Let’s not pretend that Harry Kane isn’t f***ing brilliant…

Editor F365

Keep your mails coming to theeditor@football365.com…

 

Harry Kane is magic
It’s been asked before but..

Why is Harry Kane derided so much? Is it because he plays for Spurs? Is it because he’s English and talks a bit funny with a bit of a lisp? LOLZ. Nothing like mocking people with a speech disorder is it lads. AM I RIGHT?!

I mean, sure as a Spurs fan I have rose tinted glasses… So let’s avoid emotion and look at league statistics alone:

2014: 21 goals in 34 matches

2015: 25 goals in 38 matches

2016: 29 goals in 30 matches

2017: 30 goals in 37 matches

2018: 17 goals in 28 matches

2019: 18 goals in 29 matches

2020: 23 goals in 35 matches

166 PL goals in 245 games (0.68 goals per match). For comparison, Henry, the greatest striker in the Premier League era (FYI for some, you can credit players from opposing teams, you don’t lose brownie points or burst into a ball of flames by rating players you don’t like or from opposing teams), scored 175 goals in 258 games at a ratio of 0.68 goals per match. No, i’m not saying Kane is better than Henry before you pick the keyboards up…

Yet the way people talk about Kane, it’s like he’s had one good season, or scores buckets of penalties. Mark Jones (LFC) in the Mailbox says he’s a Top 10 striker but not top 3. Wonder where he puts Salah in that list? Same as Rohit (LFC) in your mailbox discussing penalties from Kane.

FYI – Kane scored 4 penalties this season. Salah scored 6. Vardy scored 8.

This season, Kane became only the second player ever to top the list of Goals and Assists. Do you know how insane that is? Do you know how difficult it is to score goals at that ratio when you’re in a team that isn’t the best in the league? It’s pretty difficult.

If you don’t like Kane, sure, that’s your prerogative. But to talk down his statistics as if he’s not the best striker in the league, it just makes you look a bit childish.

Regards
Dip aka Chief Grumpypants of Tottenham

Slow Kane
I have seen multiple mails in the mailbox recently mentioning the fact that Kane is ‘slow’ as a potential drawback of signing him. Now I’m not a Spurs fan (although I do have a soft spot for them) but why exactly is Kane’s speed important? He has been putting up superlative numbers for multiple seasons now for both club and country and he is playing for a club that isn’t one of the elite which for me makes his output even more impressive. He’s also turned into a highly effective playmaker as well. Why does it matter if he isn’t sprinting like the road runner?
I mean, Timo Werner is really fast so I guess he must be putting up some crazy numbers (checks notes) oh, I guess not. What about that Adama Traore fellow who is super quick? (checks notes again) oh he isn’t quite doing the job either. Maybe being quick isn’t meaningful if you don’t have other qualities that make you effective for the team?
Turiyo Damascene, Kigali, Rwanda


Premier League 2020/21 winners: Guardiola, Bielsa, West Ham


 

Gaz Nev’s hypocrisy
I used to be quite indifferent to Gary Neville and actually liked his pre valencia MNF analysis but these days his hypocrisy is infuriating. Watching him walk around the golf course with Harry Kane talking about why he wants to leave spurs, yet if someone like Pogba did the same interview he’d have called it disrespectful.

During the super league fiasco, watching him position himself as the saviour of football while working for Sky and while he’s overseeing the financial doping of Salford City is hilarious. Furthermore, ever since he was sacked by Valencia it seems he’s become the advocate for giving managers more time, yet Salford City churn through managers like charlie sheen goes through prostitutes. Obviously, irony is not lost on the son of a man named Neville Neville.
Longsight Lad

 

Pep v Klopp
OK, I’ll admit I’m a United fan, but even as one, I much prefer Pep to Klopp. I have absolutely no doubt that Klopp is a seriously good manager, and am not looking to spend this email trying (and failing I might add) to denigrate his success and overall performance. It has been nothing short of phenomenal, and Liverpool should rightly feel confident they will come back strong next season.

