When Aston Villa don't matter

Day -471. WorldCup2018

Aston Villa won today for the second time in 4 days. I'm not ecstatic about it. I wasn't cheering out my car window when my friend, who understands the pain of supporting a team that has fallen on hard times, sent me a message that Villa were 2-0 after I'd been driving for a while and unaware of the score. No. I just wanted to get this pretty insignificant bit of information out of the way. Who wants to hear about a second tier English team getting a little bit closer to the mid-table safety? There is only one reason for being in the Championship : to get promoted to the Premier League. Mid-table is about as worthless as third place at the World Cup.

It’s about as meaningless as winning the fifth Test in a cricket match when you've already lost the first four. And where, you may wonder, did I get that comparison from? Many years ago when I paid more attention to the sports pages than the pages of my school books, cricket was added to my list of interests. And at that time England were always losing to Australia. Always. At least that's what it felt like. And whenever it came to the fifth test of the five match series and Australia had one the last four, the English newspapers would go on about how it still mattered. If England did win it somehow became important that England had lost 4-1 and not 5-0. It's still Australia, they would say. We still beat the best team in the world. And they were definitely still trying to win. Here's what I used to think. Yes, the Australians would have liked the 5-0 but they probably could barely give a toss. They were probably sitting on deckchairs, drinking beers, watching England practice the day before the start of the last Test. And if they could lose in a three days and be done with it, they would probably be happy. Do I have any research to substantiate this theory? Absolutely not. But that was my perception. And that's exactly what I think of Aston Villa right now. Eighth or eighteenth, who cares?

The players will have absolutely nothing to play for in a couple of weeks. Summer couldn't come soon enough. In August they will start all over again and hope they are closer to the only meaningful outcome next April.

And that was the most time and emotional energy I have dedicated to Aston Villa in a long time. It's a bit odd going through a big part of a football season without really following a team when you've been doing it for so many years. Although it is quite relaxing watching as a neutral, where you can enjoy the football and not worry about the result. Which reminds me, the Confederation Cup is coming up this summer.

Leicester post-Ranieri: not bad

Day -472. WorldCup2018

Leicester City started life without Claudio Ranieri with a 3-1 win against Liverpool and a performance worthy of the Champions of England. In other words they played like they did last year. Jamie Vardy was back to having a party and Danny Drinkwater showed the kind of skill in scoring his goal that earned him an almost call up for England's Euro 2016 team.

And the obvious reaction from the Ranieri sympathisers was that this was proof that the players wanted Ranieri out. All weekend they said, "let's see what happens on Monday. If they play well then we know it was their fault Ranieri was sacked." And, voila, today's events played out just right for them.

My theory? Leicester could have won today, without any manager or anybody coaching them. The stand in guy, at most, might have picked who was playing. Or maybe he didn't even do that. The players have been tweeting and Instagram-ing all weekend about how angry they are at the suggestion that there was a player revolt. They were so worked up about the whole thing that they went today, determined to show the world that they can play, with or without Ranieri. Of course, it was Ranieri who coached them to play the way they played today. And by him leaving their true from came to the fore again. So by getting sacked Ranieri gave them his last bit of inspiration, to punch above their weight. It was down to Ranieri again.

It's the Oscars! And there's footballers in there too

Day -473. WorldCup2018

Oscar night. Not the former Chelsea player who went off to China to earn a comfortable retirement (don't blow all that money Oscar) but the Academy Awards. I always enjoy it because it makes me think about the similarities between football players and actors. I know what you're thinking, you non-football fans. Footballers and actors are two words that are in the same sentence very often. But hold your horses. I'm not that predictable.

I am not a fan of the Oscars, by no means a movie buff. I enjoy a good film but wouldn't recognise a celebrity if I bumped into him or her on the street right after I walked out a cinema having watched a film they were in. I also don't really like the term "celebrity". I did walk right past the guy from Four Weddings and a Funeral, the guy who made the moving speech, he read the poem, at the funeral, in a shop in Toronto a number of years ago. I thought he was just another bored guy pretending to be looking for clothes for himself while his wife, or partner, shopped (maybe he really was) until my wife pointed out that the dude going through the sale rack with us was that guy from the funeral. Oh, okay, he looks different in real life. So do we say hello to him?

