The Rolling Football Thread, season 2023-24

[DuncinToffee]

Football fans join in to share the joy, the heartache and VAR frustration ⚽

The thing about football - the important thing about football - is that it is not just about football.

Forest Green Rovers have sacked Troy Deeney after just six matches: after his quite astonishing outburst against his own players, is anyone surprised that the trigger-happy FGR board have given him his marching orders?

Has anyone been watching AFCON? Absolutely cracking second half last night in Egypt v Ghana - Kudus was on fire! As a Liverpool fan, though, very worrying to see Salah go off injured - looked like his hamstring. I'm hoping it is just a tweak with him sensibly choosing to go off to protect it. Fingers crossed.

Mourinho is available for FGR

I haven't watched any Afcon but I have seen Kudus' goal.

@DuncinToffee "Mourinho is available for FGR"

😂😂😂👏Oh bravo! Love it!

Jordan Henderson as signed for Ajax then. So no PL team would touch him with a bargepole? good.

We watched Egypt v Ghana last night. Was a great match and I was absolutely screaming at the mad 5 minutes with those goals. Amazing stuff.

I hope Salah isn't badly injured. I've been worried Kudus will end up injured since the West Ham injury list is ridiculous right now although most of the fan groups I'm in are more worried about Ghana doing well so we don't get him back any time soon. 🙈

Ahh he doesn't get to finish his 4 game touch-line ban or make the trip to Gillingham tomorrow. His public rant, despite being somewhat true, was appalling, and if he is that frustrated after only 6 games then lower league 2 football management isn't for him.

Gareth Southgate will though.

I've pretty much jacked in even looking up scores for internationals - given how awful FIFA and UEFA are. Still watching the women tho.

For today: go go Boro!

Well, we needed that win today. Good to see big Gabby getting some credit for a change. And a nice little cameo for Martinelli at the end.

Hopefully we'll start scoring a few more goals now...

oh Sheffield Wednesday. Useless. and Boro only drew, which helps but not much.

Another bloody draw to bottom of the league FGR for Gills this afternoon. 2 weeks left of the transfers, lets hope we can entice the players we need. One plus was our new RB Hutton had a decent debut.

FC Isle of Man nicked an equaliser in stoppage time!

Paul Tierney will be on VAR duty again for Liverpool's forthcoming match v Chelsea. I therefore predict: the onfield ref will be told by VAR to send off a Liverpool player for the kind of tackle Tierney thought Kluivert didn't even need a yellow card for at the weekend. 😑

How is Tierney still considered to be adequate for any kind of refereeing?

Another loss for Arbroath today. I also went to buy more stickers in the local shop and they gave me the trading cards instead. So a doubly disappointing day and I need to stop myself wanting to buy more cards.

@Tarkan How are you feeling - did you manage to see a doctor? Cards instead of stickers is very disappointing - you need to go back and buy the proper stuff!

watching FC Bayern vs Union Berlin play a match that was postponed just before Christmas due to snow. And German twitter is all aflutter that there are 2 English players on the pitch for Bayern. So my question is: when the heck did Dier go to Bayern?

@Brefugee Dier has gone to Bayern on loan for the rest of the season (I think maybe with an option to stay on loan next season as well?). Deal was done in this January transfer window, so within the last couple of weeks.

Liverpool v Chelsea in the Carabao Cup final - a replay of the 2022 final. Not what neutrals would have wanted, I'm sure, but here's hoping for the same result as in 2022 - although my heart and nerves would infinitely prefer us to win in normal time this year, rather than on pens!

I'm feeling so much better now thanks. I haven't called the doctor yet, I have the worst anxiety about making phone calls and I wish I could book online like we could before Covid. I hate the whole 8am phoning in thing that we have now, especially since I've had the worst insomnia for the last few days and the little sleep I've had has always gone over 8am and there's no point phoning them any later nowadays. I will get round to it eventually though, the attacks I have are actually really rare, I'lll have shorter ones at times but maybe only every few months. One this bad is usually years apart, DH actually said he hadn't ever seen me have an attack that long and we've been together over 10 years.

Speaking of DH, he's been very quiet about the Hibs v Rangers result today. I'll see how long it takes him to mention it when he gets home from work.

OMFG, Noooooooo - BBC are reporting Klopp is going to leave Liverpool at the end of this season. Oh please no no no no 😭

Oh fuck, watching his interview now - I'm utterly gutted

Any indication where he's going? We're losing our fantastic goalkeeping coach to the US soccer set up. Gutted

@Brefugee He says he doesn’t know yet if he will return to management in the future, as he wants to “find another purpose”, but that he definitely doesn’t want to manage again for a year after this season finishes, whether for a club or for a country. He also says that Liverpool is the only Premier League club for him forever - he will never manage another team in England/the Prem. ❤Thank you, Jurgen - YNWA.