Let’s here it on Sunday for the Quiet American

On the day in which Portsmouth Football Club are finally bounced into administration because of the failures of successive owners, Aston Villa are preparing for the League Cup Final on Sunday at Wembley stadium.
And whilst Martin O’Neil will quite rightly get the loudest cheers and take most of the plaudits for getting us to the Final, sitting in the stands will be a small, quite American who has made it all possible.
The experience of foreign owners promising to ‘splash the cash’ has not only been an unhappy experience for Portsmouth. At Liverpool the Hicks-Gillett combination has left Liverpool in massive debt and has brought fans out on to the street in protest. Similarly at Old Trafford, the Glazer family (should they bother to turn up or tune in from their US homes) will again be faced with a mass of green and gold on Sunday. The United fans are spurning their traditional colours to send the message – green and gold, we’ll never be sold. Of course, it is not just the foreign owners of football clubs who should be wary, ask any Birmingham supporters what they think of the cockney wide-boys who have just taken over West Ham and they will tell you the Hammers would have done better to remain in hoc to the Icelandic banks.
So, Aston Villa fans on Sunday should reserve a cheer or two for Randy Lerner, the shy, diffident American who has invested wisely and clearly has a passion for the club far deeper than that of looking to make a quick buck.
The biggest cockney club in the North need to know that whatever the short term outcome on the pitch… come Monday morning they will still be cursing Malcolm Glazer, and we will still be thanking the heavens for Randy Lerner.
PS – and if that toffee-nosed opportunist David Cameron – who claims to support Aston Villa – should show his face for a photo opportunity, we should save a chant or two for him as well… but I would guess he may not particularly welcome it.