Roman’s empire under threat from Arab invasion

WELL, what a week that was! I bet no one saw that one coming out of the Middle Eastlands did they?

I have to admit to sniggering when I heard the news that City had put a bid in for Berbatov.

“Oooh — they won’t like that I thought — but isn’t it funny?” What do they say about he who laughs last? Initially, I wasn’t even bothered whether we signed Robinho or not. As someone who doesn’t watch much football outside of the Premier League, I didn’t know how good he potentially was/is. However, the pursuit of this player was relentless and very public and when the news first started filtering through that this wasn’t just a bit of arm-flexing by the new boys at City, I felt a slight twinge of embarrassment that this “negotiation” had been such a painfully long process.

When it finally became evident he had signed for City rather than us, I wasn’t sure whether to be irritated at Roman for being such a tightwad, or relieved we weren’t taken to the cleaners again.

It’s evident from Mark Hughes’ carefully worded reaction to the signing that he knew very little (if anything) about the bid; he wasn’t going to look a gift-horse in the mouth and I suppose we’ll know how wise the decision was when we see what the Brazilian can do surrounded by the likes of Ireland, Ben-Haim and Sturridge.

Obviously the new owners at City wanted to make a statement. They not only desired a trophy signing, but just as important to them was to do it by gazumping one of the “Big Four” creating the perception they’re in the same league as United and Chelsea.

Of course, achieving that will take more than the purchase of one superstar and they have been quick to point out that they are willing to do that and more.

Parallels have inevitably been drawn with Chelsea, although we were already a top four club before Abramovich and his millions came to us and had spent the previous 10 years improving year-on-year.

The Arabs are attempting to leapfrog that stage of gradual improvement that we went through — it will certainly be an interesting experiment, starting this weekend when they come up against us.

What of Robinho himself? He has come in for some pretty heavy criticism from some very high quarters back in his native Brazil. It’s all a bit harsh. Did anyone really believe his desire to come to Chelsea was to do with anything other than the money? The hypocrisy from people such as Pele is quite astounding.

City not only had to reach an understanding with Madrid, but had to agree personal terms with the player. Now considering that City were not even in the frame 48 hours before the deal, one would imagine that the personal terms agreed consisted of nothing more than adding another 50k or so to his weekly wage.

But is he any different to 99.9% of football players in the world? Not at all.

Robinho also had seen the writing on the wall — unlike Peter Kenyon. It had become very evident that Calderon was at the stage where he was willing to sell to anyone but Chelsea, so when City and their billions appeared on the scene, Madrid were able to secure a huge price for a very unsettled player and stick two fingers up at Chelsea in the process.

But what of Scolari; I wonder what he has made of this whole sorry mess... not much I’d wager, especially as it seems that he did not come with a list of players. His desires were modest, just two players, and his new club managed to cock up his first request in a spectacular manner.

It smacks of stupidity/naivety/foolishness (delete as appropriate) not to have some sort of contingency plan and these qualities are not what you need to head up an operation of this scale.

Meanwhile, having thinned the squad as promised, Chelsea now find themselves struggling with the injuries to Ballack and Essien and the Champions League and matches against United, Liverpool and Arsenal looming.

One does have to wonder what Abramovich is thinking following this very public failure to capture a player who we had trailed for months. I wonder if Peter Kenyon is searching the job ads as we speak?

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