WORD OF MOUTH
“Humble, respectful, honest, resilient, driven, confident, clever, positive, energetic, consistent, affable, brilliant.”
Damien Duff listing out midfielder Kerr McInroy’s qualities after the midfielder signed a new contract with Shelbourne. It sounds like a Tinder ad.
“There won’t be any magic, magic doesn’t exist.”
Carlo Ancelotti not quite anticipating a supernatural Real Madrid comeback against Arsenal in that Champions League game.
Ken Early: the future of Real Madrid is suddenly uncertain
Katie McCabe’s Arsenal beaten 2-1 at the Emirates Stadium in first leg of semi-final against Olympique Lyonnais
Irish player tracker: Mark McGuinness shows grit, leadership and class for Luton Town
No magic for Carlo Ancelotti as Real Madrid fail to come back against Arsenal
“He’s failed. Sure, he’s scored a lot of goals, but in terms of his overall play, he’s been catastrophic.”
Kylian Mbappé might have scored 32 goals in 49 appearances for Real Madrid this season, but is former French international Jérôme Rothen impressed? Non.
NUMBER: 645,000
That’s how many Euros a month Kalidou Koulibaly earns at Saudi club Al Hilal, making him the world’s highest-paid defender – Virgil van Dijk will have to make do with a miserly €467,000 after signing his new contract.
Mirror investigation highlights shocking referee abuse
We’ve all heard of plenty of examples of parents behaving badly on the touchline at games, but The Mirror’s investigation in to some of the worst recent cases in English grassroots football took the biscuit.
There was the father who jumped on a referee’s back and attempted to choke him after being a touch unhappy with a decision in an under-14 game. There was an under-11 match where a Da objected to an offside call by declaring, “I am going to get a hammer out of my car and smash the referee’s head in”.
There was the father who was accused of doing a “Nazi-style” salute towards the ref after being told to calm down. “I can only presume that due to the tense nature of the game I was swept up in the emotion at the time,” he said of watching his daughter’s under-15s match.
And there was the under-14 game where a parent threatened to beat the referee “to a pulp, crush his skull and chop him up and put him in the boot of his car”. He had, the ref wrote in his report, “stepped over the respect barrier”. Just a bit, yes.
QUOTE
“Newly single man, 40 years old, looking for a woman named Nathalie so I don’t have to redo my tattoo.”
Bayern Munich assistant coach Rodyse Munienge looking for love on Instagram. If your name is Nathalie, drop him a line.
Hull women’s chairman requests for club to be relegated
Crankiest (most vengeful) chairman of the week? That would be Daniel Johnson, the head honcho of Hull City’s women’s team. He was, The Guardian reported, severely peeved after several members of the squad took to social media to criticise his running of the club.
Among their complaints was that the players have no medical insurance and the lack of a strength and conditioning coach at the club had contributed to eight of the squad suffering serious knee injuries in the last 18 months.
The Guardian also learnt that “at least £200,000 is unaccounted for within the club’s accounts”, which has prompted Humberside Police to open an investigation in to suspected fraud.
Was Johnson’s response to the criticism and allegations on the measured side? Not really – he promptly submitted a request to the Football Association for the club to be relegated ... despite them being a whole 14 points clear of the drop from the National League Northern Premier Division with one game to go. “An attempt at retaliation,” said The Guardian. Indeed.
MORE WORD OF MOUTH
“I just don’t see Onana as a very natural goalkeeper, he dives very weirdly with weak hands. He looks like when a goalkeeper has been sent off and a centre half has to go in between the sticks.”
Apart from that, Paul Parker rates André Onana highly.
“Arsenal at the Bernabeu, Tottenham watching Emmerdale.”
All-singing Gooners sending their Spurs-loving pals greetings from Madrid last week.
“I am very angry. We were s**t.”
West Ham’s Niclas Fullkrug with a rather succinct summing up of their display against Southampton on Saturday.
