Another Drive4show 'Anything goes' thread

[McLaren]

First topic message reminder :

Kwini

It amazes me that a professional footballer can end up one footed. Just practice with your weak foot every day.

I remember spending a summer playing with only my left foot in the garden. Came back next season two footed.

[super_realist]

Not sure where that nickname comes from Ralph, being the regional home of Aberdeen Angus beef I’d have thought Coo more appropriate and sheep more relevant to the Welsh outfit that humped Kilmarnock last night.

Anyways, as an Aberdeen fan I would have thought the coefficient would be of more interest. Wouldn’t you prefer entry at group stage rather than banana skin qualifiers? Personally I hate the whole approach uefa take in ranking teams/countries as it’s geared toward money laden leagues with big TV rights but it is what it is and we have to get on with it. The Dutch aren’t a big money league yet they turn out talent year after year and occasionally a PSV or Ajax light the way for lesser nations. Obviously, after the relative success of Ajax this season, their team gets broken up but at least it means money rolling into Dutch football to be recycled. That is what the Scottish League should be looking to do/aspire to. Trouble is (and this is where there are some grains of truth in what Super says), the SFA & SPFL are riddled with parochial petty jealously, infighting and a complete inability to make sound decisions for the good of the game especially in terms of selling/marketing itself. So the game in Scotland  stumbles along taking slaps in the face like Kilmarnock took last night. While the national team crawls away from places like Kazakhstan with its tail between its legs. Football does go in cycles though and with a bit of will Scottish football could/should get back to a better place than where it is now.
European football has been  going now for over 60 years, the longest period without a Scottish team appearing in a final is 16 years (Dundee Utd in ‘87 to Celtic in ‘03). It’s currently 11 years and counting, I’m pretty sure we’ve never been as low as we are now and the smart money would say it’ll be more than 5 years before a Scottish Club graces a final again. But hey, you never know when the next  Fergie, Stein or McLean will be unearthed, NOBODY can predict that, not even Super.

Scottish football doesn't deserve to be anywhere near Europe.
More than 5 years? I doubt we'll see a Scottish team in a final in the next 100 years. Why would there be? I wouldn't expect to see a Serbian or Swedish team in a final, so why would anyone think there was ever a chance of a Scottish team getting there? There's simply no financial interest in the game here.
Football wasn't always about money, which is why teams like Aberdeen and Dundee United could get to finals. That's not the case any more and I can't ever see a day when a Scottish team will ever get to a QF, let alone a final. Right now, you can't actually guarantee any Scottish club  team is going to get through a qualification campaign in Europe.

[super_realist]

Mac. I caught a bit of the news yesterday and your celebrity crush Laura Kuensberg was on. I have no idea what you see in her. She looked like she'd had a stroke. Not a remotely attractive woman.

[McLaren]

Are you kidding. That red dress she had on was hot.

[super_realist]

Are you kidding. That red dress she had on was hot.

She's incredibly plain and frumpy Mac, even by British standards.

[McLaren]

Well who is your exemplar of beauty?

[dynamark]

Am I in a dream ?

[navyblueshorts]

Am I in a dream ?

No; a nightmare.

[JAS]

Are you kidding. That red dress she had on was hot.

She's incredibly plain and frumpy Mac, even by British standards.

Can’t believe you’re biting Super, Mac’s clearly wumming. I don’t think much of her journalistic prowess either.

[JAS]

Not sure where that nickname comes from Ralph, being the regional home of Aberdeen Angus beef I’d have thought Coo more appropriate and sheep more relevant to the Welsh outfit that humped Kilmarnock last night.

