Alastair Campbell takes on The Wanted

If you half-glance at the Daily Mail, Alastair Campbell broke Tom Parker's leg during a charity football match.

Given what Alastair Campbell did to things like the BBC, and the truth, during the job he was famous for, you might think Parker came off lightly.

Over on his own blog, Campbell offers his side of the match, which unpicks the Mail story - not least the way the paper reports on The Wanted's singer being stretchered off, but neglects to mention that it was later on, and after the photos of a shouty Campbell at a skirmish. Not later on in the match; later on in a different match. (Naturally, The Sun also makes the same misrepresentation.)

The Mail's piece is all over the place all on its own - Campbell is being presented in the photos, headline and standfirst as the belligerent, but the detail actually admits that incident being photographed came after Parker had performed a vicious tackle. The paper also seems uncertain if Parker's leg was broken or not; at the outset it's snapped, but in the story itself it's just a "suspected" broken leg.

The Mail doesn't run a photo of the stretchering, but one pops up in The Sun story:

Not sure that's the big grin of someone whose leg has just been broken in a football match.