after many years of flirting with yuppie coffee i'm back on the nescafé two-in-one sachets. genuinely just think they're very nice, and about fifteen pence a brew. live a little.

some performance from dalton smith, headlining in the states and dethroning a tough puerto rican world champion. didn't see him doing that. very watchable five rounds in a febrile new york atmosphere. got the hatton/tszyu moment he spoke about. chuffed for him. youtu.be/gUaYUBGqrV8?...

appreciate there might be some fair questions around their investment, but you'd have to have a heart of stone to not take enjoyment from that result given one of macclesfield's players died weeks ago, and the fact that the town saw their club wound up just five years back. outplayed palace.

cooked a meal last night, *from scratch*, don't go on about it.

been listening to junip in bed this morning. never understood why so many people were ambivalent towards gonzalez, great songwriter. reminded me of the qpr documentary 'the four year plan'. one of the last great fly-on-the wall football docs, surprisingly good soundtrack... youtu.be/btBOS0t17vs?...

chuffed to hear these lads are back, and that robert smith is still involved. sounds like they've been going through it. one of britain's great live bands. can't wait for the album. youtu.be/kooPFvDf8rI?...

he's not going to watch *nine* televised fa cup games whilst barely moving off the settee for three days the haters claim.

quad's back on, lads.

never underestimate the amount of chaos you can cause by giving a middle-aged welsh woman a couple of gins. #traitors

i'm as pessimistic as they come, but some of our fans are miserable bastards. three tricky games in quick succession, with mounting key injuries, after eight wins on the spin. got to be viewed in perspective of realistic aims pre-season. we're ahead of schedule, but physically beat up and shattered.

why are they all so weird? a big part of why united are in this mess is ferguson's greed. stop living in the past. what he thinks about who the manager is is completely irrelevant. the sooner he stops doing his weird shankly routine the better for them.

I'm always bleating on about Play for Today & similar anthology formats & how important they are for television- so this is a public service announcement that there are 13 archive episodes of Screen Two currently on iPlayer: www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/epis...

proper football club. (from 'caught beneath the landslide' by tim rich).

i've started getting into old episodes of eastenders, and documentaries about eastenders history, just in case you thought your new year was miserable.

sort of tallies with what i've been quietly thinking, that even though it's likely that reform will win the next general election, it's not a lost hope, their support might have already peaked, and the one-two of the positive messaging from polanski and aggressively going after farage *is* working.

this is my favourite bela tarr scene. just absolutely wonderful from the off. don't know how you could watch it and not think it's simply a thing of great beauty... youtu.be/2XC4Zh2LfLc?...

Béla Tarr, 1955-2026 🤍

three quid a pop.

Bradford City v Brentford at Valley Parade, FA Cup third round 12 January 1955 📸 Northcliffe Collection

chief football writer at the times...

watched a le carré spy thing on the iplayer last night and went down a bit of a wikipedia wormhole. spent all morning lying in bed reading about kim philby's dad. definite mad fucker.

we've got to stop cryarseing about refs. oliver was fine today. missed a couple of bookings first half (james, palmer) but otherwise okay. drew two games for different reasons after eight wins, neither anything to do with officials, but people whinge relentlessly. we get our fair share of decisions.

spurs have won four of their last twenty-four home league games stretching back to early november 2024 - southampton (relegated), burnley (likely to be relegated), brentford, and the worst manchester united side in fifty years.

actually think they played okay today, looked fairly robust, and you've got to factor in the injuries, but every single time i watch them i ask myself the same question - how on god's green earth are they around the top six? the table doesn't lie, but the tight mid-table does mask how bad they are.

