Gigi Becali: football's most controversial man

George 'Gigi' Becali is mental. Properly bat-shit mental. Since 2003 he has been the sole owner of Romania's biggest and most successful club, Steaua Bucharest, and has been courting controversy from day one.

Initially starting out as an entrepreneur, Becali's real estate business boomed in the late 90's, leading him to become Romania's richest man. At the same time he became leader of the New Generation - Christian Democratic Party, being elected a member of European Parliament in 2004.

So far, so normal for a high-rolling eastern European property magnate. But it wasn't until Gigi became involved with Steaua that he really, last days of Rome, lost it.

Of course, you could get all of this off Wikipedia - I just have - so instead of dedicating a dozen or so paragraphs to his outbursts, I am going to, below, give you all of his quotes, in all of their sweary glory.

Remember, this man is a member of the European Parliament.

Sep 2010: Steaua Coach, Illie Dumitrescu, is sacked for "being too Muslim."

Jan 2011: Becali is given a warning by the Romanian FA for cancelling a transfer because he thought the player was gay - "I'd rather dissolve the club than allow a gay to play for Steaua."

2006: Backs a campaign to "finish off all homosexuals in Romania."

2007: "Gays must be kept in enclosures."

Feb 2011: Becali says League president Dumitru Dragomir "must be beaten" for "humiliating" Steaua during talks over a new TV deal, and for "corrupting football". Dragomir: "Only a moron could think like him. He's illiterate."

 2008: Becali said Dragomir called him "a retard": "In return, I called him a tramp. Then we had a fight."

Aug 2010: Steaua coach Victor Piturca resigns after 59 days, attacking owner Gigi Becali for changing his contract and "failing to shut up". Becali says the new coach, Ilie Dumitrescu, is "a better man ... He's doing this unpaid." Dumitrescu: "Money does not interest me. I just want respect."

Sep 2010: Dumitrescu is sacked. Becali appoints Marius Lacatus as the "lasting solution for Steaua". Lacatus: "I could not refuse this. This is my lifelong dream."
Mar 2011: Lacatus resigns. Becali: "I pick this team. It's not a democracy." Appoints Sorin Cartu as his fifth coach of the season. "I'm giving him three months. We'll see."

Apr 2011: Becali says outgoing FC Dinamo chairman Cristian Borcea's decision to divorce his wife and marry a model is "fine by God". "A man can choose. As God said: man is man and woman is whore."

Mar 2011: Becali, asked on live TV how he feels about Rapid Bucharest president Dinu Gheorghe making public reference to Becali's first job as a shepherd. "What? He is a filthy jerk. A fat bum. I'll force this Gypsy back up his mother. I'm tired of him, all his irony and jokes. He forces me to lose control! He's way out of line."

Gigi's Easter message last month:

Gigi Becali says holding a press conference last week to "clear the air" and say sorry to "everyone I offended this year" made him feel better. Making it on to Gigi's list:
• Rapid Bucharest owner George Copos: "I'm sorry for what I called him. He never answers back. I don't judge him. Yes, he's cheap, but let God judge everyone, I don't have to do it."
• Sexual minorities: "I apologise to them. It's their problem, their disease, not mine. You ask me if I still think it's a sin? Of course it's a sin. I always speak my mind."
• Other religions: "I'm sorry to all of the religions, the cults. But I do have my views. Jehovah's Witnesses are on the way to perdition."
• Plus Steaua's fans: "I'm sorry for offending them. Apart from the ones who called for me to die just before Easter. They are possessed by Satan."

Gigi's conclusion: "That feels better, I feel reborn. And it'll make Satan crazy: he hates it when a soul gets cleaner. But I didn't just do this for me. I'm an inspiration to millions."

May 2008: calls a black TV presenter an "ape".
May 2008: says women "have no more value" after giving birth.

Nov 2006: Becali commissions a reproduction of Leonardo da Vinci's Last Supper with himself as Christ, and the Steaua players as his Disciples.



