All in the Game

A soccer miscellany compiled by MARY HANNIGAN

A complete tat

BORUSSIA Dortmund continue to look good for the Bundesliga title, and you can only hope for this fella’s sake that they don’t blow it in the final weeks of the season.

Yes, he’s had Dortmund manager Jurgen Klopp tattooed on his back, along with the Bundesliga Shield. As theoffside.com said of the creation, it’s called “dooming one’s self to bachelorhood for life”.

Wax doesn’t work: Beckham

NO KAHN DO EITHER:THE museum in the Niavaran Cultural Centre in northern Tehran has one of the wackier collections of waxwork figures we've heard of in a while, among them Adolf Hitler, Charlie Chaplin, Napoleon, Leonardo da Vinci, David Beckham and, eh, former German goalkeeper Oliver Kahn.

That’s what you call quite a diverse collection.

The quality of the waxworks? Well, as the man on Eurosport put it, “why has Beckham been done up to look like Liam Neeson’s Jedi Master Qui-Gon Jinn character from Star Wars”?

It’s a fair question, it has to be said.

Raggy-arsed ’arry fails to inspire: Young Jack pledges his allegiance

WORD OF MOUTH :"He's three years younger than my Dad!"

– Arsenal’s Jack Wilshere astounded that 41-year-old Jens Lehmann can stand up, never mind play football.

“We have important objectives, even if we don’t know what they are yet.”

– Simone Pepe on Juventus’ slightly vague targets for the season.

“I’ll tell them when I played on Hackney Marshes and we were 4-0 down at half-time to Raggy Arsed Rovers and we came back and done them.”

– Harry Redknapp on how he intended to inspire his players into believing they could overturn Real Madrid’s 4-0 first leg lead last week.

“I wouldn’t say there were five goals between the teams. This was very evenly balanced.”

– Redknapp again after Raggy Arsed Rovers scraped past his boys, just the 5-0 on aggregate.

“The other I day I marked Ljajic in training and gave him two or three hammer blows to let him understand nobody has ever died through tough marking.”

– Fiorentina coach and former Serbian international Sinisa Mihajlovic on teaching compatriot midfielder Adem Ljajic a useful lesson.

“I know I have a reputation for being strong but I am only human. I cry during very sad moments. There was one film – The Notebook – that really touched me. I was watching it alone, sitting in the dark, and I got very involved in the story. I almost cried. Almost.”

– And with that Nemanja Vidic almost – almost – lost his hard nut image.

“Me to Chelsea? It would be beautiful.”

– Marcello Lippi offers Carlo Ancelotti his support.

“People asking if I’m going to City? I don’t kiss the Arsenal badge then leave, this club is in my heart!”

– Jack Wilshere issues a “come and get me” plea to City.

Hair Do Of The Week

NO contest, the award goes to Dagenham and Redbridge ace Bas Savage for his Spiderman do. This is the embarrassing bit, though: after going to the trouble of getting himself a web-head, Bas never even got a run-out – he and Spiderman were left on the bench for the duration of his team’s 4-3 defeat to Brighton last Tuesday.

The bigger twit: Ferdinand or us believing him?

'PIERSHASMOOBS':IN a marginally surreal battle of Twitter wits Rio Ferdinand and Piers Morgan (telly man and Arsenal fan) having been exchanging barbs of late, Ferdinand responding by trying to get "piershasmoobs" trending on the site. Moobs, our slang dictionary told us, means man boobs.

Ferdinand then reported that the company had contacted him to ask him to leave poor Piers alone: “A Twitter rep just called and said can I hold back on piers as it seems I’m cyber bullying . . . I apologise if that’s how it seems!”

“How can piers really ring twitter reps like that . . . c’mon son!” “Was it Twitter or piers’ mum who called me to call it off?!” This revelation was reported by several websites, including The Guardian’s, at which point a triumphant Rio declared: “The word gullible comes to mind!!!! Sucked right in!!! Wow the media need to relax tweeps!! Get a grip!” Yes, he’d made it up.

You know, you’d pay anything to hear him trying to explain the whole business to his manager, especially the ‘piershasmoobs’ bit.

Tax write-off: A meltdown

DIEGO'S DINERO:IT'S reckoned Diego Maradona owes in and around €37 million to the Italian tax authorities, which is a sizeable enough debt when you think about it. Of course, if he still had his 1986 World Cup Golden Ball he might be able to pay off a percentage or two of the interest by flogging it, but Salvatore Lo Russo had bad news for him on that front last week.

“I tried to get it back but it was not possible, it had been melted,” the mafia man told Italian prosecutors, explaining that after the Golden Ball was stolen from a travelling football museum it was melted down and turned into bars.

And where are the gold bars? Alas, your guess is as good as Maradona’s.

Tweet of the week

“U know what **** the lot of you u will never get another tweet from me again u just don’t get it do you. Bye bye.”

– West Ham’s Danny Gabbidon engaging in a bit of good-natured banter with supporters who were a touch peeved by the 2-1 defeat to Aston Villa.

Songs of Praise

“THE only part I can recognise is my name,” admitted Liverpool’s Luis Suarez when asked about the supporters’ new tune for him: “His name is Suarez, he wears the famous red, I just can’t get enough, I just can’t get enough.”

Mind you, Suarez was just six when popsters Depeche Mode stormed up the hit parade with the song. Now, there’s a deeply depressing thought.

Some fine Reading: Long gets the short straw

SHANE'S SONG :GOAL-SCORING wise at least the season didn't start too promisingly for Shane Long (left), managing just two in his first 14 games for Reading. Since then, though, it's been a bit of a goal-fest for the Tipperary fella who, a fortnight ago, became the first Reading player in ten years to score 20 League goals in a season.

He’s since moved to 21 (he got two more in the FA Cup), leaving him second on the Championship list of top scorers.

So appreciative have Reading fans been of Long’s efforts they even had him trending on Twitter a couple of weeks back, which, apparently, can be a good thing. Among the many examples provided to prove Long’s greatness (under #shanelongfacts) was the claim that he can spell team-mate Zurab Khizanishvili’s name backwards. Now, that’s impressive.

The celebration of Long’s achievements hasn’t stopped there, Willie Dunne and the Corrigans have unleashed The Ballad of Shane Long (you’ll find it on YouTube). Altogether now: “When we talk of the legends who wore the green, they’ll say Cascarino and Quinner and Keane; But there’s one other striker that’s worthy of song, the Gortnahoo legend Tipperary’s Shane Long.

“Wrap him up in the green shirt of Ireland, there’s no better player to be seen; See all his team mates, his boys in green mates, Shane Long gives it all when he’s wearing the green.”

You half wonder if Long regrets scoring all those goals now

Just childish

FOOTBALLERS are asked to autograph all sorts of peculiar things, not least supporters’ body parts. Manchester City goalkeeper Joe Hart has become accustomed to these requests, but drew the line when asked to sign one particular, eh, “item” for a City fan: “It just goes to show that there are strange people in this world,” he said. “I couldn’t believe anyone would ever ask me to do something like that. I wasn’t having any of it.”

What was he asked to autograph? The supporter’s baby.