Highlights from last week and a look ahead to sport on Aus TV nextweek.
When little Carlito Tevez Mighty Moused the penalty Manchester City shouldn’t have got into the roof of the net in Manchester City’s Secondary Cup semi-final first-leg win over their noisy neighbours last night, he was understandably delighted. So delighted, in fact, that he sprinted to the sideline, angrily cupped his hands behind his ears and then made a yapping gesture at Gary Neville, who had left his basket at Sir Alex Ferguson’s feet and was stretching on the sideline. Tevez was responding to Neville’s recently-aired view that His Master was right to let the Argentinian peasant woman leave Old Trafford last summer. Neville responded to Tevez’s response by giving him the finger.
Gary Neville is 34.
Today the FA confirmed it is “looking into” the one-fingered salute given by His Master’s Voice, a player who is now so over-the-hill that he has to limber up for several minutes just to be able to hoist a digit at a former team-mate. Presumably the implausibly hot, wise-cracking scientists in the open lab coats and tight T-shirts at CSI: Wembley will use their fancy equipment to zoom in on the photograph of the erect finger, crop a picture of its tip, zoom in on that and run it through their computer to see if it’s a match with that of the Manchester United full-back.
If it is, Neville can expect to feel the full force of the FA’s disciplinary committee, a merciless body of men who are unlikely to think twice about handing out a very sternly-worded warning or, if they’re feeling particularly vindictive, possibly even a small fine.
Coincidentally, Neville’s last sternly-worded warning from the FA came on the back of United’s 4-3 win over City in September, when he charged down the touchline to taunt City fans in the wake of Michael Owen’s injury-time winner, before realising the error of his ways mid-gallop and pretending he was only on a warm-up jog instead. As ruses go it was comically transparent, like somebody running for a bus, failing to catch the bus, slowing to a jog in order to save face by pretending they never actually wanted to catch the bus, then realising they’re unwittingly re-enacting one of Michael McIntyre terrible comedy routines.
Like we said, Gary Neville is 34, which is bad news for City fans, because it means he doesn’t get a game very often these days. If he can embarrass himself that badly on the sideline when City are the opposition, think of what he could achieve if only he was let on to the pitch.
Is Torres a bit of a Twitter?
I have written about footballers Tweets before but never came across this one from Torres http://twitter.com/it9. It’s a cracker. He has over 10,000 followers, no idea if its really him (its not a ’verified’ account) but it’s pretty crazy stuff…
My favourite of his recent Tweets is this:
8:44 PM Jan 12th from web – We’re virtually the same team that finished second in the EPL last season and we’re going to do everything we can to improve our situation.
Then after loosing at home 2-1 to Reading in the FA Cup…
8:07 PM Jan 15th from web – If we want to compete with United and Chelsea we need a much, much more complete squad.
Classic!
POMSPORT ON AUS TV
All FA Cup this weekend (plus a Manchester United are playing Hull on Sat).
All times below are for Setanta Sports.
Saturday 23rd January
Preston vs Chelsea 11:45pm (LIVE)
Sunday 24th January
Everton vs Birmingham 2am (LIVE)
Tottenham vs Leeds 4:15am (LIVE)
Reading vs Burnley 6:30am
Accrington Stanley vs Fulham 8:15am
Notts County vs Wigan 10:45pm
Monday 25th January
Stoke vs Arsenal 0:30am (LIVE)
