Injured Darren Bent is sorry he shopped during Villa loss

While Aston Villa were losing 2-0 to Liverpool on Sunday, a Twitter user spotted Darren Bent, who had been ruled out of the match due to injury, shopping in Cambridge. Villa fans did not like this (even though Bent was injured and just sitting at home anyway) and directed their scolding disapproval in the direction of Bent's account.

Later in the day, presumably once his Christmas shopping was finished, Bent tweeted his apology:

Nothing is more important to me than playing football, sadly injury meant I wasn't able to do that today. Gutted not to be involved......

I hope to be back very soon. Watched the majority of he game on tv. Never knew popping out would cause an issue and for that I apologise KTF

To some people this is a non-issue overblown by frustrated fans and to others it's proof that Bent doesn't care about this team. But whether he was home watching every second of the game on TV, out shopping or wearing a Balotelli costume and giving wedgies to school bullies in the Philippines, he still would've had exactly the same impact on the match: none.

If this is a major issue, it won't be long before injured footballers are tied down to seats inside the stadium on match days, fitted with catheters so they don't miss a second of the game for bathroom breaks and put in headgear to hold their eyelids open like in A Clockwork Orange. Because if fans have to watch their team lose, so do they.