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1·11 months agoJeremy Wilson, chief sports reporter at The Telegraph, reports:
Just how many Ally McCoists are there? It was one of many unanswered questions hanging in the Paris air on Tuesday night after the Scot had woken at 5.45am ahead of his radio show before commentating for TNT Sports at Newcastle United’s dramatic 1-1 draw with PSG. And yet the real drama would not begin until he was fully 16 hours into his day.
Rio Ferdinand had been taken ill during the second half shortly before PSG’s deeply controversial equaliser and so there was only one answer when an emergency pitchside substitute was required. Cue the ever versatile McCoist who, from the gantry up in the gods of the Parc des Princes, bolted from his place next to co-commentator Darren Fletcher before displaying a touchline urgency rarely seen since he was regularly scoring 30 goals a season at Glasgow Rangers.
The rosy cheeks that suddenly appeared on the screen, raging at the injustice of Kylian Mbappe’s crucial goal, was a consequence not just of the unexpected exertion but how even the most infectiously enthusiastic man in football is reaching the end of his tether with Var.
“It will just annoy me, but go on,” said McCoist, when asked if he wanted to see a replay of the penalty decision before a second watch confirmed his first instincts.
“That’s a shambles,” he declared. “An horrendous decision. Honestly, that’s not on. If that’s a penalty, we may as well give the game up. It’s bordering on robbery.”
As Newcastle manager Eddie Howe bit his tongue but looked on admiringly, it was a monologue that would soon have McCoist trending on social media and swathes of the North East added to an already bulging list of fans. His phone was also lighting up with dozens of supportive messages.
“I’m fuming – and I’ve not got a dog in the fight,” McCoist would later say, still shaking his head before finally leaving the stadium shortly after midnight and then waking up five hours later to vent some more on the radio.
It had been a frantic finale for the entire 40-strong TNT team in France.
Presenter Laura Woods, the broadcaster’s star summer signing, was herself literally putting a pen through the words she had just formulated ahead of a post-match analysis that would pivot from deconstructing a famous victory to a potentially season-changing Var intervention.
Producer Thom Hambleton was also ripping up the script and relaying thoughts to Woods’s ear-piece from inside a screen-filled truck outside the stadium.
Joel Miller, the resident stats guru (described by Fletcher as “the only person in the history of BT or TNT Sports to have never made a mistake”), was another in full flow, having earlier arrived with a full hand-crafted A4 grid of the nine different possible group permutations.
From The Telegraph’s John Percy:
It is 11.30am on a blustery morning at West Bromwich Albion’s training ground and Carlos Corberán is marching down the pitch with a ball under one arm and whistle in his hand.“Excellent,” he purrs, nodding in approval as his players execute an intense pressing drill, and it soon becomes clear that Corberán is a head coach who is extremely hands-on.
The training pitch is where he springs into life and Telegraph Sport has been given exclusive access to observe the highly regarded Spaniard in full flow, before a packed schedule of matches.
A self-confessed disciple of Marcelo Bielsa, after working under the Argentine at Leeds, Corberán is a fascinating character and football obsessive who has transformed the culture across the club.
He is also emerging as a leader in a time of uncertainty; an emblem of hope for a fanbase that has become disillusioned and frustrated with the club’s direction.
West Brom are still under the control of unpopular owner Guochuan Lai and remain in talks with a number of parties over a potential sale, with a Nigerian and American group thought to be the two front-runners.
The valuation is understood to be around £30 million, plus the various debts and money owed in loans. Sources have confirmed negotiations are “moving”.
‘Being a coach is a dream’
Corberán faces uncertainty if a takeover is not completed soon, with pressure to raise money through player sales in the January transfer window.
Try telling that to him, though. The 40-year-old is refusing to allow any outside noise to damage the team spirit he has created. Whatever is happening behind the scenes, ‘King Carlos’ will be in every day until 8pm, plotting a path back to the Premier League.
“Being a coach is a dream, and I cannot be more proud than I am to represent this massive club,” he says. “Before I worked here, it was one of the clubs that caught my attention, but now being here I realise how important it is.
“You live with a lot of responsibility because you know how much you’re impacting the club and the fans. I want to put this club at the highest point and give my best for them.”
This is a rare opportunity to witness the meticulous preparations and extreme detail of Corberán, who has guided West Brom up to third in the Championship.
He celebrated a year in charge in October, marking the occasion by presenting every member of staff with a bottle of Estrella beer (last Christmas it was a bottle of red wine from Valencia).
We were invited to attend last Thursday, ahead of the game against high-flying Ipswich, and Corberán has called a 10.30am team meeting before the players start training. Meetings are the norm here, with another after training. The day before matches, every player is seen individually for 15 minutes each.
Corberán’s meetings and training sessions are absolutely crucial in outlining his philosophy to the squad.
His training method is based around periodisation – a strategy in four phases of attack, defence and the transitions in between – with the emphasis on shorter, sharper sessions and the workload usually decreasing nearer to match day.
Tuesdays and Wednesdays are more detailed, longer sessions broken down into analytical training with defending and attacking drills, plus small-sided games.
Corberán prefers to operate with a squad of 20 and, in the session we observe, all outfield positions have two players effectively shadowing each other.
Thursday’s session focused in more detail on how to exploit Ipswich’s perceived weaknesses. Corberán prefers to operate with a 4-2-3-1 formation but, in this game, set up with a 4-4-2 deep shape. The plan was to target, press and isolate Ipswich’s right-back Brandon Williams, as left-back Leif Davis is often higher up the pitch with one winger wide. Pressing when out of possession was vital.
