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| Thursday 20 March, 2008 |
| Blog: Tell it straight |
| Despite Zlatan Ibrahimovic's outburst against Roberto Mancini, Inter insist all is well at the club. Richard Godden wishes the Nerazzurri would tell it like it is |
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“I wish you would leave.” These were the words allegedly muttered by Zlatan Ibrahimovic about Roberto Mancini after he was substituted against Palermo. The Swede wasn't the first Inter player to have a bust-up with his Coach in recent weeks. Luis Figo reportedly refused to leave the substitutes' bench against Liverpool with the Nerazzurri facing an insurmountable 3-0 aggregate deficit, while Patrick Vieira and Luis Jimenez have also appeared to show signs of dissent at the tactician's decisions.
It's safe to say that, despite their presence at the top of the Serie A standings, all is not well at the Stadio Giuseppe Meazza - right? Well, in the true style of any top football club, the Milanese outfit are doing their best to convince everyone that all is well. Nothing to see here, move along. If that is the case, why has Ibra denied that he said anything untoward against Mancio, while the tactician himself has insisted that the player apologised to him? The least they could do is read from the same script!
This kind of thing really gets my goat. Do football teams - and Inter fans must understand that my anger isn't just with their club - really think that we're stupid enough to believe this nonsense? There clearly appears to be trouble in paradise, so why not just tell it like it is? I'm sure Ibra would have got a lot more respect if he had admitted that he spoke out against the Coach in the heat of the moment and that perhaps all is not rosy in the Nerazzurri dressing room. As they say, honesty is the best policy.
This is where calcio - and indeed football the world over - could learn a few lessons from American sports such as basketball, gridiron and ice hockey. Love or loathe the folk across the Atlantic, their sportsmen speak with real honesty. There's also little of the blame culture that exists in football. As a result, the fans have a hell of a lot more respect for these guys and are far more understanding when mistakes are made.
Unfortunately, it's not something that I can see changing anytime soon. As a colleague of mine pointed out, Inter are almost forced into insisting all is well because anything other than that would spark chaos in the media - including, I guess, this website. It's a real pity that this is the case, as the fans who pay their hard-earned cash to watch these guys week in, week out deserve to know what is going on. Instead, we continue to be treated like morons.
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