Frankly, New Deal Will Save Bling Fc Money

Sun Herald

Sunday January 8, 2006

MATTHEW HALL

FORMER Socceroos coach Frank Farina and Queensland Roar striker Alex Brosque have angrily hit out at suggestions they will be at Bling FC next season. They can swat away rumours all they like but whispers from the club's Bondi Junction headquarters suggest both arrivals are done deals. Brosque's move is less controversial but in Farina's favour is that he will cost the club about $500,000 less than current coach Pierre Littbarski in salary. Sydney say they want to keep Litti - and they probably do - but the 1990 World Cup winner might find it difficult to accept a dramatic pay cut. It's all about economics, you see. This one will run for a while yet.

Di Canio is one Il Duce

PAOLO Di Canio is alive and well (sort of), and continuing to cause trouble, this time in Rome with his beloved Lazio. Di Canio has been fined and banned for one match after making fascist salutes to Lazio fans, not often known for their left-wing sympathies. "I've had time to reflect and I have decided to put the good of Lazio before my interests," he said, promising an end to Mussolini impersonations. "I will avoid certain displays in public, situations which are so devilish for some people. I will continue my battle for liberty in other ways for my fans. I will give them a certain look and that will be enough for us to understand each other." Supporters have opened a bank account to help poor Paolo pay his EUR10,000 ($16,200) fine.

Don't mention the war

OH, dear. An English artist has got his World Cup controversy in early by painting a picture depicting Rio Ferdinand and Wayne Rooney (pictured) beside British wartime leader Winston Churchill. Michael Browne, who once painted Eric Cantona as Jesus Christ, claims Churchill's presence in his painting is not intended to flame memories of World War II. "Churchill is there as he sums up the bulldog spirit of England," Browne said. "This isn't anti-German."

SURELY THE SHIRE?

ADMIT it, it's been on your mind since the Asian Cup draw last Wednesday. The only venue suitable for the Australia-Lebanon Asian Cup qualifier on March 1 is Shark Park at Cronulla. The only hurdle is whether the ground meets strict FIFA requirements. Redevelop! Upgrade! Do what it takes! You know it makes sense!

Diouf spits dummy about old Red teammates

LIVERPOOL'S new year visit to Bolton made clear that few of El-Hadji Diouf's former Anfield teammates were on his Christmas card list. "I don't like some of them," said the Senegal striker, who had an awful time when he joined Liverpool after the 2002 World Cup. "On the pitch, they want to kill me. When you play for a team, some are your mates and some are not, that is life. I have a big character but I don't like people talking behind my back, like [Jamie] Carragher, who was talking to me all the time on the pitch." Diouf so annoyed Carragher during the game that the Liverpool player was cautioned for kicking the ball at Diouf's head. And Steven Gerrard and Mohamed Sissoko were accused of stamping on Bolton players. Happy New Year!

AUSSIE COACH POACH

ONE thing is certain after the World Cup in Germany in the middle of this year: there will be a dramatic change to the Socceroos set-up. Coach Guus Hiddink and his assistant Graham Arnold are certainties to move on to greener pastures and the inside word is that overseas clubs will poach more backroom staff.

Party-pooper Hantz

FREDERIC Hantz, coach of French side Le Mans, came up with an unusual method of keeping his players on the straight and narrow for New Year's Eve. He scheduled a training session at 2am on New Year's Day. "You cannot party like crazy on the first and be fully fit three days later for a match," Hantz said. "There were two solutions: I was either extending our training week until January 1, or I left the 31st free for everyone but the players would come for a meeting between 12.30 and 2.30am. The players preferred the second solution and chose the time."

How Rids buried Leeds

GOOD news for Leeds fans, part one: former chairman Peter Ridsdale has been cleared of any "purposeful wrongdoing" in the Yorkshire club's dramatic financial collapse. The British Government took 18 months to investigate Leeds's freefall. The outcome suggests the club collapsed - debts of more than $200 million were racked up under Ridsdale - because of incompetence rather than malice. Part two (we were only joking about it being good news, by the way): should Leeds do the unthinkable and win promotion to the Premier League, the club will have to immediately pay ##5 million ($11.8m) to creditors. The club had debts of #60m when it was relegated in 2004 and has a complicated system of repayment in place. Leeds are third in the Championship.

A quick word with . . .

THE Fanatics' Warren Livingstone, unperturbed by fans unhappy about failed applications for World Cup tickets. "There would be no other sports organisation in Australia that could have handled it as well as us," he said. We presume that is meant to be reassuring. The Fanatics application system had 85,000 tickets handed out in a virtual email lottery. Internet restrictions meant applications were processed as they were received, rather than sent.

© 2006 Sun Herald

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