Top Marks for Tottenham

Tottenham Hotspur 9-1 Wigan Athletic. I'm pretty sure I'm not the only one who had to look twice when that scoreline flashed up on my screen on sunday evening. A display of attacking prowess against a Wigan Athletic team who, let's not forget, have beaten league leaders Chelsea this season, left Spurs and 5 goal hero Jermaine Defoe beaming. Since the late 90s where the likes of Newcastle managed an 8-0 victory over Sheffield Wednesday and Manchester United recorded an 8-1 scoreline at Nottingham Forest with the likes of Alan Shearer and Ole Gunnar Solskjaer making the headlines, results of these proportions have been few and far between. So congratulations to Tottenham for pressing on throughout the second half and not sitting back when the game was beyond Wigan. The sport needs games like this once in a while, so the actual football being played can make the headlines, as opposed to refereeing decisions or off-field matters. Maybe Spurs can actually hope for Champions League football next season...Well, MAYBE.

Can We Get A Replay?

The short answer is NO. No matter how much Robbie Keane and his compatriots hark on about the injustice of Thierry Henry's handball on Wednesday night, replaying the match is simply not a feasible idea. Even now Henry himself is saying its a fair solution, perhaps in an attempt to restore some of his much damaged reputation, its just not going to happen. If FIFA had the audacity to give the go ahead, the football calendar would be thrown into turmoil forever. The amount of dubious decisions that we see almost on a weekly basis would mean replays would be demanded after every bad handball, penalty, red card and "did the ball cross the line" decision. The football calendar would be thrown into turmoil, the season would last all year round and in tournaments such as the World Cup finals, where fixtures come thick and fast it would simply be impossible. It was unfair that Henry's handball wasn't spotted by the officials, but even if it had been, it doesn't mean Ireland would have won the match. Football is a game full of 'what if?'s, think back to Maradona's hand of god goal and Chelsea's penaltiless semi-final against barcelona last season. Unfortunately for Ireland, just like many before them, all they can do is hope that next time the luck is on their side...

Football's Most Hated XI

Some players get jeered almost anywhere they play, others get particularly bad receptions on certain grounds and a few are just universally hated by football fans across the country. I thought I’d take a light-hearted look at 11 of the most hated players in recent English football history and explore some of the reasons why they’ve become so unpopular amongst the football community.


GK:Lehmann

Defence: G.Neville, Gallas, Carragher, A.Cole

Midfield: Ronaldo, Barton (c), Diouf

Attack:Adebayor, Bellamy, Drogba

NB. RIGHT CLICK AND OPEN ALL LINKS IN A NEW WINDOW!

