Football Club Quotes

Soccer isn't the same as Bach or Buddhism. But it is often more deeply felt than religion, and just as much a part of the community's fabric, a repository of traditions.

It is like sitting in a traffic jam on the San Diego Freeway with your windows rolled up and Portuguese music booming out of the surround-sound speakers while animals gnaw on your neck and diseased bill collectors hammer on your doors with golf clubs.

It wouldn't hurt you to show a little school spirit," Mom said. As if she were a fan of high school football. Mom can take a simple obvservation, such as saying that it wouldn't hurt for a person to show a little school spirit, and say it in such a way that she might as well be saying, 'It wouldn't hurt you to stop clubbing those baby seals.

Ladies, we are at a massive disadvantage in the workplace. Your male peers are flirting with their male bosses constantly. The average workplace is like f*cking Bromancing the Stone. That’s basically what male bonding is. Flirting. They’re flirting with each other playing golf, they’re flirting with each other going to the football, they’re flirting with each other chatting at the urinals – and, sadly, flirting with each other in after-hours visits to strip clubs and pubs. They are bonding with each other over their biological similarities. If the only way you can bond with them is over your biological differences, you go for it. Feel pressurised to actually f*ck them if you do? Then don’t flirt. Find it an easy way to just crack on? Then crack on – and don’t blame other women for doing it.

It is a strange paradox that while the grief of football fans(and it is real grief) is private - we each have an individual relationship with our clubs, and I think that we are secretly convinced that none of the other fans understands quite why we have been harder hit than anyone else - we are forced to mourn in public, surrounded by people whose hurt is expressed in forms different from our own.

The train slowed down at the approach to shrewsbury station and glided between the eleventh-century abbey and the stadium of shrewsbury town football club. Two sacred arenas where men chanted and waited for a miracle that never came.

You ought to go to a boys' school sometime. Try it sometime," I said. "It's full of phonies, and all you do is study so that you can learn enough to be smart enough to be able to buy a goddam Cadillac some day, and you have to keep making believe you give a damn if the football team loses, and all you do is talk about girls and liquor and sex all day, and everybody sticks together in these dirty little goddam cliques. The guys that are on the basketball team stick together, the Catholics stick together, the goddam intellectuals stick together, the guys that play bridge stick together. Even the guys that belong to the goddam Book-of-the-Month Club stick together.

After you’ve been to fight club, watching football on television is watching pornography when you could be having great sex.

I’M LOSING FAITH IN MY FAVORITE COUNTRY Throughout my life, the United States has been my favorite country, save and except for Canada, where I was born, raised, educated, and still live for six months each year. As a child growing up in Waterloo, Ontario, Canada, I aggressively bought and saved baseball cards of American and National League players, spent hours watching snowy images of American baseball and football games on black and white television and longed for the day when I could travel to that great country. Every Saturday afternoon, me and the boys would pay twelve cents to go the show and watch U.S. made movies, and particularly, the Superman serial. Then I got my chance. My father, who worked for B.F. Goodrich, took my brother and me to watch the Cleveland Indians play baseball in the Mistake on the Lake in Cleveland. At last I had made it to the big time. I thought it was an amazing stadium and it was certainly not a mistake. Amazingly, the Americans thought we were Americans. I loved the United States, and everything about the country: its people, its movies, its comic books, its sports, and a great deal more. The country was alive and growing. No, exploding. It was the golden age of life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. The American dream was alive and well, but demanded hard work, honesty, and frugality. Everyone understood that. Even the politicians. Then everything changed. Partly because of its proximity to the United States and a shared heritage, Canadians also aspired to what was commonly referred to as the American dream. I fall neatly into that category. For as long as I can remember I wanted a better life, but because I was born with a cardboard spoon in my mouth, and wasn’t a member of the golden gene club, I knew I would have to make it the old fashioned way: work hard and save. After university graduation I spent the first half of my career working for the two largest oil companies in the world: Exxon and Royal Dutch Shell. The second half was spent with one of the smallest oil companies in the world: my own. Then I sold my company and retired into obscurity. In my case obscurity was spending summers in our cottage on Lake Rosseau in Muskoka, Ontario, and winters in our home in Port St. Lucie, Florida. My wife, Ann, and I, (and our three sons when they can find the time), have been enjoying that “obscurity” for a long time. During that long time we have been fortunate to meet and befriend a large number of Americans, many from Tom Brokaw’s “Greatest Generation.” One was a military policeman in Tokyo in 1945. After a very successful business carer in the U.S. he’s retired and living the dream. Another American friend, also a member of the “Greatest Generation”, survived The Battle of the Bulge and lived to drink Hitler’s booze at Berchtesgaden in 1945. He too is happily retired and living the dream. Both of these individuals got to where they are by working hard, saving, and living within their means. Both also remember when their Federal Government did the same thing. One of my younger American friends recently sent me a You Tube video, featuring an impassioned speech by Marco Rubio, Republican senator from Florida. In the speech, Rubio blasts the spending habits of his Federal Government and deeply laments his country’s future. He is outraged that the U.S. Government spends three hundred billion dollars, each and every month. He is even more outraged that one hundred and twenty billion of that three hundred billion dollars is borrowed. In other words, Rubio states that for every dollar the U.S. Government spends, forty cents is borrowed. I don’t blame him for being upset. If I had run my business using that arithmetic, I would be in the soup kitchens. If individual American families had applied that arithmetic to their finances, none of them would be in a position to pay a thin dime of taxes.

Mankind finds futility very hard to stomach. People find all sorts of things to give their brief lives meaning. Religion, football, astrology, social media. Valiant efforts all, but everyone knows, deep, deep down, that life is both a random occurrence and a losing battle. None of us will be remembered. These days will all be covered, in time, by the sands.

Arsenal play pretty-boy football. Good to watch on the telly, but there’s no real grit in their play.

Wearing your red scarves, your Liverpool scarves. To support Liverpool Football Club. So I thank you, boys. I thank you. For supporting Liverpool Football Club. Because we could do nothing without you, boys – We would be nothing without you.

This is why people get obsessed with festivals, or clubs, or drugs, or football, or other temporal approximations of togetherness; these distilled vials of the elixir are craved by our starved souls.

Your own politicians make our Dr. Goebbels look like a child playing with picture books in a kindergarten. They speak of morality while they douse screaming children and old women in burning napalm. Your draft-resisters are called cowards and ‘peaceniks.’ For refusing to follow orders they are either put in jails or scourged from the country. Those who demonstrate against this country's unfortunate Asian adventure are clubbed down in the streets. The GI soldiers who kill the innocent are decorated by Presidents, welcomed home from the bayoneting of children and the burning of hospitals with parades and bunting. They are given dinners, Keys to the City, free tickets to pro football games.” He toasted his glass in Todd's direction. “Only those who lose are tried as war criminals for following orders and directives.

AFC Leopards were as thrilling a side as ever took the pitch and they dominated East African football in the eighties. That Kenyan players were an excitable bunch was attested to in one memorable Leopards match, with the opposing goalkeeper being handcuffed and dragged away to jail by police.

No country is completely free of those who would prefer to keep people separate. Even in countries with the most homogenous of populations, there will always be some who feel compelled to condemn, envy, and attack others, whether for belonging to a different political party or merely for supporting a rival football club. But

The club is not a business. It's a populist democracy.

He spits out an epithet so nasty I think it's only legal in England. And then only when your favourite football club loses.

I think you're a shit,’ said Keith sharply. ‘I think much of what you’ve done this season is shit and I think what you've put everyone involved with this club through is shit. How’s that?

President Josiah Bartlet: Good. I like your show. I like how you call homosexuality an abomination. Dr. Jenna Jacobs: I don't say homosexuality is an abomination, Mr. President. The Bible does. President Josiah Bartlet: Yes, it does. Leviticus. Dr. Jenna Jacobs: 18:22. President Josiah Bartlet: Chapter and verse. I wanted to ask you a couple of questions while I had you here. I'm interested in selling my youngest daughter into slavery as sanctioned in Exodus 21:7. She's a Georgetown sophomore, speaks fluent Italian, always cleared the table when it was her turn. What would a good price for her be? While thinking about that, can I ask another? My Chief of Staff Leo McGarry insists on working on the Sabbath. Exodus 35:2 clearly says he should be put to death. Am I morally obligated to kill him myself, or is it okay to call the police? Here's one that's really important 'cause we've got a lot of sports fans in this town: Touching the skin of a dead pig makes one unclean. Leviticus 11:7. If they promise to wear gloves, can the Washington Redskins still play football? Can Notre Dame? Can West Point? Does the whole town really have to be together to stone my brother John for planting different crops side by side? Can I burn my mother in a small family gathering for wearing garments made from two different threads? Think about those questions, would you? One last thing: While you may be mistaking this for your monthly meeting of the Ignorant Tight-Ass Club, in this building, when the President stands, nobody sits.

