Grapeviney

Hard not to feel sorry for Karius.. How do you recover from that? It’s not like anyone’s ever going to give him a chance to redeem himself. I also get sad when they show the kids in the crowd at the end, tears running down their faces. Reminds me of me in ‘88, with red and blue face paint running down my face and all over my clothes.

The quarter-by-quarter scores from all 12 premierships, pictures of the 10 greatest MFC marks and goals, and the names of every player who played more than 100 games for the club, along with their signatures. Usual logo stuff.

W0o0-h0o0 !! Great comeback away from home after another sleepy, sloppy start. Spurs will need to be on guard against Juve doing the classic Italian 1-0 smash-and-grab job in the return fixture, but as you say, the away goals puts them in the box seat. With the league titles wrapped up in all the 5 major Euro leagues except Italy and maybe Spain, the remaining CL matches this round and beyond are all the more enticing, and I'll definitely be tuning into to RM v PSG tomorrow morning. Also interesting to read today that there's been a slump in broadcast revenue in EPL rights in the UK, following years of massive increases. Didn't realise that British broadcasters are only allowed to show 200 of the 380 games live, a restriction apparently aimed at maintaining high attendances at the grounds.

Spurs should have had a bagful, Macca, they botched plenty of gimmes, but Arsenal never looked threatening. In fact, they looked disinterested most of the time. Champions League returns this week, with plenty of good fixtures as highlighted in one of your earlier posts. I’m quietly confident about Spurs’ trip to Turin.

Jimmy? No-one called him that. Pretty sure it was Jimbo, or if not that, Cooky.

I haven't read the Wolff book, nut, but I came to exactly the same conclusion you did about sources / facts / quotes / opinion from reading the extract at the time of its release. There is a real art to that style of 'reportage' (if you could call it that) - creating something out of nothing and making it seem solid - but it leaves the door wide open for criticism about accuracy and truth, and also leads to questions about motive and bias. Also agree about the Broome book - a pretty good historical account.

Fascinating read here about Israel's attempts over the years to assassinate Yasir Arafat, an extract from a forthcoming book about the history of Israeli intelligence agencies and their targeted killings. What stands out is the moral tussle between senior military / intelligence / government figures, and the lengths to which some of them were prepared to go to, to get rid of the PLO leader, and how they were thwarted by others who thought the collateral damage (such as shooting down a commercial plane) was too high a price to pay. Really looking forward to the book as the article reads like a thriller and seems to be meticulously researched, with multiple sources giving their perspective on how each event unfolded.

I was kind of lucky, Macca - not only did they get one of their largest crowds for the season, but they were on song, too. Rooney actually put Everton ahead about 10mins in but was ruled off-side. From then on it was all Spurs and they could have finished with 6. The Barcelona game was much less of a spectacle, and while it was good to see Messi score, they never had to get out of 1st gear. I should add, the tour of the Camp Nou and the Barca museum is superb. You can go into the visiting team's rooms, walk down the race (which has an adjoining chapel!), sit on the bench and visit the press box. The trophy cabinet, obviously, is enormous, stretching the entire length of a large room. One of the best exhibits was a huge glass case with dozens (maybe hundreds) of little squares, each labelled with a highlight from Barca's history; you touch the square you want to see and it brings up a larger box that shows that particular goal, or game etc. I caught the first half of the match at Anfield, but had to leave for the airport at half-time unfortunately so missed the exciting finish. City's loss leaves the door just slightly ajar for United, but for the rest it'll be a battle for CL spots. Hammers have really turned the corner since Moyes took over, a mid-season revival along with Palace and the Cherries. It's been an interesting season in every respect except for the actual title race itself.

Some shots from the Barcelona v Levante game. The official attendance was listed as 56,000 but I reckon they fudged it, just as they do with crowds here, as the stadium seemed to be less than half full. Had amazing seats, sitting at about half-forward on level 2, which gave a great vantage point for the action. In the second half, the top row of seats in the stand opposite me took on this ethereal glow from the setting sun, and my cousin, who was sitting in the stand opposite, snapped the magnificent final shot in the series below. Seats at the Spurs - Everton game were also sensational, albeit this time at ground level, and I was within spitting distance of the Everton bench. Great atmosphere where I was (there were hundreds of Koreans sitting near me going crazy for Son, who was on fire) but not as good for viewing the match as the upper levels, where you get a better idea of space and distance etc. The thing which really struck me was how congested much of the play is, in comparison to what you see on TV, where it seems they have oodles of time and space to move the ball around. At both games I was one of the first in the ground so I could just sit there and soak up the enormity of it all!

