The Page That Is Looking Forward To The Soup

Bale Fest
Thankfully there has been no over-the-top reaction to Gareth Bale's rather decent form. The English media have definitely not got the slightest bit carried away. Oh no.

As an experiment, Mediawatch tried Control F and then searched for 'Bale' on the football front page of the Daily Mail website at 10.30am on Wednesday.

There were 44 matches. 44 (forty-four) matches! To put this into context, there were only 38 matches for the word 'football'.

This Bale-fest includes 13 separate articles about the man we're contractually obliged to call the 'Welsh Wizard'. Namely:

Rio: Think Bale is on the same level as Ronaldo? You don't know football!
Unstoppable...but how long before Gareth bails out?
How AVB turned Bale into...the Predator!
Chris Waddle: Bale will be worth 70mn if he produces this form in the Champions League
Matt Le Tissier: Even as a 17-yr-old at Southampton, Bale was a class apart
Keep Bale in Blighty: Sportsmail launches campaign
Bale knocked stuffing out of West Ham AND Arsenal with wonder goal
I haven't turned Spurs into a one-man team, insists Bale
REVEALED: How Bale came close to dropping into the Championship!
Top 10 Spurs players of all time...is Bale good enough to join?
Bale deserves to be player of the year says AVB
Today's poll...Should Bale quit Spurs this summer?
Bale hits last-gasp stunner to hand Spurs three points

That's 13 separate articles from a total of 52 football-related items on their site, giving Bale exactly 25% market share in the world of football newsworthiness. Wow. Imagine if he won something.


Blight
Let's focus for a minute on one of those headlines: 'Keep Bale in Blighty: Sportsmail launches campaign'.

Yes, that's a campaign - complete with logo seemingly drawn on a Mac by a five-year-old - to stop Bale joining any of those nasty foreign clubs. Mediawatch's challenge to you is to keep down the bile as you read on...

* 'The Barclays Premier League needs Gareth Bale. English football needs Gareth Bale.'

* 'He must be viewed by a generation of starry-eyed kids.'

* 'The Premier League needs heroes. And at the moment, Gareth Bale is the right kind of one.'

Recovered your stomach? Let's read on as Neil Moxley writes: 'It has been repeatedly thrown at him that the 23-year-old Welsh wizard 'doesn't fancy it'.'

Has it? Has it really? Mediawatch googled 'Gareth Bale doesn't fancy it' and simply generated links to the Daily Mail's 'Keep Bale in Blighty' campaign and a news story about Ashley Williams really not 'fancying' coming up against Bale. Well, who would?

Moxley has clearly been taking lessons from Oliver Holt (the king of the genre) on the finer points of the straw man argument. What's that phrase about wise men never arguing with fools again?


Harry's Game
Forgive us while we turn again to the Daily Mail (so you don't have to) and Sami Mokbel's piece about AVB transforming Bale into a 'predator'. He begins with an obligatory nod to Harry Redknapp...

'Former Spurs manager Harry Redknapp's influence on Bale's career is undeniable. Taking a player who was widely recognised as a left back and transforming him into one of the most feared wingers on the planet is something Redknapp should reflect on with immense pride when he retires to his Sandbanks residence.'

Is this the same Redknapp who still insisted after Bale's devastating performances on the wing against Inter Milan in 2010 that "in the long term I eventually see Gareth dropping back and playing at left-back where he can be one of the best, if not the best"?

Rednapp even admitted that Bale was only playing on the wing because Benoit Assou-Ekotto is a rather good left-back.

But well done, Harry, well done. Mediawatch is clapping now.


Normal Talk = Angry Bust-Up
Headlines on various football websites on Tuesday afternoon after Rafa Benitez's press conference:

Football365: 'Benitez plays down bust-up reports'.
The Guardian: 'Rafael Benítez plays down reports of row with Chelsea players'.
The Daily Mirror: ''It was a normal meeting': Benitez insists post match 'exchange of opinions' with Terry was no bust-up'.
Sky Sports: 'Rafa Benitez: No problem with John Terry or the other Chelsea players'.

Those headlines were prompted by these quotes from Benitez: "This was a normal meeting between players and technical staff, which happens after every game. It was normal talk, nothing else. You show your disappointment, that is normal...

"It was very brief exchange of ideas, and that is it, nothing else. It is just a team talk after a defeat. We had a meeting on the training pitch with my players and technical staff, which is part of our business."

Only if you work for The Sun - who broke the original story on Tuesday morning - could those quotes be read as a massive big tick for your 'bust-up' story.

Mark Irwin writes on Wednesday: 'Benitez last night confirmed SunSports's exclusive report of a training ground row with Blues skipper Terry following Sunday's 2-0 loss at Manchester City?'

Glossing over the 'last night' (it was about 2.30pm) for a second, did he really 'confirm' the story? Or did he simply say it was a 'normal meeting'? Presumably anything short of being forced into an embarrassing apology is considered 'confirmation' if you work for The Sun.


D'Oh
Hands up anybody who thought Rafa Benitez was going to be in charge of Chelsea next season. Nobody? Not even you, Rafa? What do you mean you don't want the job because they're a bunch of...

Well, it seems that Mark Irwin of The Sun thought Interim Manager (there was a clue there if you were paying attention) Benitez was going to be in charge of Chelsea next season. Until that 'angry bust-up'/'normal talk', that is.

'Rafa Benitez has sealed his Chelsea fate after delivering a few home truths' and is 'about to pay the price for his brutal honesty after blaming the players' attitude for the demise of a series of high-profile managers', apparently.

So basically it was all going swimmingly with that 47% Premier League win rate until you opened your mouth, Rafa. Silly, silly boy.


Exclusively Underwhelming
From the Daily Mail website: 'EXCLUSIVE: Di Matteo airbrushed from Chelsea history as club remove Champions League picture featuring former boss'.

They've airbrushed him out of a picture? That's a bit sodding low. Let's read on...

'Roberto Di Matteo has been airbrushed out of Chelsea's Champions League history after the club replaced his image on an iconic wall at Stamford Bridge,' writes Neil 'Mr Dossier' Ashton.

'Chelsea's history-making manager, sacked last November by owner Roman Abramovich, was pictured on the West Stand wall with the rest of the squad and their trophies at the start of the season.

'Di Matteo has now been replaced by a huge image of Chelsea's players and coaching staff - minus the manager - celebrating the club's first European Cup triumph in the Allianz Arena.'

Oh, so he's not been 'airbrushed' (to 'improve the image of (a person or thing) by concealing defects beneath a bland exterior', according to an online dictionary) out of a picture at all? Chelsea have simply replaced one picture with another (better) picture?

Apparently 'Chelsea supporters, who often take souvenir pictures next to the giant poster, have been left stunned by the decision'. Stunned? Really? Mediawatch is similarly stunned that this counts as a story.


Generous Gesture Of The Day
From the Daily Mail: 'Cheers, Sam! Allardyce paid for £1,200 bar bill as Christmas thank you for Hammers backroom staff'.

That's an awful lot of pork scratchings, fella.


Headline Of The Day
'Vidic Is Up & Run-In' - The Daily Mirror.

Worst Headline Of The Day
'It's Bale Madrid' - The Daily Star.

Non-Football Headline Of The Day
'Otters' penises are shrinking - and why yours might be too' - The Week.

Runner-Up
'Kesha pens song about vagina with mum' - Hindustan Times.


Thanks to today's Mediawatch spotter Nick Smith. If you see anything that belongs on this page, mail us at theeditor@football365.com, putting 'Mediawatch' in the subject field.