An open letter to our relegation rivals

Before KUMB.com becomes inundated with Fulham fans and whinging Northerners crying into their pies about how unfair it is that West Ham were not deducted points by the Premier League, and before even the outcome of the ‘battle at the bottom’ for the last two remaining drop slots are decided, I wanted to put the record straight in (hopefully) language that all of those embittered followers of the relegation scrappers could understand on the situation regarding Carlos Tevez, Javier Mascherano and West Ham United.

So listen up you pathetic moaners. West Ham were found guilty of taking on players who were owned by a third party, i.e. their CONTRACTS were owned by neither one club nor the other, but by a company. In effect, what this means in terms of Premier League rules is that someone else could have had an influence over the players involved and direct them to effect the outcomes of matches.

Match fixing in simple language. The ironic nature of this offence is that neither player - until recently when Tevez actually waded in with a few goals (two of which have been in home defeats) - actually contributed in a positive manner to the outcome of any games for West Ham, and in the case of Mascherano, didn’t actually play more than a few hours of football for us in total.

Anyway, having players on your books that are owned by someone else is not new. There are clubs in the Premiership right now with players in a similar situation. The issue is that West Ham United were found guilty of it and were duly (and some could argue, heavily) fined for it.

That, my bitter friends, is what the ruling was about. A fine was pretty much all the Premier League could hand out, seeing as West Ham had arguably enjoyed little benefit from having either player on our books in terms of a huge points haul, Champions League qualification, FA Cup wins, Carling Cup victories or even in being able to defeat relegated Watford once out of three attempts.

In effect, we gained ZERO points in an unfair manner from having them play for us. Another touch of irony comes from the fact that those getting red in the face about this, your Warnocks and Whelans and whoever is in charge of Fulham this week, have taken either two or three points from West Ham this season already.

West Ham have done more to aid the cause of those bottom eight teams than any other team in the Premiership this season by capitulating against Wigan, Charlton, Watford, Sheffield United, Manchester City and Middlesbrough at least once and by drawing with Fulham twice (one game in which we let them equalize in the 93rd minute).

Now, let’s get something straight; what the ruling wasn’t about was the eligibility of Tevez or Mascherano to actually play for West Ham because of irregularities in their registration, which were found to be correct and in order. Tevez was not only cleared to play against Wigan, but also for the remaining games of the season for West Ham. Therefore we were free and clear to pick the diminutive hitman at any time we chose in order to boost our magnificent strikeforce and drive us up the table (sic).

Had there been any issue with the registration of either player, i.e that we had fielded ineligible players, then the Premier League would have had no choice but to dock us points, throw us out of the FA Cup next season and castrate our erstwhile chairman Terry Brown (actually, most of us wish they had been allowed to do that either way). There were no such findings and therefore there were no such penalties (lucky escape Mr.Brown).

The fact that the press can find nothing both negative and real to write about West Ham has finally stumped them and they have resorted to reporting continually that we fielded players who we shouldn’t have, thus throwing fuel on what should be a damp (but truly skint – a £5.5million pounds fine? Surely all Premiership balls in use next season will have to have ‘courtesy of West Ham United’ printed on them) squib.

It all just goes to prove that some people believe that everything written in The Sun is the gospel truth and they are not prepared to look at the facts before making their minds up.

Whatever the outcome of the forthcoming games and whoever joins Watford in planning their journeys to Colchester and Barnsley next season, you can all rest assured that if your team is relegated, it will not be because of two Argentineans playing in East London, but your own team’s failings.

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