Saliba is staying

KP-the muxic in question was a live recording from the Fillmore by the pre-Abracadabra Steve Miller, who was far more bluesy during the band’s more formative years in the mid to late 60s

btw sweet Dusk to Dawn vid featuring Chong’s former Corsican brother…how can I ever forget Selma Hayek’s striptease scene…even now it makes me shudder to think

btw many were completely unaware that, like myself, Tommy was Canadian, so he was held in even higher regards in my neck of the woods…during that time period he was touring in a one-man show called The Marijuana-Logues, as an obvious play on the Vagina Monologues…some 2 years later I saw he and Cheech perform at the Orpheum Theatre in Boston, where they were the headliners and one of my favourite bands, Kings of Leon, were one of several opening acts, which likewise included the Whigs(check out their best song “Right Hand on my Heart”) Cheers

the music in question…

not sure if I want to extend more treble kudos in United’s general direction, even though I obviously understand why some might choose otherwise…I would go as far to suggest that United enjoyed some advantages that could be considered as, if not more, important than the financial ones City presently enjoys…there have been several teams who have tried and failed to buy their way into a treble winning season, or anything close, whereas there was a time when United seemed to hold some clear recruitment and officiating advantages which could have been deemed even more crucial in the grand scheme of things

now if some hack of a manager was patrolling the Etihad sidelines and he had seemingly every top player in world football at his disposal, then I would have a vastly differing opinion, but this clearly isn’t the case…it appears to me as if the Grealish 100+M acquisiton inflamed matters, likely due to some deeply ingrained prejudicial concerns which were bubbling under the surface, as this really wasn’t an issue of such preeminent importance in years prior, except for those following Wenger’s lead

don’t get me wrong, I understand the frustrations of others, especially those coming from teams/fanbases who’ve never had the proper backing or even a brush with greatness, but it’s a bit disingenuous when it comes from those who don’t fit in that aforementioned narrative…no one of any import said sweet fuck-all, except the agendized Wenger, when the lack of adherence to the FFP rules allowed others to skirt the system and win subsequent titles…in fact, I can never remember a more agregious period of player acquisitions than last year when Chelsea went on an unprecendented buying spree, which didn’t cause near the uproar, likely because things went pear-shaped…as such, it gives the not so ludicrous impression that organizational jealousy might be the driving force

like I’ve said before, when you really look closely at City’s squad it’s never been a who’s who of megastars, minus the odd period when they had a rather ecclectic lineup of internationally well-known players, but even then they didn’t dominate abroad…frankly I don’t want to see them severely punished then have to witness a year or two of champions with asteriks firmly attached to their accomplishments…let’s face it, when you closely examine this year with a commonsensical lense, we had everything squarely within our hands and if we handled our business they could have done nothing to upset our very attainable title run, but we cocked things up and that had nothing whatsoever to do with their financial wherewithal…furthermore, every top team, regardless of root of their respective monied interests, have employed questionnable financal practices, whether it be Real, Barca, PSG, Juve, Milan and even Bayern, and if we get carried away with the punishment we will undoubtedly usher in the Super League era, which would be a crying shame

I just want to state unequivocally that if it were up to me no single individual would ever own more than 49% of any club and that the remaining 51% would be owned by members from within each respective fanbase, but I’m well-aware that this ship has sailed, at least at the highest levels of football….there are a few similar models which have thrived, like at Real or with the NFL’s Green Bay Packers, but they’re few and far between

Morning all
Yesterday was one of those days where so much was going on; little actually got done but the groundwork is there more now.

Apologies TRVL I read your baked differently to how you meant it.

KP
It seems we can’t get the French book delivered to the Uk or Thailand from Amazon. Thailand, I understand, but the UK is just bizarre. I’ll write the the publisher and get it sorted.

Fortunately, I have plenty to do this TW in designing studio internals to begin with.

Almunia
Always happy to read your thoughts when you comment them to print. 🙂

I see Berlusconi has passed. I hope they don’t intend to cremate him,it would be an environmental disaster.
On a serious note,that Milan team with the Dutch trio will remain one of my all time favourite teams. Simply brilliant. No wonder the Milan fans loved him as an owner.

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2009/jun/07/mirek-topolanek-czech-naked-photo

Hi Almunia

Nice one. There’d be a burning cloud of plastic and formaldehyde stretching across Europe were he to be cremated.

A hagiography about as classy as the man deserved.

My memory of Bunga Bunga Berlusconi (the erstwhile cruise ship crooner) forced me to dredge up the above story of his dealing with a tumescent czech politician. Italy’s answer to Jimmy Saville and Boris Johnson. He certainly lived la dolce vita.

Maybe that’s where Saliba and his mates got the idea from a few years ago.

