"Thanks very much and let's have coffee,"

There isn’t much room in football for fairytales anymore. Inter park the bus in front of the Nou Camp goal in the semis and then out-defend Bayern to win the Champions League. Europe apathetically half-watches while secretly wishing that Messi was banging in a hat-trick at Real’s home ground, or that Arsenal had somehow chanced their way to glory. Fulham march to within a whisker of Europa League silverware but come a cropper to a side that got to the final by drawing the vast majority of their games in the tournament. Real and Barca play in a league so two-sided it makes the SPL look competitive. Meanwhile, The Premier League is supposed to be the most exciting competition in the world, but I can’t think of a time when it has been more staid. People got worked up about Tottenham knocking Liverpool out of fourth place. Why? It’s not like they didn’t spend decent sums of money to do so. Is it really such an achievement to finish higher than a club descending down a slippery slope and a Manchester City team who, if you gave them Mourinho’s bus, would probably end up accidentally parking it behind the goal instead of in front of it?

Tottenham’s sense of triumph at reaching the Champions League qualifiers is indicative what is wrong with the Premier League. How long have we had the notion of The Big Four? Why do we have it? Why should ‘breaking the top four’ be lauded in such a way? The Premier League has now reached such a level of predictability that teams like Spurs and Everton set their sights on fourth place as the very best they can achieve. Tottenham’s top four finish was in no way, as some are suggesting, a fairytale. This will inevitably be proved when they are bundled out of the Champions League at the first hurdle before next season has even got going.

Not much has been said about it, but I think Wolves deserve a lot of credit for staying up. However, even they, by driving the streets of Wolverhampton and rounding up a bunch of strangers to make up their eleven at Old Trafford, highlighted just how the Premier League playing field is less level than Wembley’s.

Wolves' starting line-up at Old Trafford.

Thank God then, in a season when teams field the reserves against a side from the same division, because they know their best eleven has no chance either, for Ian Holloway’s Blackpool. The only footballing fairytale of the 2009/2010 season (so close, Ross County, so close). Playing in a three-sided ground in front of League One sized crowds, they were tipped by many for relegation at the start of the campaign. Marvellous then, that a late burst took them into the play offs. Even more marvellous that they went and got promoted. And the best thing about it? That they did so playing really exciting, attacking football. Their devil-may-care approach was best summed up by the final against Cardiff. You scored two? Okay, we’ll have to score three. Blackpool’s attacking style is a breath of fresh air and, as full backs rampage forward, leaving open spaces behind them with gay abandon, one can’t help get the feeling that this is the way football should be played. If Mourinho gave them his bus, chances are they’d all pile in it and drive it straight at the opposition goal.

So, well done Blackpool for giving football romantics a little slither of joy at the end of a dull season. And, when the critics are handing out plaudits, they should look no further than the man with more classic quotes than Karl Pilkington (see clip below) - manager Ian Holloway. By achieving the unthinkable with mere pennies at his disposal, he is surely the manager of the year. Mourinho might be the name on everyone’s lips as he takes over the hot-seat in Madrid, but I’d like to see him come to Blackpool and do what Holloway’s done on the same budget.

Another case of footballers making the news for the wrong reason

So, recently, English Premier League footballer Marlon King went and got himself banged up for 18-months for a sex assault. It's not the first time he has been in trouble with the law either.

This is yet another, albeit more extreme than usual, example of the kind of story that crops up every now and again in the newspapers, as footballers seem to be as much on the front pages for being involved either as the perpetrator or the victim of a fracas in the early hours as they are on the back pages for scoring goals.

Even though he intends to appeal, King is clearly a troubled person, but, when considering some of the slightly more trivial cases, I suppose it must be hard to go out on the town if you’re a footballer. I’ve had the occasional night out with groups of players and, sure, it’s nice to walk straight to the front of the queue and to be looked after by proprietors, but there are downsides too. There are inevitably supporters who want to sing your name or bend your ear about tactics when all you want to do is hang out with your mates, and then there are the opposition fans who, fuelled by too much booze, want to tell you exactly what they think of you. And if you’re Stephen Gerrard, a bit of a row about the music in a club ends up with you appearing in court.

