Saturday, December 23, 2006

Interstellar Overdraft



Now my grasp of economics is rudimentary at best. For proof of this you need look no further than my bank accounts monthly slide towards the red. Going back a bit further I can cite my C in Economics A-Level, the final product of two years spent alternating between bafflement and boredom. So my grasp of fiscal good sense is shaky in the extreme.

That said, I’m versed in the fact that money is ultimately an entirely notional, abstract concept. Goods and services have no innate value in themselves, we merely attach arbitrary values that float free of reality. Who decides that The Most Talked About Footballer of his Generation should earn more than the nurse tending the elderly and infirm this Christmas Eve? With both of these things said I’m finding it impossible to get my head around the mind-boggling levels of debt that continue to accumulate on the back of the Glazer takeover as revealed in the Times the other day.

All money may well be notional, but the notion of £656 million is just a little too abstract for me to wrap my head around. Try as I might, I simply can’t fathom how the Glazers plan to turn United into a profit-making organisation. The phrase voodoo economics seems particularly apt, but what little information trickles out of the Glazer camp provides little indication of how they plan to pull off the ultimate conjuring trick and make the debt disappear.

In the circumstances it’s virtually impossible not to find the pledges made about stadium naming rights and collective TV bargaining disingenuous. At least they’re upfront about exhibition matches straddling the globe, but the acres of empty seats on the most recent jaunt abroad should prove salutary here. Ticket prices will of course rise, the elasticity of our loyalty no doubt being tested to its utmost. According to the Times the Glazer’s feel that tickets at Old Trafford are undervalued when compared with other Premiership clubs, essentially those clustered around the capital. Of course they neglect to point out the fact that many workers in the Northwest are equally under-valued in comparison to their Southern counterparts.

The only glimmer of positivity to emerge from the Times report was the dismissal of Chelsea’s prospects of ever competing with United in the domain of, and a chill passes over the soul as I even contemplate using these words, brand recognition. Unless Kenyon will be able to manufacture a history for his adopted first-love by 2014, his chances of making good on his claim that Chelsea will be a bigger name than United look utterly hopeless.

Meanwhile the level of debt continues to soar, and the Glazers believe that we’ll be happy to be fobbed off with the purchase of a Galactico every couple of seasons. I’d like to think that they’re wrong, but deep inside, I worry that they could be right.

Sunday, December 17, 2006

Deal


I rarely travel to away games, particularly ones in that there London - and if you think that robs me of the right to pontificate on United related matters, well I'm partially inclined to agree, but degrees of fandom is an issue I don't want to dwell on here. Anyway, this meant I could skip the post-mortem from Upton Park - which no doubt consisted mostly of Keys and Gray chuckling at what a wag Jose is and how justified he was in his smug conviction that Chelsea would ease past United before too long - and get stuck straight into Deal or No Deal.
.
Before long I was wrapped up in the game and all the foul-mouthed rage that had filled the living room a few minutes earlier, had evaporated quicker than a 9 point lead. When the banker weighed in with a penultimate offer of £41,000 I was screaming at the TV urging her to take it. When she declined I could sense implosion looming. But it never materialised, and by the end, only the 250,000 and 10,000 remained. The banker offered in excess of 100, 000 (the precise amount escapes me) and, quite sensibly, she dealt. Quids in, and the fact that if she'd have held her nerve she would have scooped the 250,000 which was sitting plump in front of her throughout the game, was a mere technicality.
.
What does all this have to do with United? Well, if at the start of this season you'd have offered me a two point lead over Chelsea going into Christmas, no real injury issues - in fact the treatment room clearing out in preparation for the festive season -,Henrik Larsson in the wings poised to wreak havoc in the Premiership, I would have said 'Deal' faster than Ronnie tearing down the touchline. In short I'd have taken the £100,000 and not let the fact that it could have been 250K bother me, just like I refuse to let the fact that it could still be a five point lead steal all my pre-festive cheer.
.
So, United two points clear of the rent-boys? Deal or no deal?
.
Deal

