Chelsea have announced a club record shirt sponsorship deal with Yokohama Rubber reportedly worth £200 million over the next five years. Though the deal doesn’t begin until next season, the influx of FFP friendly cash has already been earmarked for several key areas.
Here’s a breakdown of how the money will be divided up…
Kongstonian lost 2-1 to visiting Bognor Regis Town in the Ryman Premier League (the seventh tier of English football) and after the match, the home side’s goalkeeper, Rob Tolfrey, decided to jump into the stands to take out his frustrations on the Bognor supporters.
He scuffled with a few of the fans until a group of players and staff ran over to break them apart. Later, as the two teams headed towards the dressing rooms, the players squared up to each other while some of Tolfrey’s teammates kept him restrained at the other end of the pitch.
The police were called in, but according to the Daily Mail, it’s still unclear what prompted Tolfrey to go into the stands in the first place. Other than the fact that he is a goalkeeper.
On Saturday, a Conference North match between Worcester City and Stockport County devolved into backyard wrestling when former Pakistan international Shabir Khan body slammed Charlie Russell in response to a reckless challenge. Khan was shown a red card for the slam and Russell was shown a yellow for the tackle. But this was only the beginning of the English football’s tribute weekend to the WWE, though.
Joey Barton got himself sent off in the 32nd minute of QPR’s visit to Hull for punching Tom Huddleston in the penis. And that might be the least shocking sentence ever written.
As Chelsea continue to root out the fans who refused to let Souleymane Sylla board a Paris metro train and sang “we’re racist and that’s the way we like it” at him before Tuesday’s Champions League match against PSG, they used Jose Mourinho’s Friday press conference to publicly apologize to Sylla.
Former QPR manager Harry Redknapp has decided that if England don’t win Euro 2016, they should just “give up.” The man who would’ve accepted the England job if it was offered to him made this proclamation on talkSPORT, but first he was asked about the last World Cup.
“I don’t know if I could have done any better,” Redknapp said of England’s winless, bottom of the group showing in Brazil. “But I couldn’t have done any worse.”
With that established, Harry was asked to look ahead. And he started out with a reasonable statement, though.
Olivier Giroud scored both of Arsenal’s goals in their 2-0 FA Cup win against Middlesbrough over a span of just two minutes, highlighting his noticeable improvement since he joined the club three years ago.
“I believe that he is a different player today than the guy who arrived here,” said Arsene Wenger of the French striker, who was widely mocked for having the shooting accuracy of a drunk lemur in his first season with Arsenal.
If we compare 2012 Olivier Giroud to 2015 Olivier Giroud, we can pinpoint exactly how he has improved himself.
Liverpool came from behind to beat Crystal Palace 2-1 to reach the FA Cup quarterfinals, with their first goal coming from Daniel Sturridge, who had teammate Alberto Moreno as a guest back-up dancer on his trademark celebration.
This wasn’t a spontaneous expression of tandem joy, though. Moreno had to audition for his part during Liverpool’s training session on Friday.
Following the dismissal of Paul Lambert, Aston Villa are in need of a new manager and FA chairman Prince William has apparently notified his first choice. Even though he has no official affiliation with the club (aside from being their most powerful fan not named Tom Hanks).
Fresh off losing the African Cup of Nations final in a shootout ended with a penalty scored by a goalkeeper, Ghana coach Avram Grant tells Sky Sports:
“I met Prince William and he asked me ‘why don’t you come to Aston Villa?’. I said ‘when you become the chairman, I will come’.
“As long as my name is mentioned, I feel good with this, but not more than that. I want to continue with Ghana.”
It’s probably not a good sign that the future King of England can’t even convince someone to take the Villa job.
Though Diego Costa has quickly established himself as one of the most formidable players in the Premier League, the language barrier has limited his ability to express himself primarily to his many goals and even more confrontations on the pitch. The one memorable quote we do have from Costa’s time in London so far comes from the second-hand tale of when he had Oscar round up their three toughest teammates (John Terry, Gary Cahill, and Branislav Ivanovic) on his first day and told them “I come into battle. You come with me.”
This sounds like a line from an old samurai film, but as Costa’s new interview with Sport Magazine reveals, this is actually how he talks. Naturally, this interview has several quotes that need to be highlighted.
