news tidbits

[jazzypom.livejournal.com]

News

• Memo Ochoa wants to return to Ligue 1 Wait, he was the second goalie at Malaga right? I remember they have a fantastic goalie


• We are currently in contact with Didier Drogba and Chelsea FC. We are doing everything we can to have him back with the Impact in 2016.#IMFC Gus Hiddink wants Drogba back as a coach/mentor at Chelsea. Montreal Impact don't want to let him go


• Chelsea are working on bringing Didier Drogba back to Stamford Bridge, confirms Guus Hiddink more on that development. Drogba has been good for Impact, so... we'll see


• BREAKING - Bild | Pep Guardiola to #MCFC is a done deal. 3 year contract worth €25m/year+ bonuses Guardiola in the PL? Why?!


• Manchester United ready to poach Pep Guardiola as Ed Woodward looks to muscle in ahead of Manchester City and Chelsea Not so fast


• Real Madrid fans polled on what coaches they want for the team people said Mourinho and Guardiola Because when it comes to success, who cares about history, amirite?


• Boss - Possession not rewarded as before Good, it shouldn't be


• Louis van Gaal storms out of Manchester United press conference after five-minute rant about whether he will be replaced by Jose Mourinho Huh, I'm in a motel with spotty internet, I didn't hear about this!


• REVEALED: David Accam training with English Premier League club Stoke City, sparks rumours of €4m move What's he like, MLS watchers?


• Sources: Brad Friedel named U.S. U-19 coach He did his coaching badges whilst at Tottenham

Pictures

Salut! The rumours of Rafa's exit get louder and louder. Besos, Rafa!

Gerrard at a hospital in Liverpool, sharing good cheer. He has a charity that works with children, iirc

Spurs threw a Christmas party for the kids in their neighbourhood (Tottenham is relatively deprived, compared to the rich boroughs of Fulham and Chelsea, which is why their stadium development is supposed to be a BFD for the borough

Lamela chipped in

On the other side of Norf London, Arsenal had their own festive cheer!

One more

OP: done! Cheers, jeers, corrections and pushback at commentary. Gotta dash!

Comments

[the4thjuliek.livejournal.com]

Poor Thumbsy. He didn't exactly storm out of the press conference but rather refused to answer any more questions and wished everyone a merry Christmas. The journalists were absolute assholes to him. The media are pushing for him to be sacked. And the Sun has all but insulted him on their front page, acting like they didn't do anything wrong. As one r/soccer use puts it perfectly, 'I hope the Sun gets sucked into a black hole.' I really hope Man United don't sack him.

On the subject of managers being sacked, I really hope Rafa isn't sacked either. He and Thumbsy are in the same situation, except Madrid aren't even doing as badly as Man Utd. And I feel like some of the players are partly responsible for their performances, it's not all down to Rafa.

And then there's poor Pellers who looks to be in the same situation Jupp Heynckes once was.

[lady-teazle.livejournal.com]

What you said. "Storms out" my ass. He's just fed up with the media.

If United can manage a few wins, his job is safe, at least till the end of the season. Rafa, I dunno. Perez is a law unto himself.

It looks like Pellegrini is about to be ditched for no particularly good reason other than that Pep wants a crack at the PL. Though nothing's set in stone yet, afaik.

[ladya-sama.livejournal.com]

Meanwhile, Wenger must be running out of space around his house for all the We Love/Appreciate You Christmas cards from Arsenal. Was growing worried hearing talk of Pep taking over from him next year (supposedly he's a big fan of Wenger's philosophy) and that almost killed my pre-Christmas booze buzz. But it looks like he's off to Citeh for a grand total of three years. Wenger's not going anywhere! HOORAY FOR LOYALTY!! :D

RE: Re: RE: so weird

[the4thjuliek.livejournal.com]

Someone on r/soccer posted a thread: How safe is your club's manager? One of the Arsenal fans replied: "I don't understand the question."

I could see Grandpère extending his contract and staying through Pep's City years. At least I hope he does.

Re: so weird

[blackjedii.livejournal.com]

given his puffy coats he is 100% safe from falling down steps and colliding with walls

[marsyke.livejournal.com]

I think guardiola is the only CL winning coach that hasn't trained real. There are not a lot of options.

Merry christmas everyone!  4 hours left at work and then a long weekend!

[meliadoul.livejournal.com]

It is gross the way the media are hounding LvG.

[ladya-sama.livejournal.com]

Given that I hate LvG with the burning passion of a million suns (never mind he got us to 3rd place in Brazil), I ought to be enjoying watching him struggle with that first bite of humble pie ... but, then again, I hate these kinds of media witch hunts even more, so I have to side with the lesser of two evils and take some pity on old scarecrow-head. United aren't exactly struggling like Chelsea, but given that this season's hottest trend appears to be Whack-A-Manager people are now gleefully anticipating the next guy to go.

so weird

[jazzypom.livejournal.com]

Considering the media was up his backside for the entirety of his first season. Odd how things change.