KP,
I was only showing a picture of him to my wife a few months ago,we were talking about plastic surgery and celebs. She reckoned he was the worst she’d seen. He must have been afraid to go near a hot bath or sauna. I’d imagine a biography would be jaw dropping all the same. Father Time always wins,but some people push him harder than others!

until we make some fairly significant changes to the way in which we conduct ourselves from both a tactical and transactional capacity our club won’t have a substantive impact on the European footballing landscape…our rather rudimentary managerial ways mixed with our amateur hour transfer practices will never cut it on the big stage…as such, if we don’t get this particular window spot-on a regression will be forthcoming…of course, I’m not suggesting that the drop-off will be drastic, but top 4/Wenger Cup talk will once again become our predominant narrative

Hi Almunia
If there was a large financial award for butchered plastic surgery among money grubbing male celebrities, I think Mickey Rourke, Pete Burns, Jacko (rest in purgatory) , and the soon-to-be behind bars POTUS Mr Donald orange-faced-bastard Trump would hotly contest Ms Almunia’s judgment.

Fancy doing a top 5 yourself? Or – a bit closer to home – the 5 ugliest ever Arsenal players? I’ll get thinking on mine in the meantime.

Hope you’re well mate. I guess the exam season is nearly over where you are too. The twins are walking around the house with faces like thunder, leading me to conclude their own exams have not gone well. An even worse time to be around young uns!

TRVL

Not as extreme as Chelsea but Arsenal has always been a Tory party club in my opinion. The opposite of clubs like Liverpool, Manure Newcastle and Cardiff.

Imagine Hill-Wood, the gun-toting Kroenke senior and the old board discussing blood sports, shrinking the state and blaming society’s ills on single mothers over cigars and vintage port… Not hard is it.

To that extent, our miserable record in games outside of England mirror their political thinking ie the club is chronically euro sceptic. It must be 30 years since Parma in the Parken.

Paul Dickov wheeled out on Sky as a totemic City star of the past. He’s a fucking Arsenal man (and a decent Trossard lookalike)!

KP,
Yeah,exam season in full bloom,couple of weeks left before I get to put the feet up for the summer,can’t wait. How about yourself? Any free time coming up? Hols with kids aren’t stress free but they are still preferable to the mundane.
I’ll skip straight to the Arsenal players,my knowledge of celebs is pathetic. Joint top is Almunia,his hair,his stupid expressions after his mistakes,drove me mad. Equally galling in a visual sense was Gervinho,wtf was going on with his hair? You’re a footballing millionaire man,go to a barber and sort it. In third place I’m going to put Franny Jeffers. Look at his face and immediately you’d know he was a scouser,say no more. Fourth,John Hartson, he looked like he had spent his career in rugby league. And finally I always found John Jensen’s face extremely annoying. Maybe it’s just because he was such an uninspiring player. Harsh, I know,but they’re my five.

KP-Mickey Rourke hands down…love the boardroom imagery…Squid Game, behind the glass, meets the head table at the Red Wedding…old world ragged with a dollup of entitled cuntiness

I really don’t think Chelsea are that far off, once they clear out the non-believers and the contract rich hangers-on…when the smoke clears Poch will have the makings of a future juggernaut, with the likes of Nkunku, Enzo, Fofana, James, Mudryk, Madueke, Chukwuemeka, a couple teneable short-term CBs and likely Caicedo and Onana coming(not to mention Poch is pushing hard to keep Mount)…they clearly have the monies, they just need to reign the new owner in a bit…I would rather have that problem than the reverse, as our absentee landlord is oft-times the reason why everything moves at such a snail’s fucking pace

Kroenke

Peter Hill-Woods go to newspaper was the Daily Mirror if my memory serves me correctly.

Its hardly a right leaning newspaper.

Marc
I think PHW would have folded up the sports pages as firmly as possibly and used it as an impromptu wedge to remove some regal dangle berries from his double barreled derriere. After that he’d sit on a gold plated ceramic throne reading the Daily Telegraph, defecating foie gras profusely and accidentally letting hot cigar ash drop onto his greying pubes before pulling his ‘o’ face.

5 pig ugly alternatives coming up after I’ve had my dinner. I knew you’d instantly get the best ones.

TRVL

You may well be right about Chelsea, but the step before the rebuild is a pretty formidable one, ie the purge of the current squad. Auba, Lukaku, Kante, Mendy the list goes on.

KP-by the sounds of things Kante’s gone on a free to the Saudi league, Lukaku might remain in Inter as part of the Onana Keeper transfer and Auba will likely return to Barca with a subsidized contract or will follow Kante to the Middle East…I think their biggest hurdle, in light of their willingness to pay their way out of trouble, is how quickly they solve their longtime Striker concerns…maybe it’s the returning Broja, but I would suspect that this might be the most logical landing spot for Osimhen

It may sound absurd but the Saudi league infatuation is going to kill the hope for Indian football. And there is MLS too for retirement.

