The Fiver | The sensation of the sharp stick

Click here to have the Fiver sent to your inbox every weekday at 5pm GMT, or if your usual copy has stopped arriving

Manchester United are widely considered to be fathers of the modern attitude to the FA Cup, a tournament now viewed with contemptuous disgust by a new generation only interested in YouTube footage of Lionel Messi and Him metronomically volleying the Ballon d’Or trophy back and forth at each other in time to Zadok the Priest. This of course harks back to 2000, when the eternal buffoons of the FA railroaded United into competing for the Fifa Tin Pot instead of defending the cup, fatally compromising the integrity of their own competition at a stroke. The FA wasn’t completely stupid, mind you, because while its unctuous forelock-tugging didn’t persuade Fifa to give it hosting rights for the 2006 World Cup on a silver platter, as the oily clowns were hoping it might, it did somehow manage to frame the decision in a manner which saw poor United cop all resulting flak. Bad United! Naughty United! Disrespectful United!

Continue reading...