Manny

Shame. Hate those game ruining cunts.

Actually just catching up on the UAE stuff and this needs proper - and by proper I mean independent, public and transparent, not just the PGMOL marking their own fucking homework a little bit more harshly to avoid suspicion - investigation. How did they get there (what class of flight)? Where did they stay (how many stars was the hotel)? What basis were they employed on and what was the fee? What kind of expenses were racked up? And most crucially of all, who fucking paid for it!? This wasn’t some showpiece final. It was a cunting exhibition, a meaningless game which quite frankly would be easy to set up for no other reason than to have a justification to lavish fees and expenses on otherwise untouchable marks. Why did they need foreign referees, if not just to buy some favour with a mid-season jolly? Can you imagine if John Henry flew Stuart Attwell out to the US, business class both ways, five star accommodation, top restaurants all expenses paid and full corporate hospitality at Fenway park for a Red Sox game? The furore would be off the scale - and rightly so. But basically doing all that under the auspices of raising profile and doing ‘work’ makes it ok? Fuck off.

Maybe it is corruption - as in envelopes, bank transfers, that kind of thing. I dunno, it’s not impossible. It’s definitely cronyism though, with a lot of subconscious bias thrown in for good measure. 100 percent. And that’s not really any fucking better, is it?

Looking forward to the spurs wankathon. “We’re not spursy anymore” says bottle job Maddison after they need an og in the 96tg minute playing with 14 against 9. What a cunt match.

I think there is a bit of an agenda around Nunez. It stems from a few things: There was a lot of narrative energy about the two titans of English football over the past 6 years in City and Liverpool both going out and signing fairly traditional number 9s at the same time (having never really used them previously), and therefore that drew comparisons, for better or worse. The mancs were in for Nunez for a long time seemingly, and we beat them to him. So there was a big stink kicked up by their knobhead social media fanbase, a sort of “didn’t fancy her anyway” kind of bollocks. He’s seen as a traditional number 9, as Haaland is. Players like Jesus are viewed more like Bobby is/was, as more workhorse forwards for whom goals and conversion are slightly diminished in importance. Haaland and Nunez are just viewed as tools for getting the ball in the net and every time they fail to do so, there’s an element of “you’ve got one job.” He cost a lot of money for such a young player. Most rival and non-rival fans are bitter dickheads waiting for us to fail. He then gets sent off on his full debut and misses a couple of chances when he comes back over-eager to make amends, and the whole thing snowballs a bit. This year he’s got three league goals from about 2.75xG, if you’re into that sort of thing - which is pretty good. Last season was worse with 9 from 12xG, which isn’t amazing but it’s really not that terrible.

Saw that article in the Athletic this morning. Apparently he's had things he wanted to say about his tenure but just couldn't quite find the right time. Now his successor is under real pressure for the first time and he's suddenly found the right time and he's out to correct the record. Said it loads of times - they all think he's got this smiling, nice guy vibe going on, but he's a snivelling little shithouse who can politick with the best of them.

From the senior club in the city to senior debt packages. We don't know the meaning of losing.

He's talking shit there, in fairness the Glazers didn't inherit "the best in all areas." They inherited an excellent manager (who's now in his 80s and retired) and a massive budget (which they still have). The way Neville is talking you'd think they had the best off-field operation that was the envy of the league. They didn't, they had an adequate off-field setup that suited slur, and he did the rest. Once he left it was doomed to failure - that was a side of the club the Glazers have actually had to build from scratch, not just put batteries in and let it keep going. Agenda driving little twat.

I’ve got no advice Section but sounds like she’s in a nest of absolute cunts, hope you get sorted!

Too dodgy for the mafia.

Very little that Chairman Bill has done in his tenure was openly criticised by them as a fanbase at the time. They've applied a lot of hindsight to his tenure, making out that he ran the place into the ground in the face of open criticism from the fans for years. They applauded him when he came up with the People's Club bullshit. They thought he was the greatest when Moyes was in charge. They loved him for bringing in Mosh when they thought they were going to be the next bankrolled chequebook team. I've no great love for Billwright, other than the fact he's always been a decent fella over Hillsborough. But their rewriting of his history to portray themselves as "right all along" and him as some destructive force despite their opposition is characteristically detached from reality.

Why the fuck would that be a major scare? Would they have to give his seat to a fella who'd take full advantage of the free buffet or something?

There's also this! Yeah. I've no doubt the new stadium will increase their revenue but it won't be transformational, either financially (their match day revenue will go up by a few %, which will then have to offset against increased costs) nor from a prestige sense (the best players in the world don't move to specific fucking stadiums, and despite their wet dreams it won't become a tourist magnet to rival the Great Wall of China). They're moving out of Woodison because, well, it's made of wood, so sooner or later they're going to have to move out. They can't stay there forever. But as you say, TV money is where it's at. I read somewhere that the last international TV rights deal for the Premier League would mean that all clubs could basically let fans in for free for a couple of years and they'd still have the same TV revenue as they had before the deal. So Everton could build BMD; build it for free - fuck, they could probably build two BMDs for free - and relegation would still swallow their newfound matchday revenue up several times over. Over to you, Sean...

