Never mind the World Cup, the new season started yesterday with European games, including perennial Welsh champions TNS losing 2-0 in the Champions League first qualifying round first leg to Sabah in Azerbaijan. Here’s their same stage Champions League game from even earlier, June 26 2017.

The 61st Wildlife Photographer of the Year exhibition at the Natural History Museum at South Kensington closes on July 12. Here are some of my favourite images #wildlifephotography

To mark Colombia playing Switzerland here’s a favourite moment at the London Stadium - their fans playing football on the pitch after the 1-0 win over Spain in a friendly in March 2024 #WorldCup

Today’s World Cup Art marks Spain’s late win over Portugal to reach the quarterfinals. Again from the @courtauld Gallery exhibition by renowned photographer Roger Mayne called Youth that was shown in the summer of 2024. This is @Footballers Jumping, Almunecar, Costa del Sol” (1962)

Today’s late night World Cup Art is from a 2024 exhibition at the Courtauld Gallery at Somerset House called Youth by the wonderful photographer Roger Mayne (5 May 1929 – 7 June 2014). This is: Goalie, Brindley Road, off Harrow Road (1956)

England playing in a crucial World Cup match today. Scorching sunshine at a soldout Lord’s for the T20 Final. Australia won by seven wickets, and there was little tension as the result seemed fairly certain within the first few overs #cricket

Darts played a Fourth of July show at a soldout gig at Dingwalls in Camden Town to mark exactly 50 years since their formation. Remarkably, eight of the nine members featured in the lineup during their Golden Years. This is Gotta Go Home, joined by a cappella group The Mint Juleps #Darts

1 - Shibden Hall, near Halifax, dating back to 1420 and now best known through the BBC drama Gentlemen Jack 2 - Portrait of Anne Lister, diarist, entrepreneur and so much more 3 - Shibden Hall 4- Anne Lister blue plaque #ShibdenHall

Today’s World Cup Art is from the impressive exhibition Our Promised Utopia by Theo Park, which was at Stevenage Museum in January 2023. It is about 19-year-old Joe, a carer for his mother, father and sister who escapes the pressure through football #WorldCup

Spain are looking to win their first World Cup knockout match since they won it in 2010, playing Austria in their first knockout game since 1954. Spain haven’t lost to European opponents for a while, but they were beaten 1-0 by Colombia in this March 2024 friendly at the London Stadium #WorldCup

Desperate times mean I must go for this for today’s World Cup Art - from the summer 2022 at the Design Museum in west London exhibition Football: Designing the Beautiful Game. Geoff Hurst’s 1966 World Cup Final adidas Diamant boots dipped in bronze. Time for heroes indeed #WorldCupArt

Time for a proper cuppa

Japan v Brasil #WorldCup

Today’s World Cup Art is from the Taylor Wessing Photo Portrait Prize 2023 at the National Portrait Gallery in That London - Reece and his daughter, Crawley Town FC vs Barrow. By Kate Peters. Because grassroots football is more important than the World Cup #WorldCupArt

Today’s World Cup Art comes amid a heatwave that’s seen record June temperatures in the UK and across Europe. From the Royal Academy Summer Exhibition 2022: ‘Climate clubs’ - if only we cared about climate change half as much as our football clubs by Kyle Harman-Turner #WorldCupArt

I guess this is why they call Yorkshire God’s Own Country, Sowerby Bridge looking swell in the summertime #sowerbybridge

Today’s World Cup Art is more of a football ground really, but to mark France 🇫🇷 winning again on the way to what is obviously going to be another triumph, here’s a view of Stade Velodrome, before Olympique Marseille 3 Olympique Lyonnaise 0 in Ligue 1 in December 2023 #WorldCupArt

Today’s World Cup Art marks Germany playing the final Group E match v Ecuador. On display at Dortmund’s Deutsche Fußballmuseum, midfielder Renate Lingor’s shirt from the German women’s 2nd World Cup win, defending their 2003 World Cup title, beating Brazil 2-0 in the 2007 final in China #WorldCupArt

Today’s World Cup Art of course marks Brasil playing their final group game later against Scotland. Once again from the Design Museum exhibition from the summer of 2022, Football: Designing the Beautiful Game, this is Pele’s shirt from the 1958 World Cup, which he helped win aged 17 #WorldCupArt

Belle and Sebastian invited fans to dance on stage with them during The Boy With The Arab Strap at the Piece Hall in Halifax, a wonderful venue.

Today’s World Cup Art marks England’s game v Ghana. From the Design Museum exhibition Football: Designing the Beautiful Game, Bryan Robson’s England shirt from the 1982 World Cup. The World Cup song turned out to be wrong, and Robson remains the only England captain I’ve played against #WorldCupArt

Exactly 40 years apart to the day two Argentina players score two goals in the World Cup. Maradona v England including the “Hand of God”. His successor as world’s best player Messi two v Austria to become the tournament’s top scorer ever with 18. So, obviously, here’s Lionel scoring at Upton Park.