Some things are like that—they strike you as repugnant for instinctive reasons, probably having to do with your culture and the way you were raised. The French word “gauche” comes to mind, but I preferred the Hebrew word “treyf.” Literally, it means not kosher, but I also use it to describe things like cars, bars, strip clubs, guns, dogs, rock-n-roll, and football games. Things that are treyf, you avoid, not because you hate them per se, but because in avoiding them you keep yourself from becoming like the people you hate.

Did you ever get fed up?" I said. "I mean did you ever get scared that everything was going to go lousy unless you did something? I mean do you like school and all that stuff?" "It's a terrific bore." "I mean do you hate it? I know it's a terrific bore, but do you hate it, is what I mean." "Well, I don't exactly hate it. You always have to--" "Well, I hate it. Boy, do I hate it," I said. "But it isn't just that. It's everything. I hate living in New York and all. Taxicabs, and Madison Avenue buses, with the drivers and all always yelling at you to get out at the rear door, and being introduced to phony guys that call the Lunts angels, and going up and down in elevators when you just want to go outside, and guys fitting your pants all the time at Brooks, and people always--" "Don't shout, please," old Sally said. Which was very funny, because I wasn't even shouting. "Take cars," I said. I said it in this very quiet voice. "Take most people, they're crazy about cars. They worry if they get a little scratch on them, and they're always talking about how many miles they get to a gallon, and if they get a brand-new car already they start thinking about trading it in for one that's even newer. I don't even like old cars. I mean they don't even interest me. I'd rather have a goddam horse. A horse is at least human, for God's sake. A horse you can at least--" "I don't know what you're even talking about," old Sally said. "You jump from one--" "You know something?" I said. You're probably the only reason I'm in New York right now, or anywhere. If you weren't around, I'd probably be someplace way the hell off. In the woods or some goddam place. You're the only reason I'm around, practically." "You're sweet," she said. But you could tell she wanted me to change the damn subject. "You ought to go to a boys' school sometime. Try it sometime," I said. "It's full of phonies, and all you do is study so that you can learn enough to be smart enough to be able to buy a goddam Cadillac some day, and you have to keep making believe you give a damn if the football team loses, and all you do is talk about girls and liquor and sex all day, and everybody sticks together in these dirty little goddam cliques. The guys that are on the basketball team stuck together, the Catholics stick together, the guys that play bridge stick together. Even the guys that belong to the goddam Book-of-the-Month Club stick together. If you try to have a little intelligent--" "Now, listen," old Sally said. "Lots of boys get more out of school that that." "I agree! I agree they do, some of them! But that's all I get out of it. See? That's my point. That's exactly my goddamn point," I said. "I don't get hardly anything out of anything. I'm in bad shape. I'm in lousy shape." "You certainly are.

The Premier League is a timeless tale of boom and bust, no different from all those other bubbles they warn you about in business-school textbooks. Except, that is, in one crucial respect. In football, the bubble never burst.

Who’s this?” I point to Soccer Guy. He’s wearing red and white, and he’s all dark eyebrows and dark hair. Quite good-looking, actually. “Cesc Fàbregas. God, he’s the most incredible passer. Plays for Arsenal. The English football club? No?

I need to stop thinking about peeing. I should focus on dry things.  Like California’s drought, month old Christmas trees, British wit. And my vagina while listening to the world’s most boring date mansplain to me about his fantasy football club.

What is a club in any case? Not the buildings or the directors or the people who are paid to represent it. It’s not the television contracts, get-out clauses, marketing departments or executive boxes. It’s the noise, the passion, the feeling of belonging, the pride in your city. It’s a small boy clambering up stadium steps for the very first time, gripping his father’s hand, gawping at that hallowed stretch of turf beneath him and, without being able to do a thing about it, falling in love.

An official statement from Liverpool raised the spectre of a future where ‘a club’s rival can bring about a significant ban for a top player without anything beyond an accusation’. But on hearing this, many Manchester United fans would have been asking for a definition of the word ‘rival’.

To really enjoy football, you have to accept the rules of the game, and forget for at least ninety minutes that they are merely human inventions. If you don’t, you will think it utterly ridiculous for twenty-two people to go running after a ball. Football may begin with just having fun, but it can then become far more serious stuff, as any English hooligan or Argentinian nationalist will attest. Football can help formulate personal identities, it can cement large-scale communities, and it can even provide reasons for violence. Nations and religions are football clubs on steroids.

In the workshop where I started to write fiction, you had to read your work in public. Most times, you read in a bar or coffeehouse where you’d be competing with the roar of the espresso machine. Or the football game on television. Music and drunk people talking. Against all this noise and distraction, only the most shocking, most physical, dark and funny stories got heard. Our test audience would never sit still for "Barn-Raising Club.

My hot-as-fuck Mistress makes nachos, watches football, and has a book club. Careful, baby, I’m gonna start thinking you’re a real person and not an angel sent from heaven to jack my shit.” She started laughing, through it saying, “I’m sure you’ll agree I’m no angel.” He moved his face close to her. “Don’t know about that.

Dialogue in the works of autobiography is quite naturally viewed with some suspicion. How on earth can the writer remember verbatim conversations that happened fifteen, twenty, fifty years ago? But 'Are you playing, Bob?' is one of only four sentences I have ever uttered to any Arsenal player (for the record the others are 'How's the leg, Bob?' to Bob Wilson, recovering from injury the following season; 'Can I have your autograph, please?' to Charlie George, Pat Rice, Alan Ball and Bertie Mee; and, well, 'How's the leg, Brian?' to Brian Marwood outside the Arsenal club shop when I was old enough to know better) and I can therefore vouch for its absolute authenticity.

I held the face of mister angel like a baby or a football in the crook of my arm and bashed him with my knuckles, bashed him until his teeth broke through his lips. Bashed him with my elbow after that until he fell through my arms into a heap at my feet. Until the skin was pounded thin across his cheekbones and turned black. I wanted to breathe smoke.

In any game, the game itself is the prize, no matter who wins, ultimately both lose the game.

Barcelona fans labor under the touchingly innocent belief that everyone else in the world, apart from Real Madrid and Espanyol fans, is happy to accept that their club is the biggest on earth and quite simply the bees' knees of the whole footballing cosmos.

In its modern form, football comes from a gentleman’s agreement signed by twelve English clubs in the autumn of 1863 in a London tavern. The clubs agreed to abide by rules established in 1848 at the University of Cambridge. In Cambridge football divorced rugby: carrying the ball with your hands was outlawed, although touching it was allowed, and kicking the adversary was also prohibited. ‘Kicks must be aimed only at the ball,’ warned one rule. A century and a half later some players still confuse the ball with their rival’s skull owing to the similarity in shape.

When my pals in high school were starting to drink, it always looked unappealing to me. I would be at a big party and see one of the popular girls or football players completely wasted and puking and acting a fool, and think to myself, There’s nothing cool about that. I never wanted to be that out of control.

That promotion is satisfactory. Yes, Liverpool Football Club are back in the First Division. Back in the Big League. But that is only where Liverpool Football Club belong. Only where they should have been all along. In the First Division, in the Big League. So the next time you come bearing gifts, bringing presents, it will be because we've won the Big League. Because Liverpool Football Club have won the First Division. And the FA Cup. And the European Cup. And every cup there is to win. Because only that will be satisfactory, gentlemen. When Liverpool Football Club have won everything there is to win, when Liverpool Football Club have conquered the world. Only that will be enough.

The captain is basically the messenger of the manager. I always think that when a relationship between a captain and a manager is strong, it makes the team stronger and it makes the manager stronger. When that relationship splits, the club is in trouble because there is nothing worse for the team than to get two different messages from two different leaders.

