Chelsea’s ageing footballers must be loving it.
“No more kids coming in here and threatening our jobs.” Not for two whole years, anyway, if 2011 minus 2009 equals two. (Sums of such low magnitude are not easy to relate to for highly-paid footie stars.)
Just because Chelsea’s top duds (sorry, dudes) got found out after getting some kid to break his contract in France, Chelsea’s transfer plans have been botoxed. So why shouldn’t general player happiness break out at Stamford Bridge?
Six things you can do when your club can’t afford to not play you now:
- Not bother to call Mr Ancelotti or Mr Kenyon or Mr Arnesen Mr Ancelotti, Mr Kenyon or Mr Arnesen, anymore. Carlo, Pete or even Frank Baby, will do nicely now. But it’s still Mr Abramovich.
- Not worry about making sweaty, off-piste, on-TV comments such as “Me is not why caring if Carlo will play me now. But as we no ‘ave ozzer players…”
- Not really having to bother about bothersome training sessions now there’s no one else likely to fill your boots when you shoot and don’t score for the next transfer-frozen 104 weeks. Approximately.
- Chill out when it comes to going out clubbing and having a few beers with the lads the night before a big match. So you play with a bit of a sore head tomorrow afternoon…tough.
- Focus on your image and branding rights; like Bex — after all, living on £120,000 a week isn’t going to pay the mortgage, right? Er…isn’t it?
- Forget about your future. You can’t do anything about it for the next two years and by the time the ban ends you’ll be too old, anyway.
Yep, FIFA has done a really good job by banning all signings at Chelsea. Perhaps it’s good that other football hopefuls looking to extend their career at Stamford Bridge won’t be able to. That the recession hit, over-exploited fanbase — still paying zillions for a season ticket — won’t be able to see their team develop through greater talent that new signings can bring or that a great youth team could develop. That Chelsea’s efforts to win by buying titles will be stopped.
And yep, praise the Lord that Chelsea is the only club trying to create an unfair advantage. Just like Harlequins’ “Bloodgate” or Arsenal’s Eduardo or McLaren Merecedes’ (and our very own) Lewis Hamilton all tried to gain an unfair advantage. And just like financial investors around the world who wanted the best returns on their investments — come what may — never envisaged the downside of their greed resulting in global financial meltdown. We won’t discuss those parents who discover God because their children might do better at a more respected catholic school.
We all want our teams, our heroes, our children, our investments to win. Bernie Madoff was every wealthy investor’s hero in the US until he got found out, too. Do we want an unfair advantage? You bet we do. Now… about those odds on the next snooker tournament…
