Has Wayne Rooney betrayed Alex Ferguson?

Before I say another word I need to reiterate the bleedin obvious... My first team is Newcastle United and my second is England. Who I choose to support for the top prize every year varies from year to year, but is never ever Chelsea.

In the last 48 hours, we have heard the rumours then the confirmation that Wayne Rooney would not be staying with Manchester United. Tonight I saw a sad confused and betrayed man on Sky sports talking about Rooney, trying not to show just how hurt he was. I remember back in the mists of time when young Wayne was still a Toffee, and he was considering a move for the good of his career. Back then, even though I thought Everton were getting a raw deal, I agreed Man U was the best place for him to go. He would learn his craft under the watchful eyes of a master of football. He would be surrounded by the best equipment and the best footballing minds that weren't already working for Arsenal or Chelsea.  After what seemed an eternity to Everton fans, but only a few weeks for the rest of us, Wayne Rooney was a Red Devil.

Since that time he has kissed the badge, professed his love for the Gaffer and the team. He's even become a fixture in the City of Manchester. All that work and attention took a quick to anger young man and turned him , for a while, into a man who could play football spectacularly well. He regularly punished my beloved Newcastle United with blistering evil goals scored from as far away as 40 feet. He became one of the few footballers I truly enjoyed watching. And when he played for England, it was the the high points of a game, even when he was red carded.  Surely you cannot become that player without the development and trust you get from an organisation like Manchester United.

If there had been trouble off pitch that involved some battle of wills between him and the club, I would understand, but if anything , the club has done all it could to give him games, and protection from the sorts of risks, football related and press related that most players never seem to get. His odd behaviour with prostitutes at least twice now and before getting married, as well as the attitude after the England exit from the World Cup, certainly pointed to trouble in paradise. I'd say it about money but it's not is it? Even his agent was taken aback. I honestly believe Wayne Rooney has talked himself into some kind of catastrophic corner.

If I'm honest, I don't think I've missed him at Man U or England of late. Plenty of players have filled the gaps and he's been revealed to be expendable. Who in their right mind will take on this powder keg of anger and inconsistency?  I'll glass you if you say Newcastle! Despite our record of taking on troubled players, there's no way Mike Ashley would shell out the money for a rotten asset like him. Real Madrid seems a likely place, as most ex Man United players who've crossed the boss seem to go to. But besides them, I don't see any team willing to give him a chance after his last antics.

Regardless of what does happen to him in the next few months, I have lost a great deal of respect for somebody who used to be a pillar of the community and an example of  sporting good form and loyalty of the old school. As it turns out, he's no better than Tevez and Ronaldo and all the other mercenaries who've passed through the EPL in recent years. He/they have forgotten who pays their wages and without whom they would still be lorry drivers and fisherman in isolated villages. I have been watching and playing football most of my life, but this year has been harder than most to get up the desire to watch these over paid,  over privileged  pansies play football for the fans. Perhaps Newcastle was better off in fizzy pop. At least there, the pressure of getting in players worth more than some countries GDP wasn't ruining a century old tradition.

Getting back to Mr. Rooney  though, he's displayed the gratitude and loyalty of a Katie Price. What Alex Ferguson wanted was reasons and some kind of rationale that made sense. He's got  none of either. Wayne Rooney looks to be in a headlong rush into chaos, and one senses it is mostly of his own doing. Yet again football has taken a fine talent and muddled his head with fame and wealth, blinding him to the very people who took him in hand for his own good.

In the end, Manchester United have no choice but to sell him to the highest bidder in the January transfer window. Only problem is, will he be worth anything by then? The self destructive behaviour is making Michael Owen look a prize by comparison.

It was nice knowing you Wayne, but if you keep this up, the best you can do for all concerned is to piss off home and never play again. The two I feel sorry for  most are Coleen and the bairn, a child needs father and a wife needs a trustworthy partner. Instead they have a mixed up un happy and confused ball of angry 12 year old.

Yes, Wayne Rooney has betrayed Sir Alex Ferguson, Manchester United, England Football, as well as all of us

I love the sound of deadlines whizzing by

A propos of nothing, I got up this morning like a fag addicted creature stabbing in the dark for my fix, only to remember there is no football today or tomorrow, so now stuck with an entire day to fill interacting with other humans, I need to come up with a game plan that still has room for the two articles I promised but haven't touched since the World Cup has started. I'd like to say that I'm feeling guilty about having had to make an excuse to my editor, but to be honest he knows I been spending my time watching the world cup. What I'm sure concerns him more is that I had time to write an article on the state of Humour, saved English football, reviewed a BBC4 Bio pic , the last episode of Doctor Who till Christmas, and still not even a draft for him to look at. Honestly Mark, I haven't forgotten you, I promise, hand on heart, I'll have something for you in a couple of days tops.   

