They’re beginning to build up. I still don’t know why a SHOT is now a HIT or a SAVE is now a STOP. Or why someone suddenly decided ‘assist’ should be a substitute for the perfectly adequate ‘made a goal’. One too many syllables perhaps?
I have a new one. Why has somebody decided that Manchester City footballers should wear shorts designed to look as though their braces are hanging round their arse? This is the sort of urgent question Baddiel and Skinner might once have answered. Failing them…
————————————————————————————>
On the awful City shorts which as a City fan (of forty years standing etc etc.) I have to watch a lot of, they have always struck me as ‘Amazon – official arse sponsor’ as they look like they have the amazon logo stretched across their bum cheeks.
🤣
So many things have changed around football over the fifty years I’ve been following, many, as you point out, merely fads of terminology.
I do find it tremendously reassuring, though, that the objective of every travelling side remains as it was when I was a nipper: joy.
As in “teams tend not to get much joy at Anfield on European nights”; “QPR haven’t had much joy in the cups since decimalisation”; I can’t see Scotland getting much joy knocking high balls into the box with wee Jimmy Krankie playing up front” etc
The simple art of defending is now a low-block and a good old-fashioned midfielder is now box to box.
Football in the UK is so obviously being groomed for TV. The American owners will get their way and matches will be streamed into homes/bars etc as events. It will mirror the US coverage of NFL within 10 years. And promotion/relegation will be things of the past.
It’s all about “the press” now isn’t it. And “group” instead of team, and “project” instead of football clubs.
Pressurised was the word they used all the time on the commentary for a while which used to annoy me.
“Brand” (“the Hamilton Academicals brand”) is an even more egregious descriptor for a club/team
Yuck. Indeed it is
See also ‘identity’ as in ‘I don’t know what their identity is a team anymore’, what type of football they are trying to play’.
Managers in a Gucci merino jumper prowling around the “technical” area is an unwelcome development. They should be in the dugout wearing a sheepskin coat and smoking a cigar.
And chewing gum.
In the case of Brian Clough and Peter Taylor, often at the same time
Cloughie often had sons Simon and Nigel sat next to him in the dugout. You wouldn’t see that these days.
Re: “They should be in the dugout wearing a sheepskin coat”
Yes – and I always liked the raincoats that 1970s German managers tended to favour.
Exhibit 1: Helmut Schön
https://www.gettyimages.se/detail/nyhetsfoto/helmut-schoen-the-west-german-football-team-manager-nyhetsfoto/3298549?adppopup=true
It’s banality masquerading as expertise, presumably as a consequence of ultra TV saturation of the game – notably since the Premier League’s inception in 1992.
Commentators and pundits using terms like : false nine, inverted full backs, pivots, playing in the pocket, playing in the hole, playing off the shoulder, playing as a ten, transition, he’s won a free kick/corner/penalty. Complete gibberish.
“Young @noisecandy has definitely put a shift in, but I think we may need a fresh pair of legs to help out with the off-the-joke running before we’re off to the races”
This. Still don’t know what a false nine or playing in the pocket are, but I am pretty sure neither of them exist at Altrincham FC
As it ever was. When I was a kid there were a different set of terms to describe football. Go back far enough and football was called soccer – most fans would ask you if you were American if you called it soccer now.
A lot of the terminology, I think, has grown out of the ability to much better analyse matches. Heat maps of play positions, touches, passes made, tackles made, possession stats, expected goals for example. These all allow the pundits to wallow in the data, reviewing action from 15 angles. They need terminology. See business, politics and any other high revenue activity – they all do the same thing. There has to be just enough terminology to make the expert and expert without losing the audience.
There are some terms that have disappeared though. Players rarely seem to get purchase on the ball anymore. There seems very little penalising going on. And rarely is a curled shot called a bender.
Assists have been called assists since the start of fantasy football though – back in the day when you had £20 as a budget, you had an auction down the pub and only one person could have Alan Shearer. Someone else would buy Matt Le Tissier becasue no one could afford both. I like the term – its suggest far more going on that made a goal. Football is (very slightly) about more than scoring goals.
Exactly, scoring goals NOT expected goals. The XG stat is bizarre.
Top level football is a completely different sport to the version that was played 15 years ago, let alone four decades ago. Data analysis has impacted everything.
If anything, it’s surprising the terminology hasn’t changed more.
The abundance of data makes everything technically better but also, less romantic.
Football was probably a more fun sport to watch when the best teams used to simply field 2-3 geniuses and hope that their self expression would win the day.
Nowadays, it’s a systems game: a team with a functioning system will invariably beat one without, even with slightly inferior personnel.
