As we saw in Germany this weekend that sport has the potential to disappoint and outrage in equal measure and for all different types of reasons.

Overpaid sportsmen behaving like morons does no one any favours, and the general condemnation of Messrs Haye and Chisora is entirely justified, but just every so often sport too can show that it is a tremendous force for good and it did that earlier in February.

When Zambia beat The Ivory Coast on penalties it did so much more than give the tiny nation – population just under 13m – a first ever ACoN victory, it helped bring some closure to one of the most tragic sporting events in recent times.

In 1993 the squad was on its way to Senegal for a qualifier when, minutes after a stopover in Gabon, their plane crashed killing all 18 members of the squad on board. The plane was old and decrepit and in a recent article in When Saturday Comes players were joking about the state of it and saying they wouldn’t get to Senegal.

It was, according to reports the most talented team ever assembled by Zambia and one which had a real chance of winning the African Nations Cup the following year. As such, the loss was felt on an immense National, not just personal level. But from the ashes – almost literally – there was still some hope.

Their star player, Kalusha Bwalya, wasn’t on the flight. He had to play for PSV Eindhoven and was on a different aircraft. The former African Player Of The Year realised how lucky he was, and skippered his country in the 1994 tournament, when, astonishingly the scratch team finished runners up.

That was as good as it got for the landlocked country, which shares its borders with – amongst others – The Democratic Republic Of Congo, Tanzania, Malawi and Botswana. Until that is fate was to take them back to Gabon to compete in this year’s tournament.

So etched in the National psyche is what happened back in 1993 that the word “Gabon” has become slang for a faulty vehicle in Zambia, so when they qualified for the 2012 tournament, being held in the country where the tragedy took place, there was a real feeling of destiny. Goalkeeper Kennedy Mweene, speaking before the ANC began summed up the feelings of the squad when he said: “We are going to this tournament to put the souls of our fallen heroes to rest.”

The lost players are buried in “Heroes Acre,” just outside the National stadium in the Zambian capital, Lusaka and Bwalya, who is now the President of the Zambian FA spoke movingly of what the victory would mean to him personally: It is my dream to win the Cup of Nations in Libreville because a great part of Zambian football history was written there. Imagine if we could lift the trophy, it would be a fantastic way to honour the memories of those who made the ultimate sacrifice while serving the land they loved."

So, it was with that sense of pride that they confounded all expectations to beat Drogba, Kalou, the Toure’s and the rest. This was no run-of-the-mill victory for the country, as was evidenced when they got back home.

Their manager, Herve Renard (former boss of Cambridge United) was apparently close to tears when he gave a speech on the squad’s return to Zambia: “"My players were magnificent," he said.

"I know we're not the best but we have a strength and force that animated our team and made us African champions. They might make some tactical mistakes here and there but you can see the talent.
"This is something enormous - something that appeared unrealisable before the competition began.”

As these scenes show, they were rather pleased …..and rightly so!

It was certainly a weekend for apologies.

First Carlos Tevez said he wanted to come back to Manchester and help City win the league (surely the right thing for all concerned as this blog suggested a fortnight ago) then Mick McCarthy had to say sorry for his teams disgraceful second half capitulation in the Black Country derby. But they say these things come in threes and the one we all not just wanted, but needed to hear came too.

As we have said before on this blog, somebody, somewhere at Liverpool Football Club needed to take a firm lead on the Luis Suarez issue. It did appear that nobody had, and the events of Saturday lunchtime showed just how much it had got out of control.

Saturday, at Old Trafford, was the time to publically draw a line under the matter of what Suarez did or didn’t mean when he used racist language towards Evra in October, but what actually happened did anything but.

Quite what was going through the head of Suarez when he refused Evra’s hand only he knows, but in doing so there is little doubt he inflamed a situation that needed calming. Then Kenny Dalglish decided to give a rather bizarre post match interview to Sky where he claimed he “didn’t know” what happened pre-match.

The actions of Liverpool football club since Suarez was found guilty of racism have been ill-thought out at best and disgraceful at worst. I don’t think it is going to far to suggest that the image of one of the great clubs of World football – never mind the UK – has been damaged by not just what happened, but by what didn’t. There has – it seems to an outsider – been no clear leadership from the Liverpool hierarchy, who you would have thought would have been tremendously unhappy at seeing the adverse publicity.

