My little bungies

Panorama managed to stir the football hotpot. Harry and Sam. Like two peas in a pod, now? Well, at least two Premiership managers who will go (also?) for the points in the Portsmouth-Bolton match come this Saturday.

The big question is, do they like a bung? No absolutely conclusive evidence was presented by Panorama. No receipts for secret cash transactions, no filming of a manager accepting a good old suitcase full of dosh.

After the programme ended, the show begun. Ensued shouts of outrage. Good names of Sam and Harry have been tarnished. "It is in my lawyer's hands!"

The surprise was, however that the focus was on Allardyce, a recent candidate for no less than Feik-Sheikh-prone Sven's job, and not "Dirty Harry", surrounded by numerous if unsubstantiated rumours.

The obvious question is, did the player agents including Peter Harrison and Craig Allardyce, lie when they conveyed to the undercover investigators clearly enough that Sam does not mind a bung. Did they lie motivated by greed as it could be said Panorama used entrapment in "public interest" by flouting an invented US-based multimillionaire interested in gaining business by using bungs to managers to grow his marketshare. They certainly did not express their outrage about suggesting such methods but seemed jolly enough to talk more. Was it really to find out about the undercover reporters' methods? Is this a credible defence? A key question.

What seems quite clear that the explanations by Harrison that his was only "pub banter" not to be taken seriously does sound tenuous, at the very least. He seemed to like pub banter inside football stadiums too, when quite clearly trying to ensure a 15-year-old's transfer to Chelsea from Middlesbrough withouth the north-east club's knowledge - something clearly illegal according to the rules.

This does not mean, however, that the managers in question would necessarily have taken a bung. What came clear is that Craig Allardyce seems to be a rather loose-tongued and foolish character. "Me daddy is a manager, easier to do business with me daddy, you see. Yes, me daddy knows about everything I do [ok, paraphrased heavily with editorial freedom, this bit]" Yes Craig, we saw.

Chelsea must be very happy that the main focus, at the moment at least, is on Sam and Harry. After all Frank Arnesen of Chelsea clearly seemed, unless the cutting of the film was made intentionally in a misleading way, to be keen on the idea of taking a teenager touted to him illegally. Against the background of Chelsea's massive financial muscle, this is clearly worrying.

As they say, money cannot buy you love. The worry is that youngsters and players are more easy. But not everything is legal in football (not that i think everything should be in love and war either, for that matter).

Come Saturday, one thing is for sure, though. Both Sam (Bolton) and Harry (Portsmouth) cannot win. Chelsea can.