Bad Pun Corner

With two London derbies featuring the same teams in an eight day stretch, the back pages were bound to focus on the capital tussle. The first Arsenal and Chelsea match-up inspired The Metro to boast of ‘One Hec Of A Night’ before going on to give a drooling account of the game and Hector Bellerin’s last minute equaliser.

Just over a week later, The Sun got in on the action with the even more laboured ‘Alexit Strategy.’ Lowering the bar to a level The Metro’s second bite at this cherry, the up to the minute ‘VAR From Over’ couldn’t sneak beneath. It would have to be something special to break into this Sun/Metro showdown.

The ‘special’ arrived courtesy of The i, till now only an observer of our bad pun tomfoolery. Like veteran word-manglers they elbowed the competition aside, emulating the scorer of Liverpool’s winning goal in the FA Cup game against Everton. Virgil van Dijk, newly signed from Southampton, was making his debut and that was all of an opening The i needed.

Were 80’s pop music and a very tall Dutchman ever combined to such frightening effect? I doubt it.

Midfield General. (Ret.)