Premier League Managers: Which Game of Thrones Character Are You?

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hankfully, the United Kingdom bears little resemblance to the land of Westeros, geography aside. Westminster can hardly be described as a vipers’ pit. There isn’t even a Master of Whisperers since the departure of the great schemer of our age – Peter Mandelson. I suppose the closest parallel that we have, or that I can concoct, is the Premier League with its endless jockeying for position. So, in a desperate attempt to make comparisons that don’t really exist, much like Buzzfeed, I thought I’d have a good go at comparing the principle protagonists of the two worlds. Big Sam as Robert Baratheon? Pulis as Bronn? Close, but not quite – Bronn has sense of humour and isn’t chippy. Anyway, my comparisons are set out below:

Barclays Fantasy Football 2014/15 – Top Tips

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las, from a league table perspective, Barclays Fantasy Premier League (FPL) 2013/14 was a disappointing season for me. I say from a league table perspective as points-wise it was my highest total to date. It would seem that the general standard of FPL play is improving, although the particularly high points hauls of 2013/14 probably owed more to the performance of Luis Suarez – glad to see the back of him!

My stubborn, contrarian streak negatively impacted my performance last season (in some seasons it has aided me). Sticking with Van Persie when he was fit, thereby missing out on some hefty Suarez points hauls, and ignoring the Ramsey bandwagon, hurt me. For instance, in one gameweek alone I missed out on approximately 50 points after Suarez’s heroics against Norwich.

As the last two seasons have been relatively lean, I have revised my FPL ‘Top Tips’ for 2014/15. I now accept that incurring points deductions in FPL is not the biggest sin and possibly has some merit, particularly early on in the season and in joining the big club player bandwagons as demonstrated by Suarez, Y.Toure and Ramsey last season. Still, my contrarian outlook remains and I like to think my misjudgements of last season have sharpened up my analysis. I hope you find my recommendations below helpful.

A Day at the Cricket - MCC v The Rest of the World

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was a little bit apprehensive before the MCC v Rest of the World at Lord’s. I’m not normally one for friendly sporting fixtures and I feared that it might be light entertainment at its worst with an ambience bordering on the inane, hyperactive, jocularity of Question of Sport. Thankfully, none of the cricketers made any concerted efforts to mimic Matt Dawson, playing the game in a semi-serious manner. There was even some scuttling about on the boundary led by the blooming Tamim Iqbal and everyone’s favourite, Kevin Pietersen. Most of the retired cohort looked in pretty good shape with no one yet reaching the comfortable proportions of an Inzamam-ul-haq, although Murali seemed to be developing a slight paunch. Brian Lara kept the amateur spirit alive when he failed to make up the five yards necessary to take a dolly at short mid-on after a thick edge from Yuraj Singh.

Jeremy Paxman Departs The Jeremy Paxman Show (Newsnight)

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ast week the ‘great lion of BBC journalism’ and ‘the scourge of politicians’ called it a day after 25 years in the saddle as the principle Newsnight anchorman. Of course there was no thanksgiving, tears or even a wobbly lip. The ‘great lion’ did, however, agree to mark his departure by partaking in some minor frivolities, going on a bike ride with Boris and presenting his favourite news item – the weather. Newsnight will certainly be weakened by his departure; it might as well have been called The Jeremy Paxman Show. Fortunately, the ‘scourge of politicians’ won’t disappear entirely as his enthusiasm for reading out tricky questions to bright young things and making high pitched utterances of disdain remains undiminished. 

As a Newsnight anchor I shall miss him, more as an entertainer than as an informer. He had charisma and star quality and was a cut above most of his contemporaries. In a programming era increasingly driven by ‘accessibility’ he was a welcome intellectual bulwark. Indeed, if Jeremy Paxman presents a programme, you know that it comes with a triple A intellectual rating. The questions on University Challenge are as difficult as they ever were.

