I know that’s not a song - rather, we can sing about “the b*stard in the black” or claim “the referee’s a w*nker” - but some recent procrastination resulted in discovering that the footballer Juan Carlos Pérez López - known as “Juankar” - has actually turned out in an all-black kit for Málaga in 2018-19. When I realised that wondrous fact, I was quick to poetically announce it to the brilliant Martin Le Roy, who, to his credit, chose sparing my blushes and feigning being impressed at my find over correcting my embarrassing error.

Generally, I’m not one to defend football referees against accusations of being b*stards or w*nkers. Their arrogance and self-importance has been a scourge on the game for decades, especially some of the most successful ones. Their abuse of their power has led to far too many miscarriages of justice in pivotal games, and aside from a temporary demotion to lower level matches, their crimes go unpunished.

I’ll show my working, of course.

In tonight's Europa League Final, have a look out for instances of what, for me, is the single most frustrating recurring moment in football viewing: the wrongly-called offside.

Let me explain what I mean. This is when the linesman raises his flag to indicate to the referee that a player receiving the ball, generally-speaking, has strayed into an offside position before the ball was played, despite not being sure that that is the case.

Because they do that, linesmen. They guess. This is the flaw in the way the rule is utilised by officials. It doesn't matter how often they're told not to make a call unless they're sure, to give the benefit of the doubt to the attacking player, they will continue to see their lives flash before their eyes and raise a flag when there might be a chance the player was "off".

Well guess what, guys, Sralex has long gone. You don't need to lose sleep over that man raging about a goal being given thanks to you not spotting that the thickness of Papiss Cissé's heat-transferred plastic Wonga logo was ahead of the last defender when the ball was played. It's over, we can move on.

The dust has settled, the mainstream tributes have poured in - both knowledgeable and hamfisted - and he's away. Sralex Ferguson - to childishly both respect and denigrate the man's premature honouring - announced his retirement from the managership of Manchester United several weeks ago.

I was shocked. The signs were there earlier in the season - the Wembley Champions League final a tantalising potential farewell, the desperate ambition to wrestle the Premier League title from Manchester City, the distressed reaction to missing out on one and composed satisfaction in securing the other - but they only appeared in hindsight. Ferguson was surely to perish in the line of duty, Lord willing not pitchside like his mentor and friend Jock Stein, but in gainful managerial employment all the same. He was "too old to retire".