Which is why there simply had to be an apology. Suarez pointedly stopped short of apologising to Evra when he said: “I have not only let [Dalglish] down but also the club and what it stands for and I'm sorry. I made a mistake and I regret what happened.

"I should have shaken Patrice Evra's hand before the game and I want to apologise for my actions. I would like to put this whole issue behind me and concentrate on playing football." But it was a start.
Dalglish too finally showed some contrition: "All of us have a responsibility to represent this club in a fit and proper manner,” he said.

"That applies equally to me as Liverpool manager. When I went on TV after yesterday's game I hadn't seen what had happened, but I did not conduct myself in a way befitting of a Liverpool manager during that interview and I'd like to apologise for that."

But what was interesting, more than any of that – and to be blunt both these “statements” were most probably written by someone in the Liverpool press office who had to give up their day off – was that this time the Managing Director and owners got involved.

MD Ian Ayre couldn’t have been much clearer saying that: “"Luis Suarez was wrong to mislead us and wrong not to offer his hand to Patrice Evra. He has not only let himself down but also Kenny Dalglish, his team-mates and the club. It has been made absolutely clear to Luis Suarez that his behaviour was not acceptable"

And a “source” close to the owners apparently told the BBC – and you can read this as you like – that “no one is bigger than the club. Apologies were necessary.” These apologies should have come a lot sooner than they did – and certainly after the ridiculous decision to wear those shirts at Wigan, but at least they have now come.

But you do wonder why they came. Maybe there is genuine contrition from the people involved, maybe there is genuine outrage at board level, but I will wager that also that there economic considerations. Liverpool have sponsors. Liverpool have sponsors with big pockets and lots of influence, but in return they want to be associated with a clean brand, not a brand where one of the star players acts like that and the Manager appears to back him.

It is said that Suarez has a future at Anfield if he shows what is termed as “better judgement” in the future. The same good judgement, not to mention proper leadership, is something that those within the Ivory Towers at Anfield would do well to exercise themselves.

As Derek McGovern put it in the Daily Mirror this week: “since the start of December, Manchester City have kissed goodbye to the Champions League, to the FA Cup and to the Carling Cup, but not to Carlos Tevez.” And so it was that perhaps the most surprising aspect of the transfer window is the fact that Carlos is still at the Etihad.

In recent months it was said he was going to PSG, to one of the Milan Clubs, back to South America, that he was going to retire from football, but nothing has happened, except he has been pictured playing golf in the sunshine while his team mates were training in the cold and his agent Kia Joorabchian has collected more Air Miles than its possible to use.

And then last week – with time running out to see the player leaving the club – a story emerged with set out the staggering amount of money that Tevez was missing out on.

These forfeited payments included a SIX MILLION POUND loyalty bonus, £1.2m in lost wages for his initial disappearing act, another £1.7m because City haven’t paid him since November and a £400,000 penalty for the now infamous refusal to come on as a sub against Bayern Munich.

These stories were subsequently denied by Joorabchian’s Media Advisor, former NOTW Sports Editor Paul McCarthy, who said there was no animosity on his client’s behalf, and the striker had waived his rights to wages deliberately and explained: “It was never an economic situation with Carlos.”

Of course, it is easy not have “economic” worries when it turns out that you earn nearly £10m in five months, lets be honest, if Carlos Tevez – who lets not forgot is 27 years old – fancies living in luxury and not doing another days work in his life then he can do it. The sums of money involved are ludicrous and beyond our comprehension, but now isn’t the time to discuss whether footballers get too much money, but rather to ask who this unedifying can be ended?

It appears that City’s asking price is putting people off – £25m allegedly for a player that hasn’t kicked a ball since September and comes with, shall we say, baggage – and whether his continued non appearance is a strategy to bring his price down is debatable, but this has been denied by Tevez’s side.
And as much as we can say that the player himself can cheerfully remain on the beach, wouldn’t he, deep down want to play the game he is gifted to perform in? He must surely have the hunger that got him to the top level in the first place?

That being the case, it appears that there are still three options for him. First he could move to Russia still (their transfer window is open for another month) second, perhaps he could make some sort of return to West Ham, or third, is there no chance of a truce – however uneasy it would be – and the player pulling on the Sky Blue shirt again?