Italia ’90: Glorious Failure

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t’s a little odd, I know, but in the build up to the World Cup in the Youtube age, I watch it again, and again, and again: the montage clip of England’s travails at Italia ’90 accompanied by Nessun Dorma* belted out by Luciano Pavarotti. Why do I do it? Is there nothing more to it than having a particular regard for Luciano’s stirring rendition? Do I like watching grown men cry? Am I just weird?**

Urbane Londoners: UKIP welcomes your sneering

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mong urbane Londoners, admitting to a fondness for UKIP and its man of the moment* Nigel Farage is about as bad as confessing never to have watched Mad Men and The Killing. Maybe that’s a touch extreme; perhaps a better analogy would be about as distasteful as drinking blue top milk or serving up a Dairylea Dunker as a canapé?

Despite making inroads across much of the UK in the Local and European elections last week – Nigel was particularly excited** by UKIP’s gains in Wales – UKIP failed to convince a large chunk of London voters of its merits. And why was this? Well, one reason for UKIP’s London failure, as acceded by Suzanne Evans, UKIP’s communities spokesperson, when interviewed on Radio 4 last week, was UKIP’s difficulty in appealing to the ‘cultured, educated, and young’, of which it would seem London is absolutely packed to the rafters.

Rodgers: 4-2-3-1 is, like, so 2012/13

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n 1 June 2012 Brendan Rodgers was unveiled as Liverpool’s new manager. His appointment did not exercise the bulk of Liverpool fans. Many felt sheepish about King Kenny’s departure; others deemed him callow, ungarlanded with silverware, not a big enough name for a club of Liverpool’s stature*; many would have preferred ‘Rafa’ Benitez. I would have liked to have seen Jamie Carragher appointed as player manager for a giggle.

With a weak mandate, and inheriting a squad versed in the ‘swing the ball about’ culture of King Kenny, Rodgers’s task in reversing Liverpool’s downward trend was bordering on the herculean. And from a strictly outcomes focused, league table perspective, it appeared in the initial months that the task might be a bit too tricky for Brendan. Indeed, Liverpool were languishing in mid-table.  The fans were disgruntled and the media unimpressed.  Both were particularly vociferous in their criticism of Rodgers’s decision to send Any Carroll on loan to West Ham with a forward line lacking in numbers after Borini’s injury. Then came the unfortunate documentary (marketed for a US audience and the worst decision of the current Liverpool management) portraying Rodgers as not too dissimilar to David Brent. Personally, I don’t think that I would ever be bosom pals with a man possessing a self-portrait at his family home. Anyway, I digress: mild egomania is a pre-requisite of being a successful football manager. In fact, omit ‘mild’.

Barclays Fantasy Football 2013/14 – Top Tips

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arclays Fantasy Football 2012/13 was my annus horribilis. I should have known that my egotism and vanity in labelling myself the Warren Buffett of the Barclays Fantasy Premier League would come back to bite. Actually divine retribution had nothing to do with it; rather, the astonishing individual performances of Van Persie, Michu and Bale, all of whom I ignored for too long, overly deterred by their hefty values.

2012/13 was certainly a year that favoured concentrating your resources on a few individuals and less on a balanced approach. Defences were particularly poor with four point clean sheets markedly reduced amongst the big four teams. It also favoured the aggressive players willing to lose four points in transfers to a greater extent than previous seasons.

Anyway, although my 2012/13 was not great by my own Buffett standards, being the saddo and egotist that I am, I felt the need to reveal my 'Top Tips' for 2013/14 (not that different from 2012/13); adherence to which I reckon will stand you in good stead throughout the season.

Should Wenger unlock Arsenal's war chest for 2013/14?

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f you're Alan Shearer, Alan Hansen or the perma-tanned, newly buffed up, terrified of old age, Gary Lineker then the answer to the question is yes siree. After all 'Arsenal have 'NOT WON ANY TROPHIES FOR EIGHT YEARS'. Yes that's eight years: an age; a lifetime; an eternity. For many – not just the Match of the Day Holy Trinity – this state of affairs simply cannot continue and Arsenal must spend big to win competitions again.

