euros and copa america

[jazzypom.livejournal.com]

Hat tips (from people who linked me to interesting content)
Faroe Islands: Why foreigners play in Europe's most remote league

The Faroe Islands are a long way from anywhere.
Midway between Iceland and Norway, around 200 miles north of Scotland, the country sits in the wind-whipped North Atlantic.
The national team are improving fast: ranked a best-ever 102nd in the world, just below Macedonia, they shocked Europe by winning 1-0 away in Greece last year.
The return match takes place on Saturday evening in the tight, sold-out stadium in Torshavn.
But while the national team basks in the spotlight, the national league waits in the wings. The Faroes' top division is ranked 41st out of 54 associations belonging to Uefa. The average attendance last year was around 500.
Look closely, though, and it becomes clear that this remote and unassuming league attracts footballers from around the world.
Twenty-five foreigners - from 14 countries including Brazil, Nigeria, and the United States - have played in the top division this year.
So why do they migrate to this rocky outpost, where crowds are sparse and the average temperature in summer is only 13C?
Their answers reveal much about the shrinking world of modern football, where players will go anywhere - even 62 degrees north - for a contract. I didn't know that Faroe Islands had a league, oop at me. I always think of knitting! h/t to lady_teazle

Cristiano Ronaldo: An Adopted Son Florentino Perez Never Wanted at Real Madrid
The biggest looming decision for Perez is whether Real Madrid should sell Cristiano Ronaldo. It's personal with Perez, and it goes back to the start of Ronaldo's story with Real Madrid.

It is ironic, given all the goals Ronaldo has scored for Real Madrid—he's averaged more than a goal a game, including a record haul of 17 goals in last season's Champions League-winning campaign—that Perez almost blocked the move to sign Ronaldo from Manchester United six years ago. more here. H/t to chrysa

Chatter from the sidelines

• Sepp Blatter is planning to UN-RESIGN after receiving support from African and Asian football federations, claim Swiss media eyeroll. Blatter is that dudebro who just won't GTFO


• Borussia Dortmund have signed Swiss goalkeeper Roman Bürki (24) from SC Freiburg.#welcometodortmund Get it done - twitter link


• Gibraltar Soccer Fans' Bus Crashes in South Spain, 1 Dead RIP


• Jose Mourinho set to sign £30m mega deal that will secure his services at Stamford Bridge until 2019 Mourinho is here for the long haul. RIP to young talent aiming to break through to the first team

Miscellaneous

Football clubs and their ranking over the past seven years. SMH at LFC though. Go, Atletico! Simeone has done miracles with that side (he rocked up in 2011)

Jack Grealish sprawled out on the road on holiday. Okay Ireland, he's yours. O'Neill wants him now, now, now! Veruca Salt style

Kun Aguero and his son Ben


Copa America

Neymar firing his team up. 1 goal, 1 assist

Neymar was cutting up. It's unalloyed joy to watch him play

A cross between Tinkerbell and Harlemglobe trotter with lashings of Samba flair, I see you

Do you remember this man? From the World Cup 2014 when he cried for Brazil's loss? And I think gave his replica trophy to a German fan? He's back! I'm so glad you're back, dude. Football will break you, and yet, you'll still love it. *sigh*

I don't really like fans swarming on the field. It's all fun and games until someone gets stabbed. Don't people remember Monica Seles?!

Colombia 0 -1 Venezuela

I'm not Colombian but I'd rock the hell out of this.

Wow at this kit. Wow, Venezuela.

I am digging the colourway

The hero of the match, Salomon Rondon for Venezuela. Who is he?

Falcao was straitjacketed in this game. Couldn't shake off people to get goals in


Euro 2016

Round up of Euro 2016 qualifiers, because I don't have pictures for all the matches, soz
Slovenia 2 - 3 England

Wilshere was lit --- with inspiration yesterday

Gif of one of his goals? I didn't watch the match I had Spanish speaking practice. So tell me how it went

Wayne Rooney scored a goal and something about a record?

England's back four need an ass whooping. All four of them. How they make this happen? How, Sway?