 
There are problems with all these suggestions, not least is what sort of physical condition is Tevez in after his inactivity – we all know how hard players have to work in pre –season to get fit and that after only a couple of months, so if he does any of those things we suggest it might be of no immediate use to any of the parties involved. And of course he won’t be named in Man City’s squad for the rest of the season, so can’t play for them.

Which is perhaps the saddest thing of all. One of the best strikers in the world is, in theory, at the peak of his career and yet is playing golf in South America. One day, at some point in the future, Carlos Tevez will look back on his life and realise he has made a terrible mistake.

One of the great recurring themes of British Football happened the other day. Once every couple of years one of the Managers of the “Big Six” clubs sticks his head above the parapet and says something about wanting to have their reserve sides in the football leagues.

The most recent exponent of this idea was Andre Villas Boas who said we should follow the model in Spain and have reserve teams playing in their equivalent of the championship: “What happens in Barcelona is a good model in terms of competitions. They promote talent,” he said.

He went further in explaining himself. “The reserve team, for all the hard work, is not competitive. It serves the first team, but it doesn't serve the progression of talent coming through.

"The youth development system in England is not right. If you’re 'B' team plays in the Championship, where they are fourth or sixth and threatening, playing good football, you'd call them up.

 
"It could be a great benefit because you don't have to work with a 26-man squad, but a 19-man squad and just recall the best young guys with constant activity.”

Not surprisingly this preposterous idea was given short shrift by the football league themselves. Their Chief Executive Andy Williamson was aghast: “The suggestion is frankly offensive," he said

.
"Our clubs are constituted as sovereign entities which represent their town or city with pride, rather than being a subsidiary of another club in another part of the country.”

"These are senior professional football matches that matter - they are not just platforms for developing other clubs' players.”

The issue here is that there are rights and wrongs on both sides. Of course Williamson is right, these clubs with hundreds of years of history and fans who live and breathe the team and this is not something that can be overridden on the whim of a Manager who has no concept of the English game (and unless results improve will probably be gone at the season’s end!)

But where you do have to agree with AVB is on his comment that the Youth Development in this country was not right. It does have to be said that there is not a lot of quality coming through – certainly not in the abundance that it used to be.

 
Of course it could be argued that this is a direct result of the big clubs themselves, stock-piling all the best young English talent and buying expensive foreign players meaning that those expensively assembled young players never get a chance anyway so that their career stalls.

But whatever the reasons it is abundantly clear that something needs to be done, because there is not the quality in this country that there is in other places.

There is little doubt too, that reserve football isn’t a great breeding ground for players any more, but if reserve football isn’t doing it, and AVB’s idea is both nonsense and a non starter, then what can be done?

Arsene Wenger – who has produced more than his fair share of good young players down the years – had some interesting ideas on the subject. He first rejected the idea of his Chelsea counterpart, saying: "The supporters of Barnet do not want their club not to be promoted because the reserve team of Arsenal is in front of them."

He then continued: "It is very difficult to mix the interests of the smaller clubs with the interests of the big clubs who could have a second team, and could be competitive in the smaller leagues."

The Gunners Boss is one of the many Premier League Managers who loan the best of their young players out to Football League (and in some cases Premier League) clubs to help them gain experience, and this, he says, has served him well. "We give our players out on loan to the lower leagues. If they manage to convince people they can play in there, they come back,” was how he put it.

Indeed Wenger believes that the forthcoming change in the Academy System (as ratified by the PL) would help any way. This will create an under-21 league, pitting the best youngsters against each other. According to the Frenchman its “an interesting idea,” and I am inclined to agree.

Not perfect perhaps, but infinitely better than Chelsea reserves playing in the championship.

There has been much talk about who would do what in the January Transfer window, and yet, despite all the conjecture, very little has happened.

It is hard to see anything really that will rival the earth shattering last day in 2011 when Fernando Torres and Andy Carroll moved clubs for an astonishing (for all sorts of reasons) £85 million. Indeed, it could be argued that both those transfers going so badly for both the clubs and players concerned has proved a salutatory lesson that all should learn from.

Those two transfers – and the ones which saw David Luiz and Luis Suarez move to the Premier League total spend in the window that ended January 2011 to an eye watering £215 million, but this time around there has been just a fraction of that.

A quick glance at the Premier League Transfer Tracker shows that Gary Cahill swapping the race to avoid the Championship for the race to get in the Champions League is comfortably the biggest transfer, with only nine other clubs signing players for money.

