Football journalism

What do we like?

What do we hate?

What do we expect?

And other such conundrums.

I expect better.

The other day I read this in the Guardian. It's by Louise Taylor, who isn't a particularly great writer, but it is exactly what I want from football journalism: it's entertaining, it's informative, it's considered and it is considerate.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/sport/blog/2011/mar/04/kenny-dalglish-sir-alex-ferguson

It isn't shrill, contentious, controversial, predictable, snide or moralistic, which seems to be what most football journalism is about.

i quite like old distinguished types eulogising in the times, good tactical analyses are always welcome though hard to come by, feverish transfer speculation often works as a quick fix

ILX works, when it's more than just quickfire posting like mine and sam's. There's a lot of people worth reading on varying subjects.

x-post

I don't expect amazing prose from football journalists and think some of the most lauded writers are massively over-rated (Glanville, McIlvanney), so that's not an issue. It's more one of tone. Of the heavyweight pundits (Barclay, Lawton, Collins, Des Kelly, Williams, Heyward) I think only Martin Samuel is worth reading. The rest write drivel.

Most of the correspondents (Winter, McCarra etc) are by-the-by, although Oliver Kay at The Time is quite decent, and rhwy too often found themselves caught in a trap of having to churn out reactive prose to non-stories (Rooney swearing, Club A winning/losing/drawing a game they weren't expected to win/lose/draw). I don't know what they are supposed to do in these circumstances.

There are some very good specialists like Jonathan Wilson. Ian Hawkey at the ST used to be good, but I haven't read him for yonks. David Conn's articles are IMPORTANT but I rarely read a whole one. I think Rob Smyth has a good feel for the game. There's a guy at the indie who is okay (corcoran?).

Then there's online. I find Run Of Play too overwritten, too lit-crit PPE clever, although I applaud the sentiment; Zonal Marking goes the other way, far too dry, an analysis of football as if it were played and then written about by robots. I'm sure there is better stuff out there on the web: thoughtful and intelligent, but much of it falls down the Football 365/Fiver route of taking cheap, snide, predictable (if occasionally OTM) shots at predictable targets, or are so pathetically club-biased they are almost unreadable. I swear fanzines were never this bad.

So that's what I think.

When I find pieces I like, I will post them here.

There is some good stuff on ILX and also in the comments in the Guardian, although you have to wade through some proper shit in the latter to find it.

Has anybody else downloaded Wilson's The Blizzard? I'm not as impressed as I'd like to be, but will persevere. Also, should I be reading 4-4-2 regularly?

442 is good, i think- particularly good feature pieces imo.

The Blizzard's good enough, but far too much filler - which only really became apparent when I got to the end and Wilson's own bits overshadowed the rest so thoroughly. The Verona piece was great though.

That Dalglish/Ferguson piece is excellent, yes - I feel I got a piece of the human beings behind all the rubbish for once. I'd like to see similar about Hodgson, in fact lots of managers might make interesting subjects if you caught them not-on-the-job.

The Guardian's strike rate is pretty high I'd say - maybe one-in-three features are worth reading and I enjoy the fiver. I don't really seek out much other stuff, though The Telegraph seems good when I happen upon it.

lol at ILX as a home of good writing - it's true though!

I'm sure I've said this before but Martin Samuel is a pious prick.

Generally don't mind broadsheet football journalism unless it's just mindbogglingly wrong, I will admit a sheepish enjoyment of the Graun's football comedy crew. I think David Conn's the only person I'll go out of my way to read though.

Glanville has written many novels! C+P the list on wiki:

* The Reluctant Dictator - London, Laurie, 1952.
* Henry Sows the Wind - London, Secker and Warburg, 1954.
* Along the Arno - London, Secker and Warburg, 1956; New York, Crowell, 1957.
* The Bankrupts - London, Secker and Warburg, and New York, Doubleday, 1958.
* After Rome, Africa - London, Secker and Warburg, 1959.
* Diamond - London, Secker and Warburg, and New York, FarrarStraus, 1962.
* The Rise of Gerry Logan - London, Secker and Warburg, 1963; NewYork, Delacorte Press, 1965.
* A Second Home - London, Secker and Warburg, 1965; New York, Delacorte Press, 1966.
* A Roman Marriage - London, Joseph, 1966; New York, CowardMcCann, 1967.
* The Artist Type - London, Cape, 1967; New York, Coward McCann, 1968.
* The Olympian - New York, Coward McCann, and London, Secker andWarburg, 1969.
* A Cry of Crickets - London, Secker and Warburg, and New York, Coward McCann, 1970.
* The Financiers - London, Secker and Warburg, 1972; as Money Is Love, New York, Doubleday, 1972.
* The Comic - London, Secker and Warburg, 1974; New York, Stein andDay, 1975.
* The Dying of the Light - London, Secker and Warburg, 1976.
* Never Look Back - London, Joseph, 1980.
* Kissing America - London, Blond, 1985.
* The Catacomb - London, Hodder and Stoughton, 1988.
* Dictators - London, Smaller Sky Books, 2001.

The first and last have the word 'dictator' on the title. I am not going to make a lot of this.

* Goalkeepers Are Different (for children), London, Hamish Hamilton, 1971; New York, Crown, 1972.

"for children" ffs. I picked up a copy recently and it's a decent occasional commuting read.

I find Run Of Play too overwritten, too lit-crit PPE clever, although I applaud the sentiment

― isn't house rubbish and Pete W mental (Pete W), Monday, 4 April 2011 15:36 (5 hours ago)

HALLELUJAH A MAN WITH SENSE

ur fiver caricaturing still weirdly ott as ever though

the main football correspondents, or 'chief football writers' as nult would say, neatly parallel their publications' shtick

mccarra - amiable, periphrastic, pathologically inoffensive
lawton - challops challops challops challops challops
kay (?) - lumpen crap
winter - bloviating little englande shite, incessant self regard

mccarra's general opinionating is more inane than i care to admit, but i (like the pinefox) enjoy pretending his match reports have an anachronistic flaubertian rigour to them

"there was a staleness about them that invited harm"

this is a mccarra phrase from a long-forgotten match report that has inexplicably forever lodged itself in my mind

yup, loved the taylor article

big fan of the bbc's chief football writer, forget his name. paul mcnally or something.

mccarra gets dissed a lot around here so i'm glad i'm not alone in liking him. he does at least try to capture the tenor of match day - what's at stake - in an original way and he sometimes succeeds. r|t|c's remembered phrase is exactly the kind of thing i hope to read when i read him and he very often delivers. then again, i don't read much besides the guardian so i'm interested to see what else pops up in this thread.

I enjoy Glenn Gibbons of the Scotsman and Tom English of the Scotsman on Scottish football, they often look deeper than the cliche and the received wisdom that surrounds much of Scottish football, and are all the better for it. Graham Spiers used to be an excellent thorn in the side of the establishment up here, but has turned into a cliche/challop-spouting merchant since going down south. I've all but given up on the Herald. Kevin McKenna and Ewan Murray of the Guardian are nothing outstanding.

Tabloid hacks are uniformly awful here, but Jim Traynor of the Record in particular has gotten increasingly mental over the years, culminating this weekend in a glorious on-air spat with BBC rentagob Chick Young* and perhaps the maddest editorial ever committed to print, complete with at least two factual inaccuracies that I can see (Neil Lennon's touchline ban has not been overturned and Dougie MacDonald [the referee referred to] resigned, he wasn't "binned"), some misplaced innuendo (Hugh Dallas' departure from the SFA was nothing to do with Celtic) and a ton of insane warblings that reads like a drunken idiot rambling on a messageboard rather than an opinion piece by one of the most prominent hacks in the Scottish game.

http://blogs.dailyrecord.co.uk/jimtraynor/2011/04/our-beautiful-games-gone-banan.html

* highlight was when Young accused Traynor of being a "Rangers puppet" as he tried for over 10 minutes to rubbish Young's reporting of Rangers being in danger of going to administration. Traynor's response was not to refute Young's arguments with fact, to present any journalistic research of his own to counter the claims, to deny any accusation of peddling the pro-Rangers line. His retort was "aw, are you jealous, Chick?".

I mourn the days when the useless Ian Ridley of the Observer would predict with utter certainty that Liverpool would win the Premiership, every single year.

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sport/columnist-354/Ian-Ridley---Mail-on-Sunday-Sports-Reporter.html

Oh, I should give an honourable mention to internet journalist Phil Mac Ghiolla Bain who has done some useful research on the institutionalised bias within the SFA, but dripfeeds it from his blog via Twitter with loads of "guess what I've got up my sleeve, huh?" hints and then takes big huffs when a paper takes the cue, does some research, breaks what he thinks should be his story and then doesn't give him credit. IMO he'd be better off freelancing and selling his complete and fully-researched stories to papers to reach a wider audience - the only people I know who are interested enough to read his blog aren't the kind of people whose perspective on Scottish football wouldn't be changed by reading any of his stuff anyway, and hacks who want to take credit for stories they didn't uncover themselves, but he does deserve credit for the sterling work done on the SFA.

The only other internet opinion pieces I tend to read are by Paul Brennan on Celtic Quick News - he isn't a bad writer, he has access to the Celtic Board (was first on the internet to break Strachan resigning, Mowbray's appointment, Mowbray's sacking and probably Lennon's appointment as well), but he's getting kind of insufferably pompous and deserves a kick in the testicles for some of overwrought pish that he writes.

I should really investigate more general football internet journalism, I have Run of Play bookmarked but never get round to reading it unless a piece is linked to from here.

No relation of Phil Mac an Ultaigh I trust?

:-)

Oh, thanks to onimo I'm rather enjoying http://rangerstaxcase.com/ - again, the internet coming good where actual print journalism is failing.

i always liked dion fannings writing but i heard something recently that he had to make a donation to the Hillsborough Family Support Group following inappropriate references in the Sunday Independent about Jamie Carragher.

here it is;

"Carragher was vocal again last week. Torres' sale might have been for the best if "he didn't 100 per cent want to be here". Nobody can question Carragher's desire to be at the club but many now have to ask if he should be.

It was "time for a change" he said when Benitez was sacked, even if the change only made things worse. Then, like now, he made some conciliatory public noises, but his private view reportedly was different.

Most, if not all, of those who contributed to the psychodrama at Liverpool have left. Carragher is the issue that needs to be confronted by Dalglish who has the powerbase to do it, a powerbase that may have intimidated those who felt he shouldn't get the job last summer."

Don't let that put you off Fanning. Carragher in 'gets a bit touchy when someone has a go' shocker.

It's funny you should mention that by the way, as I've just been talking to someone about that very subject.

I don't think there's anything particularly inappropriate in that. Carragher's just a whiny bitch.

yeah i think so too. fanning had to shell out 5 grand. ouch!

Re: FourFourTwo

tbh it's only worth picking up once every six months or so. A huge amount of what they do is already covered elsewhere, rehashing cliches and already outdated by the time it hits stands. Too many of their interviews are just shilling or rehashing what press officers will allow.

Otoh, they occasionally do features that wow - last season they went into all the great derbies across the world, where and why they started, how fans and players and etc. got involved and what that means in the modern day environment. Every one of these articles was terrific to read. And their tactics writing can be tremendous - the Sneijder cover that had articles on the evolution of the #10 was worthy of Wilson.

how come when i type stuff it's much shorter than when u type stuff

only 6 characters needed for a darragh post, 7 if you include the space inbetween

tbf under ramos it went up to 9

I'm often put off 4-4-2 by the coverline and tone that makes it look like a teenage version of Match. The derbies thing sounds great - somebody wrote a book on that theme a while ago but it was dreadful, completely wrong tone, sub-Hornby crap about the author rather than the political and social importance of the games. Real wasted opportunity.

I used to work with Kevin McCarra and he's a good writer when he isn't being worked to the bone on these shitty reaction pieces that seem to be the job lot of the correspondent. I feel sorry for them - they have to write so much fluff that use 1,000 words when only 100 are needed. That's part of the problem - a lot of what is in the football pages isn't really needed.

the internet makes a mockery of the lot of them, especially in the guardian where they have to have a reaction or "5 things we learned" ten minutes after any remotely significant match or event...

richard williams is a total joke imo...wouldn't trust him remotely, different sport but he interviewed the irish rugby manager after we won the grand slam in 2009 and in the piece he'd written a completely factually incorrect summary of the game that won us that title, fabricating a last minute try that didn't exist, when it was a last minute drop goal in a massively publicised game.

if that sounds abstract it would be like writing about man u winning the cl against bayern with a beckham free kick or something. just utterly shit. i've read him talk about headed goals that were actually shots too, lots of errors.

can't really be doing with the contrarian side of the guardian guys, rob smyth or the generally just nasty scott murray. those joy of sixes are always so pretentious and omit the thing you want to read about under some spurious pretext, with that ultra annoying disclaimer about "not meant to rank things..."

i quite like tim vickery on bbc....can be tedious but at least he's writing with a specialism and informing you...too much of the writing is just raw opinion, sport should have more than that, there are winners and losers and stats, it's not like art.

