Yesterday Owen Hargreaves, of all things a Canadian footballer, was the most beloved man in Premiership football. Agreed, that is not much of a claim to fame bearing in mind that most Premiership footballers garner about as much love as infected asbestos splinters under the fingernails, but he was. Today, after 63 minute of game time for the latest money spending megaliths on the footballing stage – Manchester City – his star is falling.

Speaking to UK newspapers after the Carling Cup defeat of Birmingham (in which Hargreaves scored, marking a memorable comeback after just 6 minutes of football in 3 years) Hargreaves blamed painkilling injections he received whilst with Manchester United for his prolonged period of tendonitis and zero football.

“I received some injections but my tendon was never the same. After the injections, I tried to get back on my feet and they said my tendon was good, but it felt like I was made out of glass. That obviously had a huge impact. With my tendon injury, I’ve had to be a guinea pig for a lot of these treatments. It’s difficult.”

That the player, who cost Manchester United the best part of a million pounds per game after his mega-money move from Bayern Munich, would say such a thing is a parting blow for the fans on the red side of Manchester, who, in huge majorities, didn’t voice contempt for his move to the enemy the other side of the city. Indeed, many of them wished him luck and sent nothing but good will: something that has never happened before and will most likely never happen again.

Owen Hargreaves blames Manchester United for his injury woes

Take the blame would like to offer its condolences for the red half of Manchester. You know he’s going to score against you.

This bunch of zillionaires cant even beat Levante. Who are Levante? Exactly.

Not a bear trap. Not a mouse trap. Hell, he didn’t even blame a trap door. Jose Mourinho blamed a verbal trap for his Galatico megolith getting unstuck against tiny, minnow, microscopic, amoeba sized tadpole of a club Levante at the weekend. Real Madrid went down 1-0, losing their first game of the season and opening a blame game. Just why would such a unstoppable force of unimaginable riches come to a very quick and grinding halt against a such seemingly easy team?

The blame needs to be assigned to Real Madrid midfielder Sami Khedira who managed to get himself sent off, even after the team had studied similar games and installed jedi-mind tricks to not rise to the baiting of other players. In a news conference after the game, the Special one had some very insightful blames.

“The blame in my opinion lies with one of my players who was lured into a trap. They (the players) have to have enough intelligence to avoid situations like that and have a sense of whether the referee will allow it or not.”

The incident that Mourinho is referring to happened just before half time when Khedira, already nursing a yellow card, reacted like a cricket to a slight breeze – that is, completely over the top -  and pushed the Levante captain, Sergio Ballesteros, to the ground. It is unclear what Sergio said to the Real Madrid Galitico but was probably something along the lines of “youre a **** ****** ****** ******* **** **** ***** *****”.

The defeat leaves real Madrid 3 points lower down the league than they would be, had they won.

Craig Levein and the Scotland football team have laid the blame squarely at the feet of the referee for their 2-2 draw in their European qualifier against the Czech Republic. An infuriated Levein had to watch on from the sidelines as the visiting Czechs were awarded a last minute penalty for what, to most eyes, was a big fat dollop of nothing. The referre saw something that nobody else did, had an attack of whistle epilepsy, blew up for a penalty, which, to use football terminology, was buried in the back of the net deeper than your Great-great grandmother. Speaking (carefully) to the BBC after the game, Manager Craig Levein had this to say.

“I’ve got to be careful what I say. What I can say is that we lost the game not through anything we did wrong. I lay the blame on the referee’s shoulders. Two huge mistakes. Berra gets brought down and is booked for diving.”

Scotish Manager Craig Levein squeezes the puny head of the referee in his fist

The result leaves Scotland in a world of European football pain and facing a Summer of  listening to the aggravating, bothersome and vexatious nation south of the border as they battle fruitlessly to quarter final embarrassment.

European qualification comes automatically to the first team in each of the 9 groups fighting for a place in the finals in Ukraine/Poland next summer. The teams which struggle and fluke their way to second place then go into a mini knockout tournament where they have one more chance to cock things up or get on the plane.