It clearly worked, with West Brom winning 2-0 and sentencing their opponents to a first league defeat since August 26.
“Football is growing and the coaches have a big understanding of the game. It’s getting more difficult to prepare but it’s all about finding solutions,” says Corberán.
“It’s important that when players go out on the pitch they don’t feel they need to give the right answer every time.
“Training can help us to create habits and positive behaviours, that is why our level of concentration is so high. Everyone needs to know everything that is going to be demanded in the game.”
Every player knows his job
Corberán’s squad is a mix of experience and emerging talent, which includes captain Jed Wallace, highly rated striker Brandon Thomas-Asante, goalkeeper Alex Palmer and playmaker John Swift.
There are high hopes for Caleb Taylor, the 20-year-old son of former Birmingham defender Martin and the latest academy graduate.
“Aggression” and “intensity” are two words Corberán regularly uses as he delivers instructions. Every player knows his job and if the team loses at the weekend, it will not be down to a lack of preparation.
Along with his coaches, another key member of Corberán’s backroom staff is Tony Strudwick, Albion’s director of medical and a former head of performance with England and Manchester United.
Strudwick works closely with Corberán in developing the weekly schedule, with every player’s fitness levels and statistics captured by GPS trackers. Players are weighed every day, and were asked to send through personal reports while away during the recent international break.
The mission is always to out-run the opposition and West Brom have one of the fittest squads in a highly competitive league. The team’s average distance per match is 112km (including the goalkeeper and centre-halves, who do less running).
Fitness and athleticism is fundamental to Corberán’s explosive, high-energy game.
Corberán idolising Benítez
The manager’s influence also stretches to the training ground canteen: bread, tomato ketchup and a number of other processed carbohydrates have been removed.
As you walk towards the players’ dressing room, there is a slogan on the wall that perfectly captures his approach.
“If people are doubting how far you can go, go so far that you can’t hear them any more,” it reads.
A former goalkeeper, Corberán has been waiting for these moments ever since idolising Rafael Benítez during his tenure with Liverpool.
Corberán established his reputation in this country working with Leeds’ under-23s and then the first team. He still speaks regularly to Bielsa and describes the relationship as “a privilege”.
In his first job as a No 1, he guided Huddersfield Town to the Championship play-off final, which they lost to Nottingham Forest. Yet it is at West Brom where he feels most at home, and his impact has been significant.
After missing out on the play-offs on the final day of last season, hopes are high that this time he can go further.
On Saturday his team face another test with the visit of league leaders Leicester to the Hawthorns. As usual, ‘King Carlos’ will leave no stone unturned.
Read on site (without a paywall): https://www.telegraph.co.uk/football/2023/11/29/west-brom-carlos-corberan-efl-championship/
1·1 year agoSean Dean reports in The Telegraph:
The question was about Liverpool, but Ivan Toney instead chose to speak about Arsenal. Asked on a podcast earlier this year about his future, and specifically about his support for Liverpool, Toney said: “Yeah, I have been a Liverpool fan my whole life. But from young I have liked Arsenal. I have liked watching Arsenal, how they play and how passionate the fans are.”
Inevitably enough, the gossip machine immediately started to whir. Toney to Arsenal? To many Arsenal supporters, it is an alluring thought. Arsenal have not had a traditional target man since Olivier Giroud left the club in 2018, and Toney has proved himself to be a deadly finisher in the Premier League. On paper, at least, there is a lot to like.
As Arsenal prepare to face Brentford this weekend, then, supporters of both clubs might be wondering if this is a battle between Toney’s future team and his current employers. The striker is still serving his gambling ban, and is therefore unable to play, but his transfer status will be regarded by many as an intriguing plot line on Saturday.
It is no secret Toney is targeting a move to a bigger club. He has said so himself. As of January, he will have 18 months remaining on his Brentford contract and, within the game, it is seen as inevitable that the 27-year-old will soon be departing the Gtech Community Stadium.
Telegraph Sport understands, however, that a January transfer is far from likely. It is also understood that, if Toney is to make a move in the winter window, it will almost certainly not be to Arsenal.
Why? The first reason is that Brentford have no intention of selling their star striker midway through the campaign. Thomas Frank is planning for Toney to lead his attack in the second half of the season and, along with his coaches, is working to create “Ivan Toney version 2.0”.
Brentford’s need for Toney is made greater by the likely loss of strikers Bryan Mbeumo and Yoane Wissa to the Africa Cup of Nations, which runs from mid-January to mid-February. Between them, those two players have scored nine of their side’s 19 league goals this season.
Brentford would have been open to selling Toney at the end of last season, but then he was slapped with an eight-month ban from the game. There have been no talks of a new contract and so, with his deal running out, next summer’s transfer window will likely be the club’s last chance to sell him for a significant fee.
This is not to say that Brentford will simply ignore all offers in January. Every player has a price. In this case, though, that price will be extraordinarily high: earlier this season, Frank spoke of the cost of defensive midfielders (Moises Caicedo joined Chelsea for £115 million, while Declan Rice joined Arsenal for £105 million) and made the point that proven goalscorers have traditionally been the most expensive players to acquire.
