when_you're_smiling

I bet he’s going to the UK version of The Athletic that’s launching. It’s a paid for sports service that’s been in America for a few years now.

To complete the circle (of life) he used to play for a Tanzanian club called Simba apparently (according to Wikipedia).

As people above have mentioned, pretty sure it’s been uttered throughout football’s history. Can certainly remember the furore when Chris Sutton was the first £5m British footballer in the mid 90s. The big clubs with the bigger grounds persuading the rest to ditch the rule that the away side gets 25% of each gate income at the ‘start’ of the Premier League in 1992 arguably led to the elite club predictability we’ve had since the 1990s. But people are still lapping it up and will do for some time yet.

Their best player Ada Hegerberg, who won the Ballon D’Or in 2018 (good old Wikipedia) refuses to play in the tournament as part of her protest about how the Norwegian FA treat the women’s team.

My girlfriend hated football, until the title winning season and she got swept along with it. She started going to a fair few games, even away ones, suggesting games herself which was a bit surreal given how much she hated it, but brilliant. Then we were at a game the previou season (17-18) where a woman, probably in her 40s with young primary school aged children was shouting all kinds of nonsense at opposition players including calling one frequently ‘a little black c***’. I was a bit shocked myself at the time, but hardened to hearing stupid comments at football didn’t think much to it other than what a terrible parent she and her husband (who was sat next to her and the kids) were. I noticed my girlfriend was upset during the game but she wouldn’t tell me why, and it was only after that she said that fan’s racist behaviour had upset her so much and made her never want to go to another football game again. That’s really hit home and I’m now pretty disgusted at myself and a bit embarrassed as much as anything for not mentioning it to someone at the time, especially as there was at least one steward within a few metres of her throughout most the game. The girlfriend still hasn’t gone to a game since but hoping I can persuade her some time during next season and she’s showing signs of regaining that interest. The player the racial slur was directed at? N’golo Kante.

Another big issue with VAR for me is who chooses what angle the ref is allowed to look at? Quite often you can find one angle that could give you an excuse to change a decision. Similarly, who is going to be the one who chooses what decisions and what angles of those decisions are shown to fans on the big screens? Whoever it was could easily try and whip up the fans by showing things at different angles. That’s a heck of a lot of power for someone who’s not involved in the game.

Exactly, he’s got us in those positions. Others have struggled in similar eg 2010 etc which may have been a better draw without hindsight. As mentioned do have issuers that’s now Columbia, Croatia and a few others in terms of what Southgate did in major games, but hopefully he's learning his lessons tactically in that role as much as any of those players.

I agree with you to a large degree...but he’s got us there too. We’re not in the top four in the world in terms of quality available to us. so the fact we’ve done so well in the past few years has also to be attributed to him too. Hopefully he’s learning as much as this young England side.

To be fair. It shows the level we are, which is not far from the top, but f*** me it’s hard to get the top anyway without shooting yourself in the foot. Dutch didn’t win that, England lost it. Plenty of positives...but there’s a fair amount to do to get to the top, including developing players to make a difference as a squad rather than just a best 1st XI.

The one problem with Southgate is his tactical inability and tendency to sit back when just a goal up. Cost them in the World Cup semi. Hope it doesn’t cost them then. Wish Vardy was on the bench.

Part two for those interested. It won’t let me load page three.

This one? Includes James Justin on list of possibles.

I don’t think any of us would rate Maddison as worse than Lingard, (apart from Gareth Southgate) so why wouldn’t Man U be interested? They will probably see him as too expensive at the moment but if they’re panicking close to the start of the season a ridiculous offer wouldn’t surprise me. Still think Spurs is a more likely destination if Eriksen goes, particularly with what Pochettino was saying after the Champs League final about a “rebuild” and “creating a new project”. That worried me.

The amount of time, money and especially emotion I have since a small kid (and pretty sure will always continue to) put into something....and I’m not entirely sure why.

I’ve not heard of a newspaper that has had a proof reader for about a decade! Remember everything goes online first and as quick as possible to maximise clicks. Pretty sure all Reach journalists hate Reach websites themselves. They’re built on an adverts first basis and centrally done so locally they have no choice. There’s plenty of good journalism in there in terms of news and in this bizarre fake news era it’s more important than ever. It just gets lost in bizarre dogging stories from down south which sadly gets more clicks.

The Leics CC Twitter account only tweeting about a wicket going down after we’ve scored a boundary has pissed me off all season, but even more so today when I think we’ve lost three without scoring one. Why do we need PR like that? We’re Leics fans. We’re used to the disappointment.

Horton gone now too for a run a ball 18. Presume going that quick was an attempted tactic that hasn’t paid off. Currently 29-2 with 205 more needed for Azad and Cosgrove to grind out for two days.

The Mercury was bought out by Reach (formerly Trinity Mirror - the Daily Mirror’s group) about five years ago and there’s huge emphasis on clickbait articles on the journalists from their bosses. Add to that various job losses since have left those remaining with more to do with less. For reporters in the offices there’s screens constantly live showing the top performing web articles and pressure on individuals as well as teams to reach targets on clicks. I’ve heard about league tables for reporters within Reach and if you’re towards the bottom then there can be consequences. I’m not sure how much that carries over from news into the sports department itself, but given how important football is to hits I’m sure there’s pressure from a number of angles from above to get people clicking and please the advertisers, accountants, shareholders etc. The thing is, top exclusives will always get more clicks anyway, so don’t for a second doubt the reporters won’t be trying to get those. Also, they do speak to the club and get facts. Look at the way Tanner shut down the Robben story only a couple of days ago. I’m sure though they still have to top up their clicks and make sure there’s content on their website, particularly during the quiet off-season. That constant swamp of news articles they have to put up makes the quality hard journalism not stand out as much. The kind of stuff they will be much more proud of and much more determined to get. Thankfully though I think the Mercury are better than some of the other Reach titles like the Liverpool Echo and MEN guys. Some of the clickbait I’ve seen from some of those sites is horrific and also biased to the point of it being tribalism nonsense. It will still be a paper for a while yet. People have been saying it and others will fold and the industry’s dead for getting on for 20 years now.

Ha. Had forgotten about this. Was stood right next to that door when they kicked it through in the 2008 (relegation) game. Was nothing but throwing stuff at each other really though.

Apologies if already posted elsewhere but hadn’t seen this stat before. From F365’s end of season awards page- https://www.football365.com/news/the-prestigious-football365-end-of-season-awards-2 The Brexit Award Leicester, who would have finished seven points clear at the top of the Premier League if only goals from English players counted.

If you prepare a batsman friendly pitch, don’t bowl on winning the toss too and let them control the game from the off. (Easy to say with hindsight to be fair though.)

Apparently plays for Guisley now. Got subbed off after just over half an hour though. Ouch.

Is Silva injured too? Not in the squad for Monaco’s game today. They’re currently 1-0 down at home to Caen.

I wonder which one he gets paid more to speak about.