A Sticker's Worth 500 Words

The Euro 2024 knockout stages are upon us and we’ve been served a veritable feast of football so far in Germany. Scotland once again suffered a group stage exit while Austria topped a tricky group after securing a famous win over the Netherlands to prove that maybe Ralf Rangnick wasn’t the problem at Manchester United after all.  The last remnants of Belgium’s ‘Golden Generation’ snuck through Group E while debutants Georgia pulled off the shock of the group stage with a 2-0 win over Portugal which Cristiano Ronaldo was absolutely fine with. Gareth Southgate ’s England, meanwhile, have taken a unique approach to winning a group by boring their opponents, travelling fans and supporters at home into such a vegetative state that it makes you wonder if they are taking the game to strange new places rather than bringing it home. Football had no chance of coming home in 2008 as, due to a certain “wally with a brolly”, the Three Lions were not even heading on the plane to Austria and Sw...

The European Championship is back in Germany for the first time since 1988 and if that tournament was anything to go by we might be in for a fun few weeks. Those present and watching along at home didn’t see a single red card and no game went beyond ninety minutes sparing all involved the ennui of extra-time. The Netherlands finally overcame their major final demons thanks to Ruud Gullit ’s header and Marco van Basten ’s iconic volley against the Soviet Union. Jack Charlton ’s Republic of Ireland reached their first international finals and earned a cathartic win over an England side who flew home following subsequent defeats to both finalists.  Gareth Southgate ’s men have a kinder group than Bobby Robson’s but they are also long overdue a humiliating exit with Serbia and Slovenia providing potential banana skins. Meanwhile the hosts are looking to go ahead of Spain as the competition’s most successful team with a fourth win and begin their campaign against Scotland tonight. The...

Since October 2023 Joey Barton has had a fair amount of time on his hands. Never one to shy away from sharing his views the former Fleetwood Town and Bristol Rovers’ manager has followed in the footsteps of many a former footballer and launched a podcast which, in turn, has increased his already extensive use of Elon Musk’s social media experiment. Rather than leaning on the Nietzsche and Morrissey quotes that got him on Question Time back in 2014 Barton has gone down a more tried and tested route of dishing out controversial barbs at female pundits, Jeremy Vine and Gary Neville to name but a few. Having played a full twelve minutes of international football he also shared his views on the current crop of England stars. Particular vitriol was levelled at Kyle Walker for being “more arsed about looking like the rapper Drake than the great Bobby Moore” while midfielder Jude Bellingham was praised for his lack of earrings or leggings in training in comparison to his team mates “all wanti...

While the 1994 World Cup was the first major tournament I remember and Euro ’96 dominated all aspects of life due to being held in England and the host nation’s penalty shootout heartache it was not until 1998 that I truly tapped into the build up to the forthcoming festivities in France. We gathered at my uncle’s to watch the pivotal qualifier between the Three Lions and Italy to witness Paul Ince do his best Terry Butcher impression and the 0-0 draw meant it was time to squirrel away the pocket money for yet another sticker album. It’s probably a good time to personally apologise for the climate crisis, and to my old man, due to the regular visits to the Sainsbury’s petrol station deemed essential for the good of the family motor which were actually to add to the supermarket’s questionable tie-in medal collection . The speculation over who would make Glenn Hoddle’s squad was endless and the England manager was spoilt for choice in a variety of positions. The joint top scorers in ...

Mat Jolin-Beech takes us back to the ongoing psychodrama that is Manchester United with this post on a solid midfielder who followed up his 342 appearances for the Red Devils by entering the Byzantine world of the club’s backroom staff. Unlike his hard work and efficiency on the pitch it’s less obvious what he’s up to these days. Perhaps Mat has solved the riddle. One lunch break at work, scrolling though YouTube to pass the time, coupled to my pesto pasta salad, a theme cropped up from the INEOS revolution hopefully taking place at Old Trafford. The role of the imminent director of football , and how the club can conform to, and thrive within, the FFP (or whatever they will be called with the shakeup and alignment to European regulations – Brexit, what Brexit?) was something kept coming up. One key theme within this was the role of the academy to produce players for the team, but also players that can be sold for, under FFP rules, pure profit. Players like John O’Shea , Phil Neville, ...

Given an opportunity I would probably have cereal for most meals. I appreciate this reveals an unsophisticated palette, a distinct level of laziness and a concerning lack of maturity but if you hadn’t worked the last two out from this blog then maybe you haven’t been following too closely. Thankfully being married to an actual adult and enjoying cooking has prevented me from existing entirely on Cheerios but there’s always a box of something on the go for emergencies and what seems to be missing nowadays is a questionable prize to go with the breakfast, lunch or dinner of champions. In the halcyon days of the 1990s the choice of breakfast had much more to do with what random thing came free with it over nutritional value or flavour. This is perhaps why Sugar Puffs dominated the market. Buried in your pack of glazed puff wheat could be a figurine of Alan Shearer , Les Ferdinand or Lee Sharpe or perhaps a pencil topper letting you light up your Maths lessons with appearances from Gunna...

The last in our fourth year anniversary collection of cult hero posts comes from Mat Jolin-Beech and takes us to his traditional stamping ground of Old Trafford and the production line of quality Manchester United talent from the Sir Alex Ferguson years. Over to Mat on one of Waterford’s most famous sons. Cult heroes – those fan favourites than opposition fans and players love to hate. Or players that the homes fans love, despite them being a bit shit. That’s the definition right? Well, yes. But also no. It’s a very subjective thing and each club will have its own roster of cult heroes. I’m lucky, although having recently lost to Fulham makes me doubt that statement, that being a Manchester United fan there is a big list to choose from. I was thinking about Park Ji-Sung but I’ve covered that tireless worker before. Another was Diego Forlan purely for those goals against Liverpool. But I’ll save him for another day. Today, it’s John O’Shea and first up: that goal against Arsenal . T...