At Arsenal, Telegraph Sport understands, there is no appetite to spend vast amounts on a new centre-forward this winter. The pot of money is far from full after their summer investments (a combined £200 million on Rice, Kai Havertz and Jurrien Timber), and it is worth remembering that their deal to sign David Raya, from Brentford, is an initial loan with an option to buy of around £30 million.
It was for financial reasons that the Raya deal was structured in such a way, with the payments for the goalkeeper effectively starting next summer. How could Arsenal strike this type of agreement with Brentford and then, five months later, go back to them with a mega-money offer for Toney? Clearly, it would not be a good look.
Strategically, Arsenal do not view January as a good time to do business. The club have splashed around £600 million on transfer fees since Mikel Arteta’s appointment in 2019, but only around £60 million of that has been spent in winter windows.
Last year, when Arsenal were pushing hard for the league title, was an exception to the usual rule — Leandro Trossard, Jorginho and Jakub Kiwior arrived for a combined cost of around £50 million. Arsenal were actually willing to spend even more that month, having made huge offers for both Mykhailo Mudryk and Caicedo.
This season, however, the feeling at Arsenal is that their squad will be in a good place once their injured players return. There is certainly no sense of urgency when it comes to strengthening the frontline, as Arteta and sporting director Edu are pleased with the performances of Gabriel Jesus, Eddie Nketiah and Leandro Trossard in that position.
Telegraph Sport understands it would therefore take an unexpected opportunity, or a drastic change in circumstances, for Arsenal to invest heavily in another striker this winter.
A more immediate area of concern is in midfield, where there is uncertainty over the futures of Thomas Partey and Jorginho. Partey’s fitness issues have restricted him to only four starts this season, and his contract expires in the summer of 2025. It would not be a surprise if he left before then.
Jorginho’s deal, meanwhile, expires at the end of this season, although there is an option to extend it for another year. Another holding midfielder, Mohamed Elneny, is also out of contact at the end of the current campaign. In the medium to long-term, this is an area that Arsenal will need to address.
So, where does Toney fit into all of this? The answer is that he probably does not fit in at all.
For him to leave Brentford this winter, it will require an offer that very few clubs could make. Perhaps Chelsea is a more obvious destination, given their striker problems, but they cannot keep spending indefinitely.
A swoop for Toney would require Chelsea to move away from their transfer policy of signing young players, and it seems unlikely that his wage demands would fit their new model.
Then there is the issue of Toney’s performances. After eight months out of the game, will he need time to get back up to speed? What sort of player will “Ivan Toney 2.0” be? It would be reasonable for interested clubs to want to wait a few months, and see how he plays in the second half of the season, before throwing wads of cash in Brentford’s direction.
Such things can change in an instant, of course. Sometimes it only takes one injury for a club’s entire transfer policy to be redrawn. But, at this stage of the season, it seems clear that Toney’s departure is not as inevitable or imminent as might have been expected just a few months ago.
From The Telegraph’s Chris Bascombe:
Everton’s director of football, Kevin Thelwell, says the club is united by a sense of injustice following the 10-point deduction for breaking Premier League spending rules.
Everton have dropped to second bottom in the Premier League ahead of this weekend’s visit of Manchester United, and have indicated they will appeal the penalty handed down by an independent commission.
Thelwell echoed the views of the club’s acting chief executive, Colin Chong, in arguing the decision was too harsh.
“Colin’s video message last Friday echoed my views and the sentiment of everybody here at Finch Farm. We are shocked by what we believe is a wholly disproportionate and unjust ruling by the Premier League’s commission,” said Thelwell.
“We cannot say anything further on the commission’s findings until the conclusion of the appeal process.
“But the clear and tangible impact on our league position because of that ruling is clear to see in the Premier League table. We return to action five places lower than the 14th position held following our hard-fought victory over Crystal Palace at Selhurst Park.
“The three points from that victory may no longer be accounted for in the table - nor seven other hard-earned points amassed during this season. But what does remain in place is the unity, focus and determination that helped earn those points on the field of play - now supplemented by the additional fuel of what we believe is a wholly disproportionate ruling.”
Everton were punished because their spending surpassed the threshold of allowable losses over a three year period up to 2022 - the club found to be £19.5 million above what is permissible.
The Merseyside club acknowledged exceeded the amount allowed but said that mitigating factors such as the impact of interest rates on stadium expenditure should be reconsidered upon appeal.
In the meantime, Sean Dyche’s side must turn its attention to ensuring their punishment does not mean they fail to escape the bottom three. Everton could be out of the relegation zone as soon as Sunday if they beat United.
“We are rallying in the face of a sporting sanction in the only way we can - and that is our focus and hard work in supporting the team in delivering to their fullest on the pitch,” said Thelwell.
“We go into this weekend having secured six wins from our last nine outings in all competitions. The team has displayed a level of effort, camaraderie and bravery that is synonymous with this club in earning those victories.
That spirit remains strong - unwavering. Sean and the players are fully focused on the work that lies ahead. And everybody at Finch Farm is united.”
Article link ⤵️
Exclusive from The Telegraph’s John Percy:
West Ham are furious amid fears Michail Antonio has suffered a long-term injury on international duty with Jamaica.
Antonio is flying back to England for a scan as concerns grow that the forward could miss the rest of the season with damage to his medial knee ligament.
The 33-year-old went off late in the first half of Jamaica’s Concacaf Nations League quarter-final against Canada on Saturday night, and was seen limping down the tunnel.
