Now, the first thing to say is that Stoke City getting relegated would reduce the thuggishness (or is that 'thuggery') and physical 'taking the piss' which is demonstrated and administered by Stoke players every week. However, the Premiership's gain [ie. the loss of Stoke] would be the Championship's loss [ie. the gain of Stoke in its line-up]. The comments and suggestions by solicitor, Mr Stephenson, included claims that charities would suffer, as would investors who have contributed £60million to Stoke City FC. "They would suffer if they were relegated as a result" is a statement that is undoubtedly true, but quite unrelated to the actions of a manager who drives a car badly! Linking Tony Pulis's driving fortunes with the fortunes of a football-playing (allegedly) group of blokes is not really on. If I don't buy a raffle ticket at next year's works Christmas party, the standard of food in the cafeteria might drop. I am sure you will think that this equally-absurd proposition has no relevance to anything, and would not be of use to any inquisition, Spanish or otherwise.
To believe that "the people of Stoke would suffer if Mr Pulis lost his licence" is preposterous, and makes Scientology look totally reasonable! Over and above all of this shit about Mr Stephenson trying to help Tony Pulis escape a ban, and the complete absence of anything in mitigation but instead the threat to the community, I am amazed at a couple of other 'obstacles' that would make a ban inappropriate. Apparently, Pulis has claimed that he cannot use a chauffeur for fear the driver would leak details of secret transfer deals that he discussed on his mobile. Oh, I see - Tony not only drives at 96mph, he does so whilst conducting transfer deals via mobile phone. Hands-free or not, that hardly backs up any request for leniency, does it !!!
So, Tony likes driving, and manages to go a bit too quickly, paying less attention to the road than he pays Peter Crouch, and of course operates the phone's buttons whilst stationary (ie. after he has stopped in a lay-by). He quite clearly never speeds unless it's for the good of the community or his charity causes, and manages to conduct secret deals that no one could ever overhear without risk of unauthorised disclosure, all the time keeping his eyes on the road and applying 100% concentration - or "giving 110%" in football-speak. This begs the question "How does the Prime Minister ever get anywhere?" Clearly he has a chauffeur, who might just hear some secret deals. What about the Queen? Does the chap with the whip and funny costume wear ear plugs? I suspect that a chauffeur is more than capable of being discreet, especially if a clause in his or her contract demands confidentiality etc. - that's what every other high profile passenger would demand!
We now have a weird situation where Tony's players accumulate (rather quickly, looking at their records and playing styles) points for yellow cards, and get banned upon gaining a fifth. In the driving world, Tony accumulates points and should be banned, but escapes because otherwise Stoke City FC 'might be relegated'. Pathetic. If I had been allowed to comment from the bench, I would have highlighted that Stoke being relegated was an outlandish suggestion, and nigh on impossible when there are teams around like Wolves, QPR and Bolton all eager to pip Stoke to a relegation position!
Finally, I would like to point out that he was caught speeding on the M42 in November, after Stoke lost 5 - 0 at Bolton. Sorry, Tony, but (1) there's no excuse for losing to Bolton, and (2) you seem more than able to target relegation with a shit performance like that, and well ahead of the speeding offence, so there's clearly NO LINK between speeding and relegation - though there is a link between performance on the pitch and relegation. QED
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