The Warm-Up: Passive-aggressive Pep Guardiola's bizarre Yaya Toure blunder
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Updated 21/09/2016 at 07:53 GMT
Pep Guardiola had no earthly reason to pick a public fight with Yaya Toure and his agent, but Alex Chick is pleased he did. It's more fun when people are arguing pointlessly.
Fuhgeddaboudit!
Image credit: Reuters
WEDNESDAY'S BIG STORIES
Passive-aggressive Pep's bizarre Toure blunder
Life at Manchester City has been entirely rosy for Pep Guardiola; his team have hit the ground running, winning every game while debunking preconceptions that Guardiola’s teams play, to quote the England manager, tippy tappy b*****ks - all while his nemesis flounders sulkily across town.
But now we have our first sighting of Passive-Aggressive Pep in his assertion that he won’t consider Yaya Toure for selection until his agent apologises for saying the player was “humiliated” by being left out of the Champions League squad (a pretext that, in itself, sounds like some tedious Kardashian beef).
It was so difficult for me to put him out of the Champions League, so difficult. ... But the day after his manager [Seluk] spoke. In that moment Yaya is out. I cannot accept as a coach, when his player doesn't play, going to the media to speak and speak and speak. When [Seluk apologises] Yaya will be part of the group and he will have the same chance to play all the games.
A few things here:
- “In that moment Yaya was out” – well, no. Even in Guardiola’s telling of the story, he had binned Toure from the Champions League squad the previous day. Yaya was already out.
- “I cannot accept [agents] going to the media to speak and speak and speak.” – Agents go to the media and speak and speak and speak. It’s what they do. It is literally their job. Why not kick that dog for barking?
- "When [Seluk apologises] Yaya will ... have the same chance to play all the games.” Again, he won’t because he’s not in the Champions League squad. But more than that, are you really holding Yaya Toure responsible for what his agent says? The Warm-Up, speaking as a collective represented by Christopher Biggins, finds that a troubling precedent.
- Most of all, why did Guardiola feel he had to get involved? He had already won. He managed to ease out arguably City’s greatest-ever player with far less furore than met Mourinho’s defenestration of professional tennis mascot Bastian Schweinsteiger. It was over – and Toure’s agent’s anger was somewhat justified and entirely predictable – this, let’s remember, was a man who used a non-existent cake as the pretext for a transfer saga.
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Guardiola launches blistering attack on rebel Toure
Guardiola had no need to take the bait several weeks after it was laid. It was perfectly clear before Seluk’s comments that Toure had no future at City; pretending the player is an apology away from coming back is unnecessary and disingenuous.
If the Warm-Up were Seluk, it would call Guardiola’s bluff, apologise profusely then demand he keep his promise to restore Toure to the first team.
However the Warm-Up isn’t Seluk, who told Sky: "Guardiola wins a few games and think he is king. I live in Europe so I can say whatever I like and Guardiola can't stop me,” and amusingly suggested he will say sorry when Guardiola apologises to Manuel Pellegrini for his part in the Chilean’s dismissal.
And all you had to do, Pep, was say nothing at all...
Football: It's better when it doesn't really matter
The League Cup (sorry EFL Cup, the Warm-Up’s not buying your rebrand) did its thing at the King Power Stadium last night, providing a match with loads of goals, a bit of controversy and 30 bonus minutes though sadly no penalties.
Thoroughly enjoyable stuff that cemented the competition’s place as the most fun you can have on a Tuesday night without calling Keith Vaz.
The Warm-Up suspects the fact it matters less than other competitions actually enhances the enjoyment – nobody really minds losing all that much, so why not go out and have a crack, uninhibited by fear?
Throw in some rusty fringe players and you’ve got hilarious mistakes to add to the enticing mix. Terrific fun, all in all. More please.
The concussion discussion
Having been raised by cartoons, the Warm-Up has always believed that, when you get hit on the head, tweeting birds circle for a few seconds and a large bump comes up almost instantly. (Pro tip: The bump can be pushed back in by applying moderate pressure with the index finger.)
However it seems that being hit on the head also hurts your brain, hence the ruckus over Anthony Martial continuing to play while apparently dazed against Watford.
Our own Carrie Dunn offers a perceptive analysis of the situation here.
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Anthony Martial hits his head in Manchester United's game against Watford
Image credit: Reuters
Clearly, it is a serious issue, particularly in the US where the violence of NFL football has taken a horrible toll on players and concussion protocol is strictly enforced.
But the Warm-Up – as both a cynic and a Twitter-dweller - would be more inclined to engage with the issue if every banged head were not greeted with such a blast of sanctimony.
Call us old-fashioned, but we’d suggest post-match is when Man United should be putting their doctor in a treatment room with the injured player.
IN OTHER NEWS
And people say Nicklas Bendtner wasted his talent.
RETRO CORNER/DIRTY LAUNDRY
So Tom Adams thinks he has found peak Retro Internet in the form of Boli and Waddle, does he? It’s time to reach for the big guns – and for this we go beyond the confines of football.
17 minutes of Scottish teenagers interrogating Ian Botham might not sound that good, but you absolutely have to watch this episode of ‘Open to Question’ from 1986.
There’s no intro, so we jump straight into a defensive Botham telling a girl: “I think you’re missing the whole context, love” before expounding his views on nappy-changing.
Within a minute, he’s asked: “Is your wife satisfied with your attitude to child-rearing or do you think she resents your apparent immersion in your own sport?”
Botham is pure Brent (sample quote: "There are more deer in this country now than in the days of King Henry VIII. Fact.") but he emerges with our grudging respect for sitting through a grilling of unrelenting ferocity.
Watch it, watch it all.
HAT TIP
While we’re being all retro, take a look at the ever-superb David Squires’ cartoon commemoration of 20 years since Newcastle pumped Manchester United 5-0.
COMING UP
Remember the pure sadness of Soaking Roy Hodgson? Well, if that’s Mourinho tonight the massive Schadenfreude eruption will not just break the internet, but actually jolt the earth out of its orbit, and send it spinning into the sun. But it’ll probably still be worth it. Northampton v Manchester United: Live at 19:45.
In Thursday's Warm-Up Jack Lang has the pleasure of dissecting Mourinho's ultimate humilia... what's that? United claimed a routine 3-0 win? Oh, never mind
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