I can't say I am surprised because well... money. I do find it curious that I have not heard an opposition politician or political group ask why their government continues to allows foreign clubs to enter the country.

Because they claim to have their "bubbles".
To be fair, letting professional soccer leagues go on might be enough to avoid a good percentage of possible riots in all those countries. I don't think it's openly proposed and defended, but it's logically a way to avoid super spreaders.

No guarantee he'll come over, but always nice to see a dual national 17 y/o who just scored for Valencia and has captained England's U17 team at least coming in for a couple USMNT friendlies. Report: Valencia’s Yunus Musah to accept USMNT call-up - Stars and Stripes FC

(Next can we get Folarin Balogun plz... bigger position of need imo, just can't see Josh Sargent being the guy we want as a #9 in a one forward system.)

If anyone is interested in the women's game, the Manchester derby will be on NBCSN at 7:30. USWNT members Tobin Heath and Christen Press will be on the Manchester United side and Sam Mewis and Rose Lavelle will be in the Manchester City side.

Man when was the last time the US scored 6 vs a competent opponent? Crazy what playing a real CF (even completely untested ones) can do!

March 2017. USMNT beat Honduras 6-0 in Arena2's second game (yes, I know I just ruined it ;) ). The last time we played Panama, we won by 4 goals as well. 4-0 against Panama in 2017, right before the T&T match.

Young players looked great and like they are having fun (I think Berhalter may be ok ;) ).

Wrexham: Ryan Reynolds and Rob McElhenney set to finalise takeover | Football News | Sky Sports

I'm interested to see how this one plays out. Wrexham is a Welsh team that plays in the fifth tier of the English leagues. The actors are expecting to inject about 2 million pounds into the running of the club.

I missed the announcement before but ESPN+ will now show a Scottish Premiership game every week and select games from the Scottish second division, Scottish Cup and Scottish League Cup. I enjoy the Scottish game and I appreciate it being shown in the US. That being said, how the hell are we getting Scottish Championship matches on TV and nothing from LA Liga and Ligue 1?

Because unlike La Liga or Serie A, the Scottish championship will be charging about £2.50 and a tray of donuts for the rights

La Liga and Ligue 1 are both on Bein Sports.

On the subject of Scottish football on tv, not sure if this story belongs in here or in the weird news thread:

Beyond Science: AI Camera Confuses Referee's Bald Head for Football, Tracks it Through the Game

Didnt know AI tv cameras were a thing. Isnt technology great, normally.

You are right. That was a case of out of sight out of mind for me. Frontier dropped Bein Sports.

That was the most bizarre pk shootout I've seen in a long long time.

Ok, here's a link to the official description and break down of the rules involved:



What happened in the Orlando City vs. NYCFC penalty shootout? Here are the official explanations from PRO | MLSsoccer.com also has the match video of what happened)



For those who are curious, but not enough to click a link and watch a video (LAZY!), here's the breakdown



1. Orlando leads NYCFC entering the fifth round of PK, 4-3. All Orlando has to do to win is for NYCFC to not score on their round (Save/Miss), or score on theirs.

2. PK taken, saved! BEDLAM ENSUES. Orlando Wins, or do they?

3. VAR contacts referee, let's him know that the Orlando keeper did not have at least one foot on the goal line as required at the time the PK was taken. This means that the PK has to be retaken, and the goalie, under the 19-20 rules (which MLS plays under the entire season, postseason included), has to be given a yellow card. Under the 2020-21 IFAB rules, that's only a warning for the first infringement, under the rules that the match was played under, no discretion.

4. Since the Orlando Goalie has already received a yellow earlier in the match, that is his second yellow and thus a sending off.

5. Orlando field player gets ready to go in net, but Orlando tries to put in their backup keeper.

6. We get ready to take the PK again.

7. That little voice in the referee's head (VAR) reminds him that teams aren't allowed to make substitutions in a PK shootout. Even if it was for a sent off goalkeeper

8. Bedlam is getting pretty freaking tired at this point.

9. Field player puts on the gloves, PK retaken, goal! 4-4! But that's ok, Orlando just has to convert to win..

10. And of course, they fail.*

11. Bedlam needs a good lie down at this point.

12. Both teams score on the 6th round of PK, 5-5

13. The field player SAVES NYCFC's 7th round penalty! Finally, it's almost over... Of course, we've been at this point before...

14. NOT THIS TIME! Orlando scores, they win 6-5!

15. Bedlam lurches out to the center of the field, gives out a triumphant yell, and dies.

This Liverpool squad might have a chance to do big things.

Yeah, we never really competed

Another weekend of not watching soccer because they want me to pay for it.

I think that OGS gets some unfair criticism but losing to Southampton based on two set pieces is not al good look.