Ethics has three levels, the good for self, the good for others, and the good for the transcendent purpose of a life.1 The good for self is the prudence by which you self-cultivate, learning to play the cello, say, or practicing centering prayer. Self-denial is not automatically virtuous. (How many self-denying mothers does it take to change a lightbulb? None: I’ll just sit here in the dark.) The good for a transcendent purpose is the faith, hope, and love to pursue an answer to the question “So what?” The family, science, art, the football club, God give the answers that humans seek. The middle level is attention to the good for others. The late first-century BCE Jewish sage Hillel of Babylon put it negatively yet reflexively: “Do not do unto others what you would not want done unto yourself.” It’s masculine, a guy-liberalism, a gospel of justice, roughly the so-called Non-Aggression Axiom as articulated by libertarians since the word “libertarian” was redirected in the 1950s to a (then) right-wing liberalism. Matt Kibbe puts it well in the title of his 2014 best seller, Don’t Hurt People and Don’t Take Their Stuff: A Libertarian Manifesto.2 On the other hand, the early first-century CE Jewish sage Jesus of Nazareth put it positively: “Do unto others as you would have them do unto you.” It’s gal-liberalism, a gospel of love, placing upon us an ethical responsibility to do more than pass by on the other side. Be a good Samaritan. Be nice. In

Everyone becomes equally conscious of his body as a separate and complete organism, [but] everyone does not become equally conscious of himself as a complete and separate personality. The feeling of apartness from others comes to most with puberty, but it is not always developed to such a degree as to make the difference between the individual and his fellows noticeable to the individual. It is such as he, as little conscious of himself as the bee in a hive, who are lucky in life, for they have the best chance of happiness: their activities are shared by all, and their pleasures are only pleasures because they are enjoyed in common; you will see them on Whit-Monday dancing on Hampstead Heath, shouting at a football match, or from club windows in Pall Mall cheering a royal procession. It is because of them that man has been called a social animal.

As with all Torino stories, there was to be a final, weird, twist to this tale. In 2000 Torino appointed a new president. He was a life-long Torino fan and had worked as a spokesman for FIAT. His name? Attilio Romero. The same Attilio ‘Tilli’ Romero who had run over his idol – Gigi Meroni – in 1967. The club was now run by a man who had killed one of its most famous players, albeit by accident. This bizarre fact did not pass without comment. Some fans, unhappy at the performance of the team, took to shouting ‘murderer’ at Romero.

She had lived in eight different countries growing up and had visited dozens of others. To most people, this sounded cool, and in some ways, Ayers knows, it was cool, or parts of it were. But since humans are inclined to want what they don't have, she longed to live in America, preferably the solid, unchanging, undramatic Midwest, and attend a real high school, the kind shown in movies, complete with a football team, cheerleaders, pep rallies, chemistry labs, summer reading lists, hall passes, proms, detentions, assemblies, fund-raisers, lockers, Spanish clubs, marching bands, and the dismissal bell.

This lad is an elite European coach. One of a select group of about half a dozen managers working in the world game today. The other five only take jobs with clubs that guarantee squads and trophies that will further enhance their already muscular CVs. Klopp doesn’t seem to need that in his life. He is truly a throwback. A contradiction in many senses – for instance he seems to have no problem being a shameless shill in doing adverts for some heavy weight corporations (Puma, Opel and others) and yet it is hard to escape the conclusion that here is a man on a mission that represents something more honest.

The feeling of apartness from others comes to most with puberty, but it is not always developed to such a degree as to make the difference between the individual and his fellows noticeable to the individual. It is such as he, as little conscious of himself as the bee in a hive, who are the lucky in life, for they have the best chance of happiness: their activities are shared by all, and their pleasures are only pleasures because they are enjoyed in common; you will see them on Whit-Monday dancing on Hampstead Heath, shouting at a football match, or from club windows in Pall Mall cheering a royal procession. It is because of them that man has been called a social animal.

One more thing about the kind of audience that football has decided it wants: the clubs have got to make sure that they're good, that there aren't any lean years, because the new crowd won't tolerate failure. These are not the sort of people who will come to watch you play Wimbledon in March when you're eleventh in the First Division and out of all the Cup competitions. Why should they? They've got plenty of other things to do. So, Arsenal... no more seventeen-year losing streaks, like the one between 1953 and 1970, right? No flirting with relegation, like in 1975 and 1976, or the odd half-decade where you don't even get to a final, like we had between 1981 and 1987. We mug punters put up with that, and at least twenty thousand of us would turn up no matter how bad you were (and sometimes you were very, very bad indeed); but this new lot... I'm not so sure.

began to walk home, very quickly. A car full of high-school girls screeched around the corner. They were the girls who ran all the clubs and won all the elections in Allison’s high-school class: little Lisa Leavitt; Pam McCormick, with her dark ponytail, and Ginger Herbert, who had won the Beauty Revue; Sissy Arnold, who wasn’t as pretty as the rest of them but just as popular. Their faces—like movie starlets’, universally worshiped in the lower grades—smiled from practically every page of the yearbook. There they were, triumphant, on the yellowed, floodlit turf of the football field—in cheerleader uniform, in majorette spangles, gloved and gowned for homecoming; convulsed with laughter on a carnival ride (Favorites) or tumbling elated in the back of a September haywagon (Sweethearts)—and despite the range of costume, athletic to casual to formal wear, they were like dolls whose smiles and hair-dos never changed.

I love football. I love the aesthetics of football. I love the athleticism of football. I love the movement of the players, the antics of the coaches. I love the dynamism of the fans. I love their passion for their badge and the colour of their team and their country. I love the noise and the buzz and the electricity in the stadium. I love the songs. I love the way the ball moves and then it flows and the way a teams fortune rises and falls through a game and through a season. But what I love about football is that it brings people together across religious divides, geographic divides, political divides. I love the fact that for ninety minutes in a rectangular piece of grass, people can forget hopefully, whatever might be going on in their life, and rejoice in this communal celebration of humanity. The biggest diverse, invasive or pervasive culture that human kinds knows is football and I love the fact that at the altar of football human kind can come worship and celebrate.

It was a fittingly heroic end to this final. Because regardless of all the titles Schalke would come to collect, the most lasting legacy of this side was the creation of a concept (a myth, if you like) that permeates German football and especially the Ruhr to this day – that of honest, close-to-the-people, proletarian football. Nearly all the Schalke players had been raised in or near Gelsenkirchen, and the majority had known each other since early childhood. Most had worked either down the pits or at the steelworks, and many continued to do so while winning championships in their spare time. As if that weren’t enough to make them a close-knit group, they were also family in a very literal sense. Fritz Szepan was married to one of Ernst Kuzorra’s sisters, reserve player Fritz Thelen to another. Szepan’s own sister was the wife of Karl Ambriss. The wives of Ernst Reckmann and August Sobottka were cousins. In 1931, Ernst Kuzorra married the daughter of the man who ran the club’s pub. Winger Bernhard and goalkeeper Hans Klodt were brothers (though they only played together for a few years).

Subect: Sigh. Okay. Since we're on the subject... Q. What is the Tsar of Russia's favorite fish? A. Tsardines, of course. Q. What does the son of a Ukranian newscaster and a U.S. congressman eat for Thanksgiving dinner on an island off the coast of Massachusetts? A.? -Ella Subect: TG A. Republicans. Nah.I'm sure we'll have all the traditional stuff: turkey, stuffing, mashed potatoes. I'm hoping for apple pie. Our hosts have a cook who takes requests, but the island is kinda limited as far as shopping goes. The seven of us will probably spend the morning on a boat, then have a civilized chow-down. I predict Pictionary. I will win. You? -Alex Subect: Re. TG Alex, I will be having my turkey (there ill be one, but it will be somewhat lost among the pumpkin fettuccine, sausage-stuffed artichokes, garlic with green beans, and at least four lasagnas, not to mention the sweet potato cannoli and chocolate ricotta pie) with at least forty members of my close family, most of whom will spend the entire meal screaming at each other. Some will actually be fighting, probably over football. I am hoping to be seated with the adults. It's not a sure thing. What's Martha's Vineyard like? I hear it's gorgeous. I hear it's favored by presidential types, past and present. -Ella Subject: Can I Have TG with You? Please??? There's a 6a.m. flight off the island. I can be back in Philadelphia by noon. I've never had Thanksgiving with more than four or five other people. Only child of two only children. My grandmother usually hosts dinner at the Hunt Club. She doesn't like turkey. Last year we had Scottish salmon. I like salmon,but... The Vineyard is pretty great. The house we're staying in is in Chilmark, which, if you weren't so woefully ignorant of defunct television, is the birthplace of Fox Mulder. I can see the Menemsha fishing fleet out my window. Ever heard of Menemsha Blues? I should bring you a T-shirt. Everyone has Black Dogs; I prefer a good fish on the chest. (Q. What do you call a fish with no eyes? A. Fish.) We went out on a boat this afternoon and actually saw a humpback whale. See pics below. That fuzzy gray lump in the bumpy gray water is a fin. A photographer I am not. Apparently, they're usually gone by now, heading for the Caribbean. It's way too cold to swim, but amazing in the summer. I swear I got bumped by a sea turtle here last July 4, but no one believes me. Any chance of saving me a cannoli? -A

