The Rolling Football thread 2024/25 - part 3

[DuncinToffee]

https://www.mumsnet.com/talk/sports/5250874-the-rolling-football-thread-season-202425-part-2?page=40&reply=144449521

Taking us to the seasons final ⚽

i went to bed when it was 2-0 thinking, well i don't actually care about Internationals anyway, men's or women's, and woke up this morning to excited messages from DH that England won. Baffling.

As for penalties: i believe that you run in and strike it as hard as you can. I am very very scathing and judgy of the stuttering pretend run up that some do, and no matter who it is, always have a good laugh when they miss or it is saved. I think all Goalies should take penalties, they really know how to hoof a ball.
(shoutout to Uwe Kamps for saving 4 penalties in a cup match penalty shoot out ages and ages ago. Go go Gladbach indeed)

Same in this household!

Come the Lionesses!

We have just had the excitement of seeing Al ITTIHAD train turns out where we are staying in Portugal is where they do warm weather training - Fulham and Notts Forest are also here and Burnley and Sunderland and Wolves just left.

Currently trying to work out whether it is worth watching the Fulham Forest friendly on Saturday for 20 Euros a ticket as it is a 20 minute drive away - Fulham end have lots of Fulham friends and am not sure about the Forest owner

Time to bring on the Arsenal girls...

Why does she wait so long to make the substitutions?!!!

My God, that was nerve-shredding!!! Taking me back to Bellingham’s amazing bicycle kick to save England from oblivion last year. Well done, Agyemang! Anyone up for some calming yoga before the thrills and spills of extra time and… just maybe… penalties??

I was wondering the same. I thought maybe because she wanted to keep the players as fresh as possible for extra time, on the off-chance that there is extra time. But that seems like a risky move, considering they very nearly left it goal-less, with no chance of extra time.

utterly nailbiting.
Meanwhile i am getting messages from all my friends in London if i'm going to the Brentford-Gladbach match in August.

Unfortunately not.

Fantastic well done Lionesses

Great to watch.

Stressful but great!!

I’m guessing Spain will win tomorrow night. So… perhaps a rerun of the World Cup final on Sunday?

I'm going to be in Berlin on Sunday so hoping for a Germany vs England final. Will take both shirts, if so, and wear the winning one round town after the match...

We can't leave it that late against Spain.

C’mon Lionesses!!! 🙌👏🌹🦁

@Brefugee

Do you think Xhaka will go to Sunderland?

oh sorry, have completely stopped following him and his activities.

It’s difficult to imagine a bigger clusterfuck of a transfer window for Newcastle. I’m absolutely staggered as to how badly it has been handled. And now it looks like Isak will be away. How have we gone from winning a cup and qualifying for the champions league and a ‘transformative summer’ to this? We’ve fannied around in the transfer market, quibbled over prices, refused to pay the going rate and now we’re going to lose our number one asset. There is something rotten in the state of Denmark.

Our transfer window is very quiet which has people worred but so far no real drama.

@JasonTindallsTan i think it is tricky to cross the line between being a selling club and being a buying club (and one with an academy)
Brighton/Bournemouth/Brentford/Wolves buy young raw talent whip them into shape selling them on and hope to get a good cup run and maybe make Europe - you can see with Jota how proud Wolves are of the role they played in that and getting his talent. The so called ‘bigger’ teams need them to do so and most harvest good relationships with them.

Some teams (Spurs/Manchester United) still manage to spend big even with disappointing seasons

Newcastle are trying to transform from being a club that nurtures talent to one that keeps it - but to keep it you need to increase wage structure etc in line with a champions league team

Personally I thought how Bayern Leverkusen and Brentford handled the sales of Wirtz and Mbeumo probably would have aided Newcastle - make it very clear that a £150 million bid (with add ons) with at half up front and the rest in 3 £25 million installments was what they wanted and see what happens and then spend that money wisely and have a transformative summer - look to how a huge cash injection can transform rather than keep a player whose slightly injury prone

because this I think means he loses market value!

Hmmm. I see what you’re saying but I don’t think that is strictly accurate for Newcastle. We have plenty of money to spend and we’re competing in the UCL next season for the 2nd time in three seasons, we’ve won silverware. We should be competitive in the transfer window instead of inept. We’ve not spent any money for three transfer windows under the guise of PSR so the transfer account should be full and we should be intent on keeping our biggest assets and bring in in talent to play along side them. There’s something off and I can’t put my finger on it.

Yeah I can see I don’t know where Newcastle quite sit either.

of all the things I was expecting this wasn’t it - forcing a move like this is quite the nuclear option and I can’t see why he would want to go to Al Hilal. So the handling of it for him to force a move is interesting

Having got all our ‘in’ business (atleast I assume it’s all done as there was loads!) done early in the window Brighton now seem to be busy with the ‘outs’- a lot of loans

It's bizarre! Unless Isak is angling for Saudi or something it doesn't seem to make sense! Arsenal and Liverpool where ready to bid for him at the drop of a hat, but he waits until they've both (nearly, in Arsenal's case) signed a striker for big money before saying he wants out.

His advisers need to be sacked unless they've got some plan to sell him to Bayern or Real, although I don't reckon Real would be interested with his injury record.

I didn’t have Isak pegged as someone for who the money was more important than the game but like you say the timing is off given Liverpool made enquiries a week ago and then hijacked the move Newcastle were making for Ekitike when their advances were rejected. Had he said he wanted out at that point then the likelihood is we would have negotiated with Liverpool and tied up the Ekitike deal, meaning we at least had a replacement in the bag. Means he could have left with a semblance of good will from the fan base at not leaving us high and dry for the £££. As it is, LFC clearly have a magic money tree and could potentially take Isak and have Ekitike and we’re left with zilch. Either that or he is after the big money move to Saudi and is happy to sacrifice the best years of his career in a non league purely for the dollar. If Newcastle sell to Liverpool it shows a clear lack of ambition in selling your biggest asset to a direct rival, very naive and a move I hope we would be cannier than do. Unfortunately we’ve shown a distinct lack of canniness so far so fuck knows really. It’s all incredibly disappointing tbh.