Rapists. Murderers. Child Abusers. Thieves. Cattle rustlers. Terrorists. Politicians. Conmen. Phil Collins fans.
Pick the odd one out. Struggling? Yes. And so you should be. There is no odd one out. They’re all despicable cunts. Have you ever read a book about serial killers? I have. Many of them exhibit signs of their potential as youngsters. This disorder could manifest itself in acts of cruelty towards animals or an uncaring attitude when castigated for their wrongdoings. They grow up and they murder and abuse people in the worst possible way.
Often the family of the victim struggles to come to terms with what their child has done, but some take some small comfort wherever they can. As one unnamed mother of a killer of multiple children, as detailed in ‘Serial Killers: A pathology (Penguin £17.99 + p&p), said:
Well, at least he wasn’t a football agent.
There is no more self-serving, duplicitous, rancid group of people on this earth than football agents. I know, we live in a world where the rich profiteer off the poor and buy football clubs in West London, where famine is still a reality, where politicians protect their developer and banker friends at the cost of an entire nation … and then, at the very top, there are football agents.
I read Yaya Toure’s agent yesterday, saying:
Arsene Wenger likes him and Arsenal are interested. If the conditions are good, everything can be finished soon. He could come into the Cesc deal and Barca and Arsenal are struggling to come to an agreement.
This is the same agent who said just five days ago that his ‘client’ was all set for a move to England:
We already have a closed deal, and all will be resolved before the World Cup.
Clearly the realities of life are very different when you’re a football agent. If a deal has already been closed then why is he now on offer to Arsenal? Arsene Wenger’s interest in him is hardly a secret but Yaya Toure is the Sebastian Frey of midfielders. His name is linked with us every single summer without fail. And here we have an agent who has probably fucked things up somewhere and is now desperately trying to ensure he gets another big pay day by moving Toure to yet another club.
A bottom-feeding, scum-sucking, parasite has juggled things around and dropped his balls. Now he’s profile raising and using us to do it. He can go fuck himself – and Yaya Toure, a man who so casually dismissed Arsenal in the not too distant past, can join his leeching, mooching, perfidious agent in the same act. Pair of cunts.
Meanwhile, back at the ranch, Barcelona have admitted that the stories about Arsenal telling them to double their offer are, as we suspected, a complete load of shit. Joan Oliver, Barcelona’s director of bollocks, said:
They said they would not sell, it’s logical therefore that they have not set a price for him. We made a formal offer. The only official response we have from Arsenal is that they are not ready to sell the player, for which it would be difficult for them to be putting a price when they say they are not selling.
At least someone gets it. I mean, not to the point where they accept that we say what we mean and they go about the rest of their summer trying to figure out how to pay what they still owe for Ibrahimovic and Chygrynskiy, but it’s something. Barcelona say they remain ‘optimistic’ but someone needs to tell them their glass is, in fact, half empty. As for us making a deal with potential president Sandro Rosell to sell Cesc in a year’s time, I don’t believe we’d enter into that kind of arrangement for one second.
I can certainly accept there might have been some contact from Rosell who would be eager to try and maintain some measure of relationship between the two clubs. And while Arsenal might be willing to deal with someone who isn’t a gigantic, ego-tripping cuntspanner like Laporta, I’m positive we would not do any kind of deal to sell Cesc in one year’s time or anything else. I’m not saying we might not sell him if he does stay this summer but not in this way.
And one more thing – bar one or two very noteable exceptions, why has the English press simply facilitated the tapping up of Cesc Fabregas by Barcelona? The continual and never-ending statements about the transfer from Barcelona officials and potential presidents, to Xavi’s DNA obsession, it has been public and quite clearly against the rules. Where is the condemnation for the way Barcelona have behaved? Why is it more important for them to paint Arsenal a club in crisis rather than take Barcelona to task for trying to weaken English football?
It’s the exact same as Ronaldo last season or the season before. And Thierry Henry. And Patrick Vieira. These were world class players, the best players in the world in their positions, playing in England, ensuring the Sky money kept coming, the advertising and sponsorship revenue poured in and ultimately providing enough public interest for their cushy, well fed, press box jobs. Yet almost all of them are quite happy to get down on their spiral notepadded knees and suck the cocks of Barcelona or Real Madrid or whichever European giant comes calling looking for players who play in England.
They laud the Premier League as the ‘best league in the world’ yet help clubs from abroad weaken it season after season. And the funny thing is their xenophobia is obvious (Eduardo’s nasty foreign dive V Gerrard’s forgiveable English dives) when reporting on the game here, yet it doesn’t extend to clubs like Barcelona and Madrid who behave without conscience, decency or any regard for the rules. I can tell you this, the papers there would be quick to stick the knife in if Arsenal or United went after Spain’s best players they way they do ours.
Yet the cowards of the press boxes in England do nothing but make it easier for them. They regurgitate the speculative fiction spewed by Marca, El Mundo and co, then add fuel to the fire by making up stuff themselves – like yesterday’s nonsense that Arsenal had told Barcelona to double their offer. For fucks sake, even Barcelona are making them look like cunts, and that takes some doing, let me tell you.
So the next time one of these hacks writes an article about how this or that is ruining the English game, pay no heed, or even better, remind them of their complicity when it comes to transfer sagas like Ronaldo or Cesc, which result in the best players in England going abroad. Instead of protecting what they have, they actively seek to make it worse, just for a few more papers sold or a few more clicks on their run-of-the-mill, homogeneous website which just carries the exact same news as every other football website out there.
Take a story from the wires, maybe re-write it a bit, add something in the final paragraph to put a ‘personal’ touch on it and publish. It’s not even monkeys and typewriters. It’s lazy, it’s cheap and pathetic. Who can make the most clickable headline about Cesc’s departure? Forget facts, forget the fact Arsenal have said they won’t sell, forget the fact he has a contract, forget the fact Barcelona can’t afford him, let’s just try and send one of the best players in the world to a different league. Idiots.
Online standards have fallen considerably in the race for hits and page views and ultimately providing content on the web isn’t cheap. Let me rephrase that, providing good content isn’t cheap. I know we’re all used to getting our news online for free and I know many people are looking at Murdoch’s decision to charge for access to the Times etc as a bad thing, but as more and more people use the web to get their news through their phones, their iPads, laptops and whatever else, how long can we realistically expect traditional media outlets to provide their content for free?
They have to pay their staff, a couple of clicks on a Google ad doesn’t do that. I’m the first to bemoan the quality of the majority of what’s on offer, and I’m no fan of Murdoch, but if we want better content on the web, at some point we’re going to have to pay for it. The alternative is the absolute takeover by the shite we’re bombarded with at the moment. That’s a whole other argument though.
My initial point still stands though – Barcelona’s behaviour does not merit the kind of coverage it has been given by the English press. They have acted disgracefully, using bullying tactics, subterfuge and handily placed hacks to further their goal at the expense of Arsenal, its fans, players, and even Cesc himself. And too few of the English press have criticised them for it, choosing instead to help stir the shit.
Shame on them.
Sorry for the rant, more tomorrow.