Well, I hate it. Boy, do I hate it,” I said. “But it isn’t just that. It’s everything. I hate living in New York and all. Taxicabs, and Madison Avenue buses, with the drivers and all always yelling at you to get out at the rear door, and being introduced to phony guys that call the Lunts angels, and going up and down in elevators when you just want to go outside, and guys fitting your pants all the time at Brooks, and people always—” “Don’t shout, please,” old Sally said. Which was very funny, because I wasn’t even shouting. “Take cars,” I said. I said it in this very quiet voice. “Take most people, they’re crazy about cars. They worry if they get a little scratch on them, and they’re always talking about how many miles they get to a gallon, and if they get a brand-new car already they start thinking about trading it in for one that’s even newer. I don’t even like old cars. I mean they don’t even interest me. I’d rather have a goddam horse. A horse is at least human, for God’s sake. A horse you can at least—” “I don’t know what you’re even talking about,” old Sally said. “You jump from one—” “You know something?” I said. “You’re probably the only reason I’m in New York right now, or anywhere. If you weren’t around, I’d probably be someplace way the hell off. In the woods or some goddam place. You’re the only reason I’m around, practically.” “You’re sweet,” she said. But you could tell she wanted me to change the damn subject. “You ought to go to a boys’ school sometime. Try it sometime,” I said. “It’s full of phonies, and all you do is study so that you can learn enough to be smart enough to be able to buy a goddam Cadillac some day, and you have to keep making believe you give a damn if the football team loses, and all you do is talk about girls and liquor and sex all day, and everybody sticks together in these dirty little goddam cliques. The guys that are on the basketball team stick together, the Catholics stick together, the goddam intellectuals stick together, the guys that play bridge stick together. Even the guys that belong to the goddam Book-of-the-Month Club stick together. If you try to have a little intelligent—” “Now, listen,” old Sally said. “Lots of boys get more out of school than that.” “I agree! I agree they do, some of them! But that’s all I get out of it. See? That’s my point. That’s exactly my goddam point,” I said. “I don’t get hardly anything out of anything. I’m in bad shape. I’m in lousy shape.” “You certainly are.

Between 2003 and 2008, Iceland’s three main banks, Glitnir, Kaupthing and Landsbanki, borrowed over $140 billion, a figure equal to ten times the country’s GDP, dwarfing its central bank’s $2.5 billion reserves. A handful of entrepreneurs, egged on by their then government, embarked on an unprecedented international spending binge, buying everything from Danish department stores to West Ham Football Club, while a sizeable proportion of the rest of the adult population enthusiastically embraced the kind of cockamamie financial strategies usually only mooted in Nigerian spam emails – taking out loans in Japanese Yen, for example, or mortgaging their houses in Swiss francs. One minute the Icelanders were up to their waists in fish guts, the next they they were weighing up the options lists on their new Porsche Cayennes. The tales of un-Nordic excess are legion: Elton John was flown in to sing one song at a birthday party; private jets were booked like they were taxis; people thought nothing of spending £5,000 on bottles of single malt whisky, or £100,000 on hunting weekends in the English countryside. The chief executive of the London arm of Kaupthing hired the Natural History Museum for a party, with Tom Jones providing the entertainment, and, by all accounts, Reykjavik’s actual snow was augmented by a blizzard of the Colombian variety. The collapse of Lehman Brothers in late 2008 exposed Iceland’s debts which, at one point, were said to be around 850 per cent of GDP (compared with the US’s 350 per cent), and set off a chain reaction which resulted in the krona plummeting to almost half its value. By this stage Iceland’s banks were lending money to their own shareholders so that they could buy shares in . . . those very same Icelandic banks. I am no Paul Krugman, but even I can see that this was hardly a sustainable business model. The government didn’t have the money to cover its banks’ debts. It was forced to withdraw the krona from currency markets and accept loans totalling £4 billion from the IMF, and from other countries. Even the little Faroe Islands forked out £33 million, which must have been especially humiliating for the Icelanders. Interest rates peaked at 18 per cent. The stock market dropped 77 per cent; inflation hit 20 per cent; and the krona dropped 80 per cent. Depending who you listen to, the country’s total debt ended up somewhere between £13 billion and £63 billion, or, to put it another way, anything from £38,000 to £210,000 for each and every Icelander.

But he had grown very self-conscious. The new-born child does not realise that his body is more a part of himself than surrounding objects, and will play with his toes without any feeling that they belong to him more than the rattle by his side; and it is only by degrees, through pain, that he understands the fact of the body. And experiences of the same kind are necessary for the individual to become conscious of himself; but here there is the difference that, although everyone becomes equally conscious of his body as a separate and complete organism, everyone does not become equally conscious of himself as a complete and separate personality. The feeling of apartness from others comes to most with puberty, but it is not always developed to such a degree as to make the difference between the individual and his fellows noticeable to the individual. It is such as he, as little conscious of himself as the bee in a hive, who are the lucky in life, for they have the best chance of happiness: their activities are shared by all, and their pleasures are only pleasures because they are enjoyed in common; you will see them on Whit-Monday dancing on Hampstead Heath, shouting at a football match, or from club windows in Pall Mall cheering a royal procession. It is because of them that man has been called a social animal.

So to avoid the twin dangers of nostalgia and despairing bitterness, I'll just say that in Cartagena we'd spend a whole month of happiness, and sometimes even a month and a half, or even longer, going out in Uncle Rafa's motorboat, La Fiorella, to Bocachica to collect seashells and eat fried fish with plantain chips and cassava, and to the Rosary Islands, where I tried lobster, or to the beach at Bocagrande, or walking to the pool at the Caribe Hotel, until we were mildly burned on our shoulders, which after a few days started peeling and turned freckly forever, or playing football with my cousins, in the little park opposite Bocagrande Church, or tennis in the Cartagena Club or ping-pong in their house, or going for bike rides, or swimming under the little nameless waterfalls along the coast, or making the most of the rain and the drowsiness of siesta time to read the complete works of Agatha Christie or the fascinating novels of Ayn Rand (I remember confusing the antics of the architect protagonist of The Fountainhead with those of my uncle Rafael), or Pearl S. Buck's interminable sagas, in cool hammocks strung up in the shade on the terrace of the house, with a view of the sea, drinking Kola Roman, eating Chinese empanadas on Sundays, coconut rice with red snapper on Mondays, Syrian-Lebanese kibbeh on Wednesdays, sirloin steak on Fridays and, my favourite, egg arepas on Saturday mornings, piping hot and brought fresh from a nearby village, Luruaco, where they had the best recipe.

Please, I don’t want to go yet! I want to see what you really look like. “IT WILL STRIKE FEAR IN YOUR HEART.” I promised I wouldn’t be frightened and said that it would be a privilege to see them. However, I did request that they make a peaceful gesture in the midst of this frightening exposure, just to reassure me. A wave, perhaps? A spinning white light with a hint of green began to radiate over their faces and upper bodies. The intensity of this light slowly got brighter. It radiated from no detectable source. Then I saw what they truly looked like. They were big, all right. Their upper bodies looked like football linebackers. As the light became brighter and the details clearer, fear and shock did course through me like lightning. They had scales, and their faces were sort of snakelike, or lizardlike. Nothing at all like the smaller aliens. I felt an odd, deep-down instinctual shock, but I told myself to calm down. Fig. 31: I See What These Aliens Really Look Like Their eyes were small like ours, but diamond shaped. The pupils were reddish. Their heads were big, and their brow stuck far out from their eyes to various degrees, giving them all some kind of individuality. I was surprised that I was deeply upset by them. “Hey,” I said feebly. “You promised to…uh...wave.” Wave they did. Each and every one of them slowly lifted their arms and waved them in front of their faces — a sight to behold. This relaxed me, but I was surprised by a feature I didn’t expect — their hands. Their hands were huge, with thick club-like features, which appeared too thick by my estimate to work fine instruments.