Well it's many hours later and the visitors I least expected have left, I've made enough spaghetti sauce to feed a small army, the cat has been washed, made some sandwiches re-organized the pantry and took a bath. My wife who is my researcher, baked two loaves of bread and a massive tray of cookies,  but it's not procrastination. I can hear you asking, did you do any writing today?  Well yes in fact, I did some stuff on facelick, banged on in Galli Base about why Germany will take Argentina to go on to the final, and wrote a polite note to my council about getting us a new recycling bin, as the one we have is knackered. All in all a productive day, if not big on  literary output.

I also did one thing I hadn't had a lot of time to do.  I looked at how my list of regular readers has grown. I'd like to thank mysterious person in Moscow for coming back everytime there's a new post, then there's Gavin in Estonia who doesn't read my Who reviews till he's seen the episodes as he thinks I might have too many spoilers, maybe yes and maybe no Gavin. Jeffrey wants to know where the food bits are, they're coming  is the short answer. Have a cracking honey bread recipe that would be at home in any Polish home and if you can lay hands on some matza, you can make your own skor bars...  In the last few days I have established a steady supply of information from Unsigned Sunderland and few other sources ( more on that another time), so a few days hence, you can expect a once weekly list of must try acts you won't ever hear on Darth Cowell's iPOD. Then there's the nice people at BBC Radio Newcastle who have knowingly and not so knowingly contributed to this blog. Nick Roberts and Paddy McDee are legends and if you've not caught their contributions to radio I can only ask , what are you waiting for?

I know some of you are wondering why I didn't write a word about the last few days of World Cup Matches, but if you watched, you'll know that like most, I was too busy trying not to slit my wrists to  dull the pain of having to watch Japan v Paraguay play the kind of football that makes watching paint dry feel exciting. By the time we got to the penalties I was relieved it was over, I didn't care who won. I do know that if I ever see either of those teams on a fixtures list, I will hope they get hammered into oblivion until they learn to at least try and score some goals. Crossing your legs like a frightened virgin seems interesting for the first 5 minutes, but three matches in a row is enough to make you swear off the game. At least Chile  Brazil was interesting even when it was nil nil for the longest time. In the end Chile succumbed 3-0 and it was entertaining.  I must also confess a slight perverse joy in the discomfiture on Christiano Ronaldo's face as he was having a pretty bad day at the office. Seeing him unhappy more than made up for all the unpleasantness a few years ago and since. There are few players currently active that I dislike more, in fact only three and two of them had a vile World Cup, seeing Gatusso not play and then get sent home a loser was personal joy surpassed only by the knowledge that Lippi, master of dull anti-football and cheating will likely be sacked joining the disgraced Raymond Domenech on the manager black list. I won't belabour the point made by a few others in various other blogs and columns, suffice to say that the self important superficial condescending Adrian Chiles, is not worthy of licking Gary Lineker's shoes. Bet you thought I was going to have Chiles lick some other part of Lineker?  Well it's not that kind of blog, but for £2.99 a minute there is a site where you see strange creatures humiliate themselves live on telly. Is anybody still watching Big Brother? ITV have proved that even the World Cup can be trivialized to a point where you wait for the last possible second before tuning in to the match to miss the awfulness that is the ITV warm up show. Thankfully, you can choose who's coverage of the final you want to watch, with luck, next World Cup/Euro ITV will be stripped of any right to International football.

You may wonder who the revelation of the world cup has been, the most remarkable person or thing  to come along and make a permanent mark on our imaginations. Is it Diego Maradona, maybe the Dung Beetle, or perhaps the seriously annoying vuvuzela? Putting on my best Jeremy Clarkson voice, You're all wrong , it's ...  Ivica Slavikova  , yes the bird off the Sky broadband advert featuring the perverse (purrverse) pea in her mattress. Every time she say "Stop leaving vegetables in my bedding. Its perverse",  males watching are hypnotized or at least trying not to let it show if the  girl friend or wife is in the room. And on the subject of these self same women. Such brave, long suffering people they are, even my football loving wife wonders how I've managed to watch all but one live match without going blind, crazy and soft in the head. I'd like to put this in perspective. If you follow a team like say Newcastle United, and somehow you watched every match they played in the season, you'd have 38 regular season matches, a few FA Cup ties say 4, if you make Europe, another 10 if you go all the way, so 52 in total over a period of 10 months. I have watched 52 of 56 matches since the World Cup kicked off . I will watch another 7 between Friday and the final for a total of 64 matches in under a month with only a two day break. I've grown used to the idea I could see two allegedly high quality matches a day and even secretly missing the inane droning of Mick McCarthy in my ear. My wife knows enough to let me have my fun, it's only every two years and the rest of the time "I'm the best". Football zombie Mietek will be around for another couple of days and it's back to normal programming, my editor will have a steady stream of brilliant stuff, my wife will be able to talk to me normally as opposed to only for 10 minutes in between matches, life will go on and I will catch the occasional crap friendly, or Europa league qualifying match until the real football comes back in August.   Those of us lucky enough to have women loyal enough to understand we won't always be like this, need to appreciate how lucky we are. Some men have been forced to miss the football to go to in laws, do shopping or eat out cos it's nice.  These women don't seem to know we'd rather have our teeth pulled than miss the World Cup. So men, after all the fuss is over, and you need to go on footie withdrawal, show some appreciation to your lady, take her to see that new vampire porn flick that just came out, ( you can sleep in the dark it's ok) , you could have a few friends over and talk for hours she'll like that, or you could just revert to default setting and that will seem like a huge improvement on the grunting football obsessed eating sleeping lump she's been living with for the past month.