Kampl got a yellow card from the referee for dissent. That, I did see. Slovenia is a good team though, all my snarking aside

Belarus 0 - 1 Spain

David Silva scored the only goal of the game, and what a goal that was. He hooked the ball out of the air and... back of the net

Apart from Silva's brilliance, I don't know if I'm convinced by Spain. Yes, two times Euro champions and one time World Cup champions, but you can't eat stale bread for the future


Real Madrid 4- 2 Liverpool

Legends of the Liverbird and the golden orb (or whatever they call RM's crest). They played a match yesterday. Ummm. This is Kewell and Salgado

Michael Owen used to be a red. Came up in the LFC academy, then got whisked off to Real Madrid. Came back and played for Manchester United and supposedly for Newcastle, but he was more injured than not, tbh. The Reds don't talk about him, he's like the mad wife in the attic. Damn it

Ian Rush! Oh my days! Where did they dig you up from, boo? He's testing his might against Roberto Rojas at the Bernabeu

Luis Garcia!? I thought he'd gone to India! Oh mannnn how the hell have you been?

Roberto Carlos is still husky

Man United 7- 5 Bayern Munich

I didn't know that this was going on

Scholes captained the team

More legends. You can tell me who is who

They were playing at Man UnitedOP: done! Any cheers, jeers, corrections, pushback against commentary you know the drill! Not much news today because they just seem to be rumours that we've read before.

Comments

[the4thjuliek.livejournal.com]

Doesn't Ian Rush do commentary nowadays? I know he did for the Wales match. And isn't that Macca with Michael Owen?

Luis Garcia!? I thought he'd gone to India!

Yup, he won the league with Atletico Kolkata! Our league runs from October to December (I think) so all the players get the rest of the year to themselves. Bobby Pirès trains with Arsenal during his time off.

England were not terrible, but how Phil Jones gets started over Clyne is beyond me. And then he got injured too. Gibbo switched off for the second Slovenian goal, sigh. Lallana was really great. His backpass was Jack's second goal was fabulous.

Wayne Rooney scored a goal and something about a record?

He's now joint-second in the all-time scoring list with Gary Lineker, just 1 goal behind Sir Bobby Charlton.

[the4thjuliek.livejournal.com]

I just heard that Zito died :'( RIP.

[ndobler.livejournal.com]

yep :(

[chuk-is-dazzled.livejournal.com]

Rm released their new kits and it took me like 10 mins of staring to notice the difference lmao. I'm glad the collar is gone didn't really like it. And I still hint like the gray kits cause the look like training tops O.o

So glad I can watch football all day today since it's my day off :D I can only watch late mls games since I get off at night. David Villa and Kaka both won their games this weekend and scored! While mix scored against the Germans and for nycfc :)

[blackjedii.livejournal.com]

Sepp Blatter is planning to UN-RESIGN after receiving support from African and Asian football federations, claim Swiss media eyeroll. Blatter is that dudebro who just won't GTFO

Eh not surprised tbh. The old shit probably announced his retirement to keep the heat off him as the investigation continued. here's hoping they find plenty of dirt or else Russia and Qatar lose their WC and he has to spend his life running away from the Russian mafia or something idgaf

also SCHALKE HAS A NEW COACH!!
some guy from a relegated tean named Andre Breitenreiter (http://www.espnfc.com/schalke-04/story/2488833/schalke-name-andre-breitenreiter-from-paderborn-to-coach). This is reminding me of Wolverhampton Wanderers in all the wrong ways.

[eva]

German source: Höwedes is staying with Schalke, in spite of two offers from abroad.

[blackjedii.livejournal.com]

Bless his far-too-loyal heart

[marsyke.livejournal.com]

Oh dear, footballers should know that there are cameras everywhere nowadays. So stay away from the booze.

I fell asleep even before Silva scored so the Spanish game wasn't that impressive. Oops England. I'm sure there is potential but they have to show it off at some point.
Lots of people want the football dwarfs to play pre-qualifiers but only Andorra and Gibraltar are stuck with 0 points. Faeroer even has 6! I do not know what's going on with Greece, they are last in their group which is terribly bad considering they played in Brazil.

[ndobler.livejournal.com]

Rondón plays for Zenit. Colombia was really disappointing yesterday, ngl. Congrats to Venezuela, they deserved it.

We sucked, as expected, but Peru sucked even harder so I'll take the 3 points lol. Neymar's assist to Douglas Costa on the second goal was amazing (http://streamable.com/irno). I'll refrain from commenting on David Luiz's positioning because I'm afraid that's a lost cause, sigh.

[marsyke.livejournal.com]

Sie kann trotz Regen noch lachen @matshummels (https://twitter.com/matshummels) @BVB (https://twitter.com/BVB) @BILD (https://twitter.com/BILD) @BILD_Sport (https://twitter.com/BILD_Sport) #wedding (https://twitter.com/hashtag/wedding?src=hash) #cathy (https://twitter.com/hashtag/cathy?src=hash)&mats pic.twitter.com/kLldCpIlIH (http://t.co/kLldCpIlIH)

— Kai Psotta (@KPsotta) 15 juni 2015 (https://twitter.com/KPsotta/status/610420365110734848)

[aquaecolore.livejournal.com]

ah, congrats to them. (Mats looks kinda terrified in some of the photos showing up on twitter tho xD)

[the4thjuliek.livejournal.com]

OMG! How nice! She's so thin though.