There is a great story about Richard Williams when he was a music writer writing about Lennon's Weddings album and favourably reviewing the engineer's test recordings of white noise that he was sent by mistake.

I quite like the Joy of Six. I think Smyth is a real feel for the game, unlike many of the other Guardian people. I feel like he is caught in a tug of war between Wilson and Glendenning and hope he chooses right.

Couple of other good recent pieces that stick in the memory.

This excellent profile of John Terry came out in the middle of last year's witchhunt. It's sympathetic and, perhaps, much more damning because of it. No football writer would attempt to write such a thing. They either sneer without bothering to meet somebody, or they churn out a load of dull quotes. But Crampton is very good - his piece on Ruud Gullit was infamously lacerating.

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/sport/football/international/article7020356.ece

The Guardian's Secret Footballer is running out of steam very quickly, but this was good and is appropriate.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/football/2011/jan/29/secret-footballer-andy-gray-pundits

Bought the new 442 for the article on Berlisconi's influence on Milan. It was very vague unfortunately. "He wanted to run it as a marketable business" = greaaaat, you got really in depth there. Also seemed more interested in Hateley leaving even though it seemingly had little to do with Silvio. All I got was basically he paid off their debts and was heavily involved in the booster tv deal that lead to serie a being dominant in the 90s... which i already knew.

Yes, the Terry piece was great. I've never seen the Gullit one.

I've been having a think about what I want/don't want since you put this thread up. I do want proper humanity in the articles, a look at the person behind the usually-dull image, which you won't get from identaquotes. That Terry piece is dead on. I want a fresh angle if possible, and if not (there's only so much footy can bear after all) I want old angles done well and straightforwardly.

I don't want spurious political angles because the game can rarely bear it (see Wilson's blizzard Red Star piece for how it should be done). I'm surprised you all speak highly of the fourfourtwo derby series, anything I've seen attempting similar has been way off imo.

I know what I want and what I don't want (alas these rules can be broken but rarely are):

Want:
Factual data (injuries, form, etc.) that will allow me to make my own decision on a game.
Sober understanding of off the field details (i.e. finances, fanbase size and opinion, etc.)
A basic understanding of tactics. You don't have to be Jonathon Wilson but fucking hell you'd think TOO MANY writers/talking heads etc. have only just been introduced to the game.
Try to avoid bias, especially when it comes to nationalism.
An appreciation of all that happens on the pitch - sometimes a great last gasp tackle is much more important than a goal, a right back can be MOTM over a striker etc.
An interesting perspective about something that is droppin' knowledge (in a normal tone and not a 'oh these kids know nothing these days' one).
An understanding of history or perspective of what made a team what they are. I know it was only a ilx thing but the chanting Where Were You When You Were Shit to Chelsea fans discussion is a good example of how journalists need this.
Genuine enthusiasm for the game.
Genuine enthusiasm to see more to the game than the goalscorer.

Don't want:
Predictions on games like I'm not supposed to think for myself.
Flowery or forced language. I know that if Havand & Waterlooville are playing at Anfield that it is a spectacle, you can only ruin it by telling me what I already know 4000times with stupid language.
Ridiculous loss of perpective: for example - only 5 clubs at most can win the highest level championships in this country (incl. Europa/CL) and it is not the end of the world when 90 teams a season don't win them.
Mispaced idolism (i.e. the Rooney media).
Writers/talking heads not knowing shit about who they talk about. If Utd get a team of plucky part-time plumbers and window washers from Moldova in the Champions League, it is ok to not know but if someone plays in the top 5 leagues and you are professional, I'd hope you'd do more than read a wikipedia article. Or at least know who fucking Ben Arfa or David Silva is.

There is a great story about Richard Williams when he was a music writer writing about Lennon's Weddings album and favourably reviewing the engineer's test recordings of white noise that he was sent by mistake.

Now that is what I call 70s music journalism!

There is a great story about Richard Williams when he was a music writer writing about Lennon's Weddings album and favourably reviewing the engineer's test recordings of white noise that he was sent by mistake.

lolol I thought you were just joking abt it actually being him

oh cmon can we not just get music its own board or something?

http://www.guardian.co.uk/profile/paulhayward

look at this jawdropping litany of pointless filler. i hadn't actually realised it was this bad til now since it never occurred to me he could possibly be writing three separate identical pieces on each non-subject daily.

Carlo Ancelotti on the precipice as Chelsea prepare for Old Trafford
10 Apr 2011

Even Carlo Ancelotti the cool one has been consumed by this age of rage
7 Apr 2011

What Chelsea's Fernando Torres wouldn't give for a goal celebration
7 Apr 2011

Emotional baggage brought home from Moscow still weighs on Chelsea
6 Apr 2011

hayward is dire....

not football but check this quote, used as a link in the story on bbc sport about the augusta masters

"To McIlroy's generation, Woods is the icon, the man they watched as kids, the man who changed the sport. They could be about to get their own icon"

if woods is their icon then how could they be about to get their own one? it just defies belief how shit these people are.

I understand the need for LOTS of journalism each day but does that sort of stuff really bring in more hits than a well written piece about a club less talked about? Like if you regularly picked a club with lots of fans that aren't necc. written about often, like say, modern Leeds, couldn't you in theory be more interesting AND still get mad website hits?

there's too much opinion on everything

Well, yes.

the real question is how many of us saw the title, thought fucks sake that looks shit, clicked it, read it, thought yep that was shit

advertisers arent going to care about the quality of the hits and the media can't afford not have them

don't click them then?

people always will

the only pieces that are going to negatively impact on advertiser revenue longterm are the EXCLUSIVE transfer wind-ups like the bale stunt, and even that's highly arguable

tbh im surprised how fucking many sites still run on EXCLUSIVE TRANSFER NEWS each and every day, like oh yeah you found out who Man Utd are going to spend - FUCKING HELL THAT WAS SWEET FROM EBOUE - 60m on in October, did you?

it's the tribalfootball.com model that's especially brutal - just dudes churning and churning out random flagrant lies and everyone knows it. would love to find out how much money they make

but yeah the greater point is it's folly to claim that we're totally above it. i for one can't wait til qpr reinvest the £20m taarabt money from madrid on niko kranjcar and oscar wendt this summer (all "actual" "rumours" i've seen).

i gave it up cold turkey when arsenal signed arsenal's joe cole this summer on 100k a week and it would be the best signing ever

could still happen

please!!!

That top Hayward piece is absolutely typical of the sort of stuff I hate. It's full of conjecture, it's unoriginal, it's drably written - it's pure space filler. Yes, I did read it but that's because it was about Chelsea, wouldn't have touched it otherwise.

Hayward used to be a good writer but is now burnt out. Reminds me of many music journalists. I feel a bit sorry for them, cannot possibly imagine being stuck writing on one subject, be it sport, music or football for the rest of my life.

Alan Green (of all people) was saying recently the problem with football coverage/journalism is access. Footballers don't make themselves available for interview so hacks have to fill the space with waffle. That's definitely the case with Abramovich, where nobody has a clue what he is thinking but rarely dares admit it.

In the Crampton piece on Terry he talks about the fact he liked terry because he showed common courtesy in turning up on time and then attempted to answer questions honestly and with thought.

This is quite important. Football people are diabolical at interviews. I interviewed Neil Warnock last November. He changed the interview time at the last minute and then turned up an hour late anyway. He wasn't bad when he got there, but spoke largely in platitudes. that meant he gave good quotes, but ones almost entirely lacking in depth. He didn't attempt to engage with me, didn't really answer my questions and only give the photographer five minutes. (By comparison, the next day I interviewed Marianne Faithfull, who is 100 times more famous and 100 times better to interview.)

This is typical and it's something football writers have to deal with on a daily/weekly basis. It would drive me insane.

^ excellent post

Football people don't really need the media, as individuals anyway, so the poor attitude maybe shouldn't be that surprising. They do seem better when they have something they need to promote that they actually care about - Ryan Giggs gave good copy on his Sierra Leone stuff last year.

It also doesn't help that they get such gentle lobs all the time, but then if you ask Ferguson a difficult question he just tells you to fuck off, and it's you who loses out - music journos have a bit more power that way too.

Pete W largely otm. The attitude of the football clubs towards the media is massively depressing. There is no sense of sharing the game or wanting to let it breathe in a public space, they know they are the number one sport in the UK and hence they don't give a flying fuck about anyone.

When I worked on the kids sports show in the Beeb so many other sports would set up whatever the hell you wanted, great access to pros and they'd do things for you, like we had Ian Poulter fielding questions from a bunch of kids etc...the press officers in other sports help you and want to make the game stand out.

Football clubs have massively wary and hassled press officers who you get the feeling have a nightmare job in trying to get the players to do anything, so the same vaguely media friendly guys are wheeled out over and over again.

The players themselves seem like aliens half the time, incapable of actually having a laugh or relaxing, and barely able to stop swearing or making horrible jokes for the two mins interview you wanted for kids telly. It's majorly hard to bring out a human side in so many of the pros.

There are exceptions obviously...

This is quite important. Football people are diabolical at interviews. I interviewed Neil Warnock last November. He changed the interview time at the last minute and then turned up an hour late anyway. He wasn't bad when he got there, but spoke largely in platitudes. that meant he gave good quotes, but ones almost entirely lacking in depth. He didn't attempt to engage with me, didn't really answer my questions and only give the photographer five minutes. (By comparison, the next day I interviewed Marianne Faithfull, who is 100 times more famous and 100 times better to interview.)

weirdly we did a shoot with neil warnock and he was brilliant, the press officer was really helpful and we got him to talk about being a manager and explain how it works for kids and stuff, he had a bit of a laugh and was funny. he said his kids watched the show tho so maybe he gave us more as a result.

lol this whole issue can be summed up as WHY HARRY REDKNAPP HAS A NEWS STORY ON BBC SPORT EVERY SINGLE DAY

Yeah people bitch about Wenger getting love from journos but it is only because he has a press conference every friday and will at least allow any question to be asked (whether he answers it is a different matter).

It also makes me hate that clubs are cracking down on twitter. There was a small, miniscule really, period of time when the public could see a footballer's genuine opinion on matters instead of the dull press officer nicey nicey approach (i'm looking at you darren bent etc.)

Lack of an angle unless it's one the journalist is working to death is also a problem. There was a good interview with Kalou in the Graun on Saturday though.

Actually the reaction to that Kalou interview sums it up really, he gave a thoughtful and emotional interview about the political situation in the Ivory Coast and then talked a bit about being frustrated with lack of starts. Obviously the subsequent stories are all 'SALOMON KALOU CONSIDERING CHELSEA EXIT'

chicken egg in vicious circle SHOCKAH

but i mean cmon, the press in england are, taken as a whole, probably best left the fuck alone from the pov of yr average english footballer.

“Stan Kroenke can take Arsenal forward by working with Arsene Wenger to quicken the pursuit of trophies.” – Henry Winter

http://twitter.com/#!/henrywinter

Winter's current Twitter liveblog of Pool-City is a bit of a grab bag of familiar bollocks

henrywinter Henry Winter
What. A. Goal. Andy Carroll off the mark in style for #lfc - left-foot 25-yarder that flew past Hart. Majestic strike.

What. A. Tweet.

henrywinter Henry Winter
Tevez just limped off. Huge blow for #mcfc. Must be a major doubt for FA Cup semi on Saturday. Looks disconsolate as heads down tunnel

An injury to Man City's best player: disappointing to Man City; also the player

henrywinter Henry Winter
Kuyt makes it 2-0, low drive after a series of chances for #lfc. Terrible half for #mcfc. Sky saying Tevez has a hamstring

Player has hamstring

There were 18 characters to spare in that one

lol

Manchester City fans still exercising their vocal chords though

FUCK YOU NULT ARRRGHHH

I bet that rat cunt thinks "begs the question" means "raises the question" and all

I still don't know what the real meaning of 'begs the question' is supposed to be.

Embarrassing old Roy talks all sorts of rubbish here. Unspectacular piece, but well done - the right questions, lets Hodgson do the talking, avoids the difficult stuff mostly but what're you gonna do? The problem is it should be a much longer feature I feel, Roy going in-depth on a number of those topics could be really interesting.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/football/2011/apr/15/paul-scholes-manchester-united-manchester-city

not going to complain too much about yet another "rare" interview with paul scholes, but this piece is full of annoying shit. eg who needs to hear YET AGAIN that paul scholes doesn't like haircuts or flash cars?

Or Barcelona maybe, the side he loves to watch and that, in many ways, symbolise his own brand of pass-them-to-death football – quick, elusive and, when everything clicks, bloody brilliant.

