Netball bib? Tabard? Urine-stained bedding? Man City kit destroyed
Man City drawing with Inter Milan was largely pointless so let’s talk about that kit. What a monstrosity.
Send your views on all subjects – including that kit – to [email protected]
What the hell is that Man City shirt?
Just a quick question for any mailboxers in the know.
How can an absolute juggernaut of a club that is run with utter efficiency, managed by the bestest bald fraud ever, etc, etc…. go into the ultimate football competition, against a side who has a strip that is legendarily bloody brilliant, wearing that monstrosity?
I genuinely thought that they were wearing a borrowed kit with the sort of hi-vis bib the girls would wear at school while playing netball on top!
Have they really given up? Did they actually leave their kits at Manchester Airport, have to borrow a kit from a local school and put the bibs on for logo reasons? Is this yet another sign that they know they’re due to be relegated to Sunday league football? Is this Rodri’s low-key attempt at strike action?
Ta Muchly,
Dave (Our kits in recent years have been bloody lovely) PVFC
…A tabard? Having seen City last night, presumably their kit manufacturer expects them to clean up this season,
Howard Jones
…Is Guardiola happy with a draw? Will De Bruyne’s injury make Arteta less grumpy?
Who cares? The real question from that game is what on earth possessed City to model their kit on a chain smoker’s old curtains? Or is it urine-stained bedding? Worse than the fruit salad one (which kinda grew on me as the season progressed).
Nick
MORE ON MAN CITY FROM F365:
???? Man City draw of no consequence aside from an INJURY CRISIS to curb Arsenal bleating
???? Man City: Barcelona ‘offer’ Haaland ‘exchange’ with Laporta to ‘sacrifice’ £42m star in ‘dream’ transfer
???? Man City FFP: Arsenal title and ‘relegation’ claims made as new ‘leaks’ are addressed
Do Arsenal need a striker? Sort of…
I see in that the old “do Arsenal need a striker?” debate has flared up in the Mailbox again. I think, in the no doubt forlorn hope of settling it, both viewpoints expressed can be true.
I think it is entirely fair and reasonable (to my and many other’s surprise) to say that Havertz is good enough to be their starting striker. They can win major trophies with that being the case, however… a glance at their bench says there’s not much beyond him.
Gabriel Jesus should be the next cab off the rank, but he’s now entering into “perma-crock” territory, has never been clinical and doesn’t offer any variation to what they’ve got. Trossard can do the false-9 thing, but again, it doesn’t offer much variation. Nketiah is now gone and, if we’re being honest, was always short of the standard required.
So yes, Arsenal do need a striker, probably one that can offer something different, more of a target man perhaps, but that striker only needs to be a squad player, not a £100m guaranteed starter. They need a Saha or a Giroud, not a Van Nistelrooy or an Henry.
Lewis, Busby Way
Arsenal fans getting awful angry
We get it. We’re so hot right now that even opposition fans know the name of our set-piece coach. We also understand that it is tough having to wait all the way until Thursday evening to watch the mighty Gunners in action again, it’s hard for us all.
We also fully perceive that when the knuckle draggers over at the Daily Mail do it, it’s Mediawatch worthy clickbaiting but when the venerable F365ers do it, it’s self aware, nuanced and tongue-in-cheek. We comprehend that no other team offers the intoxicating blend of pure quality and a burning desire to prove themselves capable of going all the way.
But could you please at least try to give the others some attention, they are also trying to do stuff. So, unless you have a compelling reason to say something about him, please keep Ben White’s name out of your @#%*ing mouths!
Lawrence (Gooner in SA)
…Blimey, an article on Man City’s CL game which repeatedly references Arsenal, a day after a Liverpool CL article that also repeatedly references Arsenal.
No matter how tongue in cheek you think you’re doing it lads, it’s no different from the tabloid rags name dropping us left right and centre. You’re no better, we’re living rent free etc etc.
Tom, now in Leyton
Lovely to be Villa at the top table
Well that was nice. Excellent performances from Tielemans and Rogers. Watkins looking sharper again. Ramsey getting somewhere back to the promise he showed a few years back. Duran being Duran. A pleasant away fixture to begin proceedings admittedly, but a very professional win. Bring on Bayern Munich. What did they do? Oh.
Without injuries, Villa’s bench could have been Gauci/Olsen, Mings, Diego Carlos, Maatsen, Barkley, Buendia, Bailey, Kamara, Philogene, Duran, Bogarde and Nedeljkovic. That’s not bad depth. Thank you, Unai. Thank you.
Gary AVFC (Sandro Lauper for Young Boys showed his true colours by committing fouls time after time).
…I watched the Champions League draw with a sense of disbelief as Gianluigi Buffon read out ‘Aston Villa’ Proper Bonkers. I remember playing QPR at home in the Championship where their goalkeeper started time wasting 2 minutes in. At 0-0. The many ‘circling the drain’ years of getting beaten every week (Cheers Micah Richards…). What a transformation….
While not everything is anywhere near perfect off the pitch, the team are an absolute joy to watch at the moment. Win or lose I can see there is a plan, players giving 100% every game and they genuinely seem to be enjoying themselves which translates to the supporters.
The game on Tuesday night was a little surreal. Champions League on a Tuesday night? Madness. We started slowly as the players got used to the artificial surface, you could see underhit/overhit passes that were very uncharacteristic of our general play. After the ‘Austin McPhee Masterclass’ (doing it way before Arsenal thought it was trendy) of a corner kick we settled into the game and, frankly, took them to pieces.