West Ham are understood to be angry because Antonio played for more than 10 minutes after sustaining the injury, while they are also unhappy with the state of the pitch at Kingston’s Independence Park.
Antonio will return for tests and there are hopes that he may only miss up to six weeks with the injury. The worst case scenario is that Antonio could be absent for up to nine months.
Antonio has scored two goals this season and appeared in all of the club’s Premier League matches so far. He has also come on as a substitute in two of the club’s Europa League group matches so far in this campaign.
Jarrod Bowen has also returned to the club after suffering a minor knee injury on international duty with England.
Bowen is West Ham’s leading scorer and did not travel to North Macedonia with Gareth Southgate’s squad for Monday night’s game.
Southgate said: “We felt better to leave him in England so that he can get it properly assessed.
“I don’t think it’s going to be anything serious, but we just didn’t have enough time, and we wouldn’t take a risk with that player.”
More player injuries after Qatar World Cup
The blow to Antonio comes as a study found that injuries to European footballers have became more severe after the winter World Cup in Qatar last year. There has been a jump of nearly 30 per cent in the cost to clubs of having their players sit on the sidelines.
The findings come in a report by City of London insurance firm Howden Group Holdings Ltd., which said clubs in Europe’s leading five leagues suffered a €704.9 million hit from injuries last season, up from €553.6 million the previous campaign. The report calculates the cost of injuries from players’ salaries and the amount of time they are injured.
Teams in the Premier League took the biggest hit, accounting for more than 40 per cent of the cost across the five leagues. In the two months after the World Cup in Qatar, there were 49 injuries in the Premier League, more than in any other top division. Germany’s Bundesliga was second, with 46 injuries.
“The staging of a men’s World Cup in a European winter led to players facing an extra eight days on the sidelines in the second half of the season, compared to the first,” said James Burrows, Howden’s head of sport.
Injuries in October caused players to be out for 11.4 days on average, while January’s injuries led to layoffs of 19.4 days. For consistency, this comparison applied only to players named in World Cup squads.
West Ham return to league action on Saturday with a trip to Burnley.
Article link ⤵️
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/football/2023/11/20/michail-antonio-west-ham-furious-injury-jamaica/
Full story below:
The Premier League’s so-called ‘Big Six’ are at odds with rivals over the long-awaited £130 million pyramid rescue package as a wealth-gap row reignites after the Everton crisis.A meeting between the 20 top-tier shareholders on Tuesday will be the most consequential in years as clubs finally attempt to vote through their New Deal for the wider game.However, amid increasingly febrile scenes after Everton’s 10-point deduction for spending breaches, tensions are resurfacing over whether the top clubs will be contributing enough to the bill. Telegraph Sport detailed a year ago how smaller clubs wanted the richest teams to accept a greater share, potentially through a transfer tax.
A transfer levy of sorts, in addition to the traditional formula of relating contributions strictly to prize money, now appears likely as a model is finalised on Tuesday.However, while some insiders now insist that the New Deal is “on the runway” ahead of Tuesday’s vote, there remains a fierce divide behind the scenes over whether proposals are fair.Several smaller clubs complain a sliding-scale payment system based on merit alone would leave them paying a much higher proportion of their revenue into the solidarity pot.Manchester City, for instance, could be paying as little two per cent of their revenue, which could equate to around £15 million.
That figure is dwarfed by club revenues soaring to a record £712.8 million this year, almost £100 million more than the season before.A wider sense of unfairness is felt most at Everton, where executives are still reeling after the club was plunged into the relegation zone by an independent panel on Friday.It has not been lost on the club that major teams who conspired in Project Big Picture and the European Super League breakaway plots previously went unpunished.
In a reference to unresolved spending inquiries into Chelsea and City, Everton wrote on Friday that “the club will also monitor with great interest the decisions made in any other cases concerning the Premier League’s Profit and Sustainability Rules”.Everton fans build a fighting fundThe club’s fans will be making their own noise in the coming days, having raised over £30,000 for a fighting fund to stage a protest at Goodison Park next weekend.Fans are making banners, flags and leaflets to show their anger amid a hostile atmosphere for a fixture against Manchester United which will be on Sky Sports on Sunday.A GoFundMe page set up by the The1878s Fan Group, which has a target to raise £50,000, says: “We have plans in motion regarding banners and flags against the Independent Commission’s quite frankly, disgraceful and nonsensical decision to deduct the club 10 points. If anyone would like to help, we will release more information in due course. Any more donated will go towards making Goodison Park atmosphere as hostile and electric as it can be at a pivotal time for Everton Football Club. We won’t take this lying down. F— the Premier League.”The Everton situation has prompted MPs to pile renewed pressure on the Premier League to finally announce the New Deal this week after years of talks. The league’s main priority is to ward off a more restrictive model under the new independent regulator in English football which was outlined in the King’s Speech earlier this month.
Dame Caroline Dinenage, chair of the Culture, Media and Sport Committee, said the Everton verdict illustrated “that the status quo cannot continue”.Big Six at odds with rival clubsThe most likely scenario remains that the model for paying for the New Deal remains strictly merit-related rather than connected with any transfer tax.United, City, Liverpool, Chelsea, Arsenal and Tottenham Hotspur have often been at odds with the other clubs over how the new solidarity system should be paid for.Last year they were outvoted after initially proposing those playing in Europe should not have to contribute more and each club’s contribution should strictly mirror their Premier League income.