Anyways, as an Aberdeen fan I would have thought the coefficient would be of more interest. Wouldn’t you prefer entry at group stage rather than banana skin qualifiers? Personally I hate the whole approach uefa take in ranking teams/countries as it’s geared toward money laden leagues with big TV rights but it is what it is and we have to get on with it. The Dutch aren’t a big money league yet they turn out talent year after year and occasionally a PSV or Ajax light the way for lesser nations. Obviously, after the relative success of Ajax this season, their team gets broken up but at least it means money rolling into Dutch football to be recycled. That is what the Scottish League should be looking to do/aspire to. Trouble is (and this is where there are some grains of truth in what Super says), the SFA & SPFL are riddled with parochial petty jealously, infighting and a complete inability to make sound decisions for the good of the game especially in terms of selling/marketing itself. So the game in Scotland  stumbles along taking slaps in the face like Kilmarnock took last night. While the national team crawls away from places like Kazakhstan with its tail between its legs. Football does go in cycles though and with a bit of will Scottish football could/should get back to a better place than where it is now.
European football has been  going now for over 60 years, the longest period without a Scottish team appearing in a final is 16 years (Dundee Utd in ‘87 to Celtic in ‘03). It’s currently 11 years and counting, I’m pretty sure we’ve never been as low as we are now and the smart money would say it’ll be more than 5 years before a Scottish Club graces a final again. But hey, you never know when the next  Fergie, Stein or McLean will be unearthed, NOBODY can predict that, not even Super.

Scottish football doesn't deserve to be anywhere near Europe.
More than 5 years? I doubt we'll see a Scottish team in a final in the next 100 years. Why would there be? I wouldn't expect to see a Serbian or Swedish team in a final, so why would anyone think there was ever a chance of a Scottish team getting there? There's simply no financial interest in the game here.
Football wasn't always about money, which is why teams like Aberdeen and Dundee United could get to finals. That's not the case any more and I can't ever see a day when a Scottish team will ever get to a QF, let alone a final. Right now, you can't actually guarantee any Scottish club  team is going to get through a qualification campaign in Europe.

Looks like the gauntlet has been laid for the 21/22 season with the advent of Europa league 2 (for teams from countries ranked 16 or worse. We’ll need 2/3 good seasons to get back to the top 15, doable but certainly not guaranteed.

[Collapse2005]

Ireland need 182 runs to win at Lords. England all out with the first ball of the day. Will they do it?

[McLaren]

Not a wind up.  




And she plays golf

[Collapse2005]

Rough enough looking bird

[dynamark]

Play golf -Not with me she doesn't .

[navyblueshorts]

Ireland need 182 runs to win at Lords. England all out with the first ball of the day. Will they do it?

That'll be an emphatic 'No' then.

[Collapse2005]

Ireland need 182 runs to win at Lords. England all out with the first ball of the day. Will they do it?

That'll be an emphatic 'No' then.

Yes smashed, albeit you weren't willing to make a prediction until after the fact it seems.

Still they acquitted themselves well over the three days.

[Be_the_ball]

Jesus Mac, you need professional help. What happened to the Mischa Barton lookalike you said you were going out with? Did she get a puncture?

[Collapse2005]

Haha

[McLaren]

Can you not find them both attractive?

[navyblueshorts]

Ireland need 182 runs to win at Lords. England all out with the first ball of the day. Will they do it?

That'll be an emphatic 'No' then.

Yes smashed, albeit you weren't willing to make a prediction until after the fact it seems.

Still they acquitted themselves well over the three days.

Sorry, only saw your post after the eye-blink that was the Irish innings I'm afraid. Doesn't help that all cricket is on Sky now either; I've pretty much lost the interest in it that I had pre-2005.
I'd agree with you re. Ireland though; for a new Test nation, they were pretty damned good and, if anything, England came out of the result infinitely worse. Pretty sure the Aussies pacemen will be licking their lips at the thought of the upcoming Ashes series.

[navyblueshorts]

Jesus Mac, you need professional help. What happened to the Mischa Barton lookalike you said you were going out with? Did she get a puncture?

Just Googled her; to be fair, she does look pretty plastic. Am I allowed to say that sort of thing these days?

[McLaren]

Anyway not sure I ever said Mischa Barton lookalike, more just has that general look.

[McLaren]

Jesus Mac, you need professional help. What happened to the Mischa Barton lookalike you said you were going out with? Did she get a puncture?

Just Googled her; to be fair, she does look pretty plastic. Am I allowed to say that sort of thing these days?

