Taxi for Craig Moore! Punch-ups, kidnaps and lapdancers in the Top 10 football and cabbie collisions

Published 17:55 20/09/10

Former Rangers and Newcastle defender Craig Moore has been has been released on bail following a spat with a Dubai taxi driver . Source of the alleged dispute? A fare that cost less than ten quid.

It's not the first time that the footballer/cabbie relationship has been put under strain. With a run down of the brief, yet turbulent history of these two established giants of English society, here's MirrorFootball's Chris Bloor .

1) Dennis Wise

In 1995 Chelsea talisman Dennis the Menace - diminutive in stature, big in temperament - was handed a three-month prison sentence after being convicted of assaulting a cab driver on the way home from Terry Venables' drinking den Scribes West. The fracas, which ocurred after Wise's girlfriend was injured by the taxi door, ended with a smashed glass partition and alleged punch-trading with driver Gerald Graham.

Happily the sentence was overturned on appeal and little Den escaped with his reputation intact.

2) Joey Barton

What list of footballing misdemeanours would be complete without an entry from McDonald's gourmand Joey Barton? The combative Scouser had already been sentenced to six months in jail for reportedly punching a man 20 times outside the Golden Arches, when a late-night Big Mac craving again caused bother. It was claimed that driver Michael Kay had been threatened and his partition broken when he refused to take Barton and his cousin through a drive-in, suggesting they might want to get out and go to the kiosk themselves. The incident ended when three other cabbies turned up, one wiedling a rounders bat and shouting "come on, Barton". The footballer and his relative fled and hid behind a wheelie bin for an hour.

Justice was done, however, when Joey was cleared by CSI: Huyton, who ruled that fingerprints on the partition were not his.

3) Ryan Babel

In August of this year the erratic Liverpool forward landed in a Washington DC police station after a 10-miIe taxi journey which took seven hours. Having hailed down a large, minibus-type cab in America's capital, Babel proceeded to fall asleep on the back row of seats. On waking, he found himself half-way to the city's Dulles Airport, and in the company of two ladies. It appeared the driver had forgotten about the snoozing Dutchman, picking up the new travellers while he slept.

Apologising, the cabbie dropped Ryan off at his original destination and offered to charge him only $20 despite the meter reading $68.50. The £50,000-a-week player offered $8. After a full and frank exchange of views, Babel threw down his eight bucks and strode off, but was approached by an armed policeman who encouraged him to discuss matters down the station. Fortunately said patrolman happened to be a fan of Liverpool, and the matter was dropped, leaving Ryan to tweet about the whole debacle on Twitter, which is how we all know about it.

4) Mrs Maxi Lopez

In the Summer of 2009 Wanda Nara set out to meet her husband - flaxen-haired Argentina striker Maxi Lopez - after training in the Brazilian city of Porto Alegre, where he was on loan with Gremio. Hopelessly lost, she stopped to ask a friendly taxi driver, who invited her to follow his car in the time-honoured fashion.

Unfortunately their route took them through a dangerous favela where, Ms Nara insists, a kidnap attempt by several youths, orchestrated by the cabbie himself, was attempted. The shop steward of the Porto Alegre Cabdrivers’ Trade Union later called into question her version of events.

5) Rob Lee and Warren Barton

In September 2007, two of the stars of Newcastle epic 1996 title choke found themselves in the brown stuff after a night out on the Toon. The details involved a private hire Mercedes limo - crucially without its driver - which somehow managed to leave its parking space and was found crashed into the back of a van. No charges were pressed against the pair, but Barton - these days a US TV pundit with a Creosote tan and brilliant white gnashers - admitted: "It was just silliness and I apologise for any embarrassment which may have been caused. People know Rob and I don't get involved in this sort of thing."

6) Paul McInnes

Stranraer's 2009 club Christmas party, at the beachfront Seamill Hydro Hotel, when the 20-year-old midfielder was stabbed twice in the chest following an argument in the taxi queue. McInnes suffered a punctured lung, lost pints of blood and was put on a life-support machine. "In the future I'll be very wary about going out," said McInnes, who returned to football last Saturday - 18 September 2010 - as a late sub in a 2-2 draw with Berwick.

7) Liverpool FC

Clean-cut Liverpool players were horrified in 2008 when it was alleged that local taxis were using their names to advertise a lap-dancing club. The ads included mis-spelled names, alleging that the likes of 'Riena', 'Hyppia' and 'Fernandes' were regulars. The cheeky nightspot insisted that the names were merely those of their erotic dancers. Would anyone else be curious to see a Jamie Carragher lookalike shaking her thing? No? Just us?

8) Allan McGregor

While his Scotland partner in childish V-signs Barry Ferguson has reason to smile at the sight of a 'For Hire' light - he was told of his international recall by a Glasgow Airport cabbie after a long flight - it's a different story for controversial Rangers keeper McGregor. Last February he was left with a swollen face and an injured back after being attacked in a taxi rank after attending a party thrown by - gasp - a Celtic player.

9) Jack Rodwell

In his early days as Goodison Park, young Rodwell was driving with his girlfriend to training at the club's Finch Farm HQ when he quickly realised he was lost. Not wanting to lose face in front of his missus, the quick-thinking midfielder used his considerable intellect to find a solution. Impressed then-team-mate Joleon Lescott commented: "He had a sat-nav as well so I don't know how he got lost. Instead of trying to find his way through the sat-nav he paid a taxi driver to drive to the training ground and he followed him behind in his car. The youth of today, eh?"

10) Neil Shipperley, Jimmy Glass and John Sitton

What unites the sizeable Shipperley, Carlisle's 1999 saviour Glass and the former Leyton Orient manager who was filmed during a half-time team talk inviting his players to fight him with the memorable words "you can pair up if you like, and you can bring your dinner"? They've all switched codes, swapping the pitch for the patch and ekeing out new livings as taxi drivers. With this kind of integration, we here at MirrorFootball can only see the green shoots of recovery in the turbulent, ongoing affair between the beautiful game and the black cab.

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