Small and medium-sized clubs successfully argued then for income from Europe, particularly the Champions League, to be part of the equation. But there is still a feeling that the wealthiest teams should be paying more.The Telegraph reported on Sunday how top clubs are also set to be handed a greater proportion of prize money, with the existing 1.6 to one ratio increasing to 1.8 to one from 2025-26.Other matters to be dealt with on Tuesday include a vote on fast-tracking a ban on loans between associated clubs ahead of the January transfer window. Clubs are also expected to be updated on the league’s negotiations for a new domestic TV rights deal, after executives began the tender process last month.
Full story:
Everton will fight any attempt by rival clubs to sue them for in excess of £200 million following their unprecedented 10-point deduction.
The club were still reeling on Saturday after being hit with the biggest sanction in Premier League history for breaching financial rules.
They have already vowed to appeal the punishment, which opened the door for rival clubs to claim compensation, and Telegraph Sport has learnt they will oppose any attempt to sue them by the likes of Leeds United, Leicester City and Burnley.
Everton are also expected to fight any attempt to make them pay compensation covering multiple seasons amid an earlier ruling by the chair of the commission, David Phillips KC, that Leeds, Leicester, Southampton, Burnley and Nottingham Forest all had “potential claims”.
The former trio were all relegated last season, while Burnley went down the previous year but only they and Leeds would have stayed up if Everton were docked 10 points in either 2021-22 or 2022-23.
Restricting compensation to cover a single season could therefore pit Leeds and Burnley against each other in a battle for a pay-out of around £100 million – the estimated cost of Premier League relegation.
Leicester would push for last season to be included given they would have finished above Everton if the 10-point deduction had applied then, which would have earned them more than £2 million extra in prize money.
Southampton may have no case after finishing 11 points behind Everton, while Forest ended up above their rivals in the final table.
Any club seeking compensation was given 28 days from Friday to lodge a claim with the same independent commission which found Everton guilty.
The independent commission that ruled Everton breached profit and sustainability (PSR) rules for the three seasons ending 2021-22 said “the inference of a sporting advantage is one that should properly be drawn from the fact of a PSR breach, and that sporting advantage will have been enjoyed for each of the seasons on which the PSR calculation was based” but also said “the club had not carried out ‘a deliberate cynical breach of the PSR to achieve a sporting advantage’”.
Any compensation payments could slash the value of Everton’s proposed £500 million sale to 777 Partners.
From The Telegraph’s Chris Bascombe:
Everton have been docked 10 points for breaching the Premier League’s spending rules in an unprecedented punishment for a top-flight club.
An independent commission set up to examine the club’s losses during the era of Farhad Moshiri has found the club guilty.
It means Sean Dyche’s side drop into the bottom three of the Premier League with immediate effect, second from bottom.
Everton are reeling after the decision and have vowed to appeal to the Premier League board.
Club officials are shocked and bewildered that their mitigation was rejected.
The Premier League recommended in October that Everton face a maximum 12-point deduction for breaching profit and sustainability rules, as reported by Telegraph Sport.
The top flight recommended the punishment to be extremely severe.
Everton’s case was heard by the independent commission after they recorded financial losses of £304 million over a three-year period, which is well over the permitted amount of £105 million set out by the Premier League.
Article link ⤵️
From The Telegraph:
The Football Association has been dragged into a fresh Israel row after a council member posted on social media that “Adolf Hitler would be proud of Benjamin Netanyahu”.
Wasim Haq, who also has roles with England Golf and the Lawn Tennis Association, immediately apologised as campaign groups accused him of anti-Semitism.
Haq, who joined the FA’s council in 2019 as a “BAME Football Communities Representative”, wrote in a now deleted post on X: “Netanyahu has sacrificed his own people to maintain power…whilst #Palestinians are trying to maintain their sanity. Adolf Hitler would be proud of Benjamin Netanyahu.”
Among those to express immediate concern was Lord Wolfson of Tredegar KC, who chairs the Football Regulatory Authority which also sits within the FA.
“I’m very concerned that a member of the FA Council [who’s also an Observing Board Member of the Inclusion Advisory Board] posted in these terms,” said the peer, who resigned as a junior justice minister in the Government last year.
“I have already asked for an immediate, formal and urgent investigation,” he said, adding that the FA had “adopted the IHRA definition of antisemitism in January 2021.”
Haq’s message was deleted soon after being posted in the early hours of Sunday, but it was discovered in archived messages by GnasherJew; a campaign group which uses Open Source Intelligence to uncover anti-Semitism.
The FA, which introduced black and ethnic minorities football communities as part of 2017 governance reforms to further help diversify its council, said: “He has deleted the tweet and apologises for causing offence.”
Haq’s post comes just weeks after the FA sparked anger among other members of its own council after a perceived failure to condemn historic tweets on boycotting Israel by Inclusion Advisory Board chair Deji Davies.
Davies had deleted his Twitter posts from 2013, and issued a statement saying the tweet was deleted “as I do not wish to cause any further offence”, that he continues to learn about the subject and stood by the FA’s message of peace and unity for all.
Haq, meanwhile, has been openly posting messages of support for Palestine in recent days. Several messages across his platforms include posts about children innocently caught up in the conflict in Gaza. His latest post with a video of a young girl attached says: “I’m only ten…I don’t know what to do…”
GnasherJew, which sent Telegraph Sport evidence proving the Hitler message had been sent, said Haq was a “disgrace”.
