Earlier this week, our favourite Sevco website, Ibrox Noise, wrote an “open letter” to BT Sport’s Chris Sutton.
Let’s just say they did not sign it with hearts or flowers and it wasn’t delivered with a candy-gram or a stripper.
It came shortly after a barmy group of Sevco fans had actually started a petition to have him removed from the air.
And these people just don’t get it. Sutton loves this stuff, and BT Sport love this stuff.
The more controversial he is the higher the ratings. Sutton knows exactly what he is doing.
I’ve watched a lot of him now and clearly he does say a lot of things just to stir the soup. He is a wind up merchant and a self-promoter; in his game, as in this one, it pays to be both. You need to be opinionated. You need to rock the boat a bit. But that doesn’t mean Sutton doesn’t take his job seriously. He doesn’t do this stuff just for the Hell of it; Chris Sutton goes where other hacks are too afraid to go, and he says the things they should.
Today a video was posted in which he has another pop at Pedro Caixinha, and I agree with every word of it. In the video, Sutton was speaking to The Sportsman, shortly before the transfer window shut, and he was asked about the Sevco boss’s recent comments about having the best team in Scotland.
“The best side in Scotland? Come on, do yourself a favour Pedro … You’re beginning to sound a bit like David Ike …”
And I laughed hearing that because I’ve spent weeks comparing Caixinha to Donald Trump, and here’s Sutton finding the perfect example, because Ike is a far better one than the President of the United States, who for all his witlessness has his stinky finger on the nuclear trigger and pretty much runs the shop. His very unpredictability forces you to take him seriously.
But Ike is a crackpot, who’s stock in trade is saying the most outlandish stuff. Nobody can take that seriously, nobody at all. Sutton knows exactly how that statement will play; that will be headlines in every newspaper tomorrow, and most of Scottish football will snigger with recognition. Sevconites will foam at the mouth.
It is hilarious. Sutton has hit the mark, once again, and basically sent a message to his critics that he won’t be shutting up, for anyone.
He will keep on poking them with a stick.
He will keep on telling it like it is.