2026 resolutions: - start exercising - stop eating shite - watch 50+ new films - visit 50+ football grounds - read 12+ books - start buying music again - have an actual holiday - find a non soul destroying job - watch less premier league football - save 10% of my salary - gamble less - get a dog

View from the pitch at Dunlewey Celtic, County Donegal.

dawned on me rewatching an old episode earlier that these blokes are all dead now. bernard hill, michael angelis and alan igbon all passed within four years of eachother fairly recently. peter kerrigan died in 1999. tom georgeson (not pictured) still knocking about, pushing ninety. brilliant telly.

sport getting called off is as enjoyable as watching sport, imo. rain stopping play makes tms miles better. on frosty mornings like today i love scrolling through seeing which fixtures have succumbed to the conditions. weirdly, some of my most vivid city memories are of abandoned or postponed games.

been a dismal start to 2026. definitely haven't hit the ground running. so much for new year, new me. i'd say probably second only to 2007, where i'd had properly earnest chats with pals over a number of weeks about giving up the booze and by 11am new years day had a pint in my hand.

makes him scoring five goals in fifty-nine games for west ham before leaving on loan even funnier.

that's a point gained for me, not two dropped. sunderland were brilliant, cauldron of an atmosphere. we weren't quite at it, picked up a few knocks, but showed real character in a physical end-to-end game. nunes very good again. savinho did well before he had to go off. rodri improved us instantly.

pathetic that he couldn't sort new york out top to bottom in six hours, tbh.

maresca being binned off a week after apparently being the heir apparent to guardiola would be an interesting turn of events. i think he's probably an excellent coach but not a great man manager. the links to city felt very strange at the time. suspect they might have come from his agent...

chucked a random episode of a true crime podcast on when in bed last night - a body in a cellar type thing - and weirdly it happened on a street we used to live on, a few houses down from our flat, admittedly a few years before.

wow, the jules hootenanny line-up this year looks great... paul weller joss stone tom jones rod stewart pissed michael buble ruby turner seasick steve lulu for some reason ronnie wood half cut kt tunstall ruby turner again

Throughout their win vs Botswana at AFCON, a DR Congo supporter replicated the stance of Patrice Lumumba, a key figure in African and Congolese independence who was assassinated in 1961 following a joint plot between political opponents, Belgium, the US, and UK 🇨🇩

just going to put this here to remind myself how terrible at betting i've become. not a single winner over a calendar year's pretty miserable isn't it? thirty quid-ish a week feels manageable, but seeing the cumulative losses is a bit of an eye opener. that's the new year's resolution sorted.

think my favourite new films this year were probably: late shift hot milk no other land holy cow when the light breaks lollipop treading water sinners the kingdom steve i swear jaws @ 50 it's never over, jeff buckley john candy: i like me

the universe has got to start healing at some point, man. it can't just be shit and bollocks every day.

united's good run - three wins in eleven games.

pied british gas off finally. worst company i've ever dealt with by an absolute distance. spent weeks trying to get through to someone with functioning braincells, got nowhere. minute we cancel they're ringing us up non-stop asking what they can do to help.

i think the true meaning of christmas has become lost. it's not about the presents you receive, it's about watching darts and not having to shower for a week.

ground twelve of the season. a freezing cold park road for cheadle town versus abbey hey, again in the north-west counties premier division. comprehensive 3-1 win for the home side. great free-kick for the visitors' goal. simple stadium, one small stand of covered seating. crowd 380. £8 on the gate.

the next thirty-odd minutes will tell us whether or not city are title challengers.

the next thirty-odd minutes will tell us whether or not city are title challengers.

whenever we go away to certain clubs - villa, leeds, forest, newcastle - who've stayed at their traditional grounds (unviable for us) and haven't been spoiled by success (admittedly nice) and/or gentrified their fanbase (completely unnecessary) i always feel a tinge of sadness.

ground eleven. silver street, for irlam v glossop north end in the north-west counties prem. finished 0-1, but a decent enough game. irlam threw everything at it but couldn't find a goal. a red card, and a bit feisty. comfy modern clubhouse. roughly 300 in attendance. eight quid in.

The 400 Blows at Christmas

there must be people who think die hard's a christmas film but groundhog day isn't.