THERE’S one big problem with so-called footballing “fairytales”.
Instead of “and they all lived happily ever after”, they tend to end with the words “and they all f***ed off to Big Six clubs”.
Before and after Crystal Palace lifted their first major trophy at Wembley on Saturday, those who inspired the club’s FA Cup triumph have been the subjects of a speculation avalanche about summer switches away from Selhurst Park.
Boss Oliver Glasner is in pole position to take over a Tottenham team nowhere near as good as Palace, while Eberechi Eze has attracted the interest of Spurs and both Manchester clubs, all of whom have been beaten by the Eagles this season.
Midfield man Adam Wharton is wanted by Liverpool, while skipper Marc Guehi could be holding out for a free transfer to Real Madrid or Barcelona.
These are the last things any Palace fan wants to read in the afterglow of victory over Manchester City — but it is the way of the footballing world, with its big, bad wolves.
Money talks. The bigness of big clubs is big. And killjoy PSR regulations make it increasingly hard for smaller clubs to be upwardly mobile.
Yet the day after Palace’s Wembley glory, we received a timely reminder of English football’s greatest fairytale merchant, Jamie Vardy.
After their miraculous title success in 2016, Leicester were precisely where Palace are now — their euphoria troubled by rumblings from a traditional, self-entitled elite desperate to dismantle their team.
N’Golo Kante immediately headed off to Chelsea, to be followed by his midfield partner Danny Drinkwater a year later.
Riyad Mahrez begged for a move but had to wait until 2018 before he was snapped up by Manchester City.
Yet Vardy, the subject of a major bid from Arsenal in 2016, stayed put — claiming it was an easy decision to stay at Leicester.
The idea of rough-diamond Vardy working under the urbane Arsene Wenger would have represented an intriguing meeting of minds.
But nine years later, there was Vardy, netting his 200th goal in his 500th and final match for the Foxes, treated to a guard of honour from the boys of 2016 and hailed as Leicester’s finest-ever player.
Of course, it still wasn’t “happily ever after”. Leicester have been relegated for the second time in three years following a train-wreck campaign.
But Vardy’s achievements, since his £1million arrival from non-league Fleetwood in 2012, have been extraordinary.
From the great escape, to a record 11-match Premier League scoring streak in the title campaign, to the Golden Boot in 2020 and the FA Cup in 2021. Vardy isn’t your classic romantic hero.
Jane Austen never wrote about a bloke who played non-league football in a convict’s ankle tag, taunted opponents with incessant s***housery and thrived on a diet of Skittles, vodka and the tobacco product snus.
Nicknamed Steptoe, due to his resemblance to an ancient TV rag-and-bone man, Vardy went from rags to riches and back to relative rags, due to his wife’s defeat in the Wagatha Christie court case.
But in an age of here-today-gone-tomorrow transience in elite football, Vardy has been a glorious exception.
He snubbed Arsenal, became the Foxes’ GOAT and, at 38, still operates with the speed of a thoroughbred racehorse.
Of course, nobody should blame Eze, Wharton, Guehi or any of Palace’s Cup final heroes if they do jump ship.
And certainly not Glasner, given the complete lack of loyalty shown to modern football managers.
Claudio Ranieri, architect of Leicester’s 2016 success, was sacked nine months later — in between two legs of a Champions League knockout match against Sevilla.
When I recently asked Glasner whether Spurs would always be a bigger club than Palace, he insisted that they “inhabited a different world”.
While Europa League nights at soulful Selhurst Park sound like a treat, the lure of a higher salary and higher expectations, in a world-class stadium feeds the egos of these men.
Glasner may leave this summer, along with two or three of Palace’s best players, and that would be a shame — because it would be such a bleeding obvious thing to do.
Vardy, meanwhile, is looking for another Premier League club. Palace might well see him as a more reliable back-up striker than Eddie Nketiah. And Vardy might see another fairytale opening up.
Named n’ shamed
ONE of the most depressing factors when a club moves to a new stadium, is that they are nearly all subject to “naming rights” deals.
Take Everton’s new home — which has apparently been named after a law firm, rather than the farcical comedian Benny Hill and the orange-skinned antique dealer David Dickinson.
English football ground names used to possess a certain romance — from Scunthorpe’s Old Show Ground to Shrewsbury’s Gay Meadow.
There is nothing so poetic about the ‘Hill Dickinson Stadium’.
Fans show they Cair
WHEN Fulham face Manchester City at Craven Cottage on Sunday, both sets of supporters will say goodbye to a talismanic midfielder who arrived at his club ten years ago and led them to previously unscaled heights.
And while Kevin De Bruyne wasn’t bad, the Fulham fans will be singing “ain’t nobody like Tom Cairney”.
Glanville’s no puzzle
BRIAN GLANVILLE, who has died aged 93, was a prolific journalist and author who was the doyen of our trade.
And for all the great lines Glanville wrote, the words I remember best were ones he spoke at Loftus Road during a friendly between Trinidad & Tobago and Iceland in 2006.
We were covering this bizarre fixture because England were due to play Trinidad at that year’s World Cup but the “action” was hardly gripping, so another esteemed writer turned his attention to the puzzle section of his newspaper.
At which Glanville hollered: “Four letters beginning with ‘C’ — a bloke who does a crossword in a press box.”
Esse option a tier jerker
CRYSTAL PALACE’S FA Cup success owes much to their willingness to recruit from the Championship — an increasingly-rare approach among Premier League clubs.
Eberechi Eze, signed from QPR, and Adam Wharton, from Blackburn, were stars of the show, just as Michael Olise proved an excellent recruit from Reading before last summer’s move to Bayern Munich.
Romain Esse, a January signing from Millwall, looks like he will prove to be Palace’s next such shrewd buy.
It’s a wonder more top- flight clubs don’t do likewise.
Pep’s sour Hend
PEP GUARDIOLA’S ranting at Dean Henderson after Manchester City’s FA Cup final defeat by Crystal Palace, brought to mind a quote attributed to American football coach Vince Lombardi — “Show me a good loser and I’ll show you a loser”.
But despite his reputation for volcanic outbursts, Sir Alex Ferguson — the one manager with more Premier League titles than Guardiola — could often be extremely gracious in defeat.
Such as after the 2011 Champions League final at Wembley, when Guardiola’s Barcelona defeated his Manchester United side 3-1.
“Nobody’s given us a hiding like that but they deserve it,” Ferguson said. “In my time as manager, it’s the best team I’ve faced.”
Sure, Henderson should have been sent off — but Palace’s first major trophy should have been a moment for similar good grace.
League of their own
FOR English watchers, a clash between Paris Saint-Germain and Inter Milan is the least sexy Champions League final in years — no English clubs or players and no Lamine Yamal to marvel at either.
Yet PSG and Inter are wonderful teams and this promises to be the competition’s best final in years — especially as there hasn’t been a decent one since Real Madrid’s 3-1 win over Liverpool in 2018.
Crystal Palace ratings
CRYSTAL PALACE secured their first ever trophy with a famous FA Cup final victory over Manchester City.
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