Anyone ever hear the story of Messi defiantly drinking a can of Coke in front of Guardiola?
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Anyone ever hear the story of Messi defiantly drinking a can of Coke in front of Guardiola?
Conte bemoans Oscar's China move.
http://www.irishexaminer.com/sport/s...ta-435696.htmlQuote:
The Stamford Bridge chief revealed Oscar will leave with his blessing, but also accepted football’s ever-increasing battle between ambition and money. “I think the most important thing for us must be the passion. Okay? The passion for football,” said Conte. “If you haven’t got that, it’s no good. No good. I repeat: this concept is very important. Before the money must be the passion, the passion for the sport, for football.
“We started to play when we were children without money, and only for the passion. Then, also, came money but the passion is more important than money, for me.
Funny Conte says this considering how the club he manages essentially bought their Premier League titles and the Champions League. The only reason he's managing that club right now is because they became money rich over night.
At least the Chinese clubs are owned by Chinese people and have a cap on foreign players.
Chelsea are supposed to be an English club, yet it's not unusual for them to put out a team of eleven foreign players.
This is a monster English football has created with the emergence of foreign benefactors and the importance placed on increasing the stock of the English game in places - ironically - like China.
It's all about money. And it has been ever since the Sky era.
Pardew gone from Palace. Strange manager. Seems to work the oracle when he starts and then the wheels fall off in a big way after a season. A Geordie friend of mine says he is totally overrated but it won't be long before he gets another job. Then of course "Big Sam" (the man who has never been relegated) probably arrives on the scene. It says a lot about Allardyce that the big clubs won't touch him with a barge pole but is regarded as a relegation expert. Is that something you want to tell your grandchildren? "I never won a major honour but I was never relegated".
Swansea are normally quite good at their managerial appointments but Bob Bradley ? And now Ryan Giggs is the favorite to replace him ? That is a risk for someone who is just used to fighting for trophies and not scrapping away at the bottom.
Obviously it didn't work out but why was Bob Bradley considered such a suspect appointment? Hadn't he done well with the US national team and plenty other experience besides... it's only Swansea we're talking about here, not Real Madrid.
Ryan Giggs would be interesting after all the talk about him but he doesn't have much in the way of credentials from a management perspective, even his stint as assistant manager at United can hardly be deemed a particularly successful one. He's a terrible pundit though, so maybe he could be the reverse of Gary Neville (not that Valencia have improved any bit without him).
Great win for Everton yesterday. Another nightmare from Bobby Moore.
Think Spurs might have been doing pretty well to miss out on the Olympic Stadium...
Tottenham Hotspur: New stadium images revealed
a step too far I think...Quote:
Originally Posted by DeLorean
◾A glass-walled players' tunnel allowing people a view of what is happening behind the scenes before a game
The myopia of football managers never ceases to irritate me. In the Palace game a Palace player tweaks a hamstring and is off the pitch and then decides to roll back on to try and stop the game. Ref ignores him. Allardyce berates the ref. for not stopping the game. FFS. Wenger was at it was well again. So tiresome.
Two non-league teams in the last 16 of the Cup. Rather than adding to the glamour of the Cup, it just shows how far down the priorities of managers winning a trophy has become. At least in the old days, a "shock" was a shock when the first team of the lower team beat the first team of the bigger club. Now the lower team is just playing the reserve side of the bigger club.
As for Jeff Stelling and his "giant killing", don't get me started when one pygmy from Div 2 beats another slightly taller pygmy from Div 1 it's described as "giant killing".
End of venting.
I see the FA are taking no chances of a premature glamour club clash and have implemented a Blatter type draw, giving all the epl clubs weaker league division opponents in the 5th round draw.
To listen to all the hyperbole about the FA cup losing its prestige, you'd think the world of football revolved around epl stalwarts such as Liverpool, Everton, Stoke and WBA. Maybe one day the penny will drop that there are football fans supporting their clubs the length and breadth of England in places like Lincoln, that in all probability have more right to call themselves football supporters than those hordes of whiners and moaners who attach themselves to the branded moneyed clubs.
Apart from the spectacle of the cup final itself, the main attraction of the FA cup is that the smaller clubs have their day out, just as Shamrock Rovers fans traveled in numbers to Turin, or to White Hart Lane to play Juve and Spurs as equals (of sorts).
James Morrison's goal for West Brom is, I believe, the 28th goal scored by a Scot in the Premier League this season compared to 12 goals scored by Irish players.
That is really quite remarkable considering there are probably, roughly, the same amount of players from each country playing on a weekly basis and IRL have more strikers (Walters, Long).
At least one of Morrison, McArthur, Snodgrass or Phillips seem to score each week.
This is even better now...
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xpaXl7kQmAw
How is he on television with his stupidity and xenophobia?
He can barely throw a coherent sentence together.
Listen to him.
People would rather manage Watford, Sunderland and Hull than Bayern Munich, PSG and Juventus.
:rolleyes:
Here's a better question for them.
Where are the opportunities for black managers in Great Britain?
*crickets*
You could pick gaping holes in nearly everything they said. F365 covered it pretty well.Quote:
Originally Posted by TheOneWhoKnocks
The question is does anyone really take the pundits seriously ? The screams when the ball goes near the goal! Could you imagine them at home watching the same game. They're probably asleep in front of the TV or in the kitchen having a cup of team or G and T if it's Charlie Nicholas. We are supposed to take Chris Kamara seriously on Sunday hosting "Goals on Sunday" when he is a comic strip reporter at the live games and appears in advertisements dressed up as a woman etc (not that I am knocking dressing up as a woman you understand). It's a show like Eamon Dunphy is. Not worth commenting on really but the F365 response is excellent.
