The football thread.

[barbados]

The problem with his appointment is solely because he isn’t English, and the fans and media will always back an English manager over a foreign one. Except of course the last one, or the one before that, or of course the one before that.

The nationality shouldn’t matter , and indeed it won’t as long as his record is as good as Southgate’s and let’s face it to lose only 17 out of 107 games while not having a clue isn’t too shabby., and it is widely acknowledged that Tuschel is ten times the manager that Southgate is, so we should do alright.

[tetsabb]

Oh, I think people were OK with Capello and Erikson, but a German???
There have been comments about the royal family's ancestry, and, indeed, Monsieur Farage's wife...

[suze]

There are two separate issues here.  One is nearly a thing of the past, but I doubt that it's completely extinct among football watching folk.  When we were children, it was not rare to hear older people say things like "The only good German is a dead German".  By now that is rare, but I've heard it within the last decade.  I hope that no such thing will be heard from the stands at England's first game under Herr Tuchel, but maybe it cannot be ruled out.

If it is heard, it will be a few idiots.  They will get more publicity than they deserve, but such is life.  But more generally, is there an argument that the maneger of a national football team ought to come from that country as surely as the players have to?  It is not open to King Charles to decide that Keir Starmer is rubbish, so let's buy in Donald Trump to be Prime Minister instead, because the Prime Minister can't be a foreigner*.  That is a more important role than being Head Coach of the national football team, so should it be open there either?

Now of course, such a rule would need to apply to every national football team, not just the England team - and England is very far from being the only country whose national Head Coach is a foreigner.  But a few points if you can name the only foreign Head Coach who has ever won the World Cup!

* under the rules of the day.  Neither Wellington (Irish) nor Bonar Law (Canadian) were strictly British under today's definition, but they were considered so at the time.

[barbados]

Jill Ellis

[suze]

Oh, very good barbados!  I think you get double the points I had it in mind to offer for that answer! The United States of America won the Women's World Cup in 2015 and 2019 under Head Coach Jill Ellis, who is English.  There might have been a bonus point for mentioning the US team that won the 1991 Women's World Cup under Anson Dorrance, who was born in India although of American parentage, and first became interested in football while at a boarding school in Kenya.

I didn't say Men's World Cup when I posed the question, so barbados' answer is entirely valid and I should penalise myself for not being specific enough - but there has actually been one team that won the Men's World Cup with a foreign manager ... sort of.  The West Germany team that won the World Cup in 1974 was managed by Helmut Schön, who was actually an East German.  

Herr Schön defected across Checkpoint Charlie at the age of 34 and had one season as a player at Hertha Berlin (that was West Berlin's club in those days), before becoming Head Coach of the Saar "national" team.  Saar was at that time a quasi-independent nation and played international football in its own right, and when it became part of West Germany in 1957 Herr Schön became Assistant Head Coach to the West Germany team, before moving into the big chair in 1964.

But no team has ever won the World Cup - of either sex - under a Head Coach whose first language was not the same as that of his/her players.  Will Herr Tuchel become the first?  I'm going to say "no" there, but only time will tell.

[celebaelin]

Oct 17, 2024 17:38:46 GMT suze said:

* under the rules of the day.  Neither Wellington (Irish) nor Bonar Law (Canadian) were strictly British under today's definition, but they were considered so at the time.

From the other point of view at that time both nations were considered British under law were they not?  Both were therefore British citizens AFAIK; clearly if you don't hold to that then you should 'bugger off home'!  That's excluding your pre Brexit Polish EU loophole obvs.

This from 1859 might bring some perspective...

[barbados]

Oct 17, 2024 21:55:12 GMT suze said:

Oh, very good barbados!  I think you get double the points I had it in mind to offer for that answer! The United States of America won the Women's World Cup in 2015 and 2019 under Head Coach Jill Ellis, who is English.  There might have been a bonus point for mentioning the US team that won the 1991 Women's World Cup under Anson Dorrance, who was born in India although of American parentage, and first became interested in football while at a boarding school in Kenya.

I didn't say Men's World Cup when I posed the question, so barbados' answer is entirely valid and I should penalise myself for not being specific enough - but there has actually been one team that won the Men's World Cup with a foreign manager ... sort of.  The West Germany team that won the World Cup in 1974 was managed by Helmut Schön, who was actually an East German.  

Herr Schön defected across Checkpoint Charlie at the age of 34 and had one season as a player at Hertha Berlin (that was West Berlin's club in those days), before becoming Head Coach of the Saar "national" team.  Saar was at that time a quasi-independent nation and played international football in its own right, and when it became part of West Germany in 1957 Herr Schön became Assistant Head Coach to the West Germany team, before moving into the big chair in 1964.

But no team has ever won the World Cup - of either sex - under a Head Coach whose first language was not the same as that of his/her players.  Will Herr Tuchel become the first?  I'm going to say "no" there, but only time will tell.

Objection your honour, Helmut Schön cant be of a foreign manager, East and West Germany didn’t exist until just before he retired, and your nationality is a rite of birth. Should you, for example take up the job of managing the Canucks in the upcoming World Cup, you wouldn’t be considered a foreigner. And Helmut Schön was  a German, managing Germany. 😉

[suze]

I did say "sort of", and for sure it would be possible to argue the case of Herr Schön in whatever way suited one's point.  