Now, I'm not overly keen on the use of the phrase 'Arsenal have not won any trophies for eight years', which you might guessed, as it implies that Arsenal have underachieved in this period. I find this odd when you consider that Arsenal's net spend on transfers (not player wages admittedly) over the past eight years has been just £9 million; far less than the two Manchester clubs and Chelsea and less than the likes of Aston Villa and Sunderland. In fact on a transfer spend to league position ratio Arsenal have overachieved not underachieved. Mr Moneyball Billy Beane is impressed!

Sir Alex Ferguson's Dying Glory

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ike many across the country I'm not particularly fond of Sir Alex Ferguson. This wasn't always the case. Whilst I've never been particularly fond of his feverish chewing of Wrigley's Extras; his lack of graciousness in defeat; and the sense I have that his views of family and loyalty are not that far removed from Don Corleone, I used to be able to gloss over these traits and focus on the fact that he had an overwhelmingly positive impact on English football in the mid- to late-1990s. I saw him as a footballing visionary who challenged conventional wisdom (well, Alan Hansen's dull-witted assertion: one of many) that 'you could not win anything with kids' and helped bring English football clubs back to the vanguard of European club football. I was also captivated by his Manchester United team of the late 1990s and early 2000s which played with a swashbuckling majesty that was beautiful to watch and made the hair on the back of my neck stand up on those wonderful Wednesday Champions League nights.

Grant Shapps's Love Bombs

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eader beware! In May 2015 when the Coalition will finally call it a day and ask you and I to go to the polls, there is the real risk that you might be accosted by a man armed with a 'love bomb'. Mercifully the love bomb will not actually make you fall head over heels in love with its creator, the Chairman of the Conservative Party, Grant Shapps, but it is not without potency. The love bomb has been designed to ensure that those of us who perhaps agree with one or two Conservative party policies, and have nagging doubts that Labour can't be trusted to manage the economy and the Liberal Democrats can't be trusted with anything, will vote Conservative.

Anyway, flippancy aside, the love bombs simply represent Grant Shapps's election strategy (as many have done before him) of encouraging the Conservative candidates in the key forty marginal constituencies in the 2015 General Election to become 'local champions'. As 'local champions' they will champion local issues and sympathise with the NIMBYs by, for example, opposing any proposed train line or any house building programme in the area, which might if enacted – best whisper it – result in house prices going down! What could be worse than that? Of course, if the candidates looked to their 'moral compass' (what a horribly sanctimonious phrase) they might well think that improving the creaking national transport infrastructure and building more houses were causes to endorse.

Horrid Facebook Updates

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f Facebook is a reflection of its creator Mark Zuckerberg then it is a medium that one should treat with caution, trepidation and ideally circumvent. Indeed, if the murmurings and tittle-tattle about Zuckerberg (or the despotic and psychopathic Gaius Caligula as I like to imagine him given his uncanny resemblance to the young Caligula in 'I, Claudius' and his controlling behaviour in the Facebook float) are to be believed then Facebook, like its creator, is vain, self-aggrandising, mean and ultimately self-deluding. Perhaps that was a touch sensationalist of me as Facebook is not without benefits, although unlike Zuckerberg I don't quite view it as a harbinger of democracy, but hopefully it conveyed my belief that it does not on the whole accentuate the positive traits of humanity.

Now although Facebook has given an outlet for the vain, the bores, the needy, the dull and those lacking self-awareness, I have accepted the medium for what it is and realised that from a sociological and psychoanalytical bent, it is quite fascinating. I even feel a level of sympathy – I know that this is pretty patronising – for those who feel that they have to let people know that they are baking a cake or going on a 10k* run. Perhaps such individuals feel that if they don't update their Facebook statuses on a regular basis that they will cease to exist: I update my Facebook status therefore I am.

