Gottlob

His left eye framed by a curl which his lips can scarcely muster, he's heard of his namesake, the short-lived Italian actor, but on the pitch he's languid rather than dashing: never one to lead the dance, his passivity gives the mistaken impression of a come-hither.

Less Argentine-Italian than Italo-Mexican, as a child he watched games of polo through a chain-link fence and wore a broken bandolier which he found by the dump. Slung low around his scrawny waist, he was no conquistador but a sunken crevice.

He sounds like a too-cute-to-be-rakish Argentine pivot player, slight of build, wearing his floppy hair with an undercut, most content away from the pitch nuzzling up in a woman's heaving embonpoint.

The problem with female football commentators, is that they don't like it up 'em! At least not on a cold night in Stoke etc.

I can only presume that Match of the Day are practising sabotage in appointing a woman with an horrendous voice who is as cliche-ridden as any of the men. Otherwise there are some good female commentators, good female analysts like Eni Aluko and Alex Scott, and I don't want even my colour commentators to be solely comprised of male ex-professionals, especially since male ex-professional footballers must be one of the thickest and most sheltered and least reflective demographics on the planet. Seriously it's astonishing the discrepancy in analysis between former footballers and former athletes in other sports, perhaps not coincidentally especially some of those sports that give relatively equal billing to men and women, like tennis and track and field.

There's always a strain of support at least on the internet which seems to think that firm avowal of results and trophies makes them themselves winners.

I'm not sure that the forwards would ever see the ball in these teams with two deep-lying midfielders and five at the back. If you have Debuchy and Enrique as your 'wing backs', which they're not really, then Cabaye and Tiote in the middle and three up top, there's not much pace and a dearth of options when it comes to carrying the ball up the pitch.

I'd go with Disco's team:

feeling that Cabaye offers more balance and creativity than Tiote, wondering whether Perez might offer a bit more than Remy when it comes to linking the midfield and attack.

Dinho's been on a rampage for ages.

It's probably those ill-fitting Tommy Hilfiger shirts.

In conversation, sometimes mumbling so only I can really hear what I'm saying, I always refer to teams by their most hilarious nicknames, so Manure, and Liverpoo, and Nuked Arsehole U-shited, Slumberland and Smell-a-ton, Pork and Ham Codspur, Transmere, Wet Spam U-shited.

I renew my call to swap him for Vurnon Anita.

I will not respond to my denigrators who imply I am wrong or haven't read the report, and instead hark back to that time I spotted Peter in Sainsbury's. As he dribbled a can of baked beans up and down the aisles of the store, a thought crossed my mind: he is just as good even now as Lionel Messi. He was as skillful as Messi, he had all of Messi's footwork and feints, no doubt he could pass like Messi, and shoot like Messi, and he had the face of a young Lionel Messi.

Peter Beardsley a racist, I think I've heard it all I tell ya. When he was passing him all those goals, Andy Cole never seemed too bothered! Peter probably doesn't even know the meaning of the word 'racist'. It's a good thing the PC snowflake brigade are chasing him now and not in his pomp, cause back then a little shimmy, a drop of the shoulder, and he'd have been off, and the ball would have been in the back of the net, and there'd have been no time to wonder. Nowadays he'd probably sell for £150 million and he'd be the first player to take home £1 million a week, but he was no prima donna. He was just like Lionel Messi, he was skillful like Messi, he could pass the ball like Messi, he could dribble like Messi, and he had a face like a young Lionel Messi. I saw him once in Sainsbury's and he was absolutely no hassle.

Any possibility we can arrange a two-for-one swap deal, Anita for Colback and Shelvey?

I predict a training ground bust-up with Jonjo Shelvey inside six months.

Allan Saint-Maximin

You're one in a million

When you perform to your maximum

I play this on my theremin

*play on theremin*

*pause*

(all shout) Weyyerbugger man!

Being publicly rejected by Sam Allardyce while chasing after Steve Bruce feels like a new low for the club, an embarrassment for the fans, and not something humorous or left-field enough to reignite any interest in the coming season. If we're going down this route, I'd have preferred something like a Joe Kinnear/Gerry Francis double act, or we could have just given the job to Shola.

Is it the quintessential studmuffin Joel Gertner?

It's not real for heaven's sake. Mourinho was in an episode of NCIS: Los Angeles from a few seasons' ago: the man on his right isn't our man, but a generic Islamic terrorist. The long hands belong to Henrietta 'Hetty' Lange, brilliantly portrayed by Linda Hunt, the NCIS Office of Special Projects operations manager.

Is it even the law though? As far as I understood, the handball law states that handball has to be deliberate. Other things like the distance the ball travels and the position of the arms are meant to be considered only in so far as they help to determine intent. UEFA seem to have decided to pay particular attention to the position of the arms, so that in their interpretation of the rules any time a ball strikes a slightly raised arm, a penalty is given. That's a stupid and unjustified interpretation. The actual law as it stands - before the ludicrous changes meant to come into effect next season - is fine, it's the only possible handball law that's valid, it just needs a common sense interpretation.

I'd hate to be one of those fans who had to travel by train or taxi from Georgia for this.

What’s the standard for determining who gets a CL winner’s medal? Everybody in the senior squad? Only players who made appearances? Does Karius get one this year even though he’s been on loan?

This article and others suggest that the winners and losers get forty medals each, to hand out to players and coaching staff at their discretion:

http://www.espn.co.uk/football/uefa-champions-league/2/blog/post/3452273/could-philippe-coutinho-get-a-medal-if-liverpool-win-the-champions-league

I know UEFA supposedly have their own interpretation of the rules, but they're not entitled to it: handball has to be deliberate, with the position of the arms merely a guide towards determining intent, and there's no way in the world especially given the context that anyone can conclude Sissoko handled the ball deliberately.

Perhaps the lack of quality isn't a surprise. I understand the Premier League was the first of the major leagues to finish, but three weeks later, this feels like a hangover more than a climax.

If you don't have £350 million or whatever the supposed price is now, isn't it better if people think you might possibly have £350 million than if they don't think about you at all?

Time to start putting pressure on the Bin Zayed Group to come clean about their role in all of this. I won't be investing in any of their real estate, luxury boat, or distance learning products until I know just where we're at. I don't demand that they buy the club, I just demand a Bin Zayed Group that tries.

There seems to be a few Sheikh Khalid bin Zayed Al Nahyan's banging about, but this guy's a Khaled and a Nehayan. Is it possible that it's just Lee Charnley in disguise?

Hopefully this gets confirmed properly by Thursday, there's a full week of national holiday in the UAE following that...

I don't think national holiday applies to international sheikh businessmen, or to the 80% indentured servants who make up the UAE's workforce.