Paying over the odds to Tottenham (yet again) for the signature of Dimitar Berbatov: £30.74 million.

Citeh paying over the odds to Real Madrid to prise Robinho from under the noses of Chelsea: £32.5 million.

The look on the faces of Peter “I fucked it up again” Kenyon and (some) eager Chelsea fans: Priceless.

I have been in a naughty mood today, hence the baiting and teasing. A more serious article will follow (either today or tomorrow). But I’ll just say this: whilst we got our pants pulled down yet again over transfer fees, it at least dispels the thought that had seemingly enveloped a lot of fans over the summer — that we are broke. We are not, and I think spending 30 million quid on a 27 year old surely stands as reasonable evidence?

Comment away…

[Oh, and I acknowledge the flurry of activity that smashed all commenting records for a single post yesterday. Cheers for spending a good part of your day on Red Rants. And apologies for some of the comments that somehow got sent into the moderation queue. I've managed to recover some and lost some others. Sorry for the inconvenience.]

We lost the Super Cup to Zenit. Chelsea proved they are still shit by dropping points. Liverpool drew to Villa, sussing out early season optimism and, more importantly, both Steven Gerrard and Fernando Torres are extremely doubtful for our Anfield visit.

We have no news on Berbatov, yet. Either way we’ll get to know it today. Hopefully let the good times roll as we get into a two week period of boredom — also called the international break.

Meanwhile, I apologise for not writing up my thoughts on the Super Cup. Or generally not updating this for the last couple of days. Kudos to the folks to keep commenting despite my negligence — trust me this is only temporary. It turns out that I do have a life outside of writing about United, which is what caused me to be off the blog during the weekend.

So, in the words of Arnie, I’ll be back. Hopefully, by then, Berbatov will be wearing the red of United.

Today is the Champions’ League draw. This, coupled with the lack of progress on the Berbatov front (only four days to go), have made my job infinitely easier — I don’t have to come up with a longish post today.

Since the Champions’ League draw starts at 4:30pm (BST) I will leave the stage to you to come up with your predictions for our opponents. (I know, I can be a lazy prick at times).

So here are the pots:

Continue reading “Manchester United’s 08/09 Champions’ League Opponents”

Sometimes honesty can be misplaced and ill-advised. Most of what Vidic said was true. Perhaps he could have been less honest about some of the stuff he said. Or perhaps, should we applaud him for his honesty?

Who knows, really! But what irks me is the tone adopted on some of the broad sheets.

Continue reading “Some Words on Vidic + Fabio’s Cracker + Berbayawn”

According to reports, a Manchester United player who goes by the name Cristiano Ronaldo has just returned to light training.

I was curious, so I looked up Wikipedia and did my research about this player — because, you know, it’s always good to get your facts right about lesser known players. I found out that he’s got great pace and can get past defenders with ease. He also scored 42 goals last season and played three months carrying an injury. So he must be some player.

So this some player has returned to light training and concentrated on jogging all week.

Oh.

Continue reading “Ronaldo Returns + Fergie’s Optimism Dips + Squad ‘Swells’”

So everyone knows this by now. It’s not an April fool’s joke because, well, it’s not April. It’s cold hard truth.

Excuse me for a moment.

Hahahahahaha!

Ahem. Ok.

Continue reading “Easter Island Head To Arsenal: Funniest. Transfer. Ever.”

It’s a quiet day if you ignore the words Dimitar Berbatov. But you can’t ignore it today, because otherwise, there wouldn’t be much to write about here. So let’s not ignore it and decide to talk about it. Er, okay…

Continue reading “United are on the ‘Brink of a Signing’”

We return to some real footballing action today with the Community Shield against Portsmouth — although pseudo-real could be a better word as the real action begins next week. But before we move on to the preview of today’s game a brief word on some early morning bollocks.

Continue reading “Some NOTW Nonsense + Community Shield Preview”

Fergie faced off with Fergie junior, in what looks like an annual affair of family reunions, as United’s boys beat Peterborough 2-0. I must first say a big, big sorry for not being here when the club paid its tribute to one of United’s — and the modern era’s — greatest professionals in Ole Gunnar Solskjaer. I have never hidden my love for players of his kind. And we all know it’s not just the injury time winner against Bayern that makes us love him so much.

But back to yesterday’s game United eased past Peterborough, but not before being given a good workout by the opposition.

Continue reading “United beat Posh + Media Froth As Ronaldo Returns (Apparently)”

This comes fresh off the Madrid press. Well not fresh exactly but outrageous nonetheless. Ramon Calderon has again, not surprisingly, opened his mouth. Consider this from the Telegraph:

Continue reading “So How Does One Define Tapping Up?”