What An Incredible Fluke XLVII!

Five hyperrealities to dwarf your weekend...

1) So who will referee the Manchester Derby? Webb, Atkinson and Clattenburg are away on a training session for Euro 2012 on Monday. Red Walton has been forced to retire early. Lee Mason has been removed from refereeing two of the last three Man City games. Chris Foy, Mike Jones (described as "rubbish" by David Moyes at Old Trafford yesterday) and Anthony Taylor are merely 12th men for Ferguson. Mark Halsey is prohibited due to refereeing the penultimate match at Old Trafford.
Which leaves Mike Dean - a referee who has been anti-Mancunian teams generally - Phil Dowd (with whom City have only won 7 out of the last 22 matches that he has officiated) or Andre Marriner (14 United games, 12 wins, 1 draw, 1 defeat) as the only valid officials.
Marriner for Referee?
There will be Red control.

2) Robin van Persie, who had absolutely nothing to do with the agreed draw with Chelsea on Saturday, was named PFA Player of the Year on Sunday.

3) As we posted last week, Reading and their promotion are backed by hot money. As Matt Scott says in the Telegraph: "The man [Chris Samuelson] fronting the Russian takeover at Reading has been accused in US court papers of being the subject of multiple high-profile money-laundering investigations."
In a statement before US bankruptcy courts: "Most prominent were the probes by the French Central Office for Combating Grand Financial Offences (OCRGDF) a principal French governmental agency investigating major financial frauds, and the Economic Investigation Service (FIOD/ECD), the Netherlands money laundering watchdog.

“In the early 2000s Samuelson was also investigated by the FBI in connection with the Bank of New York money laundering scandal.”
And Football is Fixed can reveal that there is a Gibraltar-based bookmaking organisation involved in this collection of criminalities.
Last week Richard Scudamore referred to Reading's promotion as "fantastic".

4) Juventus manager Antonio Conte is refusing to talk about the fixed match between Novara and Siena last season when he was manager of the latter.
Former Siena midfielder Filippo Carobbio, who now plies his trade with Spezia, told La Gazzetta dello Sport on Saturday that Conte knew Siena's 2-2 draw with Novara last season was being rigged.
Juventus moved three points clear at the top of Serie A on Sunday night via a penalty and the early sending off of Roma's keeper, Stekelenberg.

5) As we predicted when the choice was made, the appointment of Undiano Mallenco as 12th man for Real Madrid against Barcelona was the title decider. Real Madrid have bought La Liga title through rampantly biased refereeing over the season.

So, five illicit manipulations against the integrity of the sport and five winners rewarded for such manipulation.

What a weird fluke!