Friday, December 08, 2006

With hatchets, hammers and moustache trimmers


Less than 24 hours to go to the first derby of the season, and I'm sure that the residents of Stockport are already grooming their moustaches in anticipation - removing a few stray foodstuffs that have been lodging in the bristles for a couple of months while they're about it - as they ready themselves to show us what being a real football fan is all about. No doubt they will - hilariously - serenade us with cries of USA, and remind us that, courtesy of their wonky geography and skewed grasp of history, they are the only football team to come from Manchester.
Most amusingly, they will sing that nonsense about the invisible man and not being really here, the irony of the fact that, unless they're playing Man United, they very rarely are, being totally lost on the lazer blue brigade.
.
Indeed when I happened to flick on Sky on Monday night - part of a Clockwork Orange style attempt to make my daughter flinch at the merest glimpse of a blue shirt - I assumed that some sort of emergency evacuation of the ground was underway so vast were the expanses of empty seats. But it was raining. And it was a Monday night. And it was only Watford. And it's nearly Christmas. And did you know we once took 500,000 to Blackburn?
.
Of course it must be disappointing that city's efforts to rebrand themselves as the Britain's first green club - their commitment to recycling demonstrated in the continued employment of Paul Dickov who really ought to have been melted down for scrap by now - and Britain's first pink football club - feel free to insert your own Nicky Weaver joke here - are not paying off at the turnstile. The sad fact is that until they rebrand themselves as something other than the most turgid and unwatchable side in Britain, the seats are likely to remain unoccupied. Until we turn up to win the league in May that is.
.
Needless to say the quality of football on display was utterly abysmal and, like most games involving city, stands as a useful corrective to anyone still inclined to recycle the clapped out idea that 'The Premiership is the best league in the world'. That said, in comparison to city's recent stodge-fest against Newcastle, the Watford game was as incandescently brilliant as West Germany V Italy in the summer.
.
So the form book - that handy rhetorical invention - suggests that annihalation is on the cards. So why do I feel ever so slightly jittery? Why have recent derbies been such frustrating affairs? Why do I have this fear that they'll be cavorting as they grab a point and celebrate like they've just heard it's two for one on stonewashed jeans at Matalan? Why do I have this dread that Alex will start with Kieran Richardson on the wing?
.
Here's hoping that my foreboding feelings are as misplaced as a Kieran Richardson pass and that come tomorrow afternoon it's a celebratory swig of mulled wine on Albert Square, and tears falling into taches the length and breadth of Stockport.

Thursday, December 07, 2006

Stop, thief!

Ethical dilemmas of our time, Part 212. It's the Everton game last week and I arrive, as is my usual custom, about 45 minutes before kick-off, giving me ample time get a coffee and to buy and read a programme. At this point of course I must offer some kind of flimsy apology for the fact that both of these purchases stick more revenue in the Glazer coffers. Eighteen months ago, when an air of militancy still buzzed around Old Trafford, the idea was that those of us who were opposed to the Glazer coup but were unable to sever our connection to M16 and up sticks to FC would boycott anything that wasn't a match ticket. Indeed there was much heady talk of barricading concessions, stopping anyone handing over cash to the midget. How long ago and quaint it all seems now. So please accept this admission of how morally compromised I am and move on.

Anyway, I've got my programme and order a coffee. Being super-efficient and always eager to please I tender exactly the right money. And this is where the ethical dilemma bit kicks in. The bloke behind the counter, decides that, seeing as I gave the right amount, he might as well save himself a few seconds and not bother running it through the till. Indeed, he might as well go a bit further and not bother opening the till, and just nurses it in his hand, from where I'm pretty sure it was quickly transferred to his trouser pocket.

Now I could be wrong here. Indeed I could be unfairly maligning a soul of unblemished virtue. it's equally possible that United may have some kind of stringent and highly invasive policy of checking the pockets of all staff just on the off chance anyone does try to siphon a bit of the revenue stream off for themselves. But I reckon the guy just saw the chance to pocket £1.50 and took it.

So should I applaud this act or decry it? Was he stealing from me or was he stealing from Malcolm Glazer? No doubt he receives an obscenely small amount for his labours and I really shouldn't resent him topping up his pittance. But couldn't he have at least gone halves with me so I could join in the feeling of getting one over on Malc, even if it was only to the tune of such a meagre amount?