Harry Maguire- England footballer on the naughty step.

Harry Maguire- England footballer on the naughty step.

Your mind keeps harking back to that fateful day 50 summers ago when England football captain Bobby Moore was accused of doing something that he quite clearly didn't do and then was arrested by the Mexican police because such unforgivable indiscretions can leave a filthy stain on your otherwise impeccable playing career. At the time it seemed like a most horrendous breach of protocol, nay less a criminal transgression that could never be condoned under any circumstances.

For 50 years ago was the last time any England footballer stepped out of line, breaking every disciplinary record and simply had to repent for their sins. Moore was alleged to have stolen a bracelet in a Mexican boutique hotel and the woman responsible for this outrageous allegation may well have had to live with her notoriety for quite some time. Moore was dragged through the mud for a brief and horrific period in his legendary career before being allowed to play again.

Roll forward another half a century ago and now step forward one Harry Maguire, Manchester United centre half and now villain of the piece. It can hardly have escaped your notice that Maguire has been in a spot of bother, a troublemaker of the highest order, a nasty piece of work, a confounded nuisance and utterly reprehensible. Mr Maguire were you at the scene of crime earlier on this week because if you were a Greek court of law would like to be furnished with as much as information as possible relating to the said case?

You see the trouble is that England footballers are just uncannily attracted to the full glare of controversy even when they appear to have done little wrong. Yesterday Harry Maguire was interviewed at length by the Press about the dreadful ordeal his sister had gone through and how he should never have been manhandled by the Greek police for some unseemly incident over nothing. But then of course Maguire emphatically denied all the charges levelled at him because he hadn't done anything wrong.

The truth is of course that Premier League footballers, once released from the shackles of a hard, punishing season, are very partial to several pints of booze, love to trip the light fantastic on the dance floor of a Mediterranean hotel and generally let themselves go. Which is perfectly alright in moderation but sometimes things get out of hand and one pint turns into too many to mention and suddenly the police come calling with a wailing siren and the handcuffs.

Now we're not quite sure what happened to Maguire on the night of the incident and we're not entirely certain why he mentioned his sister but we do know that the England defender was naturally on the defensive and probably felt very hard done by. Did he really stumble out of a Greek nightclub in an embarrassing state of intoxication or was he just unruly, moronically obnoxious and the proverbial pain in the neck?

Now all of the moralists, do-gooders, puritans and judgmental critics of players like Maguire will jump onto the rickety bandwagon and make Maguire's private life most uncomfortable. When questioned about what happened to him, butter looked as if it would never have melted in his mouth. The problem is we've been here before with English footballers because they can never seem to be in the right place and the right time and besides where's the proof, officer?

And so we open up our papers and switch on our TV's, immediately deploring and detesting Maguire's misdemeanours because that's what footballers always seem to get tied up into when there's nobody else to blame. But Maguire may well put forward his defence to a Greek court that may not be quite as sympathetic as he would wish it to be. He will now have to serve the appropriate sentence and when the new Premier League season kicks off again in a fortnight's time Maguire may be feeling a raw sense of injustice.

Today though Maguire stands as the guilty party for sticking two proverbial fingers up at the law, disobeying the orders of a Greek police force determined to make an example of those typical Brits. English players or their fans are never to be trusted and besides they're always either fighting with opposition supporters, provoking argy-bargy or wallowing in their very thuggish exploits. Look at the evidence. It's there in clear print. The English love a good, old fashioned dust-up or headline-grabbing altercation. Let's hurl a cafe table or smoke bomb at the coppers mate. They just can't get enough of downright eye-balling confrontation.

But Maguire is far from being a seasoned, hardened hooligan because he knows for a fact that if he'd really broken every rule in the book, he'd probably never pull on a Manchester United shirt again. Fists were apparently raised and Maguire should be punished accordingly. But the truth is that Maguire may have to wipe this wholly unavoidable punch up from his memory. Surely the distinguished history that now lies behind everything Manchester United have ever achieved should never be taken for granted or ruin the club in any way, shape or form.

Still, you find yourself thinking back to that swelteringly hot day in Mexico when the immaculate West Ham captain Bobby Moore was humiliated by some shameful saleswoman who thought nothing of re-enacting Andy Warhol's fifteen minutes of fame or infamy. Life for Moore was never quite the same after the 1970 World Cup but for Harry Maguire this could be the right time to mend his ways and salvage something from a mini Greek tragedy. We must hope so.