Olympic Sponsors Pick GB Team

Adidas are one the major sponsors of the summer 2012 Olympics. It has embarked on a major ad campaign featuring David Beckham as its ‘main man’. Some of the ads seem to have it as a given that David Beckham would feature in the GB football team.

It wouldn’t be the first time that a sponsor has chosen a team. In France 1998, Brazil had to bow to contractual obligations with Nike that meant that Giovanni had to feature in the team, despite bad form and not deserving his squad place. Brazil obliged by playing him in the first half of their first match against Scotland. He wasn’t seen again in the tournament. Infamously, in the final, it was said that a clearly not-up-for-it Ronaldo played also only at the insistence of Nike.

RTG would love it for GB to do well in this tournament, but a lot of our passion for it will evaporate if it’s viewed as another corporate vehicle promoting its products and celebrity at the cost of sporting endeavour. There are many, many better choices than David Beckham.

Cheat! Cheat! Cheat!

Those of us who can recall the playing days of Rodney Marsh and Francis Lee in the 1960’s and 70’s, will know that today’s commentators bemoaning players’ diving to gain penalties, as a modern blight, are totally wrong. Usually those same commentators betray their Little-Englander instincts by adding that diving was a direct import that came with foreign players and that all us solid British types would never have gone down this road without the lessons taught by and learnt from foreigners.

At least one of them, Gary Neville, had the balls to state quite categorically that diving had been commonplace amongst players that he played with and against. And he included himself, as well as naming English icons such as David Beckham, Wayne Rooney and Steve Gerrard as all ‘going down easy’. However, Neville went on to differentiate going down without contact and going down with contact. The former being a cheat, the latter as not cheating. Needless to say Sky Sports, who had broadcast his views, was inundated by supporters appalled by his easy dismissal of the practice as part of the modern game.

Again, those of us who have followed football over the last few decades could certainly attest to numerous incidences of players winning penalties with little or no contact. RTG can even recall a teenage ‘butter wouldn’t melt in his mouth’ Gary Lineker doing his aquatic acrobat stuff with Leicester City. It can also recall Glenn Hoddle specifically encouraging a raw Michael Owen to learn the dark art of diving to ‘improve’ his game at a press conference in France ’98. Michael certainly learnt quickly, as he found Argentine legs to plunge over in that World Cup and the next one. That the first one was balanced by an earlier equally dubious Argentine penalty is beside the point.

The real question is: does it happen more often than it did? With multiple cameras, better technology and rolling 24 hour coverage, more dubious cases are more able to be spotted, highlighted and endlessly debated nowadays. We just don’t have the data available from previous eras. Sadly, therefore, it is a question of which RTG can only provide an answer based on anecdotal evidence and experience.

Yes it is more common, but then with potentially multi-millions of pounds at stake resting on one incident, it’s really not that surprising. What has changed is that, increasingly, modern players, pundits and supporters see it as ‘professional’ and a ‘duty’ – as illustrated by Neville’s recent public pronouncements.

There has been some wild talk of retrospective punishments for divers using the camera technology available now as routine at Premiership grounds. But until someone comes up with a camera that measures the force of a push and the brain waves of intent, no current technology will solve the problem. Retrospective refereeing is frankly an area we should not go down at all for reasons that RTG will cover in a later piece.

No, the real danger in redefining the modern morals of sport is best shown by a story from American Baseball. In 1994, the top batter for the Cleveland Indians, Albert Belle, was accused of using an illegal corked bat. One umpire removed the bat for testing, locking it up safely in the umpires’ room. One of Belle’s team-mates, Jason Grimsley, acting the cat burglar, broke into the umpires’ locker room and replaced the tainted bat with a legal one. The deception was easily spotted by the fact that it looked totally different and had a totally different player’s name on it. The dim-witted Mr Grimsley was treated as a hero by fans and colleagues alike and Mr Belle got a paltry minor ban. Hmmm…dim-witted sportsmen….sounds familiar.

This relaxed view of cheating has led directly to wide spread performance enhancing drug use within baseball. It has directly affected results and the record books. RTG is not saying that football will go the same way, if it hasn’t already, but collectively we need to address this moral issue. And fast.

But then who amongst us England supporters would genuinely complain if Ashley Young’s 89th minute dive wins us the European Championship this summer? RTG would like to think that it would bother us.

Help join the debate to Reclaim our Game.

