Thor: Rangnick
It's Prime Week! Hate on Amazon all you want but it does mean one thing: ALLY MCCOIST CO-COMMENTARY KLAXON
The Week In Ball
So close. I nearly got the full set of all my favourite teams winning this weekend, only for Milan to fall at the last hurdle, losing 1-3 to Sassuolo with Alessio Romagnoli both scoring for Milan and getting sent off (I'm watching the match now and absolutely fair enough, he rugby tackled the last man to the ground).
They're still second in Serie A though, after a masterclass by Napoli on Sunday evening to cement their top spot. At the closest home game to the anniversary of Diego Maradona's death they did him proud, beating Lazio 4-0 with a couple of wonderful goals from personal favourite Dries Mertens and a rocket to finish from Fabian Ruiz.
They wore their Diego tribute jerseys and I love this picture they tweeted at the final whistle.
The lads who didn't let me down did test my patience at times. Both Dortmund and Barcelona eventually won 3-1, however Dortmund had to come back after a second minute goal from Wout Weghorst, but HAALAND IS BACK. And thank god. He came on as a sub and scored the third, choosing to celebrate by winding up the Wolfsburg fans in incredible fashion.
He then tweeted about it but annoyingly the tweet he QTd had the video removed (it was someone filming their TV so was never going to last).
Barcelona left it even later, scoring two goals with mere minutes to go after Villarreal equalised in the 76th minute and looked for the most part like they were going to break the deadlock and take the points.
My wonderful son Gavi also played a full 90 minutes, possibly riled up by the way in which La Liga EN did him absolutely dirty in the build up. What is this?!? Why have they given two teenagers white hair??
Dortmund now sit second in the Bundesliga with the home leg of Der Klassiker to come on Saturday and Barcelona are continuing their slow, lavaesque crawl up La Liga and are in 7th and unbeaten under Xavi.
Back on these shores Arsenal faced a Newcastle United team being lead for the first time, in person, by Eddie Howe. I had such a nervo before this game, convinced Newcastle were going to pull something out of the bag and I can't lie, there were some hairy moments. However, unlike many other matches we've played in recent times I actually felt quite relaxed when we got to that most dangerous of leads, 2-0. It was nice to finally have a moment of confidence, of feeling fairly early on that it was OK and that we had it.
The scoring was opened by Saka with Gabi Martinelli (who I adore, I rated him so highly until his spate of injuries) following up with a beautiful goal after a brilliant pass from the absolutely wonderful Tomiyasu. Him and Ramsdale are my gold star signings from the Summer, they've both made such an instant impact. Lokonga and Tavares are also up there and I think they'll be fantastic given time, Tavares in particular was what is technically known as On One on Saturday. Mikel is building and we're moving and once we refine it all and learn to deal with high pressing, well organised teams and have a bit more oomph at the front, I think everything will be OK.
Across the rest of the league on Saturday there were no real shocks and the post-International Break goals seemed to have dried up. Although as this person has pointed out, it's no wonder Brighton couldn't score against Leeds
On Sunday in The North, Burnley v Spurs was scuppered due to the weather. Not that Sean Dyche gave a solitary shit. Strong 'Kieran Tierney vs West Brom' vibes for me.
We then had the spectacle of Chelsea v Man United. Another game led by Michael Carrick before the official takeover of Ralph Rangnick and this time he decided to bench golden boy Cristiano Ronaldo. This action caused a heated debate in the Sky studio between Keane and Carragher (see pic at the top of the newsletter) with Carragher asking, not unfairly, what the point of signing Ronaldo was. I agree. Aside from all the issues I've previously written about, from a purely footballing perspective, why is he there if he's just going to sit on the bench? His presence seems to have upended any plan for this season and to me it just feels like a case of the Woodwards flexing their wallets and trying to buy kudos.
The game eventually ended 1-1 with Jorginho both villain and hero having firstly collected the ball terribly to allow Sancho to scamper forwards at speed and slot home the opener and then hop and skip his way to the equaliser after Chelsea were awarded a penalty.