 If you do manage some telly time and you've missed these gems earlier in the week, go to your iPlayer and fire up Mock the Week, Graham Norton from this Monday and the first new Top Gear. More on those tomorrow as well as some recipes and music you won't find anywhere else.

In othe telly news Phil Collison Corrie boss and ex Doctor Who producer was recently asked about plans for the 50th anniversary.. “It’s still quite early and we’re still planning what we’re going to do. We’ll be announcing more details soon but what I can say is that it’ll be massive. It’ll be Corrie like you’ve never seen it before.” Collinson was also asked whether Corrie would be repeating the idea of a live episode like they did for the 40th anniversary in 2000. He acknowledged that the idea had been raised but added that he wasn’t terribly enthusiastic about the idea himself, citing the enormous amount of coordination necessary to make it work. I'll take that as a no Phil. Regardless, since his eps have started to run, Corrie has been a treat to watch. Good work Mr.Collison. Long may you reign.

One more day of rest and maybe I'll get closer to finishing at least the one article this week. In the mean time, if you feel like wasting a few bob at the bookies, put a fiver on Germany to get past Argentina. If they loose, it's just a fiver, but if they win the odds are tasty. If' I'm right send me my ten percent in the post. Laters all.

How do you solve a problem like Team England?

Before wa talk about solutions lets have a nice sober look at the problems we face with English football. We gave the world the sport that has now surpassed all others as the King of sports, more popular than any other, if you made four piles of jumpers and threw a ball at 22 people , there would be a game even if they didn't speak the same language. So why is it that the land whence sprung the funny old game cannot field a decent side in the World Championship of the sport it invented?

I'll start at the peripheries and make my way to the core of the matter slowly as it's worth looking at it from a few angles. My first target is a press machine that fuel our vanity and expectations like delusional parents telling their 5 year old they're brilliant on the piano even if we're rubbish. Of course we'll go all the way, that loss to Malta or Northern Ireland was an aberration, we played the C side , it was cold, it was wet, it was too dry, the pitch was to blame. We will triumph over all comers and bring to an end 44 years of pain. Then the lads get on the plane for South Africa, the already frenzied war drums and shrieks reach a terrifying level of insanity that make Joseph Geobles seem reasonable and measured in his expectations of the players. Once there, the media machine crank it up to ludicrous levels with adverts exhorting us to "Do it for Bobby", Brian Blessed shouts at us to excel and take no prisoners. After a while of this you begin to think they surely they wouldn't go to these lengths if were utter shite? They must be as good as they say they are, Com'n lads, make us proud! For Bobby , for the Busby Babes, for the Hillsborough victims, for the soldiers in Afghnistan, for little baby Baz and his Mam and his dog.....YOU CAN DO IT. Imagine being one of the players so assaulted by all this pressure, all those hopes and dreams on your well paid pampered shoulders, can YOU resist maybe getting a bit nervous? Then the inevitable crash as manager and players board the bus emblazoned with ironic words like Glory and Pride. The inquisition in the various media begins even now with huge banner front pages crowing the news of the returning prodigal sons who are not worthy of forgiveness, their clueless manager talking of meetings and deadlines. These hapless inadequate ambassadors, once heroes, were never as good as advertised and the press knew it, The FA knew it, Murdoch knew it, WE knew it. But the red tabs, television networks and various promoters were not going to let that wee detail stand in the way of a massive marketing exercise designed to make millions for certain parties involved. A World Cup without England? Sepp Blatter would rather kiss a cucumber in public than miss out on all those supporters, I mean travelling parties. The Sun wouldn't sell as many papers, and ITV would have an even harder time getting us to watch James Corden. And now the Jackals fall on the players like some kind of tsunami of hate and shame. Indignation and anger following every word photo and page. Hardly the kind of behaviour conducive to a realistic branch and root review of football.

