TAP TAP TAP TAPPITY TAP TAP, THERE'S ANOTHER NAIL BANGED INTO THE LID OF FOOTBALL'S COFFIN
On 28 May 2002, three days before the start of the World Cup in South Korea and Japan, the FA took a leaf out of New Labour's Big Bumper Book Of Burying Bad News Under The Still Smouldering Rubble Of The World Trade Center – you can find it in the Humour section in Waterstones – and announced the relocation of Wimbledon FC to Milton Keynes. Well done, the FA, we all chorused, you've really got the best interests of football fans at heart! Anyway, a decade on, and as Jarvis Cocker so nearly sang, clowns are still running the world.
For in Cardiff, a deeply unpleasant shower of chancers are busy dismantling the local football team. This morning, two days before the start of Euro 2012, and with an England race storm dominating the media agenda to boot, the gaggle of shameless bozos currently with the keys to Cardiff City have quietly announced a "radical and revolutionary" change of team colours, plus a really cack new badge. What's more, they've got the brazen cheek to dress up the effective franchising of the club as a "progressive" measure necessary to the club's survival.
While hoping to distract large swathes of the club's support with a couple of shiny coins, Tan Sri Vincent Tan and Dato Chan Tien Ghee – pompously referred to in a rambling statement as Our Investors – have decided, seeing they have no respect for anyone or anything, to change Cardiff's blue kit to red, and their famous bluebird badge to a Welsh dragon. "I know and understand that there have been reservations in certain quarters over the changes accompanying the investment, but …" began Dato, before going on to explain that he was going to do whatever he liked anyway.
Chief executive and rich man's lackey Alan Whiteley insists that the rebrand will be "accepted by the vast majority of supporters as judged in the light of the numerous emails and letters of support, backed by recent poll results from the Supporters' Club and Media Wales". Which is an interesting take, given it was only 27 days ago when Dato himself insisted that "in the light of the vociferous opposition … we will not proceed with the proposed change of colour and logo and the team will continue to play in blue at home for the next season with the current badge."
Exactly why Cardiff are bothering anyway is a moot point. Their argument – "to reactivate rebranding proposals with a view to exploiting and maximising brand and commercial revenues in international markets" – doesn't actually mean anything in the world outside the PowerPoint presentation. But if building a modern superbrand is the aim, well, red shirts are hardly unique in football, while the new "crest development" is so amateurishly cobbled together it makes Shrewsbury Town's infamous clip-art effort look like it was designed by Saul Bass.
Still, all is not lost, with the majority of fans presumably of the opinion that some things – 113 years' worth of tradition, basic self respect, etc – are worth a wee bit more than coin. Accordingly, the Fiver looks forward to City's attendances plummeting next season as fans boycott the club, before Our Investors are chased out of town, and the blue kit with bluebird is restored two or three home matches into the season. All of which to simultaneously occur with the descent of Milton Keynes Dons into liquidation, please, seeing we're compiling a wishlist.
QUOTE OF THE DAY
"I can't see us winning it. I think maybe a semi-final position for England" – you won't catch Alan Shearer hyping England's Euro 2012 chanc … oh.
FIVER LETTERS
"Re: Friday's quote of the day. Can some psychology pedants enlighten us on the Dunning-Kruger Effect and whether it applies to the awesome Nicklas Bendtner?" – Paulo Padilha.
"Is it just me or are Team Ingerland fans' lesser expectations causing them to have higher expectations, thanks to the belief that the higher expectations were causing millionaires to fail at major tournaments, and now that the fans have low expectations, said millionaires should waltz to victory?" – Gerard Fitzgerald.
"Well done Graham Haslam, your Capital One League Cup pun (Friday's Fiver letters) does you credit. Credit!" – Matthew J Purchase.
"Presumably the interest in the competition will be at 0% for a period of six months" – Paul Menadue.
Send your letters to the.boss@guardian.co.uk. And if you've nothing better to do you can also tweet the Fiver.
BITS AND BOBS
Liverpool suit Ian Ayre has called Wigan chairman Dave Whelan "a comedian" for his conduct during the club's recent search for a new manager. "To be honest, I always thought John Bishop was the biggest comedian in the north west," claimed Ayre, as Jimmy Tarbuck alerted his legal team.
Mr Roy's England have moved up to sixth in the Fifa rankings. No pay-off required.
Giovanni O'Trapattoni has denied that he's working the Republic O'Ireland squad too hard, saying their training camp was like a "holiday" – claims perhaps reinforced by defender Sean St Ledger's recent tweet: "its got to that point of the trip … anyone got any [bongo] sites!!"
Poland No2 Jacek Zielinski claims coach Franciszek Smuda is like a "fox in a cage" ahead of Euro 2012. "He just wants to waste them all," roared Zielinski.
After toxic substances such as lead were found in Euro 2012 replica kits, Europe's consumer watchdog BEUC said fans could be risking their health by buying the shirts. "It is inexplicable that heavy metals are used in mass consumer products," said BEUC director-general Monique Goyens, giving the much-maligned musical genre another undue kicking.
Birmingham City's Chris Hughton has taken his spin on the managerial merry-go-round and pitched up at Norwich City to talk about their vacancy.
New Aston Villa boss Paul Lambert has promised to get Aston Villa fans back on board by "playing football the right way". As long as it's not the Alex McLeish way, he'll be fine.
And having offered Didier Drogba less money than Shanghai Shenhua, the chairman of Diego Maradona's Al Wasl, Marwan bin Bayat, is mystified that the former Chelsea striker "seems more interested in China".
STILL WANT MORE?
Stand back while we hawk some stuff: buy our new ebook: England's 20 defining matches.
Catch up on our entire series of AC Jimbo-narrated Euro 2012 animated histories here.
What do Frank Lebouef, Youri Djorkaeff, Fernando Torres, Jurgen Grabowski and an empty spot in the trophy cabinet have in common? Find out in this week's Euro 2012 Knowledge special.
Jonathan Wilson wonders whether England's 4-4-2 can work at Euro 2012. (The answer is "yeah, probably" if you can't be bothered to read his piece.)
And just how good is Manchester United target Shinji Kagawa? He is "reminiscent of the filigree writing of calligraphers," one German hack tells Louise Taylor.
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