I'm not offended, as I said the likeness isn't all that great, just the general idea.  You guys are hard to please though, Mischa Barton and Laura K beneath your standards!

[beninho]

Isn't mischa barton drug addled? So like most scots then..

[navyblueshorts]

Jesus Mac, you need professional help. What happened to the Mischa Barton lookalike you said you were going out with? Did she get a puncture?

Just Googled her; to be fair, she does look pretty plastic. Am I allowed to say that sort of thing these days?

I'm not offended, as I said the likeness isn't all that great, just the general idea.  You guys are hard to please though, Mischa Barton and Laura K beneath your standards!

Be a bit boring if we all like the same things, wouldn't it?

[beninho]

£15m for Phillip Billing. Who the hell is he? Remember when that figure got you an Alan Shearer, or whem 11m got you a Thierry Henry.

I have no idea about the transfer market anymore.

Arsenal spending £72onm on Nicholas Pepe, and 26m on Saliba who is 18 and sent back to france for the season. 50m on Joelinton. Its all utter madness.

[super_realist]

£15m for Phillip Billing. Who the hell is he? Remember when that figure got you an Alan Shearer, or whem 11m got you a Thierry Henry.

I have no idea about the transfer market anymore.

Arsenal spending £72onm on Nicholas Pepe, and 26m on Saliba who is 18 and sent back to france for the season. 50m on Joelinton. Its all utter madness.

Completely agree, you get somebody like Hudson Odoi, who is not much more than an embryo, has played a handful of first team games and is getting 100k a week when he's not even an established player. I'm not sure that it can be sustained, surely at some point football is going to implode (which will be funny). It's only supported by TV money, and without it how could it survive?

[kwinigolfer]

£15m for Phillip Billing. Who the hell is he? Remember when that figure got you an Alan Shearer, or whem 11m got you a Thierry Henry.

I have no idea about the transfer market anymore.

Arsenal spending £72onm on Nicholas Pepe, and 26m on Saliba who is 18 and sent back to france for the season. 50m on Joelinton. Its all utter madness.

Completely agree, you get somebody like Hudson Odoi, who is not much more than an embryo, has played a handful of first team games and is getting 100k a week when he's not even an established player. I'm not sure that it can be sustained, surely at some point football is going to implode (which will be funny). It's only supported by TV money, and without it how could it survive?

It seems ALL Sport is "only supported by TV money" . . . . . . . . a bubble will burst sooner or later.

[super_realist]

No other sport pays such ridiculous sums to nobodies though, that's the point.

Most other sports, you only make the money if you actually succeed and win something, footballers get paid outrageous sums of money for being average.

[Be_the_ball]

Is it possible to feel sad to see someone become the highest paid footballer in the world, £1m per week? That's what Gareth Bale will be on in China. A waste of talent imo playing over there.

[Davie]

The Bale deal has reportedly fallen through already

[beninho]

The Bale deal, I have no issues with. He's basically conquered European football. Let him take the cash if he can.

Curious whether Madrid have pulled it, over Zidanes head. Especially aftet the thumping to athletico.

[Be_the_ball]

Unfortunately I dont think Zidane had any time for Bale. Some of the reports out of Madrid sounded like bullying. Him being left out of various things. He had some level of Spanish, but its very easy for native speakers to exclude a non native speaker if they want, using slang etc..

[super_realist]

Unfortunately I dont think Zidane had any time for Bale. Some of the reports out of Madrid sounded like bullying. Him being left out of various things. He had some level of Spanish, but its very easy for native speakers to exclude a non native speaker if they want, using slang etc..

How long has he been there now? There's no excuse for him not to be fluent in Spanish. Given the time he's been there, the resources he has, the spare time he has per day,  he should be able to speak good enough Spanish to be able to pick up on everything.

Lineker was only in Barcelona for three seasons, he's fluent, Bale has been there six I think. If he's not fluent, he only has himself to blame.

[pedro]

Unfortunately I dont think Zidane had any time for Bale. Some of the reports out of Madrid sounded like bullying. Him being left out of various things. He had some level of Spanish, but its very easy for native speakers to exclude a non native speaker if they want, using slang etc..