Mark Clattenburg's gone to Saudi. I don't think he's ever reffed an Ireland competitive game. Are English ref's excluded from games involving Ireland because they might have a bias?
I have only been at one game where he was the ref. He officiated the recent Iceland home game against Turkey and he effortlessly orchestrated the whole game from the middle, keeping up a frequent dialogue with players, stopped all the (one sided) diving shenanigans stone dead. He looked like he enjoyed the whole task without trying to be all pally.
If I was going to live in Saudi I'd consider buying a Harley.
Dermot Gallagher was the referee for the friendly against Russia before World cup 2002, but it was allowed because he was stepping down from full internationals soon after
I like Clattenburg's style of refereeing too but he makes a lot of howlers I think.
Him being English would have been no issue... but as an Ireland supporting Irish immigrant child he probably shouldn't have reffed it.Quote:
Originally Posted by tetsujin1979
He's from Ringsend, isn't he?Quote:
Originally Posted by BonnieShels
Mad that he was allowed ref it.
yeah. he's from Ringsend. Discussed it recently on newstalk: http://www.newstalk.com/dermot-galla...eree-interview
I saw him sitting behind me at one of the Euro games in France, the Italian one I think, bedecked in an Irish jersey so yes, strange to see him refereeing an Irish game.Quote:
Originally Posted by tetsujin1979
Here it is:Attachment 2524
Maybe the rules for friendlies are a bit more relaxed that for the competitive internationals.Quote:
Originally Posted by tetsujin1979
Back in the day I have the haziest memory of John Carpenter refereeing an Irish international but I may be wrong.Quote:
Originally Posted by geysir
Quote:
Originally Posted by TheOneWhoKnocks
I didn't get to listen to that on OTB. I was listening to that night's show though but missed the interview. I vaguely remember them saying he moved. But I assumed for years he was a 1st gen child. My mistake.Quote:
Originally Posted by tetsujin1979
Ringsend so... Rovers or Shels...?
Bit of a nightmare of a memory...Quote:
Originally Posted by OwlsFan
John's ok as he awarded that penalty to Shamrock Rovers in the 1978 FAI Cup Final - those in the red western part of the country still feel aggrieved about it although I am not sure this video enlightens us muchQuote:
Originally Posted by BonnieShels
Never a peno, not in a million years, he slipped on the mud.
Looks like that was a televised game from 1878.
Handball ?Quote:
Originally Posted by geysir
I was wondering who really can do it on a Tuesday night in Stoke? So I checked out the numbers - http://irish-abroad.appspot.com/Blog...28113939187465
I'd say you'd probably see the same record for Sunderland for most away games anywhere on any day of the week !Quote:
Originally Posted by tetsujin1979
Bye bye Ranieri.
I can understand the decision, but I think he'd earned the right to fight relegation himself.
Above all, he should have been allowed to quit rather than being sacked (though he may have been offered the choice).
From a Leicester fans' point of view, I suspect that if you offered them a League title and relegation to the Championship, they would bite your hand off compared to a few seasons of Sunderland-like existence in the Premier League. He deserved loyalty after one the biggest sports achievements of the century which every Leicester City supporter will bring with them to their grave. His team is outside the bottom three, which is all a Leicester team should really expect, and in the knock-out phases of the Champions League, which they shouldn't expect. I don't understand the decision which is a disgrace and shows football up as the rotten cesspit that it is and that the only important thing is money.
Howd you take that photo, hole in the newspaper?:p Jesus.......Quote:
Originally Posted by OwlsFan
Exactly OwlsFan. BBC5 had Kasper Schmeichel on yesterday supposedly to quash talk that the players threw him under a bus. He did everything but. Never directly said anyone approached the owners but described scenarios in which the message could be conveyed. Without any hint of disdain or dissatisfaction he described how the owners are very, and I quote him here, "hands on" and are frequently in direct contact with the playing staff. They come down the training ground etc and sound people out individually on all manner of things according to KS. He never alluded at any point -nor in fairness did anyone put it to him, that there might be something inappropriate about that. Now maybe it's just me and maybe I'm in a shrinking minority but I happen to feel one of the things that's ruining football is the emergence of the "hands on" owner who thinks he's the best pal of the clubs big egos and thinks his decisive business acumen trumps his managers coaching badges.Quote:
Originally Posted by OwlsFan
Maybe, as a Leeds supporter, I'm hypersensetive to this sort of thing but it struck me it's not a million miles from what KS was describing to Cellino carry-on of phoning your "head coach" in-game to instruct him as to what would remedy your disattisfaction.
Pretty poor game on Saturday at Elland Road but I suppose you're not complaining. 1-1 might have been a fairer result but with 2 shots on target the whole game, one resulting in a goal and the other a penalty save, not compulsive viewing for the neutral I suspect.Quote:
Originally Posted by Lionel Ritchie
When I compared that to the great performance by Southampton in the League Cup Final, it showed how far behind the Championship teams are. Genuinely (as Miriam O'Callaghan says) felt sorry for the Soton fans. Unlucky to have their first goal chalked off due to an incorrect offside call and pretty much dominated the game with some lovely football but this often happens in football. The team with the better players (e.g. Georgia vs Ireland comes to mind) are sometimes dominated by the better team but the individual ability of some players can overcome that. No doubt that Soton were the better team but Man U had the match winners in their ranks. Will it be another 40 year wait for the Soton fans? Really felt for them.
Yeah, they were kind of unlucky in their F.A. Cup Final appearance a few years back against Arsenal too I think. Well, I remember James Beattie having a header cleared off the line near the end anyway and not much else.
In terms of the gap between the PL and the Championship, obviously Southampton would be a level above as a solid top half PL team, but the promoted clubs tend to hold their own generally as well?