It’s more impressive to watch, but it’s made the manager the focal point, rather than the most gifted player, and it’s sucked away a lot of the romance, along with the audience’s ability to really understand what they’re watching (and I certainly include myself in that statement).
I’m really not sure.
Whilst the romance s less (ignoring Leicester winning in 2016) the level of skill in todays game is genuinely breathtaking at times. I also don’t mind the fact that hard man types have been largley forced out of the game. The level of skill in defending now is immense – it used to be rare to see ball playing centre backs, now evryone has them.
I think it always was a systems game – but data changes how systems are deployed. The Netherlands in the 70s definitely played to a system as did the Germans and Italians.
But romance is a beguiling thing (that is best viewed through rose tinted spectacles).
Is that the brilliant Jimmy Rimmer I can see on your avatar thing?
The very same.
It says much about my knowledge of/interest in association football that I have Lt. Ellis as my avatar…
There have always been systems, but not to this level.
It’s a flowering of what began in Holland in the 70s. You can trace the line through Cruyff to Guardiola (with a stop along the way for Bielsa, of course) to everything we see today.
You’re right about the hardmen. Sadly, a few of them are still clogging up the punditry sofas – hopefully they’ll be gone from there soon too. I’d learn more about modern football listening to my dog than I would (say) Roy Keane.
Roy Keane? Whilst this could be viewed through a ‘Bantz’ lens, I do love the final 20 seconds.
Was no finer sight than a Glenn Hoddle bender getting caught in the stanchion.
My favourite bit of commentary was a Tony Currie goal (I think for England against Wales – I could check but it would ruin my memory if it’s not true).
It went “Tony Currie – what a bender!”.
I would add Tony Currie – what a brilliant footballer.
See also: Banana kicks.
Banana Kicks – TMFTL
Also : an overhead or bicycle kick is now a “worldie”.
A “bicey” according to my empty headed football playing 17 year old grandson.
I think worldies describe any spectacular goal (of which overhead kicks always are). Here’s an example of a worldie.
Glenn. Probably the greatest player I have ever seen live – remember seeing him single handly make fools of Newcastle United once. Magnificent.
Away with the high press and assists! OK, a few things about modern football. It never ceases to make me smile how lower league managers all now seem to adopt the same tactics for certain situations, ie two defenders back in the box when their keeper is taking a goal kick. It’s so obviously something they all picked up on the same summer coaching course and makes everyone look slightly silly and incapable of originality.
Next, all clubs now seem to have a person whose exact job is unclear, perhaps designated as a type of “Assistant Kitman” but whose real role is to act as an unofficial court jester, someone who sees himself as “a great lad with good bantz” but who is really there to be the butt of overpaid and undertalented young players ideas of humour.
Finally, floodlights. You simply cannot beat a nice, old style set of 4 pylons, visible from miles away. The demise of these has clearly led to midweek evening games losing much of their previous atmosphere and stature.
And no longer a simple task to find the ground visiting fans.
Plus many grounds are now 5 miles walk rather than 10 minutes from the railway station.
Been watching Big Match Revisited recently. Totally different game now – decent pitches rather than mud baths, higher skill levels rather than lump it forwards and run (was there a point to midfield?), and the general “niceness” of the stadiums.
Good thing / bad thing? It’s all evolution, and despite the over analysis I think it a better spectacle.
Plus we now have Fantasy Football to wile away many wasted hours
On yes, the mud! That’s probably proof in itself of how much more athletic the game is now. Pitches have to be in top top shape…can you imagine how much all that played insurance must cost?
Bring back Subbuteo. A proper man’s game.
“Kevin was a smart boy then
He always beat me at Subbuteo
‘Cause he ‘flicked to kick’
And I didn’t know”
Notice the new Subbuteo pitches are mown in that annoying circular fashion..
If you video the game on a smart phone you can introduce VAR.
Instant red card and a five match ban for accidently kneeling on a player. Super glue banned as a performance enhancing drug.
Presumably everyone already knows how it got its name?
Yes, but that doesn’t mean we’d object to the retelling of the story, if you’re inclined.
All right. But what about those shorts?
Never mind the shorts …most of them wear a sports bra now. What next; frilly knickers?
I find Five Live’s Monday Night Club to be the perfect balance of the old and new. It’s even caused me to like Chris Sutton. And Rory Smith, what a wonderful fellow.
Rory Smith really is very good. Chris Sutton is good as long as there is no Robbie Savage in the same show.
