Moyes was not Man Utd’s first choice

I believe there's some truth in it. Ancelotti is, apparently, nailed on for the Real Madrid job. Why would he go to the worlds biggest club when he could go to the actual real biggest club in the world?

Could it be there were no smoke and mirrors? Shock!

-'Look mon ami, we're gonna say Fergie offered it to Ancelotti to take the heat off us tapping him up. Ancelotti will be cool with it because it looks like he was in the loop. Just don't push the story. Let it grow, like, organically.''

This one has presented an interesting quandary. Ammunition to say that maybe he's not quite 'the chosen one' offset by having to accept that the decision was a recent one.

Personally, I think it's probably better to keep an open mind about individuals in the game and just mistrust all the media.

Combined with the end of year accounts being bad and DM looking at having to break up his squad to pay back the banks and try to rebuild on the scraps he's thought "fcuk this for a game of soldiers" and given SAF a call.

Hanging on hedging his bets lying through his back teeth while praying for the stars to align really does add up with every machiavellian falsehood.

Why timely?

Well because when there is no summer football, the newspapers are under pressure and when they're under pressure, the level of bullshit increases.

Is the story above true?

It might be and it might not be (indisputable fact - we don't know either way).

It states..

"The Metro reports how Julien Laurens, who writes for Le Parisien, believes.."

So there's the story - some feller 'believes'.

Ok to be fair that's not quite ALL the story, there's...

“Very reliable sources tell Le Parisien that..."

So a feller 'believes' and a very reliable (UNNAMED!) source tells.

Well, that's good enough for me!

Seriously, if you were in the alehouse and some feller said 'I believe Brendan Rodgers is coming to Everton' you would ask "WHY do you believe this?"

If the answer was "A reliable source told me" you would then ask "Who?"

If the response was 'I can't say' or 'I'm not telling you', an entirely legitimate response would be "well fuck off then".

Wouldn't it?

We are going to be getting double-bubble this summer.

First re the appointment of a new manager, then re transfers.

It is going to be fucking relentless and 99.9% of it will be total and utter bollocks.

What to look out for?

"An insider yesterday informed us.."

"Sources close to the player..."

"Friends believe..."

"Those closest to the player think.."

"It is believed the player won't be..."

"Club officials are thought to be..."

Etc etc etc.

It is all newspaper-speak for "We don't know..but we'll take a guess..and then we'll present our guess as fact and hope you mugs swallow it"

It is going to be a loooooooooooong old summer.

Rodgers out!

Ok, in short, I went to a pre-season against Aberdeen with a few mates.

There was a feller in the Everton End who imo made a huge twat of himself during the game (he could be identified as he had a replica shirt on with 'Lyon' on the back)

He was constantly goading their supporters, not watching the game (actually spent half the game facing away from the pitch imploring us all to sing our hearts out 'for the lads' etc).

Anyway back then, I used to write the odd piece for WSAG and I sent in a 'match report' that was mainly about the antics of this feller.

It was printed and in the issue after that, he responded.

It's so long ago I can't remember specific details of his response but he wasn't happy and hinted that if he knew what I looked like, I might be in trouble.

I think I responded to his response saying the reason he didn't know what I looked like, is because I had the good sense not to plaster my name all over my back and act like a twat.

I also seem to remember saying "actually I really fancy you" and describing my 'look' as being very like Dick Emery doing 'Honkey-Tonk'

So as you can see, it was all grown up stuff.

So would you have expected him to sign a new contract on that basis? Or have walked away from the Club and not honoured his contract and lef the Club in the lurch?