Whammy of the Month - January

Football Whammy

So we’re in the middle of a silly season and yet there hasn’t been any sign of any multi-million pound attempts of luring player’s left, right and centre. Unless you believe those rumours of a North Eastern club putting in a £35 million pound bid in for Emile Heskey as one useless striker just isn’t enough. Talks of Modric moving to Chelsea have cooled off, news seems quiet about the Man United midfield now Scholes has come back into the fray having fixed the DeLorean and there is nothing in the rumour mill about Messi, Ronaldo or Kaka being sighted at the gates of Ewood Park…yet.

Of course, some small deals have been done nationwide, Cahill has finally completed his move to Chelsea and Anelka has jetted off to the Football Capital that is China to apply his trade as a target man. Not the most difficult job considering the Chinese aren’t particularly renowned for their height…or jumping ability…or football skill. Wait, why has he gone there?

But something is afoot. Somewhere in the dark recesses of the Man City reserve team, a solitary figure is lurking. At first glance, you may think you are back in the early days of civilization as a silhouette rambles about, dragging his knuckles across the floor. But on closer examination, eyes focus and realisation hits; it’s the person we all love to hate – Carlos ‘I’m too sexy for my shirt’ Tevez.

Tevez - Raa ra ru...garl

Long has it been since Tevez was allowed out of the darkness and on to the fields of green, to run free amongst his own kind under the bright spotlights of the Etihad Stadium (or any stadium for that matter). During his darkest days under the Mancini regime, he has been linked with this club and that club, but few stories contain any truth. At the moment, it seems like there’s a tug of war happening between PSG and Inter Milan, with AC Milan dropping off because of Pato’s inability for making up his mind. Where Tevez will eventually end up is beyond anyone at this point, his preferred choice being Argentina but he’ll settle for the just a bus stop away…Milan. #getthiskidaglobe

Cricket Whammy

In other news, England are back to their best (or rather, worst) after crashing to a 10 wicket loss against Pakistan. For a team that are supposed to be first in the world in test cricket, the performance has been completely dire. What happened to the Strauss-Cook partnership that stunned the Aussies? What happened to England’s Mr Dependable? And where on earth has the KP of yester-year gone? All these questions have been left unanswered after this first test, as the only players who seem to have turned up are Swann, Prior and Jimmy. England are running the risk of being caught with their pants around their ankles whilst the Pakistan team take turns in beating them with cricket bats.

Pakistan – this is a team supposedly missing some good players from the betting scandal last year and to be completely honest it is a shadow of a team from the days of Inzimam Ul Haq. And yet England, who trounced the Aussies down under and beat both the Sri Lankans and the Indians on home soil can barely manage to scratch the surface of a team who are ranked 4 places below them… Time will tell if England can get out of this all to often “We can play amazing, we can play crap. Depends how we feel” attitude else we’ll have to borrow Scholesy’s DeLorean and bring back Flintoff. When he was good that one time.

Whammy.