Futebol

Clint Dempsey returning to MLS is a bit of a surprise. He is a proven goalscorer in the Prem and I'm surprised someone didn't step in and grab him if Spurs were looking to offload.

He isn't a Champions League type of player but if he can get 6-10 goals for a club that can be a difference maker.

You could have imagined Fulham taking him back for sure. If not the likes of Aston Villa or Swansea would be improved by him.

Nick wrote:He isn't a Champions League type of player but if he can get 6-10 goals for a club that can be a difference maker.

i think this is a great description of what Dempsey can do. he can't lead the line for a Prem club week in week out, but he has a good work rate and decent eye for goal. he doesn't need to be in an intricate passing system to score goals either. Dempsey will get his 5-10 goals no matter what side is on. he poaches well and creates unique goal scoring chances with his good movement.

Spurs selling Dempsey and Caulker signals to me that AVB is more focused on continuing to shape the team to his style of play than trying to find a way to get the most out of the ill-fitting pieces he has. they might not have contributed in two or three years, but Dempsey and Caulker definitely would have contributed wins for Spurs this year.

i can't even talk about Arsenal this summer. what do you call anticlimax when you could have never even reasonably expected a climax?

i still feel like Benteke is the player i am most excited to see in the Premier League in '13-'14

i guess i could say Jovetic because he's Montenegrin, but honestly Benteke looked like a world beater to me last season and i could see him scoring 25 goals this campaign

This is probably one of the least interesting summers I can remember. Other than Rafa going to Napoli and Monaco & PSG making more moves no one has done much.

New The Football Ramble & The Game podcasts available!

The new season is days away. I can stop posting nonsense in the baseball thread for my own entertainment during this lull!

Nick wrote:The Football Ramble & The Game podcasts

can you describe these a bit? right now i just listen to the SI Soccer Roundtable (has a bit too much MLS/American soccer talk for my liking) and Arseblog (even though that dude can be really annoying). i'd be interested in something new.

The Football Ramble is one of the funniest podcasts I've ever heard. And they do it on a weekly basis. Imagine sitting around with friends talking football, making jokes and ball busting to an absurd level.

The Game is much more serious - the host Gab Marcotti apparently doesn't think football pods should be funny. They are more of a traditional round up with The Times reporters. It is a solid listen and usually only 40 minutes. When Tony Evans is on though it is at another level of entertainment.

I've tried a bunch of different soccer podcasts but http://totalsoccershow.com/podcasts/ is the only one that has stuck.

that looks pretty US-centric too, phixed. probably just because its summer. it's not that i don't care anything about the USMNT and MLS, it's just a topic that i can only listen to for 5-10 minutes a week. my USMNT fandom is pretty fraudulent though. i'm not sure where one would develop a huge passion for American international football though. maybe playing youth soccer? i just haven't really found anything to cheer for yet. i wasn't moved by the 2010 WC Landon/Algeria nonsense either. yes, stoppage goals are incredibly exciting by definition, but it shouldn't have felt historic. we just beat Algeria. the USMNT is just a chore to watch, really.

Football Ramble was pretty great, Nick. the accents can get thick which might make it hard to have on in the background. definitely heavy on the jokes which is sometimes good and sometimes annoying, but they're funny guys.

i grew up playing soccer so have always like watching the game but my love of usmnt started during the 2002 world cup. i would come home from work and go to sleep at 8pm, wake up at 11 and watch soccer until 3 in the morning and then get another 3-4 hours of sleep before work. seeing the USMNT get to the quarterfinals in this hallucionatory sorta state of mind was awesome.

back to the podcast: it is very USMNT focused which is one of the reasons i like it. i still don't have a club team i actually support so mostly just focus on the US players and what clubs they are at. the 20-30 minutes a week is about the perfect amount of time for me to listen about soccer. plus they are pretty hilarious. they'll ball bust not just each other but guests like eric wynalda and alexi lalas.

I wouldn't go as far as going to their Xmas party but I would buy a round of beers for the Rambler's if they were in my local.

Hour long Football Weekly today as well. Lovely stuff.

Still feel like Bale deal will be done soon if Spurs have any sense. Suarez and Rooney not going it looks like. Sure in next 20 days there will be movement that excites and delights.

Coutinho and Suarez are going to link up a lot this season. That was LFC's problem today. Coutinho's passes were so perfect that the attackers weren't expecting them to be threaded through and kept fucking up.

As soon as munchy Luis is back this could be a fun side to watch.

hearing Darren Anderton attempting to get his tongue around Aubameyang, Błaszczykowski, Mkhitaryan and Papastathopoulos was pretty funny yesterday

while watching the Monaco v Montpellier replay yesterday my lady friend noted that listening to someone pronounce French words with an English accent was really horrible

i thought it could have been worse

jasperness wrote:my lady friend noted that listening to someone pronounce French words with an English accent was really horrible

met plenty of French girls who think its cute

depends a lot on the English accent though....we have so many

jasperness wrote:

Bruegel wrote:Aubameyang, Błaszczykowski, Mkhitaryan and Papastathopoulos

Lol, first two were pretty good but quite a few syllables went missing from the last two

Obama-Yang
Blashjikovski (or just say Kuba)
Mickey Tarian
Sokratis (Papa-sta-thopo-loose if you're feeling brave)

i wanted to see if i could do them without practicing the pronunciations

i don't talk football with many people in person so i don't hear them aloud too much and when i do it's being butchered one of seven ways by an English journo

still trying to work my way through "Deulofeu"

Dayo-lo-fayo

Its old Catalan for "made by god" - orphans/abandoned kids basically

I already hate Roberto Soldado. He has such a cuntface.

Capoue having a real shocker of a game then stretchered off for a knee injury

Should've been an Arsenal player!

Darby!

Moyes getting ripped apart by "Man United Fans" on Twitter.