Had to settle for a brace, but it’s hard to complain about a 4-0 thumping in front of more than 76,000. Was an unforgettable night, my seat was so good I was basically sitting on the bench, and could hear Poch and Sam Allardyce yelling out instructions. Spurs fans lament the lack of atmosphere at Wembley compared to the Lane, but coming from the much larger ‘G, it seemed intimate and the vibe all night was amazing. With Barca winning 3-0 last weekend, the whole trip has been a dream come true and I’m glad I came. Will post some pics when I get back to Oz. ⚽️⚽️⚽️

I’m going - and soon! Just bought premium seats at the Camp Nou for Barca v Levante on the 7th, and the same for Spurs v the Toffees 6 days later at Wembley, with a pre-game function, drinks etc. Pretty pumped, as I’ve dreamt about these stadia since I was a kid (albeit Wembley’s been totally refurbed since then, much like the ‘G). Hopefully Harry Kane can keep scoring hat-tricks for a few more weeks yet..

The Dortmund-Schalke game was a belter. Dortmund was 4-0 up within 25 minutes, only for Schalke to peg them back in the last 25 minutes and level the scores deep in injury time. Spurs again stumbled at home to weak opposition, while the draw at Anfield just helps City.

I caught some of the Switzerland - Nth Ireland match in Basel the other night and the pitch there was as bad as the one in Honduras. Hard to fathom in this day and age, especially in Europe. The North London Derby is on this weekend at the very respectable time of 11.30pm Saturday night on SBS. Incredibly, Optus have got yet another free trial going, which means at least half of the season to date has been a give-away. I'm actually weighing up a quick, bucket list soccer trip to Europe in the new year. I figure with Spurs playing at Wembley this season, it will never be so easy to see them live again. Would try to go to matches at San Siro and the Camp Nou while I'm over there. Anyone done such a trip and have any advice?

Would love to see them play PSG in the Champions League at some stage, goals galore.

Thought we were probably the better team on the day but there were few chances at either end, and they were able to capitalise on what was really our only defensive lapse of the game. The riddle of replacing Kane continues to plague Poch - Llorente has failed to fire so far, much like Janssen last year. Son is quality but not an outright striker.

It's pathetic Macca, bloody frustrating - I think I'm going to write to them and complain and see if it can't be rectified. I've tried through TuneIn too. As you say, it's amateurish from arguably the number 1 comp in the world. You'd think that if the local rights-holder (in this case EON) falls over, there'd be some provision for it to revert to TalkSport as the principal rights holder. Did you watch our Cup tie earlier in the week? Not all that dissimilar to the PL fixture a few weeks back, except this time the Hammers were able to complete the comeback. The shift in momentum was huge after the break. Probably helped Bilic earn a stay of execution, although I see you dropped 2 points in the dying seconds last night against Palace. Was a good night on the telly last night, with the Man U v Spurs game followed by Milan v Juve and then Bayern v Leipzig.

Interesting that Optus are running another free trial, the second one is as many months. Must be struggling with subscriptions. And @Macca this might explain the mystery of the TalkSport on/off situation, as it’s definitely been unavailable this weekend, even through the website, presumably to protect the Optus promotion.

Thread's been purged of the politics and insults - there's a general board for that.

Kouyate’s goal was great (both the ball in and the finish) but yep, too little too late, thought you could / should have played with more intensity and urgency when Aurelier was sent off.

Yeh it tends to be either feast or famine with Spurs, although I thought Dele was probably fractionally off-side on the first one.

@Macca Good news - Talk Sport website is working, Macca, but I’ll be listening to the TV commentary tonight as Peter Drury is one of my favourite callers. Edit: just saw your post, beat me to it

Hmmm I'll try again this weekend too. Perhaps I listened successfully through the computer / website last time and only tried the phone / app on the weekend. I like the radio call too, listened to most Spurs matches last year. As with the TV commentary, the standard puts our own (AFL) callers to shame.

I'm almost certain I listened through Talk Sport a couple of weeks ago Macca, but no such luck last weekend - was definitely blocked with an ad telling Australian listeners to go through EON. Did a little bit of hunting around and noticed others had the same problem (the Talk Sport app review page is full of Australians telling them to unblock it). I (think I) tried the website on the weekend, too, same problem as the app.

EON have gone bust and the British rights holder, TalkSport, have still got Australia on geo block, so there's no way to listen to the broadcast at the moment. Pretty pathetic situation, to be honest, as EON went belly up a few months ago so it really should have been sorted by now. The general standard of coverage here leaves a lot to be desired, especially for the EPL as one of the world's premier sporting leagues. The SBS match-of-the-round is neither the earliest game nor the best fixture, and Foxtel have either lost the rights to the English Championship or are no longer showing it, and we're getting Turkish football instead. Even the La Liga coverage is ordinary, with most games called from the studio rather than live at the ground, and very little atmosphere / crowd noise in the audio feed making for a very dull viewing experience. /end rant PS: Because of the aforementioned EON issue, I ended up following the match in a Spurs forum game-day thread - funny how similar it was to the Demonland game-day, with hysterical posters calling for good players to be banished to the moon on the back of a single mistake, and realists trying to talk them down off the ledge. Think it's time to (reluctantly) fork out for the Optus subscription.

Update: he can fly.