Brushed by the wing of genius, from the first frame onwards.

Asking people, again, to pay me for the work that was commissioned, written and published in November. It’s illegal to make us wait this long and I‘m too old to be begging like this. So if anyone dares to give writers shit for monetising their Substacks - it’s better than begging the broadsheets…

“I have had interest from many clubs, including Champions League clubs, which I have always been open about with Marc Keller and our owners. I will love [Strasbourg] for the rest of my life but I cannot turn down Chelsea". That I think we knew.

"How many greying celebrities mouth progressive platitudes with real confidence and how many because of a dread of seeming out of touch?" asks James Marriott in a column for The Times. In his defence he's very young, and probably doesn't remember Rock Against Racism, Red Wedge, Artists United-

This is fantastic. Contains gems such as "I"m the Woolworth's Elizabeth Taylor" and Prince Philip censoring her revelations about sex with his mate www.telegraph.co.uk/obituaries/2...

Elephan Gogh

Well worth investigating - the starter list format does not enable you to add all the accounts you wish to link to (hello, @bsky.app!). Many of those included in that pack I'd have gladly put in my own if I'd had the space. Great to see so many of the footie crowd over here in any case.

The current Marie-Antoinette exhibition at the V&A is as dazzling (the artefacts on show) as it is shallow (a-historical to a degree I'd have thought impossible in our age), which, in a way, is apt given its subject. But the worst thing about it is...the music. The "music".

Many (most?) of the country's best cryptic setters are here on Bluesky, shooting the breeze and exchanging clues (and jokes). go.bsky.app/DFcDorW

As there has been a steady stream of new arrivals on Bluesky lately, here are a few starter packs I put together which might be of use. go.bsky.app/LkYr5cE

Ratcliffe behaving exactly like you'd expect a thin-skinned billionaire egotist to behave, dumping the plant on the compost heap when it was starting to grow.

So Liam Rosenior is "having talks" to accept a job offered...by his current employer, in what is basically an in-house promotion within an MCO structure. Ah, the romance of football. www.theguardian.com/football/202...

Bernardo Silva, all of three feet tall and looking like a novice monk in a Zurbaran painting, gets away with being a top candidate for the title of dirtiest player in the PL week after week. Even better at this than Casemiro was with Real. Never mentioned in comms either.

Good to see @lemonde.fr use "abduction" rather than "capture" in its headline, unlike so many others.

4 January 1914 | Pole Stanislaw Szczepanik was born in Chybie. A football player, from 1929-37, a defender in Wisła Kraków. In #Auschwitz from 25 August 1943. In 1944 he was transferred to Mauthausen, where he perished.

The tomb of Lionel Lockyer, the quack who claimed he could bottle sunbeams and sold pills ('Pillulae Radijs Solis Extracta') he said contained them. Their effect could be unfortunate. "Sometimes it works upwards and sometimes downwards, and it may be both ways at once".

Happy birthday Van Dyke Parks youtu.be/ZdQ3f5TlM8g?...

Correction, with apologies - not "Ensemble", but "Renaissance".

Two French MPs (from Ensemble and the Parti Socialiste) have triggered a criminal investigation into the "proliferation" of sexualised deepfakes on X. Several French ministers have followed suit, and the government has filed a complaint with the regulator. www.politico.eu/article/la-j...

My old friend @djsplendid.bsky.social just told me the awful news. Yoshie Hiragakura was our drummer in Japan in the early 1990s. She could play bossa nova, she could also hit her kit to make it sound like John Bonham's, she was fabulous fun, and now she is no more, not even 60 years of age.

Yes - totally legitimate! Each digital issue costs €5.90 and includes treasures like this "Japanese Cinema" special from August 1964. Link below.

There is much to admire in what Sunderland, the team, are doing this season, and this first half against Man City is no exception; but there is a lot that is questionable about the club's addiction to gambling partners: six on show at the SoL tonight, including two illegal operators, W88 and 8XBet.

The final Calvin and Hobbes, which appeared in papers 30 years ago today.

The evening's soundtrack, as many evenings before.

Punk enstand in Deutschland, 1970. youtu.be/q-lECyje4Ts?...

That was the year that was for @josimarfootball.bsky.social and its team of investigative journalists. As @samindrakunti.bsky.social says, a year that was both stellar and "difficult" - thank you to all those who came to our help when it was needed. Here is a recap of our main stories in 2025 👇

Cheap as frites.

2025: the year in which multi-millionaire Magnus Carlsen, already an ambassador for a gambling company, confirmed he was not just a genius at the chessboard, but also a greedy bastard with zero moral compass away from it. www.theguardian.com/sport/2025/j...

Something which all chess tragics will be looking forward to: a new biography of a true genius, three-time British champion Sultan Khan, to be published in March 2026. Written by Khan's own son and granddaughter.

Enrique Collar, legendary winger of Atlético de Madrid between 1953 and 1969, a winner of La Liga and of the European Cup Winners Cup with the Colchoneros, has died, aged 91.

Jools Holland’s brother, this day in 1963

In more cheerful news, the latest addition to the already wonderful Kew Gardens, the "Carbon Garden", is something of a triumph, in no small part thanks to the Mizzi Studios' rather marvellous giant mushroom.

It is in fact *eleven* in the Premier League when taking into account the in-stadium LED boards advertising; and all of the white label "licences" have now been either revoked or surrendered. Just shocking.

I must have walked hundreds of times past the "ghost sign" for "Wimpey Autos" in Barb Mews, Brook Green, and only just discovered that it is linked to a horrific series of murders which took place in 1964 and 1965 in Hammersmith and Chiswick. The killer was never caught.

RIP BB www.youtube.com/watch?v=KgBq...

This story has just disappeared out of view. Why? It has it all: a PL club owner, gambling, aristo black sheep/Farage aide whose mother was the King's girlfriend and dad went to school with ex-prince Andrew, what more do you want, dear British media? www.theguardian.com/politics/202...

Paging @fourverts.bsky.social.

On the subject of pop stars making a mint out of charity records, this is the story we at @josimarfootball.bsky.social did about Shakira's "Waka Waka" grift. Still no responses from her, her producer, Fifa and Sony. josimarfootball.com/2025/08/19/l...

A propos of nothing, it's taken as a given that Bob Geldof should be made fun of and that his Band Aid Christmas song is not just a maddening tune, but also a prime example of the White Saviour syndrome. I'd just like to add something to this take, which I've only learnt about very recently.

The new @footballweekly.bsky.social podcast has landed! www.theguardian.com/football/aud...

Christopher Nolan is to epic film-making what Anton Bruckner is to symphonic music.

Six months and a bit to take cover before this horror lands on our screens.

This story has just disappeared out of view. Why? It has it all: a PL club owner, gambling, aristo black sheep/Farage aide whose mother was the King's girlfriend and dad went to school with ex-prince Andrew, what more do you want, dear British media? www.theguardian.com/politics/202...

Get your Euro pod questions in to the panel! 👇👌 @maxrushden.bsky.social @barryglendenning.bsky.social @philippeauclair.bsky.social @larssivertsen.bsky.social

Not all artists are geniuses or world-changers. Some just lighten up the load of living for others. Chris Rea did this for millions of people without ever cheating, with absolute honesty. This is a rare kind of dignity. RIP.

About time the police picked up the @privateeyenews.bsky.social investigation into these houchenanigans.

Half Ma’am Half Brisket