It’s official: Ashley Cole is living in a different dimension to the rest of us.

There was a tiny bit of me which felt sorry for the lad up until last weekend. He had obviously been badly advised by his agent in the whole Chelsea saga and it all blew up in his face rather spectacularly. Young, rich, naive and badly advised – a potentially disastrous combination.

But the England left-back has proved he is a few sandwiches short of a picnic by trying to blame Arsenal for ruining his career at Highbury.

“They’ve left me feeling there is no way back, that they don’t want me to put my beloved Arsenal shirt on again,” Ashley whined. “Can I ever forgive them? I don’t really know. I’ve supported Arsenal since I was seven but they have hurt me.”

What a pile of garbage. What utter nonsense.

How on earth does he have the guts to blame Arsenal for his current predicament? Surely he realises that it was him that was ‘unfaithful’ to his beloved Arsenal?

Correct me if I am wrong, but it was he who approached Chelsea to see if he could get a better deal than that being offered by Arsenal. How can that be blamed on anybody at Arsenal?

I now have absolutely no sympathy for the player. He deserves everything he gets and I hope his fine is increased by the Premier League on appeal.

It is greed – pure unadulterated greed – which got him into the mess. To try and deflect the blame away from himself and on to his club is a pathetic attempt at self defence.

Arsenal should sell him and quickly before he opens his rubber mouth again and knocks another few million on his value by adding further proof to the fact that his concept of loyalty is very, very warped.

Horrible gap

That horrible gap year between World Cup and European Cup is once again upon us and it is already proving hard going for us football lovers.

But before we let misery take over our empty summer lives, maybe we should take a look at what’s going on in England as I write this. A whole festival of football!

When you consider what little press coverage it gets, you would be forgiven for thinking Euro 2005 was not taking place at all. But it is and, if you get over the fact that the players have breasts and shaved legs, it is almost as good as the real thing.

So far I have only seen the highlights of a few of the games, but I have to admit the quality of football has been pretty darned good.

The tournament includes all our old favourites – England, Italy, France, Germany, Sweden and Denmark to name a few. And, although there are only eight teams taking part, it has the group stages and all the other bits which make the men’s contest so infinitely watchable.

So, before burying your head in the sand for the next couple of months, I sincerely suggest you tune in to Eurosport over the coming days and get what will probably be your last fix of football of any kind until August.

It really is worth a little look.

Naughty Chelsea!

Are Chelsea on a mission to annoy all their London rivals in succession?

The Stamford Bridge club have apparently been toying with the rules again, this time to the annoyance of Tottenham.

Spurs could be about to lodge a formal complaint with the Premier League over Chelsea making an illegal approach to Frank Arnesen, their director of football.

Chelsea insist they acted totally above board in this particular case, sending a fax to Spurs chairman David Levy asking for permission to speak to Arnesen. But Spurs are not happy because they copied the fax to Arnesen himself.

“By definition, Frank was approached prior to the club having had any chance to refuse permission,” a club statement said.

Arnesen has now been suspended by Tottenham and he has apparently admitted he wants to move to Chelsea so there is little chance that he will not be doing exactly that.

If they decide not to go ahead with the official complaint it is believed that Spurs will instead be looking for about 10 million in compensation, which means Roman Abramovich will probably have to put in around five minutes of overtime one day next week.

This latest incident will not have anything like the repercussions that the Ashley Cole saga is having, but it does raise questions about whether or not Chelsea are starting to believe the rules do not apply to them.

I am not being anti-Chelsea in any way here. I am just feeling a little sorry for their supporters who should be spending this summer basking in the glory of their first title in 50 years, not seeing their club overshadowed by regular claims of naughtiness.

Contact James on: [email protected]