2021/22 Soccer Thread: It's Euro 2020 until it becomes 2021

Prederick wrote:

Also, an as-of-yet unnamed PL star has been accused of rape.

UK friends, is the word out on who this might be quite yet? The "lives in north London" part may have narrowed it down a bit. At least one of the possibilities is... uh... pretty jaw-dropping.

Word on the street - well, social media detectives - is that he plays for Arsenal and he likes to Partey.

There does seem to be a modicum of logic behind that - he’s the right age, will play in the World Cup and was also actually in London at the time of the alleged incident.

At the moment it seems to be every Tottenham / Arsenal player who is 29. What is very depressing is the number of football fans on twitter who are just jumping to hoping its an opposition player / not one of there's as opposed to considering how serious this is and the victims. I think its finally time to leave twitter.

Yeah, when I looked up the ARS/TOT players who were 29... well, like I said, there's one name that would've been quite the shock, given his public persona. I mean, he's like a Son to a lot of his team's supporters.

But I'm sadly unsurprised to hear that, on Twitter, this has turned into partisan banter and sniping. Lots of people pretending they give a damn about the victims, but only as far as they get to use them as a cudgel against the other team.

If this is true, I do hope these women get justice.

I heard it was Partey a few days ago. Didn't see any banter on the Tottenham subreddit, just a few sighs of relief that it wasn't one of our players. Someone also reposted a thread from the Arsenal subreddit calling for solidarity and donations to rape centers.

Prederick wrote:

Yeah, when I looked up the ARS/TOT players who were 29... well, like I said, there's one name that would've been quite the shock, given his public persona. I mean, he's like a Son to a lot of his team's supporters.

This wouldn't have worked as Son left England for South Korea right after the season and is waiting for the team to join him there for the summer friendlies we're playing. The rest of the team is training at Hotspur Way, but he was excused from it.

England looking good so far!

It's a very England performance - start well, go ahead and then fail to push on.

Three points is three points, but that was poor.

Mr Bismarck wrote:

Three points is three points, but that was poor.

I view that as "over the line, it'll do".

I know FM isn't real life, but I must admit I'm a bit pleased that Joao Palhinha, Fulham's first big buy of the transfer window, was just bought by Manchester City in my most recent save.

Prederick wrote:

I know FM isn't real life, but I must admit I'm a bit pleased that Joao Palhinha, Fulham's first big buy of the transfer window, was just bought by Manchester City in my most recent save.

Oh no, the fraud that is my football knowledge has been found out.

Bayern rule themselves out of the Ronaldo race which is meh.

Ronaldo to Chelsea is pretty boring. Kinda surprised he would make a move within the PL just for some CL games.

If Real would take him he should just go back there.

If ManU can't sign De Jong because Barca still owes him £17m in deferred wages......

Prederick wrote:

If ManU can't sign De Jong because Barca still owes him £17m in deferred wages......

You would think it would be easier to sign him then and that part of the fee would just go straight to him but ya.

I feel like Spain is trending towards Italy 2.0 in respect of becoming a less relevant league.

I wouldn't go that far, however Barca's financial situation is delightfully absurd.

UK buds, you'll all have to watch the Danny Drinkwater interview for me, I'm curious to see what he said.

Obviously, I think the ultimate lesson here is "the grass isn't always greener."

Almost forgot this, from yesterday in history:

I've never seen a team defend as badly as Brazil did that day. Truly amazing. I also recall Ozil missing a golden chance to make it 8-0 in the second half, which would have been even funnier.

I was out of town for work but managed to watch that game at the bar of a pub while eating lunch. Fantastic game to see with a crowd, but not in the usual way.

For me, it's always the fact that if, after 20 minutes, you left the room for 10 minutes, you'd come back to a game that had suddenly gone from 1-0 to 5-0.

Like, the question for me will always be, if Germany had played hard for 90 minutes, what would the final score have been? It'd definitely have been double digits, but how high would it have gotten?

Goodness, I knew France was good, but I thought Italy's team was at least half-decent. Sheesh.

OTD:

IMAGE(https://a.espncdn.com/combiner/i?img=%2Fphoto%2F2017%2F0323%2Fr193205_1296x729_16%2D9.jpg)

Prederick wrote:

OTD:

IMAGE(https://a.espncdn.com/combiner/i?img=%2Fphoto%2F2017%2F0323%2Fr193205_1296x729_16%2D9.jpg)

IT WAS ALL BALL!

It's amazing that looking at this picture -- it gives no indication of where the ball is. Just Tae-kwon-do practice happening.

Prederick wrote:

WAYNE'S BACK STATESIDE BABY!

DC in Roo-ins.

A dodgy penalty and then an offside decision (correctly) overturned by VAR. People who don't like England are going to be steaming.

England started well against Austria and then went into sleep mode. Even with a two goal lead if they do it again that might not work against Norway.

Apparently not an issue this time. Hemp and Mead have played really well so far and Norway look like they just want to hide.

Mr Bismarck wrote:

A dodgy penalty and then an offside decision (correctly) overturned by VAR. People who don't like England are going to be steaming.

England started well against Austria and then went into sleep mode. Even with a two goal lead if they do it again that might not work against Norway.

Apparently not an issue this time. Hemp and Mead have played really well so far and Norway look like they just want to hide.

6-0 up, not even half time yet. Ouch if you’re Norwegian. England playing to their potential

England probably got this one.

Poor Thorisdóttir has had an absolute nightmare and looks like she doesn't want to even touch the ball.

That goal from Beth Mead though. I liked that one.

Okay, I may be down on the MLS sometimes, although it's come on leaps and bounds in the last 10 years, so I think calling going from relegated, barely-solvent, now-in-League One Derby to DC United a "backwards step" is fairly horsesh*t.