No Celtic Manager Would Have Been Crazy Enough To Do What The Mooch Did Yesterday.
It is a well known fact that Celtic has encouraged the work of the bloggers, in no small part because we do what the club itself is not able to. We punch back at those who would otherwise scourge us and do so with a free hand. We go after the enemies that the club itself is too busy winning things to concern itself with. Which is not to say they don’t care.
Since he became boss at Ibrox, I have marvelled at the ability The Mooch has to make mischief for himself. That mouth of his is going to land him in all sorts of bother, and I’ve said this already.
Now he wants a public spat with Chris Sutton? Is he for real?
Let’s be honest, not everything The Mooch said yesterday was completely off base.
He is entirely right to say that some of the ex-players in the media are like a comedy act; I’ve written much worse about them and all of it is earned. But our club is happy to leave the slapping down of these people to the likes of me. It has no interest in waging war in the press, or with the press as the case might be at times.
That’s almost certainly the smart thing to do.
I cannot imagine, for the life of me, Ange Postecoglou slapping back at some idiotic comment from Kris Boyd.
Who has the time for a public spat with a halfwit?
I’m not comparing Boyd with Sutton; when I attacked the media the other day it was for treating that eejit’s comments as if they were serious commentary.
As far as I’m concerned, what Sutton said was serious commentary.
Are we not supposed to discuss the things he brought up?
If the cup final was poised at 0-0 and one of their players took advantage of a situation like the one at the weekend and put the ball in the net does anyone really believe, for even a minute, that we’d get that courtesy?
With a trophy at stake, on the day?
Would we offer that courtesy to them?
I don’t think we would. I don’t think we should, considering what their club represents and what it tracks back to.
The idea of showing sporting integrity to a club which really doesn’t recognise the term, even taking into account what happened last week … sorry, but no.
Sutton makes a legitimate point, and asks a legitimate question.
What if you were faced with a Livingston type situation, where they had wasted time for a whole 89 minutes?
Where’s the sportsmanship in players rolling around as if they’ve been shot?
Where’s the sporting integrity of the goalkeeper strolling about his penalty box after he’s already positioned the ball for a goal-kick? We’ve seen teams do that … is that sporting?
So in contrast to what the Village Idiot said the other day, I think Sutton was pursuing a legitimate line of debate and that makes what The Mooch has done all the more unbelievable.
He could have left it at “some of these ex=players are comedians” and left it at that, but he had to target Sutton quite explicitly, and not only does it show a crassness which Ange would never have gone in for, but it’s an incredibly stupid thing to have done as well. Which is all the more reason Ange would never have even contemplated it.
That man has better things to be doing than starting a media row.
The Mooch has lost his mind in doing this.
Sutton gives out stick to everyone, but here’s the thing; he doesn’t do it just to give out stick.
This is a guy who, much more than Boyd, is taken seriously as a pundit.
He’s got some gravitas and not only a column in a national newspaper but a very big megaphone in broadcasting from which to become a serious pain in The Mooch’s backside if he chooses to be.
Why do I have a feeling that he’s going to choose to be?
No football manager should have enough time on his hands to read what media personalities are saying about him.
It shows incredibly poor judgement and suggests a very thin skin, but even if none of that were true this guy has forgotten, if he ever knew, one of the oldest adages in the business; “never pick a fight with someone who buys ink by the barrel.”
Sutton is going to cane this guy harder than a Singapore housebreaker.