Easy 10

Its a shame Liverpool imploded on the run-in, but they'd have taken 4th place and Champions League qualification before a ball had been kicked had it been offered, so it shouldn't totally detract from what has been a great season. As you say, nobody expected them to be challenging for the Title, but that leaky defence cost them. As Liverpool started racking the goals up at Selhurst in an effort to close the gap on the goal difference, they were retrieving the ball from the Palace net and trotting back for the restart a little too quickly for Palace's liking, trying to humiliate them - hence the amazing rally from 0-3 to 3-3 in the last few minutes. I bloody hate Palace as well ! PeanutsFromHeaven - Brighton & Hove Albion (The Seagulls) play their 1st leg Playoff game tonight. If we get into the Premiership in the next couple of weeks then why not put your arms around us We certainly wouldn't be challenging for the Title, but a battle against relegation can be every bit as enthralling just trying to stay up out of that dreaded bottom 3...come join us !

Fair play Mister Twinsnorth...a 0-0 against Norwich has all but extinguished Chelsea's title hopes. No trophies for Mourinho again this season. You were spot on.

Don't speak too soon. Chelsea are still in the hunt for the Premier League title with 2 games to go....quite a battle royale at the top with Liverpool and Man City, the closest title race in years. In fact, I'm just off down the pub to watch them batter Norwich. Then I can come back and tune in to the Twins this evening. Ahhh, Sundays.

Well, we only went and did it. In the 92nd minute of the final game of the season, with just seconds remaining, the Seagulls scored a CRUCIAL winner at Nottingham Forest to win 2-1, and snatch the final Playoff spot from Reading. We now playoff against Derby County for a place at Wembley and a shot at promotion to the Premier League. EPIC stuff. God I love football.

Not at all Mr Crapps, I have no axe to grind with Juve, except for an inherent dislike of Carlos Tevez, who refused to come on as a sub for Man City in a Champions League game in Munich. So apparently him trousering £200,000 a week doesn't necessarily guarantee you his services as a player. The club suspended him, so he went on a 2 week golfing holiday in Argentina. Class act. Anyhoo, my super Seagulls are up against the powerhouse that is Yeovil Town tonight in the penultiumate game of the season (unless our quest for the Playoffs is successful and our season duley extended). If Yeovil fail to win, then they're relegated back down to League One. Such are the stakes when you get to the sharp end of the season... Come on you stripes

Indeed. And lets be clear - I have no problem with the long-term Man U fans who were there prior to the last 20 years of non-stop trophies. The ones who get themselves along to Old Trafford to watch their team and support their team, through wind and rain, thick and thin (although its been a lot more thick than thin lately), good times and bad. The ones I struggle to have respect for are the "brainwashed generation" in this country. The Sky Sports brigade, who have never been within 400 miles of Old Trafford, and yet declare their undying love for MUFC from their barstool on the other side of the country. And you ask them why ? Why do you shun your own (less successful) local team ? The one that plays just down the road in your own town or city, the one that is desperate for the support, the one you could actually turn up and watch if you so chose ? Why instead to you support this enormous football behemoth through a TV screen ? And the answer is usually something pretty lame. "Well, my dad always supported them" is a favourite. Or "George Best was my favourite player". Or "My uncles hairdresser had a brother who's best friends dog was born near the Manchester Ship Canal that runs by Old Trafford". But we know the real reason. The real reason is that they want to be associated with success. They're gloryhunters. They want to puff their chest out in their replica shirt, and lord it over the fans of less successful clubs, because they support "the best". But the irony is, they will never find sporting fulfilment in their lives by doing this, because they have made no emotional investment in that club. They see a winning team, they see silverware, they see glory, and like a moth to a lightbulb, they're attracted to it. They flap and buzz all around it. But sure as dollars to donuts, when that lightbulb starts to dim, they'll gradually move away from it. They won't fly so close any more. They'll melt away, maybe towards a bulb thats shining a little brighter somwehere else. I could never support any other football team than Brighton and Hove Albion. They're my team, my local club, and they've never won any major trophies, at least not anything a plastic Man U fan would recognise as a trophy. We've been up and down the leagues, existing mainly in the lower divisions (except for four years in 1979 - 1983, our glory years, playing in what is now branded as the Premier League). Since then we've hit the bottom of the 4th division, 92nd out of 92 clubs. And right now, we're in the 2nd Division (or 'Championship' as it is now branded), which is one league below the Premier. So we're not big, we're not successful, but any success we DO achieve just feels all the sweeter for it. I wouldn't swap that feeling of a rare promotion, of finishing top of a lower division, or escaping a relegation, for all the pots and baubles the Man U fans get so accustomed year in, year out. Brighton till I die