Argentine national football player from FC Barcelona. Positions are attacks. He is the greatest player in the history of the club, as well as the greatest player in the history of the club, as well as the greatest player in history, most of whom are Pele and Diego Maradona [9] Is one of the best players in football history. 저희는 7가지 철칙을 바탕으로 거래를 합니다. 고객들과 지키지못할약속은 하지않습니다 1.정품보장 2.총알배송 3.투명한 가격 4.편한 상담 5.끝내주는 서비스 6.고객님 정보 보호 7.깔끔한 거래 신용과 신뢰의 거래로 많은VIP고객님들 모시고 싶은것이 저희쪽 경영 목표입니다 믿음과 신뢰의 거래로 신용성있는 비즈니스 진행하고있습니다 비즈니스는 첫째로 신용,신뢰 입니다 믿고 주문하시는것만큼 저희는 확실한제품으로 모시겠습니다 제품구입후 제품이 손상되거나 혹은 효과못보셨을시 저희가 1차재배송 2차 100%환불까지 해드리고있습니다 후회없는 선택 자신감있는 제품으로 언제나 모시겠습니다 텔레【KC98K】카톡【ACD5】라인【SPR331】 ◀경영항목▶ 수면제,여성최음제,여성흥분제,남성발기부전치유제,비아그라,시알리스,88정,드래곤,99정,바오메이,정력제,남성성기확대제,카마그라젤,비닉스,센돔,꽃물,남성조루제,네노마정 등많은제품 판매중입니다 2. Childhood [edit] He was born on June 24, 1987 in Rosario, Argentina [10] [11]. His great-grandfather Angelo Messi moved to Argentina as an Italian, and his family became an Argentinean. His father, Jorge Orashio Messi, was a steel worker, and his mother, Celia Maria Quatini, was a part-time housekeeper. Since he was also coach of the local club, Gland Dolley, he became close to football naturally since he was a child, and he started playing soccer at Glendale's club when he was four years old. In 1995, he joined Newsweek's Old Boys Youth team at age six, following Rosario, and soon became a prospect. However, at the age of 11, she is diagnosed with GHD and experiences trials. It took $ 90 to $ 100 a month to cure it, and it was a big deal for his parents to make a living from manual labor. His team, New Wells Old Boys, was also reluctant to spend this amount. For a time, even though the parents owed their debts, they tried to cure the disorder and helped him become a football player, but it could not be forever. [12] In that situation, the Savior appeared. In July 2000, a scouting proposal came from FC Barcelona, ​​where he saw his talent. He was also invited to play in the Argentinian club CA River Plate. The River Plate coach who reported the test reported the team to the club as a "must-have" player, and the reporter who watched the test together was sure to be talented enough to call him "the new Maradona." However, River Plate did not give a definite answer because of the need to convince New Wells Old Boys to recruit him, and the fact that the cost of the treatment was fixed in addition to lodging. Eventually Messi and his father crossed to Barcelona in response to a scouting offer from Barcelona. After a number of negotiations between the Barcelona side and Messi's father, the proposal was inconceivable to pay for Meshi's treatment.

What would be the natural thing? A man goes to college. He works as he wants to work, he plays as he wants to play, he exercises for the fun of the game, he makes friends where he wants to make them, he is held in by no fear of criticism above, for the class ahead of him has nothing to do with his standing in his own class. Everything he does has the one vital quality: it is spontaneous. That is the flame of youth itself. Now, what really exists?" "...I say our colleges to-day are business colleges—Yale more so, perhaps, because it is more sensitively American. Let's take up any side of our life here. Begin with athletics. What has become of the natural, spontaneous joy of contest? Instead you have one of the most perfectly organized business systems for achieving a required result—success. Football is driving, slavish work; there isn't one man in twenty who gets any real pleasure out of it. Professional baseball is not more rigorously disciplined and driven than our 'amateur' teams. Add the crew and the track. Play, the fun of the thing itself, doesn't exist; and why? Because we have made a business out of it all, and the college is scoured for material, just as drummers are sent out to bring in business. "Take another case. A man has a knack at the banjo or guitar, or has a good voice. What is the spontaneous thing? To meet with other kindred spirits in informal gatherings in one another's rooms or at the fence, according to the whim of the moment. Instead what happens? You have our university musical clubs, thoroughly professional organizations. If you are material, you must get out and begin to work for them—coach with a professional coach, make the Apollo clubs, and, working on, some day in junior year reach the varsity organization and go out on a professional tour. Again an organization conceived on business lines. "The same is true with the competition for our papers: the struggle for existence outside in a business world is not one whit more intense than the struggle to win out in the News or Lit competition. We are like a beef trust, with every by-product organized, down to the last possibility. You come to Yale—what is said to you? 'Be natural, be spontaneous, revel in a certain freedom, enjoy a leisure you'll never get again, browse around, give your imagination a chance, see every one, rub wits with every one, get to know yourself.' "Is that what's said? No. What are you told, instead? 'Here are twenty great machines that need new bolts and wheels. Get out and work. Work harder than the next man, who is going to try to outwork you. And, in order to succeed, work at only one thing. You don't count—everything for the college.' Regan says the colleges don't represent the nation; I say they don't even represent the individual.

I thought we were meeting by the field house,” I call out as I make my way over. He doesn’t even turn around. “Nah, I’m pretty sure I said the parking lot.” “You definitely said the field house,” I argue. Why can’t he ever just admit that he’s wrong? “Geez, field house, parking lot. What difference does it make?” Mason asks. “Give it a rest, why don’t you.” I shoot him a glare. “Oh, hey, Mason. Remember when your hair was long and everyone thought you were a girl?” Ryder chuckles as he releases a perfect spiral in Mason’s direction. “She’s got you there.” “Hey, whose side are you on, anyway?” Mason catches the ball and cradles it against his chest, then launches it toward Ben. I just stand there watching as they continue to toss it back and forth between the three of them. Haven’t they had enough football for one day? I pull out my cell to check the time. “We should probably get going.” “I guess,” Ryder says with an exaggerated sigh, like I’m putting him out or something. Which is particularly annoying since he’s the one who insisted on going with me. Ben jogs up beside me, the football tucked beneath his arm. “Where are you two off to? Whoa, you’re sweaty.” I fold my arms across my damp chest. “Hey, southern girls don’t sweat. We glow.” Ben snorts at that. “Says who?” “Says Ryder’s mom,” I say with a grin. It’s one of Laura Grace’s favorite sayings--one that always makes Ryder wince. “The hardware store,” Ryder answers, snatching the ball back from Ben. “Gotta pick up some things for the storm--sandbags and stuff like that. Y’all want to come?” “Nah, I think I’ll pass.” Mason wrinkles his nose. “Pretty sure I don’t want to be cooped up in the truck with Jemma glowing like she is right now.” “Everybody thought you and Morgan were identical twin girls,” I say with a smirk. “Remember, Mason? Isn’t that just so cute?” “I’ll go,” Ben chimes in. “If you’re getting sandbags, you’ll need some help carrying them out to the truck.” “Thanks, Ben. See, someone’s a gentleman.” “Don’t look now, Ryder, but your one-woman fan club is over there.” Mason tips his head toward the school building in the distance. “I think she’s scented you out. Quick. You better run.” I glance over my shoulder to find Rosie standing on the sidewalk by the building’s double doors, looking around hopefully. “Hey!” Mason calls out, waving both arms above his head. “He’s over here.” Ryder’s cheeks turn beet-red. He just stares at the ground, his jaw working furiously. “C’mon, man,” Ben says, throwing an elbow into Mason’s side. “Don’t be a dick.” He grabs the football and heads toward Ryder’s Durango. “We better get going. The hardware store probably closes at six.” Silently, Ryder and I hurry after him and hop inside the truck--Ben up front, me in the backseat. We don’t look back to see if Rosie’s following.