Racist or Not, Media Appoints the Captain

What a strange world that English football inhabits. On the one hand, almost uniquely amongst competitive footballing nations, the English elevate the position of captain to almost mystical levels – much to the bemusement of virtually every foreign manager who plies his trade in this country. On the other, we collectively proceed to ignore totally all the reasons we have for exalting that position to such high esteem in the first place.

Get caught racially abusing other players – more than once – no problem. Shag a team-mate’s girl – par for the course. Actually: you can also drunkenly abuse Americans the day after the 9/11 terrorist attacks; end up in court after a night club brawl where your only argument is “do you know how much money I make?”; defraud the taxman by conducting training ground tours for brown envelopes stuffed with cash; abuse the England captaincy perk of a Wembley hospitality box; publicly urinate in a night spot…RTG could go on...

No, this is not a moralising call for John Terry to be sacked for the above transgressions. As always, RTG will not make a call on something where we do not have all the information. We’ll leave you to decide whether his current performances warrant an England place and whether his captaincy has been a successful one. Interestingly, this aspect has not entered the media debate. We can only go on the information and experience that we have. Ever since the iconic images of Bobby Moore holding aloft the Jules Rimet trophy on his colleagues’ shoulders were published and documented the only good day England football has ever had, English supporters have been gagging for a similar paragon to emerge and wholly get behind. But let’s face it: most modern English footballers give the impression that they could easily figure in the criminal underworld, if they hadn’t been able to kick about a synthetic leather ball rather well. Either that or digging ditches.

The most disturbing aspect of the captaincy issue is that it highlights the hypocrisy endemic within the game, lead by the media. They plug away with their “me-too” views that promoted John Terry into a position in which he should never have been considered, let alone be - England captain - then twice sacked and re-instated him. The betting money now is that he’ll be removed yet again. A similar situation has surfaced with David Beckham’s attempts to get himself picked for the GB Olympic football team. And he’s getting plenty of support from the media and from those more interested in his wife’s shoes than football. None of which has anything to do with sport and being successful at it.

Take this quote from Terry’s statement: (I am proud to be captain of) …“ one of the most internationally diverse teams in the Premier League”. Note the use of the word ‘internationally’ and not ‘racially’ – which would have been more appropriate, but would have drawn attention to that terrible “R” word, from which he is so desperate to escape. This encapsulates it all. First, there is no way that Terry came up with those words. And second, it goes no way to explaining or apologising for his (on his own admission) disgusting words. There’s the rub. More money, more bullshit, more Public Relations offensives – and mark RTG’s words, that is all Terry and Beckham have in their locker.

Increasingly, the game is being run on the hot breath of highly paid PR people and has less and less to do with truth, actual talent and achievement. England (and GB) will win bugger all the longer this continues.

Reclaim the Game from the bullshit and money men!

Reasons to be Cheerful. Reasons to Despair

There’s a lot going in the football world this week: perhaps a sign of the times that much of it is taking place in courts (and we’re not talking about an ailing furniture store). So RTG thought today we would provide some highlights for you to mull over.

One highlight, by the way, is we’ve just had our email read out on Sky Sports News in response to a poll that they ran saying that 80% of respondents thought that Beckham totally deserved to be included in Capello’s first England squad. We’re not going to bang on about it again, but it looks likely that Capello has put England’s interests first and not those of a media celebrity. Well done Fabio. Long may it continue. A place in the international team should be a cherished highlight of a player’s career, not a photo op for Vogue or OK magazine. Let Beckham fight for his 100th cap by playing at the right quality level and playing consistently well.

A ruling made yesterday by the Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS) in Switzerland throws the transfer system into yet more contention and confusion. The ruling provides for a formula that allows players to breach their contracts after a certain period and pay his club compensation based on the value of his remaining wages within that contract. The case arose from the transfer of Andy Webster from Hearts to Wigan where he unilaterally decided the move. Whilst details are sketchy at this point, most commentators have interpreted this as first, more power to the players and second, a drastic reduction in transfer fees. For example, it is believed that under the new formula, Fabregas or Ronaldo (arguably the two best young players in the world currently) could be transferred for as little as £12 million without the consent of their clubs under their present contracts. As a side issue, CAS also criticised FIFA for its handling of the case - no surprises there. Expect many more lawyers to earn a lot more money following this ruling.