I’m pretty sure the BBC retain Robbie Savage purely for comedic reasons. A loaf of sliced white could do a better job. At the very least, he’s good at making even the worst of his fellow presenters and pundits look like razor sharp geniuses in comparison to him.
His only quality is confidence. Which is misplaced, sadly.
Football, in trying to make the offside rule “perfect”, has (IMHO) just turned into a parody of itself.
How can your heel or elbow make you offside? Sometimes the VAR doesn’t even seem to know the rules.
And don’t get me started on the ceaseless play-acting like they’ve been shot if they get brushed against, and/or waving cards at the ref (intimidation by any other name). It’s farcical, and it’s far too late for the FA to do anything about it now, the money’s too big. And it flows down to the grass roots game.
My main team sport as a spectator is ice hockey. You don’t get many play actors there. Anything untoward in hockey, you (quite literally some of the time) get properly punched. Tends to cut down on the shenanigans.
Yes but they’re protected from head to toe, aren’t they? There are no helmets in football apart from (insert name of unpopular footballer or pundit here).
The only ice hockey game I ever saw was in Norway, in the company of my then-12-year-old daughter and her Norge friend. We sat behind the sin bin, and both girls were positively quivering at the gusts of sweat and testosterone wafting over them. Extraordinary to behold.
One of my daughters became quite good at curling and her team got to a NZ schools tournament in the South Island – only narrowly missing out on being North Island champs by a few millimetres on the final throw(?). With no VAR, it was a ref’s call, who stared and stared at it before declaring the winner.
Anyway, immediately afterwards about 30 ice hockey boys came on for their practice session and unleashed bedlam.
Not sure an elbow can be offside
There is as much nonsense in hockey off the ice. I am not really an expert, but you can’t avoid it here. Hugely skilled, but it’s way more random than football with the puck ricocheting all over the place
And there are some movements against the random violence in the sport. People are more aware of concussions now, and a youth player died here in Canada a couple of years ago after an on ice assault
I was thinking only recently of football terms that have survived and those that have been lost. My son (who is 40) was genuinly puzzled by the references to a ‘number 9’, and I had to explain the old conventions of numbering players 1 to 11 from the back, with number 9 being the centre forward. It seems very fashionable to refer to ‘the number 10’ role, and I even heard someone say ‘he is more of an 8 than a 10’, as if everyone knew what he meant.
We still talk about ‘wingers’ and full backs (I had to explain all this too), because we used to half backs and inside forwards, although the term ‘centre half’ persists I think. Midfielders weren’t invented until the mid 60s.
On the whole, I prefer the modern game – the pitches are actually grass and the skill levels are astounding.
There is certainly no going back to these days…you can feel the Tommy Smith tackle through the screen. The right hook from Johnny Giles on Keegan gets him a booking and a wagging finger….
I think shirt numbers are still in use to define positions (maybe defenders aside).
You definitely still hear an awful lot of discussion of whether certain players are best deployed as an 8 or a 6.
People talk less about 9s because it’s a position that’s undergone a lot of change: a lot of more is expected of strikers in terms of all round game and they’re less the focal point of attention than they used to be.
The spotlight has moved on to the 10s and the wingers; in the latter case because strikers now provide (space) for wingers, whereas wingers used to provide (service) for strikers.
I like it when teams actually play 1 to 11. It can happen definitely in friendly international games only now I think.
But I wish that teams actually still used the old numbers for players who are likely to be in the first team. I would prefer Trent Alexander-Arnold to wear 2 rather than 66. But he may well be unaware that the number used to mean something.
International squads for tournaments are 1 to 23, so sometimes those numbers actually mean something and I seem to remember England playing in a tournament fairly recently and all but one of the starting line-up was wearing a number between 1 and 11.
Still meaningful numbers in rugby.
Sean Dyche notably put out a Burnley team wearing 1 to 11 and playing 4-4-2 within living memory..
Nice
I have a question about football, about most team sports actually: why?
Because it’s there.
“It” being? The jizz on the beaches of a toxic masculinity?
(Writes a man, but I liked the phrase)
Ewww!
Sport, almost any sport, when played well can be a thing of beauty to rival any “work of art”. A Federer backhand, a Messi mazy run, a yorker removing middle stump, as I say almost any sport will have moments of pure magic.
For me, football has been corrupted by commercialisation and it would take a miracle (or Alex Ferguson) for Aberdeen to win the league again but on the few times I watch a game on telly there’s always flashes of undeniably breathtaking skill.
This ⬆︎
See, you guys make fun of Nige cos of the lack of follicles but look beyond that shining pate, there lies a man of substance, wit and, no doubt, an enormous penis
“Two out of three ain’t bad…”
The Newcastle Liverpool game last Wednesday was 90+ minutes of pure joy as a game of football.