“Introducing you to Wasim Haq,” the organisation posted online. “This vile post needs no explanation. Suffice to say he’s said nothing about the 7th Oct massacre.”
Haq has been approached independently by Telegraph Sport for comment.
As well as being a council member at the FA, Haq is a senior independent director at England Golf, a nominated council member at the LTA and senior advisor to the CEO at Golf Saudi.
Haq has also been managing partner at First Team Partners with “over 25 years of experience and has held senior management roles across the UK strategic consulting landscape in the healthcare, sports marketing and sports recruitment industries”.
He said after his appointment to his unpaid role at the FA: “Whatever your background, in England, there are opportunities for everyone from all walks of life to be involved. I really believe The FA is ‘for all’ and I am delighted to be involved.”
After the conflict erupted when Hamas launched a terrorist attack in Israel, the FA had come under criticism from Jewish leaders for announcing the Wembley Stadium arch would not be illuminated in blue and white.
Read the article here: https://www.telegraph.co.uk/football/2023/11/12/fa-council-member-compares-benjamin-netanyahu-adolf-hitler/
Chief football writer Sam Wallace writes in The Telegraph:
Florentino Perez, the grand old man of Real Madrid, did not leave much unsaid as he laid out his world view at the club’s AGM, which – as can be the case with men of a certain vintage – turned into a list of the people and the things he does not like.
Uefa, Javier Tebas, La Liga’s private equity deal with CVC, referees, Var, the new Champions League format, Tebas again. All of them subject to the ire of the 76-year-old who has ruled over European football’s most successful club for 20 of the past 23 years but in recent times has been unable to resist the great changes to the financial landscape. The European Super League was Perez’s last card and he played it badly. Yet he still holds it, dog-eared and worn, hoping that it will one day prove part of a winning hand.
So opposed to Uefa is Perez that he compared the “unprecedented institutional crisis” of European football as he sees it to the commercial obsolescence of Kodak. “The Super League,” he said on Saturday, “is needed more now than ever”.
He believes on December 21 the European Court of Justice will rule in favour of Uefa having to open up its competitions and license the Super League, although not everyone shares that view. This month the club once again claimed to be in profit, but its balance sheet is propped up by huge sales of future revenue – the infamous financial levers, or “palancas” as they are known in Spain.
Another Perez attack on the status quo from the club that once was the establishment. What is going on here? Perez knows some difficult decisions are coming. Not least what happens next summer, when at last it appears at least that the great prize sought by Real for so long – Kylian Mbappe, arguably the world’s best footballer – is due to be out of contract. This is the moment Real have been waiting for and yet nothing looks simple.
There was a plain weird official club statement last Saturday in which Real denied having begun backdoor negotiations with the Mbappe camp. Given that it came apropos of the kind of flaky reports that appear regularly in the Spanish media, it could easily have been ignored.
Then this week, the Cadena Ser radio station, not known for rocking the boat, solemnly reported that Mbappe might not be coming to Real after all. His salary demands, the report, concluded, would be just too great. Meanwhile, in an interview, the Paris Saint-Germain president Nasser Al-Khelaifi, himself recovering from surgery, was upbeat about Mbappe and his PSG “legacy”.
Mbappe may yet leave, perhaps even for Real. He may renew with PSG. A decision is likely in the spring. The consensus seems to be that Mbappe will go where he believes he has the best chance of winning the Champions League. He would like to be part of the first team to do so at PSG but if that seems unlikely, he will leave and it may not necessarily be for Real.
With free agency wage demands likely to be around €70 million per year there are not many who could afford Mbappe, even in the Premier League. As for Real, that question is even more pertinent.
The club are not the biggest payers in European football as they were when, at the turn of the century, in Perez’s first period as president, they broke the transfer market. Jude Bellingham’s first contract did not make him the club’s best-paid player, although his second surely will. Mbappe’s wage demands would place extraordinary pressure on Real, and force upwards what Bellingham would be entitled to demand. All in a period when their finances are already at breaking point.
The AGM voted to authorise another €370 million loan, and as the debt soars, Perez is now, it seems, suggesting an enormous shift in the club’s 121-year-old member-owned constitution. Few details but he mentioned a corporate restructure which would likely see Real privatise itself by stealth, selling off parts of its it operation as subsidiaries in the same way that Barcelona has done.
It was indicative that one of the first questions from the floor at the AGM, from a YouTuber, was about the €70 million of player sales budgeted into the club’s financial projections for next year. That caveat, leaked ahead of Saturday’s meeting, has been a source of concern for the legion of online Real fans who have done their best to ignore the financial realities of the club.
That was one of a number of signs that point towards the strain on the finances. In the summer of last year, Real sold 30 per cent of revenue over 20 years from their remodelled Bernabeu stadium €360 million (£306 million) to the US investor Sixth Street. Previous agreements which began in the financial year 2017-2018 for the sale of future revenue had been in place with another US investor, Providence. The club books these profits as revenue but Uefa sees them as debt.
The Telegraph revealed in July that €122 million (£103 million), 20 per cent of Real’s costs, are unaccounted for in last year’s financial results. The club has always refused to clarify what this expense, a sub-category of “other operating expenses” is used to cover, or specifically whether it is the repayment on the sale of future revenue streams.
