Alph

not mine, but saw it on FB and it made me chuckle, I love stuff like this
 

It's not really a Premier League microcosm - it's a football one, though it is amplified beyond all reason in the premier league.
Footballers and managers exist in an environment where they never have to grow up. They play a game in childhood that someone pays them to do in adulthood, surrounded by similar people and those employed to perfom parental tasks like do the shopping, fix stuff etc.
Whilst this doesn't necessarily apply to all players, there are a lot of children in adult bodies, who never develop emotionally and are used to getting their own way, throwing tantrums etc.
The premier league and media endulge all this like rubbish parents.

Or, of course, it could be the fact that nobody outside of West Bridgford is in any way arsed about a couple of marginal decisions and no one has really paid attention to the clubs faux intimidating tantrum

I have had a prank backfire this morning and I thought you lovely lot would appreciate a good laugh. My friend and I love winding up her mum, Jackie. Last week I saw a postal prank that made me laugh, so I promptly ordered it for our Jackie. There must have been an address mix up and it landed on my doorstep. I work from home and see our postman all the time, goodness knows what he thinks 🤣🤣🤣 
Tell me about epic pranks you have pulled off, or failed to. I need some more inspiration 😂

Been good to see the collective headloss continue or if anything even heighten today. Lots of “we don’t care what anyone else says” which is of course something you definitely say when you don’t care.

 
 

No, me too.

Yeah, Sergeant was unfortunate and could've been handled by an instruction from race control/reprimand. I don't think he was trying to violate the safety car rules per se.
Perez has clearly had the message "if you want to carry on you must never ever upset Max, or Jos, or Marko ever again and never, ever, try to race Max, or we will destroy you." He actually tried to fight his corner for about 5 races last season and has ended up utterly crushed, the sad part being red bull will most likely bin him regardless after this season, so he might as well try to add a couple more grand prix wins to his career. I think he'll be racing sports cars soon (as in next season), too many up and coming drivers needing seats.

It never rains, it pours, eh?
https://www.planetf1.com/news/daniel-ricciardo-grid-penalty-miami-grand-prix

Is it unfair to expect Perez to actually do something that might just slightly be considered trying to come 1st? 
It seemed to me right from the off it was operation defend and I very much enjoyed watching Alonso get by. Perez launch seemed an entirely defensive one? 
Did feel sorry for the baby red bulls. Stroll was on his phone while everyone else was focused so ended up airlifting Ric and Tsunoda's admittedly poor weekend was topped off by Haassassination.
The penalty on Sergeant was too harsh. 

GP less exciting that the sprint was, Max won esily but some stuff happened behind him.
Lando got P2 with a good drive and some help from the safeth car, Perez was P3 after a pit stop under the safety car put him behind Norris and Leclerc. P4 Leclerc, P5 Sainz, P6 George, P7 Alonso, P8 Piastri, P9 Lewis "working his notice" Hamilton, P10 Hulkenberg
Most excitment was fighty Fernando at the start and at the end for P7.
1st safety car was Bottas' engine giving up, 2nd was after the restart where K-mag punted Tsunoda and Stroll rammed into the back of Ricciardo. Bad day from the cashgrab arbies tem. Typically for 2024 Danny ric, he was looking OK and got took out, but it was good to see him back to some sort of form, although to head off the DR3 stans, he would've had to pit again having run medium medium and not pitted under the safety cars, Yuki was pretty off it all weekend though.
Also typical of 2024, Hamilton spent the whole time whinging on the radio.
Zhou was enjoyed by the crowd but wasn't particually quick.
A point for Haas.
Alpine's Gasly tried to set off without one of his wheels on properly and fired the tyre into his mechanic (who is OK) - but it's a bungle from them in a pretty hilariously bad season.
 
 

Garcia v Haney was such a weird fight.
It looked like Garcia couldn’t be bothered in there, yet every now and again he’d throw a left hook and Haney’s chin was sticking right out there.
Haney looked the more skilled fighter and often took center ring, but also so sloppy as he was dropped 3 times by effectively the same combo. 
Garcia’s post-match interview was just rants thrown together. Summed up the fight.
I’m not sure if this makes Tank look a clear level above, or it looks bad for Haney. 
 

Didn't they give Georgia a kicking a few years ago whilst we all tutted and watched on?

Everyone should sit on both hands with a finger on their lips.

100% it would be better, its without question.
Good riddance to them I'd say.

It is disgusting, there's so many alternatives to how they could fix this. Ultimately the only clubs this really hurts are the ones who need it in lower leagues and non-league. The worst thing about it, only the Premier League were consulted. Boycott it and the League Cup.
Remove u21 sides from FLT, play them in the FA Cup if you're so scared of fatigue?
Why are the replays removed in rounds way before the bigger teams enter the competition?
Keep replays in rounds 3/4 and then stop them. Also, remove semis from Wembley.
Stop going on pre-season and post-season tours abroad.
 
 
I'm slowly starting to think football actually could be better if that Super League happened.

It is an utter disgrace, but not unexpected given the cosy relationship between the FA and the Premier League.
If they can do this, then there is nothing to stop them severing the relationship between the FA and the EFL - and the next logical step being the establishment of a 'closed shop' Premier League with no promotion and relegation.

The obvious solution to the FA Cup is simple. 
Prior to kick-off, ask teams whether they want a one-off game or the possibility of a replay.
A one-off game can only ensue if the decision is unanimous in favor of a one-off game.
Most PL and Championship teams will favor one-off games so you will get plenty of all PL one-off ties but it gives the smaller clubs a bigger chance of a payday.

If we get promoted automatically we’ll have played 54 games this season. 
 
Arsenal can only play 52. 

Excellent statement by Tranmere. 
https://www.tranmererovers.co.uk/news/2024/april/club-statement-fa-cup-replays/

If the PL don't want replays, perhaps they can agree to forfeit the right to progress in the competition if they don't win the tie. Win and you're through, lose or draw and the non-PL team progresses - if two PL teams play each other they can toss a coin for all I care.....(which is an appropriate method given that this decision has shown them to be a bunch of tossers)....

But we have too deal with the massive fixture backlog for all those teams in Europe playing home and away against some team who won the Cypriot cup, or 20 games to win the Champions league they qualified for by finishing 4th.  Don't forget the 4 preseason games going to Saudi to play against Al Hilal and some other randoms as well.  Rochdale can feck right off with their 200k extra gate money.

Iran have played it down so far, presumably for PR purposes to emphasise to their population and the outside world that Israel can't damage them, so it'll be interesting to see if that's an end to the direct tit-for-tat or not.
I expect exchanges of attacks between Israel and Iranian proxies will continue unabated.

Thanks to the wisdom of the F1 powers, this weekend is a sprint race weekend.
So, 4am saturday morning for the pretendy race, the quaifying atr 8am and race at 8am on sunday.
I'd love to be bigging up this one as I always thought the track was OK, but the usual "30 seconds behind Max" will probably apply.
 
Friday, 19 April
First practice
04:30-05:30
Sprint qualifying
08:30-09:14
Saturday, 20 April
Sprint race
04:00-05:00
Qualifying
08:00-09:00
Sunday, 21 April
Race
08:00
 

I saw Liz Truss at Heathrow Airport a few weeks ago. She was going mad because none of the airlines would sell her a ticket.
They didn't want her anywhere near Business or Economy. 

It's a shame he wasn't given more time. He inherited a mess and in my opinion should have been given more time. 
I've seen the movie about Brian Clough. I'm downloading the Paul Jewell one.