How long has he been there now? There's no excuse for him not to be fluent in Spanish. Given the time he's been there, the resources he has, the spare time he has per day,  he should be able to speak good enough Spanish to be able to pick up on everything.

Lineker was only in Barcelona for three seasons, he's fluent, Bale has been there six I think. If he's not fluent, he only has himself to blame.

The only words Bale picked up are: Campo de golf.

[McLaren]

A garlic festival? Yep you just keep your guns American and everything will be fine...

[JAS]

Is it possible to feel sad to see someone become the highest paid footballer in the world, £1m per week? That's what Gareth Bale will be on in China. A waste of talent imo playing over there.

I’d say squeezing a £1m a week Bale would have been pretty much making the most of his talent. More of a question would be how can Chinese clubs pay more than the worlds established leading clubs. How can they possibly have a sustainable business model (which doesn’t include some sort of money laundering activity). I take it FFP is a uefa thing not a fifa thing?

[Collapse2005]

Is it possible to feel sad to see someone become the highest paid footballer in the world, £1m per week? That's what Gareth Bale will be on in China. A waste of talent imo playing over there.

I’d say squeezing a £1m a week Bale would have been pretty much making the most of his talent. More of a question would be how can Chinese clubs pay more than the worlds established leading clubs. How can they possess Bly have a sustainable business model (which doesn’t include some sort of money laundering activity). I take it FFP is a uefa thing not a fifa thing?

They may have just copied English footballs model of attracting overseas investors to invest their illicit fortunes in clubs in order to make their money legitimate and seek refuge at the same time.

English football is one of the worlds front runners in money laundering.

[JAS]

Is it possible to feel sad to see someone become the highest paid footballer in the world, £1m per week? That's what Gareth Bale will be on in China. A waste of talent imo playing over there.

I’d say squeezing a £1m a week Bale would have been pretty much making the most of his talent. More of a question would be how can Chinese clubs pay more than the worlds established leading clubs. How can they possess Bly have a sustainable business model (which doesn’t include some sort of money laundering activity). I take it FFP is a uefa thing not a fifa thing?

They may have just copied English footballs model of attracting overseas investors to invest their illicit fortunes in clubs in order to make their money legitimate and seek refuge at the same time.

English football is one of the worlds front runners in money laundering.

Just checked (slow Monday!!) and the Chinese Club chasing Bale have an average home gate of 32000 for the past few seasons. Now admittedly one can only speculate at the rest of the wage bill but if the were prepared to lump out £1m a week on Bale it would be reasonable to guess that the rest of the squad + mgr and other assistants the wage bill may be £5m?? Divide that by 32k!! And that doesn’t include other running costs. Admittedly it doesn’t include merchandising or TV income either. Anyone know what sort of TV revenue the CSL dishes out to their clubs?

[kwinigolfer]

A garlic festival? Yep you just keep your guns American and everything will be fine...

Mac,
Gilroy is the "Garlic Capital of the World", or at least that's the way the United States looks at it.

But:
Which Major Champion, one of the tallest of that ilk and possibly the last to be functionally illiterate, was known as the Gilroy Cowboy?

[super_realist]

Is it possible to feel sad to see someone become the highest paid footballer in the world, £1m per week? That's what Gareth Bale will be on in China. A waste of talent imo playing over there.

I’d say squeezing a £1m a week Bale would have been pretty much making the most of his talent. More of a question would be how can Chinese clubs pay more than the worlds established leading clubs. How can they possess Bly have a sustainable business model (which doesn’t include some sort of money laundering activity). I take it FFP is a uefa thing not a fifa thing?

They may have just copied English footballs model of attracting overseas investors to invest their illicit fortunes in clubs in order to make their money legitimate and seek refuge at the same time.

English football is one of the worlds front runners in money laundering.

In terms of business, any other company that ran with such a high percentage of turnover as staff salaries would be laughed out of the business world and there would be a shareholder revolt.

