Is it April Fools Day in South America?

In the southern hemisphere, it's spring. That's the only possible explanation I have for the news that Carlos Tevez and Javier Mascherano, two of Argentina's best performers at the World cup and teammates at Corinthians in Brazil (not to mention two who would adorn Manchester United, Arsenal or even Chelsea) are set for Upton Park, apparently on a season long loan. Scratch that, it's a "permanent" deal. Yeah right. Until Chelsea assess how effective the pair are in the premiership. Look out for their transfers across London next summer, or even as early as January.

Comments

[Brian]

West Ham has a decent chance of winning a European trophy and as a neutral I'd say the Hammers play some pretty attractive soccer (at least by English standards).

If they were go to Chelsea, they'd barely play, except cup ties against Swindon or Darlington. Hell, even if they want to Barca or RM, they wouldn't play much either.

[Frank McGahon]

West Ham has a decent chance of winning a European trophy

Which one? West Ham have to be a good bet to qualify for European football next season but they aren't in any European competition this season.

If they were go to Chelsea, they'd barely play..

No, I'm not buying that at all as a reason. Javier Mascherano at least would have been be a fixture in RM, Arsenal or Manchester United's team and it's also likely that Tevez would have been a regular starter. There's got to be much more to this than meets the eye. It's either some sort of illegal arrangement with Chelsea or it's tied into MSI's proposed takeover of West Ham. The best that I can hope for is that MSI have placed them at WH for the season to put them in the shop window, give them some premiership experience and prove to United, Chelsea or Arsenal that they won't flop here (unlike so many of their fellow south americans).

[Brian]

West Ham is in the UEFA Cup.

Last I checked, they were given the third or fourth best odds by the bookies of taking the trophy. Tough first round tie vs Palermo, though.

[Brian]

http://news.bbc.co.uk/sport2/hi/football/teams/m/man_utd/5309852.stm

[Frank McGahon]

West Ham is in the UEFA Cup.

So they are, apologies.

As for Gill's "We didn't want Mascherano", I'd take it with the same pinch of salt I took with his myriad transfer-related comments. I'm not anti-Gill as many United fans, but he doesn't exactly have a lot of credibility.

[J.Cassian]

Hey, what happened to that post about the John Julius Norwich book you couldn't find because it was out of print? I've got my own copy so I wanted to gloat. It's a really good read. Gloat. Gloat.

[Frank McGahon]

It was the beginning of a post which sat there unfinished, mocking me for a few days, until I decided to save it as a draft and close the window, except I inadvertently published it instead.

Consider your gloating to have had the desired effect!

It's baffling to me why this book would be out of print, seeing as his other books are all still in print - maybe there's a lot of overlap with his soon to be published History of the Mediterranean - and I've been trying to track it down. I've seen it offered for over a hundred quid secondhand on amazon, almost purchased a copy online for £28 from John Randall: Books of Asia, but it had just been ordered by someone else. Upshot of all of this is that it turns out my local library has a copy - so much for the information superhighway!