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“Are you Tottenham in disguise?”
As if Wednesday night wasn’t tough enough for Arsenal, they had to endure the worst of slurs from the Manchester City faithful.
Number: 22
That’s how many years it had been since a team other than Juventus, Inter and AC Milan won Serie A. Hats off, Napoli.
Paltry Irish Premier League representation
Between Tuesday and Thursday last week there was a full set of English Premier League matches, 10 in all, and you wouldn’t have needed a calculator to tot up how many minutes Republic of Ireland players got in the games: one. That was how much time Nathan Collins got on the pitch when he came on as a sub for Wolves in their win over Crystal Palace.
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The ever excellent @irish_abroad Twitter account put more flesh, of the unhappy kind, on the story: this was the first time in Premier League history that not a single Republic of Ireland player made the starting line-up of a club in a full round of fixtures.
If Seamus Coleman and/or Evan Ferguson hadn’t been injured, this unfortunate slice of history might well have been averted, but in their absence all we had were five players on the bench – Collins and four unused subs: Shane Duffy (Fulham) and three goalkeepers, Gavin Bazunu (Southampton), Mark Travers (Bournemouth) and Caoimhín Kelleher (Liverpool).
In the Premier League’s first season, Jack Charlton had 32 regular or occasional starters to choose from, four of them ever-presents for their clubs: Paul McGrath (Aston Villa), Steve Staunton (Aston Villa), Mike Milligan (Oldham) and Eddie McGoldrick (Crystal Palace). A stat to make Stephen Kenny weep, you’d imagine.
Word of mouth
“You know when you’re a young teenager and you get a bit of bum fluff on your chin and you think ‘you know what, I could fight my dad here’? Or you could fight your older brother. Then they’ve got you in a headlock and you realise very quickly you can’t fight them any more. It was a bit like that.”
Jermaine Jenas on Arsenal thinking the bum fluff on their chins meant they could fight Manchester City, but then ended up in a headlock.
“Bald bastard, I’ll eat your heart out!”
Juventus assistant coach Marco Landucci being a touch rude towards Napoli boss Luciano Spalletti after their teams’ recent meeting. Alas for him, a mic picked up his words. The upshot? A €5000 fine and a one-match ban.
“He’s so annoying. I taught him how to wee, this boy ... he still can’t reach the toilet.”
Ian Wright on his gloating son Shaun Wright-Phillips, a former Manchester City employee, who gave him a decidedly hard time after Arsenal’s 1-4 battering.
Meaty misinformation
With 12 goals in 15 appearances for Al Nassr, on an individual level Cristiano Ronaldo’s move to Saudi Arabia has hardly been a failure, but his efforts haven’t, so far, driven his team on to success – they were knocked out of the cup at the semi-final stage last week, and trail Al-Ittihad in the league.
A number of publications subsequently picked up on a quote doing the interweb rounds, supposedly from an interview Al Nassr president Musalli Al-Muammar did with the Arabia News 50 website. Among them was Barcelona-based paper Sport, who reported the quote with particular glee.
“I have only been cheated twice in my life,” ‘said’ Al-Muammar, “the first time when I asked for three kebabs they gave me only two, the second time when I signed Cristiano Ronaldo.”
The problem? Arabia News 50 doesn’t exist. The ‘quote’ was fake. A blinding one, though.
(More) Word of Mouth
“On Wednesday – and I’m sorry to speak like this – I want to see if the Arsenal players have got balls! They need to go on the pitch balls first! I want to see which players have got the balls and are not scared of the challenge. Simple.”
Arsenal (and Chelsea) old boy William Gallas ahead of that game against Manchester City. You’d be afraid to check his post-match analysis.
“Since Roy Hodgson is now 114 and Neil Warnock is 112, I think I am quite young.”
Martin O’Neill (71) insisting he’s a toddler compared to some of the people who have returned to management lately.
“Last season, I started a game for Villa alongside Carney Chukwuemeka and I asked him when he was born. He said it was October 2003 and I told him my debut for Watford was September 2003.”
Ashley Young (37), feeling antiquated.
