Jesus and Klopp: Iscariot and Karius.

The Champions League final in Kiev really produced a lot: a not-too-scintillating contest, there had been talks of Red Arrows, Ronaldo's Superman and Spiderman efforts and many other appetite-whetting epithets but what actually turned up in place of the anticipated fireworks were at best dull sparks; Mohamed Salah's injury, largely responsible for the just-mentioned damp squib; Gareth Bale' resurrection in form of a wonder goal, the Liverpool's goalkeeper confounding howlers. And a new word play. Loris Karius is now Lor isKarius. Clever but quite disingenuous as the source is quite familiar to everyone of us; the young German goalkeeper could be accused of so many things in the blunders that led to Real Madrid goals but by no stretch of imagination could he be tagged with perfidy. Karius has done fairly well in Liverpool's bright season and we could all see the genuine agony in his eyes after the final whistle but mischief is not always far from folks in an enterprise as passionate as football, especially in Africa where suspicions and conspiracy theories are dished out daily in cartloads. It is often that players battle with nerves, as well as genuine mistakes, and what Karius suffered from on the pitch was simply nerve failure and no other thing could be responsible. And he should take heart, after all our savior was accused of far weightier things, and in football, as in the larger life, there is always an opportunity for redemption. A second is all it even takes. Bale will easily attest to that.
Apropos of our savior. We will see greater substance in the wordplay by turning our attention to the principals of Judas Iscariot and Loris Karius. We know the two guys in question very well. Jesus knew someone was going to betray him and he could have saved himself by simply having the culprit seized by his disciples. But he did not. He had the greater duty of saving the whole world and the divine will must prevail. His blood must be shed and in that would be the redemption for all of us. And that is why we still look at the curvature of our neighbor's wife with covetous eyes without the threat of fire and brimstone, that fire and brimstone, doing things to our lustful hearts. Klopp was outright negligent in not seeing that his goalkeeper was not feeling all that comfortable in goal. We could all see that the moment Salah was carried out of the pitch. It was a simple case of getting scared knowing he faced a greater threat from the suddenly expanded breathing space Real Madrid players now roamed with the pressure the formidable Egyptian was exerting now attenuated with his removal. His coach should have seen this but then the usually passionate Klopp might have been too animated in his technical area. A similar thing happened in the second leg of the 2009 champions league semi final match between Arsenal and Manchester United. Arsenal were playing at home and everyone could see that the young defender, Kieran Gibbs, was feeling uncomfortable with the prospect of facing the Cristiano Ronaldo juggernaut. The tension, the size, of the occasion  simply overwhelmed him and his inexplicable slip in the box gifted the opposition a crucial goal. Arsene Wenger would eventually take him off, seeing he was coping badly with the weight of expectations, but by then the damage had been done. Klopp should have taken Karius off after that first howler. He wasn't Jesus Christ. Maybe then the outcome would have been different. Now he carries the unenviable tag of a coach that gets selections and tactics right except at the crucial moments: the finals.

Aristotle Mentors Wenger: But the Business of Football is no Business.

"Watch the costs and the profits will take care of themselves."
Poor Arsene Wenger. As a student of economics, he must have gushed over this ancient dictum: one day he was going to run a football club - forget Arsene who? - one of the biggest on earth, and he must have taken old Aristotle admonition as a tool to be taken far more seriously than a managerial wisecrack. He wasn't the only one: for ages, it was an advice that had saved many a business and businessman from collapse and ruin.
Wenger turned out to be an excellent master at tweaking costs. He would buy players dirt cheap and place them under salary structures that were not going to trouble club finances for a very long time and with his undoubted technical ability, mold them into stars that would eventually leave at enormous profits to the club. Aristotle must have beamed with delight in his grave. He also was an excellent salesman. His beautiful brand of football was to do all sorts of exciting things to British football, a brand hitherto notorious for long balls and hooliganism. His football tactics served him well, and so was the financial model that propped up the alluring brand. The pinnacle of his smart money moves was the construction of the magnificent Emirates Stadium.
But the business side of football wasn't going to remain the business of pizza or laundry soap for long. Strange competitors would enter the market. Rich guys with with oversized pockets and king-sized egos. Starting with the Russian oligarch, Roman Abrahamovich, football clubs became mere expensive acquisitions, like yachts, private jets and priceless arts and jewelry. Clubs became expensive toys that helped massage personal egos. In other words, costs no longer mattered, profits even less. Overnight, the double model of success: winning on a solid footing of financial prudence split violently, prudence cast into the abyss of immediate gratification. A satisfaction that could be bought by spending lavishly on the best footballers on earth. The Chelsea model was soon riding hell-for-leather on the increasingly limping Arsenal model.
Wenger's model wasn't going to gain traction too by the ever-changing nature of the game. There was no football during Aristotle's time but even this wisest of all men must have been a bit stretched imagining the business side of this sport: a product with a demand so maddening you could play the most absurd version of Russian roulette with its costs and still come out a winner. Football clubs like Real Madrid, Bayern Munich, Barcelona, Manchester United were incurring hefty costs in acquisition of players and were still making hefty profits. Talent was hemorrhaging at Arsenal under Wenger's watch and there was little he could really do about it. He could not bring new infusion of prime talents and it was inevitable the club would slip rapidly. No Messi or Ronaldo was coming down to Arsenal.
He would eventually bring in expensive talents like Lacazette and Aubameyang into the club but it was all too late. Inertia and rot had set in and such acquisitions were more or less panic buyings. Football has grown malignant. Even not watching the costs is no longer a guarantee that success, which has practically replaced profits, would take care of itself. Aristotle would have been amazed.

Football's New Virus.

It might be too late, even quixotic, to rein in the present regime of outrageous transfer fees. Better to let it unravel, like all wildly-galloping schemes. Regulating imbalances in the salary structures of football clubs should be of more reasonable proposition. By this I don't mean salary caps, Lionel Messi could earn a million per week for all I care, but if Harry Kane is going to earn three hundred at Tottenham, as would undoubtedly happen one day, I see no reason why Son should not be earning two-fifty or why Eriksen should be going home with eighty. Alexis Sanchez certainly did not go to Manchester United for $140m but the mouth-watering salary he is going to earn may end up doing far greater, eye-watering damage. As matter of fact, most clubs, even those in the lower echelons of the Premier League, can afford to pay huge transfer fees now. Increasing revenue from broadcasting deals has seen to that. But such transfers also engender huge disparities in wages being earned by players and it is this imbalance that should be the focus of our concern. If I were Phil Jones, or Ander Herrera, or Anthony Martial, I would resent it a bit that Sanchez is earning such hefty money per week. Ozil's skills and contributions to Arsenal's victories are well-known but Bellerin's heart has crevices in which a sludge can naturally calcify that the disparity between his own wages and the $350k Ozil presently earns is not commensurate with the difference in values they add to the team.
My imagination might have been a bit on the effervescent but watching the Man U-Spurs match, it sort of occurred to me Sanchez would need a bit of  pandering to do to his teammates. He is a nice, affable guy, but when it comes to money, folks are far less accommodating.
Perhaps that's why Guardiola decided against taking him in. Perhaps Ronaldo's teammates in Madrid are beginning to feel the same way. Perhaps more Dembeles will still end up in Barcelona to effect a squad of players who believe what they are earning is not unjustifiably far behind that of Lionel Messi.
A team of grumpy players is a sulky team, not a silky team. Great performances can only come, at best, desultorily.
Apropos of things watering, grudges of fairness are one of human emotions that Russian master of salivation, Ivan Pavlov, must have understood too well. It would little harm Mourinho and Wenger to study a bit of human understanding.