Amid all the usual non-news, last season's Premiership had one sweet moment. Carlos Tevez and Javier Mascherano, two of Argentina's World Cup team, came to play in England. Tevez, built like the Tasmanian Devil, and Mascherano, a player of almost invisible elegance, promised the game a much-needed lift. Most of all, they were coming to West Ham, a little club in a game of corporate brutes.

West Ham could never be said to be one of the game's beautiful losers. They sometimes won something, usually the FA Cup, and did so with no small amount of panache and style. Indeed, they became an expression of football the nice way. It evoked memories of Ossie Ardiles and Ricardo Villa at Tottenham. Those two galvanised a side built by Keith Burkinshaw into Spurs’ best title chance since the 1961 team of blah-blah and blah-blah.

Players who seemed average workers assumed fire and flair as part of their game - Graham Roberts, Tony Galvin, Glenn Hoddle, Chris Hughton and the re-invigorated Ray Clemence. Of course all that fell to bits with the mass hysteria and tribal bloodlust of the Falklands. At least that could not happen with Tevez and Mascherano, neither of whom seemed remotely East of Suez. Or so it seemed.

'The players who West Ham never owned cannot be sold. This makes some sort of sense. How can you sell what you haven’t got?'


It transpires they never signed for West Ham. They signed for a third party who then contracted them to the Hammers. They are [so-far] football's only subbies. This is contrary to the rules of trade in football. These rules are nothing new. Football plc has always jealously protected its own privilege.

In recent times we have been treated to the spectacle of managers of considerable brilliance, like Brian Clough and George Graham, being pilloried for daring to take a bite at the pie that the Football Bwanas regard as their private gravy-train. Like apartheid in the slave trade. There are countless occasions of clubs losing points and ties for "fielding an ineligible player". Leeds United had the benefit of this ordinance once in Europe. They were lucky. That happened before Suits got their claws in at Elland Road and you know the rest.

But times change. By the time Tevez and Mascherano arrived, some very big Suits were in the door. Suits in bullet-proof vests were now part of the landscape. At times it looks like a Jack Palance lookalikes contest. The latest [at today's close] is something like Herlod Glutz from Izvestia to Chelsea... well it sure sounds like that, complete with hatchet-face profile pic. It's a long way from Dennis Hill-Wood and Louis Edwards. This regime promotes and celebrates its own corporate amorality whilst its PR engine [FIFA] expounds enough manure to grow a beard on a corner flag.

Meanwhile, back at Upton Park ... it wasn’t the Hammers’ best season but that's how it is when you're West Ham. You play football, good football and up the begrudgers. True romance has little currency these times. Not the boy/girl meets girl/boy kind, anyway, since junk-food sex and yob intimacy took over, but there's something romantic about West Ham. Like Fulham, it's some kind of miracle they survive. But football is about miracles, isn’t it?

Remember Liverpool v Wimbledon in the Cup Final? Now think MK Dons. If the Suits want it, you might yet see Aberdeen playing in a new all-seater-with-supermarket-plus-luxury-flats in Dagenham. Come on, you AbDabs!
Doesn’t ring right, does it? But as last season came to a close something rang loud and clear, because Tevez turned on the lights and scored like a man born to it. And West Ham survived.

Then it all came out. Tevez and Mascherano never belonged to West Ham. The corporate constitution of football had been sinned against in the most fundamental way. Player ineligible. Oh dear... that's bad! But no, it’s not bad! It may have nothing to do with another Suit having taken over the money at Upton Park. West Ham had been 'saved' by a fish magnate from Greenland or a yak mogul from Faroffistan, a "right and fitting person" in every sense.

Those are the words used by a gnome from Soho Square recently about the arrival of some geezer from Thailand with a carload of money. Perhaps a deposed dictator/embezzler from Burkino Faso, who cares? Well, Sheffield United did. So aware were they of the rules that they took legal umbrage. And lost. Correct me if I'm wrong but as far as I know the Blades have yet to be 'saved' , that is to say they have yet to be swallowed by a Suit. Halelujah! And that was that.

Well, not quite ... UK law is based on precedent. What happened last week still works this week. This works great when the house is on fire. Water still works. But not in things corporate. In such things, only money works. In precis, it goes like this: you may not field a player who does not play for you but if you do and the gig took loadsa money, then we can eh, er, well absolutely ... QED. So West Ham, with two players who didn’t actually play for West Ham, can stay in the Premiership while Sheffield United [with all their own players] can go whistle.
Yes, of course there are questions; such as how does a player you don't have play on your team? My missus, who knows her football, says there are three kinds of football .. good, bad and Playstation. I thought she was joking. You may talk footballocks to a Dutch woman but not my missus. You will be sussed. Is this Playstation football? I hear X Box have been having a few probs. No, don't scoff! Why not? Because it gets worse. Or funnier anyway. No, Harry Potter has not signed for Newcastle United. Not yet ...

In the meantime, Mascherano left Upton Park for Anfield. Perhaps to improve his English or maybe he did an Open University degree in Law. Either way, the deal went through and Anfield rejoiced at the arrival of the sweetest feet since Ronnie Whelan. Did anyone invoke any third party/fire and theft laws? Not that I know of. But now it gets really daft. When daftness is required we can ask for no greater an expert of Le Mot Daft than The Greatest Manager In The Cosmos, Sir Alexi Ferguson nee Stalin.

United go after Tevez. Why not? After throwing away the best striker in today's game [Ruud van Nistlerooy] to retain the services of a godhelpus-like Louis Saha, you have to do something! As pious as ever, Sir Alex began with penance by admitting that possibly it might be a good idea to win the Europen Cup. Wow! - as prince Willie said [off a cue-card]. Guess what? No transfer. Laugh? I nearly voted. The players who West Ham never owned cannot be sold. This makes some sort of sense. How can you sell what you haven’t got?

You can on Wall Street, where you can even sell something that doesn’t even exist. So with United and Tevez it was 'no sale‘. Except for Mascherano, who was already gone. The funniest bit is no sooner has Sir Al gone after a good player than the corporates go after him. It's too funny to be anything less than tragic. Could this be an afterburn of Sir Al versus The Murphia?

I see a new billion viewer series. [Greg Dyke are you listening?] Sir Al as the hard-faced McScrutcheon; Procurator Fiscal. Is Roy Keane due an appearance as the new Big Bad Bob? Tune in next week for more ripping yarns!

Order the DVDs now.