Taxi for West Brom
This is a mad one, this. You have four West Brom players on a club jolly to Barcelona, robbing a taxi and driving it around the city for three hours before bringing it back. There’s three ways to feel about this. The first is to be outraged and every Baggy has a right to be. West Brom are far from in a position to be having party and, while footballers are still people, they are professionals and should be acting as such. The second emotion one could portray is that of aloofness. Seriously, who’s arsed? They’ve robbed a taxi, nobody was hurt, but they’ve brought it back. They were pissed and I’m sure they’re sorry. The third, and the path I have chosen to take, is to find it fucking hilarious and admire their balls. At some point, for whatever reason, that taxi driver has left his taxi with four drunk Brits inside. He was asking for it. He was lucky that he got his taxi back and he didn’t wake up to find it parked in the centre circle of the Nou Camp.
Bash in Brazil
Let me take you out of this dreary, boring, grey land we call Britain, and over the lush, sandy beaches of Brazil for a minute. We may indeed live in the birthplace of the beautiful game but Brazil truly is its home. The state championships are being played at the minute which means there’s a derby a week right now. There’s the usual classy football played by all the usual suspects of Palmeiras, Santos and Flamengo. But as you get further down the ladder it becomes apparent that the football gives way for MMA. And so it came to be in a game between Bahia and Vitoria at the weekend where 9, yes NINE, players were sent off – six for Vitoria and five for Bahia. Things got that bad that the referee had to abandon the game because there weren’t enough players on the pitch for it to continue. I thought that this only happened on FIFA. What next, la? Are players going to start slide tackling goalkeepers when the they have the ball in their hands like you could on FIFA 98?
Cup Drama’s
I am not a fan of faux cup drama’s. Watching West Ham host Chelsea and see it billed as a massive game with a potential ‘upset’ is a cheap way to drum up ratings, as was Chelsea hosting Hull on Friday night. But I couldn’t help but actually admire Rochdale and Wigan this weekend. Two teams who are two divisions below their respective opponents actually closing the gap. Fair enough, neither Manchester City or Spurs were at their best. But credit where it’s due here, both these sides performed above themselves. I’m more made up for Rochdale here. Not because victory looked less likely due to them being bottom of League One. No, more because they managed to get £500,000 out of Spurs for a new pitch prior to taking them to a replay at Wembley in a couple of weeks time. They’ve already won.