Taking the Michael
Michael O’Neill’s achievement in leading Northern Ireland from fifth seeds to top of their Euro 2016 qualifying group is rightly hailed by Brian Reade in the Mirror, but he might have just gone a touch early with the praise for their Euro 2020 campaign.
‘This time, admittedly after only two games, he has a 100 per cent record and tops a group containing Holland and Germany.’
Good that he mentions ‘only two games’. Weird, though, that he then mentions Holland and Germany rather than Estonia and Belarus, the two teams giant-killing Northern Ireland have beaten thus far. At home.
Lies & Alabas
Bayern Munich have signed Lucas Hernandez from Atletico Madrid for £68m. It’s a big transfer, a decent story in the wasteland between the international games and the return of club football. But what to do with it if you run a football website concerned with football clubs in London?
If you’re London football website football.london, you dig out some old quotes from Bayern’s David Alaba that mention supporting Arsenal as a youngster, suggest a new player coming in means he’s heading out and come up with the headline ‘The David Alaba comments that will excite Arsenal fans as Bayern Munich announce £68m transfer’ and then put ‘david-alaba-arsenal-transfer-munich’ in the url.
Now we could just about let this one slide. It is international week, after all. Everyone gets one free pass. But hello, what’s this?
Another story, another magnificently misleading headline. ‘Alaba confirmed!’ – Arsenal fans go wild over Bayern Munich star as left-back completes move’.
Writing a story that deliberately and unapologetically adds two and two together to get five and putting a devious headline on it is one thing. Doing it again a couple of hours later based on the reaction to the first story is next level stuff.
And for those of you wondering whether the url for the second story contains the magic words ‘alaba-confirmed-arsenal’, we suspect you already know the answer to that one.
Harry up and wait
ESPN have done one of those long, wide-ranging feature interviews that American sportswriters do so well. It’s with Harry Kane and covers his rise from chubby nine-year-old reject to world-class striker, his hopes and dreams and method, and a genuinely eye-opening – and as so often with Kane – disarmingly unguarded discussion of an ambition to switch sports and end his career as an NFL kicker, in so doing becoming one of the all-time great sportsmen.
Like all American longreads, it also contains a couple of those jarring Americanisms that still really stand out when the subject is football. It’s good, though. Well worth a read.
He also talks about the need for Spurs to actually win something, to have something tangible to show for all their progress, after moving into the new stadium. He couldn’t be much clearer that he very much plans to be part of those successes.
‘I’ve always said as long as the club is moving in the right direction and showing the right ambition, I want to be part of the journey.
‘A lot of people look at it and say this is maybe the best team we’ve had, maybe the best team we’ll ever have, and the best manager, but it’s important that we have something to show for it.”
So what happens when you feed this 4000-word profile into The Sun transferometer? “Harry Kane has warned Tottenham: I’ll only stay if you show ambition.”
His comments ‘will spark fears among Spurs fans over his future’; they will if The Sun has anything to do with it.
Frank speaking
Just one further note from that ESPN feature. Tim Sherwood, coaxed to yet again reluctantly discuss being the man entirely responsible for Kane’s career, says of giving him his big break: ‘How did we know Frank Sinatra was a good singer until he sang onstage?’
Never change, Tim.
Video nasty
The Sun carry an exclusive report into the ‘silent epidemic’ of gaming addiction within English football.
Beneath the predictable tabloid hyperbole of calling it FOOTBALL’S SILENT EPIDEMIC, it’s a decent enough and even-handed look at an issue that certainly doesn’t get widespread attention. It features case studies, details of how the PFA is tackling the issue and interviews with psychotherapists and sports physicians.
But what’s this NIB directly underneath the double-page spread?
‘Dele Alli is e-gaming chair maker SecretLab’s new ambassador.
‘An avid gamer, the Spurs star has used the Floss dance when celebrating goals, a classic Fortnite move.
‘Dele, 22, who signed up yesterday said: “I’m very particular about the equipment I use. I have to be comfortable.”‘
That’s SecretLab e-gaming chairs. Available now.
It’s like saying Chocolate Oranges are available from Rawlinsons under an exposé on obesity.
A hundred reasons
‘Ole Gunnar Solskjaer: Ed Woodward reveals FIVE reasons Man Utd have appointed manager’ Daily Star
‘Manchester United: Ed Woodward reveals three reasons that led to Ole Gunnar Solskjaer appointment’ The Independent
Do these stories contain exactly the same Ed Woodward quotes? Yes.
Recommended reading of the day
Bruce Schoenfeld on Harry Kane
