Media Response to the Arbitration

The Times claim that Sheffield United are considering taking their case to the High Court to force Kia Joorabchian to hand over documents that The Times believe 'could have important ramifications'. This is the second time The Times have made sly comments about these supposed documents. As today's judgement made clear West Ham served papers on MSI stating that it tore up the offending agreement between the two parties, so unless these documents are from West Ham saying 'we're only kidding, you still have third party control over us' the documents would make no difference. And it is hard to imagine West Ham would be so stupid.

As I think I said when The Times originally made this allegation it seems to me that Sheffield Utd are feeding The Times a load of old bollocks and the paper are biting hook line and sinker.

This is unfortunate because not all their journalists are so naive. Martin Samuel, also writing in The Times points out the double standards of Sheffield United, who on one hand bleat about fairness whilst on the other were involved in third party agreements of their own,

"Sheffield United hopped up and down in fury over West Ham’s Carlos Tévez, while Neil Warnock, their manager, talked quite openly of an agreement with Watford that stopped a former player, Steve Kabba, turning out against his former club. He saw nothing wrong with that, no double standard.

Indeed, Sheffield United launched a campaign for fairness as if there were a difference between a written agreement in which an illegal arrangement is kept secret, and a gentlemen’s agreement in which an illegal arrangement is not put in writing."

In general the media seem to be of the opinion that in the long run West Ham were a little lucky to not have had points deducted originally but the decision was made and then upheld so The Blades should now let matters lie. For example, The Telegraph says,

"... yesterday's decision should draw a line under the controversy and leave West Ham and the Premier League free to concentrate on planning for next season."

It was left to The Mail to lose all sense of reality by claiming that the arbitration panel believed "that Sheffield United and not West Ham should now be preparing for the new Premiership season."