It’s my turn next, and I realize then that I never turned in the name of my escort--because I hadn’t planned on being here. I glance around wildly for Ryder, but he’s nowhere to be seen, swallowed up by the sea of people in cocktail dresses and suits. Crap. I thought he realized that escorting me on court was part of the deal, once I’d agreed to go. I guess he’d figured it’d be easier on me, what with the whole Patrick thing, if I was alone onstage. But I don’t want to be alone. I want Ryder with me. By my side, supporting me. Always. I finally spot him in the crowd--it’s not too hard, since he’s a head taller than pretty much everyone else--and our eyes meet. My stomach drops to my feet--you know, that feeling you get on a roller coaster right after you crest that first hill and start plummeting toward the ground. Oh my God, this can’t be happening. I’ve fallen in love with Ryder Marsden, the boy I’m supposed to hate. And it has nothing to do with his confession, his declaration that he loves me. Sure, it might have forced me to examine my feelings faster than I would have on my own, but it was there all along, taking root, growing, blossoming. Heck, it’s a full-blown garden at this point. “Our senior maid is Miss Jemma Cafferty!” comes the principal’s voice. “Jemma is a varsity cheerleader, a member of the Wheelettes social sorority, the French Honor Club, the National Honor Society, and the Peer Mentors. She’s escorted tonight by…ahem, sorry. I’m afraid there’s no escort, so we’ll just--” “Ryder Marsden,” I call out as I make my way across the stage. “I’m escorted by Ryder Marsden.” The collective gasp that follows my announcement is like something out of the movies. I swear, it’s just like that scene in Gone with the Wind where Rhett offers one hundred and fifty dollars in gold to dance with Scarlett, and she walks through the scandalized bystanders to take her place beside Rhett for the Virginia reel. Only it’s the reverse. I’m standing here doing the scandalizing, and Ryder’s doing the walking. “Apparently, Jemma’s escort is Ryder Marsden,” the principal ad-libs into the microphone, looking a little frazzled. “Ryder is…um…the starting quarterback for the varsity football team, and, um…in the National Honor Society and…” She trails off helplessly. “A Peer Mentor,” he adds helpfully as he steps up beside me and takes my hand. The smile he flashes in my direction as Mrs. Crawford places the tiara on my head is dazzling--way more so than the tiara itself. My knees go a little weak, and I clutch him tightly as I wobble on my four-inch heels. But here’s the thing: If the crowd is whispering about me, I don’t hear it. I’m aware only of Ryder beside me, my hand resting in the crook of his arm as he leads me to our spot on the stage beside the junior maid and her escort, where we wait for Morgan to be crowned queen. Oh, there’ll be hell to pay tomorrow. I have no idea what we’re going to tell our parents. Right now I don’t even care. Just like Scarlett O’Hara, I’m going to enjoy myself tonight and worry about the rest later. After all, tomorrow is another…Well, you know how the saying goes.

SCENE 24 “Tiens, Ti Jean, donne ce plat la a Shammy,” my father is saying to me, turning from the open storage room door with a white tin pan. “Here, Ti Jean, give this pan to Shammy.” My father is standing with a peculiar French Canadian bowleggedness half up from a crouch with the pan outheld, waiting for me to take it, anxious till I do so, almost saying with his big frowning amazed face “Well my little son what are we doing in the penigillar, this strange abode, this house of life without roof be-hung on a Friday evening with a tin pan in my hand in the gloom and you in your raincoats—” “II commence a tombez de la neige” someone is shouting in the background, coming in from the door (“Snow’s startin to fall”)—my father and I stand in that immobile instant communicating telepathic thought-paralysis, suspended in the void together, understanding something that’s always already happened, wondering where we were now, joint reveries in a dumb stun in the cellar of men and smoke … as profound as Hell … as red as Hell.—I take the pan; behind him, the clutter and tragedy of old cellars and storage with its dank message of despair–mops, dolorous mops, clattering tear-stricken pails, fancy sprawfs to suck soap suds from a glass, garden drip cans–rakes leaning on meaty rock–and piles of paper and official Club equipments– It now occurs to me my father spent most of his time when I was 13 the winter of 1936, thinking about a hundred details to be done in the Club alone not to mention home and business shop–the energy of our fathers, they raised us to sit on nails– While I sat around all the time with my little diary, my Turf, my hockey games, Sunday afternoon tragic football games on the toy pooltable white chalkmarked … father and son on separate toys, the toys get less friendly when you grow up–my football games occupied me with the same seriousness of the angels–we had little time to talk to each other. In the fall of 1934 we took a grim voyage south in the rain to Rhode Island to see Time Supply win the Narragansett Special–with Old Daslin we was … a grim voyage, through exciting cities of great neons, Providence, the mist at the dim walls of great hotels, no Turkeys in the raw fog, no Roger Williams, just a trolley track gleaming in the gray rain– We drove, auguring solemnly over past performance charts, past deserted shell-like Ice Cream Dutchland Farms stands in the dank of rainy Nov.—bloop, it was the time on the road, black tar glisten-road of thirties, over foggy trees and distances, suddenly a crossroads, or just a side-in road, a house, or bam, a vista gray tearful mists over some half-in cornfield with distances of Rhode Island in the marshy ways across and the secret scent of oysters from the sea–but something dark and rog-like.— J had seen it before … Ah weary flesh, burdened with a light … that gray dark Inn on the Narragansett Road … this is the vision in my brain as I take the pan from my father and take it to Shammy, moving out of the way for LeNoire and Leo Martin to pass on the way to the office to see the book my father had (a health book with syphilitic backs)— SCENE 25 Someone ripped the pooltable cloth that night, tore it with a cue, I ran back and got my mother and she lay on it half-on-floor like a great poolshark about to take a shot under a hundred eyes only she’s got a thread in her mouth and’s sewing with the same sweet grave face you first saw in the window over my shoulder in that rain of a late Lowell afternoon. God bless the children of this picture, this bookmovie. I’m going on into the Shade.

SCENE 24 “Tiens, Ti Jean, donne ce plat la a Shammy,” my father is saying to me, turning from the open storage room door with a white tin pan. “Here, Ti Jean, give this pan to Shammy.” My father is standing with a peculiar French Canadian bowleggedness half up from a crouch with the pan outheld, waiting for me to take it, anxious till I do so, almost saying with his big frowning amazed face “Well my little son what are we doing in the penigillar, this strange abode, this house of life without roof be-hung on a Friday evening with a tin pan in my hand in the gloom and you in your raincoats—” “II commence a tombez de la neige” someone is shouting in the background, coming in from the door (“Snow’s startin to fall”)—my father and I stand in that immobile instant communicating telepathic thought-paralysis, suspended in the void together, understanding something that’s always already happened, wondering where we were now, joint reveries in a dumb stun in the cellar of men and smoke … as profound as Hell … as red as Hell.—I take the pan; behind him, the clutter and tragedy of old cellars and storage with its dank message of despair–mops, dolorous mops, clattering tear-stricken pails, fancy sprawfs to suck soap suds from a glass, garden drip cans–rakes leaning on meaty rock–and piles of paper and official Club equipments– It now occurs to me my father spent most of his time when I was 13 the winter of 1936, thinking about a hundred details to be done in the Club alone not to mention home and business shop–the energy of our fathers, they raised us to sit on nails– While I sat around all the time with my little diary, my Turf, my hockey games, Sunday afternoon tragic football games on the toy pooltable white chalkmarked … father and son on separate toys, the toys get less friendly when you grow up–my football games occupied me with the same seriousness of the angels–we had little time to talk to each other. In the fall of 1934 we took a grim voyage south in the rain to Rhode Island to see Time Supply win the Narragansett Special–with Old Daslin we was … a grim voyage, through exciting cities of great neons, Providence, the mist at the dim walls of great hotels, no Turkeys in the raw fog, no Roger Williams, just a trolley track gleaming in the gray rain– We drove, auguring solemnly over past performance charts, past deserted shell-like Ice Cream Dutchland Farms stands in the dank of rainy Nov.—bloop, it was the time on the road, black tar glisten-road of thirties, over foggy trees and distances, suddenly a crossroads, or just a side-in road, a house, or bam, a vista gray tearful mists over some half-in cornfield with distances of Rhode Island in the marshy ways across and the secret scent of oysters from the sea–but something dark and rog-like.— J had seen it before … Ah weary flesh, burdened with a light … that gray dark Inn on the Narragansett Road … this is the vision in my brain as I take the pan from my father and take it to Shammy, moving out of the way for LeNoire and Leo Martin to pass on the way to the office to see the book my father had (a health book with syphilitic backs)— SCENE 25 Someone ripped the pooltable cloth that night, tore it with a cue, I ran back and got my mother and she lay on it half-on-floor like a great poolshark about to take a shot under a hundred eyes only she’s got a thread in her mouth and’s sewing with the same sweet grave face you first saw in the window over my shoulder in that rain of a late Lowell afternoon. God bless the children of this picture, this bookmovie. I’m going on into the Shade.