Quite an interesting article here about the apparent growing in popularity of football in the USA http://www.nytimes.com/2014/04/17/fashion/soccer-particularly-englands-premier-league-growing-in-popularity-in-new-york-creative-circles.html?_r=1#

The Europa League is for clubs finishing 5th, and they might still manage 5th. But this is very much the poor relation to the Champions League - most clubs don't even take it very seriously, and field under-strength teams in it as its played (rather inconveniently) on Thursday nights. Spending 7 hours on a plane jetting across Europe to a Siberian coalmine for a Thursday night fixture against some team hardly anyone has heard of is not ideal preperation, when you have to get back to England for a proper game at the weekend. But yes, Manchester United have failed to qualify for next seasons Champions League. Only the top 4 teams in the Premier League qualify from England, and sadly (hilariously), 4th place is now beyond them. This is the first time since 1995 they have failed to qualify for the competition. Quite apart from the catastrophic drop in income they will suffer (primarily TV money), this will also make it much tougher to recruit top-class players to the club, as top-class players tend to want to play for the clubs who are involved in what is considered THE premiére competition in Europe. Uniteds squad is in urgent need of a major overhaul this summer to become competative again, and that will not be easy with no Champions League on the agenda for the forseeable. Impossible ? No. Difficult ? Certainly. Moyes inherited a team which was reigning Champions when Sir Alex Ferguson retired last year, and its widely considered that Fergie performed miracles in making champions out of what was, essentially, a fairly average squad, with only one or two genuinely world class players. The extent of his genius has now become apparent, as Moyes has failed miserably to get even close to defending that title with what is largely the same group of players plus a couple of his own (very expensive) additions. They currently sit 7th in the table, a seismic 23 points behind current leaders Liverpool, and are well on course to becoming the worst defending Champions in Premier League history. My opinion is that Moyes made it difficult for himself from the start by binning the entire United backroom staff on his arrival, and bringing in his own backroom team from Everton, severing any semblance of continuity. So players at United who were accustomed to success were now being led by a manager and coaching staff who had won nothing. And boy, does it show. For this failure specifically ? Very little. Man U had continued with their unprecedented success during the Glazers stewardship, thanks largely to letting Ferguson get on with his job and backing him in the transfer market. Moyes was appointed his successor on Fergusons own recommendation when he retired, and was given some £70m to spend. The fact that he's made an almighty great horlicks of the job cannot be laid at the Glazers door. Oh, a whole lot. A truckload. A FLEET of trucks, delivering entire shipping containers stuffed full of schadenfreude, to be delivered around England and the world to every plastic Man U fan who ever donned that ubiquitous red shirt, sat their fat arse on a barstool in front of the TV, and basked in the (seemingly endless) reflected glory of Manchester United PLC from afar, whilst looking down their noses at fans of apparently less distinguished or successful clubs. But you know what ? Those same fans will probably just go and buy a Liverpool / Man City / Chelsea * shirt for next season. Lovely stuff. * Delete as applicable according to whoever wins the Premier League.

What a terrific blog. I'm DYING to get over to Target Field for a game and to mix with some knowledgable locals who can help me with some of the nuances of it all. And Minnesotans just seem so.....nice

One hell of a match, although I happen to think Skrtel is one of the dirtiest defenders in the PL. He gets away with MURDER in the box, pushing, pulling and grabbing opposition players all over the place. He's the only guy I see who seems to be trying to swap shirts with another player before the end of the game. If the referees were brave enough he'd be conceding 3 penalties a game easily ! But anyway. I had a cheeky little treble. Liverpool to beat Man City, Chelsea to beat Swansea, and Twins to beat the Royals, odds of around 9/1. The first two came in this afternoon, so I watched my At Bat app tonight with my fist in my mouth hoping for the Twins to get that win and bring home the bacon, and they didn't let me down God bless Correia

