Careful what you wish for

For the sake of Newcastle, I hope this is an April Fools joke. For Match of the Day viewers, I so hope it isn't...

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Hands across the web

Q: Would some of the greatest poetry in the English Language simply be reduced to cliché if spoken by some ex-footballers on a couch in a television studio?

A: Yes.

For a longer version of the above, wander over to the wonderful A More Splendid Life where I have once more ripped off channelled the spirit of Alan Coren in a guest post.

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Alan Shearer

Tributes have been pouring in for Alan Shearer, who was brutally murdered in the BBC studios last night by an unknown assailant.

Mr. Shearer, 38, had just finished an appearance as a pundit on BBC's Match of the Day when he was set upon by a man believed to be in his twenties, who was wielding what was later discovered to be the severed DJing arm of Spoony. The man beat Mr. Shearer with the detached limb, screaming incoherently. Witnesses believe they detected an Irish accent.

Mr. Shearer's last word is believed to have been: "Gerroff!"

Friends and colleagues have been reminiscing about Mr. Shearer's career. Lee Dixon, who also featured on last night's edition of Match of the Day, spoke of the great loss to the football community:

"People will talk about his hundreds of great goals for club and country, and, of course, his magnificent leadership skills. But what we'll all remember is his punditry.

"Alan was the people's footballer, and that was reflected in his TV work. He just wanted to share the wisdom that he gained during his long career with those less fortunate."

A devastated Alan Hansen spoke warmly of his friend's studio skills:

"His analysis was always spot on. Like when he suggested that Wayne Rooney punch Cristiano Ronaldo after the Portuguese winker disgracefully got his club-mate sent off in the 2006 World Cup.

"Or his technique when analysing action replays. What the ordinary punter wants - what the gormless non-ex-professional footballer wants - is to be told exactly what's happening in a replay. If someone has made a great run, the viewer wants an expert to say 'great run'. If a cross come in and it's headed wide, you have to have someone to tell you 'cross came in, and the header goes just past the post, and he'll be disappointed with that'. It takes a former player to tell you how the man who's just missed feels. And the better a footballer the pundit used to be, the better he'll be able to do that. Stands to reason."

Hansen talked about Mr. Shearer's fateful last appearance on the MotD sofa:

"Al's performance last night was typical of the man. Stubbsy asked him about the boy Rooney's alleged stamp on the Scandinavian lad. Al said, 'I don't think it was the greatest thing Wayne Rooney's ever done...I hope he gets away with it...Fingers crossed for him.'

"Al knew that it's a man's game. He got the big money because of his experience as someone who got away with kicking Neil Len...disentangling himself from Neil Lennon. It was a great display."

A BBC spokesperson said:

"We're all saddened by Alan's death. Whoever did this should be ashamed of themselves. There must be something wrong with a person who gets so upset by some people sitting on a couch and talking about football. He should get a life, or at least switch over to Two Pints of Lager and a Packet of Crisps on BBC Three."

The attacker was not apprehended. Mark Lawrenson is under police guard.

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Ready for drowning

Part two of my Newcastle witterings. (Strangely, it's devoid of the long-Germanic-hyphen-laden-adjectival-phrases that I seem to have become fond of. I have, however, been messing around with Microsoft Paint again...) Part one is here. Part three should be along tomorrow, but real life is determined to derail that plan at the moment, so we'll see how it goes...


Arguably more worrying and carrying greater potential for damage is the obsession with Alan Shearer.

Shearer's arrival at St. James' Park in 1996 came loaded with so much symbolism it's a wonder the city didn't slide into the North Sea. Here was the local boy returned, the sheet-metal worker's son come back to take the club to the promised land. He had been bought for more money than Gigi Lentini, and had snubbed Manchester United to boot. And, of course, he assumed the fabled number 9 shirt, instantly establishing himself in a cherished mythical lineage. That this mass of omen appeared in the middle of the club's dramatic regeneration, fuelled by John Hall's Geordie Nation rhetoric, ensured Shearer's dominant position in the Newcastle story at a pen-stroke.

Shearer is no idiot. All he has had to do to become the anointed one is do his loadsagoals thing, say nothing of substance in public and let the Geordie yearning for a better tomorrow take hold. His shrewdness once doomed managers. Now it is employed in silently teasing fans before being invited by Gary on MotD to comment whereupon, like a Cabinet minister, he declares that he has no ambition to be leader - not yet, anyhow.

I'm far too lazy and irresponsible to check this up, but I would wager that one could measure the time it took after his signing for someone to suggest that he would one day be the club's manager in days rather than months or years. It is astonishing how someone whose abilities for the job remain so completely unknown can apparently click his fingers at a time of his choosing and move into his new office. The longer the perpetual crisis perpetuates, the more this situation seems to fasten. It is all rather reminiscent of Britain after almost two decades of Tory government, waiting for the life raft to arrive piloted by another expert politician who professed to have an undying love for the Magpies. That turned out interestingly.

(As it goes, the employment of a British politics analogy here is quite apt. In an effort to apply some statistical rigour to this issue, the good people in the Sport Is A TV Show labs, in the basement here at SIATVS Mansions, have put the current situation at Newcastle through their patented tragedy metric, the Tragedy Metric (memo: hire new metric namer). On a scale from 'a somewhat disappointing ending to a movie you were kind of looking forward to seeing' to 'multiple wedding ceremony bereavement', Newcastle score 'Young Conservatives' Disco'. Truly these are grave times on Tyneside.)

Next time: Hitchcock! Larkin! Wire! Bob 'n' Terry! Me!

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