Kaizero

1-0 win against Spurs on the cards

"When I played football in my youth I kept making crosses as shit as the ones Diallo keep making, but I decided to call it a day thinking "I'm not good enough to be a professional footballer", but apparently I was wrong, what is Diallo even trying?"

Because of what turned into over a decade of stocking up on Uzbek talents playing FM, I have had a vested interested in Uzbek footy for a while With that in mind, I'd cream my pants if we signed Khusanov.

So you say it's not feasible he could have left the atmosphere?

Cheers

I appreciate that, fair do's Also appreciate the fact you say you want to respond with a longer post, I have no issues with differing opinions and I much prefer an actual discussion about various issues rather than short form answers. I'm not dying on any hill and welcome instances where someone makes such a convincing argument for why I'm wrong about something that my opinion about something changes. I've often used Bill Maher's viewpoint on him being right/wrong about something as an example of how I view my own take on things, which paraphrased goes something like this; "I have an opinion about certain things that will I have reached through how I have understood information that's been available to me to form an opinion about something. As many people who've debated with me know, when I have formed an opinion/view about something, I 100% believe my opinion is correct and I will enter any debate from that standpoint and do my best to explain my views and provide relevant information to others that may not share my views, in hope that this will change their viewpoint from what it was at the start of our debate to what mine was. This doesn't mean that I do not understand the simple fact that I may very well be wrong, no matter how confident I am about something going in. If someone with a differing viewpoint to mine manage to provide enough evidence for why my viewpoint is wrong and theirs is right, I'll hold my hands up and say "you know what? you're correct, I'm in the wrong here". That's why we discuss things we don't agree on and not only what we already agree on." Then he goes on a bit of a rant about how the world today has abandoned civil discourse because social media and the Internet has made it so that you only see shit that backs up your pre-existing opinions/views because everyone gets their own individual online echo chamber to exist in, which leads to them losing their shit when they happen upon a person existing outside their echo chamber that has a different opinion/viewpoint than them about something, leading to shouting matches instead of discussion. Can't say I disagree with that, even when using N-O as an example. Ten years ago this discussion would have looked 100% different on here, people would explain their views and respond to posts with actual responses. Not just "nuh-uh", "you just love the US", "you're wrong" or some form of personal attack. I miss those days. Hell, I miss HTT straight-up writing novellas to express his opinion(s) about something. I'd love to discuss the effects capitalism has had, is having and will have on modern football rather than reaching a stand-still about semantics. I'm beyond nostalgic these days, just feeling so incredibly fed up with how things are today

Saw on my betting slip that the York match today ended up being cancelled. Anyone know what happened there?

This. Went to VAR as well and was upheld.

Theoretically, if City were to kneejerk and sack Pep... who would they replace him with?

I'm on the Internet these days for a reason, and that's because not being on the Internet would not be a very good option for me right now. I appreciate the concern, though, but I'm just grateful I have something to rant about/focus on. This time of year already wasn't my favorite anymore, but this year is next level. Genuinely struggling, so whilst I understand I might be annoying some people at the moment, I hope they'll manage to look past it until we've reached the new year. I didn't mean to let it out on you in the sheep quiz thread, that was not acceptable of me at all and I'd like to apologize to you for my behaviour.

This right here is the crux of my issue, KI clarified it quite well. It's not "US influence", it's "capitalistic influence" you're against, and is something that's a very valid and interesting subject to discuss. Given that the US is essentially the home nation of Capitalism, I do understand why people find it easier to say "US influence" - but again, it just makes it so that the actual issue isn't debated as it just devolves into "fuck US owners" very, very, quickly. I've seen it happen on here a million times, and elsewhere as well. The discussion never goes anywhere and just ends up with a circle-jerk of hatred for "US ownership" of English clubs. It's counterproductive and it boils my piss, so much so I couldn't ignore it anymore and started ranting. I 100% agree with the actual concerns and arguments, but it doesn't matter what nationality the owners have if they champion changes rooted in capitalism. Again, the biggest offenders amongst PL club owners since the PL began were the Norwegian owners of Wimbledon, moving the club from Wimbledon to Milton Keynes as they believed there were more available fans to line their pockets there. The "moving" of a club to a new "market" is extremely "American", yet the only time it's been done in England, it was done by Norwegians.