RE: so weird

[ladya-sama.livejournal.com]

Oh GOD. Daily Mail in particular were insufferable! Yeah, I should know better than to hold that rag up to any standards, but when am feeling lazy (which is always) I refer to their sports section. Their live match commentary can be pretty funny. Anywho, when LvG joined United the Mail just wouldn't. Shut. The. Fuck. Up. LvG and United were given the Kardashian treatment, in that every freaking insignificant thing that they did made headlines.

Speaking of how things change, in keeping with their fickle nature, the Mail's suddenly swooning over Bambi. For two seasons almost every article about him just dripped of anti-foreigner/anti-German Englishness of the worst kind; turning their noses up at his "lazy" playing style. Over the past month or so, however, "lazy" been replaced by "languid", in an appreciative sense. Now they're being all commendable and ran two articles about how he's "bulked up" (he hasn't; his fitness is just the best it's been in a long time) and that he'll be the player to win Arsenal the league ... Methinks they're purposefully overdoing the compliments just so they can enjoy tearing him down again the moment he stumbles.

Re: RE: so weird

[jazzypom.livejournal.com]

To be fair to the sports newspapers, Ozil wasn't really tearing up trees when he first came here. It wasn't until he got stronger, learnt English and on the tail end of the break up with whatsherface that his game got a LOT better. But ahhh LvG, Man United got him to set up processes in order, but he had to keep them in Champions League too. Man United lost a LOT of money when they were in 7th place, and their Adidas deal is attached to their CL place, I hear? But yeah, a hotseat.

RE: Re: RE: so weird

[ladya-sama.livejournal.com]

Mesut certainly wasn't at his best. However, he wasn't awful either. His first season was okay, considering the leap from La Liga to the PL. His poorest form was probably the start of his second season, which isn't that surprising considering he played every match in Brazil for the whole tournament and didn't get in a good preseason with Arsenal. Then he was sidelined for a couple of months with a serious injury. When he returned in 2015 his form steadily improved. Since the start of the 2015/16 he's been stellar. But you know the Mail. I swear they must have struggled to resist adding "bloody foreigner" somewhere in Özil articles because suddenly whenever Arsenal didn't perform it was all his fault. Even when they wrote articles concerning other Arsenal players, or the club itself, they'd make sure to throw in a paragraph about how much Mesut had cost, and boldly claiming that he would lose his starting place on the German team (seriously? Löw dropping Mesut?? Think he'd sooner give up public nose-picking :P). Whatevs, DM. Am just pleased as pie to see my boy finally getting the respect he deserves!! :'D

As for LvG, I really do think it's just the feeding frenzy surrounding Rodger's and Mou's sackings that's got everyone now going after LvG. Just feels like a free for all now. It's not even like they're saying he'll be let go at the end of the season; the precedence has apparently been set and now people think it's perfectly normal to fire big managers at any random date during the year. Especially since Mou's a free agent and the media's doing that thing like when they begin speculating that two celebrities are in a scandalous relationship based on the fact that they'd been spotted within 100 yards of one another.

I remember it was said in 2014 (when Moyes was still manager) that United had two years to get back into the CL or risk a fine from their sponsors. I assume the same rule(?) applies again. Even if fined, though, considering the revenue they've made this year their wallets won't exactly be pinched.

Re: so weird

[blackjedii.livejournal.com]

considering he played every match in Brazil for the whole tournament

he did? not every minute though iirc

RE: Re: so weird

[ladya-sama.livejournal.com]

He was subbed off at 60 minutes against Portugal.
He played the full match against Ghana.
He was subbed off at 89 minutes against USA.
He played the full match against Algeria.
He was subbed off at 83 minutes against France.
He played the full match against Brazil.
He was subbed off at 120 minutes against Argentina.

With the exception of the first game against Portugal, he played out pretty much every match in Brazil :)

[ladya-sama.livejournal.com]

Hey, guys! Need some fancy-fancy to class up your otherwise trashy Christmas? Have a couple gents for Christmas Eve!!


(Also, exactly WHERE are they? And why?)

Am not saying they're officially a couple. All am saying is that if Flamini doesn't post a fitting Valentine's pic on February 14th Mesut better call off the engagement. FUCK ME, who would have ever thought Flamzil would out-Serzil freaking SERZIL!! At this rate it might even catch up with (*le gasp*) Samisut! O_o

[annoyanni.livejournal.com]

Speaking of Bug Eyes and Flamini, apparently they were clubbing together a few days ago and some girl, who didn't know who they were, asked them to take a photo of her. This is what she actually got lmao.

[ladya-sama.livejournal.com]

LMFAO! I saw that pic but didn't know the story behind it. Knowing they were trolling makes it a million times better XD XD

[annoyanni.livejournal.com]

Apparently the girl whose phone it was got really mad about it XD

[ladya-sama.livejournal.com]

Even better! Well played, gents! XD XD XD

[ananasonastick.livejournal.com]

lmaoooo, I would love to be there to see it.

[peiro.livejournal.com]

My heart has officially thawed. Also Gabi 😍

Mourinho or Guardiola at RM...oh my.

[blackjedii.livejournal.com]

We are currently in contact with Didier Drogba and Chelsea FC. We are doing everything we can to have him back with the Impact in 2016.#IMFC Gus Hiddink wants Drogba back as a coach/mentor at Chelsea. Montreal Impact don't want to let him go

why did i not put money down on this