BBC Radio 2 host and notoriously annoying cyclist Jeremy Vine is suing Joey Barton after the ex-footballer called him a “bike nonce” on Twitter. A bike nonce? Was he riding a children’s bike or something?

A libel claim has been filed at the High Court, naming Jeremy Vine as the claimant and Joey Barton as the defendant. It follows a post by Barton on Twitter featuring a photo of Vine with actual nonce Rolf Harris which Barton captioned: “Oh Jeremy Vine. Did you, Rolf-aroo and Schofield go out on a tandem bike ride? You big bike nonce ya!”

The following day, Barton retweeted a post featuring a picture of Vine cycling which dubbed him a “bike nonce”, and added his own comment: “If you see this fella by a primary school call 999.”

Typically dumb and childish Twitter antics, but Jeremy Vine was so outraged by it all that he’s literally taking Joey Barton to the cleaners over it. It’s going to be pretty amusing watching the court have to legally define the term ‘bike nonce’, but I can’t see a judge deciding that it’s libelous. If Barton had straight up called Vince a ‘paedophile’, then maybe. But “bike nonce” isn’t necessarily saying he touches kids, it’s just an insult to cyclists.

Then again, he did say in the other Tweet that we should call 999 if we see Jeremy Vine near a school, so Barton could be made to regret his Tweets yet.

Either way, we’ve got two bell ends of the highest order in a legal battle so whichever way it goes will be fairly satisfying. Is there a way they could both lose?

Don’t forget – Joey Barton is also being sued by Eni Aluko for comments he’s made about her on X too. Great going, Joey.