Final days don’t come much more dramatic.
The culmination of the 2011/12 Premier League season was breathless stuff, you might remember.
Manchester United were almost certain that they’d won the title, only for a famous Sergio Aguero winner to deliver the Premier League trophy to Manchester City at the very death of a thrilling game at the Etihad Stadium.
It was a chaotic game against Queen’s Park Rangers and remembered just as much for Joey Barton’s antics as it is for Aguero’s heroics.
Barton was sent off against his former club for an incident involving both Carlos Tevez and Aguero, with tempers reaching fever pitch.
Aguero was left in a heap on the floor after a frustrated Barton seemingly kicked him but, in a recent revelation from the outspoken midfielder, Barton claimed that he was put up to the act by teammate Bobby Zamora.
“Tevez punched me in the face. I checked his run and for no reason he decided … because we were 1-1 and they thought ‘We’re ****ing this up’, which is what they were doing,” Barton said on the Blue Moon podcast, via Manchester Evening News. “To this day I don’t know why he did it, but I knew he was going to play a one-two and I’d read it way before he’d done it.
“I got in front of him and checked his run, and he kind of jumped on my back. He’s never getting to the ball, so I’m shielding the ball, and as he does it he jumps and kind of swings his arm across me.
“In my eyes, he’s tried to punch me. I know what he’s done, he knows what he’s done.
“I was thinking the ref had seen it, but it was clear the linesman hadn’t spotted it and Mike Dean hadn’t spotted it, So I was like ‘You little ****’.
“I don’t like Tevez anyway, from playing against him, so I thought ‘F*** you, you’re getting a bit.’
“The red mist descended, and I thought no-one was watching because they had already missed the first one. So I waited for him to come behind me and just elbowed him in the face.
“Obviously he has gone down. The linesman hasn’t seen it, but he’s seen him go down, and flagged.
“And Aguero is running over. No-one has seen it but Aguero is saying to Mike Dean ‘He’s elbowed him, he’s elbowed him’.
“I was thinking I might get away with a yellow, but … red card.
“Bobby Zamora came over and said ‘Take one with you’, to even it up – a draw was a good result for us, as we stay up on a draw.”
Unfortunately, the strike from Barton wasn’t enough to take Aguero out of the game and, if anything, it likely spurred him on to write his name into Premier League history.
But we should always remember, before we condemn Barton for losing his temper that afternoon, that he arrived at the decision after receiving a cheeky word in his ear from Bobby Zamora.
