Sunderland have lifted the rather harsh ban imposed on Phil Bardsley over his social media banter, which was little more than lads being lads and taken completely out of context says the defender himself.
As usual the club have made the information available to all, and not at all purposefully releasing at night or making it nowhere to be seen on the clubs homepage in order to limit the damage. That would be taking things out of context.
In an entirely spontaneous and self-written statement, our former Player Of The Year said*;
I would like to apologise to the club and supporters for my comments made on social media.
I understand how they may have been interpreted and it was a serious error of judgement. What many of you morons who pay my wages fail to realise is it may have appeared I was mocking my employers defeat, it's a little known fact that August 17th is "Opposite Day", so I'm actually in the right.
I accept the punishment that has been handed to me by the football club and will now focus my attention and efforts on rehabilitation and regaining my fitness.
Really Bardsley shouldn't be apologising, it should be the fans who should be apologising for vilifying him over what was quite clearly some light-hearted banter among lads. You know lads, banter. It's mental. It's quite clear to anyone that flaunting your riches on a casino floor or mocking the defeat of your employers is just banter isn't it? Banty-banty-bantz.
With a serious death of defensive options it's good that Phil's back though. Colback isn't the long-term answer, and while Ondrej Celustka has done well, what if he gets injured? The less said about Andrea Dossena the better.
It's time to put away any animosity, everyone get on the same page and support Phil through this difficult time. Forgive and forget.
Woah, reading that back it actually looks semi-supportive of Phil... Fuck! What I actually meant was "Fuck right off out of this club you oxygen-thieving-lying-shitcunt-cockwomble".
He's right, words when written down and there for all to see can appear to hold their actual meaning and not mean the complete opposite, as is what you were so obviously trying to say.
*Parts of this may be made up.