The debt for the stadium remodelling project is an extra cost and has climbed to a separate €1.2 billion, only €800 million of which is covered in the original financing bond. In May, Real lost an arbitration tribunal in Paris with the Abu Dhabi energy giant Mubadala over a €400 million stadium naming agreement from 2014 that the club sought to enforce. The sum is almost equal to the new €370 million borrowings the members are being asked to approve.
For many the size of the debt is too great to contemplate. The numbers mean little, but the effect they might have on a club’s transfer summer, especially when it comes to Mbappe – that is one thing they all notice.
Link to the article: https://www.telegraph.co.uk/football/2023/11/12/real-madrid-finances-florentino-perez-kylian-mbappe/
From Paddy Crerand, writing for The Telegraph:
You know something about Bobby Charlton that people didn’t realise? He was the shyest man that God ever created. If anybody gave him praise, he blushed.
He was a lovely fella, Bobby, there’s no question about that but he was totally different from his brother, Jack. Jack was much more outgoing than Bobby. You cannot believe that, somebody who did the things that he did, when people would speak to him about it, he would go red-faced. He was so shy, it was ridiculous.
But what a player.
We always used to talk at Old Trafford: what was his natural foot? His right one or his left one? And nobody bloody had a clue what his natural foot was. That was how good he was with both feet. You never knew which one was the fricking natural one.
Of course, the Munich air disaster had a lasting impact on him. You’re a young kid at a club and you go there when you’re 14, 15, and you’re playing with players that you’ve come through the ranks with, and, all of a sudden, they’re dead. I remember that and I suppose everybody does in my age group. But, funnily enough, he never mentioned it. I played at United when Harry Gregg was playing and Harry never mentioned it either. You mentioned Munich and both of them went quiet. Never said a word.
I remember when we won the European Cup, Matt Busby and Jimmy Murphy having a go at us because it was one each and we should’ve won the game. We were all at one another’s throats more or less. All that sort of stuff that you do when you’re playing. People don’t think that but you argue with each other and you have a go at each other to lift your game and that sort of thing. That’s what all the arguments and moaning are all about. And, 15 minutes later, we were bloody winning 4-1! He was great, Bobby, in actual fact.
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From The Telegraph’s Business Editor, Ben Marlow:
Big business swamped Liverpool’s Arena and Convention Centre, turning the Labour party conference into a mini-Davos. Google, Mastercard, Ikea and Barclays paid for exhibition stands next to the main conference hall. Deliveroo and Goldman Sachs held fringe events. The parliamentary lounge sponsor was Lloyds bank.
A special business forum with Keir Starmer, shadow chancellor Rachel Reeves and shadow business secretary Jonathan Reynolds was sold out a month beforehand – 200 bigwigs snapped up tickets at a cost of £2,520 a piece. Hundreds more put their names on a waiting list in the hope that someone would drop out.
Amid the jostling, one exhibitor in particular stood out, and not just because of the green and yellow hydrogen-powered 4x4 that was parked in front of its stand. Billionaire industrialist Sir Jim Ratcliffe had dispatched a top team from his chemicals empire Ineos to the jamboree.
As the second-richest man in Britain, one of the country’s most prominent Brexiteers, biggest carbon emitters and a two-time tax exile, it is hard to think of a more unlikely Labour backer. But Ratcliffe’s delegation had serious work to do.
“It was a big team of people and they were coming and going all the time,” one delegate said.
After 10 years of cheap money and mostly friendly government, Britain’s foremost industrialist is facing spiralling interest rates and the prospect of Ed Miliband in charge of energy policy.
Having spent months battling Qatar to invest in his beloved Manchester United, rocketing costs have left Ineos facing its most serious financial squeeze since the credit crunch. Then, debts from a decade of dizzying deal-making came within a whisker of overwhelming it.
As Ratcliffe turns 71 years-old, questions over how Ineos navigates this next chapter are unavoidable for a billionaire increasingly stepping into the limelight. Will the swashbuckling dealmaker again lead it into calmer waters and a new era of growth? Or is his swelling collection of trophy assets the sign of a man preparing to hand over day-to-day running of Britain’s biggest private company?Either way, the tycoon and the sprawling petrochemicals conglomerate that he has spent 25 years assembling are at a crossroads.
Boy’s toys
Ratcliffe has assembled an impressive collection of boy’s toys even for someone with a fortune estimated at nearly £30bn by the Sunday Times Rich List.
He has a private jet and a £130m mega-yacht complete with an underwater viewing window in its wine cellar. Ratcliffe splits his time between homes in Monaco – where he has controversially chosen to become a tax exile for the second time – Majorca, Chelsea, and Lake Geneva in Switzerland. He is radically redeveloping his beachside property in Hampshire, too, to the irritation of some neighbours.
Ratcliffe also owns the struggling fashion label Belstaff, and has started a car company from scratch. It was the Ineos Grenadier – a 4X4 that aims to replace the discontinued Land Rover Defender – on show at the Labour Party conference.
His attention has increasingly been divided by sport, too. In 2017, he bought Swiss side FC Lausanne-Sport and despite admitting to some “silly errors” – they were relegated into the second tier last year – he went on to pay £88m for French top-flight side OGC Nice in 2019.
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https://www.telegraph.co.uk/business/2023/10/21/manchester-united-sale-jim-ratcliffe-ineos-bid/
James Ducker, Northern football correspondent at The Telegraph, writes:
Erling Haaland launched a foul-mouthed tirade at referee Simon Hooper after Manchester City’s dramatic 3-3 draw against Tottenham ended in anger and controversy at the Etihad Stadium.
