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Mesut Ozil has crossed a line few players dare to and drawn down wrath from on high.

The Arsenal midfielder hit back at club “legends” who were ­slaughtering his attitude, telling them that they know nothing about him, so should button it.

Ian Wright called his outburst “laughable”, pointing out that, when you are not performing for a club that you are refusing to sign a contract with, you leave yourself wide open for a good slagging off.

And Wright’s right.

Ozil has been poor for Arsenal this season and we would rather hear players-turned-pundits speak the truth than hold back out of fear of ­upsetting old chums.

(Image: REUTERS)

But does the German World Cup winner Ozil inadvertently make a valid point about our precious legends that can’t be dismissed as “laughable”?

That quite often, some sound like they are lazily living off their playing ­reputations.

Take Graeme Souness, who claimed, towards the end of the ­transfer window, that Liverpool should sell Philippe Coutinho because he’s “a six or seven-goals-a-season” player, before asking, “Does he turn up in the real big games?”.

Well, the Brazilian was Liverpool’s top scorer last season, with 14 goals, and made the second-most assists.

He has scored 16 times against top-seven rivals, including five against Manchester City and was the only scorer in Liverpool’s last two big games at ­Wembley (2015 FA Cup semi-final and 2016 Carling Cup final).

But Souness, who was ­completely wrong about Coutinho, is rarely ­challenged because he speaks with such authority.

(Image: DAILY RECORD)

Which was how Glenn Hoddle spoke, on Monday, when describing England’s equaliser against Slovakia.

It was a rehearsed, near-post corner that worked, albeit with a slice of luck as the ball went in off Eric Dier’s shin.

That’s not how Hoddle saw it, though.

“Not the best corner we’ve taken tonight,” he chundered, before praising Dier for making the corner work by mastering “a difficult skill”. Eh?

Hoddle’s commentary is basically a stream of cliches delivered with all the passion of an HR management video voiceover.

There is little insight or analysis to shed fresh light on either set of players or tactics.

(Image: BT Sport) (Image: Getty Images Europe)

Just repeated buzz-phrases about “picking the right pass” or “being big mentally” and a refusal to be honest about England’s blatant flaws, ­possibly because he still fancies a ­recall by the FA.

Many recently retired players, such as Gary Neville and Jamie Carragher, are fully clued-up about the modern game.

Others, from further back, have an air about them that says “the only facts you need to know in this commentary are the trophies on my CV”.

Take one of the legends Ozil was hitting back at, Paul Merson.

This is how he assessed Brighton’s summer transfer business: “I look through the list of signings and I don’t really know any of them.”

So, he had never heard of Australia’s national goalkeeper Mathew Ryan; Tim Krul, who played 160 times for Newcastle; or Chelsea’s former ­England Under-20 forward Izzy Brown, whose four goals, while on loan, in the second half of last season helped ­Huddersfield get promoted.

(Image: REUTERS) (Image: Getty Images)

He did not have a clue about ­Colombian striker Jose Izquierdo, whose 14 league goals helped Club Brugge finish runners-up in Belgium last season; PSV Eindhoven’s ­midfielder and Dutch international Davy Propper; 20-capped Austrian international Markus Suttner or Sporting’s Ezequiel Schelotto, who once played against England for Italy.

Yet Merson is employed as a ­football expert – indeed, such an ­expert Sky paid him to be their star man on their busiest news day of the year, the closing of the summer ­transfer window.

Would such levels of ignorance be allowed from ex-pros analysing cricket, golf, tennis, athletics or any other sport? It’s doubtful.

Maybe because, in other sports, you have to earn your legendary status as a broadcaster just as you did as a player.

But, in football, the rule is clearly “once a ledge, always a ledge”.