Planet soccer

by MARY HANNIGAN

Quotes of the week

“I’m just not sure why he came to America in the first place. Man, we don’t want your soccer. There’s no way Americans are going to buy the idea of 90 minutes of running around without much happening. Thanks for trying guys, but we’ll stick to baseball and basketball.”

– Actor Mark Wahlberg on the efforts of his Beverly Hills neighbour, David Beckham, to soccerise America.

“I saw their scout was here on Monday and he’ll know it’ll be a tough game.”

– Colchester manager Andy Boothroyd ahead of Saturday’s FA Cup game against Preston. (Result? Preston 7, Colchester 0).

ANYONE OUT there with an official Arsenal desk calendar for 2010?

No?

Well, if you spot one will you have a look inside and see if it’s true that Emmanuel Adebayor and Kolo Toure have a month all to themselves?

Seriously. That will cause some mirth in the blue half of the city of Manchester.

Iran see red over festive greeting

“DIRECTOR OF Foreign Relations for the Football Federation of the Islamic Republic of Iran” is, quite possibly, the longest job title out there, but rumour has it that Mohammad Ali Ardebili has had to surrender the title after inadvertently wishing Israel a happy new year.

Ardebili sent the email greeting to football federations around the world, but forgot to remove Israel from the mailing list, much to the displeasure of his bosses and the apparent amusement of the Israeli FA’s Amir Navon who received the message.

Navon replied to the email, wishing a “happy new year to all the good people of Iran”.

“We also added a wink,” he said.

“It was a big mistake,” said Ali Kaffashian, President of Iran Football Federation.

“IFF sends New Year greeting messages to all member federations of FIFA, except the football federation of the Zionist regime.”

All a touch unpleasant.

What next? The FAI sending Fifa president Sepp Blatter a birthday card?

Holloway's novel teddy-bear props

BACK IN November Blackpool manager Ian Holloway admitted to being a little bit afraid of Roy Keane. “You never know if you look at the eyes of a shark whether they’re going to buy you a drink or eat you alive,” he said . . . . “When he’s got the old shark eyes on-board, it’s the scariest thing ever.”

True, we’ve yet to spot a single shark buying any one a pint, but neither have we heard of a manager using teddy bears in his team-talks. “I laid them out in the hotel. It was a little bit of hard work to get all the bears to sit up but I put them in two groups of 11, with the names of our line-up next to one group and the Derby names nest to the other.”

“I lined Derby’s bears up in a 4-4-2 and ours 4-3-3, and I explained with one teddy bear what I wanted my wide-man to do, and with another what I wanted Charlie (Adam) to do.”

It worked: Blackpool beat Derby on Stephen’s Day.

More quotes of the week

“The referee gave only five minutes of injury time and that’s an insult to the game.”

– Alex Ferguson graciously accepting yesterday’s FA Cup defeat and congratulating little Leeds on their efforts.

“He comes in to training when he fancies it, every now and again when the traffic’s not too bad. He’s certainly not in my plans.”

– Roy Keane hints at a strain in his relationship with defender Ben Thatcher who has refused, as ordered, to live within half an hour of the Ipswich training ground

“Here in Scotland, you have football, you have the pubs, the church and after that comes the family. First is football.”

– Hearts manager Csaba Laszlo, whose side drew 1-1 with Hearts yesterday, on how Scots have their priorities just right.

Jose's ex

“I don’t have much to say about Chelsea. Okay, it’s my former squad, my old players, fans and stadium, but it’s all ‘former’, it’s all ‘ex’.”

– Jose Mourinho, still struggling to accept that divorce.

“I can lose a war, but never my personality, my independence or my freedom of thought. I will never be an arse-licker. I’ll always stay independent and say what I think, even if many don’t like it.”

– Jose again, his relationship with the Italian media continuing to blossom.

And even more quotes of the week

“A player’s first-team status ought to bear a relation to his performances.”

– Florent Malouda on Frank Lampard. Ooooh.

“I spent some time in Australia and there my friends called me David as it’s difficult for some to pronounce my name. If that helps make it easier, it’s fine with me.”

– Celtic’s new signing Ki Sung Yueng, or Dave, as his team-mates now call him.

“You cannot even imagine how tired I am of sitting on the bench. Do you want to hear a joke in London? It goes: Harry Redknapp put Roman Pavlyuchenko into the starting line-up.”

– Pavlyuchenko tells a Christmas cracker.