Football News And Views

Boot boy James McPike was given an unexpected tip from his assigned Birmingham City player at the end of the football season. McPike had asked player Oliver Kapo for a pair of his old boots as a thank you for a season well-served.

McPike must have done a fabulous job. Instead of used old boots, Kapo gifted McPike with a brand new Mercedes Benz, worth £30,000. A boot boy is an apprentice player who signs with a club and does chores for their assigned professional player.

A source said of the boots: “He was obviously disappointed when Kapo replied he had taken them home with him. He perked up considerably when he was tossed a set of keys.” Kapo will also pay McPike’s insurance for the first year.

Gretna, who have stormed up the Scottish Leagues could be facing closure after being in a terrible financial crisis. Gretna stormed up the Scottish leagues due to their funding from businessman Brooks Mileson but he has recently became very ill and his funding to Gretna has been cut off and now the club face peril. Only ten players have apparently agreed to play on Saturday which means Gretna could face further fines and penalties and they could easily lose any number of their players as all of them have not been paid recently which is in breach of their contract agreements. Gretna have already faced a ten point deduction because of their administration and they are looking for funds to get them though to the end of the season. Yesterday, Gretna administrator David Elliot revealed that the club owed £350,000 to the inland revenue and they also have a further debt of around £900,00. It was reported that they had to raise £30,000 by midday today or face closure but so far they have not been closed but I feel it will happen very soon as this situation is not getting any easier for the club. This may end up being the second time Gretna have lost their football team after Gretna Green FC became bankrupt in the 1920s.

I really liked Gretna and enjoyed watching them fly up the leagues but that success has proved to be their downfall and as their former manager, Dave Irons, said earlier in the week, it has all happened far too quickly for the club. Things really have gotten out of control.

I was shocked to read that Martin Taylor has not visited Eduardo in hospital to apologise for the tackle which broke the Croation’s leg. A lot of reports had suggested otherwise including the News of the World interview which Eduardo has claimed was completely made up. When asked about the News of the World story in his first interview since the injury (which was to Croation TV) he said:

I guarantee you that it’s completely made up. This here is my first interview after the injury. I asked them to clarify that it was not an interview with me, and they did, so it’s okay now.

Eduardo also thanked the Arsenal medical staff as well as Gilberto Silva who was on hand to translate for Eduardo who’s English is clearly not 100% yet. You can read the full translated interview here. Once again we wish Eduardo a quick recovery.

Arsenal became the first english club to win at the San Siro against AC Milan after a supurb 2-0 win. Arsenal continued where they left off from the first leg, in control. AC Milan have not had the best of seasons so far domestically and their poor form seemed to have continued against a fantastic Arsenal side. Throughout the whole game Arsenal dominated possession and were allowed to play their slick passing game. AC Milan had a couple of half chances in the first half, one coming after 18 minutes when a good long ball from Kaka found Pato who shot tamely at Almunia. Arsenal had by far the best chance of the first half when Cesc Fabregas shot from outside the area only to see his shot rebound on the crossbar.

Arsenal carried on where they left off in the second half and again had a couple of good chances. A Fabregas corner found it’s way to the feet of an unmarked Senderos who could only shoot straight at the Milan keeper, Kalac. Not long after Arsenal had another chance. Pirlo, who had a terrible night, gave the ball away to Adebayor on the edge of the Milan box and he picked out Eboue but his shot didn’t trouble the keeper. Pirlo almost made amends when his free kick forced a good save from Almunia in the Arsenal goal.

Arsenal bought Walcott on with 20 minutes to go and the young Englishman almost set up a goal when he was found well at the far post by Hleb but Kalac did well to block the shot with Senderos and Adebayor waiting for the tap in. Arsenal finally made the breakthrough when a low 30 yard shot from Cesc Fabregas found the Milan corner in the 84th minute. With the game beyond AC Milan, Arsenal doubled their lead when Walcott crossed low across the goal and Adebayor tapped in to get his first champion’s league goal for Arsenal.

It wasn’t that long ago when Liam Miller was scoring for Celtic in the Champions League. Remember this one against Lyon?

