A Quizzical Eyebrow

Look here, chaps. I’ve had an unproductive day so don’t expect too much expert analysis tonight. I've never been one of those pundits who have the stamina of a Gary Lineker. I'm much more likely to measure myself against the true greats of the game: Mr. Tony Gubba and Mr. Stuart Hall.

No doubt Lineker has watched the lot but I’ve only managed to see four matches today and those were the games between Man Utd and Fulham, Charlon and West Ham, Everton and Watford, and, just now, the replay of Liverpool and Sheffield United. I could have watched more. Thanks to Sky replaying them all through the night, I might even watch more. But I can’t help but feel that it’s been a day that has only reminded me of the things about the modern game that disappoint me continually.

Am I the only one to grow tired of Neil Warnock’s perpetual complaint that ‘referees just haven’t played the game, they just don’t understand it’? I know I'm not the only one who tires of Man Utd maintaining their lead in the league table, which does nothing to add drama to the end of the season. Yet, sadly, I seem to be one of the very who who lament when I see our beautiful game becoming the medium for the advertiser’s messages.

It shocked me to see that video advertising hoardings have made it to Craven Cottage. A club that still has no player's tunnel and instead has the teams line up in the car park have spent a fortune to buy themselves the most pernicious evil in the modern game. Give me a team of diving Portuguese rather than these video ads. I find then off putting and I imagine the players do too. Today in size 400 fonts a bookmaker was quoting odds of 9/2 for Rooney to score first. How could this have made the poor lad feel? Does it add to the pressure or does it give him a false sense of optimism. Surely when he sees it, it affects him in some way, doesn’t it? [Update: I take one reader's point that I'm assuming that the players can read...]

Speaking of diving Portuguese, today I finally realised who Cristiano Ronaldo looks like. It’s David Dickinson, he of antiques fame. The boy’s the spitting image of the young Duke. Give it a few years and I think the two will be indistinguishable, though worringly, I feel like he’s looking more like Danny La Rue each time I see him. I think it's the plucked eyebrows.

Mr. Forks is definately a fan of the unplucked eyebrow.