The Importance of Sport (NEW CONCEPTS)

[Mick Harper]

Tremble, Ye of Little Faith

[Mick Harper]

The New Zealanders are on their way to thumping us by coming up with a cunning plan. Their wicketkeeper is standing up to the quicks as well as the slows. 'That'll fox those dopey English batsmen. We don't mind giving up a few byes along the way.'

Sure enough, Joe and Co daren't come forward, as they are wont to do on a wearing pitch, for fear of being stumped behind. In this unaccustomed stance they soon fall to one of the other eight ways of getting out. W. G. Grace was last seen rising from his grave. 'Why didn't we think of that?'

[Mick Harper]

Your quarter finals (you read it here first)

England vs Brazil
Argentina vs Columbia
France vs Holland
Belgium vs Spain

I won't say more. I know some of you don't like knowing the results ahead of time.

[Mick Harper]

Cricket commentators, like war correspondents, are not permitted to forecast an actual English defeat, no matter how obvious it is in coming. The key phrase to listen out for is 'They've got a mountain to climb,' which is code for 'Why are we even discussing it?'

But it has to be remembered that commentators are fans too. Being an ex-professional -- and maybe knighted for services to the English batting order -- is no defence against the sort of partisan poltroonery you hear in the snug

[Mick Harper]

Quick Update on the Man City Case

* They are facing a hundred and thirty charges of wrongdoing
* The evidence comes from leaked but admitted to be genuine emails
* The evidence is completely damning
* The trial, by a three-person panel, was completed in 2024
* The verdict was expected in late 2024
* The verdict was expected in early 2025
* The verdict was expected sometime in 2025
* The verdict was expected in early 2026
* The verdict is expected sometime in 2026

[Mick Harper]

We had our first 5.30 am celebratory motorcade this morning. If one, possibly two, cars constitutes a motorcade. One of the drawbacks of living in a multicultural quarter is that there's always a national group winning an important football match in a timezone not of your choosing.

Thank God, 'English' isn't one of the national groups. They're the absolute worst but live on the other side of the M25.

[Mick Harper]

Club Representation Quiz

[Mick Harper]

I hate giant-killing. Sure, you get a quick burst of schadenfreude, but who wants a World Cup without Germany and Holland? Nobody gives a monkeys whether Paraguay and Morocco are there or not.

[Mick Harper]

Celebrity It's A Knock-Out Quiz

* Are July afternoon temperatures in Atlanta, Georgia nearer to those experienced in England or Congo?
* Is football a winter sport in England or Congo, where there is no winter?
* Are English professional footballers sensitive willowy flowers who wilt in harsh conditions?
* Are Congolese professional footballers big bastards inured to hardships of every kind?
* Are you preparing us for some kind of disappointment or are you using a Voodoo technique of setting up a faux problem in order to dispel it?

Answers tonite.

[Wile E. Coyote]

Note on a England World Cup crisis.

Nobody as a kid wants to be a Right Back.
Nobody aspires to be Lee Dixon or Gary Neville.
Its really a position for those that lack talent and cant make it elsewhere.
If like Trent you sadly end up as a right back, just as a way to get into the first team, then you will then have to try to persaude your manager, to play you in a more important position, like midfield.
Right Backs make useless pundits eg Lee Dixon, Gary Neville as they think that Right Back is an important position. It reallly isnt.
The Right Back is easier to fill than the Left Back.
We used to play our Labrador as a right back, he was actually fine.

[Mick Harper]

A young kid from the badlands of Ealing called Bukayo Saka asked for a game with Arsenal and, as you say, they stuck him at right back. (They had no-one from El Labrador at that time.) Once he'd got his knees brown in that position, he said, "Please, can I at least be a wing back?"

They said no, we never play five at the back, but he started to play as one anyway. Finally they had to give up and let him be a right-winger. And yes, ultimately, he wants to move into the centre and be 'a manager'.