It feels a little like the Premier League has never been away and that the 2022 World Cup happened in or around four years ago. Although the sense of any class of normality returning was briefly interrupted on Sunday when Graeme Souness, on punditry duty for Nottingham Forest v Chelsea, began talking about putting Vladimir Putin and Russia “back in their box”. That was an unexpected turn.
This was in response to David Jones asking him for his highlight of the season thus far, Graeme opting for “the Premier League’s reaction to Russia’s war”, describing it as “truly fantastic”, like they’d built a Maginot Line and thwarted Russia’s efforts to, say, conquer Mariupol.
That threw Jamie Redknapp and Jimmy Floyd Hasselbaink a bit, both of them looking a touch sheepish when it was their turn to reveal what stood out for them in the first half of the campaign.
Jimmy: “Erling Haaland.”
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Jamie: “Kevin De Bruyne.”
That’s like when you’re asked to pick your favourite book of all time and you choose Where’s Wally, while your mate opts for Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn’s The Gulag Archipelago.
But a tanned Graeme, in thermals since he got back from Qatar, appears to have been heavily politicised by his World Cup experience, and there’s just no reigning him in now, like he’s found his inner Gary Neville.
“We, as a country, generally do the right things ... we have to support Ukraine – not for the next month, forever! Until we can put the Russians back in their box. If we don’t, they’ll be knocking on our doors in 10 years time.”
Until that moment we all might have thought that the Red Scare was Virgil van Dijk pulling up with a tweaked hamstring, but Graeme put things in perspective, even if your average Liverpool fan would prefer Vlad to be knocking at their door than Virgil missing Brentford away.
On a somewhat lighter note, with Jamie and Jimmy’s sighs of relief almost removing the studio ceiling, David asked Graeme if he’d made any new year resolutions.
“I was looking at myself, I was cleaning my teeth this morning, and I was thinking: be a bit meaner and grumpier,” he said. That’s like vegetarians vowing to stop eating beef.
Any how, the season has resumed and Arsenal still haven’t imploded, so it’s weirder it’s getting. No one is more surprised than Paul Merson, not least about the form of Arsenal captain Martin Odegaard, about which he very understandably purred following their 4-2 win over Brighton on Saturday.
He is, Merse told Sky viewers, “the Ronnie O’Sullivan of football”, seeing “pots” that no other player can see. And there’s no higher praise than that.
Poor Merse, though, was left snookered by the pesky fact that the internet is forever. 2021: “Mikel Arteta is making a mistake signing Martin Odegaard – and his job could soon be on the line. It’s another lazy signing.”
Which, come to think of it, was said too by some folk about Manchester United re-recruiting Cristiano Ronaldo.
On Friday, ahead of the Liverpool v Leicester game, Jamie Carragher’s heart was bleeding for the fella when asked about his move to powerhouses Al-Nassr.
Jesting.
“It’s a sad end for him, isn’t it? He’s finished his career with an interview with Piers Morgan – and Messi has won the World Cup. It’s not the best way to go out.”
Gary Nev tried to be kinder, but struggled. “It tells me that the [top] clubs didn’t come in for him, there’s an element of sadness for me – the last of Ronaldo at the top level, finishing his career in Saudi.”
As tributes go to the Saudi league, that wasn’t up there.
United, then, must battle on without the fella, who must battle on with a weekly pay packet of €500,000+, which should help him cope with the cost-of-living-crisis.
Marcus Rashford got their winner against Wolves, having been dropped from the starting line-up for sleeping in and missing the start of a team meeting. This was one of the few times that most of us could relate to the experiences of a Premier League footballer.
Any hard feelings between him and gaffer Erik ten Hag?
BT’s Rio Ferdinand thought not when he saw them greet each other at full-time: “Them embracing there shows you there’s no love lost.”
That put the rift-mongers back in their box. Ish.