I know you are all disappointed, boys. I know you are all hurt. I can see it in your faces, boys. In every one of your faces. But what is done is done, boys. What is lost is lost. And so you must not let that disappointment, you must not let that hurt, devour your belief and eat your confidence. Because you are still the best side I have ever seen play, boys. You are still the finest team in England since the war. And so you must believe in yourselves and believe in each other, boys. You must have confidence in yourselves and in each other. And then you will win again, boys. And again and again. That is the only answer to disappointment, that is the only way to deal with hurt. To win, boys. And to win and win again. Until you have won the League. Until Liverpool Football Club are the Champions again. That is the only answer now. To win and win again, boys. And to be Champions. Champions again, boys!

And Bill said, I am not playing with words when I say Liverpool Football Club have the most loyal supporters in the world. The greatest supporters in the world. And that is my challenge, to care for them. That is my challenge, to look after them. Because if the supporters of Liverpool Football Club are happy, then the players of Liverpool Football Club are happy, and if the players are happy, then the club is successful. That is the only sort of dividend I seek for my labours. That is the only reward I want. To make the supporters happy, to make the people happy. And I have never cheated the supporters, I have never cheated the people. And I never will, I never will. They deserve the best. Because they are the best. And no man, no man alive, can give more, can strive harder to give them the best, to make them happy. That is all I seek to do. That is all I try to do… And so come what may, whether or not I am still associated with Liverpool Football Club after that time, that time this contract ends, my wife and I will spend the rest of our days in Liverpool. We have been made to feel at home here. We like the place and we like the people. And so we can see no reason for going elsewhere… This is our home. Our home.

In the dug-out, on the bench. The Anfield bench. Bill stared out at the players of Liverpool Football Club on the pitch. The Anfield pitch. In the sun, the players of Liverpool Football Club shining. In the sun, in their kits. Their red shirts, their white shorts. And their white socks. And in the dug-out, on the bench. The Anfield bench. Bill heard the whistle blow, Bill heard the crowd roar. The Anfield crowd.

The success of Liverpool Football Club is no one-man affair. We are a team. We are a working-class team! We have no room for individuals. No room for stars. For fancy footballers or for celebrities. We are workers. A team of workers. A team of workers on the pitch and a team of workers off the pitch. On the pitch and off the pitch. Every man in our organisation, every man in our team. He knows the importance of looking after the small things, he knows how the small things add up to the important things. From the chairman to the groundsman, every man is a cog has functioned perfectly. In the team. Every man has given one hundred per cent. For the team. And so the team has won. The team are champions, a team of champions. We are all a team of champions! We are all a team.

result he’d grown comfortable with himself and highly accomplished. At Puyallup High School, he had been a superstar. He had played football, basketball, and tennis. He was class treasurer, an assistant librarian, a member of the radio club, and he appeared

Alfredo Di Stefano changed the history of this club and he changed the history of football. He has left us, but his legend will live forever.

Alfredo Di Stefano is Real Madrid. His alliance with this club changed the destiny of this institution. Alfredo was the best in every sense of the word, for how he revolutionised football and for the values he had. Now it is our duty to tell those who never him saw him play that he changed everything. Madrid was his home and his life and we will give him the homage he deserves. He came here to stay and his presence in Madrid is eternal. Alfredo Di Stefano, Real Madrid’s honorary president, Real Madrid will never forget you.

WHEN THE COWBOYS’ coaches and front office staff met at Love Field in early July for their trip to training camp in Forest Grove, Oregon, Tom Landry was noticeably grim. Charles Burton of the Morning News wrote that the coach “appeared about as excited as if he were preparing to drive to Grand Prairie for a civic club luncheon.

Liverpool wouldn't be the club it is today without Bill Shankly and Bob Paisley and the players who played there. When I first went there it was a typical Second Division ground, and look at it now!

As for Sturridge, he comes across as quite possibly the most likable man to ever wear the Liverbird. The chicken teriyaki enthusiast has been defying expectations and unfounded prejudice since he arrived at the club to a lukewarm fan response. He was a troublemaker, you see. He had a poor attitude and was a he Big Time Charlie, don't you know? The Chelsea guys said so and Jose Mourinho has never been anything other than ethical and sincere, right? Right? "The England front man was quick to disabuse dubious fans of their misguided assumptions. From his first interview he spoke with a candour and earnest enthusiasm that were utterly endearing. His performance on the pitch has been nothing short of remarkable and his prodigious tally of 35 goals in 49 appearances to date is worthy of far more adulation than he has received. Doubtless the dancing striker has suffered by comparison with the frankly unequalled brilliance of a certain now-departed flesh gourmand, but the Birmingham native is worthy of so much more praise and, with time on his side, he has the potential to become the nonpareil of Liverpool's recent strikers.

Men don’t have a reason any more. No one wants us. Why should they? What can we do? We have no job, no home to go to. It’s been taken away. Small wonder then that all that is left for us is to turn in upon ourselves, to clutch at the few things that give us meaning, hope. Money is one thing. Football is another. Football with money does it big time. But football is made up by men like us now, not like men of my father’s years. They have no idea who they are, where they are meant to go either. Call it sport. There was sport to it once, where sport was the point. The point now? What is the point, exactly, of this beautiful game? See them on the pitch, biting each other, pulling at each other’s shirts, kicking and scratching, flying tackles, jabs in the elbow, feigning injuries, bellowing obscenities at the ref: see them later, off the pitch, urinating in hotel plant pots, wrecking Indian takeaways, abusing shop owners, brawling in night clubs, gang-banging under-age groupies, punching unwilling women in the face; see them beating their wives, breaking their girlfriends’ arms, standing outside their ghastly houses with their Doric columns and Lamborghinis, driving to each other’s hideous celebrity-strewn weddings. Be worthless now, that’s all you can be. The age of the bully is upon us.

Football’s governing body said that it would hold the 2022 World Cup inQatar during November and December that year, to avoid the hot summer. Holding it in those months would cut the revenue earned by football clubs by disrupting their normal schedule, and add heat to the contentious decision to stage the tournament in Qatar in the first place.

footballers who come from a poor family, play good football, get rich and go off the rails. Put yourself in their position. Just try to digest it. In fact, hardly any European clubs even look at that kind of issue. Because the worlds are too far apart. The board, the directors and the managers who should be keeping an eye on things like that don’t understand the culture of players from that sort of background. They just don’t have the life experience to be able to imagine themselves in that situation.

BENJAMIN Age: 10 Height: 5’1 Favourite animal: His dog, Spooky   Of all the Cluefinders, Benjamin is the most interested in sports. He is very physically active, playing football and cricket at the weekends, and often going for a morning jog with Jake, his next-door neighbour, and their Dads. Ben took some karate lessons until he decided that he never wanted to fight another person if he could help it. Like Chris, he loves to read comic books, and his favourite super-hero is Spider-Man, who is also very athletic. He says, “I love to exercise because it means I can eat whatever I want without getting fat!” Ben especially loves spaghetti Bolognese and pizza.   Ben has a dog, Spooky, who he plays with all the time. Ben has a soft spot for all animals, and supports the World Wildlife Fund, which aims to protect endangered wild animals which are at risk of going extinct. His goals for the future include travelling around the world, an ambition he shares with Clara. He would like to visit the countries of South America, where there is an abundance of wildlife.

What if it was a war? • What if it was a movement? • What if there was an exclusive club? • What if it was a rare collectible? • What if it was a party? • What if it was a dance rave? • What if it was a celebration? • What if there was a charitable cause? • What if it was a patriotic event? • What if it was an unveiling? • What if there was a space rocket launch? • What if it was a visit by state dignitaries? • What if it was a pep rally? • What if it was a car show? • What if it was a football game? • What if it was a chess match?

No country is completely free of those who would prefer to keep people separate. Even in countries with the most homogenous of populations, there will always be some who feel compelled to condemn, envy, and attack others, whether for belonging to a different political party or merely for supporting a rival football club.

Clark went on to tell us that we would provide a color guard every Friday for the recruit parade.  There would also be color guard details all over the San Diego area.   Any service club, school, ball team of any kind that wanted a color guard at their event could get one just by asking.   “You’re lucky it isn’t football season or we might as well live in our dress blues.

