MARTIN SAMUEL: Jilted David James misses the punchline and it could be a calamity

16 June 2010 00:27
A number of years ago, Warren Mitchell was booked to give an after dinner speech at a function held by the Football Writers' Association at the Savoy Hotel in London. It did not go well. [LNB]Mitchell was good, very funny, but some have a bizarre difficulty distinguishing the actor from his most famous character, Alf Garnett. Mitchell is a left-wing Jew from north London; Garnett, the invention of Johnny Speight, was a right-wing bigot from east London. One can only imagine Mitchell's frustration at this confusion. [LNB] Throwing it all away? David James has a reputation as a 'thinking man's' footballer, but may be acting like a dummy in South Africa[LNB]As if to underline the difference, Mitchell told a politically charged joke about a black man who is offered his freedom if he can beat the toughest white man on the plantation in a fight: but there are conditions. First, it is decided the black man must have one hand tied behind his back. Fearing he will still be too strong it is decreed he must have both hands tied behind his back. Then his feet are bound together. Finally, the bell rings and the black guy struggles forward and bites his opponent on the nose. "Fight fair, you black bastard," the crowd scream. [LNB]Almost everybody in the room laughed, but near the door it became apparent from the scraping of chairs that somebody had walked out. David James had left in protest at this racist assault. [LNB]The following day he was interviewed in a newspaper on the subject, still very angry. Sadly, the chairman of the FWA, panicked by the unexpected furore, then publicly apologised for any offence caused. [LNB]Perhaps he thought this more expedient than a rebuttal based on nuance and context and the fact that, frankly, James hadn't got the joke. Heaven knows what Mitchell made of it all. He was the one who deserved an apology. [LNB]For a bright bloke, James does not at times seem very smart, or very sensitive. When staff redundancies at his club, Portsmouth, were announced earlier this year, as players' representative, he was part of a move to cover their wages. [LNB]James was widely praised and the move depicted as a microcosm of socialism in action: the privileged few acknowledging a responsibility to protect the more vulnerable members of the community. Then James, writing in his column in The Observer, let a rather pampered cat out of the bag. [LNB]'When the redundancies were first announced I had several phone calls from team-mates asking what we could do about it, which I thought was brilliant. But we haven't found a solution yet. It'snot an altruistic thing though, I want to make that clear. This isn't about saving jobs for mates. At the risk of sounding like a spoilt footballer I just want someone wrapping my socks up properly on a training day. [LNB]'Losing a staff member such as Tug, the training ground manager, is detrimental to the team. Yes he's also a nice bloke and we have the odd chat about environmental issues, but I don't want him back for chats, I just want him there so that when the bogs get blocked he can sort it out. Without Tug around those kind of problems are going to cause friction in the team.'[LNB]   More from Martin Samuel... Martin Samuel: Cold logic dictates that Capello must stick with Green13/06/10 Martin Samuel: You are meant to give us a twist not go round it, Fabio13/06/10 Martin Samuel: There is no need to hide, England...this is your moment!11/06/10 MARTIN SAMUEL: Sorry, but you can't prescribe a nurse like Helen10/06/10 Martin Samuel: It's about the sublime joy of watching genius on a pitch10/06/10 MARTIN SAMUEL: Get on the sunny side of the street...we CAN win08/06/10 MARTIN SAMUEL: It would be almost cruel to make Gerrard stay at Liverpool06/06/10 MARTIN SAMUEL: Sick games betray a grim reality03/06/10 VIEW FULL ARCHIVE This is why satire died as a means of comic expression. Modern life overtook it. You have to feel for Tug, though. Good for five minutes of twaddly eco-chat when James is bored with the dolts in the dressing-room, but then it's time to get to work with the plunger again, old son, because last night's lentil casserole is not sitting too well with the U-bend, if you know what I mean. [LNB]Oh, and by the way, could you tell that silly Doris in the laundry room to put a crease in my socks the way I like them? I don't know who was in charge last week but they came out like Zig and Zag. [LNB]Some will say at least James told the truth. He admitted he was acting for selfish reasons; he did not pretend to be a philanthropist. [LNB]Yet he saw Portsmouth's predicament in only the shallowest terms. He did not recognise that there may have been a reason to keep Tug that went beyond discussing electric cars with his head stuck down the toilet. [LNB]There was no acknowledgement that those losing their jobs were probably those who could least afford it, or of the injustice that the employees who benefited least from Portsmouth's free spending - the worth of a player increases with promotion or an FA Cup victory, the worth of the sock folders less so - were to be first and hardest hit.[LNB]True, these are not issues that greatly concern the average footballer, but James does not like to be considered the average footballer. That is why he gets a column in The Observer, that is why he receives the space to pontificate on green issues, that is why, of all England's players, he can count on the greatest number of allies in the media.[LNB]  Journalists like him for the same reason they liked Graeme Le Saux; they think he is more like us than them. The press, being mainly middle class, will have more in common with footballers possessing middle classtraits. James is characterised as the thinking man's footballer, excepthow deeply he thinks is often difficult to deduce.[LNB]He does not appear to have given the predicament of Fabio Capello, the England manager, much consideration, for instance, if reports of his disaffection are correct.