Football is a hypocritical sport
By Chris Rivers | July 23, 2008 | Ads: Watch free movies online
My title may be the understatement of the century but if you will have noticed that last week the newspapers were full of allegations by Tottenham Hotspur chairman Daniel Levy that Dimitar Berbatov and Robbie Keane have been tapped up by Manchester United and Liverpool. There was shock and outrage at the news that two of England finest clubs could have done such a thing. Now Mr Levy is taking the case to the Premier League and we are set for yet another messy summer with legal teams spoiling the build-up to the start of the new season. Manchester United manager Sir Alex Ferguson has told Spurs that he will sue, which hasn’t helped the situation and now a mud slinging match has begun between the two sides.
However many have cast their minds back to only last month when Manchester United registered a complaint about Real Madrid over tapping up their star player Cristiano Ronaldo. Now the words pot, kettle and black spring to mind as United become the master hypocrites of football once again. It’s not the first time that the Premier League and Champions League winners have been accused of tapping up. Before they completed the signing of Owen Hargreaves Bayern Munich claimed that the England midfielder had been tapped up by United. Having said that nothing more was made out of the deal and things carried on as normal.
As with all tapping up cases you never really know which side to believe, normally letting your prejudice decide who you support on their claims. However that isn’t my point, mine is the down right hypocritical nature of such incidents. Whilst many of the Sunday newspapers had their writers penning pieces about how Tottenham are standing up to United it has been just as quickly forgotten that Spurs were themselves accused of tapping up Juande Ramos by Sevilla. However the newspapers feel that this can be overlooked in favour of them taking on one of the ‘big four’. To see how the big four will get on next season here are the Premier League odds.
Again you can look at this from one of two ways, one is that this is just another example of one of the big four stealing all the best talent from other clubs, making the Premier League even less competitive. The other way is that Spurs are bitter because they are losing two of their best players to a bigger, more successful clubs who have inevitably been attracted to two of the most successful clubs in the country. It doesn’t seem like it is money orientated either because I imagine if Keane and Berbatov wanted more cash then Spurs could give it to them. I think that the two players realise that they aren’t guaranteed of playing Champions League football with Tottenham and as such have moved to two clubs that nearly always make it into the European competition.
Spurs some how think that this is wrong that two ambitious players heads have been turned by the prospect of playing in the Champions League. Yet somehow they think it is fine for them to tempt Crystal Palace youngster John Bostock away from his club, who they have only had to pay £700,000 after a tribunal ruling. This is just one massive example of the hypocrisy we find in football these days. When the season starts up again we are bound to find a controversial moment within the first week of the season. This normally involves someone saying a decision should have gone there way when only a few weeks earlier the same thing happened to their opposition, which was the right decision, according to a manager or player.
It is something which annoys me immensely and I don’t know anyone who isn’t guilty of it. When you look into the media it gets even worse, I have pointed out that newspapers are happy to change their views at the drop of the hat. Even on television you can’t escape it. I find myself shouting at my television when the likes of Alan Shearer and Jamie Redknapp contradict themselves week in, week out. It’s another one of the things that annoys me when I watch football on television or read about it in the papers and sadly it doesn’t look likely to disappear any time soon. To read more from some people who aren’t hypocrites head this way.
Category: Football, Football Writers |