Well, soccer is notoriously difficult to choreograph, so you'll never get a "decent" soccer movie that looks in any way convicing in terms of whats happening on the field of play. So its got to be all about the drama off the field. Bend It Like Beckham is pretty poor, none of the football scenes are in the least bit convincing. And with all due respect, girls football isn't exactly a rich tapestry to weave a story from anyway, even if you do hang our "pin up boys" name in the title. Green Street is ok-ish as an off-field hooligan drama, but not really a very accurate repesrentation. Hobbits at Upton Park ? Mmmnah. Probably my fave football movie is one called The Damned United, based on an excellent novel by David Peace. Its set in the early-1970's when the legendary (here at least) Brian Clough took over as manager of "dirty" Leeds United, for 44 days, before effectively being forced out by a players revolt. True story, garnished a little for the silver screen, but the performances and the whole look of the film is top notch. It perfectly captures the dour grim darkess of 1970's northern England. It helps if you *know* the main characters for real of course (Clough the talented, charismatic, brash, outspoken young upstart manager, Don Revie as the curmudgeonly old former Leeds Utd boss) but the actors do fantastic renditions of them both, and their intense rivalry really brings the film to life. Check out the real Clough / Revie here http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yJHvg5c7vPE This is legendary stuff over here, and it makes for a terrific film.

Oh, and I can't let this pass with a boooo so BOOOOOOO !!

You list a lot of the things I love AND hate about the game there Steve ! But you're right, put it all together and its an intoxicating mix. The diving just drives me nuts, when a grown man throws himself to the floor, rolling aroujnd, clutching his ankle or some other appendage, simulating an injury just to win a free kick / penalty / get the other guy sent off. Then 10 seconds later he's up and running around like a 2 year old, as if nothing happened. One second he's at deaths door, the next...hey, he's ok !! Maddening. But it all adds to the controversy and whips the crowd up. Promotion / relegation realy adds an edge to proceedings. Getting relegated down a division is a miserable experience (the bottom 3 teams in each 24-team division goes down a league). Thats one thing I can't get my head around in baseball and NFL. Unless you're near the top of the standings or chasing playoffs, theres really very little to actually play for without that lurking fear of relegation being there. In football, avoiding relegation is sometimes celebrated as wildly as winning the league or getting promoted, it means THAT much. The relief is so intense at avoiding the despair of going down a league. I've never been to a baseball game, but having watched it on TV, the atmosphere seems a lot more...relaxed. Sedate even. Football crowds get a lot more involved. We like to chant songs, often with obscene and/or insulting lyrics at the players, or at the referee, or at the oppositon fans who are always housed in their own part of the stadium, totally separated from the home fans. This makes the game a very "tribal" experience. Its US vs THEM, and there they all are, in that corner of our ground, on our patch, trying to beat OUR team. How dare they. So it goes way beyond boo-ing. When a goal is scored...its bedlam. We football fans go absolutely bonkers, leaping around and screaming "YYYYEEEESSSS" at the top of our voices. This is because (unlike, say, basketball), there is a true rarity value to a goal. Scoring is hard ! There may only be one goal to celebrate. There may be NO goals to celebrate, so when your team scores, its such a massive release, a huge rush. Then once the euphoria has died down, the fans will often turn their attention to the glum set of supporters who's team has just conceded the goal, and begin the time-honoured gloating chant: You're not singing You're not singing You're not singing any more You're not sing-ing aaaany more To which they will reply... Sing when you're winning You only sing when you're winning Sing when you're wiiin-ning You only sing when you're winning Childish ? Unsporting ? You bet. But god I love it. Gosh there's about a million different chants for different situations. Sorry to waffle on, but I do find the different cultures in our sports and our fans endlessly fascinating. I could bang on about this all day I'd best get some work done though I guess.

Well, 5 games to go this season and we're just 2 points outside the Promotion Playoffs, so there's a chance, but only a slim one. We've just got to try and finish 6th and then take it from there. MaHOOsive win last night, 4-1 at Leicester (who are already promoted to the Premier League), so thats kept us in the hunt, but we've got to follow that up with, I reckon, at least 3 more wins out of the 5 remaining games, maybe even 4. Starting Saturday at the Amex v Charlton Athletic...

[edit] duplicate post. Ugg.