Essential The Official Football (Soccer) Thread - We are SO back, the Premier League returns!

[Kunty McPhuck]

any good?

Yes.

 

[Ukbrotha]

any good?

Much better than what you currently have.

 

[Kunty McPhuck]

Sad and fukked up story.

Mulamba is living like a pauper 44 years after Zaire red-card farce | Paul Doyle

Poor and wheelchair-bound, Ndaye Mulamba has just been told he faces eviction from his rented home in Kinshasa, 44 years after he was ejected from the World Cup for kicking a referee up the backside.

Mulamba is nearly 70 and that may be a surprise if the last time you heard mention of him was when a minute’s silence was held in his honour before a match at the 1998 Africa Cup of Nations, when the players of the Democratic Republic of Congo and Burkina Faso marked his “death” in an accident at an Angolan diamond mine. That turned out to be a case of mistaken identity. Mulamba has never even been to Angola.

Nor has he ever kicked a referee up the backside but that was the offence for which he was sent off at the 1974 World Cup, when the career of Mulamba and his Zaire team-mates lurched from glory to tragic farce. Tragedy has stalked glory throughout his life.
The red card was also a case of mistaken identity. Mulamba was shown it when his team were 4-0 down to Yugoslavia, who went on to win 9-0. In the 23rd minute the referee, Omar Delgado of Colombia, was scolding a Zaire player for a foul when he felt a boot up his derrière. He turned round and sent off Mulamba, whose bewilderment greatly amused commentators who did not realise that the referee had got the wrong man and interpreted his perplexity as further evidence of the naivety of the first team from sub-Saharan Africa to reach the World Cup. By the next day’s newspapers it was the referee who was being ridiculed. But Fifa backed its man and banned Mulamba for a year.

The real culprit was Mwepu Ilunga. Yes, the same man who would earn lasting notoriety in Zaire’s next match when he rushed out of a defensive wall and whacked the ball downfield so that Brazil could not take a free-kick. People still laugh at that now.

Ilunga broke the rules deliberately to protest against authorities who were not just depriving him and his fellow Leopards of their livelihoods, but also threatening their lives.

The Leopards of Zaire had travelled to West Germany as national heroes and African champions. Earlier in 1974 they had swaggered to victory in the Africa Cup of Nations, with Mulamba scoring nine goals in the tournament, a record that still stands. His goalscoring feats had already earned him a slew of nicknames, such as Volvo and Mustang – because of his speed – but most commonly Mutumbula, after a deadly nocturnal spirit reputed to inflict misery on those he visited. One local newspaper even dubbed him Hitler (“because of his destructive power”) after he scored six goals in a cup match. That tag didn’t stick.

The squad were presented with brand new Volkswagen Passats after their Nations Cup triumph but never saw the win bonuses they had been promised. Bonuses were their only income, none of them earning wages from playing. Nor did they get their bonuses for reaching the World Cup. Which is why the mood grew mutinous during the tournament.

They performed quite well in their first match, a 2-0 defeat by Scotland. After that they were assured that a sports ministry envoy was on the way with their overdue bonuses. The cash never showed up. The team talk before the Yugoslavia game was given not by their manager, the former Yugoslavia goalkeeper Blagoje Vidinic, but by an emissary of Zaire’s president Mobutu Sese Seko. “We have reason to believe that the Yugoslav authorities persuaded the coach to reveal your game plan so we have decided to put him in isolation and make some changes,” said the emissary, as recalled by Mulamba in Claire Raynaud’s book La Mort M’Attendra. So now the regime was not only refusing to pay the players but in effect sabotaging their performances. Well, two could play that game.

Mobutu warned after the Yugoslavia match that that if they lost by more than three goals against Brazil, there would be hell to pay. They lost 3-0. When they returned home the Leopards were held captive in the presidential palace for four days while their fate was decided. Eventually they were allowed to rejoin their families.

Mulamba played for the Kinshasa side AS Vita until he was 38 and then made ends meet with small coaching gigs. In 1994 the Confederation of African Football honoured him for the record he set 20 years previously, inviting him to a ceremony in Tunis where he was presented with a medal. A cigarette company paid for his suit for the event. He returned proud, happy to have been remembered. A few days later four masked men in military uniforms broke into his home and demanded the medal, plus money. The commotion awoke Mulamba’s nine-year-old son, Tridon, who ran in to help. A soldier hit the child with a rifle butt, killing him. Mulamba was shot twice in a left leg, marched out, beaten up and thrown off a bridge.

He spent eight months in hospital before being transferred to South Africa for further care. He stayed there, living penniless in a township, for years.

