Football Daily | The revamped Champions League and Uefa’s attempt to own the confusion
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How to describe the results of the inaugural draw of the “Swiss system” Big Cup? Big Website’s Niall McVeigh summed it up best in his liveblog post from 6.07pm on Thursday: “Girona will play Liverpool (H), PSG (A), Arsenal (H), Milan (A), Feyenoord (H), PSV (A), Slovan Bratislava (H), Sturm Graz (A). It feels like I’ve written Slovan Bratislava about 300 times.” To drill down further, each team plays eight matches, four at home, four away, but nobody plays each other home and away. However, they will almost certainly face Slovan Bratislava. Why? More games, more TV money, stupid. This ain’t no group stage, it’s the regular season.
We had Hagrid, Voldemort, two Harry Potters, a couple of wizards. The day was fantastic. Somehow at three o’clock in the morning I was on the dancefloor with some of your players and staff” – Aaron Ramsdale on how a magic night with promotion-winning Southampton players in May convinced him to get his fancy dress on and check in at St Mary’s.
With all the excitement (irony klaxon!) of the Big Cup draw and attendant nonsense, I missed that Joe Murphy had his annual Worthington’s runout for Tranmere during the week. He’s been on a rolling 12-month playing contract at Prenton Park for a while now, alongside his ongoing role as goalkeeping coach. The match was also a reunion, of course, because, as a fresh-faced 18-year-old, Joe was Tranmere’s goalkeeper when they lost 2-1 to Leicester in the 2000 Worthington’s (for real) final. He is now the last active player in English senior football to have played at the old Wembley. A crumbling but fondly remembered relic of a more innocent time that had long outlived its intended function and badly needed replacing, Ian Marshall came on as a sub that day too” – Mike Slattery.
‘Good work from Oli McBurnie to set up the goal’ and ‘a good challenge on Mbappé from Scott McKenna’ are really not things you expect to hear on the commentary in a Real Madrid game. However, a doff of the cap to both of them for not only getting to play professional football, but playing surprisingly well and getting to do it at Las Palmas in the Canary Islands. They’ve won at life” – Noble Francis.
Chelsea can claim something that Real Madrid will never match. Show us your Big Vase and Tin Pot medals, losers!” – Krishna Moorthy.
