Note about Arsenal 4 - 4 Spurs

What the hell was that minute and a half of a documentary about the USS Nimitz just after the half time adverts all about?

Barrymore

A fair amount of justified use of the word "cunt" in the comments thread for this baffling embarrassment.

'Keep your daughter in sight. or you will be my family'

Rapping footballers - can I get enough? The answer: no.

Of course the Anfield Rap we all know about. I was close to posting Fulham bench-warmer Clint "Deuce" Dempsey's rhymes, but this is fully sick, yo:

The commentary makes it...

Aparantly that's a language he's speaking.

Townsend speaks! The first of an occasional series

A bit old, but I couldn't resist poking fun at this insult to the word 'analysis', by the sham-paddy buffoon.

Apparently, Lionel Messi is 'a bit special'. No fucking shit. Also, Tiger Wood is 'good at golf' and old Picasso 'could paint a bit'. He goes on to add: 'Word reaches me from Spain that he is on top of his game.'. No need phone up your no doubt numerous contacts on the Iberian peninsula Andy, all his games are on the telly.

Other pearls include Chelsea looking 'knackered'. For the record, the blues went on to stroll to a 2-0 win against a tough Villa side four days later.

You’re in f***ing Latvia!

Classic Warnock:

You're a c**t.

We've all seen this, right?

News!

Nigerians confirm bid for Magpies

A spokesman for the consortium added:

"In order for Newcastle to obtain the funds for the takeover, Mike Ashley must deposit $100,000 in a Nigerian bank account for administration fees

GOOD DAY AND GOD BLESS"

Two things about tonight's Liverpool game on ITV

1) Why does Clive Tyldesley pronounce "another" to ryhme with "bother"?
2) Why were Marseille playing in gold? I thought their home kit was white and blue.

The Today Today

On Today this morning, one of the codgers (Humphrys? Naughtie? Could even have been Stourton. If it's not Sarah Montague or floundering new-boy Evan Davis I don't notice) was reading out some football news.

He had three names to say and managed mispronounce and incorrectly stress all three.

He pronounced Robinho "Rob-Eno".

Berbatov became "Ber-BAT-off".

I began to wonder if he was taking the piss when he pronounced the name of the out-going West Ham manager as Alan "Cur-BISH-ley". Come on! It's hardly an exotic surname.

I see the football season has started...

I'm sure I'm supposed to have opinions on it and that. While I think of some, here's Jimmy Bullard in a bin:

00:50

Testify, brother.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SNHXGC9zXDs

More

Further to two of Marty's posts below:

1. As established by Marty himself, balls *aren't* getting lighter. Law 2 of FIFA's Laws of the Game stipulates (amongst other things) that the ball be:

"not more than 450 g (16 oz) in weight and not less than 410 g (14 oz) at the start of the match"

And this rule has been unchanged since 1937 ... when balls were made marginally heavier with an increase in the permissible weight from the original 1872 specification of 13-15oz.

2. Only TV pundit to get the van Nistelrooy offside-call right? Steffen Simon, much-loathed German TV commentator. Spotters badge to Uli Hesse-Lichtenberger. And of course *he* knew it too.

Pleat update

He is currently refering to the Czech Republic as the "Republic of Czechoslovakia".

Twat.

Article 11.4.1

Martin to Stefan
10:44 (3½ hours ago)

So I'm looking for this so called "Article 11.4.1" which says a defender can still play an attacker onside when he's off the pitch.

Can't find it of course. However, the photo on page 78 showing how much shirt has to be removed before a yellow card offence is committed was some consolation.

Can you shed any light on any of these areas?


Stefan to Martin
10:44 (42 minutes ago)

Some of the phrasing in the Rules of the Game is wonderful, for example:
"Removing a jersey after a goal has been scored is unnecessary"

I like the implication that there are some people labouring under the misapprehension that it *is* necessary.

More generally, what the fuck is going on with this article 11.4.1 business??

I too have tried to search for it and for the "refereeing code" and the only references to either are from the last 24 hours and refer to this particular incident.

Is it
a) top secret
or
b) a massive made-up lie?

I. Don't. Understand.

Martin to Stefan
14:10 (10 minutes ago)

I mean - Article 11.4.1 sounds plausible enough. Law 11 is the offside rule after all. Maybe it's from an internal document circulated by FIFA? Not that I can find it of course.

I like the unintended consequence of this law - could we see an attacker lining himself up with a player being stretchered off along the touchline, for example?

PS The Dutch have peaked way too early.

The second most predictable pre-major tournament football story

Petr Cech is concerned about the ball being used at EM2008 (as I insist on calling it)

Not unlike Kasey Keller in 2006.

Or Gianluigi Buffon in 2004.

Or Zlatko Zahovic in 2002.

The most predictable? The one about how it's going to be "Spain's Year".

Citation Needed!

From wikipedia:

Peacock has worked with the BBC, regularly appearing as a pundit on Football Focus, Score, Match of the Day 2, where his insightful comments and sharp dress sense has become a hit with viewers

He will be moving to Canada to become a priest after Euro 2008, though. That is true.

