Forensic examination of the all-important data

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- Barry Glendenning
- theguardian.com, Monday 9 March 2015 12.29 EDT

'Bring on our inevitable semi-final exit to Manchester United.'

Happy football fans. Photograph: Ben Stansall/AFP/Getty Images

ALL THIS FOR A QUARTER-FINAL?

Pitch invasions are bad. The Fiver knows pitch invasions are bad because it spent all day yesterday and much of today listening to various people pontificating in newspapers, on TV and on the radio getting their smalls in a righteously indignant twist over two separate pitch invasions at Villa Park on Saturday evening, when some happy booze-fuelled numpties stormed the pitch to celebrate a goal and then victory for their team against local rivals West Brom. Happy football fans? We can’t be having that.

Rather than being a return to the bad old days of the 1970s and 1980s, as some more hysterical commentators have suggested, your glass half-full Fiver prefers to think of it as more of a reminder of the 1960s, a decade in which a similar pitch invasion perpetrated by similarly happy football fans at Wembley outraged public sensibilities to such an extent that it is to this day celebrated through its immortalisation in one of the most celebrated snippets of sports commentary ever heard. Happy football fans? Let’s put it on a 49-year loop.

OK, so pitch invasions aren’t ideal or indeed particularly rare (has a play-off semi-final second leg ever actually ended without one?), but compared to fans being hit by seats torn from the Villa Park away end or corner-takers being pelted by missiles flung by spectators, they’re little more than a minor inconvenience that can be fairly easily avoided. So that’s that sorted out, then – The Fiver has spoken so let’s move on. Pitch invasions are not that bad and certainly nowhere near as bad as Arsenal’s recent record against Manchester United or The Fiver’s shameless segue from one FA Cup-related topic to another in the space of a solitary sentence at the end of this paragraph.

Like a beleaguered England cricket coach who needs to “look at the data” to figure out why his team of under-achieving wastrels are incapable of hitting a cricket ball hard or often enough to score the runs needed to beat supposedly inferior World Cup minnows, The Fiver has also taken a “look at the data” before tonight’s FA Cup quarter-final between Manchester United and the Gooners and arrived at the inescapable conclusion that in the last 20 meetings between the teams, Arsenal have managed just three wins, while contriving to lose on 13 occasions. Thirteen.

On the face of it, this doesn’t bode well for Arsenal, but closer, forensic examination of the all-important data shows that Arsenal’s last win against United came after seven failed attempts to beat them, which suggests a clear recent pattern has emerged in which Arsenal beat Manchester United on every eighth attempt. What’s more, since their last win against their old foe, Arsenal have failed to win on any of the seven occasions the two sides have met, which makes them nailed-on certainties to triumph this evening. Say what you like about the data, but it doesn’t lie. Much.

QUOTE OF THE DAY

“Apologies to Hennes for my hard celebration” – Cologne forward Anthony Ujahadmits he was a little rough with goat mascot Hennes after scoring in the 4-1 win over Eintracht Frankfurt.

FIVER LETTERS

“I get The Fiver each day, and I also listen to Football Weekly, which I have done for a very long time. Anyway, every day I get your Fiver and it keeps telling me that I maybe should consider a trip into the murky world of internet dating, because I am almost certainly single. The implication being that an interest in football, and having a girlfriend are mutually exclusive. Well, I did go on Guardian Soulmates and, after nine months and many dead-ends and terrible dates and almost giving up, I did meet someone amazing (and she’s a woman) and we’ve been together four months now. I think I just got lucky though, and I don’t especially feel that the Guardian dating website itself did anything amazing to match us up, it was more just a nice coincidence that we were both on there and we liked each other. But that’s beside the point. The point is, it is perfectly possible to listen to Football Weekly and have a girlfriend. I don’t listen to it when I’m with her, of course, I do that when I get home. I’m not a fool. I don’t want to cross the streams” – Jonathan Turner.

“After reading heart-breaking accounts on the solitary life of the away-day fan (Fiver letters passim), it brings to mind an occasion when myself and my mate (equipped with his newly broken booming voice) attended a Cork City v Athlone Town top-flight clash back in 1987. As the club had only been formed in 1984, the groundswell of support was still building so there were about 250 fans at the ground and the atmosphere was so churchly that my mate was told to shop shouting (cursing) by the angry and over-agitated cameraman from Cork Multichannel TV – The ‘Host Broadcaster’. Apparently his x-rated sonic boom was all that could be heard in their broadcast that day, completely drowning out budding future Big Cup commentator Trev Welch. You just don’t get that type of action on a windy March night in Camp Nou” – Fergus Buckley.

“My son, Paul Snowdon, is slightly mistaken in his recollection of the Sunderland v Port Vale match (Friday’s letters). The Middlesbrough-residing Port Vale fan, Mark White, wasn’t there. I offered him a lift but it was too short notice for him. I think he’s just about got over it. His presence must have been virtual. I don’t think there were any other Port Vale fans. Three or four Mackems found themselves in the away pen, I think they just used the wrong turnstile. The police escorted them to safety after it was noticed they were cheering Sunderland. It is supposed to be me who is losing his memory with my advancing years, not my offspring, however I will claim to be more accurate as I was sober. I had to drive” – Chris Snowdon.

“May I join the 1,057 reggae pedants who will no doubt be writing to you to correct Lee Manuel’s reference to ‘the rap bit’ in Aswad’s Shine (Friday’s letters)? What he means is the toasting bit. But not this sort of toast” – Paul Steeples (and no other reggae pedants).

• Send your letters to the.boss@theguardian.com. And if you’ve nothing better to do you can also tweet the Fiver. Today’s winner of our prizeless letter o’the day is: Jonathan Turner.

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BITS AND BOBS

James Milner and Glen Johnson are both contemplating switches to foreign climes at the end of the season. “It would be great for the kids to go abroad,” cheered Johnson, seemingly unaware of such fantastical concepts as holidays and travel.

Barcelona accept they may not be able to match a potential offer from a bigger-spending club for Leo Messi. “Now with these clubs that have so much money like [Manchester] City, certain amounts don’t seem to have a value,” sniffed club suit Ariedo Braida, before adding: “He is not just a player. Messi is a phenomenon, he is an alien.”

Ten games after his appointment as Cagliari coach, Gianfranco Zola has been told to do one. Presumably in Italian. “The decision was made reluctantly against a great man who wrote unforgettable pages in the history of Cagliari, giving lustre and international prestige to the land of Sardinia,” wibbled a club statement.

Angry Northampton Town boss Chris Wilder has complained about the conduct of the touchline announcer during his team’s 2-0 defeat at Plymouth. “I had a disagreement with [him] because he was trying to get into the fourth official and the referee,” fumed Wilder.

And if you haven’t caught up with the remarkable tale of Grays Athletic’s manager bringing himself on to score and save a penalty last week, we recommend doing so now.

STILL WANT MORE?

Like someone with a fetish for miserable dramas with rubbish Cornish accents, Real Madrid can’t find it within themselves to turn off the BBC. Sid Lowe reports.

Raf Honigstein explains why insufferably grim, po-faced seriousness is sucking all the fun out of the Bundesliga.

Daniel Taylor was on hand to answer your questions before tonight’s FA Cup quarter-final between Manchester United and Arsenal.

The pick of the MLS action from opening weekend in USA! USA!! USA!!!

Serie A’s all gone a bit early 2000s, what with Luca Toni rolling back the years against Milan, as Paolo Bandini writes.

Oh, and if it’s your thing … you can follow Big Website on Big Social FaceSpace.