Speaking of FIFA, in yet another court case in Switzerland, it is expected that the mystery individual who paid £1.2M to FIFA’s TV rights broker, ISL, will be revealed today. FIFA initiated proceedings claiming that it had not received its £29.6M share of the rights sale from ISL. But, investigating magistrate, Thomas Hildebrand, suspects that the original deal was oiled by backhanders (again surprise surprise), and that only revealing the identity of the mystery donator will prevent long-term prison sentences for those involved. Watch this space.

In an interesting development this morning, during a post-match interview with Steve Coppell, the Big Four have suddenly become the Elite Three! Which we can only imagine is bad news for Liverpool after losing 1-0 to West Ham last night. On a more positive note for Liverpool, there is talk of a £500 Million supporters bid for the club based on the Barcelona model. Needless to say, RTG thoroughly endorses their efforts and hope that it proves both a resounding success and a blueprint for the future of other clubs.

RTG is priding itself on its first exclusive. We have the first photograph of Keegan meeting with Dennis Wise. Scroll down for this ‘exclusive’.

Fabio Capello. Now This is a Test.

OK, so RTG is on its Beckham bashing soap box, again, but the issues surrounding Beckham epitomise exactly what RTG is railing against in modern football.

For the record, let us just reiterate. He was a great footballer with the sweetest right foot of several generations. He contributed immensely to Manchester United’s success and he was a stalwart of arguably the greatest midfield quartets ever. He also does usually give everything in an England shirt. That was then. Now is a different matter. Rightly or wrongly he chose a path to further his ‘career’ in a league that is barely English League 1 standard. We say career in his truest sense of the word – that of a media celebrity.

Sir Alex Ferguson has joined the chorus of bleating sheep saying that Beckham deserves his 100th cap irrespective of what England needs. Last week Beckham went to Sierra Leone; this week he’s in Brazil. Interspersed between these wonderful photo ops are pictures of him on a foggy Arsenal training pitch enjoying the banter and wet-towel slapping frolics of the Arsenal squad (Bendtner and Adebayor excepted). So imagine RTG’s surprise when waking up this morning to reports that Fabio Capello is having serious reservations about including Beckham in the squad. Is it just us or are other genuine supporters angry about how trivialised playing for your country has become?

Here is a man who has not played at a world class standard for nearly a year and who has not played a competitive match since his substitute’s appearance versus Croatia. Note also he only played a couple of handfuls of games for Real Madrid in his final season with them. Meanwhile we have an England team that has failed to qualify for the Euro 2008 tournament and who need, at this time more than any, need to concentrate on getting the right players, tactics and systems in place. What do we get? Tiresome, and never ending, discussions on one person’s tribute to celebrityville.

Reports suggest that Capello wants to break with the tradition of naming a 23 man squad and pick an initial squad of 30 in order to see more players close-up at England training sessions. Which led RTG to thinking that ALL the English players in the Premier League (who are not too old, on crutches or serving at Her Majesty’s pleasure) should be included in the England preparation for EVERY game. This would cover all age groups. There are probably only 50-60 players across all ages that fall into this group. Gone would be the endless speculation about who is injured or who ‘deserves’ inclusion. What Capello and his staff would get to see is every English player’s motivation and commitment, up close. Plus, it starts the important process of building the concept of Team England. Of course, we assume that there will exist a suitable place (i.e. Burton) for this to take off.

Hopefully, Capello will see sense and treat this game against Switzerland as the beginning of a new era and not a salute to the last. After all, what is there really to salute?

Reclaim the Game – The Weekend’s Events

• Talking of tiresome, never ending discussions, the Toon (nostalgia and return of the messiah) army now await with baited breath over the potential return of Alan Shearer in their so-called ‘dream ticket’. Amazing, that multi-million pound organisations can make decisions influenced more on the principles of the schoolyard than those of serious businesses.
• Derby County are the latest club to find themselves with new American owners. The new owners were quick to point out that their management style is more Randy Lerner of Aston Villa and less Gillett and Hicks of Liverpool. The group to take over is an organisation called General Sports and Entertainment. Hmmmmmm…….not hopeful.
• The African Nations Cup, currently being played out in Ghana, has been rocked by a series of bribe scandals. Sketchy reports and accusations have been made, but officials of CAF so far are attempting to bury the story in the hope that it will go away. Watch this space.
  
  Hats Off, Take a Bow (or Not)!
  
