Ollie Irish - Premier League Tales

Ah, I get it now – he has an adamantium right foot. Figures.

Despite looking increasingly like a mutant cross between Wolverine and how I imagine Ryan Reynolds' grizzly older brother might look, Becks rolled back the years to put in a man-of-the-match stint for England against Belarus last night at Wembley.

…

Okay, sorry, that last sentence was way too long, like Peter Crouch's body. I'll calm down.

Except, Becks was a sub and only played, like, half an hour....

"I had high hopes indeed of luring Ruud Van Nistelrooy away from the Bernabeu…"

Woke up early (5am: sleep is for losers, I believe), as usual. Showered, applied bronzing moisturiser, put on dressing gown – Egyptian cotton, monogrammed with my initials – and grabbed a power shake – Big Sam got me into them – before changing into my Ciro Citterio suit (those bloody Italians know how to dress!) and hopping in my sponsored Daewoo for short ride to training ground.

Lovely gearbox, smooth ride,...

"Zoran, you know I said I'd kill you last? I lied."

I can get a handle on the mysterious disappearance of Zoran Tosic only by imagining the following scenario: Fergie ordered Nemanja Vidic – it would be Vidic, who closely resembles a James Bond henchman; Robert Shaw's Red Grant in From Russia With Love, to be exact – to dump Tosic in some disused Manchester canal, concrete football boots and all.

How else can you explain the Tosic no-show at Old Trafford, since...

We all love a good victim, even more than we love our heroes. In the Premier League, Liverpool midfielder Lucas Leiva, more commonly known as "that useless bag of Brazilian shite", has become the bete noire du jour. "And he doesn't even look bloody Brazilian!"

It's true that Lucas doesn't look like the British idea of a Brazilian footballer: we prefer our South Americans to be tanned, elegant and outrageously, ostentatiously gifted. Like Zico, in other...

I frequently move the goalposts to suit my own needs – sometimes because I want to score, sometimes because I want others to miss. We all do it, no matter how subtly.

There is no real, physical moving of any posts, of course. It's a phrase, a metaphor, a fallacy, a cliché even.

But, awesomely,...

Bit late with this, I know. Much like Michael Owen…



THE GOOD

• Sunday's Manchester derby was the greatest Prem game I've ever seen (please note italics, folks) – even better than the pair of 4-3 belters served up by Liverpool and Newcastle United in the mid-1990s, or the 4-4 belter between Chelsea and Spurs in 2008.

Okay, greatest is perhaps wrong; the match was the most entertaining Prem game I've ever seen. The 90+ minutes...

From the recent Muscovite derby between Spartak and Saturn. We've all wanted to do it…


This is so many times more impressive than streaking – sure, anyone can sink a few beers and then muster the courage to take their clothes off in front of thousands of people, but who can time their pitch invasion so well that they get to take a penalty in their stride. And what a finish! Confident, clinical… England could use some of that in South Africa next summer.

[Spotted on The Spoiler]

The best of the week in football, played out via the medium of YouTube…

(As ever with YouTube, some of these videos won't last long, so get 'em while they're hot.)

First out of the gate, Wayne Rooney reacts less then well to being taken off in Man Utd's Champions League opener against Besiktas:


Much ado about nothing, and hardly the 'tantrum' it's been described as by the media. I too would be sorely aggrieved if I was subbed off for Michael Owen. Honestly, there's almost nothing left of the Owen who, in his teens, jinked past defenders...

Power to the people?

No. Quite the opposite.

This is exactly the sort of half-baked, lily-livered gesture I'd expect from an Islington-dwelling Gooner with an Australian accent.

"Watch out for the fumes, Justin! They might be toxic!"

Pathetic. Almost as pathetic as those Arsenal fans crying and bitching about how Adebayor "made them throw stuff onto the pitch" at Eastlands:

"He incited us [erm, but only after they had been abusing him, no?] – and anyway, because we're footy fans, we can't be held responsible for...

The 2009/10 Champions League group stage begins today, and I for one am less-than-slightly excited…


The Chaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaampionzzzzzzzzzzzz

If you get the football competitions you deserve, then the Champions League is very much a tournament for these cynical, logoed times: its pompous theme tune (an adaptation of Handel's overblown 'Zadok the Priest', fact fans) and brazen corporateness (the logos of the many official sponsors are inescapable) leave a sour taste in the mouth. Boy, how the CL could use a good sense of humour.

Permit me...