Posts Tagged ‘gossip’

Wayne Rooney’s incredible decision to sign a new five-year contract at Manchester United has shocked the football world, just days after he made it clear he was looking to leave. The persuasive powers of Ferguson are legendary in football and he could well have played another blinder to keep Rooney on-side.

Bear in mind that what was said in Rooney’s statement a mere 48 hrs ago undermined his fellow players, the fans and, surely, the manager too. Rooney said publically that Fergie and the club had no ambition! He pointed the finger at everyone at Manchester United.

How, then, can he ever recover? It may help that people expect these duplicitous ways but that is unlikely to stop them feeling cheated by the soap opera that has played out over the last week.

The abrupt Rooney U turn is bad all round; a PR disaster for his brand and deeply unhelpful for his club. Using the back and front pages to play hard ball brinksmanship, the furore has produced the result his management team desired: more money and better terms. Read the rest of this entry »

The Mel Gibson/Oksana Grigorieva row that has been consuming America whole for the last few weeks has taken a new turn, according to the TMZ website, with Oksana’s publicist Steve Jaffe leaving for pastures somewhat less argumentative.

The big question racing round the media and the net is: did Jaffe walk or was he pushed? But in an age when the big news organizations are repositioning themselves as verifiers of the news, given the predominance of the blogosphere and the Twitterati as breakers of the news, it’s never going to be as cut and dried as that.

According to RadarOnline, and quoted in the Mail, Jaffe has stated: “The case was so all encompassing in terms of my time and the strict orders by the judge. I have other clients in serious crises who require my time.” Read the rest of this entry »

What a depressing week for lovers of football. What a sorry, sad, insane mess played out by fools and halfwits. Ordinarily, the focus would have been on the big game, Arsenal v. Chelsea. Instead, this weekend, our interest in the game will be for all the wrong reasons. So, instead, I have decided to focus on the American version of football, which reaches its colossal climax on Sunday. I hanker after the hype, showmanship and ballyhoo of the Super Bowl.

US and UK sport have always been different – from the amount of body armour the Americans wear to play what amounts to rugby to the way the world views the different sports on each side of the Atlantic. Whatever your view of American sport, however, there is no doubt they are well ahead of the game when it comes to using social media in cahoots with big sports events. Read the rest of this entry »