The result in Scotland at the weekend sees the Scots 5 points behind the Czech Republic, thus languishing in third place and far from a qualification place. Had they held on at 2-1 then second place would have been a real possibility. Now it is a fantasy. At this juncture we should point out that World and European champions and current best team in the world by around 17 aeons are currently sitting pretty at the top of Scotland’s group with the best part of 254 points. That would be Spain to you and me. So La Furia Roja are taking first place. It’s a dog fight for second and Scotland have just taken a huge mauling.

So where do we fit in? “The referees a wanker”. So the song goes. But this is by-the-by, because wankers or not, one thing they dont ever do is accept liability after the event. Just ask Alex Fergueson, Arsene Wenger, José or any other football manager. From the top to the Sunday league bottom, the referee is to blame and they never take it. Take The Blame™ would like to apologise for all the Scotland fans whose 2012 looks a little bleaker thanks to the ludicruos decision of a man who really doesnt care about you or your team. We would also like to take the blame for a penalty that was never a penalty.

To make you feel slightly less wounded, you will always have Archie Gemill against Holland.

Before we begin, spot quiz. Do you know which football team Diego Amando Maradona, World Cup winner, Golden Ball winner, Golden boot winner, UEFA cup winner, Italian cup winner, Spanish cup winner, Spanish league cup winner, double Italian championship winner, 5-time South American player of the year currently manages? Any guesses? Well let us tell you. It’s Al Wasl. You know who they are? Al Wasl?  Because we at Take The Blame™ sure has hell don’t. It’s like Pele playing for Scunthorpe.

Spot the difference.

After being, arguably, the best football player to ever grace Terra firma, things took a turn for the worse for Señor Maradona. It must be difficult to acclimatise to life without the beautiful game when you are the most gifted and beautiful player of it, but some people adapt better than others. But we will come to that. First lets fast forward to the present day and the 2011 Copa America and Argentina’s calamitous early quarter final loss, on penalties, to Uruguay. Because there is a blame game afoot. And we like the Blame.

The blame is simple enough but might need a splash of history for the uninitiated out there. Until Argentina’s early, catastrophic knockout at the 2010 World Cup, Maradona was the coach. He resigned. Now, as yet again, Argentina crash out early, he is pointing the finger squarely at coach Batista and head of the AFA, Julio Grondona.

In regard to Batista, whom Maradona played along side during the 1986 World Cup, he said that,

“If I had only beaten Costa Rica, I would have gone of my own accord“. And if Batista didn’t like the media pressure that goes hand-in-hand with job, he should “cross the border to Uruguay where nobody would recognise him.”

However, Maradona kept his choicest words for continual headache, AFA president Julio Grondona, whom Maradona had continued run-ins with during his tenure as coach.

“What is happening right now is not the fault of the players. Julio Grondona is doing just what he likes“.

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So there you go. But before we leave, no story about Maradona would be complete without the barren years. The nutty, crazy, gun-toting, drug-taking, wildchild megalomaniac years. The years that famously ended with a blown up, over weight Maradona taking pop shots at journalists with an air rifle from behind the gates of his mafia mansion. Stories of hookers and cocaine and stomach stapling are too good to be untrue and too surreal to be ignored. A stomach stapled fat man who used to be the greatest football player in the world shooting people. It is a tale so priceless, so ludicrous, that the only possible outcome would be the anti-villian leading the national side in a World Cup.  A failed hero becomes monster becomes hero.

The Argentinians love hm because he bought them the world. The world love him because he is a raving lunatic. Lets hope he brings a story to the Gulf  state of the UAE, where, for 3.5 million euros and a private jet to do with what he pleases, the next chapter in the Diego Amando Maradona story will be told. Lets pray for madness.

Are you feeling lucky punk? Maradona takes target practice at the local journalists.

This is the world cup and one supposes, what all the fuss is about.