However, I did want to raise a quick issue with an email from Mike, LFC, London… In a perfectly reasonable email, Mike suggests that because Klopp inherited a much weaker Liverpool team, he deserves more praise than Pep, who inherited a top quality squad. Now this is where I take issue. Pep did indeed land on his feet and inherit a brilliant squad, however, as we have seen countless times, it takes more than a good squad to achieve success – just look at Lampard this season. Klopp has a strong squad, but hasn’t won 3 Champions League’s in a row like Zidane…

Also, to be a very boring and data driven person, if we think of improvement in a pareto chart, to get those last few % is much harder than getting the first x%. Klopp has done both, which is admirable, but Pep has done the harder part over a longer period of time. Not saying one is better than the other, just that the actions of both deserve some respect.

Finally, to touch on the email from Mark Kelly – yes Tuchel has done an excellent job, but he has also set his team up to be defensively sound and low scoring. It has worked and he deserves the plaudits coming his way. But don’t make it out that just because his team is low scoring he is a genius to have won points…
Jack (OGS has also done well – if, and it’s a big IF without Maguire, we win the Europa, then it has been a top season) Manchester

Good email from Mike, (LFC, London), setting out some points of caution with regards to the praise dished out by Eamonn (Dublin) about Pep Guardiola. There is little doubt that Guardiola is a superb coach and I would have thought very few people doubt that. But at least to my mind, for him to be classed as one of the greatest ever he would need to achieve a league title win/ CL win with a side that doesn’t already hold a huge advantage over its competitors in terms of the resources/ budget available. Putting rivalries to one side for a minute, surely a title win for Klopp at Liverpool/ Dortmund is a far greater achievement than the equivalent at City/ Bayern? Similarly, (and much as it pains me to say it), I consider Mourinho’s success in Europe to be a greater achievement than Guardiola’s. Guardiola is very talented and may well be capable of achieving great domestic and European success with a side like Napoli, Porto or Dortmund… but we don’t know. I’d love to see him have a go… I guess the question is whether he is brave enough to?

More generally, I often think the disparity in resource availability is not given enough prominence in the media when appraising the respective performance of clubs and managers: perhaps this is in part because teams within the Premier League and other major leagues in Europe are all operating on a hugely uneven playing field and this slightly diminishes the competitions which are being reported on? Who knows. It definitely is a contributing factor to the general sense of apathy around City’s latest title win.
Tony, New forest

 

Wenger didn’t die for this
In response to mailbox entries from Naz, Adonis and others (I had to stop reading just to send this in), it’s a little embarrassing to see Arsenal fans so desperately clutching at straws, citing such positive accomplishments as “[finishing] only six points off 4th place this season”, “a lack of European football next season” and (my favorite) “we finished 8th again, but with 5 more points”.

Are these the same “Wenger Out” fans who weren’t satisfied with a dozen consecutive years (2004/05 – 2015/16) of consistently finishing in the top four (including two second-place finishes at the beginning and end of that “post-Invincibles” 12-year period)? I understand the necessity of lowering one’s expectations, but celebrating consecutive eighth-place finishes and no European football smacks of denial and, let’s face it, a bit pathetic.
Ebrahim (relegation to the Championship will allow Arteta to finally complete the “work in progress” and really make the team “his own”), MUFC, Seattle

 



 

Bad champions
F365 and Liverpool fans are completely missing the point about “bad champions”.

At the time Roy Keane said it, Liverpool had been on a bad run but it was the excuses and blame apportioned to others that made them bad champions. Pickford was being vilified for his season ending challenge on VVD. VAR was being criticised every game and Klopp had gone from an entertaining and positive post match ball of energy to Jose Mourinho.

For Liverpool to finish 3rd after their first half of the season was a great fightback but does not make them good champions.

Similarly, Leicester were not bad champions. They were very happy champions who didn’t expect to retain their crown and have been a hard working likeable bunch ever since. They also had crippling injury problems this season but we barely heard about it.
Jon, Cape Town (not sure i should praise Leicester as I grew up near the Posh)

Awards season
As the dust settles on another Premier League season, it’s awards time! Here are my much coveted, entirely sincere and in no way flippant award winners from a season like no other….

