Another week, another dispatch of freshly-baked gaffes to indulge yourself in, brought to you by Sport.co.uk’s resident team of leading gaffologists. Gaffaw, gaffaw…
1) Marlon King’s agent
Tony Finnegan, agent of disgraced Wigan Athletic ‘star’ Marlon King, had this to say to 5Live about his client: "He'll be devastated, sitting in a cell with someone tonight. But he's a grown man; he's been there before and he'll take it on the chin."
Take it on the chin, eh? I’m afraid you’ll have to come up with your own punch line for this one. We at Sport.co.uk are far too mild-mannered, of course…
2) Robbie Keane: Spurs are stronger than Arsenal
Well, Saturday’s 3-0 defeat at the Emirates was a funny way of showing it…
3) Liverpool losing at Fulham…
…meaning that, if you take the first letter of the name of each team to have beaten Liverpool in the league this season – namely Fulham, Aston Villa, Chelsea, Tottenham and Sunderland – you can spell the word ‘FACTS’.
Ooh…you gotta love that. Unless you happen to be Rafael ‘Fact Hunt’ Benitez, that is.
4) The Castrol Rankings
…which claims to be “the world's first rankings based on the actual performance of every football player across Europe's top five leagues”. If you’re intrigued about how it all works, then you can watch this handy video.
The current top three of Henry, Messi and Ronaldo seems reasonable enough. But Claudio Pizarro at number ten? Methinks someone forgot to carry the 1 there…
5) Arsenal.com
Headline from Arsenal.com on Thursday morning: “Fabianksi - I am so happy to be back again.”
Headline from Arsenal.com on Thursday afternoon: “Keeper Fabianski ruled out for three weeks.”
Look what you did. You broke him.
6) James McFadden’s penalty
“Birmingham City attacker James McFadden admits he should've done better with his failed spotkick in their 0-0 draw with Manchester City.”
“Done better”? Incremental improvements don’t enter it: you either score or you don’t. Just score next time, ok?
7) Everton’s defence
April 2008 – An 84th minute Joseph Yobo goal puts Everton 2-1 up against Aston Villa. John Carew equalises two minutes later and the game ends 2-2.
December 2008 – a Joleon Lescott goal in the third minute of stoppage time looks to have given Everton a deserved point against Aston Villa. Ashley Young scores in the fourth minute of stoppage time to give Martin O’Neill’s side all three points.
February 2009 – Jack Rodwell gives Everton a fourth minute lead in the FA Cup 5th round clash at Goodison Park. James Milner equalises with a penalty just four minutes later, although Everton go on to win the game 3-1.
April 2009 – Steven Pienaar puts Everton 3-1 ahead in the 53rd minute at Villa Park. James Milner pulls one back for Villa with a free-kick just two minutes later. The game finishes 3-3.
October 2009 – Diniyar Bilyaletdinov gives Everton a 1-0 lead over Aston Villa in first-half stoppage time. John Carew levels the scores less than a minute into the second half. The game finishes 1-1.
Everton defenders: learn your lesson, for crying out loud!
8) The burning sheep of Aberdeen
A 24-year-old football fan dressed as a sheep suffered serious burns to his arms and legs when his suit caught fire on a train carrying Dons fans back from Edinburgh after their game against Hibs. Obviously, we hope the guy is ok, but it’s hard not to stifle a giggle at the following paragraph from the BBC’s report of the incident
“Aberdeen fans said the man ran ablaze through the carriage as others threw beer on him to douse the flames.”
It’s hard to know which is more of a story: ‘man dressed as sheep catches fire’, or ‘Scottish football fans nobly sacrifice beer’.
9) The Rooneys name their baby…
…in much the same manner as one would expect them to get a tattoo. Yes, Kai means ‘victory’ in Mandarin. Very good. But in Maori, it means “food”. And in Yoruba, a Nigerian language, Kai means ‘stop it’.
Thinking on, that was probably quite a good choice of name, actually. (NB – Kai is also Finnish for ‘probably’. And Japanese for ‘big water’. Just saying.)
10) The referee of last night’s game between Manchester United and CSKA Moscow
As nice as it was to see United denied a blatant penalty and all that…