The same glance tells you that nine of the 20 elite clubs in the UK are yet to sign a single player this January.

In and of itself this might not be that odd – most of the big business we talked about above was done towards the end of the window last year, but there does seem to a bigger than usual reluctance on behalf of managers to part with cash.

Part of that, surely, is to do with the summer transfers. Squads are overstocked with players, so at this time of year they are looking to offload rather than freshen up their rosters.

Also it is worth noting that generally in January it tends to be struggling teams that are the most active as they try and avert the slide into the Championship. To that we can add teams with new managers and teams with new owners who are eager to splash the cash, either to impress fans, or to avoid relegation.

In that respect it is easy to see why Queens Park Rangers are just about the most mentioned club on gossip columns so far in 2012. With Neil Warnock gone and flamboyant Airline magnate Tony Fernandes appearing eager to get big name players to Loftus Road, the R’s seem likely to be the big players in the next 14 days.

Whether they get value for money is another matter, as January is a month for ridiculously overblown transfer fees. Not just the likes of Carroll, Luiz and Torres, but in the years since the window has been open, January is the hardest month to buy players it seems, and moreover it seems that the only winners usually are the teams doing the selling.

And it’s a conundrum that all managers have to face. A couple of well chosen signings could make the difference, but get then wrong and the club is in a worse state than ever.

Increasingly too, Manager’s are judged by their signings, just as much as results. With the bigger price tags comes the bigger pressure – and in these days of Media saturation it is tremendously difficult for a player who is having a bad trot to escape, just ask Messrs Carroll and Torres right now. As well as the Managers – for example Carlo Ancellotti – who lost their jobs at the end of last season.

All of which probably explains why so many managers are set to sit this one out, content to work with what they have, watching the mad scramble from afar this time around.

There is of course one hidden cost of this. Sky Sports News lives for the transfer window. It loves having reporters standing at the training grounds of all the clubs that are signing people, while crowds of people build up throughout the day, it loves having Jim White shouting louder and louder as the last minute comes, and what will happen to them if the whole thing is damp a squib as I, and many others, expect?

Surely it will have to come down to Harry Redknapp doing them a favour and talking about the fact that whatever player he is about to sign is a “good, good player, I like him, we’ll try and take him but it’s a long way off.” Like he normally does.

Go on Harry, don’t let us down.

Everyone is total agreement that the abuse handed out by a Liverpool supporter to Oldham Athletic defender Tom Adeyemi was despicable, disgraceful and has no place in any section of society.

A man has been arrested and bailed over the incident, and you can only hope that if the person concerned is found guilty of the offence he is prosecuted to the full extent of the law.

In life we are all responsible for our own actions – and if this man is convicted he will only have himself to blame for his gross stupidity. He may well be contrite, he may well regret what he said for the rest of his life, but, if the law decides he said it then its no one else’s fault.

That said, you do have to wonder if Liverpool Football Club could have handled the Luis Suarez affair in a different way, and you do have to wonder whether, if they had, this abuse of young Adeyemi, who is on-loan from Norwich, would have happened.

It has been reported in the press this week that some at Liverpool do wish their response had been different with yesterday’s I newspaper saying that it was now acknowledged that those infamous Suarez t-shirts the players – including Suarez – and Manager Kenny Dalglish wore before and after the game with Wigan were something of a mistake.

Even at that stage it was widely agreed that Suarez had used what might be considered to be offensive language towards Patrice Evra. Whether he meant it in an offensive way or not (indeed there is absolutely no reason to believe that Luis Suarez is a racist) will never be proven, but the words were said and that should have been the end of the matter.

But it wasn’t. Instead Liverpool carried on their fight, threatening appeals and refusing to apologise, until, it seems they looked at the fixtures and saw what the games were coming up after the eight games were served (Man Utd and Everton in case you didn’t know) and decided to accept the punishment.

In many ways you would have had more respect for the club if they had continued with the appeal. If they truly do believe that they were right, and that their player had done nothing wrong then surely they should have just gone ahead and fought their corner.

The fact is that Luis is not an angel. He is no stranger to controversy. He gave away a penalty in the World Cup Quarter Final against Ghana, and whilst it is easy to say that any player would perhaps have made that decision to handball, any player might nit have bitten an opponent, as Suarez did in Holland last season (for which he was banned.)