There was less than one year between the establishment of East Germany and Herr Schön's decision to move West.  In the one season of East German football that he played, he played for a team called Friedrichstadt who were perceived by the authorities to be pro-Western, and those authorities resorted to all sorts of dubious tactics to be sure that Friedrichstadt didn't win the East German league.  We can at least say that this perception was correct, since all of that Friedrichstadt team had gone West by the following season.  The Berlin Wall hadn't been built yet, and at that time the East German authorities didn't in practice make much effort to stop people.

So yes, he was basically a German managing Germany - and in that case, no foreign Head Coach has ever won the Men's World Cup.  I still don't expect Herr Tuchel to be the first; there's a fellow called Guardiola who seems altogether more likely to be that thing.  Since Senyor Guardiola makes no secret of being a Catalan nationalist, he is unlikely ever to be offered - and even less likely to accept - the Spain gig, but if France or Germany or Brazil offered him enough money ...

[celebaelin]

And so back to the Premiership with Liverpool vs Chelsea, Newcastle vs Brighton and Ipswich vs Everton looking like important games already even at this early stage.

[celebaelin]

Liverpool 2-1 Chelsea

Newcastle 0-1 Brighton

Ipswich 0-2 Everton

Liverpool stay top with Man City keeping pace and Arsenal dropping three points away at Bournemouth on what was, for me, a thoroughly miserable Saturday.  Brighton conducted a raid on the usually impregnable St James' Park to move ahead of Chelsea into 5th place while Villa's 1-3 win at Fulham earns them the #4 spot.  Everton are now 4 points clear of Ipswich in 16th and 17th places respectively.

[celebaelin]

Nottingham Forest 1-0 Crystal Palace

Forest saved my FF weekend with that win and if I'd had the strength of will to play Sels as well as Wood and Aina rather than leaving him on the bench I could have benefitted to the tune of 23 points over my accumulated tally rather than the still week-saving 13 that I did amass.

[celebaelin]

Arsenal 1-0 Shakhtar Donetsk

Arsenal were WAY better in truth but Shakhtar nearly sneaked an equaliser on two occasions in time added on.

It was a game I nearly didn't get to see because of

Queens Park Rangers 1-1 Coventry City

and

Aston Villa 2-0 Bologna

both being matters of local interest.

RB Leipzig vs Liverpool

and

Manchester City vs Sparta Prague

are both tonight (ie Wednesday).

[celebaelin]

Atalanta 0-0 Celtic

RB Leipzig 0-1 Liverpool

Manchester City 5-0 Sparta Prague

[tetsabb]

I have now seen Haarland's extraordinary mid-air shot with his heel. Could Sparta not have complained that his foot was high?

[celebaelin]

Not, I think, when there was no contact with a Sparta player.

[celebaelin]

An interesting set of results but less than ideal from my POV.  City go top by one point from Liverpool with Arsenal and Villa five points from the top.

Otherwise, well, FFS... or for FF's sake at the very least.

The weekend of general misfortune involved Arteta's choice to play two 17 y/o substitutes against the League leaders which I'm going to call 'brave' and yet still obtain a draw in the process.  OK... I guess... I look forward to seeing improvement  which I imagine is the point - or perhaps close to it.

As for my own choices they were very 'curates egg' - I was lead to believe that Wood was questionably likely to appear and so made a disasterous decision to not stay with him.  My choice instead wasn't disasterous but in truth less advantageous - overall my selections proved a bit under average for the week but I'm still clinging to the top half of the rankings for the time being.

[celebaelin]

Carabao Cup quarter-final draw

Tottenham vs Manchester United

Arsenal vs Crystal Palace

Newcastle vs Brentford

Southampton vs Liverpool

[celebaelin]

I remarked mid-week that Solanke hadn't done much since his arrival at Spurs.

He's just scored two goals against Villa (75 mins and 79 mins) to take them into a 3-1 lead with 3 minutes of normal time remaining; I believe those are his first Premiership goals this season after scoring 19 last season for Bournemouth (17 of which were in Premiership games).

James Maddison made it

Tottenham Hotspur 4 - 1 Aston Villa

in the 96th minute.

[celebaelin]

With just Fulham vs Brentford yet to come (20:00 Monday) my FF campaign has taken an upward turn.

The Spurs win and Man City's and Arsenal's losses probably caught a few people out and it's possible that the consensus was for a Chelsea away win rather than a draw against Man Utd - whatever the reason the points totals were not huge this week and I have one player yet to contribute so I'm optimistic for upward progress.

[celebaelin]

Yeah baby!

Best weekly ranking of the season so far (428,380).

Not quite back to my highest ranking yet but getting there.

[celebaelin]

Celtic vs RB Leipzig 20:00

Liverpool vs Leverkusen 20:00

Sporting CP vs Man City 20:00

Much has been made of Erling Haaland vs. Viktor Gyökeres in that regard and I have to admit I'm keen to see it.