Is this really the best he can do with words? Ah fuck it "bloody brilliant" will do.

He is talking in a quiet side room at Manchester United's training ground. Scholes, as usual, has been one of the first to arrive for work, his hair still damp from his morning shower. Training top, jeans, the same haircut he has had since he was playing for Boundary Park Juniors almost 25 years ago. Scholes has never been one for designer labels or flashy cars, and it is almost a surprise to find out he has accepted the offer of a benefit match. Already, you can imagine the adulation from the stands and the polite, unassuming little wave from a man not really comfortable with all the flashing bulbs.

Surely I'm not the only one who would actually like to know something interesting about Scholes if there is anything, or like hear him talk about his game and how he plays or who he idolised etc etc.

daniel taylor is a shit writer and a noted sycophant

Roy Hodgson is a bullshitter of the highest order. Says a lot without saying anything at all. Jeez, and the way he's portrayed as this old sage, football guru and life coach just because he's read a few books. "You can get undone very quickly in this league, and what we've got to look at in the future is the mental strength of the team so they don't get carried along by opinions about them." Mental strength a thing of the future? WTF?

yeah i think at least it can now be said hodgson isn't effective at the top level.

1807: How on earth? Arsenal's title challenge was off-bang on-and the off again all in the space of four injury-time minutes the likes of which you'll rarely see again.

off-bang on-and the off

sam lyon is the worst

the likes of which you'll rarely see again

wondering if that's some phrase that's been handed down through his family through the years, and he's oblivious to its lack of wider meaning

"how was the liveblogging today son"
"oh you know, it was a bit off-bang on-and the off"
"that's absolutely top, son"

bang and off son

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tyZspqjtG2k#t=0m57s

argh, supposed to start 57 secs in.

BBC underlines importance of full stops:

Wilshere proves that more than most, having signed for Arsenal at just nine years old, making an impression among the likes of Cesc Fabregas, Robin van Persie and Andrey Arshavin can not have been easy, but Wilshere has begun to look more and more like one of manager Arsene Wenger's first names on the team sheet.

There were some interesting comments about player access on twitter last night from Michael Owen and Stan Collymore. Worth reading.

This basically sums it up from Owen.
@OllieHoltMirror it's the sensationalising of headlines that annoys most players. It makes us look like clowns when most lads are normal.
Twitter for iPad • 20/04/2011 00:51
 in reply to… 

He and Collymore both say there is a generation of players growing up who have no relationship at all with the press, and that means journalists are more likely then ever to portray footballers as one-dimensional sub-human retards (my words, not their's). They both demonstrate a desire to do something about this if they could trust the press to write about football and not sensationalise trivialities.

That's what we all want I suppose. The basic problem is that football isn't important or complicated enough for the amount that gets written about it*, so the vast majority of stuff has to be rubbish. On the other hand, I doubt very much that ye olden days ('England wins world cup - see page 72') were a golden era of great writing either, they'd just be more polite.

* I enjoyed this Run Of Play piece on The Velvet Underground and Raul, and indeed I write that sort of thing myself occasionally, but tbh the Nico stuff is just filler - has to be, because otherwise the article says everything it can in about four or five sentences. Throwaway but it's novel, entertaining and makes me smile, in a way that transfer rumours and faux-outrage no longer do (if they ever did).

If you haven't seen all 5 seasons of The Wire and you don't want any spoilers, then don't read. If you have, enjoy.

http://gregtheoharis.wordpress.com/2011/04/10/myths-and-legends/

Great article! Although Prop Joe was always my favourite.

Yeah that's otm. There's also a kind of ennui about players before they arrive now, through much the same process. I only really get a frisson now when players have somehow managed to compile a reputation out-of-sight, either in a disastrous team (Torres), in a disastrous league (Arshavin, Suarez), or by being a prodigy (Rooney or Theo). Otherwise meh*. It definitely wasn't like that when, say, Bergkamp arrived.

* there's I guess another deeper layer of pleasure at the surprise you get when Luiz, van der Vaart or Silva turns out to actually be amazing after all. Hernandez would tick every box going here, but Mexico's forever off the radar.

I was on holiday in US when Bergkamp signed for Arsenal. I remember reading the papers at the airport and not quite believing he was gonna want to play in England and being really excited at the prospect of seeing him. That kind of feeling has somewhat disappeared for me although Suarez has thrilled me tbf.

That article is well intentioned but Rooney won't become a myth because he's a ugly dick no-one cares about and not because of the cameras. They haven't done any harm to the likes of Cassano, Balotelli or even say Ashley Cole, Zidane or Sol. Those players have stories you can enjoy telling, even if you don't like the content or the character. What story is there with Rooney after his first goal? Looking a bit shit in an England team that didn't qualify in '08 and got beat down in '10? Being in an underachieving Utd team until he rode on Ronaldo's coattails? Fucking grannies or cheating on his wife? At least you can laugh your tits off at Ashley Cole doing it properly and SHOOTING someone. Balotelli tried to break into a womans prison. Cassano decided to he was going to single handedly repopulate Italy. This is the stuff of legend, not just doing something that makes Mickey Owens frown from the other side of the room.

Fun as those stories might be, other than Zidane they're not really about the football.

Since when has myth building been about football? There is what, Thomas v. Liverpool, Ronaldo 98 final and... Romario's 1000 goals in my lifetime? I guess you could add Lineker pooing himself.

I don't generally want metajournalism but this eulogy to When Saturday Comes is a vey nice piece of contextualisation. D'you know, I can't recall ever reading WSC.

I've got a subscription to WSC which I can't bring myself to cancel even tho I don't really enjoy reading it as much as I did. The writing is patchy and it does get too 'jumpers for goalposts' at times (knowingly but still annoyingly). The straight reporting is much better than the reminiscences and attempts at humour and there are always a few things worth reading. Now competing with the Blizzard and some high-profile blogs I spose, not sure how it's coping.

Hmm, I always thought 'eulogy' was about the dead - man does my english suck.

Yeah I've never read it either, although I saw that Wenger cover the other day, lol'd and thought i might pick it up in the future.

I think 'eulogy' is for the dead though, I just liked it and couldn't be bothered checking

elegy/eulogy/eugene levy

commonly for the dead or otherwise departed, but not always

'It is shameful that the Spanish league have the most unfair revenue sharing in Europe,' says Sevilla president Jose Maria del Nido. Yes, but as King Tee said, the payback's a mutha.

http://i.imgur.com/hUNhD.png

(http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sport/article-1380844/Martin-Samuel-Spain-pain-Real-Madrid-Barcelona-turning-Scotland-.html)

eugh samuel needs culling

Ugh, what a dreadful piece of writing. There are plenty of reasons why Scottish football has gone to shit, and the one he's laying it all at is possibly the least important of all.

This is the beginning of La Liga's reinvention as New Caledonia

there already is a new caledonia u troughfed fuck

christian karembeu is of new caledonian extraction iirc

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/c/c0/Creek_South_New_Caledonia.JPG/300px-Creek_South_New_Caledonia.JPG

If Samuel's saying that this picture of New Caledonia looks a bit like some places in Spain, he may have the beginnings of a point.

i was just boggling at him mentioning king tee

bloody ponces

idk his cultural co-ordinates, roughly brummie truck driver +/- former select reader, seem quite like former microblogging fave 'thebig_sam'

Run Of Play: Your Stupid Rage is really great

I haven't read that, but Samuel is great. The only columnist I have any time for.

I was going to post that Run Of Play piece on here - it's very good. Not massive fan of his style, but agree with everything he says.

Thanks for that Ismael. V good article. Tho still think his Football Manager(the game)pieces are his best writing.

lol had to wonder when i got a column for a second there

I like the idea of manager sour grapes as an extension of the feeling of white hot "this isn't happening" rage/confusion you feel at the sound of distant away fans going apeshit for their farcical late winner

I didn't wholly agree with that Run of Play article.

I think to some extent anger and negativity are part of football, just as they are part of life. There are a lot of feelings vented when you watch sport, sometimes joy, sometimes anger, sometimes a combination of the two. Years and years of watching the same sports team builds a mental relationship which is quite unique. I cried when Liverpool won the CL in 2005 (yes had had a few drinks) because of years and years of having to admit that they were crap or not quite good enough, and finally they had some major trophy glory, in such a stupendous fashion.

It wasn't about "having fun", I don't enjoy watching Liverpool or Ireland in the same way I enjoy watching two teams I don't support at all, sure it's exciting sometimes but a lot of it is gut clenching and fear etc.

I don't think it's as simple as just deciding to control your emotions.

I agree that "hyperpartisan" fans are annoying but you know, people are jerks, not revelatory stuff. Some people should be jerks less. Definitely.

All that said it is fun to say things about football you know are completely untrue or ott just out of sheer partisan feelings, once you don't actually believe them.

And it can be fun to shout at the telly too...though sometimes after a few drinks this can get a bit grim.

xpost to way up ...

I used to work in football journalism - left 10 years ago. Even then, access was a massive problem. The only way to get to UK players for more than a couple of minutes after training was through kit sponsors. Back then, at least you didn't have to discuss the boots when you went that route, but the pics were always horrible. Club press officers in the UK were less than no help: the Leicester man once refused a ticket for Leicester-Spurs to a woman writer of ours who was doing a piece about one of the Leicester players: he said he reckoned she only wanted a ticket because she fancied Ginola.
But access wasn't the biggest problem, really: it was that most of them have nothing to say, not because they are stupid, but because they have a pathological fear of offending their contemporaries. Sol Campbell refused to even discuss players he admired in football because of the implication that there might be players he didn't admire. The best interviews were always with players who'd been good, but were now on the way down – I really enjoyed doing John Sheridan at Oldham and Peter Beardsley at Hartlepool – because they no longer had to worry about what people thought of what they had to say. That doesn't mean they ran their mouths off, but they answered honestly, rather than in platitudes. Same with Rocastle and Thomas, who I spoke to for a Whatever Happened To? piece, and who were fabulous. Also, it helps when the players love football, which isn't always the case.
Not sure older players would be such good interviewees now - the ones I was talking to were the last pre-big money generation. Their wealth might have changed it all.

Interview nightmares: talking to Sol Campbell sitting on the floor of the changing room at Spurs Lodge, with a naked John Scales standing right next to me, listening, his penis three inches from my face.
Going to Sunderland to interview Kevin Phillips after training. Him assuming that - after having come up from London at 6 in the morning - I just needed two minutes in the car park. I negotiated him up to a whole 15 mins in the boot room.
Anything connected with Harry Kewell.

there was almost a lawsuit at one prem club when a (mystery) player deliberately kicked a football full force at a cameraman we'd hired, while he was filming, massive camera black eye and had to be checked for concussion. that club was v keen to help us with anything we wanted after that.

I am interviewing two footballers in the next few days, one very famous and retired, the other very famous and still playing. For the reasons stated above, I am looking forward to one a hell of a lot more than the other.

Regarding kit sponsorship, I remember being at one paper and it being pointed out that a certain (still) very prominent young writer on another paper who was getting a lot of unprecedented access with big players always seemed to slip the word NIKE into his opening paragraph.

I thought I asked this earlier but it obv didn't come up for some reason - who do you write for Pete? Written anything worth braggin' about and sharing?

As for actual writers, McCarra was actually fantastic when he did Scottish football for the Times. And I do like Martin Samuel for having something to say, even though it's often bollocks.

Agree on both. McCarra was brilliant, and a lovely chap.

Sam, have answered on the other thread.

Guardian's Football League Blog has been a really good thing: often interesting stuff, and less frequently told stories. And the below-the-line stuff is miles better than on the Premier pieces, because it doesn't degenerate into "You hate Man U and you're shit".

http://www.guardian.co.uk/sport/2011/jun/23/wimbledon-2011-li-na-lisicki-sabine

not football but hayward...fucking unreadable. i actually can't read it.

The hyped political plot-line that cast Li Na's historic French Open win as the start of a sweep by the world's most populous nation was doused as Asia's first winner of a grand slam tennis event fell in the second round to Germany's Sabine Lisicki.

haha what.

'No results found for "the plotline was doused".'

like how could you write that sentence and submit it...do they even read their own stuff back after finishing it? and how do the subs leave it in, i've been subbing a bit in a freelance job lately and believe me i would go to town on that shit

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v622/thingummy99/Picture1-7.png

nice job, ronan

lol carles

The emergence of Chicharito on the global soccer stage doesn't just threaten the upcoming era of the American soccer zeitgeist (sponsored by Nike). His superior skills and warranted hype expose the faults with the American fan's relationship with our national team and the marketed motivations to anoint a "next great thing." Freddy Adu is still "the face" of failed American hopes that were overmarketed, and the loss to Mexico coupled with his "solid performance" has sent my fandom into a spiral of darkness. Sort of like a fun college relationship that was only possible because you were young and still living on your parent's dime, but now that you have grown up and acquired a grim office job, you realize that you were living in a distorted version of reality.

