Newsletter #1834

With “Typical City” now officially dead, I hoped “Typical England” might be heading the same way. Sadly not!

Having fluked our way through the second half and extra time, I thought the arrival of penalties might see victory for our out-played Lions. They missed, Rooney buried the next one, Big Joe looked likely to save another. Surely this time? No!

In fairness it would have been a travesty if we had gone through but could they at least have had the decency to concede a late goal to spare us the extra agony!

Still, Mario has come away with some credit despite the missed chances and it will be interesting to see how he does in the Semi. Good experience for the lad.

ARTICLE: HANSEN, LAWRENSON AND SHEARER BRING SHAME TO THE BBC

I have complained to the BBC in the strongest terms possible about their poor, biased, nasty punditry and, I am sad to say, commentary of the England vs. Italy match last Sunday.

The punditry of Alan Hansen and Alan Shearer and the commentary of Guy Mowbray and Mark Lawrenson was disgraceful and their victimisation of Mario Balotelli was appalling. It was nothing short of a character assassination. In a school this would be classed as bullying and victimisation.

If you saw it or heard it, then I urge you to complain too:

Complaints can be made at:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/complaints/complain-online/

I refer to Hansen referring to Mario Balotelli as “stupid Mario” and his untrue comment saying that he had won nothing, to which his fellow pundit, Lee Dixon, much to his credit said “The Championship”.

Hansen opined that City only won the Premier League because Balotelli got banned after being sent off at Arsenal. Again, not true. The facts say otherwise. Mario Balotelli provided the pass for the winning goal that sealed Manchester City’s Premier League Title on 13th may 2012. A Championship to which Balotelli contributed 13 League goals, as well as assists.

Hansen and Shearer focused on Balotelii’s negative points, ignoring the good, yet they made no references to Wayne Rooney’s many indiscretions.

It was not lost on the main presenter Gary Lineker who referred to “juvenile back references”, before adding “so leave it out, yeah”.

I did some further research into Balotelli.

Whilst Mario Balotelli is a young man with a colourful character and maybe needs to mature somewhat, he is very popular with his team mates and fans (not just of his own club), as well as a very successful career on the pitch. I would also refer you to Mario Balotelli’s record of success. A Champions’ League medal, 3 Italian Seria A (Scudetti) medals, 1 Premier League medal, 1 Italian Cup medal, 1 UEFA Supercup medal, 1 FA Cup medal (all before the age of 22). Hardly the record of a “stupid” person, and certainly the record of someone who deserves more respect than he gets from the BBC.

I also refer to Mark Lawrenson’s peevish joining in with the character assassination of Balotelli:

Guy Mowbray said “Mario is having a moan” (whilst ignoring all Rooney’s “moans”), and Lawrenson replied by saying of Balotelli “if his brains were petrol he wouldn’t get out of the garage”. This all went beyond the reasonable bounds of comment and was very demeaning. It is not acceptable. It is a very sad day when the BBC has come to this.

This is not the first time that Hansen and Lawrenson in particular have stuck the boot into Balotelli. They were doing it all last season. They were very negative about City too.

I ask the question: would Hansen, Lawrenson, Shearer or Mowbray be so personal about an English player, or perhaps more pertinently, about a white player?

Do the BBC want to lose more viewers or are they going to do something about it? At very least the positions of Hansen, Shearer, Lawrenson in particular should be reviewed. Firm action must be taken so that there is no repeat of this and that the BBC returns to the highest standards and integrity.

ARTICLE: NASRI AND SILVA

Hi Guys,

Spanish TV devoted hours to cover the Spain/France game Saturday.

Started at 6PM and early on filled in time with the Spain coach arrival.

Players got off, then just wandered down the tunnels and corridors, some into the dressing room but Silva continued onto the pitch.

Standing there in his “Civvies” is Nasri with a look of thunder on his face (obviously just told he’s on the bench), but when he see Silva he breaks into the biggest smile and goes over and they hug, chat and laugh then proceed to walk around the place. Nasri’s arm around his shoulder like they are the best mates ever.