I suppose the simple solution is that if footballers don’t want unwelcome attention, they shouldn’t go to places where they are most likely to get it. Harry Redknapp even went so far as to ban his Tottenham players from nightclubs after another King, this time Ledley, ended up in the local police station after a few too many. “I don't want players going out to nightclubs, getting drunk and misbehaving,” Redknapp said. “If you look at the problems, they nearly all come when people get drunk. I don't understand it; they're so well paid, so well looked after.” I think Redknapp echoed the opinions of millions of hard-working football fans with that vox-pop. Oh, and, incidentally, the alleged quote from Ledley King when he found himself dishevelled in a police station in the early hours of the morning was: "Boss man, boss man, I don't deserve to be here - I'm rich." Classic.

Footballers are young and vivacious, so telling them not to go clubbing is futile, but it does seem to be a very British thing to drink your bodyweight after a game. I remember hearing a story about an Arsenal party where the English players were throwing booze down their necks while the foreign stars like Henry sat in the corner nursing their orange juices and wondering why their team mates were abusing their bodies so badly. It’s not often you see hammered overseas players being snapped by the paps as they stagger out of nightclubs having just been involved in a dust up. Can you imagine Tierry Henry downing pints or doing shots of tequila in a dentist chair?

Of course, it’s none of our business how and where players unwind but, if having to miss out on going to a few of the rowdier clubs in town is the price they pay for all the other rewards being a footballer brings, then it doesn’t seem like a bad deal to me.

And, as far as Marlon King goes, the depressing thing is that another club will snap him up with no questions asked when he gets out. Okay, if he does his time then he is perfectly entitled to get back to playing football, but it just seems unfair that the likes of him and Joey Barton, yes, this Joey Barton, the one who is always in trouble, can live the wonderful lives of footballers and bank the pay-cheques.

A mercenary industry where cold hard cash supersedes loyalty

This week, my football column in The Argus focuses on Manchester City and on what money is doing to the game:
Even to people who have no real love for the English Premier League, a game to keep an eye on this weekend is Arsenal’s visit to Manchester City, as the juxtaposition between the two clubs is really interesting. One has a manager who, rather than spending the big bucks, likes to bring unknown players through the ranks, while the other is football’s equivalent of a Lotto winner going on a spending spree. It’ll be intriguing to see what happens and I’m probably not alone when I say that I’d really like Arsenal’s lovingly nurtured team to take City to the cleaners.

To be honest, I’m not sure how I feel about Manchester City. On the one hand, I want them to fail miserably. The way they are cherry-picking players by throwing silly money around is indicative of just what is wrong with the game nowadays. Money is a disease that is eating football from the inside out. It is creating a mercenary industry where cold hard cash supersedes loyalty and success must be attained immediately or the manager is given the sack (with a tasty golden handshake) at the first opportunity. All the while fans are finding themselves progressively more alienated. How much longer can we be expected to love a game played by petulant millionaires while we struggle to afford the ever increasing ticket prices? To see City pay £24m for Jolene Lescott, who is probably worth less than half that, shows just how distorted things are becoming.

On the other hand though, I certainly don’t begrudge Manchester City fans the newfound excitement that all these signings has brought them. It can’t be easy living in the shadow of Manchester United, and it would be nice if the top four’s monopoly was compromised. I suppose though, that the reason I’m not sure how I feel about Manchester City is because I realise that my problems with their wealth are born largely out of jealousy. In truth, it’s hard to be too resentful when I know, in my heart of hearts, that if an insanely rich Sheikh threw a gazillion pounds at my team, my outlook would be very much different. We’d all love it if success was achieved organically; if our club climbed the leagues through hard work and a sensible business model while retaining a sense of community, but if a place among football’s elite could be fast-tracked by an Arab with more dosh than sense, would you hear me moralising about how money is ruining the game? Of course not, I’d be too busy deciding which of our new superstar signings’ names I was going to have printed on the back of my replica shirt.