Cricket is too big to let anything else prosper unfortunately.

1. Geoff Barnett in goal (I love nearly all of our past gks except Almunia of course) so had to go back to this late fill-in for Willow in the 72 fa cup final which we lost to Leeds).

2. Nelson Vivas. Only a mother could love that grotesque Latino face of his.

3. Chamakh. The barnet and boat race combo would have been enough to scare any back 4 if he could have ever brought a fucking long ball under control.

4. Stepanovs. When he crossed the iron curtain, the entire population in the west regretted helping to bring about the end of stalinism.

5. Steve Bould. Looked old before his time. An ineffectual side man during Wenger’s dotage. A footballing brain from bay watch, a face from crime watch.

Re Chelsea, Poch knows how to keep a compact team. He is getting rid of the has-beens and may-be’s. I still don’t understand why they sacked Tuchel. He should have been the one doing this.

Almunia
Johnny Jensen looked more like the archetypal ‘calm down, calm down’ scouser than the real thing didn’t he?That tight curly perm and bum fluff moustache.

Almunia

We’re off to Malaga with the kids in a few weeks. Little do they know that me and Ms Kroenkephobe are taking a week off from our unpaid jobs running ‘Hotel Los Bastardos’ in Wales (as I like to call home…) and that they are going to be doing all the cooking and cleaning in the house we’ve hired, while I get beered up and do some serious holiday reading. Perfecto!

According to channel 4 tonight, 20,000 city supporters have turned out in Manchester for their trophy celebrations. A mere twenty thousand! I bet more turned out for Burnley’s championship winning parade. Any other major club would have hundreds of thousands on the street. Fucking pathetic! Plastic fans. Maybe they know something we don’t, ie that City will be in the 4th tier next year. 🤞

KP-now I get why you slag off Boehly, but I’ve never heard our organization truly take responsibility for their failed actions, properly acknowledge and show appreciation for their supporters and speak about the specific ways in which they will make their fans proud, with names attached so everyone knows who’s accountable for what…I get that this was in part their attempt at damage control following a shitty season, but we’ve had those before without any of the aforementioned measures being offered up, which is likely due to the fact that the misplaced arrogance of the latter Wenger era still lingers

OPEN LETTER TO THE FANBASE
“Our promise to you was to make our fans proud. We remain completely committed to the long term and sustainable success of our club and fulfilling that promise we made to you.
We know the huge potential we must grow to develop Chelsea FC and it is a role we take seriously. Everybody working here is relentlessly focused on driving us forward. Clearly, for our men’s team, it has been a disappointing season and there is a lot we can and will do better. Throughout these difficult periods, our fans have supported our players and our team across the country, and Europe with unfailing loyalty. We could not be more grateful for your incredible support. We are building a modern scouting, talent identification, and recruiting infrastructure within our sporting department, led by Laurence Stewart and Paul Winstanley, which will help us to identify and transform the squad around elite talent, a squad capable of consistently competing to win the Premier League, raise domestic cups and compete and win at the highest level in European football. We have also appointed Chris Jurasek as CEO to drive our business forward off the pitch, which in turn will make us more sustainable on the pitch. The success we are aiming for is only possible with our supporters behind us. We are proud of the creation of our Fan Advisory Board, which will meet for the first time over this summer, and we are confident its new members will ensure you are at the heart of decision making at our club. We will continue to ensure your voices are heard as we look to the future. For now, on behalf of the board and everyone at the club, thank you for your outstanding support. We hope you all have a good summer and look forward to welcoming you back to the Bridge in August. Chelsea Ownership Group.”

Never have I ever, at least not in this part of London

Ambarish-there’s an Indian League??? LOL

btw Tuchel was axed due to his off-field shit show

KP,
Bouldy was in my thoughts but I liked him as a player and spared him. The other 3 I couldn’t argue with but I’m going to have to Google a pic of Barnett. Chamakh was another disaster, God help him, Stepanovs is a good shout for almost every negative Arsenal list.

Malaga sounds lovely, I’m sure chez Kroenkephobe won’t be the venue of any parties in your absence! That first drink in the hotel bar though…..priceless.

very fortunate that several potential Pot 2 teams didn’t qualify for the CL, thus enabling us to move up from Pot 3, as this will afford us the luxury of avoiding several more potentially problematic teams in our initial grouping…on a side note, I was just reading up on the CL changes that will be coming into effect in 2024-25, which could see the PL get an automatic 5th qualifying spot…not exactly sure what my thoughts are on this situation, but I’m pretty sure I might feel differently if it works in our favour at some point down the line…according to Arteta’s most ardent supporters this is a nothing burger, as 5th place shouldn’t be anywhere near our organizational radar for the foreseeable future…I guess we’ll see

TRVL

Yes, started in 2011, and 11 teams participates currently.

