Reasonable to say Slot approached this game too negatively. But reasonable also to say he was only a few bounces of the ball and marginal refereeing decisions away from the plan working.

"At the stroke of midnight, the Indian women's cricket team achieved its tryst with destiny" is an outstanding line, fair play

Nope. United 3, Chelsea and Atalanta 2. Nobody else more than 1.

@andrewbeasleyfootball.com Palace have five wins at Anfield since 2015 - are any team close to that???

It seems a sub-optimal state of affairs that whether that's a penalty on Gakpo depends on how good he is at diving

If there isn't an AI dating assistant called "Cyrano" by the end of the year these guys have no culture or imagination

The near absolute polarisation in views on my timeline as to whether that was a penalty between English and non-English people is quite funny

According to some guy called, uh, Michael Caley, this is the opposite of how Liverpool got good (From @rwohan.bsky.social's book, which is great, you should buy it)

Things that make me irrationally angry: that nobody in the Eurovision green room seems to have thought of keeping track of the remaining points. Like, how is it possible that I knew Austria had won before they did?

It's funny because it keeps happening

A good question posed & answered here by @aveek18.bsky.social: aveekbhattacharya.substack.com/p/why-isnt-a...

When I tell people I got married in a castle, but it's really not that big a deal - this is the context

Why isn't animal welfare a bigger issue in British politics? open.substack.com/pub/aveekbha...

why is the co-founder of aberdeenshire-based brewdog who wants to create a british version of "doge" called james watt and not ellon musk

also that it is largely comprised of former friends of mine

the most surprising and disappointing aspect of becoming a global health philanthropist is the existence of an opposition team

Someone please do me a back of an envelope cost-benefit of dogs. What do we think the optimal number per capita is?

The 7th carbon budget is a MASTERCLASS in avoiding a climate culture war, despite having to talk about flying and farming. Kudos to the team!

I was trying to be careful not to load the dice in how I framed it, but can see how original post might have come across a bit too pro dog. The growth in dogs is a fascinating phenomenon in its own right, especially how that interacts with the pandemic.

CCC's 7th carbon budget advice on agriculture & land use: - Overall, land use changes required over 19% of UK farmland (previously expressed as 'one-fifth' of ag land) - Meeting 7CB means a 27% reduction in cattle and sheep numbers between 2023 and 2040 1/ - www.theccc.org.uk/wp-content/u...

The brewing culture war over dogs is a fascinating confluence of so many social trends: social atomisation and unwillingness to let the messiness of other people's lives intrude, safetyism, the long behavioural shadow of the pandemic. www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle...

The growing evidence of iatrogenesis (harm caused by "treating" people who don't need it with mental health interventions) is one of the most confounding research findings I've come across in recent years

Cutting Official Development Assistance to 0.3% of GDP means that a massive fraction of our aid budget will be spent in the UK on accommodation for asylum seekers. I don't have an up to date estimate, but could easily be half. Leaves much, much less for "traditional" aid.

Estimate of the impact of the PEPFAR funding suspension so far. pepfar.impactcounter.com

Listening to @zonal-marking.bsky.social on the Athletic podcast arguing that "Expected Goals" is an unhelpful or misleading term, and I don't think it is? Maybe it's more familiar if you're aware of Expected value or talking about probabilistic outcomes "in expectation"

A propos of nothing: this seeding system is nonsense. Team that finishes top of the Champions League group stage should get to pick their last 16 opponents. Team that finishes 2nd should get second pick. Etc

The UK's falling fertility rates and ageing population need proactive thinking now—waiting until we reach East Asia's situation isn't an option. Great to have contributed to this @smfthinktank.bsky.social collection, which makes a strong progressive case for action.

Great piece by Gaby Hinsliff, taking its cue from our @smfthinktank.bsky.social report to argue that the left don't just have reason to worry about birth rates, they also have a positive story to tell about how progressive policies make it easier to have a family www.theguardian.com/commentisfre...