Even though tonight does not mean much to me I will not begrudge the fun others may get out of it, or judge them for swooning over who I think are professionals who get paid a sickeningly obscene amount of money for what they do. Still talking about actors, not footballers. You see the similarities building. I have voiced my opinion many times about how footballers get paid too much and are getting very spoilt and comfortable, living in an unrealistic world.

I realise, with both the actors and the footballers, it's not them I should be angry at. Sure, one or two of them could say we make way too much money and are going to give most of it away because we do what we do for the love of it. But the reality is that they are in a market which pays that much. There is demand for actors to be in big movies in cinemas and for footballers to play for teams who's fans want them to win domestic leagues and Champions Leagues and who want to see them do all this on television all the time, weekend and mid-week.

The other part of my misdirected disdain for the two categories is the supporting casts (seriously an unintended pun and I can't think of another term). I mean the media who play up the adulation we should offer these stars, the writers, agents, producers, team owners who put these people on a pedestal and these now so-called celebrities are made to feel they have to play the part. I guess I don't like the establishment that has created this somewhat false world that these individuals are now a part of. (I try to avoid using words that are the current fashion, like "establishment" but that's what it is.)

Despite what might seem like my apathy towards footballers and actors I admit that I am not completely apathetic to films and professional football. I will not line up for an autograph. I will not wait out in the cold outside a stadium entrance to catch a glimpse of my favourite player and hope he shakes my hand. But I will watch Hollywood films and the English Premier League and Champions League. I'm probably just too lazy and maybe unmotivated to search for independent low budget films. I'll watch what's easy to access. But I will thoroughly enjoy watching amateur football which is harder and harder to find. That's why I have so many happy memories of sitting in an empty stadium watching football in Malta. My romantic concept that the players were not doing it for money has unravelled in recent years with all the accusations of bribery, but if I could ignore then I can liken it to the experience of fans of non-league teams in other countries. There were no stars, egos didn't get you very far and the fans just wanted good, honest football. (Oh dear, again I leave myself open to much ridicule when it comes to me talking about Maltese football).

I do, however, still enjoy the highest level of professional football, such as the World Cup, because as a lover of the game I appreciate the opportunity to see the best players in the world compete against each other. I can ignore a lot about the individual and the establishment for the ninety minutes. I just can't ignore the acting.

So I've come full circle to the acting footballers. I devoted a rant to Zlatan Ibrahimovich and his cheating/acting skills last week. He's involved again today. I watched some of the League Cup final with an NBA basketball loving friend. He asked why he had heard of Ibrahimovich and I replied that it was probably because he likes to be in the news, very often because he loves being the centre of attention and because of his questionable sportsmanship attributes. We got onto the discussion of "diving" and he repeated what I hear very often that North Americans are turned off of football because of the diving. Now, let's not get back into criticising all the things we Europeans see as being wrong with North American sports. The closeness to the world of showbiz and celebrity status might be on of them.

My friend reminded me of the NBA "anti-flopping" rule. The NBA introduced the rule in the 2012-13 season because of the increase in the number of players who were "flopping": "A flop is an intentional fall by a player after little or no physical contact by an opposing player in order to draw a personal foul call by an official against the opponent." (NBA)

The players are penalised by the league after reviewing video of the incident. A warning for a first offence is followed by fines starting at $5,000 for a second offence, up to $30,000 and a suspension. Now just imagine that in football: Ronaldo, Ibrahimovich and a lot of German players, watch out! Now I should watch out for making that stereotypical comment.

Footballers and actors. There's not much difference very often. But I've written this right through a huge part of the Oscars and have no idea who won what. It wouldn't happen if Oxford against Rochdale was on TV.

Down the Hamburger(s)!

Day -474. WorldCup2018

Aston Villa won a football match today for the first time in 2017. What's that I hear? Right. Silence. Who really cares about a team in the bottom half of England's second division.

Bayern Munich beat Hamburger SV 8-0 today. That's Eight-Zero. Incredible. That never happens, I hear. In February 2015 Bayern Munich beat Hamburger SV 8-0. In March 2013 Bayern Munich beat, yes, poor old Hamburger 9-2. Habit rather than unusual.

That's it for today. Underwhelming, you say, after my essay yesterday. Drained, I reply, after yesterday.