I'm still riding really high from Landon Donovan's last-minute game winner against Algeria

This phrase or a variation on it appears in roughly 70 percent of articles on US soccer, and translates as This was the last soccer match I watched, or at least caught the highlights.

Will the general public finally accept and praise Clint Dempsey as the player who we actually wanted Landon Donovan to be?

"I first learned who Clint Dempsey was last month, but I'd heard of Donovan *at least* as far back as 2009. Dempsey's a year younger. Yeah, I think I can get away with writing this like it means something."

http://www.guardian.co.uk/football/blog/2011/sep/13/sergio-aguero-manchester-city

The only time Agüero sets his ball aside comes when he reaches for his new Puma boots – which he will wear for the first time against Napoli. Draping them around his neck, and clutching them happily, Agüero says: "If I could score a goal with these boots against Napoli it would be a great debut for me and City in the Champions League. Of course, winning the game is much more important but a goal would be nice."

interesting seeing this sort of thing slowly creep into the broadsheets... first time ever in the guardian iirc?

although i suppose it's only wishful thinking that any major "regular" interview these days would be any less of a product of club/pr/sponsor collusion

http://www.guardian.co.uk/football/2011/may/18/robin-van-persie-arsenal

Similar photo in this piece, though the analogous product placement is a little subtler: "Everybody knows everything about each other," he said, at the launch of the new adidas adiPower Predator boot.

Say anything less anodyne in an interview and your club will launch an investigation, it seems.

V hard to get access to any of these guys unless it's tied to some big brand. Is why the BBC are doubly screwed.

I like that Agüero plays with plain black boots, it brings a touch of olde worlde tradition back to the EPL and I'll cling to anything these days.

― Ismael Klata, Sunday, September 11, 2011 1:21 PM (3 days ago)

FFS the real world can't even go a week without crushing me

i think this thread has made me realise that i don't like reading about football.

a ringing endorsement of ILF, that

I learnt a long time ago that if in the photo a player/manager is wearing an obvious sporting brand (as opposed to just their kit or normal attire) then you should be fine reading the first half the interview and then remember to stop because everything after that is just shilling you shit you don't want.

xp nah, i love discussion of football maybe more than i ever have, tbh. It's just lengthy written articles that fail to catch my interest.

What footballers have to say couldn't interest me less. I think pete and ithappens said it upthread, but you can't expect a player to have anything meaningful to say while they're still marketable, and even afer that there's few enough of them that engage. G Neville's been good, though. Was trying to watch sky sports saturday the last day and by the time merse and phil thompson had said their piece on stoke i was done. Pure ignorance, pubtalk, nothing bluster

been noticing recently that wayne rooney, especially in post match interviews, is just the most terrifyingly perfect of all footballers at coming out with the exact scripted straight bat responses every time. such a model automaton is he that you almost start to suspect sort of diabolical intelligence in him, idk

he doesn't blink

no he's quite natural! - like you can see in other players eyes they're restraining themselves - but natural only in saying the most artificial things

He's not though

yeah he's not though

he's completely white iirc.

Rooney's eyes are really weird, idk if it's just the way everything is filmed on BBC nowadays (well, like Dragons Den or the Apprentice where everyone has vivid eyes) but on Saturday's MOTD he looked like had doll's eyes, with quite long eyelashes. When he lies down they close gradually.

he has really long eyelashes tho, with very childlike eyes imo. Completely white.

he's completely white iirc.

this was fucked up

probably talked about on another thread, but it bears repeating

Think the NultBot 3000 might be a faulty prototype of this kind of thing tbh: http://www.mediabistro.com/galleycat/20-companies-using-computer-generated-stories-save-money-on-writers_b37987

xpost Anyone wearing plain black boots is doing so only because they don't have a kit sponsorship deal, so they'd rather black out all logos than let someone put a logo on their feet for which no money has changed hands.

warms the cockles of yer heart

It has been thus for many years ...

http://www.guardian.co.uk/media/2001/may/07/mondaymediasection.football

yeah the subliminal stuff (and editorialising) i take as given but was it really ever thus that journos were forced to crowbar references to branded goods into the copy? maybe my memory is failing me but every time i see this it always rings a loud alarm

granted some journos are subtler about it (or less strongarmed, who knows) than others; it's one thing to be like "cattermole, speaking at hi-tec's free tibet campaign launch," rather than "cattermole sips his lucozade powervom fortified by minerals and ponders the question, a smile playing on his lips"

lol

That Aguero one upthread was quite startling, I grant you. My guess would be there was only one print slot available, and that was the promise extracted for a piece all the papers would have wanted. Doubt Ryan Shawcross, say, would get that quote published.

friend pointed out something similar to me from the cricket world the other day -

Just flicking through an evening standard. Small piece on surrey's cb40 semi final on sunday, with a few quotes from hamilton-brown. At the end, apropos of nothing, it says hamilton-brown is represented by the wasserman media group. What's that all about? Do u reckon he wouldnt talk to them unless they put that at the end?

Only when football catches up with the media model of American sport, where journalists are granted formalised and regular access to players

how does this work btw? centralised organisation is one thing sure but as a space for free media too?

I'm always slightly taken aback when in the aftermath of an NFL/NBA game you see a player at his locker with about 15 mics/tape recorders in his face being asked questions. The idea of 20+ print, radio and tv journo's in the dressing rooms at Old Trafford post game asking whatever the hell they want doesn't seem feasible tbh

http://www.guardian.co.uk/football/2011/oct/29/players-managers-bad-challenges

hayward can be bad but this isn't

www.dailymail.co.uk/sport/article-2054847/John-Terry-scandal-Des-Kelly-Football-tolerate-blind-spot-racism.html

surprisingly considered stuff from ver mail

anyone read an issue of the green soccer journal? it looks great. but i have no idea as to the quality of the writing.

i read this spanish mag called panenka, it's great. if you can read spanish.

I never read tabloid journalism or listen to radio phone-ins relating to English football, but I wondered if you had a media that is as suspicious of the internet as our mob up here. Whenever there is a groundswell of support for an idea (e.g. Fans Against Criminalisation, the idea that Rangers may generally be fucked), it is always dismissed as the work of tinfoil-hat-wearing wotsit-munching mentalists rather than of functioning intelligent human beings with a useful means of contact and research and an ready-made audience at their fingertips. I just wondered if this was particular to the dinosaur media up here? (Hats off to STV though, their twitter presence and engagement is excellent)

I got a subscription to When Saturday Comes for Christmas. First issue arrived in the week. I'd never read it before but it's so excellent - short articles thus far, and every one interesting.

surprised u never read it

So am I. Just got out of the habit of *buying* media I suppose, though a quick glance suggests their website's good too and I've never been on there either. I can't really explain it.

the last one i got had ramsey&theo on the cover and wasnt great but generally its pretty good

chilling parallels with arsenal tbh

I never read tabloid journalism or listen to radio phone-ins relating to English football, but I wondered if you had a media that is as suspicious of the internet as our mob up here. Whenever there is a groundswell of support for an idea (e.g. Fans Against Criminalisation, the idea that Rangers may generally be fucked), it is always dismissed as the work of tinfoil-hat-wearing wotsit-munching mentalists rather than of functioning intelligent human beings with a useful means of contact and research and an ready-made audience at their fingertips. I just wondered if this was particular to the dinosaur media up here? (Hats off to STV though, their twitter presence and engagement is excellent)

― ailsa, Sunday, 15 January 2012 10:13 (Yesterday)

If anything I think it has made clubs

-try to be even more secretive abt 'big issues'
-allow twitter for players who, lets be honest, dont ever really say anything newsworthy but makes it feel like the fans are more connected and inside because they read what jermaine jenas ate at pizza hut
-ignore message boards and blogs until they have a new shirt or dvd to sell, in which they use them as an promotional tool, knowing fans do read them. i'm more likely to find out that arsenal have a dvd of [xyz] because arseblog are doing a competition about it than because it is mentioned in the sun and that has to be the same all around by now. Again this makes them seem 'inclusive' or whatever when it really is just shilling.

I think we won't really find out until there is an arab spring of a football club (to use a very awkward metaphor). If Bolton are 100m in the shitter and with no prospects, how long is it until Bolton fans a) find out through blogs and b) get together to do something about it, like an Ebbsfleet for a Premiership team or something?

FC United?

oh yeah, like that.

The Black Scarf Movement?

I'm hoping that Rangers going tits up, as discussed on many a blog/messageboard for years while the traditional media fail to mention it and mutter about internet mentalist conspiracy, will be the thing up here that shifts the balance. There was definitely an undercurrent of suggesting that Hugh Dallas is no longer head of refereeing at the SFA because of meddling nerds rather than because he was a bigoted bastard in charge of a corrupt system exposed by a journalist who wrote on the internet rather than in a print publication. Antiquated old twats like Hugh Keevins and Jim Traynor have no idea how modern communication works.

The odd thing is that almost every fan under 40 reads blogs and gossip, right? Or at least 60%? I know some folk who are seem like the most casual fans who check out Swiss Ramble or at least f365 and talk about stuff you don't hear/read within trad media. Once a week you are also seeing some sort of club protest at places were the trad media aren't talking about problems (isn't every thing said on tv 'give kean a chance already people!' as opposed to 'hmmm maybe they have an issue with how venkys run the club?') and this is gonna have to reach a tipping point soon enough, right? TV pays for the Premiership, not the other way round but they act like they are muzzled by the Etihad and can't speak about actual stories.

(Could you imagine how essential viewing Football Focus would be if you just gave it to James Richardson and told he can go as far as he wants before the libel cases came in?)

Interesting horrifying-if-you're-a-Blackburn-fan stuff in the papers today about the Venky's bypassing their own board on major decisions like... who the manager should be.

Yeah, a hoy hoy, the TV perception of the Blackburn fans is a good case in point. It just baffles me how guys in the media can fail to capture what's going on with actual fans or with the world in general in terms of communication and chat, especially when it is done more publicly and on record than yer man chuntering on on the Clapham omnibus.

even the soccer saturday guys have closed ranks on blackburn, it's quite weird

the prob with the blackburn fans is just, at least superficially and in the way it is going to be perceived by outsiders, that a lot of their moaning is just bleating "keane out". venkys out i would have a lot more sympathy with.

They only talk to each other, no? Explains why the occasional cheating, diving foreigner is incongruously fair game, like I dunno Christian Gross or Massimo Taibi. Steve Kean was one too until Ferguson and Moyes pitched in.

keane out, venky's out, i've no quarrel with either tbh. He's the front, the plant, the mouthpiece, the cuckoo's egg. A win or two doesn't alter that in any way.

Yeah but the 'don't be mean to kean!' line seems so uptight and against what fans feel, it borders on ludicrous.

"there was a staleness about them that invited harm"

this is a mccarra phrase from a long-forgotten match report that has inexplicably forever lodged itself in my mind

― r|t|c, Monday, 4 April 2011 20:55 (1 year ago) Bookmark

this has recently been superseded by "the evening fell under the control of marcelo bielsa's squad" just fyi

Adel Taarabt causes trouble. Despite his undoubted talent, Tottenham gave up on Taarabt. So, earlier this season, did Ian Holloway. On Saturday, Mark Hughes, who has replaced Holloway as manager, started his mercurial midfielder against his former club.

http://sportsillustrated.cnn.com/2012/writers/peter_berlin/04/21/premier.league.thoughts/index.html

As United's manager begins his annual summer holiday in the south of France he may reflect that calligraphy derives from the Greek words kallos and graphe. Meaning "beautiful writing", it is a form of expression intended to address the heart as much as the eyes.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/football/blog/2012/jun/05/shinji-kagawa-manchester-united

guessed richard williams

http://www.dailystar.co.uk/football/view/254015/Liverpool-job-is-Brendan-Rodger-sLiverpool-job-is-Brendan-Rodger-s

just putting the worst football headline of all time here for posterity

The new Blizzard contains the following sentence:

Constantly high, drunk or both, Lundekvam took to roaming around in his garden with a huge knife, hunting paparazzi.

haha yeah,i read that. Thought it was a poor issue in general though.

Manchester City had two new players on show. One was Jack Rodwell, right, spoiling his debut with the mistake that led to Southampton's second goal after a £15m transfer from Everton. The other was not technically foreign to this parish: Carlos Tevez 2.0, who is promising to be all the good things, and none of the bad, that any £250,000-a-week forward should be.

The pain inflicted by the loss of Fábregas and, more recently, Robin van Persie – not to mention Nuri Sahin's decision to join Liverpool on loan from Real Madrid – was temporarily at least diminished by his new 5ft 6in Spaniard.