Wolves' Jimenez suffers fractured skull after Luiz clash

Hopefully he makes a full recovery and continue his career. I also think it was irresponsible to allow Luiz to remain on the field for another 30 minutes before taking him off at halftime.

Leicester looks so bad I'm expecting Kendall Hinton to be subbed in to start the 2nd half.

I have zero confidence that Fulham won’t lose this game much less hang on for a win.

Just a quick heads up. All EPL matches tomorrow will be show on Peacock in the States.

Four separate freaking game times today and not a single game on TV. Eff off EPL and NBC.

Fantastic to see that ~2 years after the Crew were saved, they are playing in an Eastern Conference Final on ABC. (Yeah, Austin seems to be doing everything right, but fuck Precourt).

PSG vs Istanbul Basaksehir has been suspended following an alleged racist incident involving the 4th official towards Istanbul's assistant manager. pic.twitter.com/mLIkZiPK7u

— Champions League on CBS Sports (@UCLonCBSSports) December 8, 2020

While there is a clear problem with both conscious and subconscious discrimination in football, which is itself reflective of society, I don’t believe that this particular incident was an example of racism.

I’ve kept quiet until there’s someone active against racism who can argue this on my behalf (as a middle class white man I’m not really in a position to take the lead), so can now agree with the ex England international John Barnes’ tweets @officialbarnesy, and similar perspectives from other black footballers who have been on sports radio today.

What John Barnes doesn’t seem to be saying though is that maybe this incident (albeit one I believe to be misunderstood) was the straw that broke the camel’s back. In isolation I put this down to a misunderstanding over a foreign language, but at the time, with Webo and Ba believing they heard something different, I can understand why they reacted they way they did.

I’ve had bad days where something relatively innocuous has set me off: I can’t imagine the multiplier effect of having been regularly discriminated against for a lifetime.

I hope calm heads prevail, I hope the 4th official is able to get on with his life and career, and at the same I hope that the universal collectiveness that has sprung up is maintained, and positive change is the end result of this (IMO) misunderstanding

I am not going to go as far as giving the official the benefit of the doubt. I am not saying it was clearly racist either. I am comfortable saying I don’t know and leaving it at that. The example that Barnes used of the coaching staff with five black coaches, one white coach and how the official would identify him is a bit problematic. Given the current makeup of coaching staffs at that level throughout the game, it would be impossible to believe that the official wouldn’t know the manager of the team. Sad but true.

One thing we can all agree. This is one incident where we are sure that race (not necessarily racism) played a primary factor.

He wasn’t the manager FWIW, rather one of a number of coaches, and I think its highly likely that the 4th official didn’t have a clue who the majority of the coaching staff were.

But I concur with your last sentence race was clearly the primary factor: he wouldn’t have been described as ‘the black guy’ if he wasn’t black, not if he was not the only black guy

Edits in italics as I felt more clarification needed

If I were to be that "white" person in that exact example, I'd have to restrain myself the way Pierre Webo did too, because people intentionally called me "white" clearly meant to try to hurt me too much in my life that I decided to no longer let people get away with calling me that without getting a "please, don't call me or anybody else that ever again". I would even realize that a lot of people are too inexperienced with the matter (in a sense that they just never really thought about this) to understand why it would be uncool.

The intent of the 4th official was perhaps meant in no harm, but of all the things he could have said, he picked out the one thing that's not just very sensitive, but it's factually inaccurate. Although that we should understand here that "negro" (in this particular case "negru") isn't slur at all, in many languages it is the color "black", nothing else. Which still makes it factually incorrect and why an internationally assigned assistant referee should know better, because they're supposed to pick up on such language and act on it when players or "fans" use it.

Which brings us to the tedious part, the argument of what would have been acceptable here. The guy with the darkest skin? The brown (brownest) guy? The tall guy? The guy with the biggest/smallest [whatever stands out compared to the others]? With players it's simple: send #25 off or #10, that's why they have those numbers. But the people on the bench with no name tags or numbers, you'll be going for something that makes it easiest to pick the one out from the rest.

Oh, I am aware that. It was more of a commentary on the example that Barnes used to rebut the allegation in light of his statements on the lack of opportunities for black head coaches/managers at that level.

Of course the 4th official has no clue who most of the coaching staff was. This was an incident that involved race. We are going to need more information to determine for sure if it was racist or not.

Personally wouldn’t have a problem if I thought they said the word white, and I was the only white guy.

If I thought they had used a racial slur however, very different story... I was (relatively mildly) racially abused for being white once while in Malaysia in 2003, and it still rankles with me. That was once, 17 years ago, and I remember it vividly, so I can’t begin to imagine what that must feel like if it happens regularly.