For all his faults (and the fact he is far from a prolific striker is not least of them) Suarez is a fine, fine footballer, blessed with tremendous skill, and one who is hugely popular with both the Liverpool fans and his team mates. That perhaps does not excuse the wearing of those t-shirts. Suarez, however much he wants to paint himself as such is not the victim here.

It is not a giant leap to suggest that those t-shirts, the lack of an apology, the continued adoration and support has created an atmosphere where the issue of race has become a little more raw at Anfield than it might have been. And on this occasion it was a young defender on loan from Norwich to Oldham who had to suffer the consequences.

Oldham Athletic themselves have praised Liverpool for the way they handled the affair, but Piara Powar, Executive Director of anti racism organisation F.A.R.E, believes they haven’t gone far enough: "I'm afraid there is no question that the club's approach has stoked this affair, and there is now a highly charged atmosphere around the issue. The Suarez T-shirts surely no longer have a place at Anfield,” Powar said.

"This has done a lot of damage to Liverpool FC and in many people's eyes to English football.
But it is time surely that progressive fans stepped forward and started to be active in this debate……[and] show support to Adeyemi at this weekend’s game.

“I would say it is time for progressive fans to tell the club and Kenny Dalglish that enough is enough, this episode has done a lot of damage to Liverpool FC, and the manager, as their spokesperson, needs to publicly start to calm the waters.

“A club position that says, enough is enough, Suarez is serving his ban and everyone at Liverpool should move on and try to build bridges, would be very welcome."

And the sooner this happens and we can back to talking about Liverpool on the pitch instead of off it, the better.

There’s always one every year.

One manager who “slams” the fixture schedule at Christmas.

It’s usually Steve Bruce, it used to be Rafa Benitez, but neither of those two chaps are bothering us this festive season for various reasons, but this year the baton of chief moaner has been passed to Brendan Rodgers, the Swansea City Manager, who had this to say: “The people who put fixtures together do not have a clue about physical conditioning,”

He then went on: “If we are having a normal recovery period from a game on a Saturday, the Sunday would be the first day of recovery and then the players really feel the effects of a game on the Monday, so they have a second day of recovery.

"They don't properly come back up to speed until the Tuesday because of the tempo of the modern game.

"So for us on what would normally be a second day of recovery after we play Tottenham, we have to go and play another [game] full on, high-tempo Premier League at Aston Villa.”

This is a point of view that I can’t subscribe too. And I can’t subscribe to it for the simple reason that these people – whether they are Swansea players, or whatever team they play for – are highly paid, professional athletes and they are entitled to play a few games over the festive period as far as I am concerned.

There was another strand to Rogers’ argument too. He was angry at the two games in three days over the New Year weekend. For those that don’t know there are games on New Years Eve (this is a normal Saturday game) with another fixture two days later on the Bank Holiday and Rogers is less than impressed: “We don't need the Monday game," he said.

"They should play that game on the Tuesday or Wednesday or extend the season by a week. Or we could have a midweek game somewhere else in the season.

"I can understand the New Year's Eve game but is there a need for the Monday game? I don't think there is. It's ridiculous."

Let me, if I can, explain to Rodgers and anybody else who wants to bleat about it, just why we SHOULD have that game on the Monday. Its really quite simple.

People can get to the match.

It’s a bank holiday. People are off work. Therefore people can go.

Perhaps these Manager’s would like to consider, just for a second, the travelling supporters. If that game was on the Tuesday many of these would need to get a day off work – perhaps two.

Quite frankly its about time that football remembered that, first and foremost it is an entertainment business and as such, it has a duty to do just that – to entertain the spectators and perform. Whilst increasingly clubs – certainly at top level – are less and less reliant on gate receipts for income, playing games to empty stadiums would be pointless, and as such people in the game would do well to remember just how important the supporters are.

There is another reason for wanting the games over Christmas too. It’s traditional.
Forgive me for living in the past, but this is world where many of the things we used to hold dear about our game have been eroded and one of the only things we have left is the Christmas games – and lots of them.

Given the criticism from various sources, the cutting down of fixtures, just like video technology and the winter break, will probably happen whether we like it or not, so the Leisure Leagues Christmas message is a simple one:

Have a good one, enjoy the football, and don’t listen to Brendan Rodgers, or anyone else who thinks you shouldn’t.