..

From Giroud's viewpoint this could only be a good thing. Long before Cazorla had assuaged Wenger's anxieties – not to mention ruined José Reina's afternoon – by scoring Arsenal's second goal, their lone striker had appeared a weak link.

These are, of course, early days and expectations are, as Wenger puts it, very high. Giroud must be given a decent chance to adapt to a new football culture but it is impossible to resist the thought that a move for Andy Carroll on Arsenal's part last week might not have been quite as left-field as it sounds. Alan Pardew, Newcastle United's manager, sees shades of Zlatan Ibrahimovic in the England centre-forward and what better habitat in which to coax them out of him than The Emirates?

http://www.guardian.co.uk/football/blog/2012/sep/02/santi-cazorla-arsenal/print

These are, of course, early days and expectations are, as Wenger puts it, very high. Giroud must be given a decent chance to adapt to a new football culture but it is impossible to resist the thought that a move for Andy Carroll on Arsenal's part last week might not have been quite as left-field as it sounds. Alan Pardew, Newcastle United's manager, sees shades of Zlatan Ibrahimovic in the England centre-forward and what better habitat in which to coax them out of him than The Emirates?

― Unlike humans, dogs don't talk shit (Nilmar Honorato da Silva), Sunday, 2 September 2012 23:40 (Yesterday)

i think i just threw up a little in the back of my throat

Ezra Pound described his incomplete poem, Cantos, as a "rag-bag", but he could just as well have been talking about Queens Park Rangers' style of play.

Was that Richard Williams? Please tell me that was Richard Williams.

once again williams is surprisingly found innocent

http://www.guardian.co.uk/football/blog/2012/oct/05/premier-league-10-things-weekend

it's this new (?) prat at the graun, not his only choice line either

£'s the cuntos morelike amirite

http://www.guardian.co.uk/football/blog/2012/oct/03/steven-fletcher-sunderland-scotland

first comment hall of fame btw, sweet as a nut

And then there is the question of Gervinho. The Ivory Coast international often looks like an embarrassed teenager on an early sexual encounter; he's scoring, yet most of his time is spent fumbling around without really knowing what to do.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/0/football/19885940

I once got a text off Coyle that featured a smiley face. He is an easy man to like.

cool story

that gurning bio pic.

International weeks are a killer, mentally. I felt Coyle's passing should be marked, but I just couldn't get it together to revive any thread for it.

I wasn't sure where else to put this because Ray Hudson isn't really a journalist and there's no commentary thread I'm aware of. But seriously, this is one of the best things: http://illustratedray.tumblr.com/

wait, we really don't have a general commentary thread? ilf is still just an infant

Coyle got such a free pass from journalists and pundits in general it was ridiculous. He took down a Bolton team that had been established in the top flight for an entire decade and no one seemed that bothered. Even 2/3rds of the way through last season people like Alan Hansen were still saying "he's a good manager, he'll sort it out..."

i believe i have a guffbank thread somewhere

AVATAR EYES

Eh I think the free pass was more due to a player actually dying midgame tbf

Nah it was happening before that. Martinez gets a similar free pass.

http://i.imgur.com/KHe3O.png

they've changed it now. This slipped by them though

Banks, who won 7 caps for the Three Lions

would of won more if he had of played for one of the sky 4 and not stoke

Is there anything de Gea could conceivably do to move into the 'not crap' pile?

bulk up, get intimidating tattoos, date hollyoaks extra and then dump them with a text sent at exactly the same time as he is photographed leaving a brothel

And is there anything Hart could do to be not the best keeper in the world?

has there ever been a bad boy goalkeeper in the epl?

Bosnich?

closest thing i can think of is charles itaandje and his prodding of damien plessis during the hillsborough ceremony

change nationality
xp

Paddy Kenny's a bad boy AND a bad keeper

bosnich true....although he was more a floppyhaired, slightly foppish coke-bloated waster and rather than a really intimidating type

paddy kenny had part of his ear bit off in a 'nightclub incident' iirc but he seems just generally hapless in all respects

http://www.footyplace.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/02/Mark-Bosnich.jpg

What is everyone's view on the awkward shoehorning of Joe Hart into BGITW theories? It's fucking stupid, right? Is it because Cashley is winding down and twp just won't stand up to Danny Alves and we need at least 1 player to be the best in the world? It's not like Buffon and Casillas are even close to retiring and both won the league last season/CAPTAINED THEIR COUNTRIES TO THE FINALS OF THE EUROS.

his distribution is shit, and he seems to specialize in doing four or five good saves and then conceding a relatively easy goal

best in the world

u know who would be a good person to ask abt this

bozza

http://cache.images.globalsportsmedia.com/news/soccer/2007/10/20/newswide11915732200.jpg

More of a psycho than a badboy really.

BGITW has always been an Englishman, ever since I first became aware of football. It's just one of those truths that is self-evident and always has been. Banks begat Shilton, who begat Clemence, who begat Shilton again, who begat Seaman, who eventually begat Joe Hart. The David James era was helluva awkward, because for the first time in forever there was a prolonged spell where you couldn't pretend England's no.1 was the top top man.

Not that I was around in the Banks era you understand, I'm just going by the received wisdom in my childhood footy encyclopaedias. Sometimes the BGITW can be non-English, but only if he's an honorary Englishman like Jennings or Schmeichel.

Lev Yashin is the only exception.

Being a kid in the 90s I was naturally more in love with strikers and wingers to know the answer of this so-

Was it a legit case of Schmeichel and Seaman as world's #1 and #2? You don't really hear about other guys, maybe Oliver Kahn?

Chilavert!

Not really

http://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gardien_europ%C3%A9en_de_l%27ann%C3%A9e

Ravelli, Pagliuca, Barthez, van der Sar, Walter Zenga ... I dunno tbh, goalkeepers then rarely moved countries or even clubs, so it's down to World Cups really. I don't know if it was a vintage era or not.

it shows how badly represented goalkeepers get in history that i only know 2 of those, because they played for utd (well i knew vds before) and zenga sounds vaguely familiar.

You don't know Pagliuca? James Richardson died in vain

A guy in my class went to the hairdresser circa 1990 and asked for a Walter Zenga cut, and got all incredulous when the barber hadn't heard of him.

Haha. Gianluca Pagliuca, Sampdoria legend.

the zenga cut still holds up today, imo.

paddy kenny had part of his ear bit off in a 'nightclub incident' iirc but he seems just generally hapless in all respects

he fucking wishes it was (a) merely an ear and (b) a mere 'nightclub incident'

pagliuca was amazing!

underrated 90s goalies,vitor baia,goycochea,goram

two of these things are not like the others

Seaman was way too prone to stupidly high-profile fuckups to ever have been a serious BGITW contender.

he fucking wishes it was (a) merely an ear and (b) a mere 'nightclub incident'

― Randy Carol (darraghmac), Sunday, October 14, 2012 12:23 AM (14 hours ago)

not sure what u refer to here

http://www.thesun.co.uk/sol/homepage/news/71478/Stars-pal-bites-off-eyebrow.html

twice cuckolded and partially eaten but on the other he will of looked at the positives

marchegiani

illgner, kopke, taffarel (<-- last one actually a bit naff)

barhez / llama always shakey

Paddy Kenny was fucking immense in QPR's promotion season two years ago. Just saying.

And I don't mean fat.

that's four hours now the guardian has had "Colliccini is fab and Dzeko is no sub" on the front page

What else is new?

Ah, there you go: 'Chelsea's John Terry to wear anti-racism armband'. I like that they specified the type.

"fucking black armband"

http://www.guardian.co.uk/football/2012/oct/23/roy-keane-book-extract

found this pretty poor.

As a player, he was of his time by not being of his time: he captured the pre-millennium angst of the outsider who cannot understand the world of which he is part. In doing so he brought to mind a number of pop-culture characters of a similar disposition. Two in particular: Tyler Durden in Fight Club and Tony Soprano in The Sopranos. Like Keane, both raged, raged against the dying of society's light. There are other similarities. The intense adoration Keane receives evokes that of Tyler Durden, while his obtuse charisma, anti-heroism and scattergun frustration is shared by Tony Soprano. Keane, like Soprano, was raging for a better world and a better him. He has always been an incredibly complex man, a compelling fusion of instinctive intelligence and pathological desire.

back in your box.

Amused that they highlight the fact that Rafa gives them a quote for the front cover, and that the quote is "These are the writers as you don't normally see them: when they are fans with pens."

Not too sure that this is the ringing endorsement they think it is.

yeah exactly... fans with pens is as worrying a concept as monkeys with knives.

rob smyth can be pretty bad

definitely.

dunno if it's based on his stuff, but i've always felt there's a tendency on the guardian's football site to try and mention the wire at any given opportunity.

Like Colonel Kurtz, Ronnie Johnsen embodied the defeated machismo at the heart of the Western imperial project.

"pre-millenium angst", like what the fuck does this even mean? usually used to describe radiohead's music.

people felt a unique blend of unhappiness in erstwhile-present-day-year, 1999. the former current year has long been held up as a time of great and distinct feelings of things being rather rubbish.

Klebseron's arrival emboldened Trafford-watchers who had long been used to arrivals from Scandinavia and Holland but never from that far afield. It was said that as he exited the taxi to be greeted by Paul Scholes, he had never seen a person so pale before. Like Doug Liman's thrilling 1999 cult film 'Go', mutltiple narratives were coinciding here, different ideas about what it meant to be a Manchester United player.

aw, i was hoping that was real

Are you aware of the Sachin Nakrani affair, btw?

no, sadly

what's that?

a link to a summary:
http://therepublikofmancunia.com/guardian-journo-will-regret-starting-battle-with-united-fans/

ugh at that website.

That's even more numbing than the Duncan thingy story

Put this here 'cos these guys are too old to be child prodigies as such.

In Bed With Maradona did their list of the 100 best young players in the world this time last year and now they're assessing their progress one year on. Not an obscure list, the vast majority most people will have seen play or would have heard about. The new list comes out Dec 19.

Last year's 100 - http://inbedwithmaradona.com/journal/2011/12/21/the-ibwm-100-the-class-of-2012.html

Progress report on first 20 of last year's 100 - http://inbedwithmaradona.com/the-100-2012-intro/ Click on the names on right hand side.

Some excellent photos as well.

Looked to see if Victor Wanyama made the list, now even more depressed about my impending forties by realising he can still make the next one :(

(putting this here coz a thread on Nigerian football would probably sink without trace)

Interesting exchange on twitter recently between Jonathan Wilson and Nigerian football writer Colin Udoh on the scarcity of away wins in the Nigerian league.

"Jonathan Wilson ‏@jonawils
@ColinUdoh Any explanation as to the poor away form in the Nigerian league? pic.twitter.com/YAetMgqs"

https://pbs.twimg.com/media/A8KQHu2CAAA3-Mg.png

Colin Udoh ‏@ColinUdoh
@jonawils
"Corruption/intimidation of match officials, intimidation of away team arising from desperation of home teams to win."
"I have seen a player from an away team deliberately miss what could have been a point-saving PK, just so his side leave unharmed"
"And a GK on fire on the day being begged by his team mates to let home team score after 3-min injury time stretched to nearly 15"
"you hear club officials talk about 'tactical' and 'playing the politics of the game'. It's just double-speak for bribing refs"
"the big (rich) teams that win or draw away from home, usually pay refs to allow 'fair-play', meaning a level playing field."
"I have been assaulted twice in two different match venues. Once for protecting a cameraman filming bizarre ref calls"
"I'll try and tell you a story about a young ref in a few tweets
here's the story. This young ref had just been promoted to the top level, and given a quite critical game to handle
Before he left, away team sent an emissary to his house to 'settle' him. He refused. Claiming he would just do his job.
On arrival in match city, home team sent their own emissary. He turned them down too. On match day, he did a fab job
by his and every standard. After the game, home fans attacked him claiming he was 'settled' by away team. Security got him away
At his hotel, away fans were waiting to assault him, claiming he had been settled by home team.
so he ended up taking a beating from both sides. He took slaps, blows, punches. After that, he started to 'behave'"

The controversial 4-1-9 formation: Jigawa Golden Stars won't win the Nigerian Premier League 2013/14

Bizarre that you can be relegated without losing a single home game because you don't have enough bribe money to win an away game o_O

Are you talking about Rangers?

http://www.insidefutbol.com/2012/12/21/joey-barton-mocks-end-of-world-mayan-prediction/75387/?

haha.

James Milner was speaking at the opening of the Etihad Campus Metrolink tram station, which will operate for matchgoing fans for the first time on Sunday against Leeds United. Milner, along with Roberto Mancini, Joe Hart and Vincent Kompany, has recorded public announcement messages on the trams which passengers will hear.

