It’s only four weeks until the January transfer window opens and all eyes turn eagerly towards Manchester City in the hope they they will pump some money around and get a merry-go-round started. What better time than now then for The Spoiler to bring back it’s daily transfer rumour round-up? Here are the latest whisperings that we’ve heard:
Dean Ashton to the highest bidder
Everybody is expecting a FIRE SALE! at West Ham next month but which player do the Daily Mirror think is on top of every Premier League club’s wishlist? Not Robert Green, who starred against Arsenal and Liverpool, nor Matthew Upson, who has established himself as England’s third-choice centre-back. Instead it’s injury-prone pizza fan Dean Ashton, who may not play again this season, who West Ham are supposedly expecting £18 million for.
The Spoiler Truth-o-meter: Any sale would surely happen in the summer and for a seven-figure fee
Former Spurs player belittles Redknapp’s attempts to snare Given
Joe Kinnear today laughed off suggestions that Shay Given would leave Newcastle for Tottenham in January by saying:Â ”Why would he want to go to Spurs? This is a bigger club than Spurs.”
It’s normally supporters who attempt to elevate their own club and it was because of Tottenham and Newcastle fans’ inflated sense of their own importance that neutrals took so much pleasure from seeing the two clubs suffer earlier this season. However, that hasn’t stopped Kinnear jockeying for position with the team he spent most of his playing career at in the big club stakes.
Newcastle’s claim to being a big club is that they came second twice over a decade ago and that they have lots of fans, some who are so passionate that they take their shoes off to support their team. Tottenham of course won the Carling Cup, the same highly-regarded trophy that launched juggernauts such as Leicester, Blackburn and Middlesbrough on the path to greater glories earlier this decade, and nearly finished ahead of Arsenal two years ago.
The league table, which surely fans should consider the most important measure of a club’s prominence, shows Tottenham are the sixteenth biggest in the Premier League right now, while Newcastle are eighteenth. But which club do you consider the biggest? Let us know with a vote and comment below:
Sheffield United’s successful tribunal ruling against West Ham could cost the Hammers £30m in compensation, and it also sets a dangerous precedent for results on the pitch being overruled by men in suits. The Spoiler decided to examine other potential footballing matters that could end up being settled by lawyers:
1) Watford miss out on the play-offs by a point
The Football League have decided there will be no replay of Saturday’s Watford/Reading match, despite the fact that the Royal’s opener was clearly not a goal. If Watford end up finishing just outside the play-off places, or if Reading wind up just inside them - does that give Watford the right to sue the Football League, the referee and the linesman?
2) Germany claim the 1966 World Cup
Sheffield United were able to win their case relying predominantly on ‘what ifs’, rather than solid facts. Imagine how successful a Germany appeal could be when they have digitally-enhanced evidence that Geoff Hurst’s second goal didn’t cross the line - another example of West Ham cheating!
3) England gain passage to the 1986 World Cup semi-finals
Maybe England could compensate for losing that World Cup by sueing Argentina for Diego Maradona’s
Newcastle executive is a stand-up guy, according to himself
In case you didn’t know, Dennis Wise - the chap who Alex Ferguson said “could start a fight in an empty house” - is a thoroughly upstanding citizen who is adored by fans across the nation for his refusal to acquiesce to demands of the the money men. That is, according to the jacket of his 1999 autobiography:
In an age when football is dominated by glamorous foreign players chasing multi-million-pound contracts from club to club, Dennis Wise represents the traditions of team loyalty, dogged determination and fighting spirit.
It is perhaps this, as well as his charmingly irascible nature, that makes Dennis - Wisey to his teammates and fans - such an enduringly popular player.
‘Enduringly popular’? Leicester, Leeds and Newcastle fans would probably disagree…
