The earnest question of whether Lionel Messi could do it on a cold, wet night in Stoke has persisted as a cliched joke for a few years now. So when Barcelona surprisingly sold Bojan, a 24-year-old once hyped as the next Messi, to Stoke City, the only explanation was that Messi personally asked him to go there on an expedition to see if the conditions in this mythical place are as challenging as the fables suggest. This is Bojan’s seventh letter back to his friend.
Tag: Dirty Tackle
Arsenal’s substitutes for injured players are also getting injured now
It was all going so well for Arsenal. After losing their first two Champions League matches, they bounced back to claim four consecutive victories, including decisive wins against Manchester United and Bayern Munich. This proved enough to restart talk of Arsenal winning the Premier League, but then came their Capital One Cup round of 16 match against second-division Sheffield Wednesday.
Man United give Wayne Rooney a testimonial and a nudge towards retirement
Manchester United have heeded the calls of supporters and granted Wayne Rooney a testimonial, which has been scheduled for August 3 of next year. The club award testimonials to players who have served for at least a decade, so Rooney’s 11 years puts him in that category, but they usually come before a player leaves the club or retires. Given Rooney’s much discussed poor form of late, that makes the timing of this announcement a bit interesting.
Future News: FIFA presidential candidates insist they are real people
Six of the eight FIFA presidential candidates have banded together to assure the public that they are, in fact, real people.
Newcastle can’t even spell their players’ names right
Newcastle’s already miserable season reached a new low on Sunday as they lost the Tyne-Wear Derby 3-0 to a Sunderland team led by their own former manager, Sam Allardyce. And as if that wasn’t bad enough, they also misspelled Chancel Mbemba’s name wrong on the back of his shirt.
Paul Pogba turned his shirt number into a strange math equation
Paul Pogba played Juventus’ 2-0 win against Atalanta with a hand written addition to the back of his shirt. Next to the No. 10, he wrote in a “+5.” But why? Did he decide that he prefers the No. 15 just before kickoff? Was it some kind of psychological warfare against his opponents? A tribute to the Jackson 5? What could it be?
Spurs fan accidentally taps into Bournemouth PA system, offers accurate assessment of their performance
Late in Spurs’ 5-1 dismantling of Bournemouth, an unusual but very accurate announcement was made over the Vitality Stadium’s public address system.
Claudio Ranieri fulfills clean sheet pizza promise to his players
Leicester finally recorded their first clean sheet of the season and all it took was the supreme motivational power of pizza. Last month, Claudio Ranieri promised to buy pizza for all of his players if they achieved the feat and in their 10th match of the season, they finally did it, beating Crystal Palace 1-0 to put them three points behind first-place Man City.
Being a man of his word, Ranieri announced that he will fulfill his promise and even throw in some champagne for good measure. And for scorer Jamie Vardy, who now has goals in seven consecutive Premier League matches (giving him a league leading 10 for the season), there will be an added bonus.
Wayne Rooney got his head stapled during the Manchester derby
A clash of heads with Vincent Kompany left Wayne Rooney with a busted hair plug and a river of blood flowing from his head. So to patch up the damage, Man United’s physio had to break out the staple gun. This was the only borderline interesting thing that happened in this match.
Everything goes wrong for Chelsea in first half against West Ham
Look at that! That’s how close Chelsea were to an equalizer after West Ham opened the scoring in the 17th minute. Amazingly, things only got much, much worse for the struggling Premier League champions after this.
Cesc Fabregas then had a goal disallowed for being offside and Nemanja Matic was sent off after his second yellow just before halftime. In the frustration of all of this, Diego Costa and Fabregas were also shown yellows for dissent, while Jose Mourinho (who was already on a suspended one-match ban for his comments about the referee after Chelsea’s loss to Southampton and assistant coach Silvino Louro were sent off.