David Moyes-Wayne Rooney case show settling scores in print a mistake

Jun 5 2008 Mark O'Brien

IT SEEMS that David Moyes and the Everton Former Players’ Association, to whom the manager has kindly donated his damages, are the beneficiaries of the manager’s legal victory over statements in Wayne Rooney’s book, My Story So Far.

These concern Rooney’s assertion that the Everton manager breached his trust and, not surprisingly, the offending comments were removed from the paperback edition of the book, published after the instigation of Moyes’s legal action. Still, anyone who has had the misfortune of reading the ‘cleaned up’ version will be struck by the vindictive and petty tone it adopts whenever there is any reference to Moyes.

This is in stark contrast, by the way, to the celestial glow that radiates from the page when he mentions anyone connected with Manchester United and England.

Clearly Moyes and Rooney don’t get on then, but what the player fails to realise – along with plenty of other people who try to settle scores in their memoirs – is that their sniping always paints them in a worse light than their intended target.

If Rooney even had to pay the damages himself, the sums involved are unlikely to put even the slightest dent in his bank balance, however, that shouldn’t stop him from asking questions of his co-author, Hunter Davies, and the publisher Harper Collins, who really should have known better than to let a lad with no experience of these matters to make such a fool of himself in print.

Every summer we are told that one big signing sparks off the proverbial merry-go-round.

Everyone expects the bulk of the player transfers to be done after the European Championships though, so more attention seems to be on a number of managerial hot-seats that are going to need filling.

With Jose Mourinho finally taking over at Inter, things might start moving on that front then, with Chelsea being the next biggest post available.

The most interesting name being linked with a move into Avram Grant’s old office was Mark Hughes. The more exotic names, like Gus Hiddink and Carlo Ancelloti, were always going to be linked, but Hughes was a different animal altogether. That’s not to say that he wouldn’t have been just as good, than some of the big name continental coaches, but it’s a brave boardroom – like his new employer’s at Eastlands – that would stick their neck out for a relatively inexperienced British coach when he could easily cover his back by appointing someone more established.

From Everton’s point of view, let’s hope these mega-rich clubs remain conservative in their outlook, because David Moyes’ record is more than a match for that of Hughes.

Euro sceptics

IF THERE was a medal awarded for bravery in the face of public apathy then surely the BBC Sport department would have to its first recipients in light of their attempts to get the public interested in a European Championship shorn of the hysteria and hype that surrounds the England team.

With no WAGs and no ‘Wazzer’, their “Who will you support” catchphrase could be interpreted more accurately as, “Could you give a monkey’s?”

Because even the most Anglo-sceptic football purist, who winces at every hurled chair or chorus of the Great Escape theme, has to confess, surely, that any tournament loses a certain degree of lustre because of England’s absence.

The biggest losers though, aren’t the Beeb, but the pubs and off-licenses, the manufacturers of knock off England tat, and of course the glazers who had banked on making a fortune fixing the windows smashed in market towns across the country following the Three Lions’ inevitable quarter-final exit.