From the Sunday Times. Sums it up really
THAT lovable little Welsh imp Craig Bellamy apparently went on strike at West Ham United, because he wanted to be part of Harry Redknapps exciting revolution at White Hart Lane.
Harry is an ambitious man he is determined to lift Spurs to their rightful place in the league (17th) and understandably Craig found that prospect attractive before his 14m move to Manchester City last night. The strike, though, was a little like that by social workers a few years ago, when they downed tools for six weeks and nobody noticed. Bellamy hit seven league goals for West Ham since signing from Liverpool 18 months ago.
Meanwhile, at Chelsea, Didier Drogba, the scorer of precisely one league goal this season, has also gone on a sort of strike, his epic petulance having developed into a kind of rigor mortis, as you will have seen during Chelseas emphatic defeat at Old Trafford when Drogba displayed the agility and commitment of a fridge freezer. He is thought to want out and the intimation is that the skids are under Big Phil, too. The manager has had to cope with quite a few of his expensive monkeys acting all dissolute and distrait this season (allegedly, mlud) and it seems to have taken a toll on his mental faculties. Stoke City are more dangerous than all the teams in England and the world, he told the press.
Michael Owen is not particularly happy at Newcastle but will deign to stay there until the end of the season, blasting over the bar from three yards every so often just to show he is not properly himself. Ronaldo is apparently perpetually miffed, still aggrieved at being treated like a slave. Across the city at Middle Eastlands, Robinhos early enthusiasm for the Manchester City project seems to have evaporated. He feels he was misled. Now that it has become apparent that City are not about to storm the portals of Europe but have a rather greater chance next season of storming the portals at MK Dons, the energy seems to have flooded out of him. Kaka, who has been offered 500,000 a week, Kuwait and 72 virgins for eternity, still appears to have little intention of joining. And down at Fulham even Jimmy Bullard is grumbling. He thinks he can do better than a club on the fringe of European qualification. He feels he is being undervalued. They all do. The lot of them. They are too brilliant to be subjected to adversity, too gilded to play in teams that may, occasionally, lose. They deserve better.
I think this more than anything else more than the extortionate ticket prices, more than the obscene wages, more than the continual vilification of referees, the all-seater stadia, the predictability of outcome, the utter and complete triumph of money over everything is why I dislike the Premier League. There is not a soupon of loyalty among the players, just a bottomless pit of hubris and venality. The notion that a player should have a sort of spiritual commitment to his club, to his teammates and to the supporters has long since gone. As a consequence you must surely wonder what it is you are supporting as you make your way to Stamford Bridge or the Emirates or Old Trafford.
At the slightest intimation of failure a run of a few points dropped and a gentle glide down the league the players want out. It is not their fault that their team keep losing, it is the fault of their team-mates or the manager or the fans, or maybe the programme sellers.
Hired on extravagant contracts, the players leave their clubs on average once a season, lying through their teeth when asked why they wished to join, say, Spurs or Manchester City. (I felt it was time for me to take on the new challenge of earning a lot more money, in a very real sense). There is not the remotest commitment to the teams for which they play, which is why we have to witness, every week, the risible sight of goalscorers kissing the club badge when they have been lucky enough to beat Paul Robinson from inside their own penalty area.
Its called overcompensation. Most of them, I suspect, would struggle to describe their club badge if blindfolded. There is no sense of shared struggle, of responsibility, of loyalty. It used to gall us, as Millwall fans, that Teddy Sheringham would say, whenever he joined a new club, that hed supported them all his life. (Ive always held Colchester Utd dear to my heart . . .) But the current crop dont even bother with that little white lie. They dont even pretend to like the clubs that pay their wages.
I suppose we ought to tell ourselves the club player is a thing of the past. But the business now verges on the surreal. Maybe youre still hanging on in this transfer window, hoping your team will sign a decent goalscorer. Good luck hell be gone by September, unless you win the Champions League.