don't be a premier league news account and just call them "nottingham"

get it done

iirc gerard houllier was baffled that michael owen didn't seem more excited about winning the ballon d'or. wasn't viewed as a big deal in england back then. let me say that for once, english football was right.

it was dumb for the players to decide the ballon d'or is really important and should be prioritised like a major trophy. but that's the world we live in and it's funny that it happened.

football awards are not real, and that's the whole fun of it.

"without wanting to turn him into mr numbers, because he is so much more than that" i mean haaland kind of is the numbers. he scores lots of goals. easiest great player in the modern game to describe with numbers.

that goal feels like what pep wanted from hiring klopp's assistant

i'm surprised clubs don't more often end up paying players some money to go away. like, whatever the difference is between the value left on sterling's deal and the amount he thinks he can get paid elsewhere.

oh, i know that one! that's the one where he blames "typical germans" after bayern won! bsky.app/profile/jenn...

does seem tremendously unfair that, when the main centre left party breaks, we get centre right hegemony... but when the main centre right party breaks, we get the far right. the sheer asymmetry of it offends me

not really sure there are any takes to be had here. this is exactly the game everyone expected.

people say donnarumma doesn't fit pep's image but his hair is already thinning at age 26.

it's a good sign for burnley that they can go into a low block for this sort of game

breaking news: in response to a chant of “shoot keir starmer” at the fascist parade in london, the government has announced plans to shoot keir starmer

Chelsea briefing about acquiring Strasbourg players as if there’s no relationship between the two clubs is a very useful bellwether for evaluating how various reporters that cover Chelsea approach their jobs.

mcsweeneyist realism, there is no alternative

in my entire time in the community (and looking from the outside when i was in the closet) i have never seen "arrows" used as a trans symbol

every time i get invited to anything it's obvious someone has just assumed i live in london. no!!!

really understood the world when substack started inviting me to their london events along with dominic cummings et al.

david weir leaving brighton. obviously part of an effective recruitment system but still feels like someone worth hiring by some club.

Feel kind of sorry for the guys who just score of goals in the Eredivisie and not much else. Was a time when someone like Sem Steijn would've been sold to the Premier League by now, but everyone's long since figured out that won't work.

I have been taking The Lads to weekly training and matches for a decade now, and anecdotally the drop in the number of Asian kids in the team as they progress through the age groups is STARK

never misses

laziest criticism of the past week was saying england were "the same old" against andorra just because they weren't very good. the style has visibly changed. they were more like southgate's england against serbia, if anything.

"first muslim man to play for england", a country where 7% of the population is muslim, happening in 2025 should shame english football at all levels.

that advert that pretends to be for a gym club then reveals the greatest gym club of all is the royal navy reserves is among the bleakest things i've ever seen on tv

a tuchel team at 2-0 up might not be the most thrilling thing to watch

researching this article by rereading the greatest work of literature ever written: sven's autobiography

there is nothing i understand less about america than this guy having a successful career. mid-tier andy gray impression.

today is when the world remembers ange postecoglou is greek

i would like to let the record state i am a member of the green party and do not think people should vote reform

england, specifically, have *never* called this position a number six. that is always a centre back in england shirt numbers.

crisis over losing a friendly. america is finally getting it.

something to watch out for with the world cup, i guess

only two shots outside the box at home to andorra is some hardcore nerd sicko shit

I don't want Linehan in a cell I want people to acknowledge that if this call to punch trans women was made instead about Rowling or someone who people actually give a shit about the government would have a very different attitude.

…?

the long tail of piracy disruption. i kind of vaguely wonder if football looks like this in 20 years.

Said this so much, but "short attention spans" don't mean people want shorter, more engaging forms of sport. It means they want to also look at their phone while watching it. Young people love Twitch streams that last for hours with very little happening because they're not paying full attention.

bit weird to complain the green party are being weird radicals instead of laser-focused on electability in marginals. they're the green party. that's the point.

i would rather someone called me a slur than called me a british journalist

Sooner or later you have to come to the conclusion that mainstream journalism is printing lies and assisting the worst elements in your country, not because they are ‘scared’ of the repercussions of telling the truth, but because they believe the lies, or they embrace them because they benefit them.

one of the most baffling things about all this is that I really can't understand why nobody in government seems to be saying "guys the strategy isn't working"

of all the english players i thought might try their luck in another top european league, i must admit jamie vardy was pretty low down the list.

anyway liverpool are a better club for not employing marc guéhi

i just submitted the deal sheet to land your mum.

it is not uniquely british, but it is definitely *more* common in britain than america.

luke edwards an obvious example, but there is a culture in british journalism running all the way to westminster politics that the job is to repeat the thing the source told you, not to critically engage and figure out the truth.

First rule of football internet, if a user has a different opinion of a player than you do, that means they've never watched the player

Keir Starmer has appointed as his new Comms Director Tim Allan who was a board member of the hate group Sex Matters. It's no longer even pretending to adhere to its Manifesto promise to "remove indignities for trans people who deserve recognition and acceptance."