Ranieri, and Gent, and Genk

Day -475. WorldCup2018

Most days I write this late at night, the last thing I do everyday. It really is the last thing. Reading it again would be a good epilogue to my post but I don't even do that. So then I may return to it the next day, or when I'm updating my blog which I keep updated for the day I get discovered, and I think, "on no, did I really write that?" I cringe at grammatical mistakes in others and am ashamed when I do it. Auto correct takes care of most spelling mistakes but it sometimes picks words which I did not intend to write, but I miss the change. I realised just today that a couple of days ago I wrote about Aston Villa's reparation when I meant to say relegation. It explained why somebody who has never liked my posts before liked that one. He/she (I will not give him/her away) must have appreciated my sentiments that Aston Villa needed to make amends to some particular group for injustices caused by the football club. I'm sorry. I was not being political or philosophical, only bemoaning the fact that Aston Villa may be facing the humiliation of further relegation. The owners of the club, previous one included, may have to make some reparations to the fans for all the suffering they have endured over the last few years.

Many days I write this as an easy escape or distraction from the crazy news from the real world: wars, bombings, refugees, insane Presidents of world superpowers and such. Things that I wish didn't happen, that I could do something about, but can't so I write about football.

Other days I superimpose my emotional reaction to something that happened in the football world onto my emotional reaction to a personal event. So that retirement of a player or sacking of a manager becomes a bigger event in my head than if I was in the different frame of mind. Today it's Claudio Ranieri.

Now to be fair to myself I don't think I was the only one who was saddened a little bit more about this than I should have been about a football manager losing his job. BBC online runs a daily sports news update page. It was dominated today by reactions to Ranieri's sacking. At regular intervals the journalist running the page had to clarify that nobody had died, it was just a sacking, such was the outpouring of grief from people writing in.

Apart from the perceived unfairness at the decision after Ranieri's fairytale with Leicester last year, wasn't part of the sadness because it seemed like somebody who could be your wonderful father had come to the end of the road? There was sadness for the man, that a person who led a group of footballers to their dreams was being discarded for being not up to it anymore. After reading all the tributes today (again nobody died!) I suddenly got the urge to contact Ranieri. I've always wanted to talk to somebody of some importance who can add some legitimacy to my daily ramblings. And I thought Ranieri would be a fantastic start. It would also be an amazing conversation. I imagined myself on the phone with him, talking to him about football just like I do with my dad. So I was searching online for "Ranieri contact" and "Ranieri email". No luck. There are a couple of twitter accounts and a lot of Facebook pages with his name but are not really him. I hear he left for Rome right after losing his job. So if anybody knows where to track him down.....

The last word about Ranieri is the first sentence of his statement today. It says it all about how upset he must be and why so many of us feel sad about what happened: "Yesterday my dream died."
My day did start with a bit of humour, for myself. The draw for the last 16 of the Europa League took place today. BBC took some time out of the Ranieri obituaries to report on the draw. I looked through it and had varied thoughts.

Celta Vigo vs. FC Krasnodar: they're still in it? Last July, yes July, Krasnodar stood in the way of Malta's Birkirkara and the group stages. Birkirkara had made it to the third qualifying round after an historical win against Hearts. They were dreaming o further greatness but the Russians swept them aside and here they are many months later amongst the last 16.

Then, a match-up I don't care much about followed by Schalke vs Borussia Monchengladbach. An all German affair. That will be fun, for the fans of those two teams.

Next was Lyon vs Roma. Now that will be good and these teams might even start caring about the competition for losers and put on a good show.

Then it's Manchester United against FC Rostov. Stories of long trips to Russia abounded. I'm not interested, yet.

Olympiakos vs Besiktas. The Greeks against the Turks. Those jokes about the London police being concerned about Tottenham playing Millwall in the FA Cup seem like just that now, jokes, compared to what the armed police must be fearing in Greece and Turkey.

And then there it was: Gent, of Belgium, drawn to play Genk, of Belgium. So they are two different teams! When Tottenham played Gent in the last round I thought again what I had believed in my head to be true for many years: that they were the same team but there were different spellings depending on whether they were being talked about in English, Walloon or Flemish, Dutch or French. A bit like Basel, Basle or Bale (with the accent on the "a"). Belgians, and people living in Belgium, please excuse my ignorance. At least after this round there will only be on on them left.

And the last tie is Copenhagen vs Ajax. It could be a good one between two teams who always think they should be doing a lot better than they actually are. But after the Belgian teams who are not one and the same, I didn't care anymore.