Goal of the season: Manuel Lanzini v Spurs
A swerving, outside-of-the-boot, last-minute, thirty-yard, in-off-the-bar thunderbastard to cap a fantastic late comeback in a silly six-goal-thriller? Yes please!

Runner-up: Erik Lamela v Arsenal
Could easily have been the goal of the season, but it was all for nothing as Spurs ended up on the losing side. Besides, it “just trickled” into the bottom corner, anyway!

Own Goal of the season: Sergio Reguilon v Villa
It all happens at Spurs! It hasn’t been dull there this season, despite Jose’s best efforts. Reguilon’s own goal was a classic. Wonder if he slices pizza as cleanly as he sliced that ball?

Runner-up: Matt Ritchie v Fulham
Because a ball in the face is never not funny. Except when it happens to you, and everyone laughs, adding insult to probable injury.

PR own goal of the season: European Super League plans
Caused a public and media backlash so intense, news of Jose Mourinho’s latest sacking the very next day after the announcement barely even registered! Truly, a dropped bollock of epic proportions.

Most Batshit Mental Afternoon of a Batshit Mental Season Award: Sunday 4th October 2020.
Manchester United 1-6 Tottenham, followed by Aston Villa 7-2 Liverpool.
To quote Liverpool’s most beloved son, “nobody told me there’d be days like these…strange days indeed!”
Props too, to the Liverpool fans all over the internet exploding with laughter immediately after, and during the freak result at Old Trafford, only to get progressively quieter as the evening wore on, until they were stunned into near total silence. Bad karma’s gonna get you, indeed.

The Hull City Award for Most Dramatic Plunge Down The League Table: Southampton
From top of the entire league for a day early in November, to finishing 15th, beneath a Newcastle United managed by Steve Bruce. Oof.

Runner-up: Liverpool
Top of the entire league at Christmas, only to embark upon a nightmare run of form for the first couple of months of the new year. They slipped down to about 8th, all the while looking like that car you sometimes see in Formula 1 and coasting at the front, only to pick up a puncture on the back of the machine. All of a sudden, the tyre started to delaminate, with bits of rubber flying off everywhere and half the field was overtaking them, But thankfully for them, a good pit stop and some fresh tyres (Phillips, Kabak) saw them fight back into the podium positions.

Best Hair: Fabio Silva
Looks like he should be in The Kooks. Lovely stuff.

Worst Hair: Gareth Bale
Extravagant lengths to go to in order to conceal a bald patch.

Peak Arsenal Award: 2nd in form table since Christmas…
…and still finishing beneath Spurs. Peak Arsenal, that.

Wooden Spoon: Tottenham
Congratulations, Spurs. You’ve finished above Arsenal once again. Your prize? A place in the new UEFA Conference League, the ultimate wooden spoon.

Deer Hunter of the season: Roman Abramovich
Turns out Roman killed Bambi, to answer an old question for the Sex Pistols.

Best Kit: Manchester United 3rd
It’s divisive. Traditionalists hate it. On first sighting, I thought: hmm. But seeing the kit in action, with the plain black shorts and white socks, instead of the matching dazzle-camo attire it was marketed with, it grew on me and I came to really like it. It’s nice, it’s different, un-ewes-yewl. It may not be everyone’s cup of tea, but it’s the most memorable kit of the season for my money and these are my awards, so there!

Worst Kit: Wolves Away
Rarely called into action after the relegations of Norwich and Watford last season, which was for the best.

Best In-House Catering, sponsored by Barry Fox: Tottenham Hotspur
With revolutionary pint-pouring technology that dispenses your alcoholic beverage in just three seconds flat, an on-site microbrewery and artisanal bakery producing freshly-baked bread, not to mention a range of mouthwatering cheeses on offer, the matchday experience at the Tottenham Hotspur Stadium is truly a great day out for the whole family. As long as none of them support Tottenham, obviously.

