Saturday 13th June 2009

Looks like David Miliband has been stirring things up again! The Foreign Secretary has claimed in The Guardian that he nearly resigned from the Cabinet along with James Purnell last week. The timing of this has been criticised by John Prescott, who questions Miliband's motives. We all know that David Miliband wants to be Prime Minister, something which became clear last summer when he outlined his vision for Britain in an article in The Guardian without mentioning Gordon Brown. However, Miliband won't stand against Brown any time soon when he knows Labour have very little chance of winning the next general election no matter who leads them.
I predict, as do Labour supporters I have spoken to about this matter, that Miliband will bide his time and attempt to become leader of the Labour party in a few years time when the party are in opposition and Cameron's Conservative government start to become less popular with the electorate.
I'm confused as to why David Miliband has come out and said now that he "nearly" stepped down as Foreign Secretary. The Convention of Collective Responsibility means that all members of the government must agree with the policy of the government and if they don't they must remain silent in public or resign. Miliband seems to be sitting on the fence, making it unclear whether he agrees with government policy and its leader or not. To me it looks as though he's only staying in the post to protect his future leadership ambitions.

There's a worryingly lack of news on the Saints takeover front, but the big football story this week has been Cristiano Ronaldo's likely transfer to Real Madrid, after Manchester United accepted their £80 million bid. I think its about time United and Ronaldo parted company, its obvious the relationship between club and player has been under strain recently and this was made apparent when Ronaldo threw a tantrum after being substituted against Manchester City last month. For me, it looked certain he would be leaving Old Trafford this summer when he criticised Sir Alex Ferguson's tactics after United's Champions League final defeat. Jaap Stam, David Beckham and Ruud van Nistelrooy to name but a few will tell you that when you face up to The Boss then you don't tend to stay at Manchester United much longer!
With the transfer looking inevitable, United are already planning for life without Ronaldo, with reports today claiming they're after Wigan's Antonio Valencia as a replacement. I haven't seen too much of Valencia, but his statistics of just seven goals in 83 appearances suggests they'll need to buy someone else as well as Valencia to replace Ronaldo's ability to score plenty of goals. After all, I imagine £80 million could buy almost any player in the world (with perhaps the exception of Lionel Messi), so watch this space...