Lionel Messi ‘circle jerk’ declared ‘nauseating’ as FIFA help their ‘darling boy’ | OneFootball

Not everybody wants to read about the brilliance of Lionel Messi while we also have views on transfers, the Scots and more.

Stop the Messi fawning

The absolute fawning over Messi across every media medium is nauseating, the fact FIFA are trying their very best to make sure their darling little boy is in position to win back-to-back World Cups with favourable decisions should negate any kind of praise for him.

The man is one of the best players to ever play the game yet needs outside help to make sure he wins. Maradona dragged Argentina to a World Cup through his brilliance, Messi’s brilliance is tempered by dodgy penalty decisions and weak refereeing.

If Argentina do indeed win this competition, then please take a look at how they did before the inevitable Messi circle jerk. Paul Murphy, Manchester

Why big clubs all chase same transfers

So I read Will Ford’s earlier article headlined ‘Richard Hughes and co. stealing Todd Boehly strategy in uninspired chase of Man Utd, Spurs target’ thinking that Richard Hughes (and by implication Liverpool) would get a kicking, and to an extent, following last summer’s transfer window , they deserve it!

But it’s really just a Liverpool based headline (for clicks, obviously) as the actual article is about more that one club all seemingly criticised for homing on on the same targets.

These targets are those who tend to be named by bullshit artists like Fabrizio Romano and F365’s beloved gang of 5/6/7 nameless ‘elite journalists’ (so confident in their output they won’t put their actual names to their nonsense!).

But surely there is an explanation why the same names get linked to many clubs? They all will have access to the same or similar performance data, they all have eyes and the players you mention have the intangible ‘Premier League experience’ which seems to count for a lot, and given that the BS merchants you love tend to rehash each others posts, this is to be expected isn’t it?

I also saw Liverpool (and possibly others, can’t remember) being linked with Kephren Thuram recently which doesn’t really fit your narrative.

You cite other clubs as examples of how to go about transfers in a different way (you use Brighton, Bournemouth or West Ham in you article), and this is fine, they have picked up very good players for relatively low fees and have sold / look like they will sell for very good profits, but they are not apples for apples comparisons.

Surely the expectations are different, and at these example clubs they can take a gamble on a lesser known player who can develop, where as at Liverpool, Man City, Arsenal etc. the players are expected to make an impact and improve the team NOW, not in 12 months or whatever. A, LFC, Montreal

On exonyms

Quick one but I have to disagree with AdidasMUFC – the BBC and other English language media calling Turkey ‘Turkiye’ (can’t be arsed to find the umlaut) wouldn’t ‘showing some respect’. It’s actually not very respectful to try and dictate to speakers of other languages what words they can and cannot use. Exonyms are completely natural and exist in all languages. Start calling it ‘Turkiye’ and there’s no leg to stand on when every other country decides it wants to be referred to as Hellas, Espana, Zhongguo, etc. In English, the country is called Turkey. It just is. Sorry. Ben (World Cup has been a solid 8 so far)

Mailbox replies ahoy

Some random replies on a few mailbox threads over the last few days.

Firstly Phil, Manchester you were right the first time on your dodgy tv the Netherlands kit is a horrible bright orange. Against Japan they wore it with matching orange shorts and it was awful it seemed to be blurry. For whatever reason they switched in the second game to black shorts and it seemed to tone it all down but still awful colour choice.

Peter Andalucia on the number of local derbies. Sorry to burst your bubble but that is because 48 of the 211 nations in Fifa are in attendance. Effectively 25% of countries are there. Most have 2 or 3 land borders each or let alone naval neighbours so obviously there are lots of derbies.

Next up, I am English but for goodness sake just let Scotland enjoy themselves. More generally just let everyone enjoy themselves. Fifa and the main host have already done their best to price people out of the whole thing. Can’t people just drink pints standing in a fountain and get sunburnt without some prick telling them their obviously quite limited team are not very good. Che Adams starts up front for them they are never going to win it so what else are they supposed to do. Have fun guys.

In terms of English anthems I would love to have one for many reasons the main ones being… Firstly while other home nations use a different anthem I think using GSTK only for England seems to tacitly imply that England thinks that IS the UK and the other bits don’t matter so much. Secondly as a song it is just a shit dreary tune which rouses nothing in my limited national pride.

