THE manager of Hairy Fadjeetas has been granted an official pardon by the United Arab Emirates for the second time in three weeks as his side returned to the top of the Kenna League.
Roberto Firmino (14 points), Felipe Anderson (12), Juan Mata and Serge Aurier (both 10) put Fadges into first place and saved their manager from unspeakable human rights abuses in a UAE prison for a second time.
“This is getting silly,” said the Fadges boss, standing outside the prison in blood- and faeces-encrusted pyjamas.
“It’s the most competitive Kenna ever with a different team top every week. If this keeps up I’m going to be in and out of prison like John Warboys’ parole officer.”
The Kenna vice chairman’s side Young Boys went top. Every Young Boy scored points except goalkeeper Marcus Betinelli who didn’t register for the seventh straight week.
Fadges had the last laugh, or took first blood, over Young Boys in the first round of Krakow Cup fixtures winning by more than 20 points.
The result put the Dubai-based manager top of the league-and-cup-double stakes according to the chalkstripes in Kenna HQ’s speculations department.
Elsewhere in the so-called ‘group of death’, reigning Kenna champions Pikey Scum beat cup specialists Dynamo Charlton.
Scum lie just seven points off the league leaders.
YOUNG Boys were back on top of the table this week as The Most Competitive Ever Kenna Season continues apace.
Alexandre Lacazette’s goal brought mixed emotions for the vice chairman, who was watching proceedings on Sunday afternoon with the chairman in the Tottenham Beehive.
THE government of UAE has officially pardoned the manager of Hairy Fadjeetas today after the team went top of the Kenna League, but they say he is still ‘shit’.
The Dubai-based boss of the Fadges has been in custody in the Arab state for the last six months after being found guilty of having an empty trophy cabinet since 2011.
In a news conference in Dubai, a UAE spokesman showed a video of the Fadges boss allegedly confessing to ‘being shit at the Kenna’.
The club claims their manager did not understand the charges brought against him since he does not speak Arabic.
The Fadges gaffer was granted a ‘presidential pardon’ once it emerged he was number one in the Kenna, the first time a manager in the Middle East has topped the league.
The UAE spokesperson went on to say the manager was free because of “the state’s extreme clemency in the face of him signing Victor Moses, Martin Dubrawka and Danny Ings at the August auction.”
A statement from Kenna HQ read: “From Riyadh to Ras El Hanout, regional experts are scratching their heads at the situation. In eight seasons in the league Fadges have finished 15th, 9th, 13th, 10th, 17th (relegated), 3rd and 8th.
“You’d have thought they would cut off the hand he uses to bid for players.”
AROUND 7.30pm on a Friday night last month the Kenna League auction hammer fell to pieces.
The incident sparked little comment in the Hoop & Grapes. It was a cheap hammer from ebay, paid for by Kenna funds, and it had served five glorious years. Even if many of the hundreds of signings it had sealed were unremarkable.
No, in itself the hammer head falling off was not of note. Except that it was the most exciting thing to have happened in the opening half hour of the October transfer window.
Let us drop all pretence, it was a bloody slow night. The October window is usually a jaunty occasion where managers are keen to replace those August signings who drifted off to the Continent, the Championship, Scotland. Or prison.
That was when the Premier League window closed at the end of the August. This summer it closed before the Kenna auction to transform the October transfer window into a curious affair.
A distinct lack of talent was available. Perhaps the record number of managers in the world’s leading London pub-based fantasy football league were partly to blame. Surely even the most incompetent Kenna managers could sign all the best August players if there was enough of them?
Burnley, Wolves and Cardiff players dominated the window’s proceedings. The three hours of dogged, Bramble-strewn bidding familiar at transfer night was reduced to a tawdry 60 minutes.
How can Kenna HQ breathe life back into the October window?
Wild ideas were being whispered around the corridors of Kenna HQ even before the window began.
Should managers be forced to release their fourth highest scoring player? Or the third? Or second?
If managers were coerced into losing their top scoring player, how would that affect August player sales?
The marketing flakes at Kenna HQ are already keen to implement a scheme where each manager loses their best midfielder. After a ‘blue sky, ideas shower, no bad ideas’ session (they were going to add ‘helicopter view’…) they came up with a name for it: ‘Midfield General’.
Others suggest the event could be used solely as a cup draw made by a celebrity guest like Mike from the pub or a local prostitute.
