Football's modern day circus could serve an even higher role

Show Blattism the Red Card

For those of us who remember Chelsea as a yo-yo club and Manchester City as whipping boys with a penchant for the drop, these are strange days indeed.

Money buys success but little else. 

There's much wrong with the modern game. Still, for all the ugliness of £300k a week loanees and corrupt governing bodies, football does spread the tabernacle of peace among all the dwellers on earth.

And let us say Amen! 

It literally crowds the senses across digital media taking attentions away from war and pestilence everywhere its syndicated.

The word Messi must cross more cultural and language boundaries than any other. 

Football's size in commercial terms, it's power for our attention and disproportional importance make it more "real" than it used to be. 

The best Wiki-cockup of all-time

The proof lies in any news report you see at 10 o'clock. Next to the reporter in the warzone or refugee camp will be five hungry children staring out at you, three wearing Barcelona and Manchester United shirts. Hollywood has nothing, nothing on the power of football.

Is American soft power declining? Yeah, it started with Abramovich buying into London.

But the more money in the game, the more fragile it becomes. How can it keep growing? Won't it stagnate and start to look stale if the money flatlines? The growth is unsustainable. There's a tendency to tinkering. Football's governing bodies will mess it up. Civilisation usually ends in self-destruction. It'll be trashed just to be rebuilt again.

Can he phone a friend? Not sure.

But such is it's growing cultural power, we're left with a huge deficit of quality leadership. Where are the world class politicians that could gear football to a higher level? Blatter and Platini dither and piddle around its edges. 

What unites people more than anything else? It starts with World and ends with Cup. It starts with Champions and ends with League.

Football's constituency is wider than religion. How about a role for the Beautiful Game in the United Nations? 

Maybe Bill Shankly will be proved right - one day. 

Fergie hints at continued influence at United

Thanks for 2004 to 2010, Wayne.

It was his last home game at Old Trafford and Sir Alex Ferguson received rightful rapturous applause for 26 years of magnificent management at Manchester United.

United beat Swansea 2-1 with a typical late strike, the signature and style of so many United triumphs over the years.

He gave a candid series of after-match interviews and confirmed his retirement had been planned for months, and it's largely down to personal reasons.

I revealed earlier this season that David Gill had announced his departure from Old Trafford before Fergie so as not to upstage the big man’s retirement. Privately, Gill had always vowed never to leave the club while Fergie was manager.

Because I'm worth it.

It was a real signal that moves were afoot for a change at the helm.

But Sir Alex also says the death of his wife's sister played a big part in him deciding to step down as manager.

But if you think Sir Alex is going quietly, think again. He also confirmed Wayne Rooney slapped in another transfer request. And he’d said NO!

He says the player has grown frustrated at being substituted in recent games.

Humility nay slight embarrassment. "I'm joining United."

Fergie says we won’t let him leave. The clearest indication yet that Fergie will be Director …of Football. Some of Moyes’ decisions will be ratified - or hamstrung by Fergie’s determination and experience. "Don't worry about that!"

When Bill Shankly left Liverpool, the Anfield board were determined that he was ushered away so Bob Paisley could run the team. They’d learned from Matt Busby’s continued presence which hung like a shadow over his successors.

The difference is David Moyes has managerial pedigree – but don’t think Fergie won’t have a say in some of the key personnel decisions as his comments implied so yesterday.

Hodgson's a dead man walking at Liverpool

Hodgson: holding on but for how long?

I'm sorry to say this about a good man, but Roy Hodgson's reign as Liverpool boss will be a short one.

Hodgson, who steered modest Fulham to the Europa League Final and a mid-table finish last season, simply can't steer the Anfield Titanic round the iceberg.

But home defeat to relegation-haunted Wolves, without a single away win since March and a first victory at Anfield in 27 years, must be close to being the last straw for Hodgson. It's an eighth defeat of the season and their third in four games.

Unfortunately, the damage began in Rafa Benitez' last campaign. Liverpool dipped from Premier League runners-up to seventh place - so failing to qualify for their usual Champions League spot.

The hallmarks of Shankly's Liverpool are all but gone.

And a change of ownership's not yet galvanized anything resembling a recovery.

John W. Henry's adopting a watching brief in his first months as owner - and will be troubled with what's on offer. This is easily the worst Reds team since Bill Shankly shook the club to its foundations and built modern Liverpool.

Not even the era of Graeme Souness was as bad as this. The abolition of the Boot Room was a symbolic low point, akin to the ravens leaving the Tower. 

But even then, as the Reds lost their grip on an annual title assault plus cup shocks at home to lowly Bolton and Bristol City, there was still an FA Cup victory and just the thought that the right manager could restore the trophy culture.

And it duly came to pass; even though the title hasn't returned to Anfield since, Liverpool have won trophies galore in the last twenty years including the very biggest one, the Champions League.

But this time, Liverpool's decline is spectacular. They are fast-becoming instititional also-rans. As the Reds slide down the table and lose their glister and status, Tottenham and Manchester City are fast-replacing them in ways that make them uncatchable. London and Manchester hold more excitement to young men with dreams of the Champions League than Liverpool, with less to offer all-round.

The summer will surely test the loyalty of Steven Gerrard and the commitment of Fernando Torres. Will both be considering life after Liverpool?

Hodgson admits the support has never been there from the Kop, but neither have the results. He cites the popularity of Kenny Dalglish, who he beat for the job, as the reason. Good results would have made life easier though.

But the key fact is, Roy Hodgson is not Henry's man. The ex-Inter and Switzerland boss had a clause added to his contract about severance should ownership change. As sure as eggs is eggs, Henry will trigger it - and soon.

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The tragedy of Robert Enke

BY GREVILLE WATERMAN

The awful suicide of Hannover 'keeper Robert Enke puts the game's importance firmly into perspective. Whether Bill Shankly had his tongue firmly in cheek or not when he famously proclaimed that football was more important than life or death, those words now seem hollow and tunnel-visioned.

Enke's death follows on from those in the recent past of Justin Fashanu and David Clement. My dad told me of the pathetic end of former Chelsea and Newcastle great Hughie Gallacher who, overcome by family problems, also killed himself on a railway line.

Professional sportsmen are as prone to depression and stress as any other human being and their situation is surely exacerbated by being thrust in the public eye, always being under pressure to perform.

Imagine how stressful it'd be if we were in the spotlight everyday and unable to slink away and lick our wounds in private.

There's no hiding place for professional sportsmen who are expected to be supermen and put on a performance irrespective of how they feel. They are as prone to illness, stress and (certainly at the lower ends of the game) to the same types of financial pressures as we lesser mortals. Amazingly enough, English cricketers are almost twice as likely to commit suicide as the average male and have a suicide rate higher than players of any other sport. That's according to respected author David Frith who wrote a book on this very phenomenon.

Frith asserts that cricket puts a strain on nerves that can be as destructive as the post-traumatic stress disorder suffered by war veterans. 'It is the uncertainty, day in and day out, that plays a sinister beat on the cricketer's soul,' he said.

Famous cricket suicides include A.E. Stoddart, the most glamorous cricketer of the 1880s and captain of England from 1894, who shot himself in 1915 after his career ended; Albert Shrewsbury, the finest professional batsman of his day amd in more recent times, former England wicketkeeper David Bairstow.

Mike Brearley commented that "it is not cricket which causes suicide: people kill themselves for reasons that are internal to themselves and their histories.'

For that reason perhaps we should cut our footballers some slack, they're not super human and are as subject to the same foibles, problems and stresses as everybody else. Perhaps we should take that into account when they next miss an open goal or let one through their legs.

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