  Player of the Week: Alfie Potter of Havant and Waterlooville (but on loan from Peterborough). Not just because he has a name that is a throw back to cloth caps and jumpers for goal posts, but also because for a few minutes at least, neutrals dared to dream of the greatest cup upset of them all.
  
  Villain of the Week: Yossi Benayoun. OK a bit harsh on Yossi but he spoilt the dream of the greatest cup upset of them all.
  
  Heroes of the Week: Havant and Waterlooville who led for most of the first half. Excellent effort – even if their team was shored up with a smattering of loan professionals.
  
  Shock of the Week: this week’s shock is one of the literal kind – how we laughed at the look of shock on Michael Ball’s face when he realised that he was clearing a balloon rather than the ball which resulted in United’s first goal in their ‘shock’ win against City.
  
  Cliché of the Week: With a Potter playing in the magical FA Cup 4th round, all those media muppets couldn’t help themselves in trying to describe Havant and Waterlooville’s exploits in terms of being more ‘Harry Potter’ than ‘Alfie Potter’.

Media Familiarity Will Breed Supporters' Contempt

Much has been made of the ‘role’ that footballers are supposed to play in the modern world. Apparently, according to the media, our so-called stars are not only worthy of celebrity status, but also of being virtuous examples of how our youngsters should behave. Really?

All be it RTG is fairly long in the tooth, but our parents and teachers were the people who taught us how to behave. Back then footballers were revered only for their skill and behaviour on a football pitch: track back; ‘if in doubt, kick it out’; lose the ball, get it back again; refs don’t change their mind so don’t answer back. And so on. Never were we expected to emulate our on-pitch heroes by copying their off-field activities. In most cases we didn’t even know what they were. In those days people were simply not interested (a certain Mr George Best aside).

So what are we to make of David Beckham’s current antics in Sierra Leone? RTG’s burning question is if indeed Beckham is to gain his 100th cap, as the media seem so desperate for him to do, and given that he has not played a competitive match since his substitute’s appearance against Croatia, how can he afford to take four days out to act as Unicef goodwill ambassador in a visit to Sierra Leone – good cause though it may be? RTG has written many times about the farce that surrounds Beckham’s 100th cap and this serves to reinforce the fact that the whole issue of Beckham is turning into a media ‘circus’ and not about football at all.

On balance it is probably a good thing that celebrities are using their status to highlight worthy causes. But for every David Beckham, Geri Halliwell or Out-of-work Eastenders star that beats a path to a Third World Country, very little appears to have been achieved in relieving poverty and people’s suffering. But that’s another issue.

At least Beckham, to his credit, is not kidnapping small children to adopt them or roasting some poor wannabe WAG in a hotel room, but we are surely expecting far too much from our footballers who are generally very inexperienced in the ways of the world, not especially well educated and exhibit all the common trappings of people who have far too much money and time on their hands. Imagine, back in the 1960s, anyone bothering to ask Jimmy Greaves his opinion on world poverty. And therein lies RTG’s point. Nobody would have done because they knew there were better qualified people to ask (and not just because he usually couldn’t remember). Greaves’s skill was in scoring goals and that’s what the media and public were interested in as far as he was concerned.

There are, of course, too many examples of behaviour not worth copying: roasting stories, rape allegations, fights with bouncers, urinating on floors and in their pants; and blatant examples of racism. In addition, there are the likes of Rio Ferdinand launching his £300,000 football academy in Uganda to educate street kids in Kampala who said meeting the kids was ‘overwhelming and humbling’; while also launching an exclusive, luxury, gated housing development overlooking Kampala designed to exclude the very people he’s humbled by. John Barnes gave us his ‘responsible’ attitude to the environment and Green issues by choosing to boast to us how he didn’t understand recycling so he didn’t do it. This from a man who constantly craves ‘respeck’.

If the media keeps trying to hoist on us values and expectations of footballers’ off-field behaviour, this will serve only to drive a wedge further between players and supporters. And the more players try to court the media to bolster their off-field incomes, the more likely that this situation will get worse. Nobody is expecting to see a return to the cloth cap days when players travelled to the game on the same bus as supporters. But what footballers have to realise is that the more they cosy up to the media, the more likely it is that they will lose the respect of their ultimate paymasters, the supporters. Many supporters are already turned off by the cynical manipulation of the ‘badge kissers’. Players should remember one of the old adages, ‘familiarity breeds contempt’.