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sport/football/article-2289463/Martin-Samuel--The-Debate-Studs-high-tackle-red-card-Not-sure-fuss-Eh-Manchester-United-lost.html

they be callin him zingarevich

So just for that, here’s another little belter from Nigeria.

yeah samuel likes to leave a trailing leg somewhere in pfunkboy's record collection from time to time

it's been a long time coming but finally i get to see a daily mail columnist call someone a cunt. triffic stuff

Do any of you follow Henry Winter on Twitter? I don't know why I do, because he just self-importantly tweets robotic match updates non-stop. Every tweet comes with a silent FACT after it.

Antiquated old twats like Hugh Keevins and Jim Traynor have no idea how modern communication works.

And, a year on, Jim Traynor is now Head of Communications at The Rangers. He still has no idea how modern communication works. He writes a blog on the Rangers website in which he slags off Alex Thomson (Chief Correspondent of Channel 4 News) and dismisses him as a blogger (a dirty word for Traynor who likes to think of himself as a Proper Journalist) in his, er, blog, purely because Thomson uses the internet to relay the results of his investigations that aren't always featured heavily on the actual TV news programme. Like, y'know, how Traynor uses the Rangers website now that he doesn't has editorial leeway on the Record and two hours on Radio Scotland every week to talk pish about how great (The) Rangers are/were.

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sport/football/article-2289463/Martin-Samuel--The-Debate-Studs-high-tackle-red-card-Not-sure-fuss-Eh-Manchester-United-lost.html

they be callin him zingarevich

― Nilmar Honorato da Silva, Thursday, 7 March 2013 22:42 Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

Too many photos interrupting the shite in between. Football writing should be something I can surreptitiously read at work.

xp to Ailsa

Jim Traynor hasn't learned the DNFTT rule of Internets. Repeatedly publishing articles responding to any old shite from a handful of Celtic bloggers and Alex Thomson means they've won. Why would you bother refuting some blog by a lone freelancer in Donegal unless there was something to it?

He also hasn't worked out (despite being a journalist for his entire adult life until now) that publishing a half/incomplete truth only leads to more awkward questions than would an outright denial or a refusal to even engage. He's quickly forgotten how his former peers work.

I don't think that's how his former peers work, tbh (hi dere Keith Jackson). And now he's couched in a role where he thinks his remit is to preach entirely to the converted (except the likes of us who read his ramblings to point and laugh) so accuracy is even less of a requirement.

I really find it mystifying that any club with aims to be taken seriously would employ a shambling idiot with a complete disdain for social media to head up their communications and PR. Instead they have someone who basically makes like me on here going "um, that man said something nasty about my team, let's slag him off for it". Except that I'm not the PR face of anything, just a random bored drone who needs a wee distraction from my work every now and then.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/football/2013/jun/18/newcastleunited-alan-pardew

idk is it just me or is this kind of a poor fucking show from a major media organ

like they may as well just go the whole hog and illustrate every story with a lolcat if they're really so desperate for the pageviews

I didn't check it out, but I'm sure that yesterday they had audio of a robot voice reading the thing.

unless it was a daft punk troggs tape, idk

list of informative and concise paul wilson columns

LEAGUE WINNERS

Louise Taylor

Tottenham. Europa League involvement and the potential loss of Gareth Bale are worries but Roberto Soldado and Paulinho look excellent signings and AVB is a class coach.

ban her

Not sure what I'm doing reading the Guardian's 'Rumour Mill' now that they are liveblogging the transfer world, but jesus christ it's irritating.

But Alan Pardew will not be outdone. No one outdoes Alan Pardew, for he is Alan Pardew, and Alan Pardew is Alan Pardew. Alan Pardew! Therefore he has been dragged to France by Joe Kinnear and Graham Carr, and ordered to sit in silence with his finger on his lips while they watched Bafétimbi Gomis and Yoann Gourcuff. Then, he was forced to eat his dinner, every last bit of it, and sent to bed while the big boys discussed what to do. He is Alan Pardew.

Meanwhile, relief for Manchester United: sometimes this week, Besiktas plan to sign their "left-back" Alexander Büttner on loan. No one at the club is quite sure why, but they are rumoured to have a vacancy for a free-kick mannequin.

And United will also be relieved to learn that after an intense period of intense psychotherapy and physical rehabilitation, Everton have recovered from the derision and insult that massacred their Monday. It has been a long road back, but, eventually, they made it, and they're here, and they're ready, and they survived, and waaaaaaaaaaaaaaaah, of course there will be occasional lapses waaaaaaaaaaaaaaah, it's to be expected, triggers, breathe, waaaaaaaah waaaaaaaaaaaah, calm. But they're here, and in the way that light can be found in the darkest places, a bulb has illuminated in the dinky little head of Roberto Martínez: sign James McCarthy from Wigan. Martínez plans to pay Wigan as much as possible, to avoid visiting upon them the same horror endured by him.

Their house style is fucking abysmal. They all try to get this mixture of cynicism and whimsy across while straining really hard to let everyone know that they are so far above caring about stupid football.

I thought that was David Peace for a minute

Their house style is fucking abysmal. They all try to get this mixture of cynicism and whimsy across while straining really hard to let everyone know that they are so far above caring about stupid football.

otm. it's like lawro with a better education.

I thought that was David Peace for a minute

― Ismael Klata, Wednesday, 21 August 2013 10:29 (12 minutes ago) Bookmark

you know who it is though right

http://static.guim.co.uk/sys-images/Guardian/Pix/pictures/2011/4/5/1302019018185/Daniel_Harries.jpg

http://rlv.zcache.com/im_that_guy-r1289ab0e64804baa8a45db357ac030b9_v9wfy_8byvr_324.jpg

http://static.guim.co.uk/sys-images/Guardian/Pix/pictures/2011/4/5/1302019018185/Daniel_Harries.jpg

They clearly got a good response to the original OBOs/MBMs written by Ronay/Smyth/Murray and have told all subsequent writers to just copy them. Jacob Steinburg seemingly chose to ape Scott Murray wholesale while most of the others, including That Guy, just write a terrible mish-mash of them all, devoid of any actual personality or feeling.

Yeah the Rumour Mill is total pish. The Fiver's pretty hit and miss depending on who's writing it but even on its off days it's comedy gold compared to:

Iker Casillas, the Real Madrid goalkeeper, has been displaced by Diego López, and accordingly, Arsenal would like to sign the former. In particular, they are attracted by his ability to play centre-back, right-back, centre-forward, manager, coach and chairman simultaneously.

ronay and hyde should just have exclusive rights to whimsy and cynicism, everyone else gets the subeditorial pepper spray

2 sentences, 39 words, 9 commas, 0 laughs. Not read the Fiver in ages, RM coincides with my first coffee+cigarette of the day - maybe this is the final push I need to stop smoking. xp

ronay is okay but can't be doing with hyde personally.

I can't remember much about Hyde or his style, is he quite like Ronay then? Will stan for Ronay tbh, he gets away with too much in terms of writing pointless articles that are all persiflage and no content, but he still makes me laugh quite a lot and I find some his ideas quite interesting, even when I disagree. I'd just be happier if they handed the whole thing over to Wilson and Cox.

i'm a not a super fanboy or anything but at least she keeps it on a fairly evenly vicious keel

Oh her, yeah just googled, I recognise the picture.

ronay was alright when he was adding flighty filigree here and there but now he's really become a bit of an overindulged monster, and moreso than his own stuff his influence on others is simply terrible

he seems very bored now.

for me, hyde just carries that "lost in showbiz" sneering tone into the football stuff. and they always wheel her out for really big obvious stories.

i like a proper sneer. demonstrably not as easy as it looks

Cox is such a dull writer.

She's great on her rare sorties to football weekly.

Ronay's always trying to capture that 'like a medieval ox hurled over the battlements' line. In fairness he'll usually get somewhere close, but you only really need to skim his articles searching for it.

that's cox's appeal, makes you feel smugger for reading him

reading this thread I frequently wonder why the luminaries of ILX don't attempt to show up these objects of scorn and envy by besting them in their field. sure spend enough time thinking & writing about football

demonstrably not as easy as it looks

haha, or perhaps easier!

imago should we start a proper football website and how to do so. i would def prefer it to ilx at this stage tbh.

Shall we try an ILF Weekly podcast, is that what you want?

both serviceable ideas

WS (would stream)

list of informative and concise paul wilson columns

― Nilmar Honorato da Silva, Wednesday, 14 August 2013 11:29 (1 month ago)

Premier League is always interesting
Paul Wilson: Even this early there are enough hints to indicate the domestic season will be full of stories
141 comments

Fraser Forster, who has emerged as the leading contender to challenge Joe Hart as England’s No 1, could emerge as a target for Manchester United. AC Milan have already declared an interest in the 25-year-old Celtic keeper.

But United could step in. Although the general form of Reds keeper David de Gea has improved, he is still prone to unforced errors.

And it is known goalkeeping coach Chris Woods is on the lookout for potential replacements. It is understood Fraser is high on the list.

After the Gunners' 4-1 vivisection of 30 million pounds-wasted-on-summer-transfer-fees Norwich, a clearly besotted Chelsea supporter sidled up to me at the Football Factory and asked whether he could buy me a pint. Now, if there's one thing I never trust, it's a seemingly pleasant guy wearing a John Terry jersey. After all, Terry himself must have acted friendly to Wayne Bridge at first too, right?

http://espnfc.com/blog/_/name/kickingandscreaming/id/576?cc=5739

fuck this gets so much worse.

he is let to the front of the toilet queue because he is an gooner by upset man utd fans because fergie retired

I told my new Ghanaian best friend that from now on he was to refer to Arsenal's next savior as Aaron Rams-messi, but that the Welshman's sick corkscrew dribble in the box that left three Norwich defenders flat on their derrieres wasn't even our best goal of the game.

Can a Frimpong hat trick be far behind? That's three goals, not a yellow, yellow and red card.

How fitting was it that Robert Pires -- who, along with Thierry Henry, Dennis Bergkamp and Patrick Vieira formed the attacking spine of that storied unbeaten side -- should be in the stands to witness the latest sleight-of-foot magic unfolding in the 18th minute. (Although I'm pretty sure that Cazorla waxes his eyebrows, which none of the Invincibles would have considered.)

But anyone who has watched Arsenal this season knows that the only holding the Welshman does is after the game when he clutches the bottle of champagne awarded to the man of the match.

fucking hell

pure ideology

Before that, however, Brendan Rodgers must try to find a way of muddling past West Bromwich Albion, which will be no easy feat. Steve Clarke's side are just a top striker and left-back away from being a serious force and are inspired by a player whom Rodgers would love to be able to call on and fill in for Coutinho. If Stéphane Sessègnon is on song on Saturday, the Baggies could beat Liverpool for the fourth time in a row. PD

perfectly captures my unease about tomorrow tbf

in turn perfectly capturing how the weekly lfc unease parade is mostly self-absorbed twaddle

long may it continue

the important thing to remember is that every time a midtable team's best player plays does well against a europa league level team, they are PAYING THE PRICE for not buying him to use as a substitute

Gary Medel has long been a ‘football hipster’ favourite, a part of Marcelo Bielsa’s beloved Chilean side that went to the 2010 World Cup. The “Chilean Gattuso” will provide plenty of tenacity, commitment and the odd yellow card.

any reference to football hipsterism in journalism is obviously execrable but if there is a football hipster favourite from the that side surely it would be isla?

michael cox is on dis ting, v nicely understated

― navihchkan (nakhchivan), Thursday, 17 May 2012 19:54 (1 year ago)

Szczesny has also developed his game thanks to increased competition -- by his own admission. "I raised my standards when Lukasz [Fabianski] got his chance in goal," he told Arsenal's match-day programme earlier this season. "When you realise your position is not safe, you give it that little bit more -- 110 percent rather than 100 percent." Which, using the footballer-to-fan percentage conversion scale, means Szczesny wasn't giving 100 percent.

WHO IS ILKAY GUNDOGAN?

He was born to Turkish/German parents and played for Bochum and Nurnberg before signing for Dortmund in 2011.

A central midfielder who can act as playmaker - not too unlike Shinji Kagawa.

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sport/football/article-2498173/Manchester-United-need-sign-midfielder--Rene-Meulensteen.html

they don't mention whether he can play on the wing

What was Bayern Munich manager Pep Guardiola doing at a trendy London eatery on Friday afternoon... meeting Luis Suarez’s agent?

Sportsmail can reveal the Spaniard - who joined the German giants in the summer - was in the Big Smoke over the weekend making the most of the international break with a trip to London.

But was he here on business or pleasure?

Guardiola enjoyed lunch in Borough Market’s lively restaurant Eliott’s Cafe - and was joined by Liverpool forward Suarez’s representative.

Of course, the Anfield hero’s agent is non other that Guardiola’s brother Pere.

