I must concur with Tolmies Hairdoo, but not just for the benefit of the lad himself. To be honest I'd have happily flogged him after the two legged fiasco against Kiev, but I was then delighted when he proved me wrong at the end of last season. And as he started this season in similar vein, playing for the club rather than himself, I thought we'd got ourselves a real gem (which in some ways we have).
I also agree completely that most of his bookings are bullshit, the one on Sunday being a case in point. First challenge he makes in a game that had already contained at least a dozen more serious fouls, all of which had gone unpunished, and out comes the card faster than you can say knife. He's never gonna get a fair deal here. The media are unquestionably out to nobble us and he's an easy target. Three times this season since the Tevez fiasco we've had to take players off in the first half of games and on each occasion the commentators have eschewed the possibility that they might have been due to injuries and assumed instead that they are evidence of an unhappy club, at which point the cameras have then immediately and repeatedly scanned the benches desperately hoping for any kind of dissent. Same deal with the training ground.
That though is where my sympathy for Mario ends and my concern for the club begins. Every player at the club must surely know the knives are out, yet Mario seems incapable of not giving our enemies ammunition. 2 weeks ago against the dippers (I think) he had to be stopped from chinning someone by Milner over an innocuous challenge and then on Sunday he needlessly tries to tread on Parker (and my own inclination is this was 80:20 a deliberate act).
We are Manchester City, we are challenging for the title for the first time since 1977, and we have just 3 proper strikers at the club. We need someone who puts himself second and City first, someone who won't be banned for almost a quarter of the season, someone who won't indulge himself at every opportunity. It's only the fact that showing Mario the door is exactly what the media want us to do, that makes me baulk against such a course of action, but if I was Mancini I'd be in the market for a 4th striker right now (Podolski maybe) cos I'd be willing to bet you a pound to a piece of shit that between now and May, Mario will get himself sent off again. He's a complete liability and we have to either legislate for that fact, either by getting proper cover in or by going on the offensive with the press like Taggart does whenever Shrek gets caught putting the boot in, or say ta ta altogether. Either way, things can't go on as they are. Our season is just too important for stupidity