Whether you think football is Gods gift to mankind or as interesting as a visit to a Ukrainian dentist, one thing is clear, football and footballers are a hotbed of ineptitude, both on and off the field. For the time being we are sticking to the pitch and what should be the easiest task there is for a professional footballer; kick. The penalty kick. Just kick it. Just kick the ball, preferably in a straight line, into the goal. It’s not rocket science, it’s your job. A footballer who can’t kick is like a politician who can’t talk or a french waiter who can’t be a miserable, impolite bastard; pointless and probably playing for Birmingham City.

So when entering the modern day arena of sport, expect inept things. The modern day colosseum (this is such crap. Why do football commentators compare football to ancient gladiatorial contests? There is no comparison. One involved being killed or killing someone or something in a hugely barbaric and violent way, probably involved dismemberment, beheading, flailing and resulted in gallons of blood, pain and suffering. The other is 22 men falling over, crying, insulting the referee, play-acting, diving and sometimes trying to kick a ball.) regularly lives up to its billing.

Take the blame™ has compiled some of the most tragically bad kicks the game has ever seen. In doing so we haven’t simply gone for Sunday league, hungover amateurs who spend most of the game fighting; no, we have chosen the crème de la crème too. In fact, we go all the way to the top for starters. To the world cup final of 1994.

Brazil went on to win the World Cup.

Enter stage right, Roberto Baggio. Having scored 5 goals, literally dragging Italy to the World Cup final, and with an injury to boot, The Pony-Tailed Assassin was on the verge of an Italian knighthood and ownership of the country. Had Italy won the world cup in 1994 it would have been on his shoulders. He could have walked into the presidential office and assumed power of the state. But sadly for him his penalty practice had obviously involved watching Diana Ross in the opening ceremony, for when the closing, final act came about; when it was time to kiss the girl in front of a setting sun on a Caribbean beach as the end credits roll, he fluffed his lines. Jimmy Stewart became Vin Diesel, and Italy lost the world cup. For a footballer there is obviously nothing better than winning the world cup and nothing worse than cocking it up.

So Roberto Baggio is here because of the magnitude of the error. At least he kicked the ball. At least the ball left the ground. At least he used his foot in a pendulum motion to levitate the ball off the ground. That the ball soared over the cross bar is by the by when you consider our next two inept candidates for the position of most inept footballer ever. From the World Cup final of 1994 we descend like a sinking ship to the 1991 HFS Northern Premier League Division One Cup Final of 1991. The gulf in class and the gulf in ineptitude is there for all to see. Enter Peter Devine playing for the mighty Lancaster against the equally mighty Whitby Bay.

As you can see, kicking was a touch out of his range of movements. He set his sights too high and failed miserably. He should have stuck to standing. But again there is hope. This is funny but also a little sad. You can see the momentum carry him to the ground, you hope he can stay on his feet, because we have all been there, but every time you watch it there is the same sad result. There is also the quality of the video and some early 1990s nostalgia creeps in. We don’t really blame Peter Devine for his ineptitude because we know we could probably go to the pub for a pint and laugh together at the comedy value of the moment. The next contestant receives no such pity, no such forgiveness. Mainly as it is so arrogant in its ineptitude; and the one thing which is worse than ineptitude is ineptitude brought about by arrogance. Enter Robert Pires. Even the name conjures up arrogant images.

Peter Devine kicked the ball. He fell over in the process, but there is no denying the ball moved. Not very far, but it moved. Kicking, in the loosest sense of the word, was achieved. The Arrogant Arsenal team of 2009 in a game against Manchester City produced the following crime against all that is sacred in football. Can you imagine Brian Cloughs reaction if it had been under his watch? “Just kick the fucking ball you arrogant, self-indulgent fucking ponsy premadoners.” Or something along these lines would have been his – and rightly so – reaction.

In South America if you miss a penalty you could very well end up dead. Which is why the next video makes sense. We can’t understand the commentary but we think it revolves around a possible betting and gambling scam involving Colombian and Mexican drug cartels and the possible cutting off of hands if the penalty is scored. Possibly.