Onside Midweek Football Thread

Another treble for the WW2 infantryman as Stoke capitulate. Chelsea wrap up the title, Palace win the Selhurt six-pointer.

Bayern slam eight past Hamburg, Napoli wobble, Sevilla win Europe’s fiercest derby. PSG trounce Marseille. Feyenoord edge nearer to the Eredivisie. Nainggolan adds a couple more to his increasing collection of big game blooters. Real come back from two goals down at La Ceramica (heh) to keep in chage of the Spanish title race.

United win the League Cup after an absolute shocker from the officials. Hard not to feel sorry for Southampton who were absolutely superb throughout. The stats eggs are saying that’s the seventeenth offside goal United have benefitted from this season (incorrectly given for, or incorrectly ruled out against). Would be nice if we could have a mature chat about this rather than the usual CONSPIRACY! versus WE’RE BACK! nonsense.

City have apparently agreed two big deals for full-backs - Bellerin from Arsenal and some lad from Leverkusen. Aguero to Real…again. Guuuuuus to Leicester. Michael Keane. Everton. £28m. Okay.

AOB?

Think there’s an odd inverse relationship that goes on between defenders’ innate quality and their own teams. Whilst strikers are so often good despite the dreck they’re surrounded by, a lot of the time it’s difficult to judge how good a centre back really is versus the unit he’s a part of and the amount of drilling they’re getting.

Poorer teams will spend a lot more time on defensive training than better ones, and the threats they’ll be facing at the next level up will be intrinsically different - instead of 90 minutes of aerial bombardment, scrambles in the box and instinctive blocks, they have to learn how to not switch off, not get caught cold on the break and to cope with being pressed. Think much the same can be said of goalies. I remember when he was at Sunderland Mignolet was lauded because he was a great shot stopper, and a step up seemed natural at the time. Turns out though his distribution is terrible and he’s a flapper supreme, so now his name is mud.

All of this is to basically say that if you took Michael Keane and dumped him into Liverpool’s backline, he’d be getting pelters within the month.

Said it on Saturday but wouldn’t be surprised if someone in England bought John Brooks (especially if hertha don’t get champions league). Had the mix of size, pace and ability on the ball of someone like Van Dijk. Reckon he’d improve all bar 2 premier league teams

IN SCOTLAND:

  • Dembele scores a lovely goal as Celtic keep winning
  • Aberdeen strengthen their grip on second with their relentless form, as Rangers continue to stumble without a manager
  • Motherwell concede about their 90th goal of the last few games

Sad news about the condition of Billy McNeill:

SUBTHREAD that’s possibly been done before:

What names have adorned the back of your various football shirts?
I’ve only ever had 2 proper shirts, and only one had a name on the back - Earnshaw, obviously.
Considered a Bale Welsh shirt this summer though, still might get one soon.

YOU?

None. It was hard enough to get my parents to part with the cash for a football strip when I was young, no chance they were paying for a name/number as well. By the time I had my own money I was old enough to know better.

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Got a Hargreaves England shirt in 2006 cause everyone at school had beckham/lampard/Gerrard/Rooney and I wanted to be an edgelord. Ended up being our best player in that tournament too.

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I’ve not had a football shirt for years and when I did I generally didn’t have a name. Apart from once when I had Lombardo on a Palace shirt.

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Quite a team our collective backs are forming so far :joy:

never had one. wanted to get Agbonlahor on the back of mine when he first broke through but didnt…good anecdote

Another stirring address from Moyesy to rally the troops:

“I don’t think it’s beyond the lads to be slightly worse than average.”

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First shirt i got just had a number on the back. Think it was 2 or 5, or whatever Paul Lake was. This would have been after his injury and subsequent demotion to 33, but he was the only hope we had.

After that, White, Walsh, Rösler, Kinkladze. After about 1997 it simply became to embarrassing to bother, and by the time we’d signed Silva and Tevez i was too old.

ROY

Scholes, P. Neville (made a JJB guy cut a full stop off of a pre-made v. Nistelrooy for me) and my own surname (after I was talked out of getting Greening on the back by a megastore employee on my first ever visit to Old Trafford)

Also got Jenas 14 on the back of an England shirt once in some fucking dreadful bants.

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The cheap option?

At 2.9 mil he was a then club record transfer.

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#how did i get on in my BIG LEAGUE predos?

#aberdeen v rosco PREDO 2-2 RESULT 1-0
#celtic v hamac PREDO 4-0 RESULT 2-0
#motherwell v dundee PREDO 3-1 RESULT 1-5
#partick thistlenil v :hearts: PREDO 1-2 RESULT 2-0
#st johnstone v lee mckilliech’s big boys PREDO 2-0 RESULT 0-2

#final score 1/18

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BEBETO - Depor 95 kit
HIERRO - Spain 96 kit
DI MATTEO - Chelsea 97 kit