Fifa secretary general Jérôme Valcke. Photograph: Karim Jaafar/AFP/Getty Images

Each week GITG acknowledges persons in and around football for their services to being a git.

This week the award goes to the Qatar 2022 organising committee chief executive, Hassan al- Thawadi!

If the thought of an ill-gotten World Cup being played out in 50Cº temperatures couldn't get any worse, Thawadi told reporters today that drunk fans would be "taken care of."  

So book your tickets today everybody, it's going to be shit!

GITG

GITG | THE STRIFE AND TIMES OF A. CUMALATOR #1

In this new weekly feature our resident gambling addict keeps us up to date with his hilarious affliction.  

06/02/16

Saturday morning brought all football fans the chance to tune in to see the glorious and presumably humiliating end to Leicester City’s obnoxious attempt to win the Premier League. Up against a City side boasting the enormously impressive Sergio Aguero in attack and that crafty little swine, David Silva, in midfield, it was just a question of how many would be flying past Schmeichel in the Leicester nets.  Obviously no televised game can go past without a flutter, so I went in heavy handed on City to win or draw coupled with an Atletico Madrid stroll against pub team Eibar. ‘City might draw but they surely won’t lose at home’ very much being what I muttered to nobody in particular as I pressed ‘Place Bet’.

A horrendously timed phone call from abroad cost me the first 5 minutes, but my face dropped as I walked in to see that Leicester had smugly taken an early lead. Simply horrific defending from a City side that is quite horrific at defending was the cause of Huth’s scrappy opener. Whilst quite stunned by this, I also felt quietly pleased with myself that I hadn’t put my money on a City win. ‘They’ll come back, it’s Leicester’ I thought. City were turning the screw at this point, probing deep in the Leicester half and creating one or two openings.

Then came the big decision of the first half when balding full back Pablo Zabaleta was wildly taken out by one of the ex-factory workers in the Leicester back line inside the penalty area. The referee blew his whistle and gave a foul, but outside the box to the dismay of City fans. One wasted free kick later and I was starting to get pretty fucking worried. The odd glance at my diminishing cash out amount the only notable memories I have from the rest of the first half.

At half time, a bunch of halfwits in the BT Sport studio convinced me to stick it through and wait for the City onslaught. Instead Mahrez and Huth scored to make it 3-0 and game over. Whilst everybody else presumably celebrated such a shocking result, I was picking up the pieces and cashing out for a miserable sum. Aguero’s glancing late header only made me murmur something relatively offensive.

Atletico won, obviously.

***

The beauty of Saturday is that football is non-stop and for a betting man, there is always a way back. Flicking down one channel made Soccer Saturday come on my telly and I was full of optimism again. In the studio Jeff talks about the upcoming games with a collection of 4 men who struggle quite badly with conjugating verbs. ‘He’s went over too easy there’ – Really, Thommo? ‘The referee give it’ – Come on Charlie, I know you are Scottish but please. They are getting paid to talk on T.V.

To drag myself out of the abyss, I went for a quadruple on 4 games where there simply had to be a winner, just no draws. A lovely option for those who can’t stand to see their bet go up in flames early on, this bet always keeps you alive until the very last kick. However, it wasn’t looking good going into the last 15 minutes as Bolton had been pegged back by Rotherham and the Preston v Huddersfield clash looked to be petering out to a pathetic 0-0 draw. Leyton Orient, led by wonderful scouser Kevin Nolan, were doing the business against Portsmouth and Wigan were marching to a comfortable away win at Sheffield United. Time was ticking down and frustratingly Preston and Huddersfield had traded goals and there was still nothing from Bolton or Rotherham. 

Then something special happened – ‘BOLTON HAVE STOLEN IT’ yelled some poor bloke in a head set who had to go to Bolton for the day. Almost simultaneously I discovered that Preston had also won it with the last kick. This was a moment to cherish, my luck had changed. My football results app then wrongly informed me that Huddersfield had equalised but after confirmation that my app was being mental (or mischievous) I was celebrating a win that erased the hurt caused by a Leicester city side that will still surely be 7^th come May.

Anon.