Reclaim the Game – The Week’s Events

• The clamour by Liverpool supporters for the removal of the American duo, Hicks and Gillett, from ownership of the club grows daily as the realisation that securing the required new loans against the club’s assets is not a good idea after all. But as Manchester United supporters discovered, when congratulating themselves over the blocked Sky takeover, they went from the proverbial ‘frying pan into the fire’ with the arrival of the Glazers. What do Liverpool supporters know of the potential buyers Dubai International Capital (DIC)? Probably the same as they did of Hicks and Gillett. Bugger all. Be careful what you wish for.
• Justin Gregory, the Havant and Waterloo player, who will sadly miss this weekend’s FA Cup tie at Anfield through suspension, appears to be the only person with a realistic view of his predicament. The sensationalists at Talkshite Radio accused the FA of being ‘jobsworths’ by not allowing the rearranged mid-week fixture to count as his suspension game. A shame though it is for Gregory, teams can’t tinker with the fixture list to enable suspended players not to miss vital games. Otherwise, why have a disciplinary system at all? Worse still, why have a system operated not on rules, and equal treatment irrespective of status, but on sentiment? This is one issue RTG actually backs the FA on.
• Manchester United CEO, David Gill’s, house was daubed with anti-Glazer graffiti. Whilst RTG has every sympathy with the plight and aims of Manchester United Supporters Trust (MUST), we would like to remind those taking this action that the tactic did not work with John Magnier and JP McManus, the Irish major shareholders in the club pre-Glazer. In fact, it made them more willing to sell up to the Glazers when the bid came in. Not that RTG is at all suggesting that this was sanctioned by those that run MUST but you get the point.

Roll up. Roll up for the 100 Caps Wembley Showbiz Spectacular!

According to England skipper John (do you know how much I earn in a week?) Terry, Jose Mourinho is the ‘stand out’ candidate for the next England manager. For once, RTG finds it hard to disagree with JT on that. Sadly, however, this is in the same breath as stating he would be willing to sit out the Switzerland friendly in order for David Beckham to win his (in JT’s own words) “very well-deserved 100th cap”.

Much has been said recently regarding the England football team and its current woes. JT’s ‘sincere’ offer undermines his position as captain of a failing football team as he is trivialising the whole wretched situation that we as supporters have had to endure. What exactly is he stating? Beckham is going to play centre half? If so then we definitely haven’t even begun to learn anything from our recent debacle. Why is a captain talking up a player who won’t have played a competitive match for over three months, and only a handful in the last six or seven? The truth is that this situation is not going to happen. So why bother saying it?

Could it be that in an effort to fill Wembley for what is now a meaningless friendly on February 6th, next year, the FA have decided to turn the event into some sort of football celebrity love-in rather than focusing on rebuilding a flagging side? Let’s face it, the economics of filling Wembley with thousands of toilet-licking teenyboppers make much more sense than trying to half-fill it with miserable, disgruntled England supporters, still smarting from the lack of competitive matches to look forward to.

There have been four previous winners of 100 or more caps for England – Billy Wright, Peter Shilton, Bobby Moore and Bobby Charlton. As RTG has stated before, David Beckham was once a very fine player. Unfortunately, you can count only a handful of world class performances he has made for his country; most notably, in his total command of the world cup qualifier against Greece, where his last minute effort secured automatic qualification to Japan 2002. It is hard to imagine him, however, in the company of these four greats and perhaps it would be better for the game if he stayed on 99 caps.

Reclaim the Game – The Week’s Events

• Call RTG cynical (and we are), but we believe that John Terry wetting himself and urinating on the floor on the eve of the important Croatia match was not caused by excess drink and exuberance. No, this was a carefully calculated publicity stunt for his rumoured new sponsorship deal with Pampers. OK….not strictly true…..it was Huggies. OK enough!
• Is it RTG’s imagination or has Richard Keys got even more vacuous in his summation of matches on Sky? He appears to take no account of the full 90 minutes and seems to refer constantly to his stock of clichéd points gleaned from the media, no matter what happened out on the field. As hard as Peter Beardsley tried to talk about the game last night (and as hard as we tried to understand the mumbling Geordie), Keys just kept bringing him back to, “Oh Arsenal, they play lovely football don’t they?”…..”Allardyce is under a lot of pressure isn’t he, Peter?”….”Pressure off Allardyce now Peter?”. Thanks Mr Keys but we learnt nothing about football from one of the game's greats thanks to your inane, stage-managed presentation.
• Gretna have made a brave decision this week to agree to postpone their SPL match with Rangers at the weekend to help Rangers’ preparations for their upcoming qualification decider against Lyons. Admirable though it is to see a nation getting behind its club teams in Europe, this adds a distinctly unfair advantage and sets a worrying precedent should the habit be adopted more widely.