[LNB]He dismisses the suggestion that there are still injury concerns after a blighted season, and appears mystified that he is now third on England's goalkeeping roster. Much like the Savoy walkout or the reasons for keeping Tug in employment, he really has not thought this through. [LNB]From the off, Capello accurately identified England's biggest problem. 'The best goalkeeper is nearly 40,' he told friends in Italy, 'and there is nobody below him.' [LNB]This was the beginning of the end for Paul Robinson, Scott Carson and most others floating around the England squad. It meant that, after James, Capello would be seeking to look outside the group, hence his preference for Robert Green, Ben Foster and Joe Hart. [LNB]Green had made his debut for England in 2005 and only injury prevented him travelling as second reserve to the 2006 World Cup. He had subsequently fallen out of favour with Steve McClaren, however, and by the time Capello assumed control had taken to sporting gloves with the logo 'England's number 6' on the clasp. He was most definitely an outsider. [LNB] Waiting for the call: Joe Hart, Robert Green and James have all been left on tenterhooks by Capello[LNB]So Capello went with James but knew his vulnerability. By the time the quarter-finals came around in South Africa, he would be less than a month from his 40th birthday.[LNB]He wanted a replacement, at least a rival, and began giving more opportunities to Green. Then over a period of two months, between October 31, 2009 and January 31, 2010, James played just two games for Portsmouth. It merely confirmed Capello's suspicions that to rely on a player at such an advanced stage of his career would be a risk. None of this seems unreasonable. And Green was performing solidly for England. Their places reversed. [LNB]There was another complication. On club form, Capello regarded Hart as the best of all, but lacked the opportunity to try him. [LNB]He viewed Hart not as a rival for James, more a rival for Green, in the top spot. The question was: could he gamble on giving a kid his debut in England's opening World Cup match? Now the pecking order became Green, Hart and, finally, James. This is said to have resulted in a frosty relationship between James and Capello's backroom staff. Certainly, James denies the official line that a knee injury has put him out of contention. [LNB]        HAVE YOUR SAY...     Should Capello drop Green after his howler against USA? Robert Green made an awful mistake to hand the United States a draw in England's opening Group C match at the World Cup. Fabio Capello left it until the last moment before picking him ahead of David James and Joe Hart but should he now be dropped for the match with Algeria? TELL US WHAT YOU THINK Yet surely James can view the problem through Capello's eyes? What was he to do? He had to look at the alternatives. And if Green was the man in possession and form, why turn the clock back? [LNB]It is not as if Capello has behaved thoughtlessly towards James. He wears England's number one shirt at this World Cup precisely because Capello is respectful of his age and experience. The status afforded by that number is important to goalkeepers. Psychologically it might have been a boost to give it to Green, yet Capello prioritised James's dignity by not, at 39, making him England's number 23 (the shirt given to Hart). [LNB]If James is capable of greater intellectual consideration than his team-mates it is high time he used this facility. [LNB]A player that is perceived by the manager to have his own agenda might as well be outside the group and if Capello does replace Green with Hart against Algeria on Friday, that places James one injury from the World Cup. It will be his last major tournament for England, of course, considering he will be almost 42 by the time of the 2012 European Championship finals. Why would a clever man place such an opportunity in jeopardy? [LNB]Perhaps James needs to think more and act less. His lot is not so bad. He is in the England squad; he is, at 39 and ten months, the oldest player at the World Cup; and he is England's number one, which is higher status than he would receive in many countries. [LNB]After all, Calamity was never a nickname afforded Gordon Banks, Iker Casillas or Lev Yashin; or, Albert Einstein, for that matter.[LNB] Good news from the England camp. Robert Green has now faced 900 shots in training and has not conceded a single goal. Fabio Capello is so pleased he says that from tomorrow he is going to let him and Emile Heskey train with the rest of the squad.[LNB] Suited, booted but strangely he was mutedWithout wishing to shine light on magic, what happened to England's great morale lifter when Robert Green threw one in against the United States on Saturday? [LNB]Where was David Beckham when his team-mate needed him? He was certainly in the vicinity of the pitch because we saw pictures of him on the bench, looking smart in his suit, a fully ordained member of Fabio Capello's backroom staff. [LNB] Watching brief: David Beckham looks on during England's first game in South Africa[LNB]Yet when Green must have been desperate for public support, a senior professional to show that the team would win together and lose together, that there would be no scapegoats, Beckham had long scuttled away. [LNB]Maybe he was waiting back in the dressing room with some inspiring words. If so, he kept them secret. Perhaps like politicians, brand Beckham does not wish to be associated with failure. [LNB]Beckham is here because Fabio Capello considered his greatest value was as a leader, a player the rest turned to for guidance in a crisis. Beckham's achilles tendon injury, therefore, would not affect his capacity to influence and an invitation was extended to travel as part of the staff the moment it became apparent he would not be fit for selection in the playing 23. [LNB]So half-time on Saturday, as Green made his long and lonely walk to the tunnel, was precisely the sort of occasion when Beckham's presence in South Africa made sense; except he was nowhere to be seen. [LNB]This was particularly unusual, as experience suggests that if Green had launched a goal-kick through the rarefied air and over the head of opposition goalkeeper Tim Howard for the winner, a sounder of rampaging warthogs would not have kept Beckham out of the frame for that photograph.[LNB] [LNB] [LNB]  

Source: Daily_Mail