Manchester United have, reportedly, made a bid for Harry Maguire. The bid is in the region of £65 million which is the value they have placed on him having had a reasonably successful World Cup.
According to experts, whoever they may be, he was actually worth £25 million before his escapades in Russia and is now worth £50 million so maybe Ed Woodward knows something we don’t or maybe he is just throwing an extra £15 million in to make sure the deal happens. (more…)
With just a couple of weeks to go until the new Premier League season starts, we look at what the top six have been doing in the transfer market which, to be honest and with the exception of Liverpool, is not a lot.
Manchester City
The champions seem to be relying on last season’s heroes to retain the title this time around. They have, in fairness, added top quality in Riyad Mahrez but, having been cheated out of Jorginho by Chelsea’s immoral and unethical way of conducting business, they seem no nearer to replacing Yaya Touré although they still have a bit of time left yet. (more…)
Mesut Özil has retired from international football. Not for the usual reasons of being too old, or too slow or even too good. No, he has retired because he feels disrespected after racist comments were made about him following his being photographed alongside the Turkish president, Recep Tayyip Erdoğan.
What did he expect? Whilst we deplore all racism there was bound to be some reaction to such a thoughtless action.
Erdoğan is head of the oppressive government which has been accused of human rights abuses as well as being outspoken about German politics. (more…)
Anthony “Marmite” Martial is reaching a crossroads in his career at the ripe old age of 22.
He is adored by some fans, hated by others. He is criticised for his demeanour which is, in fact, very similar to that of his manager. He is criticised for his lack of workrate. He is considered by some to be lazy, a player who only wants to be involved in the nicer aspects of a football match.
He didn’t do enough to convince Didier Deschamps that he was worth a place in the French World Cup squad although, in fairness, they did pretty well without him. (more…)
Whisper it quietly readers, but Liverpool have bought a new goalkeeper. Apparently, after a costly mistake in a pre-season friendly, Loris Karius is no longer to be trusted as numero uno at the club.
Forget that he single-handedly, (almost literally), cost Liverpool any chance they may have had of beating Real Madrid in the Champion’s League final. No, it would appear that Jürgen Klopp, that soft-hearted old teddy bear, was prepared to forgive him those mistakes and continue with him between the sticks for another season. (more…)
Video Assistant Referee, (VAR) as it is called by those in the know, has been a relative success in this World Cup. It has made incorrect decisions almost a thing of the past and that is the whole point.
“Incorrect decisions” suggests that a clear and obvious error has been made and VAR is there to right these wrongs.
In the final of the World Cup there were two opportunities to use VAR, or there were none, depending upon your point of view. (more…)
(England supporters strike a pose which has become all-too familiar over the last 50-odd years)
Now that the dust has settled on England’s World Cup success/failure, do we really have a team capable of winning a future tournament?
On the evidence of this one the answer has to be a pretty emphatic NO.
Even the “experts” are finally starting to come round to our way of thinking which, all along, has been that this was an average England team and they put in some very poor performances on their way to fourth place. (more…)
After tomorrow there will probably be very few articles on the subject of the World Cup. The winner will have been decided and, hopefully, Croatia will have collected the trophy for the first time ever. The alternative is another four years of French strutting and preening which, while not unusual, would definitely be more annoying.
Today, England met Belgium in the meaningless third placed play-off game. A game into which the England manager was trying to inject some life. He was doing so by trying to convince a very dubious public and an even more dubious WSA, that the game was not meaningless. (more…)
It doesn’t really matter whether England finish third or fourth. For them, the World Cup is over. FIFA prolonging their stay in Russia is more like a punishment rather than any prestigious ending to the competition.
On the positive side, the game on Saturday gives England’s reserves a chance for some revenge on Belgium’s reserves for the 1-0 beating they handed out in the group stage. On the negative side, nobody cares.
The result of that game, which decided who won the group and who finished second, was the biggest mistake made by the two teams. Had they contrived to let England win the group then the team would probably have lost in the quarter-final to Brazil. (more…)
England finally reverted to type. Having beaten the team four places below them in the world rankings to reach the semi-final they then went out, quite tamely, to the team eight places below them.
In fairness, they have made massive strides forward by getting this far in a World Cup but, also in fairness, they came a cropper as soon as they met a decent team.
Forget Belgium in the group stage. That wasn’t a competitive game. It was a game between two reserve teams who had seen their senior players already qualify for the next stage. So the first real test was against Sweden and they passed with flying colours. They passed mainly because Sweden failed to work out the English system. (more…)
WHY SAY ANYTHING? 