Jens Lehmann: The former Arsenal and Germany man was a shoo-in in goal for this team, after a series of ridiculous angry incidents throughout his career. Prior to the hatred he directed towards one-time understudy and eventual successor Manuel Almunia, his most memorable act was perhaps the farcical instance at Stamford Bridge where he clashed with Chelsea’s Didier Drogba (watch here http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kNHOBdHyRfM ). The ever-irate keeper is still at it in Germany with Stuttgart, earlier this year he ripped off team-mate Khalid Boulahrouz’s headband and threw it down in anger. Jens may be 39 now but it seems he’ll never learn...
Gary Neville: The Manchester United captain has had a very successful career, but his recent quote regarding Liverpool fans, “I’m not their favourite son” couldn’t be more of an understatement. Making himself despised by opposition fans is one of Gary’s specialities. Running over to the scouse supporters and kissing his United badge in front of them after a particular late goal at Old Trafford wasn’t one of his brightest ideas and ensured his hate-figure status at Anfield (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o2DwSZdB5VE ) . After setting off to do the same thing when Michael Owen scored a late United winner against Man City earlier this season he turned his back after running half way to the away fans and made a vague attempt to pretend he was warming up. This led to former team-mate Mark Hughes labelling him a lunatic. Last week, he was sent off for a dangerous challenge on a Barnsley player yet even when Sir Alex Ferguson agreed with the official’s decision, Neville claimed the referee was ‘blatantly wrong’. Oh dear Gary, oh dear...
William Gallas: The former Chelsea man’s reputation took a battering after he made a fool of himself sulking after the final whistle on the St Andrews pitch after Arsenal conceded a late penalty to draw with Birmingham City in February 2008. (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7PTUMgpHPn0 ) Later that year, he reacted angrily when France team-mate Jerome Rothen revealed his nickname used to be Mr Bean because of his stupidity and that he even once stole £150 from a team-mate’s bank account! The French defender was stripped of the Arsenal captaincy last year after a series of outrageous quotes against his own team-mates, where he accused them of a lack of respect and even told one team-mate, ‘You’re only 20. I’m not your friend.’ All of which has led to William being considered an idiot by the majority of the football world...
Jamie Carragher: As if his whining accent wasn’t bad enough (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nDaTTVR2JXY ), the Liverpool stalwart decided to retire from international football in 2007 at the age of just 29, simply because he couldn’t get a regular game due to the presence of Rio Ferdinand and John Terry. Instead of fighting for his place like a true professional, the scouse centre-back made the childish gesture of quitting the England team. He even claimed that defeats with England didn’t hurt as much as they did in club football. In his autobiography “Carra” he revealed that he set out to deliberately hurt former team-mate Rigobert Song in a training session. Not the most likeable character in the Liverpool line-up...
Ashley Cole: The fact that when you google Ashley Cole, the first thing that comes up is a news-celebrity related item and nothing to do with football says a lot about the Chelsea left-back. Making the front-page of tabloids as often the back, usually due to his celebrity wife/ allegations of him playing away from home/ getting arrested for swearing at a policeman hasn’t exactly endeared Cole to football fans. However, the main reason he is hated across the country is due to his move from Arsenal to Chelsea in 2006. Cole somewhat engineered the move by revealing that he felt the club weren’t willing to increase his wage to ‘match his skills’ and that he almost crashed his car ‘in anger’ when told the board weren’t willing to increase their offer to him. Ashley is now taunted for this with the nickname ‘Cashley’... and in 2008 he made himself look like even more of an idiot by turning his back on referee Mike Riley during a London derby at Tottenham. He’s also not opposed to taking a tumble... (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Pz_mgHPvuBU) Cole’s certainly not Mr Popular, especially not in the Emirates Stadium...
Cristiano Ronaldo: The Portuguese winger was initially seen as just a bit of a show pony that went over far too easily. However, after his cheeky wink to the Portugal bench (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jtRYeIBO-ko ) when he had somewhat influenced the referee to send off club-mate Wayne Rooney in the 2006 World Cup quarter finals, he turned into a hate figure in England almost overnight. After returning for Man United to get booed at every away ground in England, it didn’t help his popularity with other supporters that he went on to score against almost everybody in 3 prolific seasons from 2006/07 to 2008/09(90 goals in all competitions in those seasons). However, his popularity waned even with the United fans after his long-protracted move to Real Madrid where as soon as winning the Champions League in 2008, he started making noises that he wanted to leave and that it was his ‘dream’ to play for Real Madrid. The heavily media-engineered move finally came to fruition in June 2009 when Real offered a world-record £80 million for the trickster. To borrow one of Cristiano’s favourite phrases, ‘God only knows’ if he’ll ever be popular in England...