Or should the October window be scrapped altogether?
Certainly, Kenna HQ will not be introducing the ‘third window’ of the 2006/07 season, which saw the chairman accused of having no mates.
Whatever the solution, the committee will have to come up with something before next season if we are to avoid a repeat of last month’s staid ceremony.
MISSING journalist Jamal Khashoggi is expected to make a shock appearance at the Kenna League transfer window on Friday (19 October).
Turkish authorities alerted news outlets to Khashoggi’s disappearance earlier this month with allegations of undercover involvement by a Saudi Arabia government unhappy with the journalist’s criticism of the regime.
Sources inside Kenna HQ contradict that narrative.
They claim a set of CCTV stills proves beyond doubt the journalist was kidnapped by the Kenna HQ manager experiences department, a notorious wing of the fantasy football league’s apparatus involved in blackmail, kidnapping and ‘wet work’.
Khashoggi will join Jimmy Savile, Barry Bennell, Ian Brady, Rolf Harris, Harold Shipman and Stuart Hazell as a Bramble player, the others being released by managers ahead of today’s noon player release deadline.
A source at the Saudi consulate concurred with the Kenna HQ account in quotes cited reported by Al-Jazeera: “Khashoggi did visit the consulate but left via the back door. There were a few guys outside, he talked to them and then they got into a Hertz rental car. One of the guys looked a lot like Emanuel Pogatetz.
“Like we said, it’s just a total coincidence the Saudi consul decided to redecorate his residence afterwards.”
In a statement earlier, the Kenna chairman said: “To think the Saudis would abduct and murder a man on foreign soil just because he criticised the regime. How ridiculous! What’s next: Russian spies unleashing nerve agent in English cathedral cities?
“Anyway, we’re really getting our money’s worth out of that Saudi Arabia bunting we bought for the Kharine World Cup.”
A total of 18 players were released by managers today (below). As usual the auction spendthrift Dynamo Charlton manager takes the biggest war chest into the transfer window: £37.5m.
Khashoggi style – alternative journalist disappearance in pictures
Biggin Hill Airport – A private plane registered to Kenna HQ is spotted preparing for take off the night before Khashoggi’s disappearance. Ataturk Airport, Istanbul – Members of the Kenna manager experiences department, including Clint Dempsey and Emanuel Pogatetz, are seen being waved through airport security.
North London – Jamal Khashoggi seen arriving at Kenna HQ this week under the watchful eye of manager experiences department ‘muscle’.
Released players and remaining budgets
*indicates a manager absent from the auction receiving the average remaining budget
TUMULT is expected at next Friday’s Kenna transfer window when a new ‘sham slut’ rule will be imposed for the first time.
Rather than the evening disintegrating into a beery haze of meandering signings and unkept promises of all-night drinking in Bermondsey, transfer dealings are set to cease when an old alarm clock sounds at 10pm.
The new rule is likely to cause disarray with canny managers who prey on their competitors’ lack of moderation. And of course, the Pirate.
“Managers will have exactly three hours from 7pm to sign players through the traditional auction method. Once the alarm clock sounds there will be no more sales,” warned a Kenna HQ statement.
“Anyone who hasn’t made their signings before the window ‘shams slut’ will have their side auto-filled”, a tactic working quite well for the Pikey Scum manager, Kenna HQ failed to add.
RECORD numbers of managers in the Kenna League this season means pickings will be their slimmest ever in the first transfer window two weeks on Friday.
Predictably, the best-performing available players combined would be top of the league and come from unfashionable clubs like Cardiff, Huddersfield and Wolves.
Wolverhampton in particular enjoy overrepresentation among Kenna managers, no fewer than three Wulfrunians compete this season – Reds, ‘Pies and Casuals.
Even though eleven Wolves were signed in August, three are still at large awaiting vastly inflated price tags at the Kenna window on Friday 19 October.
But one available player name from Burnley stands out above the rest.
Aaron Lennon.
The winger has recovered from his personal problems to be a surprise package in the Kenna this season with 24 points already.
That’s two points less than Lokomotiv Leeds players Alexis Sanchez (£30m) and Alvaro Morata (£25m) put together.
Managers can anticipate to dig deep for Aaron Lennon, despite his patchy Kenna history.
Lennon burst into the Kenna off the back of World Cup appearances in 2006.