So yeah, on that basis Webo and Ba were pretty restrained considering, and there is undoubtedly an issue that this incident has further increased the focus onto, but I don’t think there is an issue with describing someone as black if they are black, and there are no derogatory or negative tones or words with it.

For example if you are describing a suspect to a police officer, or a blind date to a friend, is it wrong to say whether the person was white, black, Asian, Hispanic? You might say he was a white guy wearing a dark T-shirt and shorts, or the black guy over there in a white shirt and blue jeans, or whatever.

It’s purely an adjective, nothing negative or discriminatory in this instance no different to describing the only girl with fair hair amongst a group of brunettes as the blonde girl, or the only person over six foot amongst a group of shorter people as the tall guy.

There is an issue, but a white person describing someone as black is not racist in itself, in fact it’s what we’ve been asked to do for the past 25 years or more by the black community, here in the UK at least.

If anyone is interested, on the Ornstein & Chapman Podcast feed yesterday, they had a really interesting discussion about the workings of a few of the football conglomerates like the City Football Group. The highlight for me was an interview with the Barnsley co-chairman Paul Conway. Here is a link to a synopsis of what Conway said

There is ‘corruption’ in English football — Barnsley chairman Paul Conway - The Athletic

It really should be bigger news that the club that was nearly shuttered just won the MLS Cup. That should have been a major news story.

My God, what a pass by Pogba for the Martial goal!

Liverpool might be getting revved up. Geezus.

Palace certainly rolled over in that game. Ouch

I missed about 20 minutes of the second half. If anyone on CP could make the final pass, they should have scored at least two goals in the first half.

What has been the purpose of the Gareth Bale loan from Spurs’ point of view?

I've about given up trying to understand sports. Great win for Leicester though.

Yeah, it was close to a perfect away performance.

Spuds had a couple of dangerous moments late in the first half before the penalty, in particular Kane’s header, but other than that we were the better team.

Kasper made a wonder save from Son, but we should have scored at least one more. Jose’s post match interviews were borderline delusional

And once again, the offsides VAR stuff is crap. Maybe it's just the rule sucks. 40 yards from the goal, it's irrelevant whether the hair on a guy's elbow is offsides. There's just no advantage there. I hate it. I know I've said it before, but it's like in baseball where guys are clearly safe but lift off the base by a micro-second and are called out. Totally ruins the game even though by the letter of the rule it's the correct call.

Yeah, this time it was the rule, not VAR. But what a first touch by Maddison

Dola, welcome to supporting Leicester BTW. Please don’t expect it to be a long term success, these last few years are very much a high point!

Technically the hair on an elbow wouldn't count in VAR determination... But offside starting from the half line has been the rule since it began.

Sent from my Pixel 4 XL using Tapatalk

Yeah, I think it should matter what body part is offside and how far away from the goal. Maddison's elbow being centimeters offside so far away from the goal gave him no advantage whatsoever.

Not sure if we’re talking about the same incident here? Maddison’s ruled out goal had nothing to do with running from the halfway line

He's just saying that's the rule, which I get. I understand it's a simple rule but the application is egregious when there's no benefit other than the simplicity of enforcing it (especially with VAR making microscopic application even more painful).

I don't think you understand. Elbows aren't considered because you can't use them to legally touch the ball during the run of play. If they did consider his elbow than that's contrary to the laws of the game.

Edit: I've looked it. It seems they were judging his shoulder, not his elbow (though very close at that). And it was 25-30 yards from goal. That's not even that far!! Of course that distance should be included in being off.


It was said 40 yards from goal. It's close enough to the half way line (there is no separate "offside line" in soccer).

I will say than even 40 yards out, I've seen breakaways from that far which resulted in a very good chance at goal.

Admittedly, I was on the treadmill when it happened so the sound was off and I was just going off of what I could glean from the VAR red line I saw on the replays. It appeared to be his arm that was extended forward that was on/over the line. Maybe I'm wrong. Pretty sure it wasn't his feet or legs.

Here's what I found in an article about the controversy:


The micro determinations just need to be done away with. I mean... sleeve? Who plays a ball with their sleeve?

As I said in my edit: It seems they were judging his shoulder, not his elbow (though very close at that). And it was 25-30 yards from goal. That's not even that far!! Of course that distance should be included in being off.

You can play the ball with the shoulder which is why they are judging the shoulder. Though England's VAR is very exacting compared to other countries.

I honestly don’t understand what you’re trying to say? Maddison didn’t run from his own half, and there is no running from your own half rule.

You cannot be offside if you are in your own half when the ball is played, but even if you start the run in your own half, once in the opposing half if you’re offside when the ball is played, you’re offside regardless of where the run started.

The second sentence is a statement of the obvious?