Five things we learned this weekend
IF you believe the rumours, Mario Balotelli spent the weekend driving the Batmobile through the streets of Stockport smearing pensioners with jam and giving £50 notes to dogs. Rumours about Balotelli tend to be like that, verified by a friend of a friend and spread across Twitter like warm butter. It’s a wonder really, given that the truth about Balotelli is often so much more incredible. Who else could have stepped up in the 94th minute of such a crucial game and dummied a penalty into the back of the net? The man has nerves of reinforced titanium. Whether or not he should have still been on the pitch at the time, of course, is another matter entirely. But that’s Balotelli in a nutshell; for good or for ill he inspires more talking points in 25 minutes than most players summon up in a season. He’s not a cult figure anymore, he’s a full-blown, mainstream legend.
THERE have been times this season when Liverpool could be excused for their failure to win games. Saturday was not one of them. Liverpool lost because Liverpool were rubbish. Andy Carroll continues to move like a car with a broken handbrake, trundling away at random and Steven Gerrard and Charlie Adam’s partnership in midfield was every bit as effective as Steven Gerrard and Frank Lampard’s partnership for England, with neither one of them seeming to care much for defending. For Kenny Dalglish’s sake, let this be the lowest ebb.
WITHOUT wanting to get all technical, the role of a full-back in the 21st century is perhaps more pivotal than at any time in the history of the game. Whether they have the instruction to rove forward in a 4-2-3-1, or the responsibility to support the midfield in a 4-3-3, expectations for the modern full-back are high. What they can’t do, however, is amble around with their hands in their pockets, whistling and half-watching the game. Johan Djorou is, on his day, a very competent centre-back, but he is not a full-back and he never will be. And he was only half-culpable for Manchester United’s opener. Fellow part-time full-back Thomas Vermaelen may have played there occasionally for Ajax, but he is far better suited to a central role. Arsene Wenger has been unlucky with injuries, but surely he can find someone on loan to temporarily fill the gaps?
KARMA is rarely so cruel or so swift. Just one week after lustily ’frimponging’ the ball into the face of Tottenham’s Rafael van der Vaart, Wolves’ loanee Emmanuel Frimpong was himself ‘frimponged’ by the boot of Aston Villa’s Stilian Petrov. Naturally, Frimpong professed himself entirely unruffled by the affair, logging into Twitter on Saturday night to enquire about the health of Petrov’s foot. Frimpongs are like that. It is a well-documented fact that they cannot be destroyed by conventional weapons. It is also widely known that they have an insatiable desire to scamper up and down the pitch, crashing into tackles, bombing forward to support their teammates and, as we saw here, fearlessly throwing themselves face first into danger. What isn’t clear is why exactly Arsene Wenger decided to let him join Wolves on loan. He could do with a Frimpong right now.
“YOU’RE obviously not finished yet, Robbie!” said the reporter breathlessly. “Who said I was?” grinned Keane. Well…erm…everyone, actually. Having scored 15 league goals for Tottenham in 2007/08, the sixth consecutive season he’d reached double figures, the Irishman’s career hit the skids. The move to Liverpool in 2008 was a disaster, the return to Spurs in 2009 was subdued, there was respite in Scotland with Celtic in 2010, but the stagnation continued south of the border until the semi-retirement of MLS beckoned in 2011. Or so we thought. Keane’s first start on loan for Aston Villa brought, not just two excellent goals, but an outstanding performance. Any more of this, and it’ll be time to hand out the humble pie.
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