Progress Award, sponsored by Garey Vance: Manchester United
The Red Devils continue their steady progress under Ole Gunnar Solskjaer, finishing one place higher and 8 points better off than last season. Solid progress, though not as spectacular as…

Most Improved Award: West Ham
Hotly-tipped for relegation Hammers end the season 6th with a Europa League place under the Moyesiah, finishing above both Arsenal and Spurs. Played, Moyesy!

Congratulations, You’re Not As Bad As Derby Award: Sheffield United
After the shittest first half of a season in football history, we legitimately feared the Blades would eclipse Derby County of 2007-08 as the worst team in Premier League history. But they ended up with just over twice the eventual 11 point tally of that epically shit team. So being over twice as good as that Derby side, after such a bad start, has to be worth something, surely?

Manager of the Season: Marcelo Bielsa
Bielsa has achieved what was previously thought to be impossible and actually made Leeds United quite likeable! The man is, quite possibly, an actual wizard.

Big-Money Flop of the Season: Timo Werner
Germany are in trouble if this guy is the best they’ve got. That clip of him injuring himself after inexplicably kicking the corner flag, just about summed up his torrid season. Now watch him score the winner in the Champions League final and then tear it up for Germany at the Euros!

Celebration of the Season: Jamie Vardy two-footing the corner flag at Bramall Lane
A proper career-ender for that poor corner flag.
Lee, awards-giver of the season

 


The prestigious Football365 end-of-season awards


 

…So I suppose now that the domestic season has come to a close, sort of, Play-Offs to come of course, but i felt it was the perfect time to do some End Of Season Awards, F365 dropped their own last night, so here are mine, would love to hear yours in future mailboxes!!

Goal of the season: Manuel Lanzini vs Spurs
Just the timing of the goal, the sweetness of the strike, what it meant in terms of the Hammers comeback, pure excellence, imagine if fans were present, oh my, one for the ages.
Runner-up: Edinson Cavani vs Fulham
It was potentially offside, most likely was, however it takes some ability or luck, maybe both to pull off such a stunning chip.

Best kit: Arsenal Third & Chelsea Home
This one is a tie for me, that Third strip from Arsenal is quite decent but maybe it is bias but I just loved the home kit this season for Chelsea, the less said about next season’s the better.

Worst kit: Chelsea Third.
There is only one Crystal Palace, or maybe two, paying tribute to Roy Hodgson’s final season, lets put it down to that.

Goalkeeping howler of the season: Bernd Leno vs Everton
Oh dear, he handed Everton those three points back in April, shocking stuff.

Bugbear of the season: VAR.
Yet again, another season dominated by VAR, offsides which not many would ever claim for, surely next season the rules are adapted?

Most Unexpected Performance by a Struggling Team of the season: Chelsea 2-5 West Brom
Moving swiftly on haha

Best Hair: Dele Alli.
Henrik Larsson vibes.

Worst Hair: Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang
Not quite Henrik Larsson, more Gervinho.

Signing of the Season: Emiliano Martinez.
No Ruben Dias from me here, the transformation Martinez has been a part of at Villa, especially their defence, did Arsenal sell the wrong goalkeeper last summer?

Would-be Story of the season:
Everton, what a start to the season, they are battling for the Top 4, European football for sure, yet finished *checks table* 10th? Wait WHAT!?!
Coup of the Season:
Anyone who put Stuart Dallas in their FPL team from Game Week 1, £4.5m he cost at the start of the game, icon.

Fall from Grace of the Season: Donny Van de Beek.
Left an incredible Ajax side assuming to become a key part of the Manchester United side this season, someone give him a hug, he never expected it to turn out like this.

“Carrying a team on his back until it literally breaks” Award: Harry Kane and Heung-Min Son
Spurs did Chelsea a favour, forever grateful, but if you removed these two from the side, would they even make Top 10?
Mikey, CFC

 

Entertainment everywhere
Fine the season’s final day had a lot of twists and turns but was it really the most entertaining season. take a look elsewhere in europe ……..