Next goat in this tragicomedy of errors is the combined ego and power of the Premiership. These clowns pay ever increasing wage packets to players who rightly believe they are above most people and clearly superior to any mere mortals within a golden age of them. Not content to inflate wages and egos the Premiership goes out of it's way to staff teams with only the caviar of footballers. Real Madrid may have its Galacticos, but the Premiership is the richest and most expensive league on planet Earth. Filled with the great and nearly great from all over the globe, If you're Jimmy Grimble trying out for Man City, you won't get a game until all the overpriced talent have a go first. Little wonder England can't find a decent back four, midfield or goalkeeper. If every foreign player left the Prem today, the top 6 teams would be so strapped for players it would allow in form mid table sides to grab top spots. One of the worst talent deficits is in the goal keeper gap. Peter Check, Edwin Van der Sarr, Shay Given, Brad Freidel, all are better than the two keepers who to played for England in the last 6 years. West ham and Portsmouth, powerhouse teams that finished so close to bottom you could smell the fear months ahead of the last day.

This next target is the one I know you'll find most amusing. The oddball collection of managers the FA has hired and fired since Svenn Goren Useless. First offence, they to a man ignored the wealth of under 21's and assuming the collection of passionless mercenaries could be made to play as a team, they still needed somebody they could respect. Maradona, Dunga, Lippi, Hiddink, all command the respect of their teams. They say jump the players ask, how high sir? But our wastes of space would take any order from Keegan, McManaman or Shearer as a suggestion and an invitation to question the manager's wisdom. The only man who manages in England that could do the job is Alex Ferguson. None of these soft babies would dare talk back to him. More importantly, apart from some very strange formations and subs a few year back, Fergie has clearly got it right with his lads. I suspect Wenger would do as well. They both understand the English game and the players and they have the weight of experience and authority of award winning seasons to impose their thinking. Something Sven to Capello were not able to do. You can take 22 of the best anythings, but if you don't turn them into a team they are worse than bad, they are an accident waiting to happen. One of the huge mistakes Capello made was to choose players not fit for purpose, did not require the players to seriously try out with real risk of being dropped. Treated the players like monks or children, not mega stars with a routine that for better or worse produces results. He then locked them up away from family and friends doing more practices than ever did at their club sides. Hermetically sealing these players was only ever going to lead to one thing, they would get tired sloppy and loose focus. Lastly he never varied 4-4-2. Arsenal got rumbled that way by the end of the run of 49. There is a school of thought that states if Odin himself came down to boss England, he couldn't get these Toffs to put in a single half of decent football.

Lastly the Players. Any group of lads who know they need to be healthy for MAN United, Chelsea, Arsenal, or Liverpool, cannot be expected to give it their all for England. Is it any wonder we saw the spectacle of a manager and selected players get trotted out to give post match interviews all singing the same drug induced cheerful message that the team played well, they were unlucky to get the goal not given, and had it counted, who knows how great they would have been. Honestly, they were lucky it wasn't 8-2 Germany. Capello is realistically looking at loosing his job, even it is the insane asylum better known as the English FA. He should be made to give the money back and go home now.

So how do we fix this? "Simples" as a certain meercat would say. First we accept that we won't qualify for Euro, that we won't qualify for the next World Cup and that the current crop of England caps will be told to finish their days at club sides while England do the following drastic treatment.

1- Look at the under 21's and under 19's. Form a team that will compete from here in against the rest of the World in European and WC qualifiers.

2- Conduct a two year program during which the length and breadth of Great Britain is scoured to find and train up the next great goal keepers needed to dramatically improve the chances of England Wales Scotland and NI.

3- Finally implement the dream of Trevor Sir Brooking whereby we install a full training system throughout Great Britain that will produce enough quality players to fill every Football team in every division twice over with Keepers, defenders, mid-fielders, sweepers and strikers. These player will then replenish the Leagues and develop into powerful talented players that will be diverse enough that even an amateur trained on FIFA 2010 could at least cruise through the qualifying without any embarrassments.

4- Un-tarmac the pitches turned over to car parcs for the London games or other such sacrifices perpetrated to local parcs over the last few years. Convert a large number of 11 a side pitches currently being used by 10 year olds into 7 or 8 aside pitches with smaller nets. If you keep it proportional, the young players will learn and develop better.

5- Bring in total football, teach players enough skill to respect and understand how other positions play. Look how the Brazilians broke down Mexico. It was the kind of multitasking you just don't get with English players. We all want to be the hero and score the goals, but somebody has to be stopper, somebody has to defend, somebody has to feed the ball up to the front.

6- Reduce the wage packet to only 30 times that of a teacher per year. Limit the number of non local players a club can bring in and lower ticket prices by the amount saved.

7- Force players who want to play for England to compete in open trials for spots. No player should ever be allowed to think he can just walk into a spot because he's at Chelsea or Real Madrid. Besides, if we implement the above, they will have to worry that some younger better player won't pip them.

Do I think this green and pleasant land will come to pass? A man can dream.