Now he is back in Kinshasa. “Physically he is frail but he still has the mentality of a champion,” says Alain Makengo, a football-loving lawyer who several years ago began lobbying for Mulamba and his former team-mates to be given support that would allow them to spend their twilight years in dignity. “They brought such joy and honour to the country and inspired so many young people that it is terrible to see some of them in such precarious situations,” says Makengo, who succeeded in getting the Congolese government to pay the players a stipend. Mulamba’s equates to around £175 per month. His rent costs slightly less than that. “If he pays it, how does he eat?” asks Makengo.

Just to add a little bit more flavour to the article, guess what else happened in 1974 under President Sese Seko

As it is a World Cup year, which FA going to cause the pay phuckery this time. Happens at every world cup.

 

[thatrapsfan]

Mohamed Salah is the rising GOAT!

I'm not even a Liverpool fan but this Egyptian nikka is a fukking beast.

Earliest reference to Salah in this forum's history comes from yours truly I knew he would be a star all the way back to the 2012 Olympics.

 

[Black Magisterialness]

I knew we were getting Tottenham......
Chelsea fans like

Scumbag draw, no matter who wins the rest of England loses....but AIN'T NO FUGGIN WAY I'm running with the Hotshyts. Blues all the way :mjgooner::mjgooner::mjgooner:

If barca win the treble again this year Perez is going to go mad. How you the biggest club in the world and let your rivals win 3 trebles in under 10 years.

Exactly. Perez the most insecure owner on the planet, brehs.

This nikka say Madrid can't afford Kane? nikka TOTTENHAM is the club that can't afford him. Dude is HELLA underpaid for his production rate. Madrid can come in and offer him that Pogba money and he's outa there. Especially with Benz, Bale and prolly Kroos out in the summer.

The 2nd richest club on Earth can't afford a mouth-breathing Englishman...FOH these cats is crazy.

 

[Kunty McPhuck]

Scumbag draw, no matter who wins the rest of England loses....but AIN'T NO FUGGIN WAY I'm running with the Hotshyts. Blues all the way :mjgooner::mjgooner::mjgooner:



Exactly. Perez the most insecure owner on the planet, brehs.

This nikka say Madrid can't afford Kane? nikka TOTTENHAM is the club that can't afford him. Dude is HELLA underpaid for his production rate. Madrid can come in and offer him that Pogba money and he's outa there. Especially with Benz, Bale and prolly Kroos out in the summer.

The 2nd richest club on Earth can't afford a mouth-breathing Englishman...FOH these cats is crazy.

http://www.independent.co.uk/sport/...ansfer-250m-price-tag-tottenham-a8017126.html

Daniel Levy isn't going to cash in on Kane, when they about to go into a new Stadium unless stupid money is being offered. It's not the affording, it's what they willing to part with and making sure they can still rebuild the team. Real aren't going to spend that when they can get much cheap alternatives in Lewandowski and Icardi especially when there is a chance of them getting Neymar also.

Real have dealt with Levy enough to know, that trying to add players to the deal to get the cost down won't work nor will the unsettling tactics because the price won't be lower.

 

[Black Magisterialness]

http://www.independent.co.uk/sport/...ansfer-250m-price-tag-tottenham-a8017126.html

Daniel Levy isn't going to cash in on Kane, when they about to go into a new Stadium unless stupid money is being offered. It's not the affording, it's what they willing to part with and making sure they can still rebuild the team. Real aren't going to spend that when they can get much cheap alternatives in Lewandowski and Icardi especially when there is a chance of them getting Neymar also.

Real have dealt with Levy enough to know, that trying to add players to the deal to get the cost down won't work nor will the unsettling tactics because the price won't be lower.

I think he will because he won't have a choice. Stadium builds are a huge resource strain on a club. This isn't so much about the team as it is about the shareholders, and Spurs have a history of letting absurdly talented players go. I think Kane will HAVE to leave at some point...and it'll be soon. And if not Kane, its Alli...if not Alli its Eriksen and so on.

And you take ANY of those players away from Spurs then they aren't a perennial UCL team IMO.

 

[Kunty McPhuck]

I think he will because he won't have a choice. Stadium builds are a huge resource strain on a club. This isn't so much about the team as it is about the shareholders, and Spurs have a history of letting absurdly talented players go. I think Kane will HAVE to leave at some point...and it'll be soon. And if not Kane, its Alli...if not Alli its Eriksen and so on.

And you take ANY of those players away from Spurs then they aren't a perennial UCL team IMO.

Take Eriksen away and Spurs aren't as good, everyone else barring Kane is replaceable.

I'm not saying Kane won't eventually move on, but Kane isn't being sold this Summer. I reckon Kane gives Spurs 2 more seasons and if they don't win or progress further he'll move on after that.

Everyone else in the squad is fair game, but you also got to realise that there is more prize and TV money now so Spurs aren't in a need to sell like Arsenal were. The prize money the 20th place team gets is like equal to what the Title winners got a decade ago, it may even be more. And Spurs will sell because that's how you run a profitable business and doing transfers turns Levy on.