[marsyke.livejournal.com]

She really does! It seems a bit unhealthy. So I hope she's okay.

[koyuki]

Man Utd had a celebration banner and streamers for that friendly they played against Bayern? That need is intense hahaha.

Sepp Blatter is planning to UN-RESIGN after receiving support from African and Asian football federations, claim Swiss media
I saw this and was like um no takesy-backsies. GTFO. God, not that I hope for underaged prostitution rings or anything, but I really hope the FBI finds out he's been funneling bribe money from FIFA to fund one so then they can put him on trial for crimes against humanity God this fucker needs to get burned in a flaming pit of tar.

[aquaecolore.livejournal.com]

Remember Kevin de Bruyne was voted the best Bundesliga player of the season?

the players also voted on the biggest flops and the second biggest flop the players voted for was only the Better than Messi! German World Cup hero. (http://www.espnfc.com/german-bundesliga/story/2492641/gotze-and-van-der-vaart-voted-biggest-bundesliga-flops) How sad

(sorry about the awful source and their horrid autoplaying video within the article :/)

[the4thjuliek.livejournal.com]

Lmao, at least the players recognize flopping when they see it. At least Tunnelcunt can take comfort in the fact that he's one of the 21 World Cup winners (18 Germans + Xabi, Javi and Pepe) currently playing in the whole of the BuLi. And I'm dying at van der Vaart being voted as the biggest flop.

Nice to see Bellabi Bellarabi, Prince Harry and Jonas Hector voted as the ones to watch.

[ndobler.livejournal.com]

I make fun of the-one-who-shall-not-be-named all the time, but this is indeed sad.
But lol at them asking players to vote for the biggest flop. So mean.

[lady-teazle.livejournal.com]

Lol! I could not agree more with the 1,2,3 finish of these duds! Believe it or not, total flop VdV has just gotten a 3 year contract with, iirc, Real Betis. Was somebody on drugs there? What a waste of money!

Cris is Perez's ugly stepchild :(

[koyuki]

ooh jazzy, you linked to something else on accident, so I'll just leave the link here: http://bleacherreport.com/articles/2461917-cristiano-ronaldo-the-adopted-son-florentino-perez-never-wanted-at-real-madrid

I also realized I left it on the day before rather than yesterday's post so I had to do fro the link too

BFG

[givemedaughters.livejournal.com]

Excitedly geeked out when I saw Per tweet this yesterday. The BFG is in California! Had I known before hand that he'd been at the game, I would have tried to spot him in the crowd while watching it on the tele last night.

Game 5 ... What a fantastisch experience at the #NBAFinals (https://twitter.com/hashtag/NBAFinals?src=hash). Thanks @NBAUK (https://twitter.com/NBAUK) @NBA (https://twitter.com/NBA) pic.twitter.com/5v7zuj3woU (http://t.co/5v7zuj3woU)

— Per Mertesacker (@mertesacker) June 15, 2015 (https://twitter.com/mertesacker/status/610313690093633536)

[earthlydreams.livejournal.com]

That photo of Kun and Ben, be still my heart!

And Neymar is electrifying it is such a pleasure to watch him on the pitch!

[lady-teazle.livejournal.com]

Mercy. Kampl's gone platinum. Stop, young man, you're hurting my eyes.

Falcao was useless? Shocking.Mean. But so heartfelt.

That is Macca next to Owen. Is the slightly pudgy winded looking dude to the right of Owen Robbie Fowler? I'm not quite sure.

Jaap Stam is still scary looking. You'd think the United Aged XI had won the CL or something what with all the smoke & ticker tape.

The Never Ending Story, aka De Gea to Madrid. Or not. Today's twist was a purported offer of 13m pounds by Real, greeted by one & all with utter derision. Are Real buying him on the installment plan? Paying for each arm & leg separately? Inquiring minds...

Also apparently Courtois wants in on this Madrid action. Your guess is as good as mine as to whether any of this is even remotely true.

While reading the Mourinho article, I noticed the Daily Mail has a pic of Andy Carroll - with a man bun (which he looks better in than Bale by a country mile), kissing his tiny newborn son. Congrats Andy and fiancee Billi!