The Empty Threats Of Little Lord

(Image from here)

I'm thinking that it's probably time for Le Havre to shut up about Paul Pogba. There's yet another interview with someone from Le Havre in the papers this morning, in which there is this fact that is missed by most papers but a couple of them do pick it up; from The Mirror:

Le Havre revealed they were happy to let Pogba go to French giants Lyon before United stepped in, an argument that weakens their case.

Weakens? Seems like a bit of understatement. All this talk of morality from Le Havre and it would seem that they simply had a gentleman's agreement with Lyon, which, no doubt, would have seen them make a bit more cash off Pogba. The fact that this guy says the following in the same interview seems beyond belief:

"We spend five million euros [about £4.3million] on our academy every year out of a turnover of 12 million euros. It is a huge investment.

"We do that to give a chance to our players to develop for our first team, not to be an academy for others.

"What is the point of investing in an academy if the players leave at 16? This is clearly a message from FIFA to protect the education system."

So you want to give him a chance to develop for the first team by selling him onto Lyon? Are these people for real?
The Sun has a great quote from Pogba's former trainer:

French trainer Laurent Herpe, who worked with Pogba two years ago, said: "I'm delighted that he's going to England.

"He doesn't need any authorisation from Le Havre which never upgraded him to professional level."

And from The Daily Star:

“He owes Le Havre nothing.” Mr Herpe said Le Havre will get two instalments of 90,000 euros for the transfer for training Pogba over two years.

So let's just stop with the sour grapes...
The other newspaper stupidity of the moment continues with the dive that no-one thinks is a dive still being discussed as a dive. This in The Mail is brilliant. Headlined, "Diving into the Rooney row," they have a string of "experts," none of whom think it was a dive. Surely for there to be a "row" someone has to take the opposing view?
The main quote from the Slovenian camp is pretty stupid, it seems to say that Rooney didn't dive but he still should be ashamed of himself for some unknown reason:

“I’m not happy. He is a good player, but I did not expect this from a player from a good team with his quality.

“It was wrong for him to do this. It was not fair play, but this is football. I don’t know what we can do about it now.

“It was a foul for us. Maybe Rooney should have been yellow-carded.

“In this situation the referee did not do well. He gave it because England is a bigger national team than Slovenia.

“From what I saw it was a foul against us. When the referee does something wrong it is like a player doing something wrong.

“We can all do something wrong, but I do think the referee for the Croatia game will be at a higher level.”

What didn't he expect? Rooney to challenge for a ball and end up fouling the opposing player? The horror... Save your ire for the ref.
Still on Rooney and there's some comments from Sir Alex on him:

Ferguson told Inside United magazine: "The boy's got a real hunger and drive about him. He has so much energy that sometimes he overdoes it in the sense that he wants to use it all; he'll drop into midfield or he'll go outside left.

"But he's young, and young players tend to sometimes be that way - they want to spend all their energy on the pitch.

"But if he concentrates like he did at Wigan and spends more time in the central areas rather than the wide positions then he will get goals. There's no doubt about that."

Some words from Giggs on his longevity:

"Football is my life and I will look for another challenge in the game," said Ryan.

"I accept I'm not going to be playing at 40 and when my body tells me I can't sustain playing at this level I know it will be time to call it a day.

"I want to finish playing at the top and have no intention of playing in the lower leagues. I have done my coaching courses and would like to stay in the game in some capacity.

"There are numerous opportunities that will allow me to stay in the game be it in coaching, the media or training in some capacity, but I have no direct plan.

"I'm told you can inadvertently fall into management like Mark Hughes and then you get bitten by the bug. At the moment I feel as good as I have been because I don't play as much. When I do play I feel a lot more refreshed."

And finally, The Sun links us with a goalkeeper:

MANCHESTER UNITED are eyeing Russian goalkeeper Igor Akinfeev as they prepare for life after Edwin van der Sar.

Manager Alex Ferguson has already started planning for the Dutchman's retirement - and CSKA Moscow's Akinfeev is one of his options.

The keeper, 23, has impressed for club and country since arriving on the scene five years ago.

He has been on the radar of a number of Europe's top teams and Fergie does not want United to miss out.