Barclays Fantasy Football – Updated Starting Line-ups – Transfer Window

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nfortunately, the opening three weeks have been distinctly unfruitful for me in Barclays Fantasy Football. Rooney and Taylor (Neil) picked up injuries; Clark was sent off; and Kagawa and Hazard confounded my prediction that they would need a period of adjustment to the rough and tumble of the Premier League. Instead, Shinji and 'Azard' (I love the pronounciation; I imagine myself on a Stella Artois advert behaving in louche manner when I say it) have gone about their work like billy-o and established themselves as the principle inventive fulcrums for their two clubs.

These misfortunes have forced me into the desperate act of 'whacking out' my wildcard, which has given me no pleasure whatsoever as this is not something that should used readily. Certainly not after three weeks. Indeed, in my previous Barclays Fantasy Football seasons I played my wildcard around the 30-week mark. I felt forced to play it at this early juncture as, without losing points in transfers, I would have not reached my desired line-up until around the week 8 mark – a little too long to wait. Of course, I still hold myself in greater esteem than all those idiotic, short-termists who have already used their wildcard! 

Barclays Fantasy Football 2012/13 – Top Tips

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s I hold myself out to be the Warren Buffet of the Barclays Fantasy Premier League, I thought that it was only fair to pass on my wisdom in this arena to each and every one of you. Actually, the real reason is that I need another outlet to satisfy my vanity. The Ten Commandments of Barclays Fantasy Football are as follows:

1. Do not waste points on transfers barring exceptional circumstances

I'm always amazed at the large number of people who employ this tactic believing that they are guaranteed to hit the jackpot and score a hundred-plus points if only they could have a particular line-up that week. The only certainty is that you will lose four points, which really adds up during the course of the season if done on a regular basis. 

We're All Morally Repugnant

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ntil very recently the sardonic, Bob Monkhousian Jimmy Carr didn't pay any tax. This happy state of affairs for Mr Carr would no doubt have continued but for our very own Prime Minister's heroic* intervention when on telly, visibly outraged, he lambasted Mr Carr as 'morally repugnant' for paying less tax than a toilet attendant.** It worked a treat, as the next day (possibly the day after), Mr Carr surfaced from his King Midas-like opulence with his countenance markedly transformed: earnestness had replaced sardonicism. Quite the transformation. So full of contrition was Mr Carr that he announced that he had made an 'error of judgement', offered to slip his father a few quid for allowing him  free bed and board in his impecunious early days as a comedian and, most dramatically of all, promised to exit K2*** (the tax scheme, not the second highest mountain on Earth). We'll probably never know for certain why Mr Carr voluntarily agreed to become a 50% (soon to be 45%) income tax payer, but someone with a placid mind, like myself, might conclude that the unwanted, negative publicity – exposing Mr Carr as a horrible hypocrite – might impact detrimentally upon his gig sales and television appearances. Cynical, perhaps even sardonic of me, I know.

Euro 2012: England Does Not Expect

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fter England's exit at the last World Cup in 2010 against Germany I was rather cross, which my stepmother and jaded Father found quite amusing. God I was cross. So cross was I that I proclaimed that English football was rotten to the core and could only be rescued by a wholesale shift in culture: one that rewarded technical expertise instead of 'commitment'. I even stated that the old guard: Terry, Lampard, Ferdinand, Gerrard and Ashley Cole should be jettisoned immediately for moral reasons (I deemed them to be pretty odious certainly Ashley Cole and Terry) and to usher in a younger generation.

Unfortunately (fortunately is probably more accurate), the only people who heard these recommendations were my Father and stepmother and a few friends. Fabio Capello didn't as he went on to field England's best available players in the Euro 2012 qualification campaign: Terry/Ferdinand, Gerrard and Lampard instead of blooding youngsters much to my chagrin.  My crossness mellowed into apathy as I watched only one of England's qualification matches: the 1-0 win against Wales, reinforcing my apathy and disillusionment.

Dastardly Internships

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oor old Nick Clegg. He probably had hoped that if he was ever at the heart of the machinations of government that he would have been the person associated with and credited for spearheading some weighty initiatives. A root and branch reform of the welfare system perhaps? Overthrowing a political despot maybe? What about standing up against a rise in university tuition fees (too difficult)?