Spain – came down to a straight Battle on the final day between the Madrid Clubs ….. After Atletico who at one point had an almost 13 point lead, seemed to bottle it then got a crucial point at Barca with 3 games to go and saw Real fail to take advantage needing a late goal to even maintain the status quo . Atletico still almost bottled it going down a goal in each of the last 2 games before comeback winners from Dracula Suarez ……who got instant revenge on Barca for letting him go …

Germany.-Bayern won because Bayern ,only thing of note was Lewandoski , breaking the record for single season goals ,with practically the final kick of the game

italy Inter rapped up the title (1st in 11 years) easily, After Milan ran out of Zlatan juice, the big entertainment in the end ],was the four way battle for the 3 remaining Champions league spots , culminating in Juve annihilating their last opponents and then having to check the results as Milan beat Already qualified Atalanta (including a late, late penalty ) and Napoli finally faltered. This will be Milan’s first champions league in 7 years

France This was tight , at various points Marseille, Lyon, Monaco, Lille and Psg had a sniff, ….. final day Lille Clinched it despite a late goal from their opponents Angers for a first title in 10 years.. In juvenile news ,,despite losing to PSG, Brest stayed up, Lyon finally lost out on the final champions league spot when they lost a 2-1 lead to lose 3-2 to Nice which meant they couldn’t take advantage of Monaco’s dropped points

Portugal: Sporting CP won their first ,in about 19 years …they were aided by their eternal rivals, Benfica , drawing with Porto in the run in, before turning around and giving them their only blemish of the season

Holland Ajax next …notable mainly, for that 13 or 14 nil win by Ajax

Belgium Brugge next

Scotland Rangers roared back to win the league and stop Celtic’s quest for a 10th ,while also completing the whole season undefeated

Turkey after Basaksehir’s impressive win last year the Big 3 gave a classic Fenerbache floundered in the final few games and watched from the sideline as Besiktas won the league from Galatasary by (checks notes ) one goal
roode

United and schadenfreude

Dear Akhil, Man Utd, Delhi, I’m old enough to remember when winning the Premier League or the Champions League was the only measure of success for Manchester United. They were the biggest club in the world and all other supporters hated them because they were so successful. It shows how far United have fallen, that finishing 12 points behind their city rivals and getting to the final of the secondary european cup is now good enough. That is what Ole has brought you. The lowering of your expectations.

Can it really be 9 (nine) years since United were last in the title race?!

Anyway good luck with your plastic cup final.

Thanks,
Chris, London (really its those who lived through the Fergie years that now are enjoying the schadenfreude)

 

Swapsies
To reply to Ryan, there is not much or many but there has been some. Namely Diego Milito and Thiago Motta to Inter in exchange for Bonucci, Acquafresca, two others and another’s co ownership rights to Genoa. It’s not the most perfect example but it fits.

Sigurdsson to Swansea for Ben Davies and Michel Vorm was another move more recent and more local. Heading back to Italy, Bonucci was on the move again, this time to Juve(again) from Milan, with Milan receiving Caldara and Higuain.

This merely goes to show that whilst it’s rare, it’s not impossible.

As to why? Well if Henderson is told he is number 2 he may not want to sit on the bench. Look around and see who exactly may need a Henderson. If Tottenham do decide to part ways with Loris then it makes sense. Very similarly to Martial. If Kane comes in he won’t be seeing much action and a move to be a main man at Tottenham would also make some sense. But what does sense have to do with football.

Most directions after United is down and neither is playing at a level to think they’d go anywhere else.
Calvino

Fan lead review
I’ve seen loads of people do reviews of both the season as a whole and their own clubs season, so I thought I’d talk about something else.

Roy Hodgson has been confirmed as the final member of the fan lead review and I think he’ll be a great addition. Now first thing is there is only one “fan” on there, everyone else is an MP or football administrator, which obviously isn’t what we as fans expected or wanted.