Like a shit version of the famous "slap the money on the table" post, that, just a more dystopian one. Another one who thinks that the half assembled Meccano stadium will magically finish any time now and as soon as it does, £££, and then we'll all be sorry. Woodison is the only thing holding them back from world domination, see, and there'll be no trade-off once it's built - no payments to settle, no long-term impact on the balance sheet. Just £££. They genuinely never learn.

Exactly. He went there for a massive payday - there's nothing inherently wrong with that but it's unlikely to generate a massive outpouring of affection and sympathy from the fanbase. He's exit is mercenary so it'll provoke a mercenary response, rather than, say, an emotional return to Sunderland or something which would provoke a similarly affectionate response. But to try and blame the club for this, as if he had no other option than to be a mercenary, is just plain wrong.

I've thought on this some more and it really is a fucking shame how much he's shitting not just on his own legacy, but on his very identity. Thought he was an LGBTQ ally? Not so, he's moving to Saudi Arabia. Thought he was a throwback footballer who valued respect, status and trophies over bank balance? Not so, he's basically semi-retiring at 33 in exchange for a lorry-load of cash. Thought he was a devoted club man, a consummate professional who puts the needs of the team over his own desires? Not so, he's moaning about being told that he'd have to (rightly so) accept lesser status in the team going forward. What next? We'll find out he's not a mackem, or that his gait was normal all along?

To be honest, I've lost far more respect for him basically thinking he's above being an older squad player who's minutes are managed than I have for a lot of the other stuff. I can accept a man being put into a difficult position to reconcile his morals, his employment and his salary - no easy answers there, and whilst I thought it was a bit of a shame I kind of accepted that this is going to become an increasingly popular destination for footballers on their downward slope towards retirement and we might as well get used to it. But he's a man I've always respected more than anything else as a top professional, a selfless leader who puts the needs of the team and the club far in advance of his own - and that's allowed him to help steer this club to enormous success despite his more limited playing ability. This interview shits on that selflessness more than a little bit - he comes across as far more entitled and self-pitying than I ever reckoned him to be, and that's incredibly disappointing.

In the week they’ve broken their own British transfer record and spent £115m on defensive midfielders, Chelsea have announced that they’re stopping away coach subsidies this season as well as it isn’t cost-effective. Torn between thinking they’re the biggest cunts going as the cost of the scheme is <2% of the Caicedo fee, or laughing at the simpletons cheering on the spending realising it’s going to hit them.

It'll be interesting to see how they do this year. As much as I despise the snivelling little line-toeing shithouse, Howe is a good coach and proved it absolutely last year. But this year he'll have to manage two games a week regularly - both the squad management that comes with that but also, perhaps most crucially for him, the halving of your tactical preparation time. You can't spend all week working on a plan for Sunday's game and drilling it into your players when you've got Napoli away on the Wednesday - nor can you just keep the same 11 and rely on it's inherent cohesion to carry you through. He may well be fine: I think they know they've qualified for the CL 'early' and it's not like they particularly need the cash so they might be satisfied with an honourable group stage exit so they can prioritise coming back next year with more experience and more £££ invested in the squad. But equally I can't see the Saudis appreciating even one step backwards on their latest geopolitical offensive so he might find himself joining Tindall on the beds and a bigger name supplanting him if he flounders.

Absolutely love the proper South Americans reacting to stuff like that. Like they think it's all rather quaint. Always enjoy the little details of those Inside vids though. Gomez straight onto Quansah after the equaliser - Joe's performance when he came on reminded me of how he was playing when Virgil got nobbled by Pickford in 2020; for a few games he was leading the defence and he was absolutely immense up until his knee went on international duty. Ajax and Atalanta away I remember him being absolutely excellent - the latter in a 5-0 win where he partnered Rhys Williams. Really hope he can rediscover some of that form.

They don’t want respect. They just want total obedience because they’re power hungry little megalomaniacs.

I always think it sounds like the theme tune to auf wiedersehen pet.

So we’re writing off Endo after 26 minutes on the field with 10 other red shirts? Good to know.

Klopp really ruffled some feathers at PGMOL last year, or Howard Webb is every bit the cunt we thought he was. The amount of bullshit we’re putting up with from refs is obscene.

I've viewed some of the younger ones going there (like Veiga) as a sort of footballing gap year. You go there, live in the sunshine and absolutely rake it in for a couple of years. Veiga's what, 21? So he could come back to Europe as a 24 year old with a fucktonne of cash in the bank, and he's free to build his career however he sees fit. He could go back to Celta and see out the rest of his career playing for his hometown club on a lower wage as he's basically taken more than his expected career earnings from his three years in Saudi. Or he could get his agent to push for a move to a top club - but de-risk his contract with a lower basic salary because again, he can afford it due to his maxed out earnings in the ME. Whether European clubs would view him as hungry enough after three years in semi-retirement is another thing - as is whether he'd be prepared to drop wages to open up his options after getting used to the income out there. The aftermath of these first wave contracts will be interesting, if nothing else.