Tag: Europa League

Decoding the team sheet doodles of Paul Scholes and Michael Owen

The true feelings of the Man United players turned pundits are revealed


Fenerbahce beat Manchester United 2–1 in the Europa League, adding to the woe of a Jose Mourinho side that is now off to a worse start than David Moyes or Louis van Gaal managed. Former Man United players Paul Scholes and Michael Owen worked the match for BT Sport and used their copies of the team sheet to express their feelings on their former club’s fortunes, as revealed by colleague Jake Humphrey.

First, the furious scribbles of Paul Scholes:


What immediately jumps out here is the pen-mashing rage evident in the hurricane of swirls at the top of the page. The circular motions clearly symbolize Man United’s fortunes going down the toilet in recent years. Beneath that is what could be a sketch of a prison cell, representing the team’s stifled play and inability to escape their poor form.

Perhaps most telling is the fact that he put a box around Jose Mourinho’s name and then crossed it out. Though Scholes stated during the broadcast that he believes Man United should stick with Mourinho for “the next couple of years at least,” it seems the 11-time Premier League champion is losing patience with the Portuguese.

So that’s a snapshot of Scholes’ tortured emotions. Now how about Michael Owen?


His own initials printed in big block letters (and spiced up with an exclamation point), a magic wand, a banana, the phonetic spelling of Kjaer, a stitched up wound and a cartoon face.

If I had to guess what this all means, I’d say that Owen believes he could be scoring more goals than Zlatan Ibrahimovic right now, that Man United need a magic spell to get the best out of Paul Pogba, that he doesn’t know how to pronounce conjoined letters, that bananas are yummy, that it would be funny if a piece of paper had a paper cut, and that Mr. Parenthesis Head is going to be Britain’s next great children’s cartoon.

Deep thoughts. Deep thoughts indeed.


Old Trafford pitch invader allowed to run free, touch Zlatan’s hair

An unidentified man came out of the stands and onto the pitch in the 67th minute of Man United 1-0 Europa League win against Zorya. The man wore a full Manchester United kit to try and blend in with the players, but his touches of the ball quickly betrayed that image. Astonishingly, he was still allowed to run around until the end of the match.

After the final whistle, goal scorer Zlatan Ibrahimovic let the clearly envious man touch his hair.

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DT Exclusive: The Jurgen Klopp halftime team talk that inspired a miracle

Liverpool conceded two goals in the first 10 minutes of the second leg of their Europa League quarterfinal against Borussia Dortmund, replacing the melodically vibrant pre-match unity at Anfield with a familiar gust of dejection. The scoreline held until halftime and Dortmund’s progression seemed like a foregone conclusion, but then something incredible happened. Liverpool scored four times in the second half, with the last two goals coming from Mamadou Sakho and Dejan Lovren, of all people, to win 4-3 and advance on an aggregate score of 5-4.

The Liverpool players later credited the unbelievable turnaround to Jurgen Klopp’s halftime team talk. The following is a transcript of what Klopp told his players in the dressing room during the break.

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Quiz: Name one of these players on Man United’s bench

(Action Images via Reuters/Paul Childs)
(Action Images via Reuters/Paul Childs Livepic)

Man United have been absolutely decimated by injuries (on top of their poor form). Just look at this list, which doesn’t even include David De Gea, who hurt himself during warmups ahead of Man United’s Europa League match against Midtjylland (which Midtjylland — this Midtjylland — won 2-1).

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