Bilic Update

His band "Rawbau" perform Croatia's Euro 2008 song:



PS You can also see him on Croatian "Who wants to be a millionaire?"

There's no better bacon

Round Up

1) David "fucking" Pleat gets it totally wrong on the recent Man U - Chelsea game. As Andy Gray pointed out, Chelsea's strength came from the indomitable midfield triangle of Mikel John Obi, holding that shit tight, and Essien/Ballack feeding off each other and making surging runs through the middle. Yes, The Drog is great but he had a poor game.

2) The Economist is doing a continuing series on how football explains economics. I love that shit.

3) I am still yet to see Carrick have a good game.

I fucking hate fucking Liverpool - Part Deux

So they get some soft refereeing decisions and scrape through. Doesn't stop them being boring to watch and extremely lucky...

Euro 2008 Guardian Sweepstakes

Exciting, isn't it? We are just a few months away from the first England-less major soccerball tournament in 14 years. When Taylor's boys fucked up in 1993, the Prem was in its infancy and football was yet to become the great big fuck-off THING it is today. (anybody want to buy some shares in JJB?). How is the country, the economy, and more pertinently to this concern, the footballing press going to cope with it? I can't wait.

One cert: the "England are out. Who should we support?" filler piece. Guardian will be there first, obviously, but will be followed by all the rest. The question is, what will the most "opinion" opinion on this be?

As far as I can see, the frontrunners are:

Poland - but maybe too London-centric and obvious
Germany - maybe too Guardian for even the Guardian
Austria - spirit of Havant & Waterlooville (who could probably beat Austria)

What do we think? (Obviously, I will be supporting France.)

The other dead cert is "In a way, it's better that England haven't etc" which is of course indefensible bollocks.

Carrick, early b-sides and The Emperor's New Clothes

The latest fashion amongst the more "intellectual" end of football journalism seems to be a renewed awe for the "ball-playing" midfielder. Much as any self-respecting music critic will profess a love for a band's early b-sides rather than the famous songs which are good, so a pretentious football writer will effuse praise on a Pirlo or a Xavi, rather than players who actually score the fucking goals.

Witness the Guardian's man-of-the-match rated performance for Carrick. Apparently he "Dictated the flow, covered superbly and composure shone" (which is grammatically inconsistent at best) despite the fact he "Had crowd (sic) on his back for three bad passes". Maybe that crowd have seen him play more times than you, Andy Hunter, and know a stinker when they see one.

Now I am a fan of the anchor-role; the string pulling, linchpin of a side. Paul Scholes, for example, is certainly one of the greatest English players of the last 20 years. He has a knack of knowing what the right pass is, be it 5 yards or 50. In the case of Carrick, however, I just don't see it. We know about the long list of weaknesses in his game: tackling, pace, heading, finishing etc. But even his supposed strength of passing seems no better to me than a Lampard, Gerrard or Barry never mind a Scholes, Hargreaves or Anderson, whom he must battle for a place in the side.

I'm watching you Carrick and I'm not afraid to say it. The Emperor has no clothes!

Sepp Blatter is wrong about everything

Sepp Blatter is a maniac who wants to ruin football. In just one week, he's managed to be utterly incorrect about four separate issues!

Issue 1 - obviously it's a brilliant idea, you fool

Issue 2 - because pivotal sporting contests shouldn't be decided on the whims of power crazed little Hitlers

Issue 3 - Wenger made a similar statement in the heat of the Eduardo tackle, but then rightly retracted it when he'd calmed down. Is Blatter seriously suggesting you ruin someone's career for a moment of madness?

Issue 4 - it would be a laugh, and so obviously he opposes it.

Footy, footy, footy

Nice to see Adam & Joe's deliberately terrible piss-take football song being used with a straight face by npower for their ridiculous "carbon footyprint" campaign.

Mourinho eager to 'kill' Chelsea

From the bbc.

Let's hope it's as the new manager of Manchester United.

Hideous Yellow Away Shirt #4

Wales:

Disgusting Yellow Away Shirt #3

Sheffield United:

Carling Cup Final; Chelsea

I'm not normally much of a lad for football's tribalism, but I was at the Carling Cup Final yesterday, and I finally saw why people hate Chelsea. There are some sound individuals - Joe Cole, Petr Cech - but their fans, their Lampard, their Drogba...

On TV* you see Drogba doing something cool and you think, "how can anyone have a problem with this guy?", but off the ball, and so off-camera, he never stops being objectionable.


* I say "on TV" - obviously I don't mean that I watch whole games. I don't even mean Match of the Day highlights - I mean short clips on the news or youtube.

I fucking hate fucking Liverpool

They are such awful cunts. Now we'll get the same old guff about those "glorious European nights" at Anfield. Inter were the victims of the softest sending off since teams used to bribe the refs back in the 80s and lost their other centre back on a stretcher.

The only good thing to come from tonight's games was ITV getting a workmanlike Beglin in to do co-commentary and sending that moronic arse Pleat out to Greece. Can you leave him there?

Why must Sepp Blatter ruin everything?

Obviously the idea to play Premiership matches abroad is brilliant. Fuck Blatter, and fuck the World Cup.

