To paraphrase Preki during his first TFC press conference - "he didn't blow smoke up anyone's... butt". Forgive Toronto supporters for smiling at that idea as we've been having our butts smoke blown (oh grow up) for three years plus. Most of that smoke has been blown by the other man at the press conference table today but in one of his main off-season duties, Mo Johnston succeeded. Click to continue reading...

At Asburton Grove Medical Centre, there are people who like to make optimistic statements. Then there are the players themselves who always think that they can come back sooner than they are actually able. Van Persie and the AGMC reckon he will be back in around six weeks. At Arsenal, that means anything this side of next christmas. Click to continue reading...

This is the jam Deco is using to get his adrenaline pumping for Portugal's World Cup qualification playoff match against Bosnia tomorrow. I think.

[Photo: AP]

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Cristiano Ronaldo

This is not the kind of erotic foot massage I had in mind. ... It is kind of relaxing, though. Putting me to sleep faster than one of Iker's stories. ... If Portugal tries to make me play I'm just going to cry and maybe pee my pants a little bit. They can't make me play with a hurt ankle, tear-stained cheeks, and a the distinct smell of pee wafting from my pants, can they?

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Everybody hates French national team manager Raymond Domenech. This is a well established fact. When he's not getting called "a man who seems intent on messing them [France] up" in the press by opposing players, he's getting booed by his countrymen and laughed at by his own players at the Paris Bercy Indoor Masters ATP tennis tournament (as you can kind of make out in the horrible quality video above).

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Wayne Rooney

This parenting stuff is already harder than I thought. ... Meat. ... The kid doesn't like to play with fireworks nearly as much as I do and he doesn't even know how to use a toilet. ... Meat. ... I think he might be broken. Can you fix a broken kid with a screwdriver and a nail gun?

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! Article Start >In his statement when he took Newcastle United off the market, Mike Ashley said "... he is totally committed to the future success of Newcastle United and will be focussing on gaining promotion back to the Premier League." Fair enough, but what's with all this nonsense about giving Hughton a million or two [. Click to continue reading...

And now, a moment of self-regarding nonsense on our part, if you don't mind.
What you are reading now may seem fairly ordinary by our standards (and indeed it is), but this is in fact a very special post. Put simply, this is Some People Are On The Pitch's 1,000th post.
We appreciate the sentiment and sense of achievement might be lost on most of you but when this humble little football blogsite started out in 2006, it was difficult to believe that one day we might end up with 1,000 articles to our name. Click to continue reading...

Episode 49: "Only Snorlax Can Hold 10! Look at Him, He's F***ing Huge!"
Host: Scott
Panel: Sandra, Kevin McCauley, Jason Longshore
Listen on the CSRN Media Player
DOWNLOAD Episode 49
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Available on iTunes, just search Winning Ugly

This week on the show we welcome another newbie, while the lovely Sandra checks in from her quarantine bubble and the goodiest do-gooder of all time, Jason returns to infect the show with his nice guy nonsense. Click to continue reading...

In financial markets, as in sex, humour and volleying a ball home from just outside the area, timing is everything.
The superslick who are way ahead of the curve self-compress their future profits through their inability to appropriately time market entries and exits.
The bewildered who are reactive to the curve simply exist to provide the rest of us with our future cash. Click to continue reading...

The following pictures are from two different agencies, but both are of Zidane at the opening of a watch store in Hong Kong (WTF?). By the framing of the shots, which photographer would you say thinks more highly of Zizou?

Getty:

AP:

Apparently the AP photographer doesn't think that headbutt in the World Cup final should keep Zidane from achieving sainthood.

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Hello. I am Carlo Ancelotti manager of Chelsea and amateur pharmacist. Perhaps you read yesterday about my cure for this swine flu business, which was handed down to me by my grandmother (warm milk and red wine). Fantastic. Well, in order to help with any other problems you have, here are some more of my non-medical cures that will keep you healthy and alive until the day you die.

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By Barca's high standards this year's CL performance has been shocking. A bare four points and tied with Dynamo Kyiv and Rubin Kazan at the half way mark in the group stage is not what Pep Guardiola and Xavi had in mind.

Xavi sounded a bit defensive, when he said that all the talk of an end of a cycle was nonsense and that the defeat against Rubin Kazan was unexpected.

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Forest travel to South London safe in the knowledge that the 'flag-gate' nonsense has now been dealt with by our ponderous authorities.� Both Forest and Derby have been fined (part of which is suspended) a nominal amount, and Tyson has been fined £5k and given a suspended two-match ban.� Perhaps a small hillock made out [. Click to continue reading...

Lionel Messi

Ah! Maybe if I go to sleep I'll wake up and see this was just a nightmare and we didn't lose to a team with a name that sounds like a magician. ... When I do wake up I'm just going to play Legos all day and forget about this. ... It's not working yet. .

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Valbuena (center): Aw jeez, guys don't flick my ears. I said I'll give you my lunch money. Come on, guys. Just don't flick my ears.

Hilton (right): And we said we don't want your lunch money we're professional footballers we get gourmet lunches for free.

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When Cristiano Ronaldo suffered an injury in the first match after a wizard named Pepe wrote a letter to Real Madrid informing them that he had been hired to cast a spell on Cristiano to cause him to get hurt, the world's crazies took this as a call to action.