Most successful, large businesses on a scale with a football club have a wage bill of around 10%. I suspect football clubs are nearer 80-90%.

[Collapse2005]

Is it possible to feel sad to see someone become the highest paid footballer in the world, £1m per week? That's what Gareth Bale will be on in China. A waste of talent imo playing over there.

I’d say squeezing a £1m a week Bale would have been pretty much making the most of his talent. More of a question would be how can Chinese clubs pay more than the worlds established leading clubs. How can they possess Bly have a sustainable business model (which doesn’t include some sort of money laundering activity). I take it FFP is a uefa thing not a fifa thing?

They may have just copied English footballs model of attracting overseas investors to invest their illicit fortunes in clubs in order to make their money legitimate and seek refuge at the same time.

English football is one of the worlds front runners in money laundering.

In terms of business, any other company that ran with such a high percentage of turnover as staff salaries would be laughed out of the business world and there would be a shareholder revolt.

Most successful, large businesses on a scale with a football club  have a wage bill of around 10%. I suspect football clubs are nearer 80-90%.

In some ways that's why football is perfect for money laundering. Investors aren't going to make massive returns on investment compared to other industries however, they are happy to invest their fortunes if it makes their fortunes legitimate which it inevitably does such is the extent of good will that football has accumulated in communities around the world.

It is one of the many reasons I have no interest in professional European football anymore.

[Be_the_ball]

Unfortunately I dont think Zidane had any time for Bale. Some of the reports out of Madrid sounded like bullying. Him being left out of various things. He had some level of Spanish, but its very easy for native speakers to exclude a non native speaker if they want, using slang etc..

How long has he been there now? There's no excuse for him not to be fluent in Spanish. Given the time he's been there, the resources he has, the spare time he has per day,  he should be able to speak good enough Spanish to be able to pick up on everything.

Lineker was only in Barcelona for three seasons, he's fluent, Bale has been there six I think. If he's not fluent, he only has himself to blame.

It's not Gareth Bales fault Super, he was getting lessons from Diggers,
Bale speaks fluent Spanish now btw, its just with a Geordie accent    

I'm only joking Diggers, dónde estás?

[super_realist]

Unfortunately I dont think Zidane had any time for Bale. Some of the reports out of Madrid sounded like bullying. Him being left out of various things. He had some level of Spanish, but its very easy for native speakers to exclude a non native speaker if they want, using slang etc..

How long has he been there now? There's no excuse for him not to be fluent in Spanish. Given the time he's been there, the resources he has, the spare time he has per day,  he should be able to speak good enough Spanish to be able to pick up on everything.

Lineker was only in Barcelona for three seasons, he's fluent, Bale has been there six I think. If he's not fluent, he only has himself to blame.

It's not Gareth Bales fault Super, he was getting lessons from Diggers,
Bale speaks fluent Spanish now btw, its just with a Geordie accent    

I'm only joking Diggers, dónde estás?

Like Steve McLaren speaking fluent Dutch or Joey Barton French?

Where the hell is Diggers by the way? Did he threaten the life of a Brexiteer and end up in jail?

[kwinigolfer]

The Brexiteers are devaluing my pension - not happy.

[Be_the_ball]

The Brexiteers are devaluing my pension - not happy.

Why doesn't someone tell the Forex traders they just need to "believe".

[dynamark]

Digs sadly missing somewhere in the Brighton area.Maybe he is glued to a tree or something.
School hols now so he should busy preparing for next term .

[I'm never wrong]

For those who follow footie and are not aware, there are a host of new rules coming into play next season. https://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/football/48965849

[wiretapper]

Oli McBurnie £20 million

[kwinigolfer]

Oli McBurnie £20 million

I think he's going to be good though, don't you?
Strange they only got 15M for Daniel James . . . . . . imagine their American owners will flog off a couple of their other good youngsters and sell up, pocket the profits.

Plus we've just sold our best two players from last year, PFC beginning to lose any momentum they might have retained from last year. I blame Mickey Mouse.

[westisbest]

£20mill is pretty cheap in today’s (crazy) market.

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