The camera stayed with them for a good few minutes as they played out their friendship for all to see.

Heaven knows what it means, but I thought I should share it with you.

Neither Rooney or Mario played great last night but our boy was clearly the better leader of a forward line and five years younger to boot.

FANTASY LEAGUE: LATE RED CARD

Having given Roger Booth’s DEEP POCKETS a saintly mention for being Red-free in the fantasy league my attention has been drawn to his transfer history. Sorry Roger, belated red card for you. Come on boys. Keep it clean next season.

How do you sleep at night?

ARTICLE: INCREASED MILEAGE

More stats from the MEN.

With 2 Lancashire clubs not in the Premier then the fans who go to the away matches will have to travel 1,400 miles more than last year.

City total miles (from stadium to stadium) is 5,496, which equates to an average miles per game of 289, with approximate petrol costs of £538.

Poor Stockport County fans’ miles total is 5,451 – why on earth don’t they have North/South divisions?

ARTICLE: SUMMER CAMP

A friend has just returned from Seefeld (Austria), which is only 2 hours’ drive from my home. He tells me that the picturesque town in Tirol is plastered with posters announcing that Manchester City is coming: their summer camp starts there on 7th July so I might just bob down there (but I bet Mario is not appearing).

I will keep you posted.

AND FINALLY… AUCTION FOR FUND RAISING

My name is Tony Spellacey and I’m a very proud father of two little girls called Jade Shanti Rose (5) and Georgia Belle (1). In August 2011 our eldest daughter, Jade, was diagnosed with acute lymphoblastic leukemia and our world was turned upside forever.

New Zealand is part of a world-wide trial, which includes the South Pacific, Americas and Europe, for understanding and developing better ways of giving treatment to children, which hopefully means a longer life ahead for them. we are truly grateful to have such a world knowledge-base behind us trying to help our Jade overcome her illness.

Like many countries, our Government dictates the budgets for health, education etc. and up until now I, like many others, have been ignorant of the impact this might have on those who are in need. In particular, the Wellington hospital in New Zealand has a play-specialist who works part time during the week to help make the lives of the children that little bit less scary while they visit hospital for any number of reasons.

Our Jade has frequent visits to the hospital where she needs to have her port (portacath) accessed. This procedure is where they insert a needle into her port located on her chest which is a line that feeds into a vein. the port allows for a number of treatments and also giving blood so the specialists can track how Jade is going.

The process for accessing the port with the needle is a very traumatic experience for our 4 year old girl. The play specialist has become a strong ally for our Jade and plays a major role in keeping her mind in a happy place during these times.

The Wellington play specialist gets no funding for toys and spends many hours outside of her role fund-raising to get supplies /gifts for the children in the hospital. Her name is Kate and my wife and I feel greatly in debt to her for all she has done for our Jade. Recently, she purchased this vibrating/cold pack bee-shaped device called “Buzzy”; it gets placed above the area where the needle will be inserted and the combination of the vibrations and the cold confuse the body’s nerves, distracting attention away from the actual poke of the needle. This has worked wonders for our Jade and is now shared throughout the children’s wards of Wellington Hospital.

Taking time to speak to Kate you soon realise the passion she has for helping these kids and the on-going challenges she is faced with while trying to keep devices like “Buzzy” and small toys available for gifts to brave children at the hospital. Kate gets no funding from the Government and has to rely on fund-raising for everything she does.

I want to try and make a difference for Kate, which will mean less pain and anxiety for the children. I’ve managed to get a signed Roberto Mancini photo with a certificate of authentication from the club to raise money for the Hospital.

I’m wondering if you would like to consider bidding for the photo?

If so, then please feel free to email me for more details.

I really hope and pray you can help me make a difference. It’s a shame it takes a life changing outcome to occur before we understand the real things in life that really do matter. A big thanks for taking the time to read this letter and I look for to your response.

