TIME FOR THAT ‘HE’S NOT THE MOYESIAH’ HEADLINE AGAIN
The Fiver tried living abroad once, over in that there Europe, where they all drive on the wrong side of the road and where they use their evil magical powers to turn bananas straight, but it didn’t work out. That was mainly because The Fiver’s puce faced English cousin, $exually Repressed Morris Dancing Fiver, came along for the ride wearing his St George’s bowler hat and a suit made entirely out of poppies, and he spent most of the time railing against the prevalence of the Euro, his unsettling proximity to those wonks in Brussels and how the waiters always turned their noses up at being asked about the lack of fried egg and chips on the menu. Admittedly, there was no Jeremy Corbyn, so there was that, but there were also a lot of immigrants around the place, speaking French, being French, making Paris all French. Puh! Bloody immigrants. It just wasn’t working. The vibe wasn’t right, so three hours after leaving Blighty, it was time to head back home.
David Moyes’s Spanish adventure lasted longer than The Fiver’s attempt to make a new life for itself in France, but it’s come to an end after Real Sociedad decided to part ways with the Moyesiah, the man who was once judged to be worthy of succeeding Lord Ferg handed his P45 after his side slumped to a 2-0 defeat at second-bottom Las Palmas on the weekend. Having won twice in 11 matches this season, Sociedad are 16th in La Liga and only their goal difference is keeping them out of the bottom three. They probably expected a bit more from the man who was judged worthy of succeeding Lord Ferg, a sentence that’s worth repeating over and over, just to hammer home the absurdity of it two years on. But life’s not quite gone to plan for Moyes since leaving Everton, has it?
To be fair to Moyes, a decent man and a fine manager in the right circumstances, Sociedad were 16th when he took over this time last season, so if you try to put a positive spin on it, he’s not really made them any worse, he’s merely guilty of making them stand still. He enjoyed living in Spain, he beat Barcelona and he shared a packet of crisps with a fan. But the fit wasn’t right in the end. He didn’t speak Spanish, he still lived in his hotel, a bit like Alan Partridge, and the players seemed less than convinced by his methods. It can surely only be a matter of days before Carlos Vela reveals that Moyes wouldn’t let them eat patatas bravas.
QUOTE OF THE DAY
“I believe in expanding the World Cup based on the experience we had in Europe with the Euros. Look at qualifiers now where some teams who have never qualified did and some teams which have always qualified didn’t make it. So it created a completely new dynamic in the qualification. It created new enthusiasm. If you are serious about developing football it must involve more associations in the best football event in the world: The World Cup” – if ever there was a man who would want 40 balls in the World Cup draw pot rather than 32, it was always going to be Uefa tombola overlord and Fifa president wannabe Gianni Infantino.
QUOTE OF THE DAY (PART DEUX)
“I had the feeling of being locked in a dark room without a door, or in an endless tunnel. I saw hell” – Hatem Ben Arfa on living the dream at Newcastle.
RECOMMENDED VIEWING
Well, if you are going to miss a penalty, make it a spectacular one.
FIVER LETTERS
“Can I hereby declare my support for putting Spurs alongside Nasty Leeds, Pope’s Newc O’Rangers and the Queen’s Celtic by formally renaming them ‘Lads It’s Tottenham’? The moniker could stand until the day they finally finish above Arsenal, as a sort of added incentive” – Ben Jones.
“I’m taking the bait. Re: your observation ‘The Fiver isn’t the only well respected football commentator who feels there’s something of a revolution under way at White Hart Lane’ (Monday’s Fiver). I fear The Fiver may have misunderstood the normal usage of the terms ‘well respected’ and indeed ‘football commentator’” – Adrian Zambardino.
“I never quite understood why this tea-time missive was called ‘The Fiver’. It couldn’t be the time sent, as it’s never sent at 5pm GMT. It couldn’t be the price, because we get paid for reading it (… wait … WHAT?!). After a time, I had that light bulb appear above me and I felt foolish for how I missed the bleedin’ obvious – ‘five’ obviously relates to the total number of teams The Fiver has mentioned over the past 12 months. May I suggest just one teeny-tiny entry covering all 15 other teams at once? That way the thirst of the masses will be quenched and we can get back to hearing about Arsène’s nasal hair or the other much more interesting things you normally drone on about” – Joel Coombe (and no one else).
“Hopefully I am not the only to notice that you kept to small letter “he” when talking about God and capitalised the letter when referring to Him” – Adham Davlatov.
“A friend of mine supports Bolton. In dark days under Dougie Freeman, he reports seeing a man jump over the advertising board, grab the corner flag, ride it like a hobby horse down the touch line to the dug out, where he threw his season ticket at the manager, before being thrown out. Perhaps Jürgen would have preferred this?” –
Steve Hill
• Send your letters to the.boss@theguardian.com. And if you’ve nothing better to do you can also tweet the Fiver. Today’s winner of our prizeless letter o’the day is: Steve Hill.
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BITS AND BOBS
Mamadou Sakho will have to be careful not to do one early from Anfield – he has form, after all – as he watches Liverpool from the stands for the next six to eight weeks due to knee-knack.
Garry Monk’s plans to travel to South America and explore at first hand the difference between sea Yunga and fluvial Yunga have had to be put on hold after he was told he would be in charge of Swansea for the match against Bournemouth.
Josep Maria Orobitg, Pep Guardiola’s Mr 15%, has been there and could explain it all to Garry only he’s too busy trying – and failing – to read his client’s mind regarding his future at Bayern Munich. “Not even I know what Pep’s intentions are,” oozed Orobitg. “We’ve had some intensive talks in the past few days, but when it comes to things like this, he’s very private. He will make up his mind entirely based on his own impressions.”
And in a shock on par with news that grass is green and athletes take special vitamins, the percentage of players in Premier League squads that are club-trained is at an all-time low, according to a new study.
STILL WANT MORE?
It’s David Squires on … football and Remembrance Day.
Floating football brain in a box, Jonathan Wilson, reckons that even if you combined all those YouTube videos of amply-proportioned kids on rollercoasters and a trip to the new TK Maxx in Hackney, this season’s edition of the Premier League would still be more fun.
Some people go wedding-venue shopping in France for their kicks. Others watch round-ups of the best goals of the week. Which one are you?
Chelsea Ladies are wary of being bitten by the big, bad Wolfsburg in their Big Cup quarter-final, warns Louise Taylor.
And Javier Hernández taking a flight with Do One Airlines to Heathrow before jumping into a limo hired for him from Do One Rentals all in order to do one to Chelsea? The Rumour Mill has the answer.
Oh, and if it’s your thing … you can follow Big Website on Big Social FaceSpace.
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THE PERILS OF K9 GCHAT IN BIG CHAIR
