FootballFilter

With the end of January approaching it’s not surprising that much of the news coming through the football filter this week involves transfer rumours, wheeler dealings and “tapping up” of potential transfer targets.

Though not universally popular, especially among managers, the window does provide a little bit of excitement for the fans (as well as headlines for the hacks) during the gloomiest month of the year….

We start with the DAILY STAR reporting that Wigan boss Steve Bruce has slammed (the Star’s word not mine!) Manchester City for unsettling midfielder Wilson Palacios even though they had no intention of signing him.

Bruce claims City made a secret agreement with Tottenham over Palacios, meaning City would step aside allowing Spurs to sign the Honduran, while the London club in return would leave the path clear for City to sign Craig Bellamy from West ham.

Hmmmm sneaky stuff indeed.

A “furious” (again the Star’s words – not mine!) Bruce said: “I have to say that City’s behaviour over this was absolutely disgusting – They had no intention of signing Palacios.’’

City denied the claims, saying only a tentative enquiry was made for the midfielder. A spokesman said: ‘‘The call was made to establish the potential availability of the player. No figures were discussed – nor any bids made.’’

I guess we will never know the truth, but with City showing no restraint when it comes to flexing their financial muscle and Harry Redknapp seemingly intent on signing every player under the sun, you can see where Bruce is coming from.

Version:1.0 StartHTML:0000000168 EndHTML:0000001683 StartFragment:0000000676 EndFragment:0000001666One transfer saga that feels like it will never end is Andrei Arshavin’s potential move to Arsenal. The Zenit playmaker has been linked with move to England ever since his sparkling performances for Russia at EURO 2008. The Gunners have emerged as favourites to sign him, especially since playmaker-in-chief Cesc Fabregas got injured. But arguments of how the transfer fee will be paid, wages, agents fees (blah blah blah) means the saga has dragged on through the whole of the month. I’m sure Arsenal fans will be happy when we reach February and the situation has to reach some sort of conclusion. THE GUARDIAN claims the deal is imminent (then again it’s been “imminent” for weeks) whileTHE SUN quotes Arsene Wenger saying the deal is “90 per cent” done.

We’ll wait and see shall we?

David Beckham: “I respect galaxy but……..”

This headline on Only soccer.net is not what LA Galaxy fans (if there are any out there???) wanted to read. Becks is currently on loan from the MLS side to Italian giants AC Milan and, fresh from scoring his first goal for the club, admits his frustrations with the low standard in the MLS could tempt him to make his Italian move permanent.

He is quoted as saying: “I am fine at AC Milan, but I have a contract with the Galaxy and I respect them. On the other hand, I have to admit that when I was in the U.S., playing certain games was frustrating”.

Sounds ominous to me, If I was a football betting man I would be tempted to put some money on Beckham’s Italian Job stretching beyond his initial three month loan.

Away from transfer front and just a week after he ran away from a Manchester City training camp without permission things went from bad for worse for Robinho. It was reported in, among others, THE INDEPENDENT, that he had been arrested for an alleged sexual assault on a student in a Leeds nightclub. A City spokesman (who has been busy this week) confirmed Robinho “strenuously denies any allegation of wrongdoing or criminality.” The allegations didn’t seem to affect the Brazilians play, as he inspired City to a 2-1 win over Newcastle just hours after being released on bail.
Finally how could we forget poor old Rafa Benitez? Is he losing the plot? Or “cracking up” as Everton and Man United fans have so gleefully sung this week?

Well many of the papers think so. THE SUN claims he wasn’t making sense in his post-match press conference after the draw with Wigan. While the DAILY MAIL reports Rafa as saying “I don’t know what’s happening any more.”

Liverpool have failed to win a game since the Spaniard’s now infamous rant about Sir Alex Ferguson while his continued failure to sign a new deal means the football odds on him walking away at he end of the season seem to shorten by the day.

Attempting to wade through this mess is Andy Sammons of SOCCERLENS, who in his blog tries to understand the “enigma” that is Benitez and find out why it has all gone so wrong for Liverpool in recent weeks.

Good luck with that one Andy!

This post was written by Tom Mallows, who also writes a blog here - http://onlinemediarelations.co.uk/tommallows/