Kammy

The best sending off ever?

What was he thinking?

More things to agree on

Obviously we are all completely psyched about the Premier League's plans to play ten league matches abroad in January 2011? Good.

Meanwhile - I am in town for the final group matches of the Hong Kong Football Association League Cup, which is next weekend. Assuming girlfriend permission, I intend to provide full coverage. Nine of the ten HKFA league teams are playing, which gives me a chance to pick my HK team (although unfortunately the one team that isn't playing, Workable FC, is already a frontrunner on name basis alone.) Wonderfully, all the teams except Lanwa Redbull play on the same ground, Mongkok Stadium, which will make the whole thing easier.


mongkok stadium

Hideous Yellow Away Shirt Update

Spain's is a stinker.

Something we can all agree on

Surely the most annoying "classic greatest goal" of all time is that bloody Argentina goal from the last World Cup, the one with the 146-pass build-up (mostly defenders passing to each other in their own half). Agreed? Good.

Anatomy of a goal

I'm not sure what the best Premiership goal ever was, but I'm certain that it was scored by Thierry Henry, my favourite Premiership player. Here's one from the FA Cup. Why is it so good? First, the audacity and creativity of the initial self-pass. Second, the pace needed to catch up with Carra (not the player he originally tried to tonk it around). Third, the physicality and agility to rob Carra, who gets to it first, of the ball. Fourth, the confidence and composure to pull away from goal, around Agger, when Agger starts to close him down (watch the slo-mo replay: 90% of strikers would shoot at 00:42-00:43, not bring the ball horizontally across the goalmouth at two Liverpool defenders to open up the angle). Fifth, he doesn't actually strike the ball that hard - as much as I can appreciate traction-engine legs like Hasselbaink's, true class is a calm, unhurried slot into the corner.

My favourite Premiership goal, by my favourite Premiership player, with my favourite celebration

You can't front on Yeboah

and finally...

Did Lawro really describe Wigan's pitch yesterday as "looking like a 777 had belly-flopped down the middle?"

I mean, no-one died, but still!

Also...

One of the great things about non-league football is how close you are to the pitch and the players. You hear them talk to each other, see the expressions on their faces - you even get the odd touch of the ball for throw-ins etc. This can, however, be something of a double-edged sword, as I discovered today when a Bath City striker unleashed a shot from about 15 yards that screamed towards goal, dipped over the crossbar and hit me in the nuts.

Let's kick flourescent yellow away shirts out of football

For the second time this week I have watched 90mins of my TV team Chelsea and struggled with their vomit-inducing flourescent kit.

Now Chelsea have previous when it comes to disgusting away kits, e.g. the 95/96 grey-and-orange affair, but I find this new Adidas kit (officially, "electricity yellow" - urgh) actually affects my ability to support the team. On the most basic physiological level, my eyes squint and instinctively gravitate away from the screen, and I find myself reading the paper, or just aimlessly looking around the room. On a psychological level, I find it difficult to believe that what I am watching is actually a real match; possibly because the flourescence subconsciously suggests the bibs players wear in training.

Barcelona had this away strip last season; UEFA should have intervened then. Sort it out Adidas!

Super Mario!

The best goal ever scored in the Premiership

I don't care, I'm Scottish

Another man who needs to be in the Premiership

Insert witty pun about balls

Real Madrid attacking midfielder Guti, once dated a male-to-female transsexual. Not that there's anything wrong with that.

Statistic of the day

This season, Ronaldo, Adebayor and Benjani have all scored more goals on their own than the entire Derby County team.

They got more silver than Buckingham Palace

You two scousers are always yapping
I'm gonna show you some serious rappin
I come from Jamaica, my name is John Barn-es
When I do my thing the crowd go bananas

I think he means "throw"

Get this kick-ass motherfucker in the Premiership now!

Bilic tells it like it is.

"protectionism merely coddles the mediocre"

Trust The Economist to nail the problem with English football.

I'm sorry I Havant a clue

Unless I am doing a particularly bad job of web-searching, it doesn't appear that anyone is televising the Havant & Waterlooville vs Swansea City FA Cup replay on Wednesday. This is a shame, as Havant & Waterlooville's ground would have been one of the most comically shabby affairs ever to be beamed into the nation's living rooms. I had the pleasure of watching the mighty Bath City defeat Havant 4-1 away in the penultimate game of the 2003-04 Dr Martens Premier season, the third of a four-game winning streak that almost, almost saw us avoid de facto relegation when the non-league pyramid was restructured. Thankfully we were promoted within three years and now count Havant as colleagues in Conference South.

Havant is basically in inland suburb of Portsmouth. The club's ground, Westleigh Park, is a corrugated iron shithole several miles from the town centre, in the middle of an industrial park. I simply cannot understand why anyone would choose to spend their Saturday afternoons there (obviously many would say the same of my beloved Twerton Park.)

That said, fair play to H&W for sticking to their guns this time. When they drew Millwall at home in the 1st round of the FA Cup last season, they bowed to police pressure and moved the game to Fratton Park, losing £20,000 in the process.