kevinhectoring

41 minutes ago, PistoldPete said:

Another attacking line up. Still no Jason Knight in starting line up? Is he on his way?

May well be. And at a handsome price, if it merits this much protection. 

On 10/12/2022 at 20:25, walkleyowl said:

Joe is a very very good keeper and was unfortunate to have Keiren Westwood ahead of him when he broke through,  he was trusted in cup games or if KW was absent, his form earned him a u21 call up. 

He sadly suffered a bad injury which set him back and did his confidence. 

He was kept last season ahead of Dawson who we loaned to Exeter but for reasons known to Darren Moore alone he brought Bailey Peacock Farrell in on loan.

I'm absolutely delighted Joe is thriving, I watched him in a youth cup game years back and rated him.

He’s been an astonishingly safe pair of hands for us this season. Feet too 

On 09/12/2022 at 11:32, Thameram said:

If your bielik wouldn't you want to come back and lead your club to promotion in front of fab home and away fans instead of pottering about in mid table bottom half, half empty run down stadium with uncertainty surrounding the club 

If promotion were assured, perhaps he might. Perhaps. Reality is we’re not a match with KB any more, I think we just need to accept that and wish him well

6 hours ago, Caerphilly Ram said:

 

Slightly struggling to understand why listening to PW’s chirpy description of his unremarkable Xmas routine is worthy of so many minutes 

On 14/12/2022 at 19:34, ram59 said:

I don't think that there is such a thing as obstruction in the penalty area anymore.

In this instance, I thought that it wasn't a penalty, the keeper was stationary just before he kicked the ball. Also, he tried to go round the keeper on the opposite side to which the ball went, so there was never a chance that he could have run on to it. At the very least, the ref should have been asked to look at it again, with the benefit of slow motion replays.

The ref is asked to look at it again I think only if VAR think there may be a clear and obvious error. 
In this case they thought there was not.  
 

The fact that there are so many neutrals on either side of this debate sort of proves VAR was right. And sort of proves that those who say it obviously was/was not a pen don’t really get the problem  

The problem is that there is no clear cut answer to the question:  if the keeper steps into the line of the attacker without playing the ball, how long does the keeper need to ‘stand still’ for it not to be obstruction? 
 

I think the ref probably got it right but you’d need to see it looking down the line of the attacker’s run before you could be sure, and even then you need to consider the attacker’s speed. He was in this case travelling fast, which perhaps was why the ref had no doubt. 

2 hours ago, 86 Hair Islands said:

So simply running flat out into a player means they've fouled you.

Ok.

Sure the rule is as you state - despite that many forwards notably Shearer have made a career out of backing into stationary defenders and getting free kicks 

But look at tonight’s penalty in real time and the ref can be excused for thinking the keeper is in motion at point of impact and no way is that call going to be overturned by VAR. If he was rooted to the spot at the point of impact and not in the middle of a jig the outcome would have been different 

On 10/12/2022 at 18:51, angieram said:

Forsyth 5.5

Really? Is this by his own standards or the standards of a L1 defender ?

1 hour ago, Bris Vegas said:

The commentators even mentioned this. VAR deemed it outside the box.

I guess they decided it wasn’t clearly and obviously in the box   Fair enough, but the ref had to give something 

10 hours ago, JoetheRam said:

15 yellows.

Hopefully the last we'll see of that ref.

Think the Argies deserved to go through but they're a bloody horrible team.

Paredes lucky not to see red. Cruyff would be spinning in his grave after that - and they did the same in the 2010 final. 
Now reading Argentina are favourites to win the final. Don’t understand that with England and France still there and with Modric reminding us what a great player he is

1 hour ago, Tombo said:

I had to read this multiple times to try to figure out what point you're making, and I still don't understand. I have no idea why you've brought colour into it

Don't misunderstand me though, thats not an invitation to elaborate. I'd suggest stepping away from the keyboard.

Quite a serious point so I’m happy to elaborate. There’s quite rightly pressure on all these platforms and networks to present diversity to their audience - in sport, drama, adverts, news, everything.

And there is such internal pressure on the programme makers to do it, that they do it in a hurry. There are 100s (literally) of black ex-footballers who would make excellent pundits. Mica Richards is not one of them, he’s not fit for purpose. They need to take the trouble to find the stars and give them exposure 

20 hours ago, Alpha said:

Micah Richards telling me Mbappe is fast then them all doing the lads lads lads act while laughing is boring and annoying. 

Quite.  There are plenty of excellent pundits ‘of colour’, most notably Ferdinand who is arguably the strongest pundit of all. Micah belongs on League of their own with Freddie Flintoff 

6 hours ago, Bris Vegas said:

In a roundabout way I think winning the World Cup is more difficult than winning any other trophy for a national team

Football is a less pure game than say rugby. Man City can lose to Brentford but less likely the world no 1 Rugby test team loses to no 8.  So I’d say if you’re NZ (the Brazil of Rugby) it’s easier to become world champions at Rugby than it is for Brazil in football. And if you’re Argentina’s rugby team, it’s harder than it is for Greece to win at football
 

Home advantage in these competitions is massive. We won at Wembley, Denmark won in Scandinavia (close). Greece (who won with a great manager) probably played in climactic conditions v similar to home (Portugal) and didn’t travel far

One problem of playing away is well illustrated by the challenges the Kazakh weightlifters faced at the 2012 Olympics when the British customs officers realised everyone enormous coming in from Astana in June with a heavy case was bringing a month’s supply of horsemeat. All confiscated so no one in the team had any strength, of course 

3 hours ago, Bris Vegas said:

If England don’t win it, then I’d want Messi to. 