RESULTS AND TABLE

Final League table

                    P  GD Pts
 1 Manchester City 38  64  89 *CHAMP16NS*
 2 Manchester Utd  38  56  89
 3 Arsenal         38  25  70
-----------------------------
 4 Tottenham H.    38  25  69
 5 Newcastle Utd   38   5  65
-----------------------------
 6 Chelsea         38  19  64
 7 Everton         38  10  56
 8 Liverpool       38   7  52
 9 Fulham          38  -3  52
10 West Brom A.    38  -7  47
11 Swansea City    38  -7  47
12 Norwich City    38 -14  47
13 Sunderland      38  -1  45
14 Stoke City      38 -17  45
15 Wigan Athletic  38 -20  43
16 Aston Villa     38 -16  38
17 QPR             38 -23  37
-----------------------------
18 Bolton Wndrs    38 -31  36
19 Blackburn R.    38 -30  31
20 Wolves          38 -42  25

MCIVTA FAQ [v1112.01]

[1] MCIVTA Addresses

Articles (Philip Alcock)         : editor@mcivta.city-fan.org
News/rumour                      : news@mcivta.city-fan.org
Subscriptions (Madeleine Hawkins): subscriptions@mcivta.city-fan.org
Technical problems (Paul)        : paul@city-fan.org
FAQ (David Warburton)            : faq@mcivta.city-fan.org

[2] What are MCIVTA’s publishing deadlines?

Deadlines for issues are nominally 6pm, Monday and Thursday evenings by email. Unfortunately we cannot accept email attachments.

[3] MCIVTA Back Issues and Manchester City Supporters’ home page/Twitter

http://www.mcivta.com/ is the unofficial Manchester City Supporters’ home page. Created in 1994, it is the longest running of the Manchester City related web sites. Back issues of MCIVTA are also hosted on the site. You can also follow on www.twitter.com/mcivta to get the latest updates.

[4] What is the club’s official web site?

The official club web site can be found at http://www.mcfc.co.uk/ and the official club Twitter page at www.twitter.com/mcfc. The club also has a facebook page at http://www.facebook.com/mcfcofficial

[5] What supporters’ clubs are there?

The Official Supporters’ Club and the Centenary Supporters’ Association have merged to become the Manchester City Supporters’ Club (http://www.mcfcsupportersclub.com/). The club also recognise the Manchester City Disabled Supporters’ Association (http://www.mcdsa.co.uk/).

[6] Where can I find out about Points of Blue?

The committee operates as an interface between supporters and the club. Points of Blue appears on the club website under the “Fans” heading (http://www.mcfc.co.uk/Fans).

[7] What match day broadcasts are available on the web?

Live match commentary can be found on the club website. The Radio Manchester pre- and post-match phone-in is available on the web at http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/england/manchester/.

[8] Where can I find out if City are live on satellite TV?

http://www.satfootball.com/ provides a listing of Premier League games being shown on UK domestic and foreign satellite channels. A useful site for North American viewers is http://msn.foxsports.com/.

[9] Do we have a Usenet newsgroup?

Yes we do: uk.sport.football.clubs.man-city is our home on usenet. If you are not familiar with Usenet, a basic explanation is available here: http://searchnetworking.techtarget.com/definition/Usenet

[10] Do any squad members have their own web pages?

There are a number available and direct links can be found at http://www.mcivta.com/players/

[11] Do any squad members have their own Twitter accounts?

A list of genuine player accounts is maintained at http://twitter.com/#!/MCFC/players

[12] Where can I find match statistics?

Statistics for the current season are available from the club site, but for a more in-depth historical analysis try http://www.mcfcstats.com/.

DISCLAIMER
The views expressed in MCIVTA are entirely those of the subscribersand there is no intention to represent these opinions as being thoseof Manchester City Football Club, nor of any of the companies anduniversities by whom the subscribers are employed. It is not inany way whatsoever connected to the club or any other relatedorganisation and is simply a group of supporters using this mediumas a means of disseminating news and exchanging opinions.

Philip Alcock, editor@mcivta.city-fan.org

Editor: