The Importance of Sport (NEW CONCEPTS)

[Mick Harper]

For years the Giro was ruined by twats running along beside riders as they ploughed up a mountain stage but this appears now to have been replaced by twats with hang gliders.

Fun fact: the current leader, Geraint Thomas, was taken out by an Italian policeman with a motorbike the last time he competed.

[Mick Harper]

[Mick Harper]

Forest 1 Arsenal 0

Although this was a nothing match, the portents are not good. When you have eighty-two per cent of the ball without creating a clear-cut chance you can be pretty sure something's wrong. One thing wrong is Jesus and that can be remedied by sending him off to Turkey to join Mezut Orsil. It'll cost us a bundle but definitely money well spent.

More basic though is how easily Forest snuffed us out. True, they are one of the better defences in the Premiership, but their basic system can be duplicated by anyone who wants to snuff Arsenal out next season. Should work in Europe though.

I'm not saying my (new found) admiration of Arteta means he can't work the oracle but the time it took him to come up with the present oracle and the fact that he bought Jesus for big money after several years at Man City watching Pep play a false number nine rather than playing Jesus at number nine, means I may have to go back to 'Arteta must go'.

[Mick Harper]

Bournemouth 0 Man Utd 1

I was casually watching this at the fag end of MotD when someone called Casemiro did a spectacular overhead to put Bournemouth one-up. 'He seems to have been a good buy,' I thought. A little time later I realised it was Bournemouth at home and Casemiro was in the phosphorescent lime green of Man U's away kit. You can't miss it, I should have known.

Determined to pay more attention, I heard the name Wan-Bissaka being mentioned so often in Bournemouth ping-pong penalty area action that I thought, 'The Cherries must have bought him in the winter window and are trying him out in the centre of the defence.' It transpired he was still with United but (I can only guess) has been pushed up front in some new desperate expedient of the baldy-but-bearded one to avoid the usual summer sack.

My God, I hope this shower don't make it into the Champion's League, they'll embarrass us all. I suppose we could offer them Jesus, he'll fit right in.

[Mick Harper]

You Are The Varman

There's a skirmish in the penalty area, ball comes out, bit of bish-bosh, a lurking attacker smashes it towards goal, goalie makes wundersave. You look at the skirmish and decide it could be a pen... but did the ref think it was a pen but is playing advantage even though none eventually accrued (in which case you have no jurisdiction) or did the ref think it wasn't a pen (in which case you do).

Oh yes, people think Cocklecarrot nods, but he is as pedantic as ever.

[Mick Harper]

Man City 1 Chelsea 0

The really telling comment was the commentator's "Have you ever seen a more expensive subs bench?" He was referring to City's but in fact it was true of both benches. City's because they were resting their stars, Chelsea's because they've dropped so many of their recent purchases. However, I give this firm prediction:

[Mick Harper]

Man Management Tips with Sam Allardyce

[Mick Harper]

The Denver Nuggets have reached the NBA finals. So? They're owned by the Kroenkies. So? The Kroenkies own the Los Angeles Rams. So? The Los Angeles Rams reached the Super Bowl the year before. So? Arsenal are owned by the Kroenkies. So? Arsenal will reach the Champion's League final next year. It's mystical, the Triad of Transcending Success. You wouldn't understand.

[Mick Harper]

Sir Geraint will be the oldest ever winner of the Giro if he can beat off the challenge from the white jersey. Worn by the leading young rider, currently in second place. It's the toughest finishing week of any Giro in history. We may have to hire some hang gliders.

[Mick Harper]

The Brighton equaliser against Man City was somebody who 'had never scored before at the Amex' shooting from outside the box with a bit of curl into the top corner. The goalie got nowhere near it. Experience is eloquent that this is so seldom achieved it ought not to be attempted in the first place. The AE question is: why? To a layman (I count myself one as an ex-goalie) it does not look like a skill any more difficult than the things they get up to nowadays as a matter of routine. If you can ping a ball thirty yards to somebody's feet with a bit of fade, why not a twenty yard ball into the top corner with a bit of swerve?

Clearly a Premiership footballer can't (routinely) but that may have to be given a rider ('at present'). There is a historical precedent to guide us. Long, long ago nobody could score from a free kick outside the box so it was never attempted. Then all of a sudden (I think it was Brazilians at a World Cup) you could and defensive walls had to be introduced. You young shavers won't believe it but they were unknown when I was a young shaver and were subject to ridicule ('unsporting', 'girlie' etc) when they were. As was I but that's not relevant here.

We may be on the cusp of a similar step. Forward or back I wouldn't like to say.

[Mick Harper]

Where have all these promising young white English forwards sprung from? They've got such suspiciously English names I'm sending a dossier to the Home Office. We would never live down winning the World Cup importing ringers. If they were manufactured in British gene-splicing labs, then fair enough.

And while they're about it the Home Office might care to review Guardiola's visa arrangements. He went mental because a Haarland goal was chalked off when Meister Ponytail pulled his Brighton marker's shirt so hard the bloke couldn't mark him. Memo to Pep: that's not allowed in this country. Actually they should pack Haarland off as well so the cheating duo can reflect on their crimes in ... possibly the Hague but that may be an overreaction.

[Mick Harper]

Advice to Grandfathers

[Mick Harper]

Unless it's a computer game when my competitiveness has meant the committing to memory of a number of reactions

"Oh, had we started? I thought you were just showing me how it was played."
"Okay, that's the practice round done and dusted, I've got the gist. Let's play for real."
"Oh, I thought I was Zelda the Barbarian."
"I've got a lot on at the moment, let's call it a draw and resume later."
"A bit basic. I expect you've been practising a lot. Well done all the same."
"I always let kids win, they get upset otherwise."

[Mick Harper]

Man Utd 4 Chelsea 1

Despite the scoreline I'd be happier being a Chelsea fan than a Man U one on this showing. It was quite obvious that once Chelsea have been given a proper managerial shake-up they'll take their place at or near the top (of the world). Man Utd already have a proper manager.

It's the wider club administration that's the real problem. How can two of the most expensively assembled sides in the known universe not have a striker? I don't mean a bad striker, or an injured striker or a disappointing striker... just no striker. (Apart from that Man U bloke bought from Leamington Spa for £12.50.) It's utterly bizarre. Maybe they'll try no goalies next. It would make judging offside tricky for other people's strikers.

[Mick Harper]

One loses touch with football outside the Premiership -- unlike my young day when you had your Tiger league ladders to keep up to date every week going all the way down to the Third Division (South) and Third Division (was there really a?) North. I still don't know how they kept those to their right part of England when they all stayed there, thanks to the Gentlemen's Re-Election Agreement, yet arbitrary teams would drop into them from above.

Nowadays all you hear from the nether regions is that such and such has gone into receivership and so-and-so, who used to be great, have just dropped into non-league status for the first time. The Gents' Pact has long been a thing of the past. Coventry and Luton have long been in one or other of these categories so it comes as a shock to discover they are playing at Wembley for 'the most valuable prize in football' i.e. to take the third spot for the Premiership and worth £177 million, according to the Guardian. Imagine taking a last-minute pen with that on your shoulders.

It wasn't always like this. Luton was one of my earliest memories when they played (and lost to) Forest in the cup final of 1959, and Coventry were being managed by Jimmy Hill who was creating waves everywhere. My favourite Hill stunt was when, although you weren't allowed to advertise on the shirt, he had their sky blue outfit made to look like the Talbot logo -- a car made in Coventry -- and Alan 'Hard' Hardacre at the Football League snarled but could do nothing about it.

Hello and goodbye, one of you.