The Barcelona legend, who was with his family, posed for photographs with fellow restaurant goers who recognised him.

Friday’s Guardiola family rendezvous certainly got chins wagging among the more knowledgable diners at the restaurant.

Was it simply a leisurely Friday afternoon family get together? If so, why were the Spaniards meeting in London?

Suarez to Bayern Munich? Surely not?

Yesterdays second captains podcast was quite exceptional, i thought.

Yes, really enjoyed that thanks. Two stories, neither perennials nor obscure at all, and then run them for all they're worth. The speakers seem to know less than the Football Weekly lot, but they more than make up for it with a bit of focus.

This was a really good thread btw, far too long since we've had one similar.

Guardiola enjoyed lunch in Borough Market’s lively restaurant Eliott’s Cafe - and was joined by Liverpool forward Suarez’s representative.

Good choice!

been catching up on some recent sunday times styles and now feel certain camilla long is the gatekeeper to b ronay's keymaster

just sayin like

These comments have been chosen by Guardian staff because they contribute to the debate.

GhostWiper

05 December 2013 12:05pm
This comment has been chosen by Guardian staff because it contributes to the debate
Recommend
581

1. Ask Ashley Young to dive more
2. Start properly initimdating referees again
3. Bring back Fergie time. I can't believe last night's game has finished already.
4. Ban some journalists from the club. Specifically the ones who are printing the results and league table
5. Deflect the attention by picking fights with other managers and call it mind games.

^^^an example of non-Menippean satire

http://www.chroniclelive.co.uk/sport/football/football-news/newcastle-united-reveal-plan-make-6394831

Fresh from banning ncjMedia titles , Newcastle United have broken from the pack to move in a new direction in terms of their relationship with the rest of the print media.

They have told reporters from national titles who are working in the North East that they will no longer be given access to their players between matches this season and will instead give those “privileges” to organisations that pay them.

This has never happened before. They are the first Premier League football club to try to do this and it will be interesting to see what kind of reaction it garners.

At least one national newspaper has delivered an unequivocal ‘no’ but the club seem determined to test the water on an unpopular plan.

The club have rather optimistically graded the packages as bronze, silver and gold with the level of payment determining the level of access.

Which package includes access to Steven Taylor?

need a few joe kinnear press conferences to whet the appetite imo

Newcastlol remain at the bleeding edge of finding new ways to make us lol

press shd retaliate by refusing to name them - use references to "a medium-sized northeastern club" - or any of the players in any match reports

a ban on alan pardew's voice being used on tv/radio

we will not negotiate with geordies

Amazed they haven't tried charging the press an admission fee to actual games yet tbh

all voices to be overdubbed by Brian Sewell

press shd retaliate by refusing to name them - use references to "a medium-sized northeastern club" - or any of the players in any match reports

A self-respecting media would've done this the first time Ferguson or whoever banned reporters. Ideally they'd just pretend they didn't exist - 3-0 walk overs for whoever the opponents are that week, a GSTQ-style blank in the league table, girl-with-monkey on screen for three minutes during motd.

who is more obsequious, sports journos or royal correspondents?

It was possible to script the narrative of Arsenal exhibiting time-honoured failings, chiefly the one about coming up short when the prize is in sight. They were passive in the second-half. They looked tired. After the 1-1 home draw against Everton on Sunday, this was another bad result and, next up for them, is Manchester City away on Saturday lunchtime. It is all going wrong … David Hytner

Aw c'mon, I mean I know you need to find an angle and I know a touch of hyperbole gets readers going - but maybe give it a week before unleashing this sort of challops?

David Hytner had AVB sacked last week didn't he?

http://www.nytimes.com/2013/12/12/sports/soccer/ray-hudson-mixes-soccer-calls-with-awe.html

love the dour sad sacks in the comments, people are jealous of ray

Okay, this is awesome

“Cristiano awakens his sleeping sword of destruction — and it is Excalibur!”

"Messi, merciless, like Kathy Bates with that sledgehammer."

Lol yeah, that @liverayhudson account is fantastic value

"1-0, Pandev. "Pandev emerges from the shadows and Dracula, on a plate of liver, feasts!"

they might be funny written down but he is genuinely impossible to listen to

The past year or so has seen the resurgence of the out-and-out centre-forward – Robert Lewandowski, Falcao, Gonzalo Higuaín, Asamoah Gyan, Olivier Giroud

Admittedly I haven't seen much any UAE football but that seems like typical Wilson throwing in Gyan's name amongst that company.

Ha! Just looked up his stats. 53 goals in 48 appearances!

Guardian doing their best 100 footballers of 2013 thing. Nice to see that Kagawa had a better year than Javi Martinez.

got Nesta on the voting panel though, even the ILF Awards can't compete with that

Wonder where Emmanuel Mayuka will be this year.

Shinji Kagawa is no longer a footballer. He's an idea. And it's only gotten more powerful

A one year away from MLS Frank Lampard better than Isco as well. Madrid have missed a trick there.

Nice to see Conca on there. I've still seen no evidence that he actually exists.

http://bleacherreport.com/articles/1893299-ranking-the-10-coolest-teams-to-support-in-world-football

Conca probably isn't the best player at Guangzhou Evergrande atm. Elkeson has had an amazing season. xp

FC St. Pauli are perhaps the closest thing to a cult in world football, with their fans up there with the most diehard in world football. The punk-rock-esque club also proudly boast one of the biggest female fanbases in world football due to their anti-racist, anti-homophobic and anti-sexist nature.

Dan Talintyre's had a worldy there

http://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/0/football/25488518

kompany in garth crooks' team of the week

Juventus have joined the queue of Serie A clubs ready to take Tottenham misfit Erik Lamela back to Italy.

The club record £30million summer signing has yet to score in the Premier League.

But the Argentina winger has a good reputation in Italy, where he made his name with Roma.

Rafa Benitez’s Napoli want to take him on loan, while Inter Milan could do a swap deal for striker Fredy Guarin.

http://www.mirror.co.uk/sport/football/transfer-news/tottenham-transfer-news-juventus-join-2957008

HIGHEST TROUSERS

Cardiff's popular alpha male Vincent Tan turned out for his first match since seeing off Malky Mackay in defiant garb: beltline higher than ever, with shades, replica top and leather gloves completing this season's must-have look.

>>>>>> the observer's football staff

Top 10 Epically Expensive Transfers of 2013
From: HuffingtonPost.com

FA Cup third round: 10 talking points from this weekend's action

7) Is Everton's eagerness to get rid of Jelavic wise?

It is clear why Everton want Nikica Jelavic off their wage bill after a patchy season and a-half in front of goal, but until Roberto Martínez finds a replacement, the Croatian's departure would leave Apostolos Vellios as the only back-up to Romelu Lukaku in attack at a key stage of the season. Graham Chase

• Match report: Everton 4-0 QPR

Despite Rafael’s development into a highly-rated attacking full-back, there remain concerns over his defensive capabilities, particularly when dealing with high balls into the far post.

Right-back is not a ‘must-do’ in January, but long-term targets would be Borussia Dortmund’s Lukasz Piszczek and England right-back Kyle Walker.

Also goes on to suggest they buy either Lescott or Vermaelen this month.

terrifyingly plausible tbh

Marco Reus, Ilkay Gundogan, Fabio Coentrao, Paul Pogba and Arturo Vidal are among the names in circulation at Manchester United.

They are the kind of reinforcements David Moyes will need if United are to challenge once again for the Barclays Premier League title.

Aside from their wage demands, here are the two questions they will be asking of United’s chief executive Ed Woodward:

When is Wayne Rooney signing a new contract?
And when is Robin van Persie going to play again injury-free?

As someone who used to be on first page google search results for both robin and rapey van injury, i personally would like to lol at some of the utd supporters, the ones who think 2 decent seasons meant he was cured.*

*oh wait, lj is on the first page for robin van injury

'aliardiere'

aliardiere was surprisingly good last season. Has regressed to mean this season tho.

well that league title van Persie won Utd is some consolation. Obviously that memory will have to serve us for a quite a while though

Of the many refinements Manuel Pellegrini has added to this team a level of composure that nearly topples off the scale is awesome to observe.

Que?

Eh had similar thoughts last night tbh, the patience/confidence to play/hold/keep the ball in and around the box is a rarity in epl terms and possibly historically so? Like if arsenal played on a pitch without goals, say, but with callous end product

I agree with the sentiment, was just a bit wtf at how it scanned.

From the same article, I found this quite interesting / ominous (I missed the pre-match build-up)

A distaste for holding midfielders was a topic of conversation in the Tottenham camp before the game. Tim Sherwood and Les Ferdinand had argued against the impact of such a strategic player. Sherwood's suggestion that a midfield shield is "overrated", and Ferdinand's opinion that Claude Makélélé began some kind of negative chain reaction in English football

A belief is a belief but as she points out, going into a game against this City team with this ^ kind of attitude just looks like straight incompetence.

Oh good grief penfold

Is Capoue any good as that? Was hard to tell last night, with the red card immediately after he came on. I ask because he's supposed to be for sale, Lucas is crocked, but we're only being linked with more forwards.

Yeah hes good

Sandro is great tho

And livermore was fine as backup

Dembele no, bentaleb no, like them but its never a good role for them nor for them to be in for the team

lol penfold reference way over my head old feller, if you're gonna zing then please stick to references from '90s or later just so I know what's what.

How long's Paulinho out for? Don't really know how Bentaleb has got a starting spot in this team given the other midfield options available.

It was the look in Joe Hart’s eyes as he ran down the tunnel at the end, the look of a dedicated professional who has total belief in his team-mates’ ability to sweep opponents aside. It was the look of a man who knew Manchester City have become an irresistible force and was going to do everything to keep that momentum rolling, rolling towards the title. City are on a mission, burning with a hunger to reclaim the Premier League trophy.

P sure henry Winter can turn out this guff in his sleep.

Its not zing its despair

But i mean things arent going ..... that badly

Tactics is a nonsense, bill?

Balls.ie names achill rovers site funniest irish sports writing

Balls.ie otm obv

too much time on .ie

Sherwood's suggestion that a midfield shield is "overrated"

He was shit at it for most of his career, so I can see why he thinks that.

Maybe in Timmy's mind he was actually Glenn Hoddle for his entire career but seriously, cretin.

JAMIE REDKNAPP

Who will win the midfield battle?

Chelsea and Manchester City have two of the best midfields in the Premier League, so expect fireworks. It’s a crucial area of the pitch and whoever dominates the middle could win the game.

At the risk of sounding like a broken record (dear younger generation, those were massive black CDs we old folk used to scratch with needles), there was something strange but oddly typical about Liverpool being linked with wingers during the transfer window. It showed that, far from wanting to attempt any dilution of this riveting and entertaining style, Brendan Rodgers sought instead to embellish it.

from espn. EURGH HOW DO PEOPLE STILL GET PAID TO WRITE THIS GUNK?

Managing in Changing Times: A Guide for the Perplexed Manager (Response Books) :
Author(s): Sid Lowe

thought this looked like it could perhaps be interesting but.......

This topical book challenges the hegemony of neoclassical scientific management approach, exploring new potentials for the development of the understanding of management and organization in the post-scientific era of globalization.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/sport/football/teams/brazil/10964103/Dear-Neymar-an-open-letter-from-Henry-Winter-to-Brazils-biggest-star-of-its-bittersweet-World-Cup.html

Neil Ashton's latest column about Jack Wilshere is amazing.

"Howls of anguish roll across your mighty land ever since Tuesday. "

Has Chris Bascombe been mentioned here before? Just risible LFC lackey shit.

Daniel Harris

Sunday 19 October 2014 15.18 BST

That was remarkable, incredible, wonderful, outrageous, stupid, shocking and majestic. That was why we’re reduced to gibbering, quivering, servile amoeba by the unparalleled wonder of football. Wow.

Ronaldo vs Raheem: How does
England's rising star measure up with
the No 1 player on the planet?

Away from Suárez, Lionel Messi is on the verge of making La Liga history as he sits just one goal behind Telmo Zarra’s record of 251. The Bernabéu would be the perfect place for the 27-year-old to break the record and Iniesta would be delighted to see him do it, if only because a Messi double would mean things were going well in the game.

'We went to the Lowry, we had a screen so I could watch the second half and 17 players of 18 were there,' Van Gaal explained. 'I have never experienced that before. We have a lot of Spaniards!

'I won’t tell you which one wasn’t there.'

However, Sportsmail understands Danish goalkeeper Lindegaard was the player who chose not to join his team-mates.

Attendance was not considered compulsory but his absence was noted, particularly when all the other squad members chose to come down from their hotel rooms and watch Real Madrid run out 3-1 winners against arch rivals Barcelona.

United declined to comment when contacted by Sportsmail on Tuesday morning.

