Mails: Would old teams cope in current PL?

Matt Stead

Send your thoughts to theeditor@football365.com. And be good this weekend.

 

Asking the important questions
I’m sorry, maybe I’m being stupid, but why exactly are they called ‘bungs?’ I know bungs as stoppers in a sink or such. Why would something that generally stops things be used to describe a payment that facilitates something? Is there another meaning to the word? Or is there some association with the original meaning of the word ‘bung’ that I am overlooking? Cheers.
Eamonn (‘Transfer bribe’ seems a little less ambiguous) Istanbul

 

Should all our jobs be up for a vote?
Firstly, I should apologise to Paul Merton for my email earlier in the week. His grasp of English seems just fine.

But to my point today, I’ve read a few mails on how to pick the England team and a public vote seems quite popular. Being Scottish, I hope you keep doing what you’re doing but anyway…

It lead me to think though, is this view, while obviously tongue-in-cheek, a product of our environment (yes, it is) but further, is it actually the future? None of our jobs mean much any more. Will there be a public vote for the next promotion in my work? Will I be subject to ridicule for calling it in a few days on the bounce? Does any of it really matter because all we do now is move stuff about on spreadsheets?

Are we now a society that doesn’t care about football in any way so that actually a public vote for picking teams is the way forward?

Because who cares any more?
Danny, (PFM sympathiser) Glasgow

 

Bang bang
I know this is a bit late, but can we all just take a moment to acknowledge the most significant outcome of the Sam Allardyce debacle: he unleashed the ultimate, never to be beaten, PFM quote.

“The players let him [Roy] down in the end. I think maybe he was too indecisive. Cast a bit of an anxiety over to the players maybe. If that ever happened to me as a manager, I’d be absolutely gutted. It would be my fault.

“So I’d have come in at half time and gone, right: bang bang bang bang bang. And then if that didn’t work I’d have gone bang, substitute, substitute, know what I mean, and changed the complete style in the team”

And that, ladies and gentlemen, is how you win a football match. Ring the bell, this one’s over.
Horse

 

Historical teams now
Last night after watching the USA version of football, the next thing on was Premier league classics. Arsenal’s league winning 1998 team against Liverpool, who finished third and won the game 4-0. This got me thinking where would those teams finish if they were transported into this years league?

Arsenal maybe around the same level as Bournemouth? I think they’d manage to stay up. But what about Liverpool’s team, I’m not sure that they would survive these days.

What do readers think? How much has football moved on?
Joel

 

Oh, Wayne
Thank you Sarah Winterburn

Not least for penning an article without mentioning Mesut Ozil.

There were moments last night when i looked at Rooney and felt a pang of sympathy. But then I remembered his salary and his calamitous impact on the team the past 2-3 seasons.

Great assist mind…
Richard
Manchester

 

I have the answer to the ultimate question. Very simples… The next England Manager should be Wayne Rooney. The media love him, the players love him and most importantly it would mean he can stop playing for club and country (therefore the fans will love him). This is a win win answer if I ever saw one.

On second thoughts he might decide to become player manager and will blame himself for playing himself out off his best position.
Mohammed K (Ideas man and inventor of the sharpner paper clip, sharpens your pencil whilst organising your paper) London

 

Regarding Robbie (kind of)
I too was disheartened by Robbie Savage’s awfulness during the United/Zorya game, which reminded me of something I thought of a while ago while watching a dodgy American stream. For some reason, the commentary team went silent for nigh on ten minutes and it was absolute bliss to watch the game and hear the crowd oohing and ahhing along with the action without some dimwit offering insight which is usually tantamount to “He should’ve played football better there.”

So I’m wondering if switching off the commentators but not the crowd and pitch sounds could be an option for the likes of BT Sport and the other one? I did a quick google and apparently there are special speakers that can separate the noise and silence the dimwits along with the constant naming of the player who had the ball a pass or two ago, but leave the atmospheric sound of the crowd in tact. But why not have the option with whatever sports package you bought? Surely that would be easier. Is there a reason they don’t do this already?

I would seriously consider knocking the dodgy streams on the head if such an option were available.
Ben M (Arsenal’s collapse is going to be extra fun to watch this year)

 

The mails of Martin and Eoin H, and their complaints about Robbie Savage, struck a bit of a chord with me today. “How does this pillock get a gig on TV?” one of them asked understandably.

