The Blue Oxo Cube

There is an old joke in Manchester football circles about a new addition to Oxo’s stock cub range.

Alongside the orange chicken stock, red beef stock and green vegetable stock, there is now a blue Oxo cube - laughing stock

You see, this is rib-crackingly funny because Manchester City wear blue

This season, City have recorded their record points total for a 38 game Premier League season, taken six points off their bitter and illustrious rivals United for the first time in 38 years and, albeit through the back door of the Fair Play League, are set to qualify for the UEFA Cup.

After decades of perpetual underachievement, City’s stock should riding high - but frankly they’ve rarely looked more ridiculous.

Just over a fortnight ago, Sven Goran Eriksson’s men had risen out of a late season slump with back to back wins against Sunderland and Portsmouth and were cruising 2-0 up at home to Fulham. A triumphant end to the Swede’s debut season beckoned, and a top six finish was still a possibility.

But then City did what they’ve always done best - they imploded.

Fulham, on the brink of relegation, rallied to score three goals in a frantic final twenty minutes Despite having enough chances to win two games, the Blues went down to a 3-2 defeat. Watching owner and deposed former Thai Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra was not impressed. And why wouldn’t he be - it was a retched way to lose a football game. Most City fans were at best jolly ticked off.

However, things got silly. In a succession of meetings after the Fulham match, Shinawatra reportedly told Eriksson he had no future at City beyond the end of the season. On the Monday, Eriksson told his bewildered playing staff as much and they openly discussed the possibility of going on strike.

Eriksson’s agent Atole Still and trusty assistant Tord Grip told the media it was unlikely their man would be in Manchester for the punishing slog of pre-season training. All the while, Sven remained tight lipped.

These bleak murmurings took place against a backdrop of fervent fan support for Eriksson. Mass protests were organised, 20,000 signed a petition imploring Shinawatra to change his mind and 97 per cent of respondents to a poll on the Manchester Evening News website said Sven should stay. The paper even launched their own “Save our Sven” campaign, complete with an altogether frightening Eriksson mask (which looked like a cross between a Scream mask and Hannibal Lector) to be worn in support of the boss.

At this point, things were bleak, but at least the fans could proudly claim a principled common front that was fighting for the good of their club.

This was all too simple so the delicately woven fabric that is Manchester City decided to unravel some more.

The fans bellowed their support for Eriksson during City’s next game, away at Liverpool. This included surely the first example of a Pink Floyd record being immortalised in football song.

The Blues response was a lackluster 1-0 defeat at Anfield.

The following week, Eriksson reportedly met with officials from Portuguese club Benfica in his plush hotel suite discuss becoming their new manager.

Even if he has been treated in a shabby manner, Eriksson remains under contract and should not have done this. Throughout the turbulent events of the previous week, he had dealt from a strong position of integrity and class. Now he’d clumsily fallen off the moral high ground and City fans no longer knew who to trust.

The tin hat was duly applied this weekend, when, in a display of the darkest slapstick, City capitulated to an 8-1 defeat away against a mighty Middlesbrough side who had failed to score more than two goals in any game this season before this obscene rout.

On the same day, Manchester United clinched their tenth Premier League title. City’s magnificent 2-1 victory at Old Trafford three months previously seemed a lifetime ago. The respect so deservingly won that day and during an impressive start to the season had vanished. The blue Oxo cub had returned.

The fans were perplexed. It’s hard to vocally support a manager who has led your team to such a drubbing. Maybe Thaksin was right? They no longer knew what to hope for or believe in, except maybe nothing. 

 Today, the circus continues as City embark on their post-season tour of Thailand with Eriksson still at the helm. Amid the confusion, the M.E.N’s stoic support for Eriksson has been replaced by tentative reflection.

Despite a disappointing end to the season and some questionable moves in the transfer market, the former England boss has laid some impressive foundations at Eastlands and he should be allowed the chance to finish the job he has started - the arduous task of restoring City to something like their former and distant glories.

However, this is not the way of the big business behemoth that is the Premier League.

This booming industry of billion pound television deals has attracted some obscenely rich and, shall we say, “colourful” characters. Billionaires such as Shinawatra, Roman Abramovich at Chelsea and the loving, hating and yee har-ing odd couple of George Gillett and Tom Hicks at Liverpool, cherish the clubs they own like they do their numerous cars, yachts and property investments.

For the fans, the lifeblood of football, it is wincingly painful to see their beloved teams reduced to a rich man’s play thing.

All of the owners mentioned above have either undermined or fired highly regarded coaches thought, by footballing convention, to be doing sterling jobs for their sides. In a climate of those with apparently little knowledge holding the majority of power, it comes as little surprise that the football writing fraternity has come out on the side of Eriksson.

This not necessarily through any fondness for the man from Torsby, but through a love for the game they felt they once knew so well.

When the news of Eriksson’s impending departure broke over a fortnight ago, Henry Winter, chief football writer for the Daily Telegraph, nailed his colours to the mask, stating in an impassioned article that Shinawatra was not fit to run Manchester City. Winter states talks of a shrewd and impressive spell of management from Eriksson that has won the support of City fans, but concludes grimly that the opinions of these lowly foot soldiers count for little nowadays.

Last Tuesday, the Daily Express ran a piece from Harry Harris, where the Richard Bevan, the Chief Executive of the League Managers Association, Richard Bevan bemoans the “nonsense treatment that Eriksson has been subjected to. He talks of using government regulation to bring rogue owners into line.

In the Guardian, David Conn called into question the integrity of City fans who have only now developed problems with a man who boasts an appalling human rights record as Thai Prime Minister. This is a valid point, but one that simply proves money has come to speak louder than anything in the game, including its conscience.

“He can buy us world class players and get us into the Champions League! So what if he killed a load of drug dealers without trial?” This is a regrettable truism of conversations between Manchester City fans, and placed in the same position, one fears other clubs would not be any different.

This rich man’s game will continue to benefit those at the top table, with access to the best players and the most money, while the chasing also-rans such as City are likely to remain embroiled in farce, chasing an impossible dream. For them the money can buy very good players, pay off a succession of managers and buy a lifetime supply of Oxo cubes.