Vazmanian Devils paid a whopping £21.5m for the domestic services of the diminutive Yorkshireman following the international tournament, only to finish last in the league.
(Incidentally, only two players to feature in the Kenna that season were signed this summer: Jermaine Defoe and Cesc Fabregas. Rob Green remains unsigned.)
Lennon’s highlight of the rest of the noughties was a 2nd place finish with Recreativo Brockley in May 2008.
Since then the winger’s most notable contribution to the Kenna was a £14m signing for This is Sparta…Prague in 2013, where he ended up in a midfield with Jesus Navas, Jozef Fritzl and Jeremy Forrest.
TIS…P finished the season 20th, one place above the relegation zone.
It’s one of many lower table finishes Lennon has enjoyed in his Kenna career.
But with little on offer at the transfer window in two weeks, Aaron is bound to be snapped up.
The question is: will he continue to perform or will he leave his new manager stranded on the roadside?
Aaron Lennon’s Kenna career
August 2006 – £21.5m to Vazmian Devils (finished 9th – last)
August 2007 – £3m to Recreativo Brockley (finished 2nd)
August 2008 – £7m to the chairman (finished 9th)
August 2010 – £15m to Deportivo Kensington (finished 9th)
August 2011 – £10m to FC Testiculadew. Released in October and bought by Hairy Fadjeetas for £8.5m in February 2012. FCT won the double, Fadges finished 17th.
August 2017 – £0.5m autofill to Judean Peoples’ Front. Released on October and signed in February 2018 to a desperate Young Boys manager for £13m (finished 12th).
“I’ve got to be honest, it was starting to get embarrassing,” said the Scum boss from his New York home.
“While the rest of the league were physically at the auction, responding to dynamics of the event I was picking up the odd player through silent bids and patchy Whatsapp messages. How do you think I ended up signing Mitrovic?
“How everyone else continually failed to beat someone bidding from 2,000 miles away is really beyond me. Although saying that, I hardly won anything when I actually attended auctions.”
Kenna HQ has dismissed concerns the choice of holding auctions in the pub leads to reduced decision-making capabilities in managers present.
“Kenna managers are dedicated to the league and not easily distracted from the seamier diversions of London life,” said the Kenna chairman in a press conference this lunchtime called outside The Holborn Whippet.
“This is the world’s leading London pub-based fantasy football league and we take that title very seriously. It’s not like we’re all abusing alcohol or getting high.”
STACY Amplebean was working late in her new temping role.
She had found an admin job with a football league to earn some extra money. The work was okay, the money was good, and the people were nice.
In particular, she was a little fascinated with her supervisor Asier. They had worked together quite closely over the last few days and she was taken by his simple but forceful Latin looks. He was in his late thirties he looked like he still kept in shape. He had been a professional footballer.
It was shortly after six o’clock and it was just Stacy and Asier left in the office. Even though it was September the weather was still warm, and Stacy had taken to wearing a short skirt and little top to work in the stuffy storeroom taking inventory.
She was making small talk to pass the time: “People in the office say you were a defender and your tackle is very hard.”
Asier stopped and turned, looking a little sly. He said: “Did they tell you how hard?”
“I suppose I’ll have to find out for myself,” Stacy replied, tilting her head a little to one side.
Asier gave a small laugh and raised an eyebrow. Stacy immediately stopped resisting an urge she’d had for the last week, stepped towards him and kissed him softly on the lips.
As she pressed her body to his, she felt just how hard his tackle was becoming. “Del Horno by name…” said Stacy, before dropping to her knees.
Having undone his belt buckle, she slid his trousers and underwear down. The movement ended with Asier springing back to attention like a corner flag recovering from an errant sliding challenge.
Stacy began to softly caress him with her hands. “It’s true what they say then,” she giggled.
“Now it’s my turn, Miss Amplebean,” he said. Stacy knew exactly what he meant, having heard the reference to her surname many times.
“I didn’t know your English was so accomplished,” she replied, stood and lifted her skirt to reveal a small patch of white cotton already a little moist.
In his experienced, Basque hands her panties put up as much resistance as Real Sociedad under David Moyes.
Before long he was massaging her, his fingers working as deftly and with as much timing of a fin de siècle Arsenal back four springing the offside trap.
Stacy moaned, breathing harder, and thought of Nigel Winterburn.