Finally, as a republican athiest I have no interest in either god, the monarch or the prospect that the former may somehow save the latter. I once saw David Bowie Heroes as a suggestion and I think this would be an excellent choice to solve these 3 main issues plus generally it would be cool and everyone already knows the words.

Right that’s enough of that. Nice one, James

Further defence of Scotland ahoy

This whole thing about should the Scottish Fans be celebrating their World Cup is just such a sign of Begrudgery and fun police.

I will tell you this, the Irish World Cup run of 1990 singlehandedly got the country out of a recession. It was and is the best world cup experience we ever had. We reached the quarter finals.

We also experienced our first World Cup win in 1994.

I don’t get upset that my paycheck isn’t Elon Musk paycheck at the end of the month, I’m just glad someone’s giving me money. Barry

Not all Andys from Cheshire

I’d just like to say that not all Andys from Cheshire are joyless pricks, this one has thoroughly enjoyed watching the Tartan Army’s antics in Boston.

For the first time in ages they’ve made me feel proud of being British, and to be fair, so have the England fans too (so far).

The whole World Cup in general has seemed fun for most if not all fans, which isn’t something I expected to be honest.

So, other Andy in Cheshire, please keep your miserable life view to yourself, and let everyone else get on with having fun.

Oh and as for William in Leicester, where do you start with that? Just f*** off and then f*** off again. Yours, a different Andy in Cheshire

Belgium 2026 are England 2010

Belgium at this World Cup are reminding me of England at the 2010 World Cup. Struggling against inferior teams with a team of individuals who lack clarity and direction.

And now onto William, Leicester and his rant against diversity. It’s pretty obvious what his complaint is, that “blacks” are playing for European teams like Spain. It’s made even more obvious by his listing of Norway as one of the teams he’d like to win the World Cup. A rail against diversity is little more than a coded way of saying you’d prefer only people of your own colour in your national teams and more to the point, your country. Dan, London

(Far) right of reply

I think I have the right to reply in the mailbox for the first time ever after this comment “Why do we publish? So people don’t think their views are normal – Ed”

Sorry If I don’t put much stock in the opinions of someone who works in the media and would lose their career for voicing any opinions right of center. “Normal” must just mean cowardice to you.

Now to the humorless mailboxers some of whom are very mad at me for pointing out reality:

Yes I’m ok Paul, hope you are too.

Jess, Tampa I don’t hate brown people, I live in a country right now where everyone is brown and that is fine by me.

A, LFC, Montreal if you didn’t notice my “bizarre” rant was full of humor, satirized the behavior of the media and explained truthfully why they behaving in a ridiculous manner over Yamal. I guess it went totally over your 75 IQ head. I’m not bigoted just right. If I wasn’t right your woke brainwashing wouldn’t have kicked in and forced you to write an angry reply. Thank you for pointing out Oyarzabal, who scored two goals (that double the number of one) but only got a sentence in match reports precisely because he is white. No bombastic headlines for poor Mikel but we should just ignore that part as it doesn’t fit the media’s narrative.

Dara O’Reilly do you really believe your own reply? This media you believe are so objective and agenda-less are the same one who complained the women’s England team is too white a few years ago, called the Norwegian team Nazis for dressing up as Vikings for a fun team photo, attacked the Japanese fans for cleaning up stadiums, defended a Somali referee with links to Islamic terrorist groups, attacked the Argentinian team at the last WC for being too white and although non-football related the BBC recently said they couldn’t cover the independent grooming gang hearings in the UK as they didn’t have the resources to do so (the first time ever the BBC didn’t want to spend your licence fee on something and I can’t help but wonder why?).

To genuinely believe the over-hyped media reaction to Yamal’s goal would have still happened if he was a white Spanish Catholic shows you aren’t just lying in your replies but also to yourself. Yes football as a sport is indeed meritocratic but media coverage isn’t and they have an agenda to push so maybe learn difference between the two before indulging the mailbox with your musings again.

Mike, ex Northwich in Sussex I don’t watch GB News but you should definitely turn off the BBC, put down your copy of todays Guardian, go outside, touch some grass.

Your replies were all hilariously ignorant and exactly what I expected, thank you. William, Leicester