It wasn’t long after that he signed for Manchester United. His time at Man Utd never started and he became on of the many Man Utd players to end up at Sunderland who at the time were in the Championship. Miller had some good games for Sunderland and helped them get back into the Premiership. After playing over 50 games for Sunderland and winning more caps for Ireland he has now been told he can leave the club because he has apparently shown up late to training on several occasions. Who knows where Miller would be now if he stayed at Celtic. He might still be there and playing regularly for them. I would imagine he could reestablish himself as a star in Scotland again. he certainly has the ability and he would also do well in the championship but he really hasn’t had much chance to establish himself in the Premiership and he may just be one of those many players who can take the Championship or Scottish Premiership by storm but find it difficult in the Premiership. Good luck to him wherever he ends up.

After suffering a terrible leg break against Birmingham on Saturday we would like to wish Eduardo all the best on his recovery and hope he will be playing again as soon as possible. The Arsenal medical staff are hopeful he will be back playing after 9 months which sounds likely based on previous broken leg injuries. Incidents like this really does put the game into perspective. Arsenal dropped 2 points against Birmingham and they will be gutted about the result but that emotion will be nothing compared to the distraught feelings amongst the Arsenal players after witnessing such a horrific injury. The players at Arsenal do show a bond you don’t often see at football clubs and they are all friends so the injury to Eduardo has really hurt them. Again we wish Eduardo all the best and cannot wait to see him back in action again. He’s a young man and I cannot see this injury ending his career. He’ll be scoring goals again before we know it.

Bournmouth, who find themselves in around £4m worth of debt are hoping that Harry Redknapp can lead a consortium to save them from liquidation after the club has recently been put into administration. Harry Redknapp has said today that he is willing to help The Cherries, who he made over 100 appearances for as a player and spent 9 years as manager.

“I know some people there with money who I’m sure would be interested in taking it on.

“It’s a great little club, which means a lot to me.

“I have always said I would do what I could for Bournemouth and there’s no way I’ll see them go out of business.”

However Redknapp is unsure whether there will be any regulations or rules blocking a move for him to buy his old club while he is still manager of Portsmouth.

“If a consortium was put together and wanted me to be an investor, I would do it, yes,”

“I don’t know how that would sit with League rules. I could put my son in, couldn’t I?

“Hopefully, somebody else will do it, but if a consortium came to me and I knew they were good fellows who had the club at heart, I would get involved.

“I’ve also spoken to the chairman (Jeff Mostyn) and it seems that raising about £1m initially will keep them going.

“Bournemouth certainly need a league team. They have still been getting 5,000-6,000 gates even when they’ve been in trouble.”

Personally I cannot see there being too much that would block this move for Harry although he may find it hard to have much time for The Cherries but of course this depends on what duties, if any he will take up at Bournmouth and I cannot see why he would not be allowed to put his son in to do the admin work at the club. I do hate seeing league clubs face this kind of financial trouble especially when stupid ideas like the 39th Premiership game float about aimed at making even more money for Premiership clubs. The issue regarding the number of league clubs facing administration should be addressed as quickly as possible.

John Hartson has announced his retirement from football at the age of 32. He has been without a club since West Brom terminated his contract and as no other clubs have come in for him it makes sense that he has chosen now to hang up his boots. He has explained his decision by saying he has lost the desire to keep fit.

“I’m going to miss that competitive edge. That was my weekend, letting off steam and terrorising centre-halves.

“But I’m not going to miss training though. To be honest I’d lost my desire to get back into the West Brom side.”

Sounds lazy to me. I saw Hartson in action earlier in the season when he was on loan at Norwich and he did look very out of shape. His presence did lift the team and he had a couple of good chances but overall he looked slow and had certainly put on a few pounds since his Arsenal days.

“I have been fighting my weight for 12 years. I can’t have a burger without putting on half a stone.”

