On Wednesday night, he missed the crucial penalty, started a ruckus that led to the sending off of Didier Drogba, and spat on and insulted Carlos Tevez for no obvious reason during that brawl; he also failed to control Drogba - a player of decidedly fragile mentality. 

On the other hand, Terry played a fantastic game, and quite frankly kept his team in it - the clearing header off the line from Giggs' (weakly-struck) effort late in extra time saved Chelsea's bacon. He also showed great physical courage in turning up to the game at all, having dislocated his shoulder ten days before. That he missed the penalty, which Drogba would have taken had he still been on the pitch, was bad luck - against which none of us is immune. He showed moral courage in volunteering to take it at all, which is precisely what a leader ought to do. Over the last few years, he's developed into a genuine leader of his team, while making the most of his very moderate footballing talent. As for his private life, let he that is without sin cast the first stone. All those now saying horrible things about him display extraordinarily bad taste and cowardice - how hard is it to kick a man when he's down? 

This ManYoo fan salutes a worthy adversary.

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  The anti-Terryism is making Daniel Waweru ill. The editor will see you at This e-mail address is being protected from spam bots, you need JavaScript enabled to view it