The second thing though is one of the remits of the group is to look into club ownership. Now we’ve all heard about the 50+1 rule and how great it would be but that’s not going to happen. Too many rich people with influence (looking at City’s owners, but crucially not having a go at them). However, what I would like to see is an end to leveraged buy outs.

Both Manchester United and Burnley have been taken over by American owners who have basically secured the loans against the club they’ve bought. This has lead to what we’re debt free clubs having huge debts that now need to be serviced. Personally I don’t like the sound of it for any business, but if football is more than a business and a fabric of the local community it’s even worse. These clubs are now in a worse position than they were before and as a united fan I’d like this too never happen again. I don’t know if it could be legally enforced or not but that’s the one rule, that I believe could be realistically achieved enforced.

I’d also like safe standing, caps on ticket prices and the end to season ticket holders buying tickets for the single purpose of reselling tickets but I don’t know how possible these are either.
Bernard (funny how Boris, a rugby fan, is interested in football when it hits the front pages) MUFC

The worm turns
Something that seemed to go under the radar with the end of season games and either just announced or about to be announced national squads for the Euro finals, was FIFA announcing they are looking at a World Cup every two years.

Clearly deliberate timing on their behalf, to ensure the minimum of publicity and push back. After talking of the 12 clubs as essentially parasites for trying to alter and monetize the game, they are proposing the same thing – only different. A grab for more revenue.

UEFA must be wondering what’s happening- being squeezed from both sides – the clubs in their zone and the overall governing body.

The ex-CEO of UEFA likened it to everyone trying to get a share of the cake. The question he has was whether they were making the cake bigger or just trying to take a bigger share of the same sized cake.

Clearly the calendar is already full. The Nations league was actually a great way to even up the games between nations while providing more competitive games than Friendlies. But given it takes the best part of 2 years to qualify for FIFAs World Cup, there’s not enough space to allow for the regional competition and world cups every two years. The reason they give is that there isn’t much to play for for teams that don’t qualify for the finals which take place every 4 years. They’ve already expanded it to 48 teams in the final which increases games and reduces the quality yet further. It’s why the EUROs are so much better quality. Plus each zone have their own competitions, albeit the Conmebol is infrequent, 3 of the other 5 zones have a regular competition with the 4th, Africa every 2 years. So it’s a little deceptive to say teams have nothing to play for…especially as they may be from smaller or less football centric nations. After all, it’s not as if every country has a competitive team in every sport played globally today.

Obviously the more money coming into FIFA coffers the more going into the FIFA member’s pockets.

Just surprised we didn’t see or hear some groundswell of opposition from all those pundits who called the owners of the 12 clubs scum. Perhaps they only cared about something they directly impacted their ability to earn as a pundit?
Paul McDevitt (Thought Rhys Williams tentative hug with Klopp was sweet and showed how young he still really is while the experienced players just went in for the full bear job)

 

Perspective
A big shout out to Alistair Gilmour, Glasgow for articulating exactly how I feel about the majority of football discussion. F365 is my primary source of football content given the degree of level-headedness that is typically found. I cannot stand the tribalism and vitriol that normally manifests. I started supporting Liverpool because of Kevin Keegan but Liverpool has never paid my rent or bought my family food so I cannot fathom the levels of false “pashun” that I see. To expound on what Alistair said I had to bury my child last year. Because it was a crime scene, we could not move her and we had to sit with her dead body for over 5 hours and then only 1 Forensic Pathologist pitched up so I had to help him carry my child into the body bag and then help him carry my daughters body to the van. And then help at the mortuary where the post mortem was done (Wonders of SA). A footballer leaves a team means nothing to my life. I have supported Liverpool from 1976 but I am proudly “plastic” because I don’t really feel much in life nowadays. I am numb to the joys and sorrows and just feel a degree of glee when Liverpool exceed my expectations. (Delighted at 3rd). I am not detracting anything from Aguero as I believe he is a Legend. However, him leaving does not “hurt the brain” and there is zero need for a “remedy”. “Emotional baggage” my arse. Because real life tragedy cannot be remedied. I live it everyday.
Lloyd (Jozi) SA