Everyone knows that Alli and Eriksen will leave before Kane. Kane is the crown jewel of Spurs, he only leaves if he wants too.

 

[phillycavsfan]

any good?

Best keeper this season in Europe outside of maybe DDG.

 

[phillycavsfan]

Alisson probably going to Anfield.

He's said publicly if Madrid want him he's going there.

 

[thernbroom]

He's said publicly if Madrid want him he's going there.

how much we talking

 

[beejus]

My gripe with NYCFC is that they have Man City colors and a plain ass team logo

I know they getting some kickbacks from Man City but I look at Atlanta United, or even LAFC and can't help to think NYCFC could've done much much better.

Matthew Wolff is the guy who designed the NYCFC logo. He also did the LAFC one. Designed Nigeria's World Cup collection and I believe he was involved with the new French collection. Man City's colors were heavily inspirational in the coloring of NYCFC. Funny though that his logo would inspired Man City to change theirs.

NEW YORK CITY FOOTBALL CLUB IS THE FIRST MAJOR LEAGUE SOCCER TEAM TO PLAY WITHIN THE FIVE BOROUGHS.
The club was born of the two global sporting giants, Manchester City FC and the New York Yankees, and began play in Major League Soccer in 2015. New York City FC made an instant impact in MLS, signing global superstars David Villa, Frank Lampard, and Andrea Pirlo in the inaugural season. The club plays at Yankee Stadium while searching the five boroughs for a permanent home.

In my two years as the only full-time designer at NYCFC, I was responsible for building the visual identity of this brand. Starting with the badge, I had a hand in just about everything the club produced.

Hoefler & Co, and based on vernacular signage of New York City (Gotham is also a nickname for New York City). The pentagons represent New York City’s five boroughs, and the orange is the exact shade found in the New York City flag.

Melbourne City FC and Manchester City FC.

INAUGURAL SEASON LOGO
The 2015 Inaugural Season logo is inspired by mosaics found throughout New York City’s subway stations. The logo’s primary use was as the jocktag of NYCFC home and away kits during the club’s first season. It also appeared on dozens of pieces of merchandise sold online and at Yankee Stadium.

CAPTAIN’S ARMBAND
The ‘C’ stands both for City and Captain. Colors were voted on by the season ticket holders. (I hoped orange would win).

FANWEAR & APPAREL
Working closely with Adidas, I designed dozens of graphics for apparel — from t-shirts and hoodies, to scarves and hats, to pins and patches. Some pieces were for specific events (such as the World Cup and the Andrea Pirlo signing), while others were for general merchandise.

SEASON TICKET PACKAGING
I had the pleasure of designing the season ticket holder box and all of its contents ahead of the club’s inaugural 2015 season.

The season ticket box opened to reveal a blueprint, suggesting that the founding member season ticket holders provided the plan and foundation for the club’s future. Also included in the box was a scarf with the names of 3,000 season ticket holders, a bracelet, sticker, lanyard, and – of course – the suiteticket books or seasoncards.

 

[Kunty McPhuck]

He's said publicly if Madrid want him he's going there.

Does Monchi make Real pay a record transfer fee for a keeper as a little fukk you. Also Roma are a selling club, so he definitely gone in the summer for the right offer.

If you United you tell Madrid £100m+ for DDG unless there is a gentleman's agreement in place.

 

[Ukbrotha]

Does Monchi make Real pay a record transfer fee for a keeper as a little fukk you. Also Roma are a selling club, so he definitely gone in the summer for the right offer.

If you United you tell Madrid £100m+ for DDG unless there is a gentleman's agreement in place.

Makes zero sense to sell DDG for any amount.

 

[THEREALBRAND]

'What the f***, I'm not the king, I'm god': What Zlatan Ibrahimovic told former Paris Saint-Germain team-mate Benjamin Stambouli

Zlatan Ibrahimovic was once hailed the 'king of Paris'. A title he rejected and demanded to be known as 'god'.

That's how highly the former Paris Saint-Germainforward holds himself, and it's a level of self-confidence and arrogance that comes as no surprise.

His larger-than-life personality has established him as one of football's true characters, with his stature both on and off the pitch idolised by supporters across the world.

Former team-mate Benjamin Stambouli has recalled his short spell with the 'crazy' Swedish forward during their time together at Paris Saint-Germain.

Stambouli only spent one season in Ligue 1 with Ibrahimovic before moving onto Schalke and the Bundesliga where he has remained since 2016, but their short time together still seems to have left a sizeable impression.

We were at physiotherapy and news was on TV,' the 27-year-old told Goal. 'Zlatan asked me to translate it because there was something about him on.

'So I explained that they said that Zlatan is the King of Paris. I thought he would be happy about it, because it's great that the people love him so much. But he was different. He was very angry and shouted at me: "What the f***? I'm not the king, I'm god". This guy is totally crazy.'

There’s nothing that could be said about Zlatan that I wouldn’t believe