This seems like it would be an awesome job

On 1) This doesn't seem to be the case everywhere - Finland seems to have addressed the issue in relatively non-partisan terms, as Anna Rotkirch's essay describes 2) I agree is a big problem, but we have a UK government that claims to be up for hard, long term decisions - here's one tester for them

📉Despite the dire state of UK's birth rate, Keir Starmer and the left have shied away from the issue. SMF & Boom Campaign's new essay collection aims to reclaim discourse around birth rates for the left 🧵on the solutions from the most prominent voices on the centre + left

As @aveek18.bsky.social says, the birth rate challenge is too important to be left to the right. My small contribution to this essay collection is on the economics of childcare. Unlike many other parts of the economy, expensive childcare is not primarily a 'supply side' issue... 🧵

Fertility care supports families & the economy. Each child born in Britain contributes £660K+ in earnings & pensions. Subsidised treatment raises births by 3.5% (14K-15K more babies/year). Read @prafulnargund.bsky.social essay on the morality and economics of fertility care below.

Many countries worry about declining birth rates, but in English-speaking nations, it seems to be more of a preoccupation of the right, with the left reluctant to discuss the issue. We think that's unfortunate, so we gathered thinkers from the centre/left to reflect on the issue

So? 3 possibilities 1. You don't need political education to vote, in which case this is irrelevant. 2. You do need political education to vote, in which case we need to strip older people of the franchise too 3. Older people had adequate political education but not today's youth (unlikely)

Same. I hope I'm overreacting, but it feels a sort of basic equality of status we have taken for granted is increasingly under challenge, and this is a symptom of that shift.

By comparison, Liverpool are currently on their FIFTH separate 20+ game unbeaten streak since 2011

Contrarian take: it hasn't felt like it emotionally for obvious reasons, but there's an argument that Liverpool's game management has been pretty good in the last couple, given they've had leads without playing well.

🚨Labour’s pledge to ban foie gras imports is at risk with new EU-UK vet agreement talks underway. It’s crucial that any agreement upholds the Gov’s right to restrict imports and enforce labeling requirements for animal welfare. #StopCruelImports www.theguardian.com/world/2025/f...

Latest piece defends the decision by @kimleadbeatermp.bsky.social to drop high court judges from the #assisteddying bill as - Committees will have more expertise in countering coercion - These committees have proven robust in Spain - Court backlogs would have limited the judges' involvement anyway

Latest Substack post now up—which includes a walkthrough of all my poorest predictions on British economic policy in 2024, plus some reflections on Labour's recent growth announcements. ➡️ Take a look here: notes.archie-hall.com/p/all-the-wa...

Also this is exactly the sort of transparent, quantified reasoning that Effective Altruists should be bringing to policy debate. More of this sort of thing please

My gut instinct is that this is an order of magnitude too high, but that just makes a stupendously large number into a massive number. The core point that it is weird that the impact assessment on welfare labelling for animal food products ignores the actual impact on animal welfare is a good one.

Fun fact: Humphrey Davy, the non-American who named the element, initially called it "aluminum", but was bullied out of it by the other scientists scienceblogs.com/worldsfair/2...

Going to shock you by saying, I agree! It should be easier for think tanks to get research council funding

Love a @georginaq.bsky.social deep dive on inside politics. The one she did on fraud, which featured SMF work, was great. This one, on AI and potholes, is top too.

ICYMI: Director @theobertram.bsky.social on @skynewsrss.bsky.social today To ensure data centre growth matches our ambitions, we need to fix the high cost of industrial electricity - through locational pricing, Theo explains👇 Read more in our report out today: www.smf.co.uk/publications...

Be clear about what Trump and Musk’s aid axe will do: people will face terror and starve, many will die www.theguardian.com/commentisfre...

Huge pleasure working with Karl, Eunice and Craig on Renewal - & really looking forward to seeing what @morganj0nes.bsky.social, @dmk1793.bsky.social, Lise Butler & Jack Jeffrey do with the journal going forward. Some of my favourite pieces from last 2 years, all of which hold up pretty well: 🧵