Motty

Mario Balotelli: an eternal love affair

Aggressive, petulant, stubborn, uncouth; it's quite fair to say that Mario Balotelli doesn't enjoy the best relationship with the British media. Caricatured as an uncontrollable young man lacking the requisite skills of respect and decency, Balotelli is treated like a caged animal as journalists, opponents and fans prod him with sticks before running for cover, hoping they've provoked a reaction.

The self-righteous shake their heads at his every action, labelling him as the antithesis of all that is wrong with The Modern Game. But this blog thinks it's time that someone stood up for Super Mario, and saluted his actions rather than chastising them.

Football - despite what Bill Shankly might tell you - is just game. Part of the entertainment industry and designed to interest those who pay for a ticket to a game. It is nothing more. But too often this beautiful simplicity is lost in a wave of angst and violence amongst those who forget that essentially, it's 22 men and a pig's bladder.

With the vast majority of footballers trained in the art of providing the media with tiresome cliches, surely any player who divides opinion with their behaviour and gives us something to talk about is worthy of praise? After all, isn't one of any footballers primary objectives to simply entertain?

Balotelli perplexes and infuriates in equal measure. The excuses offered up for his behaviour range from his difficult childhood - being abandoned by his birth mother as a newborn - to the abhorrant rascist abuse he suffered so regualrly whilst playing in Italy. While these factors undoubtedly contributed to his cold and often hostile persona, there's no need to over-analyse or attempt to explain the Italian: he's an entertainer, like Prince or Robert De Niro.

We all watch the game for its tapestry of different characters with their varying levels of ability, and it's this personalisation that makes football what it is. Can a sport devoid of personalities still be enjoybale? Imagine if all professional footballers were as straight-laced as Aaron Hughes or Peter Beardsley? The game would instantly lose its attraction.

Continuing the long line of erratic geniuses that includes Maradon, Cantona and Di Canio, Balotelli is just another player who's erratic temperament has contributed to their incredible footballing talent. However, perhaps because he hasn't produced consitently excellent performances for Manchester City, Balotelli is not held in quite the same esteem as his fellow nutters. Still, at only 20-years-old, there's plenty of time.

He's arrogant, egotistical and can't dress himself, but so what? Mario Balotelli is an entertainer. And long may his mentalness continue.

Motty

Nearly a Decade in the Sun

For nine years they had been trying and failing. Sir Alex Ferguson couldn't do it. Rafa Benitez couldn't do it. Harry Redknapp couldn't do it. Cesare Prandelli couldn't do it. Nor could Leonardo, Claudio Ranieri or Roberto Donadoni. Not even Big Sam could do it.

In total, 107 coaches tried to beat a Jose Mourinho team at home. On Saturday evening, Manolo Preciado did it.

Preciado: the man with the greatest moustache in football (apart from Warren Gass of course,) became the first man since Antonio Sousa to beat Mourinho on home soil. And only the second ever. Nine years, one month and 10 days the record had lasted. Porto, Chelsea, Inter Milan and Real Madrid had not lost in 150 games under the Portuguese maestro. He'd not been defeated in a home league game since 23 February 2002, when nine-man Porto lost 3-2 to Biera-Mar. 150 matches, 125 wins and 25 draws. 342 goals scored, 87 conceded. And then the record goes against Sporting Gijon!

Sporting Gijon, a team who hadn't beaten Madrid at the Bernabeau for 16 years; a team who went into the weekend's game three points above the relegation zone; a team who's best player is Nacho Novo, finally became the team to end Mourinho's unbelievable record.

It had to be a formality, surely? The start to a perfect weekend: Madrid wold beat Sporting and Barcelona would lose away to Villareal, their hardest game remaining this season. Suddenly, the gap would be down to two points with El Clasico to come later this month. Game on.

Or maybe not. It was at the exact moment when Madrid fans starting muttering and whistling at a game that had become bone-achingly dull, that Sporting scored. A wonderful move down the left-hand side; a clever dummy; a wonderful pass; a beautiful finish from Miguel de las Cuevas.