Instead, the Deputy PM during his 19 months in office has been the principle advocate of what can hardly be described as two of the most pressing issues of our time: the Alternative Vote and the unfairness of many internships today. This is admittedly a bit unfair as Clegg has been a key man in the government's laudable commitment to raise the income tax personal allowance threshold to £10,000 by the end of the Coalition's term in Parliament: an integral part of making work pay.

Beautiful Barca

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ell, it was a bit of a spanking wasn't it? No not Ryan Giggs enjoying the back of Imogen Thomas' hand, but the UEFA Champions League final. 3-1! Could have quite as easily have been 6-1 given Barcelona's overwhelming superiority. I don't know what the final possession statistic was in favour of Barcelona (it felt like 90%:10%), but I do know that Manchester United had only one shot on target from which they scored and no corners. These are the statistics that you would expect to see from a FA Cup contest between a Premier League heavyweight and a non-league minnow — not the Champions League final!

Bizarrely, Barcelona's dominance seemed to come as surprise to some. The deluded, distorted pre-match hype with every Alan, Mark and Lee offering his 'considered' opinion gave the impression that Manchester United were on a par with Barcelona and that the final was a 50:50 contest. Somehow the wily Sir Alex would fashion 'a result' for the Red Devils, although no one said with any degree of cogency how this would happen. Many said that the fact that Messi had never scored in England was a good omen. Then there was Harry Redknapp offering his nugget of wisdom by saying that 'United are capable of scoring goals'. Roy Keane even barked 'never bet against United'! I did, snapping up the extraordinarily generous 21:20 offering from William Hill for Barcelona to beat Manchester United in normal time. Thank you Mr Hill.

Royal Hysteria

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ccording to the BBC (the organisation whom you give £145.50 a year), 24.5 million people in the UK watched Wills and Kate's big day in its entirety and 34 million in part.

These statistics, and the concomitant national fervour, came as something of a surprise to me as before the Royal Wedding my friends and colleagues had shown (I should say feigned) as much interest in the occasion as the Alternative Vote. 'Would you watch the Royal Wedding with Auntie I asked?'  The overwhelming response was 'I couldn't care less' and 'day off work – whoop, whoop!' Not one person bellowed out 'God Save the Queen' or even offered the more moderate response of 'I'll probably watch it on telly'. Clearly a few people in my YouGov-esque poll of about 50 were either telling a few porkies, as admitting to Royalist sympathies is not uber-hip, or severely underestimated their British propensity for being a great big nosy parker.

Thankfully there are some who are not as credulous as me (well done India Knight) who suspected that the national urge to snoop, stick their beak in and pry into the lives of the rich and famous would override any trendy aloofness. Just look at the popularity of celebrity lifestyle magazines and television programmes like 'Come Dine With Me': we can't get enough of this sort of thing.

The Pocket-Handerkerchief

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mbarking on his perilous journey to the Lonely Mountain with thirteen dwarves and a wizard with a big beard called Gandalf the Grey, Bilbo Baggins was struck by the terrible realisation that he had left his “pocket-handkerchief behind”. Although I have never undertaken such a quest myself, I can entirely empathise with dear Bilbo's predicament. On occasions I too have committed this act of gross absent-mindedness, leaving me with the unpleasant sensation of exposure and, for want of a better word, nakedness throughout the day.

In truth I have 'sexed up' my feelings of exposure and nakedness somewhat, but I do, nevertheless, regard a pocket-handkerchief as an essential part of day-to-day regalia* which has unfortunately been lost. It was an essential item for my grandparents’ generation, with multiple functions, but is now mocked and ridiculed marking its owner as – dare I say it – 'behind the times' and lacking in personal hygiene. Admittedly, my introduction to the pocket-handkerchief was my grandfather blowing his nose in a not particularly edifying manner into an unattractive brown raggedy garment, so I suppose that this widely held perception is not wholly unjustifiable. However, don't let my grandfather put you off. A pocket-handkerchief confers multiple benefits upon its user and environs.