Moaning Geezers

There's always a tipping point in a Premier League season, where managers under pressure can't be bothered to zip it any longer and out pours the bile in a kaleidoscopic yawn, such as you might see from a Bigg Market reveller on a Friday night .

This weekend is a case in point. They were all at it. Harry Redknapp says he can't play Adel Taarabt cos he's three stone overweight, a fantastic achievement by the lad in four months. The old cockney claims he could get about the park quicker than the Fatman of Fez. Maybe so, but could Richard Dunne outsprint either of them?

Who ate all the couscous?

Clearly Redknapp's demeanour isn't helped by losing a game against a bloody awful Liverpool team. Even Rodgers couldn't hide from the outrageous fortune of two own goals, a quite bewildering array of misses (Leroy Fer's first chance suggests he couldn't hit a Taarabt from five yards) and a lively performance from Sleepy Sterling.

Harry insists he's not under pressure. Er... he is. When you're bottom of the league and your central defenders are running them into your own net from everywhere, you're in deep doo-doo. Word is he would have had Taarabt on the bench, but the subs at the other end of it were terrified of what might happen to them when the Moroccan sat down.

Meanwhile Garry Monk, whose Swansea team started so brightly, is incensed that the lack of a win since August is down to bad refereeing. Also, down to poor finishing, but hey let's not your team's inadequacies get in the way, eh? And it was one bad refereeing decision on Sunday, Garry. Moses went down like a tablet of stone and the ref bought it. The dolt. How could he?

Well, he bought it not just cos of crowd pressure but because Moses decided to try and con him. It's typical of the ridiculous hypocrisy that football perpetuates that a referee can be pilloried while the cheat is almost forgiven as it's 'part of the game'.

Not that Monk's forgiven him. Apparently the Swansea City team ethic is so squeaky-clean that players get bans for doing that sort of thing. We'll see - but it's nice to hear some proper condemnation of the dive.

Meanwhile mealy-mouthed Mark Hughes reckons that Shawcross didn't foul Bony, and that somehow poor Ryan's getting picked on after some intrusive analysis into aspects of the lad's defensive play. In other words, just because Shawcross holds onto attackers like a kid holding on to the handlebars during his first ever bike ride, he shouldn't be penalised.

Well, fact is, Sparky, he should. It doesn't happen, no. But it should. And in this case it did. Definite penalty kick. And Hughes took Shawcross out of man-marking duties after that which probably goes to show that if more refs gave such decisions, wrestlers like Ryan might be relieved of their duties more often.

Meanwhile, look at Arsene Wenger's interview with Jacqui Oatley. This is as close as you can get to watching Wenger call someone a total fucking idiot. Oatley asked searching questions that were effectively asking Le Prof 'Why aren't your team doing very well?' 'My God you still need a holding midfielder and a decent centre-back' and 'Are you saying you couldn't win cos they defended too much?'

Yes, these are the sort of polite and fair questions that are bound to incense a football manager, and Arsene responded by suggesting that the reporter - she - 'wasn't listening very well' and was asking incomprehensible questions. Petty France. Not dignified.

Yes it's a long time since Arsenal won that Community Shield, innit? It's a long time since Swansea were in the top three, And it's a long time since anyone got beat 8-0. (Save the best til last).

Gus Poyet actually mustered a reasonably controlled response to the hammering, given that Sunderland caved in like a bamboo bath chair beneath an elephant's arse. The Uruguayan confessed to utter embarrassment and admitted that there were some players who basically hid behind the furniture for the last twenty minutes.

Vito in happier times

Vito Mannone lived up to his appearance - his performance was as Gru-some as the other Despicable Mes in the team - but at least he's offering the fans their money back for a 700-mile round-trip of abject misery.

And that's the least he could offer, Frankly Southampton couldn't have had more freedom and space had they been offered an afternoon at a cabinet minister's country pile. Koeman sat there like a Dutch Buddha, smirking away and probably feeling none too troubled by the fact that he can no longer call on Lovren, Lambert and Lallana. Indeed why Brendan Rogers persists with Balotelli when honest Rickie sits on the bench in Taarabt-like inactivity is beyond me. People keep telling us how talented the lad is. Irrelevant! He's a lazy little sod. Lazy enough to get into Sunderland's first team.

PS Boro. 3rd. Just saying.