Platini Proposals Suggest Parity....but maybe not Practicality

With the first group stage draw of the Champions League taking place in a few hours, we'd like to draw attention, as supporters of a fair and honest sport, to UEFA President Michel Platini's proposals for reforming the Champions League. He should be applauded for trying to even out the spoils across more European countries than at present, thereby creating better competition in the longer term. Since his election to the presidency, he has made several suggestions such as reducing the number of clubs entering from each country (reducing the number in England from four to three), and is now proposing the inclusion of the national cup winners at the expense of the last qualifying place (i.e. only first second and third would qualify in England).

In the short-term at least, the quality and financial attraction of the competition could be diminished. In addition, his proposals for allowing cup competition winners as the last qualifying berth would also potentially create more issues.

We believe there needs to be a concerted effort to increase the importance of national cup competitions especially for the lower leagues. Much depends upon the details of his plans, but we can only point to one example in the last five years, assuming the strict interpretation of "cup winners only", where this would have made a difference for English qualification. If, however, we use the same interpretation as for the former cup winners cup competition, we would have had, in 2001/2002, Tottenham playing off against Wycombe Wanderers for the last spot. And, in 2004, Millwall would have been one of our representatives in the Champions League purely on the strength of a good cup run involving easy draws and a bit of luck (Manchester United in the final was their only Premiership opposition). No disrespect to Millwall and Wycombe Wanderers but you get our point.

Our philosophy has always been that football should attempt to be a fair and level playing field as far as is possible and in that respect Platini is at least thinking in those terms rather than being led by the financial considerations. We wholeheartedly support this sentiment, with the reservations stated above, but doubt whether the big clubs will support his proposals (planned for implementation in 2009). Above all we finally have an administrator who is prepared to tackle the inequities in football and we believe he deserves the opportunity to debate these issues as a starting point; not just for football, but for sport in general.

Beckham Bullshit Leaves McClaren High and Dry

Following our previous post concerning the value of international friendlies, news emerges from a Galaxy far away that Beckham is injured and is unlikely to play any part in England's next two qualifiers. Steve McClaren, as we pointed out, had to pick him due to his travelling 6,000 miles and the media expectations that surrounded his first appearance under the new management. While we should have been looking at options available wide right from a more practical (and maybe longer term) perspective, we are now in the situation where McClaren must fill that position with somebody who has not played that role with England for some time. Once again, short-term accommodations have messed up long-term goals.

Beckham chose to spend his autumn years in LA - nobody else. So he, and his employers, should live with that decision even if it means not playing a part in the England team and Steve McClaren has to have the courage to make that clear to all. Note Beckham's LA Galaxy record since joining: played five, lost four.

Reclaim the Game - The Week's Events

• City of Grief Part III. Liverpool FC's minute silence etc for Rhys Jones (Everton fan) last Tuesday. OK, it's still not politic but enough's enough. If the effort expended in collective grief were actually put into catching the perpertrators of this awful crime they might now be behind bars. Over to you Everton (or Tranmere?).
• Future England Gaffer? John Terry, at the prospect of Ronaldhino joining the Chelsea cash cow, showed us his true insight and tactical awareness by identifying Ronnie's prime role as the world's most gifted and exciting footballer. He must be prepared to track back and develop the Chelsea "workaholic" ethic according to JT. Leave the creative stuff to our Frank and our Sean (if playing) we think he is trying to say. If JT can chew gum and punch the air with the best of them, we have a future England boss in the making.
• Martin Allen (as of yesterday ex-Leicester boss) commenting on the influx of 14 new squad members said that Leicester training sessions were sometimes like "scenes from Zulu". What does he mean? Loads of Welshmen in red jackets being put to the spear? I think we should know. We were going to suggest he invite us to a training session but that's sadly not now possible.
• Not that we want to start vicious rumours, or are in any position to judge, but Tony Adams commenting on ITV4's coverage of the Arsenal v Sparta Prague game last night: any bad habits returning?