Today's World Cup Art marks France playing their second Group I match later against Iraq. From the Design Museum exhibition Football:Designing the Beautiful Game in the summer of 2022 - the poster for the Coupe de Monde France 98, surely one of the very best tournaments #WorldCupArt

Today's World Cup Art is Yellow Strip oil on canvas, 2006) by Rose Wylie from her The Picture Comes First exhibition at the Royal Academy of Arts in Piccadilly in the centre of London arlier this year. #WorldCupArt

World Cup Art: John Bartlett: Cars and Chaos (1996). A matchday rendition of the outside of West Ham’s old Boleyn Ground with a certain sense of menace. Bartlett’s work is on four panels and he works on a large scale - this was at the Guildhall Art Gallery 2023 exhibition The Big City #footballart

World Cup Art - from the exhibition Football: Designing the Beautiful Game at the Design Museum in west London in the summer of 2022 @designmuseum.bsky.social #WorldCupArt

Today’s football art to mark the World Cup is from the exhibition Mixing It Up: Painting Today held at the Hayward Gallery on London’s glamorous Southbank in autumn 2021. I don’t know the artist or title, so that’s two yellow cards #WorldCupArt

Struggling to get interested in the World Cup, but I have got four Panini stickers #WorldCup

What a swell party this is - High Society to July 11 then touring. The Barbican's brutalist exterior hides the glamorous Lord estate in Newport (Rhode Island rather than South Wales). This version of the 1956 film derived from The Philadelphia Story 1939 play has many of Cole Porter's best songs.

To celebrate Japan v Netherlands, two images from the recent British Museum Samurai exhibition - a poster commissioned for the 2006 FIFA World Cup in Germany, by Tenmyouya Hisashi (born 1966) and a Samurai Blue “katana” football jersey from the same tournament #WorldCup

Dortmund’s Deutsche Fußballmuseum presents the 1966 World Cup Final as a crime scene, and gives visitors the chance to vote on whether England’s third goal was over the line #WorldCup

World Cup/Art. This is from the Royal Academy Summer Exhibition 2022, but I don’t know the artist or title #WorldCupArt

Love The Lady Vanishes? Night Train to Munich? Murder on the Orient Express? Come and see ROME EXPRESS, the film which kicked off the genre. Introduced by a conversation between me and some little-known writer called Kazuo Ishiguro. Bfi Southbank, July 21st. Book here: tinyurl.com/yh2pz72b

World Cup Art - Tino Seghal: This Entry, at The Whitworth as part of the Manchester International Festival 2023. This work, made with the involvement of Juan Mata, premiered at the National Football Museum in the city. There were also a violinist, cyclist and a singer/dancer #worldcupart

Out today, absolutely brilliant. Fruit Bats have been around all this century but are new to me. Eric D Johnson is also in Bonny Light Horseman, and played with The Shins at one time. Fruit Bats is his project, but this was recorded with his regular live band, who’ve just started a lengthy US tour.

Think this is the first comment from the club on safeguarding , on the website but not on their socials.

The World Cup begins this evening, and I've felt little interest so far. Anyway good luck to the West Ham players involved including Edson Alvarez, who should feature for Mexico v South Africa if fit. Here’s Michaelina Wautier’s Boys Blowing Bubbles in her Royal Academy exhibition until June 21.

The Banksy statue at Waterloo Place in St James’s, attracting way more attention than all the many other statues in this area of central London. It’s become known as Man Blinded By Flag, though it has no title, just a signature. It’s very much disliked by exactly who you’d expect #Banksy

Dame Elisabeth Frink RA (1930-1993) Rolling Horse (about 1976) Frink repeatedly depicted horses in her sculpture. This is her Diploma Work presented to the Royal Academy in 1978 and in a free exhibition - Richard Deacon RA Selects - in the Sackler Wing , although it’s not mentioned on the website.

Claife Viewing Station, Windermere, built in the 1790s when the Lake District was fashionable with wealthy tourists who couldn't complete the Grand Tour because of the French Revolution and Napoleonic Wars. The drawing room windows had coloured glass intended to recreate landscape lighting effects.

The Triumph Of Bacchus, and other works in the Michaelina Wautier exhibition at the Royal Academy in London’s Piccadilly until June 21 in the Sackler Wing of Galleries. Painted in Brussels c1655-59 and acquired by Archduke Leopold Wilhelm. Once described as too bold to have been painted by a woman.

Three years ago today, at the West Ham fanzone in Letna Park, Prague, as some 20,000 supporters who travelled without tickets watched the Hammers win the Europa Conference League final against Fiorentina.

My new favourite band, and what an album title youtube.com/watch?v=YM2E...

Don’t believe these statements are on any of West Ham’s socials. What the fans wanted, no more BS. Never dull supporting the Hammers, the next 48 hours should be interesting, along with the rest of the close season. We could end up in a much better place, but so many questions need to be answered.

1/2 The final performance of Fourteen Again at The Victoria Wood Theatre in Bowness-on-Windermere is just about to begin . The run was extended but has been sold out for ages, and I’m sure it will transfer somewhere, sometime as the legions of Victoria Wood fans will undoubtedly love it.

Lake District wildlife #LakeDistrict

RIP Anthony Head, who has sadly died aged 72. Librarian and Watcher Rupert Giles in Buffy The Vampire Slayer maybe the role he’s best remembered for, also Ted Lasso, Merlin, The Archers, the Gold Blend TV adverts and so much more.

The cat at the World of Beatrix Potter Attraction in Bowness-on-Windermere. “He enjoys greeting visitors to the Attraction and often pretends he is hungry...” #cat

An artwork seen at ARoS in Aarhus in September 2017. I don’t know who the artist is, but there’s an image of a home recorded cassette labelled “The Peel Session Joy Division”.