Manchester United are a large football club that gets countless requests for player interviews. You only have to spend five minutes in the press officer's room at the club's Carrington training ground to see emails flying in from all over the world.
Despite that, Monday was rather fruitful. At 1300 in Executive Box 30 in the East Stand at Old Trafford, I was due to interview Wayne Rooney, while next door Dimitar Berbatov was going to have a chat with his boyhood hero... . You'll be able to see the Rooney interview this Saturday, while the "Shearer meets Berbatov" extravaganza will make an appearance in the next couple of weeks.
Just to make the day slightly more showbiz, the were also scheduled to show up. Lead vocalist and guitarist Kelly Jones is a Leeds fan but he and Wayne have become quite friendly. Wayne lists them as his favourite band and has the words "Just Enough Education to Perform", the title of their 2001 album, tattooed on his right forearm.
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Greetings and salutations, sporting comrades. As I write this, I have a cold sausage number on brown bread with a condiment combo of mustard and mayonnaise alongside me. It's a strange one, but it's definitely a winner.
Anyway, rolling on from last week, thanks very much for all your suggestions for our 20 nicest people in sport. This is by no means the definitive list and I am sure there are loads we have missed out but - based on your suggestions, and my original three - this is what we came up with...
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I was in a shop last week with one babe in arms and the other in a pushchair. Pushchair child unfortunately took out a selection of breakfast cereals with a flailing arm and an elderly gentleman spotted me struggling to tidy up. He strode over, picked up the cereals, tickled pushchair child's chin and placed the boxes back on the shelves. "What a nice bloke," I thought as he stumbled off towards the tinned-meat aisle.
We all like a good moan, don't we? Well, this week I am not going to have one. Instead, I am going to talk about someone that strikes me as a genuinely nice bloke. Not the old fella in the shop but .
The former Aston Villa and Danish international defender was a guest on the Focus sofa a few weeks ago and was a real gentleman when I met him the day before at Villa Park as he gave us a tour of the stadium.
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Is it possible to keep fans happy at a big club? When I say happy, I mean feeling part of it. "Disenfranchisement" is a very long word - and a very American one - that makes me feel slightly nauseous, but it does sum up how a lot of football fans seem to feel. They love their club but fear alienation.
I don't know whether this is down to foreign ownership, football clubs being run like businesses, TV money, or whether it's a combination of all three.
But surely the end result of "disenfranchisement" is apathy. There is only so much you can love something without being loved in return (my English teacher used to say that all the time).
It's not a disease that hits every club. I am still delighted that my boys, , signed back in the 1990s. That was enough ambition to keep me going until 2015, even though he left soon afterwards because referees kept sending him off for waist-high hacks.
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Welcome comrades. This blog is all about giving you an insight into how Football Focus comes together each week. I do pop up across the ´óÏó´«Ã½'s sporting output so there may be the occasional reference to something other than the beautiful game too.
Have a read and feel free to join in with your comments and questions brothers and sisters.
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