It attracted some retired professionals from Europe and Brazil initially but then the rise of MLS and now this Saudi league means it’s going to take some more time.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Indian_Super_League

Fun fact – Sunil Chhetri, who plays for India and Bengaluru club is the third highest international goal scorer among the active footballers behind CR7 and Messi.

In 2009, he signed for QPR a 3 year deal but UK declined his work visa because of a rule which only allows non European players to participate in EPL if their country ranks within top 70. Unfortunate for him, unfortunate for Indian football.

Anbarish-I know it exists, I was just trying to be funny by validating your fears…obviously I failed miserably…Cheers

Haha, my bad then. I need to get out and grab a coffee.

Now that the Nuggets have won the NBA crown we’re the last non-title member of Kroenke’s sporting empire, minus his MLS minnows, the Colorado Rapids…let’s pray that Big Stan hasn’t had his fill of winning just yet or we could find ourselves once again at the bottom of his financial pecking order…interesting enough both he and Josh were front and center for all the festivities, so maybe just maybe they will become so enamored by this infectious feeling that they will do whatever is necessary to bring a title to the runt of their sporting litter

TRVL
“very fortunate that several potential Pot 2 teams didn’t qualify for the CL, thus enabling us to move up from Pot 3”

Been banging the drum on that topic and why we needed to win the title. Were it not for the points deduction of Juve we would be in Pot 3 and would have had a difficult time getting out of the Group stages. Can you imagine us getting out of a possible group of death if we were in Pot 3. Bayern, Real, Arsenal, Lens. Best we could have hoped for being back in the EL.

I would have thought winning the title was intrinsically worthwhile not just as a way of getting in Pot 2!

I think KSE has shown plenty of ambition since they took over 100% ownership.

Hi Bob
I think it’s a stretch to say the Kroenkes (gawd bless ’em) have showed ambition throughout their ownership although it’s certainly increased dramatically since Usmanov left to help further with the annihilation of Everton. If they could only channel some more of that thrusting Midwest ambition into acquiring a proper manager, back room team and leadership structure.

If it comes down to only being able to choose one, are you for Rice or Caicedo? Rarely for me, I don’t have a strong opinion on the issue. 😊

Agree Kroenke, as I said once 100% ownership happened, KSE have been far more forthcoming with funds to juice up the squad.

I’ll have to admit I’ve only seen Caceido a few times but there seems to be a consensus that he is a fantastic player and at 21 years old there’s a lot of years left to enjoy. If he is that that good then RM or whoever will be willing to buy him in 2/3 years for a lot more than say Arsenal will have paid for him. He is also versatile so he would be a great addition to rotate into different roles, just like Brighton used him against us at RB. There seems to be stories that Chelsea might be up to their old tricks and offer more money to Caceido and his agent so we’ll see. I would be very, very happy if we signed him.

Rice is more important for Arsenal right now. I was far from being in the Xhaka fan club but I 100% recognise his leadership qualities and his commitment. We’ve been waiting for an upgrade for years and finally it’s going to happen and I genuinely think it’ll have been almost worth the wait! I think he’ll fit in like a glove and we’ll straight away notice the benefits. Not only is he great defensively, interceptions, positionally but he is great driving forward and this quality alone will make us so much better with Odegaard and Jesus in particular benefiting from players being pulled towards him. Less importantly but significant all the same, he comes across as a great bloke.

I want to see both Rice and Caceido lining up in the tunnel before games as both are intimidating presences in different way. I feel we’ll get Rice and 65% chance of Caceido. If Caceido doesn’t happen I’d spend the money on Fresneda and Zubimendi.

As my sons use to chant ‘chicken and rice is always nice’; not sure about the chicken reference but anyway…!

Mbappe has sent PSG a letter confirming he won’t extend his contract. This would mean he could leave for free next summer. PSG won’t allow this to happen,to keep the impression of adhering to FFP they’ll benefit greatly from a sale(the money itself is largely irrelevant to them of course). Real Madrid,having lost Benzema, will make their move now rather than risk him being courted elsewhere. He will go,it’s his stated ambition to play for Madrid.
This ends Kane to Madrid. Instead he will sign for Utd. Martial will not be renewed.
Spurs will replace Kane with Kyogo who will follow his former manager to WHL.
The dominoes are falling…….
( Or I just made this all up)

Man City, Man U, PSG will have large transfer budgets , not sure if there are enough top players to go around! Napoli have three who might be in demand.