Still available on amazon video.
Because it’s fun, helps with your personal fitness and playing team sports can help you in other avenues in life too.
In no particular order:
Life lessons – including team work, and perservering through adversity, and concentrating on the right things.
It keeps me in reasonably good nick.
Everywhere I’ve traveled, I’ve had an instant “in” to a community.
Is sport unique for that? no. But it’s what I’ve taken from it.
So right about the ‘in’ to a community.
Any football ground, anywhere, walk into the club bar and the language, whether it be Pendeen Rovers or Manchester United, will be the same.
Where I live, the only place that compares to it is on the local bus route.
I’m a rugby referee. Our community is small, but because of what we do, very very welcoming to anyone who does it.
It was 1974 when I began to lose touch and interest in football, and the pre and post match analyses.
Our team, Newcastle United, were having their arses handed to them by Liverpool in that years FA Cup Final. My Dad, brother and I were in the front room sitting in silent growing misery. Midway through the second half my mother came into the room.
‘What’s happening? Are Newcastle winning?’ We informed her of the tragedy unfolding.
She paused. Then, ‘well why don’t Newcastle score some more goals and win?’
And that was it. The essence of all punditry that ever was and will be. Score more goals than the other team. No one I’ve watched on the tv since has more succinctly put it.
Play the long ball. Four Four Two. Send the ball down the wing. Blah blah blah. All your trying to say is score more goals than the other team.
It’s along the lines of printing more money if the economy is struggling. Getting more players into attacking positions means that you create space everywhere else, which makes the opposing team’s chances of scoring a goal much easier.
When England have those games where they can’t get that crucial goal I do wonder why someone as talented as Bellingham can’t just go “right!” and run directly at the goal. It doesn’t have to be from the halfway line – just from outside the box. Instead they pass and pass and pass and hope some space opens up.
Bayern hammering Dynamo Zagreb 9-1 the other day would be a case in point.
It’s not fair, if only the bloody opposition would let England score more goals
I really like Barney Ronay’s writing, and this is one for the naysayers….
https://www.theguardian.com/football/2024/dec/07/premier-leagues-flying-ball-carriers-are-breathing-fresh-life-into-elite-game?CMP=Share_iOSApp_Other
Great stuff. And a joy to see reference to young Tyler Dibling, whose Man of the Match interview after the draw with Brighton was like Billy Elliott’s Royal Ballet audition in reverse. The ‘electricity’ had already been witnessed.
Defenders having to defend with their arms behind their back, due to the modern interpretation of handball. Drives me nuts. The offence was always DELIBERATE clear handball that sought to gain an advantage and everyone appreciated what that meant. Now, we have attackers lazily lobbing the ball chest height in busy penalty boxes in the expectation that it may flick off a defender’s arm at point blank range.
It seems to me that any hand ball outside the box is penalized even accidental. So I am not sure why it is different inside the box. Referees seem to struggle with this too.
Not to mention the grappling between players which seems to perfectly accepable in the penalty area during ‘a dead ball situation’ (hate that expression), but grab someone’s shirt as they blaze past you and it is a booking.
They have sort of addressed this, but I have never seen why referees should have to put up with any backchat. First time, a booking, second time another booking and off – managers would soon tell their players not to do it.
Watching the Manchester v Nottingham game; despite all the changes we’ve been bemoaning, how refreshing that, even in 2024, the songs of Gary Glitter feature so prominently in our favourite football chants..
I love football, specifically Premier League and major football tournaments. I can take or leave Champion’s League until such time as my West Ham reach those heights. I played regularly until my regular game dissolved during the summer and I intend finding another regular game so I’ll be still playing when I turn 60 next year.
My main thoughts about modern football are that it is best to regard it as a soap opera but one where you have to watch or at least follow what’s happening to keep up to date before you read it. It provides great drama and totally unpredictable twists on a regular basis in a way not common in modern life where you’ve usually seen reviews of a film or TV show or book before consuming it.
In the Premier League at the moment, it is noticeable how many of the less glamorous teams are playing great football to watch. Brentford, Fulham, Brighton, Nottingham Forest even Wolves are capable of delivering top quality entertainment to the neutral making any game (not featuring Everton) worth catching.
I read Desmond Morris’s The Football Tribe back in the 80s much of which still holds up I reckon. One of its main theories was that football is a symbolic hunt with the elites of the tribe revered for their prowess. This being why it connects on a primitive level with fans.
