Nevilles get on my nerves
KEEP STARTS TALKING
PHIL NEVILLE, you’re so wrong – silence most certainly isn’t golden in football.
Astonishingly, after his brother Gary was bashed by Jurgen Klopp for taking a pop at Loris Karius, Phil had a dig at the Liverpool keeper for standing up for himself in an interview.
He should have kept his mouth shut, he claimed. It’s staggering just how fragile the Neville brothers appear to be. They dish it out, Gary in particular, but hate it when someone hits back.
It was a shame Klopp axed Karius for the midweek win at Middlesbrough.
And he looks set to keep faith with Simon Mignolet for Monday’s derby at Everton, when it will be interesting to hear what Gary has to say about Klopp’s men.
It would have been impressive to see Klopp be brave and stick with the German after his blast at Gary Neville, when he pointed out the former Manchester United defender didn’t seem too good a judge of a player during his doomed and brief spell at Valencia. But back to Karius being told to shut it. It is an increasing problem in the Premier League what pathetically little access there is to players at top clubs and how strictly controlled interviews are. You would think we were asking questions where the answers might spark a riot!
Debates
I WAS in the loo at the same time as former FA chairman Greg Dyke before he made his opening speech in September 2013. “Are you going to drop a few bombs?” I asked. He promised he was and went on to explain to everyone how he was going to get more English players appearing at the top level to help us win the World Cup in 2020. Now Dyke’s gone, but he popped up again last week to have a go at the Premier League along with four other former FA chairmen. It begs the question: why didn’t he do more when he was in power? It was his one big chance to make serious changes and he blew it.