C'mon, let's be 'aving yer - yes, Off the Ball is back, and says good luck to the Dawn Parade.

In case you're wondering, they're a Cambridge band, and a damn fine one too, who are off to play some gigs in the States. Record labels, please take note.

I don't know, I turn my back for five minutes and it all goes bonkers. Ruddy signs for Everton, Carruthers does a runner, Mongin gets terminally fed up, the Mighty Iwan comes in, and the U's win as many games in five days as in the previous five months, before the heartbreak of Gigg Lane.

On top of that, Manchester United announce themselves as our Fairy Godmother (haven't I always said that Man United are a fine, nay, splendid club?).

Elsewhere meanwhile, Stephen Gerrard scores the first of, doubtless, many goals for Chelsea, a club now facing more charges than Harold Shipman, the FA Cup gets all messed up again, Jermaine Pennant goes on a diet of porridge and Delia gets all tired and emotional (Delia?? The Blessed Delia???).

I'll have to go away more often.

Strange priorities No. 1
So, Spanish manager Luis Arragones is - finally - disciplined for making racist remarks last year. Did he get sacked? Did he get fined the maximum amount? Nope, he got a slap on the wrist and a £2,000 fine, and even then he's had the nerve to bitterly complain about his treatment. Yet again, the footballing authorities have failed in their duty. I'm sorry to say it, but the racists are having a laugh right now.

Strange priorities No. 2
In recent weeks there have been numerous outbreaks of hooliganism at British matches, especially coin-throwing incidents. When the matches in question have been televised, the BBC have not only shown these incidents of violence but have repeatedly replayed them, analysed them, shown them in close-up... yet when a harmless streaker runs on the middle of a cup game, causing general mirth amongst the crowd, they turn the cameras away stating that "we don't wish to cause offence to viewers".

Now, I don't know about you, but given the choice of seeing someone dressed as we all look without our clothes on creating a bit of fun, or someone else displaying violence, hatred and threatening behaviour with the deliberate intent of harming another human being, I know which I find more offensive. I can't help thinking there's some confused thinking at the BBC.

I mean, that Delia?? Delia Smith???

Poor little rich boys
So, Mr Pennant gets sent down for drink-driving whilst already banned. Now, if you or me committed such a selfish, stupid and potentially lethal crime we'd probably lose our jobs and income, and would be told by society that we were very bad people who deserved what we got.

But when a footballer does it, he not only keeps his job but his manager tells the world he's just a poor young man who needs our help.

Actually, thinking about it, it's true - perhaps footballers really do need our help and pity. After all, they have so many hardships to contend with - we should just be grateful it's them and not us. Indeed, it's about time there was a support group to help these poor, unfortunate young men through some of the difficulties they have to cope with. So forget about Comic Relief, OTB is launching SOCCER - the campaign to help Sex-mad, Overpaid, Car-Crashing, Empty-headed Rich kids.

Here's why they need our help:

• Footballers are forever having to fend off the attentions of beautiful, scantily clad women who throw themselves over the hapless athletes. The poor men can't even dress in their finest Armani suits, Rolex wristwatches and expensive jewellery and parade themselves at the trendiest nightclubs without groups of these floozies trying it on with them. The rest of us can only imagine the horrors of having hordes of gorgeous models showering us with promises to fulfil our every fantasy. It must be sheer hell.
• Footballers are victims - fashion victims. Forced to wear £50,000 wristwatches, they are easy prey for every mugger and petty tealeaf in our major cities. Clearly, they need protecting.
• I recently heard a tragic - and true - story of a middling Premiership footballer. The sort of journeyman you'd probably forget if asked to name the players in his club's squad, but then someone would say his name and you'd say 'oh yeh, him' in a vague sort of way. Now, a couple of years ago this poor, unfortunate lad, already blighted by a lack of greatness, splashed out on a million quid mortgage, only to pay it all off in just nine months. Which left him with all that money to spend and the terrible strain of wondering what to spend it on. I mean, that sort of pressure on someone with no more than average talent is just soooo unfair.
• When one well-known footballer wrote off his £150,000 Ferrari, he immediately went out to stump up another 150 grand for a replacement. We can only imagine how distraught he must have felt on being told there was a three-month waiting list. The agony of having to go without his luxury sports car for 12 weeks must surely have explained his subsequent dip in form
• But even that wasn't the end of this poor player's problems. When a cruel and evil new manager was appointed at his club, he forced the player to - I can hardly bring myself to write this, it's so awful - he forced him to... play in another position!!! Naturally, the poor lad was distraught, even going public in his despair and grief, but the merciless manager forced him out and into a better-paid job elsewhere - the swine.
• Footballers are forced to spend long periods of each day not working. After training in the morning, and perhaps having a midweek game, they have to find something to do all afternoon while all their mates are at work. And then, and this is the really unfair bit, we expect them to work on a Saturday afternoon when the rest of us are off work enjoying ourselves. How can any caring society treat these young men like this? No wonder so many footballers feel they're hard done by and are forced into drink, drugs and wild living.
• Of course, these long, empty hours drive some players to become so desperate for work that they are driven into prostitution - endorsing products for advertisers and selling themselves to sponsors. The millions of grubby pounds they receive for this dirty work is scant reward.
• Others have to suffer the humiliation of undergoing drugs tests. No wonder the stress forces them occasionally to blank the test from their mind and seek a bit of retail therapy instead. Who can blame them?
• Then of course, there's the travel. Whilst most of us only have to commute maybe 10 or 20 miles to work, poor old footballers have to be flown all around the country, or even (apart from Denis Bergkamp, obviously) jet off to such miserable places as Italy, France, Spain, etc. And the really top players are forced to spend entire months some summers going off to Mexico, Korea, Japan, Portugal - confined to luxurious hotels, having to be dragged away from the pool and the sun to play football, forced to eat foreign muck - oh, the horror.

So you see, being a living God really is no bed of roses. The rest of should just be grateful that it's them and not us - thank goodness we don't have such stresses and problems in our lives.

Delia 'goes-to-Mass-every-day Smith'? Tipsy? Old 'butter-wouldn't-melt-in-her-mouth' Smith?? No, I don't believe it.

And finally...
Ok, that's enough sarcasm for one week. Anyway, as it happens, some of us do know a bit about the pressures of top-class football, thanks to our managerial responsibilities in Championship/Football Manager.

Talking of which, as U's manager I recently popped down to the old FM Job Centre to advertise for a new coach - and guess what?

Of all the thousands of coaches listed in the FM database, who should apply for the job of first-team coach at the Abbey but... one J. Beck of Histon.

More improbably, so did Dwight Yorke and Sergei Rebrov. But you'll be relieved to hear I did the decent thing - and stuck with Ricky Duncan.

Really, that Delia? Garlic? And bread?? Well I never.

That just about wraps up this week's column. If any of you would like to donate to my charity for hard-done-by Premiership footballers, make your cheques payable to me and I'll ensure they go to a good home. cufcofftheball@aol.com

Neil Cole

If you missed Neil's previous 'Off The Ball' columns, you can find them here

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