Fans turned off by Tevez

With Carlos Tevez, if the list of excuses were made into a paper chain it might well circumnavigate the Etihad Stadium.

It has reached a stage when the mention of Carlos Tevez is guaranteed to start football fans yawning up and down the land.

The world of the Manchester City striker perpetually appears to be mired in acrimony. It is two-dimensional only in that he is either raging or sulking.

Has no-one told him that the job of an English Premier League footballer is supposed to be fun?

Has no-one told him that just about every young man in the world would willingly swap places with him?

All that is required is a couple of hours of his time each day and for that he receives more than GBP200,000 a week. A player with his talents and work ethic should also command the admiration of the footballing public.

Yet that appears beyond Tevez, whose world took another depressing whirl recently when he missed training at Manchester City and went to Argentina, without permission, to see his family.

The excuses were trotted out as usual. He had tried and failed to get in touch with Manchester City manager Roberto Mancini, he was missing his family, etc, etc, etc...

With Tevez, if the list of et ceteras were made into a paper chain it might well circumnavigate the Etihad Stadium.

That is what it has come to after Tevez was fined by Manchester City after a charge of misconduct for refusing to warm up against Bayern Munich in the UEFA Champions League.

Just about any other footballer would have taken his punishment, apologised for his diabolical behaviour and moved on. Not Tevez, whose initial four-week fine by City was reduced to two weeks after the players' union intervened.

The least the union could have expected was for Tevez to have repaid them with a vote of thanks and a show of humility.

Instead, PFA boss Gordon Taylor gave his view on Tevez's trip to Argentina.

“The lad is digging himself a hole and it is going deeper,” Taylor said. “It is a worry to me how we can now get out of this.

“He is a human being and a top-quality footballer, but his actions are not what we could possibly recommend to any other player in the game.”

That truly is saying something when you think of some of the greedy, selfish, over-pampered, egotistical men-children who disgrace the world's most popular sport.

Yet Tevez's position is rapidly becoming indefensible. There is another facet to this and that is the rapid decline in Tevez's value.

City want GBP40million, not an altogether unrealistic sum when we consider Andy Carroll cost Liverpool GBP35million last January and Tevez is a goal-maker as well as a goalscorer.

Would anyone pay that now for a man who defies his manager on the touchline and goes AWOL on a whim? It is doubtful if anyone would risk half that.

It is something which could rebound on Tevez, as Taylor explained.

“If he is determined to leave the club, which may well be apparent, then his money value is being diminished by his actions and can affect another club's interest,” Taylor said.

“As such, he could be held responsible for that, so it is getting to be a situation that I am not at all happy about.”

Happy? Now that is definitely not a word you would associate with Carlos Tevez.

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The Football Association, often with good reason, do not always get a good press.

They are an unwieldy organisation who make footballing decisions which are often unfathomable.

Yet their stand in the ‘poppy war' with an intransigent and unsympathetic FIFA was considered, eloquent and determined. It also did not hurt having an intervention from their president, the Duke of Cambridge.

It ended with a classic English compromise, the poppy to be worn on armbands rather than jerseys against Spain at Wembley. In footballing parlance: ‘The FA done well.'

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So Newcastle's St James' Park is now the Sports Direct Arena. How long in this money-mad world before a football club changes its name completely to accommodate a sponsor? Tottenham Hotpoint for example.

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