After the length of this it is definitely the last thing I am doing tonight.

Claudo Ranieri,the end. Sunshine on Leith

Day -476. WorldCup2018

So much for that Jamie Vardy goal being the moment that Leicester's season turned around. It was, I guess, but not in the way that most of us would have guessed. Claudio Ranieri, the man who made Leicester fans dream is gone. Sacked, because the team owners have more fear about losing out on Premier League money than they have happy memories of the most unexpected Premier League win ever, and the Champions League money that brought. Dilly Dong to those ding-dongs.

Is that what you think, Aidan? That he shouldn't have been fired, I know you will ask. In a world full of the romance of sport (and what was more magical than what happened last season) he should have been allowed to at least save Leicester this season. The season after was always going to be hard. I thought they would finish in the bottom half. But that’s when I feel the journey should have ended, at the end of this season. Even if they got relegated that should have been the natural conclusion to the Rainieri story. For what he did, for how he inspired the players, fans and city of Leicester he should have been left to play it out until there was an end. It's like the film where you expect there to be a happy, sappy ending but are relieved when it is quite the opposite. The hero drifts off, not quite the hero at that moment, but he does have the memories which will never be taken away.

But football is business and not a romantic one, or with any room for romance. And if a manager seems to have lost the support of his players, if the players don't respond to his coaching anymore and the team is sliding towards inevitable relegation, it is wholly unsurprising that the owners want to protect their investment, the team. Will anybody save Leicester now? Will there be a negative reaction from neutral fans who will want to see them relegated, out of sympathy for Ranieri. As for the man himself, how can you not feel sad for how his story has ended? At his age it is unlikely there will be another chapter. But he will always be the manager of Leicester, Champions of England, 2015-16.

I was watching football today, sort of. Fiorentina-Borussia Mochengladbach in the Europa League was on tv. When Fiorentina were 1-0 up, I mentally tuned out and carried on with my job as assistant school project maker. Then it was 2-0 (3-0 on aggregate) and I really thought it was over. I kept it on. 2-1 at halftime. I walked away for what seemed like 30 seconds and when I looked again it was 3-2 to Borussia. A minute later it was 4-2. What a comeback. Of course now that I was watching I hoped that I would see a Fiorentina comeback to out-do the Borussia comeback. But, no. Nothing much happened. An exciting Europa League match between two teams I would rarely watch, it's on tv right in front of me, and I didn't watch it. But it's been that kind of week. I didn't see any of the Manchester City-Monaco 5-3, the best Champions League match for a long time.

I came across this today and it was a good consolation. There are few things better than a stadium full of football fans singing in unison to make me feel good. I have little interest in Hibernian, have no attachment to any rivalry in Scotland. But regardless of who they just beat, this alone is pretty magical.

More piegate and Leicester's turnaround

Day -477. WorldCup2018

It seems nobody liked my #piegate humour yesterday. Really, not one like. But that's ok. As I do very often it's about entertaining myself. I'm ok. Really. No sympathy likes please.

Wayne Shaw and #piegate were still in the news today. I read two stories quickly: one said he only ate the pie to wind up the Arsenal supporters who were singing the standard, "who ate all the pies?" line; the other one, more of an opinion, was about how he would have been better off snorting cocaine on the bench. At least four players have been suspended for using recreational drugs, and they still have their jobs.

As a footnote to yesterday's claims of what it was that Shaw ate, he confirmed that it was indeed a cornish pasty. And it gave him indigestion.

In other news today there seemed to be much celebration, from what I read online, after Jamie Vardy woke up from a 10 month hibernation and scored a goal. And his team Leicester were fantastic in their Champions League match against Sevilla. They only lost 2-1. They lost, and I read comments about how this could be what turns their season around. Because they scored an away goal. Such is the ridiculousness of football, sometimes, and the media that writes about it. I'll say again I am not a betting man and make useless predictions but I will be chuckling to myself when Sevilla come to Leicester in a couple of weeks and leave with a comfortable win. And then Leicester's season will have taken another turn to be analyzed.

How Jamie Vardy must be wishing he had taken Arsenal's money when they offered it to him. He could have been sitting on the bench watching Bayern Munich destroy his teammates one week, and been close to a pie-eating reserve goalkeeper the next. But he wouldn't be in a relegation battle.