Actually, it's about ethics in football journalism

#lindegaate

First Fabio Borini crossed in front of the Kop for Mario Balotelli to score from six yards and then a free-kick struck deep to the far post in injury time was headed in by central defender Dejan Lovren.

Undoubtedly, Lambert would have fancied his chances with both. As he lies awake at night, that is what the 32-year-old must wish for. A cross right on to his instep, a mistake from a goalkeeper. Something he can’t miss. Something to get him going.

Deep in his footballer’s soul, though, Lambert will know that his troubles at Anfield are not down to misfortune.

It was great to have a long catch up chat with former Manchester City, West Ham and QPR winger Trevor Sinclair last week.

Sinclair is back in England after a stint in the Middle East as a TV pundit and while he is still doing some media work he is also working as a coach at non-League Lancaster City, managed by former QPR and Newcastle centre back Darren Peacock.

Given what he had to say on various football issues Sinclair could go a long way in coaching. He has some sound and non-nonsense views.

The former England winger certainly has no doubt that the FA should be strong and pick the best possible Under 21 side for next summer’s European Championship. I totally agree. The experience of tournament football will be of huge benefit to England’s young players, even those who have been regular members of the senior squad for some time.

The following day the draw was made for the finals in the Czech Republic next summer and England were put into a tough group of five-time winners Italy, Portugal and Sweden.

That seemed to make the argument even stronger. Those teams could all offer tougher tests than some of the countries like San Marino and even Slovenia the senior side have in their qualifying group for Euro 2016.

Certainly players like Jack Wilshere - who still qualifies - Raheem Sterling, Luke Shaw, Ross Barkley, Alex Oxlade-Chamberlain, all of who have been on the senior scene for some time, should not see it as a step down. Instead they should see it as chance for glory and senior success down the line.

After the draw I texted Sinclair this team to see what he thought:

Butland; Clyne, Stones, Moore, Shaw; Oxlade-Chamberlain, Wilshere, Barkle,y Sterling; Berahino, Kane.

I got a swift response from Sinclair: 'That wouldn’t make a bad first team. Let’s hope England go for it with the Under 21 finals next summer… with that side they have a chance of winning. Despite what people say there is young talent in this country. Let’s prove it.'

https://twitter.com/BestJournoTweet/status/531543979050151937

One view of this analysis is that for nearly £60m a footballer should know when to pass and when to dribble every time he receives possession. It could be posited that Di María’s fee was arguably bloated by around £20m.

A counter-argument, however, could run that the 26-year-old shone during his opening games for United, looking about the best of the club’s summer acquisitions so he is merely suffering a loss of form. Time, as usual, will tell.

Van Gaal seems to have broken something in Jamie Jackson

https://twitter.com/BestJournoTweet/status/532933567404580864

https://pbs.twimg.com/media/B2VcQUOIcAArquF.png:large

Wayne-Rooney-does-not-rank-alongside-world-s-greatest-players-Lionel-Messi-Cristiano-Ronaldo-claims-Glenn-Hoddle.html

MARTIN SAMUEL: Liverpool's mistake was not thinking like a big club when Suarez left, they should've gone for Costa or Benzema

Paul Wilson
The Observer, Saturday 16 August 2014 22.30 BST

City’s keynote signing of the summer is not the most physically imposing of stoppers either. Centre halves have slimmed down quite a bit since Bill Shankly invited local journalists into the Liverpool dressing room to be shown round Ron Yeats, but even so Mangala is willowy.

https://pbs.twimg.com/media/ByFVxP2CAAEupAV.jpg

https://pbs.twimg.com/media/BuyBtqcCcAAxHVv.jpg

Malky Mackay and his defenders show football remains in the dark ages

All the bright lights and vibrant colours of the new Premier League season are a misleading cover for an industry that doesn’t understand the modern world

Paul Wilson
The Observer, Saturday 23 August 2014 15.51 BST

Malky Mackay given fair hearing and a chance to redeem himself at Wigan

Former Cardiff manager has paid for his mistakes and has now been given a chance to resurrect his career by Dave Whelan

Paul Wilson
Follow @paulwilsongnm Follow @guardian Wednesday 19 November 2014 13.07 GMT

Van Gaal wants to add a midfielder, a right-back, one or two central defenders, a wide player and potentially a striker. The Dutchman is targeting Roma’s Kevin Strootman, who would cost around £30m, Borussia Dortmund’s Mats Hummels who may be priced up to £35m, Atlético Madrid’s Diego Godín – in the region of £25m – Barcelona’s Dani Alves, for around £15m

Dani Alves
Contract until: 30.06.2015

transfer talk is the most vapid shit. so glad pro cycling's broken business model means there's only very occasionally this kind of kite-flying.

this is ed woodward we're talking about tbf

pointless filler questions are nothing new of course but the craven, pusillanimous deference to van gaal from the brit media rly is especially beyond the pale somehow and so deeply aggravating

every week he talks about instilling his philosophy, every week he says it was a crap performance, WHY CAN'T YOU JUST ASK HIM THE GLARINGLY OBVIOUS QUESTION THEN FFS

you know he wants to be asked as well, you can see how bored and restless he is, every press conference a cunty lil goading comment to some scurrying hack but never a total shutdown always an open challenge to step to him that is never taken up

it's like, barely conceivable how much of an oxygen thief you have to be as a journalist to see this bloke forced to appear before you and not be licking your lips at the fun you can have

Actress Catherine Zeta-Jones was born some 40 miles from Caerphilly where Ramsey grew up, but the pair are top Welsh produce according to Jan Aage Fjortoft

http://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/0/football/30406982

JAMIE CARRAGHER: Allardyce and Pardew have shown why it's time to ban chairmen from firing managers during the season

are sky going to sideline that cunt now they have henry

http://i.imgur.com/myZdt1T.png
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http://i.imgur.com/myZdt1T.png
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http://i.imgur.com/myZdt1T.png

someone voted for paul pogba as the best player in the world

http://www.theguardian.com/football/blog/2014/dec/24/cristiano-ronaldo-overtakes-lionel-messi-as-the-best-footballer-in-the-world

Could fill this entire thread with witless Chris Bascombe columns but instead let's go with his Telegraph colleague Luke Edwards

Sunderland's capture of Jermain Defoe could just be the best piece of transfer business done in the January transfer window, ever.

EVER!!!
A 3 1/2 year deal for a 31 yr old who wasn't exactly prolific when playing in a decent team for the last 3 years of his Prem career.

32, so he will be being paid £70k a week (about the same as pogba's recently signed contract) until shortly before his 36th birthday

at least if he helps keep sunderland afloat for a year or two it might just about be worth the inevitable payoff (or swp/wayne bridge sitting out of contract period) but that says a lot about the financial motivation for lower epl teams and very little about the merits of jermain defoe

oh god now i see his byline picture, this is par for the course for that idiot

In other words, they have swapped a player with Toronto who, with the best will in the world, had become a joke on Wearside – albeit a fondly thought of one – for the closest thing you can get to guaranteeing goals in English football.

To make that deal happen, they will pay Defoe around £20k-a-week more than they were paying Altidore.

this would presumably mean that since ron vlaar is marginally better than christopher samba who was being paid a mere £100k a week at qpr, he deserves 40% more than that guaranteed until he is 35 yrs old

jermain defoe has only scored more than 11 goals in an epl season on two occasions

He was better than that stat suggests given he was mostly used as a sub and even then fairly late on in a lot of games - he was probably the archetypal 'give him a run of games' striker but he was either second fiddle to Robbie Keane or not deemed physically imposing enough when we were playing one up top. Ironically probably his best run of form was as the lone striker in the early days of the AVB era.

Probably not much use at Sunderland at the age of 35 though.

I mean the statement in the article is still manifestly nonsense so hey.

Robben, who turned 31 last month, rubs his bald head ruefully in a small room on a sunlit yet freezing February afternoon in Munich

It was good to be in the company of many former Spurs stars during the week at Planet Hollywood for the launch the new football social media site Hinch.as – listening to Ossie Ardiles and Garth Crooks in a heated debate about politics and religion was absorbing.

That is among the worst conversations I can possibly imagine. Not to mention one of the longest and least comprehensible.

It was a wonderful opening salvo by Jordan Henderson when he scored against Manchester City. Here is another player who seems to relish the freedom and extra responsibility afforded him in the absence of Steven Gerrard. I don't think I've seen Liverpool play with the same intensity or tempo as they did against City. If Philippe Coutinho is the new playmaker at Anfield, perhaps Brendan Rodgers might think about making Henderson the new captain.

garth crooks. presumably sub-edited. henderson is liverpool's vice captain. this decision has already been made. bbc sport in general has always been shit but it is just full of hot air morons who drag down the reputation of sporty itself.

spoken as a sporty fan and not an autocorrect fan.

Alzheimer’s was one of the ailments which afflicted his last years and in that sad sense we have been missing this great footballer and nice man for some time already.

Over in Marca, Roberto Palomar called it “a bad day to stop sniffing glue.”

Tickled by the idea that Marca journalists look to Airplane for inspiration.

Chris Bascombe, that talent free dolt, can fuck off with his club propaganda hatchet job on raheem sterling.

how much of his time must brendan spend whispering sweet neggings to raheem sterling

he seems to be sensible about wanting to get the market rate, or about trying to get to a better club if that's what he wants......german papers think bayern's interest is serious

Bit rich of Rodgers to be playing the 'you can't give young players too much' card when Sterling has been the only fully fit and trusted member of their attack all season, and has played 90mins of virtually every game.

In a season full of badly used players he's been particularly ill served by inadequacies elsewhere within the squad.

How much do you think they're paying Balotelli per week?

do we need a mino raiola vs jorge mendes poll

pands could you see sterling at bayern in 2016? he'd have a year left on his contract and ribery would be 33, robben 32 so there's space for at least one versatile attacking mid/winger opening up before too long

Most of his very best games/performances have been in a slightly anarchic up and down fast break kind of games, like I dunno Nash era Phoenix Suns. Not sure he has the nuance to be suited to a ball dominate team. Robben/Ribery can do transition yes but they can also beat players off the dribble in v tight spots against compressed defensive lines which I haven't seen as yet from Sterling. Would more easily see him at Madrid or Dortmund stylistically. Not to say he couldn't develop.

I'm also assuming Pep hasn't the intention of being at Bayern for more than another season and a half so Sterling to Bayern could happen under a different manager as I'm not sure he (pep)is super concerned with having semi-trad wingers at all and is more likely to replace Robbery with a different *type*.

Also having a hard time imagining Sterling wanting to leave England. City seems a more likely prospect to me, dynamic, young, English, suited to a more haphazard style of play.

So I don't see it no, but tbf he has proved to be more tactically versatile than I had thought likely. His movement in the CF position has been p intelligent in the main.

don't think guardiola intends to stay, he used to say he would only spend three years in one place before he decided to stay for a fourth at barcelona, which he probably regrets or at least sees as superfluous

the main reason i can't imagine sterling at bayern is just language and to a lesser extent 'culture' but i would like to see the best english player learn to play a more advanced sort of football than just reprise the twp/gerrard force of nature crap

Would like to see at least a few times what a Pep BM would look like with everyone fit and available. ie how would he construct a line up with Robben, Ribery, Badstuber, Martinez, Thiago etc Would Lahm be in MF? I'm not sure what his platonic ideal looks like.

xp For all Greg Dyke's wire fence to keep foreigners out blueprint feel like English football would be as likely to improve through exporting large numbers of players. Of course it won't happen cos richest league in the world.

the thing that most strikes me about bayern's squad is how many of the players can play different positions to similarly high levels

even a more conservative coach would appreciate that, though hopefully neuer gets to play deep lying playmaker at least once before guardiola goes on sabbatical to a sufist monastery in yemen

do you think he'll manage the Spanish national team some time in the next 10 years?

I have no idea if he's interested

i'd imagine the idea of having a constantly shifting potential squad of 50 or 60 technically gifted players appeals to him, but i can't remember how strong his catalan identity or whatever is

https://twitter.com/wwfcofficial/status/580488732391903232

Sky: "How important is that win going into the international break?"
Ainsworth: "We're in League 2; we're at Dagenham on Saturday!"

http://www.theguardian.com/football/picture/2015/apr/07/david-squires-on-mike-ashleys-reign-at-newcastle

ahhahahaha

https://twitter.com/ianprior/status/588298570790502400

https://twitter.com/gethill/status/588332393116868608

that is magical

can't wait for david squires to draw it

13.08
Someone that speaks German has actually done some proper translating! Praise the lord. Right I'm going to pass this off as my own and hope no one notices.

Klopp: "Europe will not have peace until the Jewish question has been disposed of.

"The world has sufficient capacity for settlement, but we must finally break away from the notion that a certain percentage of the Jewish people are intended, by our dear God, to be the parasitic beneficiary of the body, and of the productive work, of other peoples.