When football was disappearing into its dark night of the wallet at the start of last week, it seemed a good moment to exhume a longburied philosophical joke and give it an up-to-date twist.
The new version went like this: a club president was at dinner with friends when a genie appeared, offering him a choice between wisdom, beauty and a place in the European Super League worth countless billions. Knowing that the ancient Greeks considered wisdom to be the greatest of virtues, he did not think twice before answering.
After a flash of lightning and a clap of thunder, the president sat, si...