Crap situation gets worse for midfielder
Contract-termination of the week: Midfielder Jeffrey de Visscher (right) insists he and Dutch second division club FC Emmen mutually agreed to end his contract simply because he’d struggled to get in the team. De Telegraaf, though, alleged that was only part of the reason.
The player, they claimed, had engaged in a spot of “drunken wildpoeper”.
Drunken what?
Sounds a bit like “wild pooper”.
And, indeed, that’s what it is: doing a number two in the, well, wild.
“The police saw De Visscher in a somewhat strange position next to his car [on a road through a forest late at night],” they reported.
“He was heavily under the influence but said he had not driven the car, claiming that a friend had sat behind the wheel. He just did not know who his friend was or where he had gone.”
The police, surprisingly unconvinced by his story, promptly arrested him and he has since lost his licence.
And, alas, his club.
Kick in the teeth for 'gay hero' suggestion
The Guardian had an interesting piece last week on a blog post by Manchester United goalkeeper Anders Lindegaard (above), who wrote “passionately about the need for a gay hero” in football.
The Dane conceded that gay players were still afraid to come out because of the fear of the reception they would receive from fans, but said “my impression is that the players would not have a problem accepting a homosexual”.
Meanwhile, in other news: Liverpool midfielder Suso Fernández posted a photo on Twitter last week of his team-mate José Enrique having his teeth whitened.
“What the **** is he doing,” he wrote, “this guy is gay. He has some mental problems.”
Upon being informed by a fellow Twitterer that “being gay isn’t a mental illness”, Suso deleted the tweet and replied: “I didn’t mean it in that way about ‘gay’ . . . just joking.”
Lindegaard might need to edit that blog post.
Tattoo of the week
The quote Mario Balotelli had etched on his chest.
And whose quote is it?
Someone like, say, Mahatma Gandhi? No: the Mongolian rowdy, Genghis Khan.
“I am the punishment of God,” it reads. “If you had not committed great sins, God would not have sent a punishment like me upon you.”
Roberto Mancini must, occasionally, feel like the greatest of sinners.
Trip of the week
The one made by Japanese reporter Daisuke Nakajima from Tokyo to Moray in Scotland to cover Rangers’ game against Elgin City, part of a feature the Footballista magazine asked him to write on the Glasgow club. The journey, according to the London Metro, involved “a 14-hour flight, an overnight stop in Edinburgh and then a five-hour train journey”.
