Friday, March 29, 2024

Job Hunt: Finding Niklas Bendtner A New Job

After last week’s hairdressing debacle, I thought it was time to focus on getting Niklas a job in the industry he loves most: the fodbold [football] industry (not a bit of Dutch there).

But don’t worry footy fans – I won’t be forcing Nicky B into any club’s starting eleven.  I think we all know that isn’t his strength, so instead, I decided to focus on getting him a job to do with off-the-pitch business.

There’s no point starting off small when it comes to making a name for yourself in football, so my first objective was getting the Bendtinator a job as a manager.

However, you can’t just apply for managerial vacancies without experience, so I bought a copy of Football Manager 2014 – a game which sadly doesn’t get the publicity it deserves – in order to test Bendtner’s capabilities as the manager of a football club.

Football Manager 2014 gets so little publicity that you’d think the developers – the fantastic Sports Interactive – would jump at the chance to reward anyone who took the time to plug their game.

So, after driving over to Bendtner’s house, I handed him my copy of Football Manager 2014 – a game which IGN Italia described as “the almost-perfect game for all the Ferguson wannabes out there” – and told him to put it on and start managing a virtual club.

He chose to play as Arsenal – which hopefully wasn’t a reflection on the club he is most likely to play for next season – and got stuck in.

While he was playing through his first season, I took the time to read some more reviews of Football Manager 2014, a game that has an average review score of 85/100 on Metacritic:

93/100 – “Football Manager 2014 is the only option you should consider” – Vandal Online

90/100 – “makes its players feel more and more like a Special One”- Multiplayer.it

90/100 – “this year it is its heart that impresses most” – Telegraph

Wow; those really are some top scores!

Anyway, after a few hours, Niklas had completed his first season of Football Manager 2014 – which you can currently buy on Steam for £8.75 thanks to an incredible 75% off sale – so I decided to take a look at his results.

The first shock was some of the promoted teams.  It looked like Doncaster Rovers, Barnsley, and Yeovil Town had all made it into the Premier League… or at least I thought they had.  What had actually happened was that Arsenal had been relegated to the Championship.

“Bendtner, how’d you managed this?  Arsenal were among the favourites for the title at the start of the game!  What did you do to that caused them to slip into the relegation zone?”

My bewilderment ended when I noticed he’d been playing himself as Arsenal’s centre-forward all season.  Perhaps football management wasn’t his forte.

Maybe he’d be more suited to a wheeler-dealer type of position, so I called up Ivan Gazidis in order to sort out a little treat for Bendtner…

I knew just what he needed – a confidence boost.  He needed to be given a task he couldn’t fail; a task that even a monkey could complete.  So, Ivan and I decided it’d be a good idea to give Bendtner at go at managing Arsenal’s transfer dealings.

However, what the Dane didn’t know was how easy this job was going to be.

Mr Gazidis informed me that he and Arsene Wenger had already sorted out our first summer signing – and it was none other than Cesc Fabregas.  Ivan and Arsene had done the dirty work.  They’d persuaded Barcelona to sell, negotiated a price, and convinced Cesc that it was time to return to the club.  All Bendtner had to do was to accept Arsenal’s first refusal offer when Barcelona called him up.  The plan was foolproof!

It looked like I’d finally done it.  I’d nabbed Bendtner a job that he’d be able to succeed at!

Of course, this article was written in advance of it’s publish day, so as I type, the deal it still in progress.  However, I think it’s safe to say that nothing could possibly go wrong.  How could anyone balls up a simple phone call?  Not even Bendtner is that stupid.

I’m sure the deal will have been officially announced by the time you read this, so let me be the first to welcome our beloved Spaniard back to the club.

Welcome home Cesc!

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