WHY SAY ANYTHING?

We are approaching the time of the season when there isn’t much of it left! The Premier League title is done and dusted as are, apart from one possible turnaround, the three places behind the champions.

There is still a scramble at the bottom end but it looks pretty bleak for the stripy clubs. West Bromwich Albion are virtually gone, with Stoke City and Southampton favourites to join them in the Championship. Just above them, Swansea City remain, probably, the only non-stripy club who may be relegated whilst the list is completed by Huddersfield Town. The rest should be safe.

The moral of the story is not to wear either blue-and-white or red-and-white stripes, just ask Sunderland!

The FA Cup final will be won by Chelsea or Manchester United, (now there’s a surprise!), whilst the Carabao Cup has already been won by the champions, Manchester City.

In Europe, Arsenal, having progressed much farther than usual, are about to revert to type and perform their annual Brexit whilst Liverpool are looking good in the Champion’s League.

So everything is nearly over and all we have to look forward to is a transfer window and a World Cup and nobody really likes watching international football unless, as is the case here, there is no other choice.

So we decided to have a look at all that is unfair in the beautiful game. Please feel free to add to our list by using the comments section at the bottom of the article.

1. Cup finals involving London clubs being played in London

2. Cup semi-finals, involving anybody, being played at Wembley.

3.  Champion’s League titles being won by teams who weren’t champions of their country. It makes a mockery of the competition, (or at least of the name of the competition).

4. VAR being used in the World Cup but not the Champion’s League. If it’s good enough for one then surely it’s good enough for the other and vice-versa, if it isn’t good enough for one then how can it be good enough for the other?

5. VAR being used in some FA Cup games but not in others and only used in games which involved a Premier League club. This meant that some games benefitted from having all of the major decisions either corrected or confirmed, whilst other games could have been decided by an incorrect decision. How is that fair?

6. Goal Line Technology only being available to rich clubs and only being compulsory in the Premier League. This is a little like a medicine only being available privately and for the rich. If it’s good and it works it should be made available to everybody and the FA and the Football League should pay the bill. After all they are, supposedly, in charge of the game and only interested in the greater good, (or don’t they make enough money?)

7. Two Welsh teams being allowed to play in the ENGLISH leagues yet Celtic and Rangers are not allowed.

8. Manchester City having a better team than anybody else!

OK, so the last one was a little tongue-in-cheek but, seriously, if you can think of more examples whereby the modern game is unfair please let us know. These are just just a few we came up with in a ten-minutes break from the usual grind.

Liverpool finish the job…..

Roma were confident, Roma fans were confident. They had overturned a three goal deficit against the great Barcelona so why should it be any different against Liverpool?

Well, it was different after nine minutes because Sadio Mané scored for Liverpool and it was the first goal Roma had conceded at home in this year’s Champion’s League.

After equalising a few minutes later they went on to concede their second to Georginio Wijnaldum and went in at half-time losing 1-2. They now needed four goals just to take the game to extra time!

Edin Džeko scored his customary goal early in the second half as Roma stepped up the pressure and the question was how many more would this Liverpool defence concede?

The answer was another two and they lost the match 4-2 but Roma’s fourth goal didn’t really create any pressure as it came from a penalty literally seconds before the final whistle.

Liverpool’s only problem for the final is how to stop Real Madrid scoring a hatful of goals!

And finally…..

Good luck to Stubborn Old Man in what is likely to be his final European game as Arsenal manager. Unless he can pull off the unexpected, of course, then he will have an extra game in charge and then we would all hope that he can finally win that European trophy which has eluded him for all of his years at the club.

After his comments earlier, (now conveniently forgotten), about how the Europa League winners should not be promoted to the Champion’s League, he will probably be quite glad that, should the unexpected happen, he will not have to suffer the slings and arrows etc., etc. next season as he will not be there.

Au revoir viel homme têtu!