I really enjoyed that they started the article off with this note: What to Know It’s never a good sign when we start seeing a massive increase in lookups for two closely related and unwelcome terms like racism and xenophobia. However, our place, as a dictionary, is not to judge the words that are being looked up (or the people looking them up), but instead to provide, to the best of our ability, as much information about them as is possible.

Side note; I googled "PL All-Star Game" and saw an article that applied the NBA All-Star selection rules to the PL to select theoretical squads. Which one of these two XI's do people think would've won? North All-Stars (4-3-3): Martinez; Dalot, Van Dijk, Botman, Shaw; Rodri, De Bruyne, McGinn; Salah, Haaland, Nunez South All-Stars (4-2-3-1): Vicario; Porro, Saliba, Dunk, Emerson; Rice, Gallagher; Saka, Palmer, Son; Toney Based on the 23/24 season.

i actually looked at the Merriam-Webster article about the difference between "Xenophobia" and "Racism" before deciding which one to go for In short, Xenophobia is the fear and/or hatred of strangers/foreigners and Racism is having the belief that you/your culture/your politics/your religion is superior to those of another race, religion or nation.

I'm not defending anyone, I'm saying it's counter-productive for what is a valid worry and argument to shrink and refer to the "problem" by one nationality rather than the problem as a whole. Whilst I've not intended to "defend" any nationality, even making it clear that I believe the worst owners in PL history were from my own country, that is what will eventually happen if the conjecture surrounding the very real and worrisome possibilities ahead of us doesn't change from demonizing a nationality into demonizing the actual issues. I fully agree that given their history with sport and league structure, American citizens would be more likely to want to implement rules they are more familiar with than other ownership groups of other nationalities. But when the main duo behind the ESL are Spanish and Italian, not American, and the three American owners appear to be given the blame for it ever existing? That's not helpful, and one could easily argue that them being the scapegoat is what has allowed the Spanish and Italian cunts to make their new ESL proposal come into existence. People need to not simplify complex problems as scapegoating only gives actual perpetrators more room to ruin the game as the complaints can just be written off as "Englishmen just don't like Americans" rather than "This is what's wrong with what you are doing to football and we won't stand for it".

Also, as mentioned, a majority of the 20 teams in the PL has has US owners for over a decade now. The season with the most US owned teams had 14 out of 20 owned by Americans (when counting both majority & minority owners). If you worry about a majority of PL teams being owned by Americans, you’re a bit late

Revisionist history, it was spearheaded by Perez and the Juventus bloke with the three English PL clubs as co-signers. Not saying it wasn’t a shit move, but when you try to use the ESL as a means to slam all US based owners - the fact the main duo behind the ESL were Spanish and Italian doesn’t help the argument. The fact the US owners aren’t backing the new attempt at a Super League, but that the very same Spanish and Italian owners are also says a lot. Again, I do not disagree with what you are opposed to, what you fear can happen and what you worry about when it comes to the future of the sport. Rather the contrary, I also oppose, worry and fear the same things. Which is why I want people to address the actual fears and issues, just as I want people to direct their anger about VAR away from VAR and onto IFAB - as making a scene about something that’s not actually relevant to the root cause of problems will just allow the problems to get worse. Just imagine I went on about “Jewish owners” ruining football. Reality could very well be that some of them were actively working to ruin football as we know it, but how much do you think my point of attack would help my cause or worsen it?