Before the game, Mourinho had insisted that one more loss and Los Blancos' title challenge would be over. At 1-0 down, Madrid launched themselves forward. Unfortunately for them, they came across Juan Pablo in the Sporting goal, who as AS put it "was an orange octopus with a thousand hands." They had 13 shots to Sporting's one. They had a goal disallowed and a penalty shout turned down. They also had a plethora of key players missing: Benzema, Xabi Alonso, Marcelo and Ronaldo. and yet you couldn't say the were robbed. Sporting's goal was an eight-pass move. No fluke.

Time and again, Madrid launched diagonal balls towards the head of Adebayor. Marca's match report even likened them to Stoke. And time and again it was predictable. Madrid are a side built to counter-attack, but as the season has worn on, teams have worked that out: before they attacked Madrid, now they wait. Mourinho's side have now been beaten by Osasuna and Sporting, and have drawn with Mallorca, Deportivo and Levante. That's 14 dropped points against teams that are all lower than ninth.

As Mourinho said after the game: "If I wanted to draw 0-0, I could have." And anywhere else in Europe that would be fine. But as I've discussed here before, in Spain that is not an option given the ridiculous amount of points Barcelona are racking up.

Saturday's defeat was nine years in the waiting and had a devastating effect on Madrid's title challenge. As the final whistle went, Mourinho was off down the tunnel. Soon, however, there was a knock on the Sporting dressing-room door. As Preciado revealed: the Portuguese coach came in and congratulated all the players individually on their win. It was a touch of class after everything that had happened.

Earlier in the season, Preciado had called Mourinho "a scumbag" and suggested that the Madrid manager should be put in among Sporting's Ultras. They both got involved in a furious argument outside Sporting's ground after Madrid's 1-0 win earlier this season. And Mourinho then accused Preciado of throwing the game against Barcelona that Sporting only lost 1-0. It was petty, it was bitchy and it was getting very, very nasty.

It probably explains why, when the final whistle blew, Preciado ran on to the pitch with his arms in the air; players spraying him with water, as if they'd won the league. He was still dripping when he spoke to the media after the game, reminding the gathering journalists what he told Mourinho in November: "if you spit upwards, it always comes down eventually."

Nine years is an unfathomably long time to remain unbeaten at home. A record that will probably never be beaten again. But as Juanma Trueba put it: "Football is as capricious as a platinum blond and as merciless as the Mafioso that keeps her."

Motty

The passing of youth

As I watched England stroll to a victory over Wales, I gawped in awe at just how composed Jack Wilshere looked at the highest level. It hasn't been an isolated thought this season. From Arsenal's first game of the season away to Liverpool, via a Champions League double-header against Barcelona, and through to the present, the young midfielder has been a constant source of joy all year. So why then, as I basked in all this Wilshere-induced glory, did I have a niggling sense of annoyance planted in the back of my mind?

Well, for the first time ever watching a football match, I thought to myself: "he's younger than I am."

When we are young, the stars of the beautiful game tower over us. They are mystical beings. Masters of the most attractive craft. Throughout childhood, we see ourselves as invincible; the world as ageless. Only as our teenage years dwindle do we start to see choices arriving on the horizon. Yet even these decisions seem far  away; mere distractions that teachers and parents have conjured up to make us do a little extra school work. Rarely do the millions of children playing in parks on a Sunday morning possess the self-awareness to realise that their dreams of scoring the winning goal in a World Cup final are just a forlorn fantasy. Even the most devoted of young fans, when following the Under-17 or Under-20 World Cups, see those players as contemporaries: classmates if we'd gone to a different school. It's only when we see a new up-and-coming star that's younger than us - a Wilshere, a Josh McEachran, a Neymar - that the true physical evidence really confronts us: the dream in now over.

