UNPREPOSSESSING

Good word, unprepossessing - it allows one to express condemnation at an unfavourable impression gained from an unfortunate experience without invoking the utter distaste one might really feel. So I`ll settle for unprepossessing.

Got home last night from Southampton having witnessed a truly heroic rearguard action as Saints held on grimly in the last 20 minutes of the game to protect their slender one goal advantage against relegation threatened Scunthorpe United, who justifiably felt hard done by. Forgive me for not going into detail, for there was, in truth, little detail to go into.

Having recovered from the day and the long journey home, I sat back to watch Match of the Day. The main feature was, inevitably, Manchester United playing Newcastle. Now, there was a time in years gone by, when these two clubs were among the nation`s favourites - Manchester United for the Busby Babes, George Best, their rise from the ashes of the Munich air crash and the quality of their football. Newcastle were the great entertainers, especially under the stewardship of Kevin Keegan. So it`s a pity that the perception of both clubs has suffered in recent years in the eyes of the rest of the nation.

Newcastle have become the basket case of the Premiership, not so much because of their performances on the field of play but because of the never ending merry-go-round of managerial failures that seems endemic on the banks of the Tyne. Manchester United still challenge year in, year out, for the top prizes in the English game and the quality of their football cannot be in doubt. Nowadays, however, they seem to be a club which encourages disenchantment, not among their faithful followers of course, but among the wider audience who look on at their corporate antics sometimes with bewilderment, often with disdain.

The club is probably a reflection of its long-serving manager, Alex Ferguson, who was improbably knighted by that pillar of virtue, Tony Blair, in the belief that some of Ferguson`s success might just reflect onto him. It didn`t, of course. It had quite the opposite result from that intended.

Ferguson gets more irascible as time goes by. His management `style` involves hairdryers, teacups, volcanic rants at match officials, flouting contractual responsibilities and generally bringing the game into disrepute. In short, he displays all the restraint and modesty one has come to expect from someone honoured by Blair.

(Tevez)

And yesterday, as his team demolished hapless Newcastle 6-0, his latest signing, one Carlos Tevez, `celebrated` one of his two goals by producing a baby`s dummy from the inner sanctums of his shorts and promptly stuck it into his mouth before prancing around Old Trafford in the mistaken belief that his display would bring admiration from the assembled gathering. But however admirable his football might be, Tevez`s `celebration` was merely infantile, arrogant and in character with his surroundings, for he is simply part of a club whose watchword must surely be `unprepossessing.`