Defend the indefensible: Kia Joorabchian

http://www.independent.co.uk/multimedia/dynamic/00269/tevez_269857s.jpg

Carlos Tévez's adviser Kia Joorabchian has said that the Manchester City player did not refuse to play against Bayern Munich and blamed his suspension on a "poor interpreter"

Maybe the dude's right about this, what do I know?

He was on Sky earlier saying Tevez understood English just fine.

lol

I think it was David Conn's piece on the Tevez affair reckons that the whole Corinthians thing in the summer was entirely made up by Joorabchian as a means of flushing out Inter's and Real's interest. It may have failed utterly, but that's admirable chutzpah from our man.

He hasn't actually been convicted of anything so we can only assume that the allegations of money laundering and operating as a front for shady "businessmen" are entirely false until such time as they're proved to be entirely true.

He has lustrous hair.

The Tevez / Mascherano / West Ham / Sheffield Utd saga was worth a few lols.

Anyone know much about the Berezovsky v Abramovich case that started this week in the High Court? So far as I can tell it's all about oil rather than football, but our man might feature I guess - he's long rumoured to have links to both.

And he does indeed have splendid hair.

least defensible ever imo

jolrafchian

xp, God knows how the high court is going to unpick that one. It related to Sibneft which was the precursor to Gazpromneft, a subdivision of Gazprom. The short version is Berezovsky and Abramovich bought a huge chunk of the state oil sector in rigged 'auctions', paying tens of millions of dollars for assets worth billions. It was done with the blessing of Yeltsin and his economic team - who all received millions in kickbacks. Berezovsky was effectively a kingmaker in Russian politics - manipulating Yeltsin's second victory and acting as patron to Putin.

When Putin started to crack down on politically active oligarchs, Berezovsky fled to London and offloaded his shares in Sibneft to Abramovich, who was his protege and much less of a nuisance to the Kremlin. Berezovsky claims that Abramovich strongarmed him into accepting a bid roughly $6bn below market value with a threat that he'd get Putin to seize the lot if he didn't. Abramovich denies it and also says he made off-the-books payments of $2bn to Berezovsky in protection money.

It's a bit like Tiny Rowland vs al-Fayed in that you hope that they somehow both manage to lose.

Joorabchian isn't involved in this one but he's pretty much a front for Berezovsky's football interests.

do u think any of them actually like football?

I get the impression that Abramovich does, to some degree. It's not the reason any of them are involved in it, though.

http://esportes.r7.com/blogs/cosme-rimoli/files/2011/07/AgenciaEstado746.jpg

There is glee on Kia Joorabchian's face as he hurtles across his box on the halfway line at the Emirates Stadium to celebrate Robin van Persie's opening goal. 'Now, that is football,' Joorabchian informs one of his international guests as Arsenal ease ahead of Porto and set off on a Champions League cruise.

Joorabchian has supported Arsenal since his childhood years as an escapee from Iran's Islamic Revolution.