I may be no expert but you could just not eat burgers or any fatty foods. You are, after all, a professional athlete and should be watching your diet. Now Hartson can eat as many Big Macs or Whoppers as he likes and die a happy fat man in his bed with hidden sandwiches and chicken legs under his folds of flab. Okay I’m being mean. Good luck to Hartson in whatever he decides to do. Maybe he will still be involved with a football at a later date, maybe a pundit or a commentator. I doubt he will decide to coach or go into management but one thing for sure is that he should treat himself to a long holiday and let the pounds burn off in the sun.

Arsenal chairman Peter Hill-Wood has hit back at Brian Barwick’s claims that Premier League clubs have a responsibility to produce more players for England. FA chief executive Barwick said that top clubs must produce more English-born stars but Hill-Wood disagrees and he said:

“It seems to me that the people at the FA are out of touch with reality.

“I can’t think why anyone would make these comments when Arsenal and many Premier League clubs are spending a lot of money on the academies.

“It is not our fault if many English players are not good enough. It is the same for every one of the big clubs now. We find players world-wide. Football is now global.

“I would love to see an Arsenal team with 11 English players but professional football has expanded and developed.

“It is against the law to put a restriction on the number of non-English players in a team and I am pleased about that. If you do that you devalue the currency of the Premier League.

“It is also the same in any industry. You go along with the trends or you suffer badly.”

I do agree with him. What the FA are missing is that Arsenal produce as many young English stars as any other club but when a club is as big as Arsenal it takes a lot for those players to make it into the first team. David Bentley is a great example. He wasn’t getting much first team football because at that stage in his career he was not good enough. He has Arsenal to thanks for his development into the player he is today and he will soon get more chances with the England team. Also Arsenal have a host of young Englishmen who are on the fringes. Justin Hoyte could well be a future England right back and Randall and Gibbs who recently went on loan look like they could be potential stars. If Arsenal were to buy English talent who are good enough for their first 11 they would also need to spend stupid amounts of money. Spurs paid £16.1m for Darren Bent and he is not even good enough to start for them. It’s just a joke and that is something the FA really should be looking at.

Hill-Wood also made reference to previously unsuccessful World Cup campaigns - including 1974 and 1978 when England failed to qualify for the finals.

“There were hardly any foreign players in the English game so what was the excuse then?”

Another point that is falling on deaf ears. Look at the England team we have now. There are some world class superstars there yet as a team they fail. This was mainly down to the manager and he was sacked. Now the FA have a new manager who just happens to be foreign (hypercritical) and if he can make the England team gel then they can win anything.

Ivory Coast 5-0 Guinea

I wasn’t going to report on any of the matches from the African Cup of Nations because I have not really been watching many full matches. In fact this match was the first one I have watched the full 90 minutes of and I was rewarded with a treat as Ivory Coast cruised past Guinea. There was only one first half goal and it was a well taken goal from Abdelkader Keita who took on two defenders before firing home from a tight angle when it looked like he was going to cross. Questions will be asked of the goalkeepers positioning for Guinea as he was too far off his line. Not much else happened in the first half until the final few minutes when Kemoko Camara in the Guinea goal made up for his earlier mistake with a fine double save to deny Aruna Dindane and then Saloman Kalo and moment later he made an even better stop from a Didier Drogba effort.

Ivory Coast started brightly in the second half and picked up where they left off, in control. Guinea did have a chance when Daouda Jabi saw his free-kick go just wide of the post. As he dived low to save, Boubacar Barry (surely that’s the best name ever!) hit his head into the upright but was okay shortly after. Miss of the tournament came from Dindane who had done well to take the ball around Camara only to shoot wide with the net gaping. A minute later Ivory Coast made it 2-0 when Arthur Boka picked out Drogba who runs past two defenders and finished as well as you would expect from a world class striker.

This was game over. Guinea just fell flat after the second goal and it wasn’t long before Kalou made it three. Drogba found his Chelsea team mate who rounded Camara and just walked the ball in to the net. Kalou then added the 4th when he was picked out by Yaya Toure who had made a powerful run into the box. He then pulled it back to Kalou who couldn’t miss. The 5th was the best goal of the match and it came from Kone who smashed the ball in from 20 yards. It was a powerful strike and flew as straight as an arrow into the back of the net. This tournament just keeps on giving us great matches and great games.