I have a BA Hons degree in Sport Journalism. For years after my graduation I worked for pittance, completing work experience, apprenticeships and also moving away from writing/reporting on sport, just to have a crack at the industry. As my twenties progressed and the pressures of wanting to buy a house/grow up came, I made the tough decision that because I was seemingly getting nowhere fast and simply didn’t have the contacts in the big places, I would retrain as a teacher. I did it and it lasted two years, but I’ve now left that to work for a digital start up company that specialise in fantasy sports games. It’s loosely related to my original degree(ish) and it’s a damn sight easier than teaching! But ultimately I’ve done it because if I hadn’t there might have always been a pang of “What if?” about my career.

Anyway, back to Savage. He was a middling Premier League player with stupid hair and was known more for his tendency to wind people up than what he could actually do with a football. He’s now enjoying his second career, as a mouth, and BT seem to embrace it. I cannot find anyone who rates him as a commentator.

Now, I’m not for one second saying I should be the face of BT Sport (mine’s more of the radio type anyway), but what I do begrudge is the opportunities this clown (and a number of others) has within the media. Ok, I don’t know what it’s like to play top level football, but I studied bloody hard to try and pave a way into the industry. It didn’t work out and that’s fine, but Savage just has no idea how lucky he is purely off the back of an average top level football career.

It can be the only explanation as to why he does zero research and says things like “just go in and smash everyone you’re bigger than them all.”

I don’t think it’s any coincidence that James Richardson, Mark Pougatch, Mark Chapman, Julien Laurens and Raphael Honigstein are some of the best on TV. And even you guys at 365, Matt Stanger, Iain MacIntosh, etc are the place to go for real written analysis (at opposed to Savage’s Mr Marmite column on the Daily Mirror: This week – “Klopp has galvanised Liverpool”). You all have one thing in common: You understand how lucky you are to do what you do, and it urges you to produce the quality that you do.

Nobody on that list has played football professionally but every single one does a damn sight better at offering analysis than Robbie Savage does. Or ever will do!
Joe, AFC, East Sussex

 

Rooney’s assist was indeed hilarious and welcome for those of us who don’t think one telling contribution should mask a whole game of ineptness. However it’s the pass a few minutes later that completely ruined a United 99-style counter attack that I think should go viral and be repeated endlessly until people concede he’s bollocks. It really was awful but something he’s been doing for years, not that his pals in the media would tell you though.

Savage was full of contradictions last night. Bemoaning United’s pedestrian play but saying Rooney should be on there (a bit like saying you’re starving and want a jam tart), slagging of Mata for dropping deep and driving forward with the ball saying he doesn’t need to be there – but you just know if Wayne was dropping behind the centre backs to ping a pass he’d have been singing his praises.

These Europa games are so boring I wish we weren’t in it. Why can’t Schweinsteiger or Carrick be sitting, intercepting and spraying balls forward rather than Fellaini awkwardly passing sideways and offering no creativity?
Silvio Dante

 

Viva Dundalk
Dear Editor. I’ve contacted you several times about the efforts of Dundalk FC in the Champions League and now the Europa League. Last night, we continued our march….

I am still horse this morning from that game. My god, what are we doing. Dundalk FC you beautiful beast. You are ploughing through Europe like a gorgeous Massey Ferguson in a field of Ferraris and you are not giving a f**k. F**k reputation, f**k the norm, f**k what should be, f**k them all. Hard work, skill, dedication, commitment and desire. That’s what, and is, winning you games.

I cried a little when that goal went in last night, not sure if it was from the sheer effort I was putting in to screaming, euphoria or tiredness. But I’d like to think it was just pure passion. I am, and continue to be overjoyed by this team. After two games in the Europa League we have more points than Manchester United. We are a part time outfit. PART FUCKING TIME LADS!!!. But we are tearing the script apart.

March on my Lilly Whites. March on to victory. Not because it’s possible. But because you can.
Ciarán (Apologies for the expletives!!) Dundalk FC

 

Not the best Friday
First I find out that dogs only live for about 12 human years and now Klopp won’t be around in a decade.

I better start saving for sessions with the grief counsellor.
H, (love my wife too just in case she reads this)