First, Fernando Nogueira, a Portuguese man known as "the wizard of Fafe", came forward and said he had been hired by close to Ronaldo to counter the black magic spell.

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If you're stuck at home waiting for something to happen why not check out Premier League Nonsense. It's where I go all sepia and imagine everything was better...back in the day! Click to continue reading...

Peter Crouch

Doing the Home Alone face every time I yawn is still totally hilarious and not at all played out. ... Also totally hilarious: the fact that I, Peter Crouch, have a hotter lady than David Beckham. ... Then again, I don't have a filthy hobo beard, so maybe that makes sense now.

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It's been 11 days since Sir Alex Ferguson questioned the fitness level of referee Alan Wiley following Manchester United's 2-2 draw with Sunderland and though he did give in and issue a half-assed, roundabout apology on United's official website last weekend, Fergie still find himself in danger of being slapped with a misconduct charge over his comments.

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Sorry for the lengthy absence - I am back. And seething with anger. This isn't exactly going to be a warm-fuzzy post about how I love TFC. It's a little negative, so brace yourself for it.
If football matches were only 75 minutes long, we'd be 3 points off of first in the league, and we'd have a playoff spot locked up. Click to continue reading...

Fernando Torres

Trying to sleep like this makes my groin feel like spicy mustard. ... Writing books is easy when you don't actually have to write them. ... International breaks are weird. Mostly because Vicente del Bosque might not be alive anymore. ... I hope no one is robbing my house right now.

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Well, 36-year-old Roberto Carlos has decided that he's leaving Fenerbahce in December and wants to return to Real Madrid so bad that he's offering to play for them from January to June for free. Unfortunately, this is a club where they're even willing to pay the toilet cleaners seven figure salaries plus all the cash they can eat, so that offer might not be enough to convince the Spanish giants to take on an aging aged star.

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Ever since Mike Ashley first put Newcastle United up for sale there have been rumours of various fan buy-out schemes for the club. The latest of them was probably that Graham Roberts nonsense, which I took a particular dislike to and refused to waste electrons on. However, it seems that the results of the Keegan [. Click to continue reading...

Arsenal striker Nicklas Bendtner was speaking for the first time after last week's car accident which many may have easily thought it was a minor one considering he only missed one game for the Gunners, but according to the 21-year old, he's lucky to be alive.

Bendtner said:

I believe that somebody held his hand over me.

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Arsenal striker Nicklas Bendtner was speaking for the first time after last week's car accident which many may have easily thought it was a minor one considering he only missed one game for the Gunners, but according to the 21-year old, he's lucky to be alive.

Bendtner said:

I believe that somebody held his hand over me.

Click to continue reading...

by CARL ELDRIDGE Cesc Fabregas has had his say on Arsene Wenger becoming Arsenal's longest-serving boss this week as the Frenchman notched up 13 years in the Gunners hotseat.

Fabregas, 22, told the Sun he believes it is AW's refusal to rest on his laurels and his constant determination to improve the team which makes him such a managerial great.

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Ted Harwood is a regular guest contributor to Arsenal Station. He lives in Chicago, IL, and has been an Arsenal supporter for the better part of a decade. Here, he follows-up on yesterday's Arsene Wenger-anniversary post. He also writes about movies, music, and other cultural artifacts on his blog, Running Downhill. Click to continue reading...

They got relegated last season. But it was only 2006 when PSIS were puching Persik Kediri all the way for the Indonesian title. But the days of I Koman Putra, Harry Salisbury, Gustavo Hernan Ortiz and Emmanuel de Porras are nowt but a distant memory for the fans of the PSIS who next season will line up in the Premier League, Indonesia's second tier. Click to continue reading...

Ryan Giggs

Old as dirt and still scoring goals, bitches. ... Ugh, where's my arthritis cream? ... Note to self: new goal celebration has to be Quagmire's "giggety giggety" thing from Family Guy. ... Because my name is Giggs and the word "giggety" is very similar to that.

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liverpool craigslist > for sale / wanted > general for sale

Shares of a sports team for sale (no they're not) yes they are! - £250m (Anfield)

Hi! I'm George and this is Tom and we're the owners of the Liverpool Reds Soccer Franchise.

Do you have billions of non-American dollars?

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Spanish newspaper El Mundo have obtained the text of a letter sent to Real Madrid by a wizard, informing the club that he has been hired to cast a spell on Cristiano Ronaldo that will result in him suffering an injury.

Yeah. Sh*t just got real.

Writes the psychopath who may or may not be a cat:

"I'm not anti-Madridista.

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Kevin Keegan is not claiming £25m from Newcastle United according to The Sunday Express. Keegan's constructive dismissal claim, which the 'judges' retired to consider over the weekend, has been plagued with rumours of £25m claims that will put the club into administration. Yet a 'close Keegan aide' told the Express: "That is just malicious nonsense. Click to continue reading...

I've been quietly impressed with Carlo Ancelotti since he began managing Chelsea. He has a quiet, unassuming way about him which suggests he takes his football seriously, while avoiding the pretentious nonsense of many other top managers ('mind-games' etc.).

This presentiment was confirmed a little today, after Chelsea's first loss of the season away at Wigan, 3-1.

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Lionel Messi

Will Maradona really snort me if we don't make the World Cup? ... It's almost like football is too easy. They should have us play against robots with laser eyes instead of all these bad teams. ... I wonder if Zlatan would let me hide under his nose when it rains.

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