Five years to save British football

These are dark times for Manchester and Britain. Both Manchester’s sides lost in the Champions League: United to PSV, and City, more predictably, to Juventus. There is no great shame in losing to either of these sides, but the time must come soon for both these teams to improve their showings on the continent. It does, though, hurt the English FA’s coefficient, and mean that it becomes ever more likely that the Premier League will in future only be able to provide three representatives. Chelsea and Arsenal must both win to provide the necessary fillip to proud Englishmen. Unfortunately, ever since the election of crypto-Stalinist Jeremy Corbyn as leader of the labour party, pride in England has taken a severe knock. How are these two things linked? Let’s take a look.

Anthony Martial’s career in tatters at United

Anthony Martial’s career is in disarray. After a bright start to his Manchester United stay, where he scored a brilliant goal against Liverpool just minutes into a substitute appearance, he brought the system crashing down around him against PSV in the Champions League. Against Liverpool, he was introduced to stretch play, but had the advantage of a team that was already winning.

But against PSV, he started from the start. Not only did he fail to keep Luke Shaw fit and healthy, he also could not help his team give up a lead. He also missed a chance to after being set up from Memphis’ cross, and it seems that slack attitude was embraced by Juan Mata when Bastian Schweinsteiger set him up with the opportunity from just four yards out. Mata miscontrolled and United lost to PSV. They have zero points in the Champions League. They have just one goal, but Martial has failed to score in every single one of his full Manchester United appearances. They have a 0% success rate when Martial appears for the side in Europe.

And yet, we are told, that he has great promise. Apparently that’s what £36 million buys you these days. Failure in Europe. Failure to score goals. Failure to help your team keep a clean sheet, and failure of a chance at one of the biggest clubs in Europe. The backlash against the criticism was incorrect. It turns out that Martial is, indeed, one of the very worst players in the world, and Ed Woodward and Louis van Gaal should be considering their positions.

Wenger at the heart of a dangerous socialist poison

Tonight, Arsenal take on Dinamo Zagreb in Croatia, far away from their Corbyn-occupied North Islington. Arsenal players should make themselves familiar with what Croatia has to offer, given its history behind the Iron Curtain, but more importantly than that, they will all be looking amongst one another, working out who will be next to suffer from the Arsenal injury curse. Both Jack Wilshere and Danny Welbeck have been removed from the squad, perhaps never to return. It is not an exaggeration to say that these sudden and chronic disappearances from the squad are similar to the sudden and chronic disappearances made in the Eastern European totalitarian states. This is just one of the Soviet-style disasters set to hit football in Britain.

Wenger must be to blame. Not only does he come from France, one of the few countries that willingly gives itself over to socialism readily through the decadence of parliamentary democracy, but he also puts into practice a relatively small divide between high and low earners, as part of a Leninist approach to pay at the club. No surprise, then, that so many willingly take such long holidays from first team action. But there is no medical diagnosis for ‘hedonism’, yet.

Is Corbyn the most dangerous man in Britain and football?

Jeremy Corbyn, it was established last week, is bent on dragging footballers and football managers into an open revolt against the glorious establishment in Britain. It might be prevented, but given the Tory party spent more time in Prime Minister’s Questions to discussing constituents’ access to tigers than they did to social mobility, there might be reason to wonder if that will remain the most likely outcome.

Not content with his attack on general British values, Corbyn went one further this week by attending a Battle of Britain memorial service. At this service, he failed to sing the national anthem, and wantonly wore a beard. He declined - shockingly - to sing a song to a God he didn’t believe in about a woman whose position he does not believe should exist.

Now, we know that plans are being fomented to bring down capitalism and in football, but we cannot be quite sure who is likely to participate. James McClean, who declines to observe the national anthem of a country other than his own, is one obvious target, but we need to take care. When players, especially foreign players, do not take part in the British national anthem, our only option now is to assume that they are part of a Corbyn-inspired, Kremlin-sponsored conspiracy to urge fans and fellow players on to regicide and perhaps more.