34
HINDSIGHT
Words by Barry J. Hindmarch
Hersh Shefrin says in Finance and the
Psychology of Investing, “Reality looks much
more obvious in hindsight than in
foresight.” I quite agree, Hersh old chap!
News has filtered through this week
that Joe Kinnear tried to sign the
lesser known of the three Toure
brothers in the summer. JFK
repeatedly tried to contact YoYo
Toure, only to find that he had gone
out, then came back, then walked the
dog, then came back, then gone
round the world, then came back,
then rocked the baby…………
Of course, our Director of F***all
has received a lot of criticism for the
lack of players acquired in the
summer. To be fair to Jackass Joe, he scoured
Europe looking for bargains. Unfortunately the
parts of Europe he scoured were mainly
beaches, night clubs, private yachts and Duty
Free shops – where he did get two bottles of
gin for the price of one and some cut price
Regal King Size! Bargain!!
Down the road at the Stadium of Plight, The
Mussolini of Mackemland, The Fascist of
Fulwell, The Muddy-kneed Moron, Paolo Di
Caniwho has been sacked after a mere 13
games in charge, and two wins. He actually
signed more players, 14, than he had games in
charge, which has got to be some kind of
record, and he successfully put the club back
where it belongs – heading straight towards the
Fizzy Pop League. Fans now are calling for
Ball to save their season – no, not Kevin Ball,
but local hero Beach Ball, who scored the
winner against Liverpool a couple of years ago.
Mr B Ball was last seen drifting out to sea near
Benidorm.
It was great to see Newcastle and Leeds fans
united in their
appreciation of the late
Gary Speed at the recent
Capital One Cup game.
The untimely death of
Speed shows that while
we as fans may think of
many footballers as overpaid prima donnas, we
don’t always realise that
they are still subject to
the same pressures in life
that the rest of us have.
Recently we have heard
how former United star
Keith Gillespie blew £7m
gambling, Kenny Samson, winner of 86 caps
for England is an alcoholic sleeping on the
street and barely a week goes by without a new
story about wayward genius Paul Gascoigne.
While we can easily point fingers and say
these men have nothing to worry about, fame
and fortune comes with its own pressures, and
we forget that footballers are still just young
men with people suddenly telling them that
they are the centre of the universe. It could be
quite easy to start believing this when people
are throwing money at you and idolising you.
Yes, some of these players (Nile Ranger for
instance), seem to just be morons who don’t
get quite how lucky they are, but even the
world’s top players, (George Best for
example), don’t appear to get the support and
guidance they need as young lads in the
goldfish bowl of pro football.
Photo: Davey Brown