This weekend also saw the beginning of the Rainbow Laces campaign where people are encouraged to make sport a more welcoming environment for those in the LGBTQ+ community. It's all extremely visually pleasing, the laces themselves are lovely, the screen wipes and score graphic on Sky are very pretty and I would honestly kill for one of the Premier League rainbow pin badges.
However, the theme this year is allyship. As the majority of people involved in football are either heterosexual, cis or most likely cishet it's important that they learn the ways in which they can be useful and consistent allies to those of us in the LGBTQ+ community. There are wonderful people like Jordan Henderson who wears his rainbow laces proudly and is regularly vocal on the issue but there are also many who remain silent and perhaps most notably those who don't speak up are those who could actually affect change, those with the power to do something. This, from Crystal Palace's official LGBT+ supporters group, Proud and Palace, is truly excellent
This made the statement by Burnley's chairman, Alan Pace, all the more impressive. The statement, tweeted from Burnley's official account and then QT'd by Alan is what we need more of. I'm the first to mock Burnley for their fanbase (and in many ways I think it's fair), however as a club they're doing a lot of good stuff and that should be celebrated.
I would hope very much that no-one reading this would ever feel anything other than warm and open to both LGBTQ+ fans or the prospect of there being, one day, an openly gay footballer in one or more of the top European men's leagues but we certainly have a long way to go; for example the fact that Sky Sports felt the need to turn off the comments on a tweet about the campaign shows this. So continue to support, shout, challenge wherever needed and ensure this sport really is for everyone.
Kick Off
Speaking of Burnley (bear with me, I know this is going to sound mad), this week's Kick Off is a dive into what we call Total Football.
What do you think of when you think of Total Football? I'll tell you, you think of this man with his good looks and sweet old school sportswear running rings around players in the 70s.
But perhaps you should also be thinking of this equally handsome chap with his equally cool vintage sportswear.
Jimmy Hogan was a Burnley native who worked with Hugo Meisl coaching the Austrian "Wunderteam" of the 1930s and "is considered one of the great pioneers of the game on the continent, especially in Austria, Hungary, Switzerland and Germany." After the Hungary 'Golden Team' picked up the style in the 50s, the president of the Hungarian Football Association, Sandor Barcs, said "Jimmy Hogan taught us everything we know about football".
As a teen he was lined up for the clergy but, deciding it wasn't for him, finished school and became a footballer and then a manager, managing widely on the continent from Netherlands to Hungary to Austria, France, Germany and Switzerland before coming back to England at Fulham and Aston Villa plus short spells at Celtic and Brentford.
His ideas of fitness, greater ball control and of the 'combination game' which emphasised more teamwork and passing over individual dribbling skills are what sowed the seeds of Total Football among a generation of managers who would come to prominence in the 50s and 60s, notably at Burnley, Ajax and Hungary.
Another Englishman, Jack Reynolds, who managed Ajax (the most famous and successful proponents of the style) in the early half of the twentieth century and yet another, Vic Buckingham, manager of both Ajax and Barcelona, were also considered pioneers and influencers of the style which still bleeds through coaches and managers now, especially in the aforementioned Ajax and Barcelona from Ajax's Rinus Michels through Cruyff himself during his tenue at Barcelona to Pep Guardiola.
So what is Total Football? Simply, it "is a tactical system in association football in which any outfield player can take over the role of any other player in a team"
To expand (this is from the Wikipedia article on the subject):
In Total Football, a player who moves out of his position is replaced by another from his team, thus retaining the team's intended organisational structure. In this fluid system, no outfield player is fixed in a predetermined role; anyone can successively play as an attacker, a midfielder and a defender. The only player who must stay in a specified position is the goalkeeper.
Total Football's tactical success depends largely on the adaptability of each footballer within the team, in particular the ability to quickly switch positions depending on the on-field situation. The theory requires players to be comfortable in multiple positions; hence, it requires intelligent and technically diverse players.
If you're more of a visual person, or indeed if you want to get a feel for the way this system actually works on the pitch, I am again going to refer you to the Tifo Football short on the subject which shows how Total Football uses space to manage the game.
The beauty of Total Football is that when it works and all the players are high quality practitioners of the game, a team is free to move fluidly around the pitch, pressing hard, passing with abandon thus creating exciting and absorbing play which is a pleasure to watch.
