WILL FERGIE'S CHICKENS COME HOME TO ROAST?
If there's one thing we learned about Manchester United's manager from last night's cowardly display in Barcelona it's that Sir Alex isn't as adventurous on his travels as you might expect from a man whose name is an anagram of 'Rail $ex'. Of course, anyone who's watched United in Europe this century already knew that - their win percentage in the away leg of Big Cup knock-out ties is the second worst of any of the regular participants since 2000 and a catenaccio-inspired victory at Totti-less Roma can't hide that fact.
Having said that, given that the world and his shopaholic mistress knows that Barcelona's defence is about as solid as urine, even the Fiver didn't foresee Manchester United tip-toeing into Camp Nou with Wayne Rooney as a frustrated full-back and Carlos Tevez as a confused holding midfielder. "We had lots of possession and created more chances than Barcelona," lied Cristiano Ronaldo today. Unfortunately for The Best Player in the World, the stats show Barca had 73% of possession to United's 27% and six shots on target to the visitors' one, suggesting Ronaldo's appraisal was even wider of the mark than his penalty.
United's shameful approach has emboldened Barca, who today called on Chelsea to make the second leg even easier for the Catalans by roasting Fergie's chickens on Saturday. "We are very aware that between now and the second leg United are playing to potentially win or lose the league," cheered Gaby Milito. "They'll have no chance to rest because Chelsea will give them a really tough match," he continued, taking out his mobile phone to record the happy slapping.
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QUOTE OF THE DAY
"It was a disgrace of petulance, temperament, throwing himself on the ground ... waving his arms at players on his own team. This fellow Ronaldo is a cod; he's a disgrace to the game. You sit and watch the BBC and Sky and watch these ... people ... describing Ronaldo as a genius ... fantastic ... the greatest player in the world. It's an insult to Rooney ... to Paul Scholes, who was magnificent tonight. You can throw me off this panel, but I'm going to speak my mind" - the football at Camp Nou may have lacked penetration last night, but the same accusation can't be levelled at the ever reliable Eamon Dunphy's post-match analysis on RTE.
"I thought his performance against Arsenal last week was disgraceful. He wasn't far off that tonight. I'd love to be praising Ronaldo but I'm not going to" - Dunphy's notoriously level-headed fellow pundit John Giles adds some much-needed balance.
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THE END O THE ROAD FOR O'RANGERS?
Correct opinions about the manager of a Premier League team that were aired by the Fiver's podcasting wing earlier this week prompted a flurry of poorly spelt emails from overweight, bare-chested, tattooed, Brown Ale-swilling football fans who wished to complain about our lazy regional stereotyping.
It's a shame, because today's Fiver had every intention of writing a story about the Pope's O'Rangers' Euro Vase semi-final first leg against Fiorentina at Ibrox tonight, but had to abandon its plan for fear the use of phrases such as "deep-fried Mars bar", "help ma boab" or "red-haired, surly, penny-pinching Highlander who speaks with an impenetrable accent" would trigger the slap on the wrist that broadcasting police Ofcom have threatened us with if we step out of line again.
With the battle-weary O'Rangers still fighting for silverware on three fronts (they've already won the McCarling Cup), they've earned their 15 minutes of Fiver fame. But now a massive fixture pile-up that could force them to play eight matches simultaneously has threatened to derail their season. "The two Fiorentina matches and the game against [the Queen's] Celtic are huge, huge games," och-ayed stoic O'Rangers manager Walter Smith, who will be without - deep breath - Allan McGregor, Barry Ferguson, Kevin Thomson, Lee McCulloch, Chris Burke and Steven Naismith tonight. "I don't think tiredness will come into it tonight. This game is above all that."
Meanwhile, in the Fiorentina camp, defender Alessandro Gamberini has been gesticulating furiously and shouting "mamma mia!" over the appalling state of the Ibrox bog. "You have to be careful with the pitch but it might just help us concentrate," he declared. Gamberini and his team-mates clearly haven't monitored O'Rangers' progress through Euro Vase this season - anyone who has could tell them that most of tonight's match will be contested in the Glasgow sky.
Follow the Pope's O'Rangers' Euro Vase travails against Fiorentina in John Ashdown's minute-by-minute report from 7.15pm.
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THE RUMOUR MILL
Mark Schwarzer has finally bowed to the pressure of his German name and will sign for Bayern Munich this summer.