A journalist watched this final in a Cologne pub that was frequented by both Germans and Englishmen. ‘It was weird,’ he later said. ‘The Germans all rooted for Manchester, the English were all urging Bayern on!’ It was natural, not weird, as Bayern were still as unloved in their own country as Manchester United were in theirs. But the instant Ole Gunnar Solskjaer scored the winner, the mood changed. It seemed too cruel to lose a match under such circumstances, even if the losers were Bayern. Also, after winning three European Cup finals they should have lost, the once lucky Bayern had now lost three they should have won. Hitzfeld took defeat in his stride, and the image of this gentlemanly coach congratulating Ferguson despite being hit so hard altered the picture some people had of Bayern as a club of cold egotists.

Young Schuster could have been the answer to many of West Germany’s problems. So good was he that Barcelona came in with an offer only three months after the European Championship. Schuster had fallen out with his club coach and so the country’s best prospect went abroad at a tender age indeed. Schuster stayed in Spain for 13 years, proving he feared nothing and nobody when he moved from Barça to Real Madrid – and then from Real to Atlético Madrid. Later, the Spanish press voted him the best foreigner ever to grace their league, ahead of Alfredo Di Stefano and Johan Cruyff.

The ground hosted an international between England and Scotland in April 1926, which the Scots won 1-0 in front of a crowd of forty-nine thousand.

Celtic won the European Cup, beating Internazionale in Lisbon with a team made up of players who hailed from within twelve miles of Celtic Park. It was a Glasgow team of Glasgow men.

Crerand recalls, it gave them an injection of confidence. ‘After winning the Cup, we realised that we could then win anything,’ he says. ‘It was the start of our good run in the 1960s, much like Alex Ferguson’s success in 1990 was the start of what has become the greatest era in United’s history.

Together Law, Charlton and Best – Old Trafford’s golden trinity – made Manchester United.

It was victory – handsomely achieved – that sold. Nothing else would do. And Ferguson, Cantona, Giggs and the new United provided it.

The war against Perot escalated quickly. The booster club geared up a letter-writing campaign to him, state legislators, and the governor. Nearly a thousand letters were sent in protest of Perot’s condemnation of Odessa. Some of the ones to him were addressed “Dear Idiot” or something worse than that, and they not so gently told him to mind his own damn business and not disturb a way of life that had worked and thrived for years and brought the town a joy it could never have experienced anywhere else. “It’s our money,” said Allen of the funds that were used to build the stadium. “If we choose to put it into a football program, and the graduates from our high schools are at or above the state level of standards, then screw you, leave us alone.” At one point Perot, believing his motives had been misinterpreted and hoping to convince people that improving education in Texas was not a mortal sin, contemplated coming to Odessa to speak. But he decided against it, to the relief of some who thought he might be physically harmed if he did. “There are so few other things we can look at with pride,” said Allen. “We don’t have a large university that has thirty or forty thousand students in it. We don’t have the art museum that some communities have and are world-renowned. When somebody talks about West Texas, they talk about football. “There is nothing to replace it. It’s an integral part of what made the community strong. You take it away and it’s almost like you strip the identity of the people.

I don’t know if I wanted to buy the English soccer team Leyton Orient Football Club (LOFC) because I loved it so much or because I was so distressed by how it was being managed

Football. Here's a surprise: I like it. That means everything didn't change when I fell on my head. It proves that you can be an athlete and a video club kid at the same time. Not in my case, obviously. Video club invited me to get lost. But it's possible to be both. I have no idea why more people don't do it. Maybe it's because the jocks will never find out if they enjoy doing something artsy because they'll never try it. And the arts kids feel the same way about sports.

Reject the tribalism. Reject the calls to fight the other team. The other party. The other species. The other football club. The other family down the street that has a bigger interstellar corvette than you. Don’t demonize the other candidate. Don’t hate the opponent. Oppose them. Debate them. Disagree with them. But then, at the end of the day, break bread with them. Because I promise you this: we will all need each other again. And again. And again. Thank you.

Our ire was reserved for SPL referees and perceived acts of bias against Glasgow Celtic Football Club.

The fact that the question is even asked, the fact that black excellence in a particular field needs ‘explaining’, tells its own story. I can’t recall any documentaries trying to discover an organisational gene left over from fascism that explains why Germany and Italy have consistently been Europe’s best performing football teams. Spain’s brief spell as the best team in the world, with a generation of players born in the years immediately after Franco’s death, would seem to confirm my fascism-meets-football thesis, right? Clearly this would be a ridiculous investigation - or who knows maybe I am on to something - but the question would never be asked because German, Italian and Spanish brilliance don’t really need explaining, or at least not in such negative ways. When I was young, I vividly remember watching a BBC doc called Dreaming of Ajax which investigated why one Dutch club, Ajax Amsterdam, was able to produce better football players than the whole of England. It was a fantastic documentary that looked with great admiration at the obviously superior coaching systems of Ajax, which became so visible in their home-grown players’ performances. But it did not look for some mystery Dutch gene left over from some horrendous episode in European history. Nor did white dominance in tennis or golf - until Tiger and the Williams sisters, anyway - need to be explained by their ancestors having so much practice whipping people for so long, and ending up with strong shoulders and great technique as a result!

Leyton Orient Football Club (LOFC) acquisition and revitalization of, 81–82 assembling the management team and board of directors, 168–169 authoritarian culture, 157–158 engaging in dialogue, 118 English Football League system, 159–160 the history of, 158–159 long-term management planning, 166–167 overcommunication after the purchase of, 204–205 public criticism of management, 166 relegation, 163–164 sale and resale of, 160–168 team building after the acquisition, 212

Knowing you, you could be discussing anything from how the code for the nuclear football is the same as your Subway Club Card ID to which Archie Comics character is the most fuckable … Jughead or Mr. Weatherbee.

We’re not a football club, we’re actually a sports entertainment media company,” Cook said internally as the new owners swept into City. “So we must create content. We must provide events, we must create shows, we must create drama. And we must be part of the news, front page and back page, in every way. Am I competing with the other football club down the road, Manchester United, or am I competing with Walt Disney, with Amazon?

In fact, Mackay had mixed feelings about the whole trip. ‘As a tour it was neither an education nor an adventure, but as a special occasion it was a tremendous success and in Kiev, Moscow and other parts behind the Iron Curtain, I shall always believe we laid the foundation of the team spirit and genuine friendship which has since played a notable part in the success of Tottenham Hotspur Football Club.

Spurs were well supported and it was claimed they were the wealthiest club in the country. Blanchflower thought that perhaps their past thriftiness had set them solid foundations to face the future. And perhaps the mood of the club was changing to face the new demands of a changing football world. Tottenham had never been known for spending big on players, but here they were in a bidding war for Blanchflower.

What that picture represents is the first ever photographic record of a tracksuit manager in British football.

Some of the habits back then seem not so much of another era as from a different planet. On the Friday lunchtime before home games, for instance, the trainer Tom Curry used to inflate the match ball, lace it up and immerse it in a bucket of water, where it stayed, kept submerged by a brick, until just before kick-off. It would then be pulled out ready for action, saturated, weighing about half a ton.

The three most important assets in a footballer, he always said, were ‘skill, flair and character’.

To play for Manchester United in 1956 was not remotely of the same order of national prominence as to play for them half a century later. Not least because Taylor, Edwards, Viollet and the rest were on a basic wage of £15, with an appearance fee of £5 and a win bonus of £3.

with granite of black, gray, and ash white. Jericho explained how all the municipal buildings were built from the same quarry stone, including the courthouse, township building and the walls lining the morgue. It wasn’t the sightseeing that delayed my exit though. In the rich corridors next to the courthouse, we ran into District Attorney Ashtole and Mayor Jonathon Miller, their voices an echo, greeting me with arms extended and questions on their lips. “I’ve already heard so much about you,” the mayor said, his barrel chest filling like a machine as he sucked in air. The man stood a half-foot over me, and though he smiled, his face was fixed in a scowl, his bushy eyebrows stuck in a permanent slant. His shoulders were wide like a football player’s and his hands were like clubs. I wasn’t normally intimidated but he had a presence, and I suddenly found myself feeling nervous. “It’s nice to meet you,” I answered, my hand disappearing in his. Ashtole stood at his side, dwarfed, nearly hidden. “What’s the progress?” the district attorney asked, his voice annoyingly sharp, like the bark of an ankle-high dog. “Three bodies. We need something to tell the press. Heck, the timing is awful.” “Daniel,” the mayor said in a foreboding tone.