Fish n Chips, Rolando?

By: Martha | January 2nd, 2008

NO! NOT ENGLISH FOOD! A lot of new arrivals from abroad have settled in just find in England — Fernando Torres and Roque Santa Cruz come to mind — but just as many of their compatriots are struggling, some of them more vocally than others. One of the strugglers is Manchester City’s Rolando Bianchi who, despite coach Sven Goran-Eriksson’s insistence that the Italian wants to stay, has been connected with a January return to Serie A virtually since the day he left the peninsula.

Unlike, say, Flourent Malouda, Bianchi’s problem isn’t the training methods, nor is it not getting properly coddled enough. No, his issues are a bit more basic: The food is disgusting, and everyone looks at him like he’s an “alien” when he says he doesn’t want a beer. Plus, defenders “[run] you over with a tank” without getting whistled for a foul. Oh, and he’s also not really scoring that much.

Actually, Bianchi’s been saying odd things full stop since he arrived in England (possibly to do with being run over by those tanks). After a couple of months with Man City, he began making noises about being willing to go home on loan; his 2006-2007 with Reggina was fantastic, and being used primarily as a substitute and not really producing in the Prem didn’t exactly meet his expectations. After that, though, things got better: He scored a few times and seemed to settle in, more or less ending the talk about Serie A. Then, all of a sudden, he’s talking about scoring 10 goals for Man City, getting them in the Champions League, and then … going to Atletico Madrid, and scoring 10 times for them!

As you’d expect, Eriksson is claiming his player was misquoted on most of the above (How can you be misquoted when you say “I raise the white flag on the food,” or “I’d like to wear the shirt of Atletico Madrid?”), and is looking forward to long future with the striker, while Bianchi himself denies saying any of it and wants to stay “for a long time.” Alright then.

Whatever Bianchi did or didn’t say, the fact is that he’s making regular appearances for a team very close to a European spot, while his old team are suffering without him, and languish in the drop zone in Italy. Starving and with tread-marks on his back or not, things with Man City sound pretty good.