An occasional thread for laughing at terrible football predictions

'At £24m maybe the most overpriced player in the history of football.'

Which writer said this of which player in 2005?

hmmmn

patrick barclay, didier drogba?

him or essien

Didier Drogba is the player.

thought this would be about our own predictions from the rolling epl thread.

about a million "liverpool will win the league this year" articles

This is probably the masterpiece of the genre.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/football/2006/jul/31/sport.comment

Apart from the pop at Liam Miller, everything in that article turned out to be so wrong it's hilarious.

When did Fergie stop playing Alan Smith in central midfield? That was genuinely batshit but way before that point, right?

The Drogba quote, incidentally, came from James Lawton, who is a tool.

I don't think I've ever been as completely wrong about anything in my entire life as Smyth was in that piece. It's quite something.

those guys are completely erratic in the guardian, particularly smyth and scott murray who take their odious nature out on whatev the article/live text of the day is.

what article is the lawton one from? i couldnt find it via google

Whole piece is worth reading.

http://www.independent.co.uk/sport/football/news-and-comment/james-lawton-benitezs-new-world-exposes-the-blinkered-void-at-chelseas-heart-508922.html

Some highlights:

Benitez is 'a man whose football spirit is essentially filled with adventure'. The match higlighted 'highlight a certain hollowness at the heart of the Mourinho empire' whose ambitions 'stretch no further than the mechanics of winning'.

'Does Mourinho or his owner Roman Abramovich care about Chelsea's contribution to the wider values of football? On this evidence plainly not... [it is] minimalist football; football that gives only what it has to. Yes, players who win or draw when necessary but who do not stretch themselves in expanding the beauty and the range of the game they play.'

By contrast: 'Expansion of thought and performance is everything in Benitez's new world of Anfield.'

FOUR DAYS after this fixture, this happened.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sstirsBhkaQ

:D

also, any football writer who doesn't get the beauty of efficiency can f right off imo

I stopped making predictions in print when i said in the Sunday Times that Man United would beat Newcastle before the 5-0 game. However, i did say in the same preview that no team containing Darren Peacock would ever win the league, so I was right in the long run.

Actually, I think I also said in Time Out that Man United would beat Chelsea before the other 5-0 game,but that was a totally thought-through counter-jinxing superstitious operation, so doesn't count.

predictions are to be made only in a reserved conversational manner...a calm "i think they'll win" does the job, firm enough that you can remind people of it in work the next monday.

Nah, counterfactual predictions are the way to go, but use them sparingly and keep them outrageous or you get no respect at all. Mate of mine gave me a long, reasoned account in February of why Arsenal had it in them to win the league, and I'm afraid I was not a big enough man to refrain from laughing in his face.

he sure showed you

if they play their cards right they could finish a couple of wins ahead of liverpool...(who only lost games under hodgson due to ownership troubles let's not forget)

Wait Pete are you a sports journo? Is there anywhere we can read your writing?

Which reminds me, Ismael have you written anything good for ROP recently? Or can you at least encourage them to put a 'written by [x]' but by the title of each piece?

No, I've not really had anything to say of late (i.e. lazy). I do fancy doing a 'Roy revisited' piece, but it's still all too confusing.

I'm not really a sports journalist any more, but I used to be. Wrote for the Sunday Times for several years doing 'funny' TV stuff and also did some sport for Time Out, but it was before the internet so I might as well have not existed. I've only done two sports pieces recently - a piece in 4-4-2 on football and education (which I've linked to before but happy to again if anybody wants to read it), and an unsatisfying interview with Neil Warnock for an in-flight magazine.

and an unsatisfying interview with Neil Warnock for an in-flight magazine.

a terrific punchline if ever there was one.

Since Colin Warnock looks like an angry owl, there must be a joke about him being in flight.

Does Neil Warnock look like an owl or what?

Holloway: Relegation 'will be the end of the world'.

he's a day out isn't he?

https://pbs.twimg.com/media/BweOBkbIcAA9Sly.jpg