The positives are Morgan Rogers regularly enabling beast mode, Watkins playing himself into form (that VAR decision was mind boggling) and Tielemans starting to run the midfield. However, the injury to Matty Cash exposed our lack of depth at right back with Bogarde having a torrid time first half.
Who knows where our season will go? It really doesn’t matter, I just want to enjoy these memories of the good times with my kids while they last… i.e. before Unai Emery leaves!
If we can get it a little more right behind the scenes (they are pricing me out of attending at the moment…) then it really will be a golden age to remember.
Funstar (football is fun…. For now….) Andy
Meanwhile for Everton, winter is coming
Reading that Dyche et Al, will be ‘happy’ at being knocked out of the Carabao Cup so they can focus on the ‘relegation battle’ seems rather sad for Everton fans.
We’re only 4 games into the Prem, Everton aren’t in Europe, means an awful lot of downtime between Prem games to ponder just how awful Everton have been.
But they have been scoring goals – something that wasn’t the case recently, so there is hope.
But the idea that Everton are deciding to compete on one front – not to win – simply not to lose – seems like a long, drawn out version of ‘winter is coming.’
Paul McDevitt
READ: Moyes back? The arguments for and against
Winners, losers, others
I left for a few days of frantic work travel in the middle of reading Matt Stead’s Premier League Winners & Losers. I just returned to finish it and found it engaging enough to want to respond, however late.
As far as I’m concerned, what I leave out of this letter is more important than what I include because it’s plain accurate. (I’ll also note in passing that I’m a long-time fan of Youri Tielemans.)
Eddie Howe: I’m not sure that anybody outside the club understands what’s really “going on” at Newcastle, or even whether it’s a big deal in the scheme of things. The relative lack of transfer business has been scrutinized to death by a press eager for red meat, but it may just have been a consequence of Paul Mitchell’s opinion that it was better to hold fire than to risk a points deduction to meet Palace’s price for Marc Guéhi. I’m not at all convinced that was unwise, especially as Guéhi appeared here as a Loser. And I don’t think Eddie is, either.
He aimed as high as he possibly could with Guéhi, and perhaps he misjudged. I don’t think he blames Mitchell, et al of that, even if he is frustrated by the lack of earlier providence (all of which he seized on eagerly at the time). In fact, if he’s angry at anybody, it should be himself, for latching onto such a difficult target when the right wing was an obvious weakness. I think there’s more smoke than fire here.
Lasting relationships may be rare these days, but I think they are attractive to our fundamentally conservative ownership. I don’t think anybody needs to fear PIF hiring Jose Mourinho, because they couldn’t stand not knowing what he’d do.
Jean-Philippe Mateta: Tucked-in shirts will be in again when bicycle-style shorts become the norm, and only then. I hope.
Everton: In making your point, you correctly insist that Sean Dyche is supposed to instill defensive stability and note that conceding consecutive two-goal leads means he’s not doing that. But I don’t think you’re paying enough attention to the two-goal leads. Dyche may not be doing what he’s supposed to, but he might be doing something we don’t expect from him. You were correct again when you called him the manager most likely to be sacked first, but I can’t help wondering whether, given time, he couldn’t do both the things. Probably not, because Everton are cursed, but when was the last time he had consecutive 2-0 leads, anyway?
Liverpool: Okay, I couldn’t just leave this one out. What a fantastic observation.
Ben Brereton Diaz: I mean, screw that guy for his dive at Fabian Schär’s feet, but you could almost forgive the lad if the prospect of breaking that record had left him in dread all week.
Anyhow, thanks for a good read.
Chris C, Toon Army DC
PS: Fabian Schär cost three million pounds in 2018. Surely, he is the greatest bargain in Newcastle’s transfer history? Nobby Solano, bless his heart and name, cost about the same in 1998. Other clubs have probably found bigger bargains, and I welcome their tales in the Mailbox, though free transfers don’t count!
That question aside, Schär has both failed and succeeded, along with his team. But he’s been such a great servant to the club that it makes me lachrymose. I’m visiting SJP with my two teenaged sons and my adult nephew for the match against Brighton, and I think maybe the shirt I buy should have his name on it.
Away kits should be flourescent
SC, Belfast email was interesting for me.
The number of times I’ve watched a game (I’m the only person I know of my age that doesn’t wear glasses!) and thought ‘these kits are a bit close’.
As someone with great vision, I can distinguish between the two teams, however, I’ve always wondered why kits are not made to be of completely different tones to each other.
Arsenal v Spurs was an interesting one this weekend.
A team in traditionally predominantly Red with white trim against and team in white with dark blue trim.
These colours have always been easy to set apart. So Arsenal wear black (closer to dark blue), I thought it clashed more.
I’ve thought for a while that all teams should have a fluorescent away kit (think Barca bright yellow).
Maybe I’m wrong as I’ve always been lucky to have good vision, however, I certainly think it’s something the footballing authorities should be looking at.
Graham
RIP Toto
Goodnight and God bless to a total football legend.
I’m pretty sure the death of Salvatore Scilacci will have resonated with my fellow Irish people. I was about 8 when he broke our hearts but it was no hard feelings, it was just a joy to be part of that moment in history. His death makes you think about a simpler time, when sport was about sport, the underdog, the recognition that some obstacles are too big and respect for the talent.
Money has come into the game, hype and hyperbole tend to lead to unmanaged expectations were these fundamentals have no real currency. It’s sad. It’s not just old man yelling at clouds stuff I’m talking about here, it’s empathy in every direction, even to your adversary. He wasn’t a bad or a good guy in the plot, just a guy and I’m pretty sure most Irish people will mourn him as if he was one of our own, just for the memories.
Come in number 19, your time is up.
DS Irishman in London