Expect St James' Park to be bulging at the seams some lunchtime this summer as the passionate hordes turn out to Scott Parker's three-years-late shadow Steve Sidwell to the north-east.
What are those round things high in the sky over Lisbon? They're the footballs Benfica's players are using to practise their clearances now that they've heard Sam Allardyce and his 165-man backroom team of vision awareness experts and holistic healers are coming to town.
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NEWS IN BRIEF
The mother of Chelsea midfielder Frank Lampard has died. Pat Lampard, 58, was admitted to hospital 10 days ago with pneumonia. "Frank would like to acknowledge and say thank you for the compassion shown to him by the manager Avram Grant and all the staff at Chelsea during what has been a terribly traumatic period for him and his family," said a spokesman for the Chelsea player.
Second-Choice Steve has found a loophole in the law preventing criminals from profiting from their crimes and secured a gig working as a Euro 2008 pundit on BBC Radio Five Live. "We are confident we have made the right choice," fibbed a BBC spokesman, repeating what the FA said when it hired him.
Internazionale coach Roberto Mancini has confirmed Arsenal midfielder Alexander Hleb is one of his targets. "We have already spoken about the players we would like to sign," said Mancini, lining up Hleb, Gokhan Inler and Abdoulay Konko in his cross-hairs.
Derby County coach Stan Ternent has been rewarded for his sterling work this season by being appointed manager of Huddersfield Town.
John Arne Riise has removed the bag from his head and spoken out about the heroic injury-time equaliser he scored in front of the Kop on Tuesday night. "What can I say? I'm ashamed and devastated. I'm disappointed, but I won't go around and hang my head. I have to use this as something positive."
And despite being wined and dined at St James' Park by Newcastle executive director (football) Dennis Wise, Croatia midfielder Luka Modric has not been put off becoming the club's most expensive signing and will complete a club record £20m transfer in the close season.
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STILL WANT MORE?
The bad news is that the Guardian Police have removed all 10,937 entries featuring oven-roasted Staff Terriers. The good news is that we were still left with enough amusing Park Ji-sungs to exhibit in the Gallery.
This week's Classic YouTube features a chain-smoking football genius (no, not Dunphy), scorpion-kicked goals and a blacked-up-as-John-Barnes Michael Barrymore losing the plot.
Jonathan Wilson is so passionate about eastern European football that a woman once dumped him for shouting out Torpedo Moscow midfielder Vladimir Yeremkin's name mid-coitus. Here's his take on enigmatic Euro Vase semi-finalists Zenit St Petersburg.
Conrad Leach wrote this article about the Mysterious Brazilian Dressing Room Stink Fiasco before the world's most tea-timely football email was implicated by 1,057 different accusers in today's Fiver letters.
Fiver Towers resident Gregg Roughley is running 223 miles from London to Liverpool for a crime he didn't commit. Laugh at his distress in his daily blog, then sponsor him a couple of quid here.
And in tomorrow's £0.80 Big Paper: all the latest alt-rock releases and Scandinavian Arthouse flicks critiqued in Film & Music; Marina Hyde skewers more celebrity pomposity in Lost In Showbiz; and Kakuro 675 enjoys its 15 minutes of fame on the G2 Puzzles page.
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FIVER LETTERS
"If Romario's vague 'mile-high club' boast (yesterday's news in brief) is anything like his claims of how many times he's scored on the pitch, then he's probably exaggerating an occasion when he indulged in a solo effort at home while watching a DVD of Airport 1975" - Jim Adamson.
"Re: Lionel Messi unsheathing his mace (yesterday's Fiver). Come on, that's a blatant attempt to upset D&D geeks. Everyone knows you don't sheath a mace, you trolls" - Nick Danger.
"Surely the Fiver is now the prime suspect in the Brazilian Dressing Room Stink Fiasco, as it is a basic tenet of law that he who said the rhyme did the crime" - Joe Brewer (and 1,056 others).
"I'd like to point out that Wednesday's edition of the News in Brief erroneously listed the 'Conflicts of Interest' section for Silvio Berlusconi as containing 605 words. If you were to remove the words "Citation Needed" in the three instances where they appear, you would have 603 words. Should you leave them in, you would have 609 words. I was not sure which you used in your calculations, so gave you both sets of numbers" - Scott Gibbings.
Send your letters to the.boss@guardian.co.uk.
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'THE REASON I PREFER SHOES TO FOOTBALL IS BECAUSE THEY ARE MUCH PRETTIER. THE END'
Source: guardian.co.uk
