Well, this is ironic. Just recently I had a brief discussion with Ian Robathan on his blog about the John Carew to Fenerbahce rumour and since he seemed determined to give the story more credibility than it warranted I suggested that he was guilty of a little confirmation bias.

Nothing wrong with his opinion about John Carew, everyone is entitled to an opinion and I don’t necessarily disagree with assessment with the player at the moment. However, the story seemed obvious rubbish, but Ian wanted there to be some grain of truth in there somewhere. Wishing won’t make it so.

As far as I can tell, the Fenerbahce rumour was started by nothing more than a Turkish website publishing an opinion piece that pretty much said ‘Fenerbahce could do with a big striker who is good in the air. John Carew is a big striker who is good in the air. Fenerbahce should try to purchase John Carew.’ Honestly, that’s all it was, but by the time it appeared in the Daily Mirror it had become “Aston Villa striker John Carew ‘discussing terms with Fenerbahce’ for January move“.  A blatant lie.

Around the same time, Ian published a blog post stating that he thought we should swap John Carew for Robbie Keane at Spurs and went on to illustrate his reasoning. That’s cool, in fact that’s the sort of thing people want to read and discuss on blogs, that’s absolutely great, but it’s nothing more than an idea from a blogger’s head. Again, I’m not saying the idea is good or bad, that would be something to discuss on Ian’s blog, I’m simply saying that it’s nothing more than an opinion.

The irony is that I put it to Ian at the time that the Carew to Fenerbahce story was exactly the same thing at its source as his Carew / Keane swap post. Nothing more, nothing less. An opinion, mistranslated and presented as fact.

So today the Daily Star published a story about about Spurs wanting John Carew and being gracious enough to give us Robbie Keane in exchange. Oh, and they’ll also be kind enough to take £5m off us too, bless ’em. Honestly, I’d say that you couldn’t make this up, but apparently Ian did and the hacks at the Star loved it!!

Perhaps I’m being over generous in joining the dots up here, but it’s not beyond the realms of imagination that a story in the Star that doesn’t even bother to claim to have any sources was inspired entirely from reading Ian’s blog, is it?

And of course it resonates with Ian. It would, it’s his own idea!! Well played, sir!!

I’m not having a dig at Ian here, I love his blog, respect his opinion and we’ve discussed between ourselves about how all the bloggers in the Aston Villa online community have something different to offer. I’m just being playful, it really is quite funny.

Well, hang on, is it really funny though? Have you ever wondered why John Carew’s name keeps being mooted with an exit despite the player, manager and, more recently, the player’s agent all expressing extreme contentment with the status quo?

I have, and I’m starting to form an hypothesis which I’ll save for another post. However, if you read the way that the article in the Star is written you may get a clue. It’s all about what Spurs are going to do. They’re going to tell us that we can have Robbie Keane and they’re going to take John Carew and £5m from us in exchange. Oh really?

I don’t want to get into any pointless “my club’s bigger than your club” nonsense, but am I alone in reading this as Spurs are the big club swooping in to dictate business with little Aston Villa? I seem to remember a bigger club than Spurs coming in for a certain central midfielder and being given what Martin O’Neill would describe as “short shrift”.

Maybe Sami Mokbel at the Star forgot about that, or maybe Sami Mokbel is a Spurs fan.I don’t  know and I don’t care, but one thing for sure is that Sami Mokbel has no quotes and no source, so we all know that means no chance!!

A final thought I have surrounds the contentious issue at the moment of pay walls and so-called old media wanting to ring fence their content. If my guess is correct – and it is nothing more than a guess, I’m certainly not making any accusations – that the Carew / Keane swap story has no other basis beyond Ian’s blog post, what does it mean in the grand scheme of things when the old media are effectively taking their content from the little bloggers in the new media?

Coming back to the lack of sources or quotes, why should I believe that Sami Mokbel has done anything other than read a blog? Sami is the one claiming this story is true, the burden of proof is on him and until he produces evidence to the contrary, as far as I’m concerned, this is straight out of Ian Robathan’s head and if I wish to discuss the merits, or otherwise, I’ll go to the source.

And if Sami Mokbel reads this…. I think that Aston Villa should swap Isaiah Osbourne for Lionel Messi!! 😉

Kthxbai.