I’d love Morocco to win if England don’t 

25 minutes ago, G STAR RAM said:

We are in League One with a Championship level squad to be fair, this stat is pretty meaningless.

Well is it a championship level squad ? We have holes and not one player in their prime. Except Wildsmith  

9 hours ago, uttoxram75 said:

etc but having Graham Souness, Roy Keane and a female ex player talking to

Is your inbox filling up?

(I’m guessing you refer to ‘female’ ex player simply because you can’t recall her name. 
But you’ve wandered into a minefield ...)

53 minutes ago, PistoldPete said:

DCFC settled at no cost to DCFc in February 2022 so wouldn't still be outstanding at June 2022. SG was suing EFL and there has been no statement of how that was settled. 

Ah ok third parties might include reference to EFL. 
But you're really suggesting the EFl made a payment to Boro?  
Seems very far fetched IMO, and if they had it would have leaked 
 

6 hours ago, Mucker1884 said:

I've already read terms such as "Everybody" and "The whole country" etc...

That for me is the crunch. 
Why should folk be allowed to just stroll in once every 4 years, and take part in the positivity?  Many of whom won't know the offside rule, or what year England won the WC, or what 2 teams played in "The white horse final"!.  They won't know who Geoff Hurst effectively replaced in '66.  
They won't realise that the vast majority of the cast of "Escape to Victory" were yer actual, real life footballers... icons in some cases... legends to many!

They won't know that Bury were winning cup finals by 6 goals decades, and decades, and decades before Man bloody city were doing it!  
They won't know who held the FA Cup for the most consecutive years (Trick question... but a good 'un!)
They won't have a clue who Mr S Bloomer was (More than just a Rams legend!), or that a keeper once played on in a cup final with a broken neck!

What does "First division champions actually mean?"  They'll cry.
"Charlton reached the '46 cup final despite losing to Fulham in a 3rd round tie?  Don't be so ridiculous!", they'll screech!

 

These are football facts... for football fans!
Pwoper Football fans take the flak.  They suffer immensely... and fully deserve to party on, when their team hit the highs.  These are the folk I wanna be partying with!

I don't want to be partying with hangers on!  I don't even want to be talking football with folk that have never been to a professional game in their lives.  "Ooh... how nervy were those penalties eh?  What about that Henry Kane, eh?  Ha, ha, did you see Emma Bappy's face!"  Feckorf!
Duck 'em!  Duck 'em all!

 

 

Oh... did I not say?  Derby for me!   ?

So have to assume you are similarly scathing about people who watch and get into the rugby World Cup but not the club game, wimbledon but not Davis Cup, British Open or Ryder Cup but not the English Open, the Ashes but not the county championship, not to mention watching America’s cup, Tour de France, Olympics, British Grand Prix, London Marathon, Boat Race, Grand National etc without have detailed knowledge of the sport in question. 
 

if people get into it and enjoy it, what’s the problem with that? 

11 hours ago, PistoldPete said:

Ok thanks. My point was that reference was made to third parties. ( plural). We know Gibson was going after Morris. Who else was he still going after beyond the end of June 2022?

The third parties were presumably MM and DCFC. 
 

MM would probably have had some (limited) input into the Note in Boro’s accounts   
 

Whole episode is a stain on Boro and the EFL 

39 minutes ago, Srg said:

What a weird take! He even won the double in the season he retired, not forgetting the Balon D'or at one point.

Yeah I see he actually pushed Zidane (then aged 28, in his prime) into second place for the ballon d’or (but Zidane had just won it a couple of years earlier). Reckon he lost his zip quite early in - unlike pastel da nata  and wine from the Duoro I don’t think he reflected the level of the Portuguese hype. 

10 hours ago, ariotofmyown said:

Which was funniest:

That penalty shoot out vs Spain when CR7 waited for the last one and didn't get chance to take it. Portugal were better than Spain in that game too but CR7 missed loads of chances (if I remember right).

Or...

The Euros that Portugal won, when they drew all 3 group games, then ended up with an easy path to the final. They were dire throughout, but only won because CR7 went off injured and suddenly they looked like a team.

Or...

CR7 being dropped tonight and Portugal looking like a brilliant team for the first time during his career. Love that he came on as sub and still didn't score. Missed the game, so assume he was desperate to score.

 

He was obviously a brilliant player for most of his time at Real. Juve basically bankrupted themselves and got much worse with him playing for them, even though he was supposed to win them the Champions League.

City tricked United into signing him and he has cost them a fortune and been pretty hopeless. Now has left in disgrace with his reputation ruined. Please sign for PSG Ronaldo!

They’re a bit weird the Portuguese with their stars. If you think CR is overrated, can you remember Luis Figo? Had a few great games as a sprightly youngster then rested on his laurels for most of his career

45 minutes ago, Van der MoodHoover said:

Either Portugal or a massed Morocco will be a very stern test even if England are able to beat France. 

If we beat France we should beat anyone. Morocco likely to have injury concerns. But if we don’t win this WC would LOVE them to do it.  

5 hours ago, therealhantsram said:

Spain really flattered to deceive in that opening game didn't they? Since then they've absolute trash.

They have won only 3 WC games since 2010 

21 minutes ago, AndyinLiverpool said:

Another yawn-inducing display from Spain.

Nico Williams’ pace is a thing to behold. 

Come on let’s all support Morocco 

1 hour ago, therealhantsram said:

The idea with the stutter run is to force the keeper to move first so you can hit your shot taking that into account.

I’ve been converted to the art of the stutter penalty. Wonderful to watch it being done well. And if it’s done badly, you can wallow in the schadenfreude.
 

(Fair to say tho that the strikers who peddle it are typically every bit as arrogant as they are gifted )

Don't think keepers have worked out the best strategy for countering them