Arsenal and Villa play tomorrow.

[celebaelin]

Celtic 3-1 RB Leipzig

Liverpool 4-0 Leverkusen

Sporting CP 4-1 Man City

Including a hatrick for Viktor Gyökeres although two of those were penalties - that's 23 in 17 appearances this season.  Almost unthinkably Haaland missed a penalty.

[tetsabb]

And Real Madrid 1 AC Milan 3
Quite an upset!

[celebaelin]

Club Brugge vs Aston Villa 17:45

Inter vs Arsenal 20:00

Martin Ødegaard may make a return after a lengthy period laid up but Rice has suffered a foot injury and will not play.  The Standard and The Metro both have a predicted 4-4-2 line-up for Arsenal and I would have thought that unlikely (if Gyökeres was an option though...); I'd expect a 4-3-3 with Saka again at the front but that is in truth nominal anyway as the formation is fluid.  Personally I wouldn't expect Sterling to begin the game and in Rice's absence the opening midfield three from six seem to me most likely to be Partey, Merino and Jorginho - time will tell.  Trossard and Jesus are rarely on the same pitch and I find this surprising as when they have been they seem to me to have an instinctive understanding of where the other will be; maybe I'll be lucky and get to see more of that at some point - though I suspect not from the outset.

[celebaelin]

Well I was largely wrong it seems - Arsenal did play 4-4-2 (I'm not saying where the 2 was) essentially and lost in the process

Inter 1-0 Arsenal

The underperforming run continues - Ødegaard did make a return latterly but not an impact.

Earlier

Club Brugge 1-0 Aston Villa

If I write 'Brugge it, millennium hand and shrimp' does it lighten the mood at all?  Probably not.

In both matches the goals conceded were penalties round about the half way mark.

[barbados]

There may be a hint towards why Arsenal are faltering - and that is with the manager.
If you look at both manager's response.
Emery's was one of disbelief, in the misunderstanding between Mings and Martinez, Arteta however was blaming the referee for giving a penalty that in the Premier league might not have been given - Note it is "might not" not "wouldn't have", that is because the Premier League referees use discretion based on the natural position of the hand - which is something they cant do reliably. In UEFA it is simple - did the ball make contact with below the shoulder? If it does it is a penalty, simple. As for the penalty that didn't get given, the goalkeeper mad contact with the ball then the player - that isn't a penalty in either the Premier League, or UEFA.

Arteta is instilling in the team a victim mentality - the reason they lose is because the referees are out to get them, so when they do lose, they was nothing they can do about it. When in reality, they have lost because they didn't do enough to win.
Aston Villa on the other hand, lost because the gave away a penalty because they lost concentration, next time out they can make sure that they do better.

[suze]

Nov 7, 2024 20:20:41 GMT barbados said:

There may be a hint towards why Arsenal are faltering - and that is with the manager.

Change the manager, then?

The runes have it that Lopetegui at West Ham will be the next Premier League manager to be given his P45, and Arteta at Arsenal seems to be considered second only to Guardiola at Manchester City in unsackability.

But he's been there five years and all he has to show for it is one FA Cup and the Spanish equivalent of the OBE.  He hasn't won the Premier League, he hasn't even come close to winning the Champions League.  Time for someone different?

[celebaelin]

I agree that the 'victim' narrative is one that fits the circumstance, I even suspect some degree of complicity in the development of that from the manager as the poor disciplinary record this season is so uncharacteristic of the sides' previous performances, I doubt however that anyone involved really believes the story.  My working theory, admittedly optimistically given current evidence, is that - as has been the case so very many times in the past - Arsenal will come good after Christmas.  That is something that 'seasoned' Arsenal fans will have seen so often that it borders on cliché but has not been viable in recent seasons in which the dropping of a low number of points makes all the difference (last season was 91/114 - 79.8% vs 89/114 - 78.1% for example and Man City have, after 10 matches, already dropped 7pts and Arsenal 12pts).  On a linear basis City should end the season on 88pts and Arsenal on 68pts (4th last season) but I suspect/hope Arteta has another approach in mind; he has not to my mind had his squad play in the same manner in any two of his last 4 (of 5) seasons in charge.  I don't think many at the club are voicing doubt regarding his leadership as yet despite the sudden departure of Edu; naming no names others however have certainly expressed doubts.

[barbados]

I cant see him getting the sack, simply because it isn’t the Arsenal way. There was a time when Arsenal were as good, if not better than Manchester City. But where Manchester City turn up pretty much week in week out, Arsenal often couldn’t be bothered.
Their disciplinary record over time doesn’t reflect recent seasons. The last couple of seasons they have had the third worst record. Yet over all they are the third best. That suggest the way they are being coached in recent years, so maybe it is time for a change?

[celebaelin]

10 games in?  Not likely.  Even if things were not to suddenly improve immediately after Christmas there would be a reticence I suspect.

Personally I hope things take an upward trajectory before then because the modern top tier is very unforgiving of dropped points in abundance but I get no sense of desperation as yet.  Getting fired for only being 5th in the Premiership would be a bit harsh don't you think?