Gattuso not making trip to Tottenham to avoid '37,000 slaps'

Rino Gattuso has been given a four-match ban for his headbutt-laced chats with Spurs assistant Joe Jordan last week. Added to the fact that he was already set to miss the second leg after picking up a yellow card between run-ins with Jordan in the first and that brings Gattuso to a five-match ban in total. Which he considers to be like a month-long prison sentence.

He told an Italian TV show (via Football Italia):

They gave me a five-match ban... they may as well have put me in prison for a month! I wanted to be at the second leg in London, but was advised not to go. Theres 37,000 of them in that stadium, Id have returned with a swollen face from 37,000 slaps.

For some reason, I don't think Gattuso sees that prospect as a bad thing at all. Still, by "advised not to go" I think he means that Silvio Berlusconi is going to put a muzzle and a straight jacket on him and lock him in a cage at Milanello while the rest of the team makes the trip.

As for the scuffle with Jordan, Gattuso said Pato couldn't handle the aggro and Cassano called him out on being a bad role model:

"Alexandre Pato went to the locker room. He was probably hiding in the bathroom!

Its lucky Antonio Cassano was ineligible for the Champions League. I was meant to be his tutor on how to behave at Milan and he said: What a great example you set for me!

Gattuso also revealed what happened in the tunnel with Sebastien Bassong before Zlatan Ibrahimovic picked them both up like rambunxtious little terriers. According to Rino, Bassong challenged him thinking that because he isn't tall, he must be a "small fry." And then Zlatan proved they are both small fries.

Photo: Reuters