The {Offside} Thirst Trap
We're going back into the sands of time for this week's Thirst Trap. Way way back to... the early 00s. Playing for Real Madrid from 1995 to 2010 and an original Galáctico, it's José María Gutiérrez Hernández, known to most simply as Guti.
Guti isn't a natural contender for this position I admit, he's not classically handsome, he's got a weird gait that doesn't make sense, his fashion sense, even taking into account the era, was dreadful, his hair is questionable and yet... the thing about Guti is that he's got The Thing. To be crude, he looks like he fucks. Watch him flirting on YouTube and tell me you wouldn't be charmed (disclaimer, I don't speak Spanish well enough to have a clue what he's saying so many apologies if he's being a sleaze.) He comes across like a bit of a bad boy, but not enough that you couldn't tame him (though why would you want to?) and he played football like a dream. He's ageing well, though possibly not to Pirlo/Beckham/Casillas/Ginola standards but enough that you still would. Guti, I salute you and my number is 07... .
Football 'eritage
As alluded to in The Week In Ball, the past week has seen the anniversary of Diego Maradona's death.
There are so many things that could be written about him that it seems churlish to even try. I could tell you that I was 7 in 1986 and my biggest memory of his actions at the World Cup was that they caused my infant school headteacher to give an assembly on cheating on the Monday morning after the game.
I could talk about how I only ever really saw him as a cultural figure, something bigger than anything else in football really, because back then the unknowable, untouchable aspect of a star was, in my opinion, much much greater. I could mention being aware that he played in Italy and thinking that when he played in the 1994 World Cup for Argentina at the age of 33 (the age that Benzema, Busquets and Lewandowski are now) I found it amazing that someone so old was still going.
We could talk about his off field activities. His political affiliations, his addictions, his refusal to acknowledge his first born child, his failure to pay tax, his arrests and the accusations of domestic violence.
Instead, I would urge you to watch Asif Kapadia's Diego Maradona, currently available in the UK on Prime at no extra cost, but be quick, it leaves in 12 days! (As of today, 29th Nov). Primarily dealing with his time at Napoli it's an incredible portrait of a man on the edge, a man so adored by his adopted home country and home city that he didn't know which way to turn, a man with so much talent it became a burden.
Kit Bag
Sticking to the Dutch-ish vibe of this newsletter (maybe I should've done a Dutch thirst trap? Too late now) and given that there have been no new shirt releases that I've seen let's instead bask in the glory of the Netherlands national team shirts. Orange is always going to be a joyous colour and their beautiful, simple, lion badge just enhances the class.
The current shirts are two of my favourite international ones. To repeat the mantra 'I've never met a black kit I didn't like' which certainly applies here and the main home kit is just utterly lovely with the lion pattern.
And of course the vintage kits are iconic
Extra Time
Before I start rounding up some of the fun content I've seen this week I simply have to share this. LOOK! All my dreams have come true! He came so quickly, I'm super impressed. The only issue is that I fucked up and um, he has a brother too, so maybe, if I ever get to 500 subs or something or if I feel frisky on my birthday in Jan, I'll do a giveaway.
Anyway, there's also been a lot of delightful football content this week, here's a few of my favourites:
As mentioned, it's Rainbow Laces time again and the West Brom Boiler said GAY RIGHTS
Is there a joke about Mark Noble I don't like? I think about the "bag of pears" tweet all the time and struggle not to RT it every Europa League day. This week though there was a new contender in town
It was the final of the Copa Libertadores this weekend and after the score was drawn at full time, it went into extra time. Palmeiras scored after 5 minutes and by the last minute Deyverson had had enough of hanging on and lived up to his name, deyving to cause a deyversion in the most spectacular fashion.
There's been lots of Chris Pratt/Mario voice content this week but this was a great football related one
Finally I want to address a huge wrong from my Christmas Gift Guide last week. I've been pals with No Score Draws on Twitter for almost as long as they've been around. They're great and are soon to be adding to the available artists in the family when their second child is born in December. I genuinely can't believe I missed them from the guide as their work is brilliant, so here's their pinned tweet with all the information you need (I'm a big fan of the EPL Moments print). Get in quick though as they're going to have their hands full any day now!
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