Desmond Morris is still going strong and lives here in Ireland
Somewhere on the Curragh in my county Kildare.
Are questions still being answered, as per the OP? Or is this now the “football thread”? Asking for a friend…
An all-encompassing (non-international tournament ) footie thread might be a good idea
Are we boycotting the Saudi World Cup?
I’ve already written to Thomas Tuchel to inform him of my unavailability for any future England squads but have yet to hear back
What time is it on?
Twenty-six minutes to nine in the evening.
Will there be half-time stonings and/or beheadings?
Of course.
Will the climate emergency be worse?
Not according to FIFA
Will it be ok to listen to this anywhere in Saudi Arabia without being discriminated against and possibly arrested.
Short answer.. Yes.
Stonings and beheadings yes. Beer, no.
Oh, there’ll definitely be beer. It’s against their religion but too profitable.
I’m deferring any decision until I discover if I’m still alive in 2034.
I was thinking the same thing (about me, not you…).
Fuck the World Cup right in the ear.
I’m out, unless Wales qualify
Brilliant skewering of Infantino et al by Barney Ronay in the Graun
https://www.theguardian.com/football/2024/dec/11/a-vote-without-a-vote-the-saudi-world-cup-is-an-act-of-violence-and-disdain
Barney Ronay points the finger at the FA, but the reality is he went to Doha and presumably he’ll go to Riyadh too.
He’s a journalist and will surely argue that his going to, and reporting from, Saudi will draw attention to the country’s appalling human rights and climate change records.
Martin Samuel’s piece in today’s Times is even more damning of the FA and FIFA.
MS also points out that if just six major national football authorities agreed to boycott the Saudis’ latest piece of sports washing, this disgusting shambles could be stopped.
https://www.thetimes.com/sport/football/article/saudi-arabia-fifa-2034-world-cup-money-8p8qlfvkg?region=ie
That’s the same excuse the FA and a thousand others used for attending the Qatar World Cup.
It’s a fig leaf, not least because (a) Saudi Arabia’s human rights abuses are already pretty thoroughly documented; and (b) attention is drawn to such abuses by actual journalists conducting occasionally dangerous reportage, not by people who write about football for a living enjoying five star hospitality on behalf of the abusers while penning articles about which is their favourite slave-built stadium.
We’re getting a World Cup in Saudi Arabia because people didn’t draw a line at a World Cup in Qatar. Because no one could possibly miss out on going to the World Cup, and consequently the Qataris got what they wanted.
Frankly, if having sports writers attend the tournament truly shone an unwelcome and unhelpful spotlight on human rights abuses to an extent that outweighed the helpful PR they provide for the regime the Saudis simply wouldn’t allow them in at all.
Can’t argue with what you’re saying, B. but at this stage, what else can journos like Ronay and Samuels do apart from draw attention to FIFA’s latest shameless money grab?
Ultimately, if respected writers like BR and MS don’t get on the plane for Jeddah come 2034, there are no end of less principled reporters who will. One or two of them may even have heard of Adnan Khashoggi.
The real scandal here is that the only footballing nation to stand up against FIFA’s latest outrage was Norway.
While happy to. bang on about players taking the knee and wearing LGBTQ+ laces, the appropriately named English FA cravenly cave in as soon as it becomes apparent their virtue signalling might carry a cost. They executed a speedy climb down over the rainbow armband issue in Qatar and they’ll surely execute a similar about turn if they qualify for Saudi.
Samuels points out that all it takes to stop the sportswashing laundromat that is Saudi 2034 from happening is for the six big footballing nations to band together and say “no”.
I totally agree about the virtue signalling. It rings utterly hollow in the face of these events.
What can journos do? Don’t go, plain and simple. Ideally, an organisation like the Guardian – which isn’t shy of talking the talk – might actually walk the walk by refusing to cover the event at all. Or failing that, cover it from home. Or failing that still, cover it from the host nation but spare us the first week of empty hand wringing before moving briskly on, a la Lineker and his “the Al-Bayt stadium might be my favourite” .
FIFA get away with this because the FA and others go along. The FA get away with this because Ronay and others go along. At some stage you have to recognise that your personal red line has been crossed and refuse to participate. Either that or accept you don’t really have a personal red line at all, in which case stop pretending you do.
As for Martin Samuel, you will struggle to find a sports writers in whose views I have less interest. The man is clearly bought and paid for by Manchester City’s ownership, for whom his son is rumoured to work.
When Barney is on the Guardian football podcast, I zone out. They guy clearly thinks he should be writing about the ontological foundation of ethics, politics and law – football is clearly beneath him.