Now, see, that point in itself is a fair point. But it falls under the same definition as me saying Hollywood is run by Jews and I don't want the Jews to ruin film production through the greed inherent in their shared cultural history. I just demonized an entire group of people because there's two powerful families of Jewish origin running two major studios. The problem in this example is corporate greed ruining creativity, not an entire group of people. Call things what they are, don't blame an entire group of people. A shit owner is a shit owner, regardless of nationality, and the worst owners in PL history haven't been Americans - but English, Norwegian and Indian. Just say you are fearful of the commercialisation of the sport and a more drastic focus on the capitalistic aspects of club ownership than saying you are fearful of "American owners", because as said, all it does is lessen your point and opinion on the matter - just as me railing on "Jews" would make nobody take my opinion on Hollywood seriously. Yes, the example used is quite extreme, but given how nobody even realizes what they're doing it felt like it had to be that extreme to have a chance of opening some eyes. I don't disagree with the fear and worry that's been raised regarding ownership, I have an issue with how it's being framed.

You did As did the two posters bringing up the same thing before you did. Says it all about how set views are when posts aren't even read properly.

Idea proposed - never going through, those owners being part of the 10% owners with weird ideas. And the Wrexham owners publicly denouncing the idea and saying it'd never happen on their watch... oh, wait, the Wrexham owners are also American! What a doozy that different businesses have different opinions even if they have the same nationality!?! Supply and demand, they sell out so they can charge that. They're a business, not a charity. Name me one English owner that wouldn't raise their ticket prices if they could? Again, how? What have they done? What do they do that makes this genuine? I see 0% evidence of this bar "americans, yucky!" No, it's exactly the point. I've listed multiple owners that have made their clubs vanish, one set even made their club no longer exist. All of these were not Americans, yet "american owners" are for some reason the "biggest threat" against english football?! It's lunacy.

I'd have lost my temper eventually given that I actually give examples, sources and reasoning for my standpoint and everyone else just reply "nah mate, fuck americans"

But, as Disco said, I doubt any of us will change anyone's stance or thoughts on the matter - so I'll tap out here.

Again, not when you're literally doing the textbook definition of it without any other counter-argument than "i is not, dey terk er jerbs!" 11 PL clubs have either majority or minority US based ownership at the moment, in past season that number's been 14 at most. The majority of PL clubs have had a majority of US majority/minority owners for over a decade. No Americanisation of the sport has taken place, nor will it, as that's bad business for the businessmen owners to do as it'd alienate a global fanbase. It's illogical and conspiracy-theory adjacent to think otherwise when you can fact-check reality and find that it's nowhere like what people keep saying over and over again about US ownership. However, crazy bajillionaire owners that don't have to think about profits? They are dangerous, no matter where they're from. And yes, some US owners are absolutely insane and dogshit. Shit owners are horrible for any fan base and they deserve sympathy. But horrible owners don't have just one nationality, and continuing my above point, US owners are less likely to fuck with traditions as they for the most part own and run the club as a business intended to make profits for their ownership group – be that through the club itself or through using the club for marketing purposes. What people are arguing is essentially "Americans owning all PL clubs", speaking of the owners as "one group". Now, if one company had owned all 20 PL clubs then yes - that'd be bad and could mean they'd change tradinional aspects because they own all the clubs. The US owners don't have a group chat on WhatsApp where they discuss how to Americanise football in the UK, though. They are separate individual business entities looking to generate the most profit possible through the intellectual property, actual property and sporting team(s) they own.

It's the textbook definition, man. Get a hold of yourselves and look in the mirror. There's no "Americanization" of football, it's people being fearful of owners coming from a different background when those people have done nothing to deserve being talked about in the way they are being talked about. Perez and Agnelli are Spanish and Italian respectively. Also, our current owners would absolutely jump at the chance of being part if a super league – without a doubt, and they are not American. Our owners are using us to engage in sportswashing a despotic dictatorship, I'd say that's a bit worse than a jolly weird American owner of Chelsea saying he likes All-Star games.

And I am saying it's not a debate fueled by facts, but racist thinking. None of the "anti-US" people have yet to bring one convincing argument as to why the fate of English football is more at stake due to many US based ownership groups than it already is due to owners of non-US nationalities. A Norwegian ownership group did what I believe is the most damage any owners have done to a club in the PL era when they ran Wimbledon into the ground and moved the club to Milton Keynes. They weren't American.