Life is defined by these moments. But because sports careers peak and troft at such a young age, often the dream of on-field glory is the one fans awake from first. Most other hopes have years of possibility left. We can still travel the world, write the next great novel, achieve fame and recognition in a host of other fields. But, after that moment as a sports fan, often for the first time in life, one dream is now permanently just a dream. Seeing these young players evokes a strange sadness, or perhaps regret, of chances gone and roads not taken.

Yet for all the sadness and regret, there is joy as well. For the passage of time allows us to form a perspective on history. When we are young, we know who the best players are (or at least who are favourties are) but rarely do we appreciate the intricate details that make them special. Our older friends and relatives can tell us that a player runs faster, passes better or tackles harder than anyone they've ever seen; we can nod, pretending to agree, but because at that age we have no experience, we can't truly appreciate that statement.

Once we have perspective though, once we see a legion of greats leave the game, we begin to acknowledge the beauty of true genius. In the halcyon days of youth everything is new: we can watch 50 different tricks and 50 different ways of scoring that we've never seen before. As we age though, novelty becomes less and less. When I hear Arsene Wenger say: "Jack is the best young player we've ever produced, " I understand how much that statement means. I've watched enough Arsenal youth products come through the ranks now to understand just how special Wilshere is.

There's a physical component to all this eulogising as well. Most of us, if we've ever played football, can recall a moment of personal brilliance: that last-minute winner against your local rivals, the penalty you scored that all your mates say is the best they've ever seen. Yet the moment when our body does what our mind conceives is fleeting. And so we wonder how anyone can score a goal like this or this or do this. Each year though, a flock of exciting, young players give these ideas substance. And isn't that the beauty of the game we love so much?

I may be sad that I will never run an England midfield single-handedly, but I'm still happy knowing that somewhere, someone can.

Motty.

My Favourite Match: Brentford 2-0 Luton Town

If one man has the right to choose the definitive “Favourite Match” it’s author Tom Dickinson. For every time you’ve stood on a cold terrace in December, or damp stand in May, this man has done it thrice over. To find out how, or perhaps more likely why, visit www.92pies.co.uk  or www.twitter.com/92pies.  

Continuing our latest series then, Tom has chosen Brentford v Luton from 2009. Here’s why.

Looking at the favourite matches picked by the esteemed messrs Mott and Buckett it’s hard to argue with their choices.  Those Champions League ties involving United and Liverpool epitomise what makes football the most exciting spectator sport in the world.  Late drama, comebacks, cracking goals, world-class performers reaching career-highs and fans revelling in the glory.  Tremendous stuff!

Which makes it slightly contradictory that for my favourite game I’ve chosen a poor-quality and irrelevant League Two match between two teams I don’t care about.  But hear me out....

During the 2008/2009 season I had made a slightly odd life-choice to spend the year attempting to watch a game at all 92 English League clubs, writing about my experiences in my book ’92 Pies’ (PLUG ALERT – Out now!).

 

I had many trials and tribulations over the year, travelling as far as Plymouth and Carlisle in my dodgy old Peugeot 206.  It had been a wonderful yet testing experience watching that much, often shoddy, live football.  For months I thought I wasn’t going to be able to do it, particularly after driving for over 4 hours to reach Crewe on a Tuesday evening in February only for the game to be called off at the last minute.  Devastating.

Anyway, the end of the season was nearly here, and it was at Brentford v Luton, my 91st match, when I realised for the first time that I was going to complete my challenge. 

Brentford had already won League Two with a game to spare, and would be presented with the trophy in front of their own fans today.   West London was braced for a day of glorious celebration.  The contrast couldn’t be any greater with Luton; relegated a few weeks earlier with their 30-point deduction proving too difficult to come back from.

It was a gorgeous sunny afternoon, the last day of the Football League calendar, top versus bottom, Champions v Relegated.    It was a match of zero-importance but maximum excitement.

Griffin Park is a beautiful old ground absolutely oozing character; popping up as if from nowhere in a nice residential area.  Indeed I had heard the legend of a pub on every corner of the stadium, so obviously it was my responsibility, nay, duty to check them all out. 

