Archive - Fitba Hell

Marlon King is a thug and bully, but also possessor of an arrogance inversely proportional to his talent. I can just about stomach a bit of posturing from Cristiano Ronaldo or Didier Drogba. But Marlon King? Just how good is he?

Bear with me here.

At the time of the offences that led to his conviction this week, he was a Wigan player but had been sent out on loan to Hull City. So he was surplus to the requirements of the first-team squad at a mediocre Premier League club, but got a few games at a team that escaped relegation by a point. Let's say every top-flight English team has a first-team pool of about 30, as Wigan do. 30x20 = 600. King was lucky if he was the 500th most desirable player in the English Premier League (before he plummeted to No 600 this week).

Let's now work on the basis that the Spanish, Italian, German and French leagues are of a roughly similar standard. That's another 2,400 players. The top halves of the Greek, Turkish, Portugese, Dutch and Russian leagues aren't bad: another 1,500 players. Let's say there's an average of five teams that would give Wigan a game in the Scottish, Belgian, Swedish, Danish, Norwegian, Austrian, Swiss, Ukrainian, Polish, Romanian and Czech leagues. That's another 1,650 players. Say 10 lesser leagues across the continent can each muster the equivalent of two Premier League squads: 600 players.

Brazil? OK, Europe might routinely plunder their best players, but this is still the planets's greatest football nation, so let's throw all 20 Série A teams into the mix: 600 players. We'll take a modest average of five teams each from Argentina, Chile, Uruguay, Peru, Bolivia, Venezuela, Ecuador, Paraguay and Colombia; moving north, the same for Mexico and the USA: 1,650 players.

Africa's Champions League could easily pull together 20 teams who'd have no fear going to the JJB or the KC: 600 players. The Japanese and South Korean leagues aren't all that bad - five teams each? 300 players. We're up to 9,800, but surely we can cobble together another 200 from the rest of the world who wouldn't embarrass themselves in a relegation dogfight against Wolves or Burnely.

In other words, Marlon King might just about scrape into the 10,000 best players in the world.

The 10,000th best tennis player in the world goes for a knockabout down at his local club before heading home for a curry and the CSI double-bill; the 10,000th best gymnast in the world does some cursory acrobatics in a grubby circus; the 10,000th best ice hockey player failed the auditions for Estonia's version of Dancing on Ice. King, meanwhile, reportedly makes £35,000 a week for not being all that good at his trade.

King went to jail for punching and breaking a slightly-built girl's nose after she dismissed his unwanted advances. Before he threw that blow, he hit her with the almost-as-stunning revelation that he was a millionaire and she was a fool not to recognise him.

Never mind anything else this unpleasant man has done - he deserves locking away to recuperate from the extreme delusional state he's found himself in.

Fitba Hell

How good is Marlon King?

Drumcree scarf