Joey Barton (captain): The dubious honour of captain of this Most Hated XI goes to Barton, one man who has surely done all within his power to give footballers a bad name. His list of offences is lengthy, from getting sent off for arguing at half-time in an FA Cup match, to beating the living daylights out of team-mate Ousmane Dabo in training, via assaulting a 15 year old Everton fan in Thailand and pulling a moony at yet more Everton fans when his City team got a last minute equaliser. After the Dabo incident, Barton was rightly hounded out of City, only to be hired by hapless Newcastle United. Only semi-present during their relegation season due to being injured, or inevitably spending some time behind bars, Barton did make an impact when he appeared against Liverpool in May of this year, he immediately lunged into a tackle on Xabi Alonso, and was predictably sent off (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZkBfsNlBEaY ) ...Joey is beyond doubt the most hated footballer of the modern era...
El Hadji Diouf: The Senegalese winger rose to prominence in the 2002 World Cup, leading then Liverpool boss Gerard Houllier to complete a £10 million deal from Lens. Whether, he knew what he was bringing to the Premier League is another question, as Diouf only scored 6 goals in 80 appearances, including becoming the first Liverpool number 9 to fail to hit the net in an entire season. The reason he finds himself in this list of hated players, would largely be down to several unsavoury spitting incidents that have marred his career in England. While at Liverpool, he spat at Celtic fans, while at Bolton he spat at both Middlesborough fans and Portsmouth captain Arjan De Zeeuw. Also, like many of his peers on this list, he enjoys a good dive. (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RiBXMPkYfXI ) Earlier this season, El Hadji, now at Blackburn, retorted to allegations of making a racial slur against an Everton ball boy by making the ludicrous claim that the Everton fans had been throwing bananas at him. No bananas were seen or found. Enough said.
Craig Bellamy: The Welshman has played for eight different clubs, and he’s still only 30. His short-tempered character may have something to do with why he has failed to settle anywhere for particularly long. Bellamy’s first nasty incident could be seen as when he threw a chair at Newcastle first-team coach John Carver after being sent off in a Champions League match. When the late, great Sir Bobby Robson (who labelled Bellamy a ‘great player wrapped round an unusual and volatile character’) left the club, Bellamy had a very public fall-out with new boss Graeme Souness. This involved the striker threatening to fake injury after being asked to play wide and he was subsequently loaned out to Celtic. During his brief spell in Scotland, Bellamy allegedly text Newcastle captain Alan Shearer with abusive messages, to which the iconic England striker responded by threatening to ‘knock [Bellamy’s] block off’ should he return to Newcastle. Whilst at Liverpool in 2007, Bellamy outrageously struck Norwegian team-mate John Arne Riise with a golf club during a training camp in Portugal. He was fined two weeks wages and earned the nickname, ‘the nutter with the putter’. Now at moneybags Manchester City, Craig’s unpopularity wouldn’t appear to be on the wane anytime soon, especially after he slapped a fan who invaded the pitch after this season’s Manchester derby.( http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vfNXYSKKSS4 )
Emmanuel Adebayor: The lanky Togolese striker seemed a perfectly likable character in his early days at Arsenal, after completing a move from Monaco in early 2006. However, it started to go wrong when he had a fight on the pitch with then team-mate Nicklas Bendtner (who would probably be on the bench for this most hated XI) during a heated North London derby at White Hart Lane. After a series of ‘uncommitted’ performances in the 2008/09 season, Arsenal decided to flog Adebayor to Man City. It was the scenes in this season’s City vs Arsenal match that really made Emmanuel a hate-figure, and I’m sure no-one needs much reminding of that horrendous kick on Robin Van Persie’s face and the ridiculous gesture of running the length of the pitch to celebrate in front of Arsenal fans. But here we go anyway... (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7KcrG_n8CDI )
Didier Drogba: The big Ivorian centre-forward is despised across the country chiefly for his absolutely ridiculous habit of going to ground like a drunken four-year old girl despite the fact he’s built like a veteran warrior. As you saw earlier in the Jens Lehmann video, Drogba doesn’t half know how to roll around like an absolute moron. Even Chelsea fans get frustrated at his apparent inability to stay on his feet for more than five minutes whether he’s putting in a great attacking performance or not. Everyone’s seen him do it, so to put a real video up would be pointless. This is a pretty accurate impression though... ( http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0_Ymx5httE0 ) As if that wasn’t bad enough he arguably cost Chelsea the Champions League by getting sent off in injury time in the 2008 Final for a petulant slap on Man United’s Nemanja Vidic, which led to John Terry taking the infamous 5th penalty, which Drogba would surely have been taking instead. Didier followed that up by ranting at the referee after Chelsea’s admittedly unfair exit from the 2009 competition, which unnecessarily ruled him out of the first half of this season’s group stage campaign. He’s 31 now, and like old sparring partner Lehmann, will he ever learn?

We might boo, hiss and jeer these players week in week out, but at least they provide us with one thing. A good laugh.