LOVE Martin Samuel's article

[Benarbia]

Here is what we need to remember about football: it is meant to be fun. It is meant to entertain. It is meant to brighten your day. Watching it should be a positive experience.

When you see a 10-year-old standing next to his dad screaming abuse at some anonymous team bus, with its blacked out windows and barely-glimpsed silhouettes inside, football has failed. When you see a 10-year-old trying to do a Cristiano Ronaldo step-over, football has won. So, Kaka to Manchester City. What's not to like?

But, ye gods, there are some miserable people out there. The death of football, one bloke called it. An impossibly rich man attempts to spend £100million of his personal fortune to bring a truly great footballer into our game in a way that opens up the domestic competition, and this is a bad thing?
Kaka

See you in Manchester: Kaka and Ronaldo, the newly crowned world No 1, meet at the FIFA awards in Zurich earlier this week.

This is not Kaka to Manchester United or Kaka to Liverpool, in a way that would have everybody moping around thinking the title was sewn up for the next five years. This is Kaka, possibly, to Manchester City, a move that may one day inspire a further challenge to the domination by the elite four of English football. At the very least it is another great player turning out in a league already blessed by a few.

Yet still a puritanical determination to resist pleasure continues. We have become spoiled by our easy access to greatness, by the fact we can turn on the television and view the finest players from around Europe every week. We have forgotten what a thrill, what a privilege it is to then see those same players in the flesh.

If Kaka comes to Manchester, English football will need only Lionel Messi for the full set. This is a unique moment in the history of our game and how stereotypical of us to find a reason to carp. Kaka, Ronaldo and Fernando Torres may be coming to town. Oh, woe.

Previous generations understood. Before television sated our interest, if Tom Finney was playing down the road, black and white men in hats paid to see him. Now we are too blasé, too knowing, too fond of pursing our lips in disapproval and debating the morality rather than revelling in the magic of the show.

We raise ungrounded fears and make specious criticisms. Yes, £100m could build a hospital, but it is not the job of the royal family of Abu Dhabi to build hospitals in Great Britain. If your hospital is rubbish, has run out of beds or is riddled with bugs, your issue is not with Manchester City but central government, via your local health authority. And, believe me, central government wastes money on projects with the potential to bring considerably less pleasure to the wider public than taking Brazil's best player on a nationwide tour, funded by outside money.

The other accusation is that paying £100m for Kaka cripples football's business, that it artificially inflates prices and impacts on the smaller clubs.
David Villa

Not true. The rest of the market, the mid-range, the bottom end has nothing to do with this specific transfer. It is a one-off. It is unique. No club will be asked, or will pay, at the going rate for Kaka because no club is in the same position as Manchester City.

For instance, earlier in the transfer window, City asked Valencia about David Villa, the Spain striker and wide midfielder, and were quoted a price of £90m. This was way above his perceived value, which, in recent seasons, has fluctuated between £20m and £30m, because City's cash capacity is regarded as exceptional.

The deal then died as City's owners felt they were being treated like fools. They had the money - as the cash upfront offer for Kaka confirms - but believed Valencia were taking advantage. No other club has been required to negotiate at that level for Villa, so the inference is clear.

If Arsenal came in for him tomorrow the price would not suddenly rise to over £100m to achieve parity with Kaka, because Valencia would know he could not be sold to any other club at that price.

There would be a much reduced compromise figure, ensuring a deal progressed. The terms of Kaka's potential transfer are unique because no great player in his right mind would seek to join Manchester City, and no major club would sell a talent like Kaka, unless extraordinary circumstances dictated. So City have made the circumstances extraordinary.

Is there a down side? Yes, but not one that impacts on the neutral. There is a distinct feeling that Manchester City are attempting to put on the roof before putting up the walls and that is no way to run a successful football club.

Attempting to marry Kaka and Robinho to a defence that cannot cope with Nottingham Forest in the FA Cup is clearly a plan fraught with danger. Central defenders and a holding midfield player are still needed, so City followers have every reason to lurch from delightful anticipation to disquiet.

So a sleepless night for them, and for Mark Hughes, the manager. For the rest of us, what do we care? Knock yourself out, Sheik. Let's see what happens. At least this is going to be worth watching, not another tedious investigation into how many mediocre, hard-working players it takes to stifle Arsenal to secure an away point.
Mark Hughes

Plenty to think about: He may welcome the potential arrival of Kaka, but Mark Hughes will still be given sleepless nights by City's defence.

To hear some critics, that is all football should aspire to these days. Good housekeeping. Safety. As if a healthy bank statement could be paraded around town on an open top bus.

'Football,' said Danny Blanchflower, 'is about glory. It is about doing things with style and a flourish, not waiting for the other lot to die of boredom.'

Except these days we have been trained to think like accountants, to value 15th place above a trip to Wembley, as if anybody remembers those seasons when each match blends into one long tiresome scrap for safe ground.

By contrast, bidding £100m for Kaka - even if, as is likely, he stays at AC Milan - reminds us that this game is meant to be amusing, exuberant and dizzying. It is meant to distract from drudgery rather than add to it, to pursue excellence and adventure rather than settle for what is anodyne and conservative.

And while it will be a pity if, after Martin O'Neill has so painstakingly grown an organic Aston Villa side, he risks being overwhelmed by what might be termed a GM club, this battle represents the other fascination of sport.

There is no guarantee that Manchester City's way will work and, right now, given a choice between what he has at Villa and Kaka, Robinho and what Mark Hughes has at City, O'Neill would probably take his balanced, settled squad every time.

What might happen next is half the fun. And the rest? Well, have you ever seen this guy play?

 

[The Fat el Hombre]

WOW, didn't see that one coming

 

[Ntini77]

Someone speaking some fucking sense at last.

Well done Martin

 

[Bluemoon1984]

I was just about to post this article. Its refreshing to read a positiv about city!!!

 

[JULES]

good read.

 

[Alty Blue]

Good, interesting read

 

[Wexford Blue]

He's gone WELL up in my estimation.. great read.. different opinion at last. F~ck you Dave Whelan.

 

[bluwes]

He still says he doesnt think he'll come

 

[JohnMaddocksAxe]

Fat, odious bawbag whose every article is coloured by his disgraceful bias and stance over West Ham and the Tevez affair.

As much as I would love to believe that he honestly believes all of the above, his previous form makes it far more likely that he is just going along with that line to stay consistent with the disgusting bollocks that he came out with time and again about West Ham/Sheff U.

The man is a joker.

 

[tommybooth]

spot on