Whitey Grandad

What a boost that would be!

And Jose Fonte. Imagine him playing at Wembley instead of Stephens

Most do, some don’t. I seem to remember that Arsenal never insured their players preferring to cover the risk themselves.

Not nil nil now

More sadness at what we have become. There is (or was) a lot of goodwill towards us but now they’re just shaking their heads in disbelief.

Buy it a clock.

Kickoff is at 19:45

The referee should have got it right without VAR and sent him straight off.

I’ve been to nearly all of them. Our favourite was Antigua with Barbados very close behind. I’ve just come back from a two week cruise on Star Flyer which is based out of Sint Maarten and I spent a few days there either side. On Antigua I grabbed a taxi and went across to Dickenson Bay where we had been several times. The beach is fabulous but sadly the resort that we knew so well is being reconstructed and not for the better. Nevertheless I sprinkled some of my wife’s ashes on my favourite rock at the north end. Antigua is a nice size with about 95,000 people. Barbados has about three times as many so there is more going on and the reggae buses go everywhere cheaply. Ease of getting there is the important thing and BA or Virgin fly to most of the ones with a British association. St Lucia is a lot safer than it used to be but the airport is at the bottom and the transfer to the hotels in the north west can take over an hour and a half. There are so many that I would be happy to talk them over with you. Send me a PM and maybe we can arrange a call.

Who is this ‘we’ whereof you speak?

Please don’t try to insult me.

I know offside when I see it. Years of practice with no one running the line.

Ah! I must have missed that. The commentators kept prattling on about something.

That’s the point. Many’s the time I’ve seen a corner awarded after an attacker has been actively offside in the build up. VAR doesn’t cover this situation. ”Similarly, if a team is incorrectly awarded a corner kick and they score from it, VAR cannot intervene.”

Or makes a play for the ball, as in this case. He made an attempt to head the ball.

The corner intervened. There was not a goal scored because the corner hadn’t been taken. VAR cannot intervene and say that the corner should not have been given. They can only step in if a goal has been scored in a continuous passage of play. ’as instructed’ relates to not raising their flag until the phase of play is over. Once the corner is given they cannot go back and check a possible offside.

Indeed we are. VAR has ruined the game. I watched a game the other evening. A cross came in, an attacking player in an offside position tried to head the ball which went out for a corner. As instructed, the assistant didn’t raise his flag. The attacking team scored from the corner. In the good old days the attacking move would have been flagged offside.

I always interpreted that as ‘having thought about it’, or ‘deliberated’ over it. Where there is no time to think about it then it cannot be deliberate. Times have changed and not for the better. The Laws, or rather the interpretation of them, have been modified to suit television and VAR.

It was a VAR penalty. One that never existed until a few years ago.

“all of the pundits“? What? Both of them? We all know that these pundits know nothing about football.

Discretional. Some referees might have given it, others not.

Brilliant player. Thanks Bournemouth. Can we sign him up?

One of those.

Bugger. Now they’ve got their excuse ready for when we thrash them.

Faffing about at the back with no purpose. Again.