The atmosphere was building up tremendously; the crowd of red and white shirts was growing by the minute.  I don’t think I had ever seen a group of football fans more relaxed and content. 

I can honestly say that everything about watching the Bees was an absolute pleasure.  True, it was a very good day to see them, but out of the 92 grounds I went to that season I can’t think of a place with a more comfortable atmosphere than today’s at Griffin Park.  The mixture of the edgier earthier football fan with the families, lone football nerds and drunken neutrals (like me and my pal John) was seamless.  

Everything about the club was family friendly, but not in a sanitised 21st Century football club MK-Dons type of way.  There were even 1950s-style rattles going off throughout the match, the noise (perhaps just in my mind) resembling a bee.  More than 10,000 people were in today to see the 11th biggest club in London, a fantastic advertisement for the Football League. 

The game itself was extremely forgettable.  Half-time came and John and I realised that we hadn’t really been watching it; instead soaking up the atmosphere, the songs, and the funny company.  The substitutes were signing autographs and posing for photos when they were warming up.  It was a day for celebration.

The players were showboating, getting around the beleaguered looking Luton back four with some head tennis.  “That’s why we’re champions! That’s why we’re champions!” sang the crowd, right on cue.   People were barely watching the game, but rather waiting for the glory of the final whistle.  There was an almighty cheer however when Brentford took the lead in the 73rd minute through their centre-back Karleigh Osborne. 

The terrace was completely rammed.  We were right next to the base of the floodlight, so we could actually sit on this big concrete base amongst the supporters packed around us and still see the action well.  Full-time was approaching, but there was one last bit of magic when in the 89th minute Adam Newton scored an absolute peach; a curling shot from outside the box.  It was the final nail in the coffin of Luton’s season of misery and Brentford’s season of joy.  

The ref had re-started the game, but as soon as the clock hit the 90th minute the fans began the pitch invasion.

 

It was fantastic! John and I sprinted onto the pitch with the other hundreds and hundreds of Brentford fans.  The feeling was one of slightly naughty childish glee, running around celebrating, but also one of tremendous football ecstasy (despite neither of us actually being Bees fans of course).  “Championeees championeeesss! Ole Ole Ole!”

Eventually a curved archway-shaped champions podium emerged, and as a suited gent from the FA handed over the League Two title to manager Andy Scott, the fireworks went off, and red and white streamers exploded into the air.

All the right boxes were being ticked now.  Shower of confetti? Check.  Players wearing silly red afro wigs? Check.  Champagne poured over the staff’s heads? Check.  Players walking around the pitch with their kids on their shoulders, mingling with the fans? Check.

John began chatting to a player who could have been the star man or could have been a reserve team member, as is our lack of knowledge of the Brentford team.  But it didn’t matter, for during this final pitch invasion, these men were stars. 

As the Luton fans were watching the celebrations come to an end, I caught the eyes of some looking forlorn and desperate at their last sight of the Football League.  The contrast of the two seasons, Brentford’s and Luton’s, show why football is the best sport in the world.  How can two such different emotions be caused by the same game?

With silver streamers in my hair and some stolen Griffin Park grass in my pocket I was in a state of slightly drunken wonder as we exited the ground and went into the fourth and final pub. 

 

On a personal note I had one game left to complete the 92 in one season, up at Bolton, my own club, a week later.  I suppose my car could have broken down on the way to the ground or I could have caught leprosy and been placed under house arrest, but failing either of these happening I was going to complete my challenge. 

So there you go.  I could have chosen the best win for my own team I have seen (Chelsea 1-2 Bolton or England 5-1 Germany), the best actual game I have ever seen (Huddersfield 3-4 Port Vale) or the best team performance I’ve ever seen (Barcelona 5-0 Real Madrid) but no.  My favourite game is the happiest that football has ever made me feel, at a small ground in West London with a pub on every corner.