Football’s Mr Congeniality on upsetting ol’ Turnip Head, Billy McNeill and Alan Shearer, and why Birmingham City will be this Premiership season’s value pick.
I’ve been told to go forth and multiply a fair few times in my life. Although ten years have passed since Graham Taylor, then England manager, gave me a verbal bashing for questioning his team selection for a pivotal World Cup qualifier in Holland, I still get people reminding me of a scene that later became the focal point of a TV documentary.
In a nutshell, Taylor berated me during a press conference for looking so miserable. He suggested, furthermore, that had I been one of his players he would have told me to, er, ‘F off out of the country’.
Sadly, my pessimism was justified and England missed out on the 1994 finals.
Not that I ever took any pleasure for being proved right nor aggrieved Taylor berated me so brutally. If you can’t take a few harsh words, don’t dish them out and I have to admit, I was rather critical of Taylor’s regime.
Billy McNeill was the first football personality to give me a fierce rollicking as a young hack. In the early 1980s, McNeill was in charge of Manchester City. Following a defeat at Oxford United in the old Second Division I questioned the desire of the City players during a post-match interview.
Now McNeill, captain of the Celtic side that won the European Cup in 1967, is a very big man and he took exception to my tirade. Not a man to bandy words, he instead threatened to launch something more substantial in my direction: a Glasgow kiss!
Alan Shearer was not best pleased when I had a dig following England’s Euro 2000 exit, questioning whether he had left his international retirement a few games too late. He bit his tongue, but several months later, when he was guest of honour at a Football Writers’ function at the Savoy, he told me where to go – in front of my peers, who were suitably amused.
Four years on and Shearer is still going strong. There were some who even believed he should have gone to Euro 2004 in Portugal in the summer. The 2004-05 season will be his last before he retires. In a bid to make sure his retirement doesn’t become an anticlimax, he let Sir Bobby Robson know during the club’s pre-season trip to Thailand that he won’t take kindly to becoming a bit-part player. He wants to bow out on centre stage.
Shearer’s skills may be diminished but he still has talismanic qualities and leads the line very cleverly. Despite that, I can’t see him winning a Championship medal for his boyhood idols. One of the cups may become Newcastle’s first trophy since 1969, but the Premiership is beyond them.
Indeed, and I don’t think it requires Mystic Meg’s predictive skills to work this one out, the title will surely be fought out between Arsenal, Manchester United and Chelsea. The pursuit of fourth spot and Champions League qualification represents a ‘title’ race for the rest and a far better opportunity for punters.
Littlewoods Bet Direct are among the bookies who have created a market for a league without the ‘Big Three’ and Newcastle are second favourites at 10/3 to ‘win it’, behind Liverpool at 4/5, who clinched the berth last season – not that it proved enough to keep Gerard Houllier in his job.
No doubt both clubs will be up there, but neither, in my view, represent value. I reckon that Liverpool will take time to settle under new boss Rafael Benitez. In fact, even if they reduce the points differential between themselves and the champions, Liverpool could well find themselves under pressure to qualify for the Champions League, and not just from Newcastle.
I’m going a bit out on a limb here, but I feel that Birmingham City, at 16/1 to finish fourth, could prove the dark horses. They fell away in the final third of last season, but Steve Bruce has improved their squad for the coming campaign by greatly strengthening their spine.
Emile Heskey is likely to be a greater threat than he ever was with Liverpool now he’s at a club with lighter expectations. His partnership with on-loan Mikael Forssell – still Chelsea’s best striker – is potentially formidable. Muzzy Izzet adds even greater resolve to their midfield, Jesper Gronkjaer flair on the flank and Mario Melchiot power to their defence.
Middlesborough’s acquisitions should see them challenge at the top, and so build on last season’s League Cup triumph. Jimmy Floyd Hasselbaink still has it in him to solve Boro’s profligacy in front of goal. It will be interesting to see whether they can sustain last season’s impressive run, which has them installed at 12/1 for the fourth spot.
Tottenham look overpriced at 16/1, but consistent Charlton, at 33/1, seem to represent great value. I reckon that if Manchester City, also 33/1, can shore up their defence, then they too could fl irt with European qualification rather than be left digging themselves out of a hole in the final weeks of the season. However, my hunch is that Birmingham will be this season’s surprise package. Making the Champions League could add £20 million to their coffers – a substantial reward for being the best of the rest.
No doubt even the velvet tongue of Aston Villa boss David O’Leary will feel compelled to have a rugged word in my shell-like when he hears that.