Haaland led a furious protest when Hooper decided to pull play back for a foul in the fifth minute of stoppage time moments after appearing to play the advantage when the City striker released Jack Grealish through on goal.
The Norwegian – incensed at Hooper seemingly reneging on his original decision and denying a goal-scoring opportunity – charged over to the referee, who was surrounded by an angry mob of City players.
Haaland appeared to scream “F— off! F— off!” at Hooper and was booked for his trouble before getting involved in a clash with Spurs players Giovani Lo Celso and Brennan Johnson at the final whistle when he launched another expletive-strewn rant.
City’s No 9 later took to social media to further vent his anger, posting “Wtf”, which means ‘What the f—”, on X above a video of the incident, a move that could yet land him in hot water with the Football Association.
City, who had come from behind to lead 2-1 and then 3-2 before Dejan Kulusevski plundered a 90th-minute equaliser, also risked being charged by the FA for failing to control their players given the way Hooper was confronted.
Why Haaland was so furious…
Haaland is fouled
The game has entered its fifth minute of stoppage time when, with the scoreline locked at 3-3 after Dejan Kulusevski’s late equaliser, Rodri plays a pass into Haaland. Emerson Royal, the Tottenham defender, comes sliding in and catches Haaland with a poor, lunging challenge.
Referee goes to stop play
The tackle results in the Manchester City striker momentarily falling to his knees and, at that moment, Simon Hooper, the referee, appears ready to blow his whistle, stop the play and award a free-kick.
Haaland gets up and referee signals advantage
Haaland has no intention of staying down and quickly jumps to his feet and turns. Hooper spots the Norwegian’s reaction and resists blowing for the foul and then raises an arm, seemingly to signal advantage being played. It looks like an excellent piece of officiating.
Grealish released but referee blows for free-kick
Haaland’s clipped pass over the top is a beauty and releases team-mate Jack Grealish ahead of three Spurs players, only for Hooper to inexplicably blow his whistle and call the play back, reneging on what appeared his original decision to play the advantage.
Grealish through on goal
Grealish appeared onside and through on goal, even if it cannot be certain the England midfielder would not have been caught. Asked after the game if Spurs had got away with one in that instance, Ange Postecoglou, the Spurs manager, conceded: “Yeah, I guess so, mate.”
Haaland fury
Haaland reacts furiously, charging over to Hooper to lead the inquest as other disbelieving City players, including Ruben Dias, Mateo Kovacic and Rodri surround the beleaguered official. Haaland is a picture of pent-up rage, unable to compute the decision and bellowing in the face of Hooper. City’s No 9 is then booked after appearing to shout “F— off! F— off!” at the referee. Haaland eventually walks away but is seen throwing his arms around in disgust at the decision as others continue the protest. Royal is also shown a yellow card.
Haaland clashes with Spurs staff
Haaland had still not calmed down by the time the final whistle goes a few minutes later and, after the Tottenham player Giovani Lo Celso knocked into him as he went to leave the pitch, City’s top scorer turned out and was seen apparently screaming “F— you! F— you!” in his opponent’s direction. A stand-off with another Spurs player, Brennan Johnson, briefly ensues, with Postecoglou at one point trying to motion Haaland away.
Haaland would later vent his anger on social media, posting the caption “Wtf” – shorthand for ‘What the f—’ – above a video of the incident on Twitter.
Guardiola: I won’t do an Arteta
Pep Guardiola warned he would not “do a Mikel Arteta” by launching into a verbal assault of the officials, as the Arsenal manager had done in the wake of his side’s 1-0 defeat against Newcastle last month.
“Next question, I will not do a Mikel Arteta comment,” he said.
But the City manager insisted Haaland’s reaction was “normal” in the heat of the moment and claimed Hooper would have been “disappointed” by the decision had he been representing the club.
Guardiola also joked that, if the rules prohibiting players from challenging the officials had been applied correctly, 10 City players – all except the captain – should have been sent off.
“It’s normal,” Guardiola said. “His [Haaland’s] reaction was the same for [the other] 10 players. The rules are you cannot talk with the referees or fourth officials so we should have had 10 players sent off today.
“He’s [Haaland] a little bit disappointed. Even the referee – if he played for Man City today he would be disappointed for that action, that’s for sure.
“It is hard when you review the image, the referee decides to blow the whistle after he has already said to play on. After the pass, the whistle, so I do not understand this action.”
Guardiola said he was “surprised” Hooper had blown his whistle having initially signalled advantage to City.
“In that action it’s football,” he said. “I make mistakes, the players make mistakes. It surprised me because in the moment Erling went down for the action from [Emerson Royal] if you whistle in that moment it’s fine.
“But when he stands up and continues and the referee in that moment makes that gesture to ‘play on, play on’ and after he [Haaland] makes the pass he then stops the game. I don’t want to criticise him.
“On the touchline sometimes I lose my mind and my gestures are not proper but here normally for many years as a manager I’m not a guy when I’m refreshed to comment. But I would say we didn’t draw for that.”
‘He made a mistake, it’s a poor call’
Ange Postecoglou admitted that Spurs had perhaps been fortunate when asked if his side had “got away with one” in that instance. “Yeah, I guess so, mate,” the Tottenham manager said.
Hooper’s decision drew criticism from a number of former players. Jamie Carragher, the former Liverpool defender, claimed the referee had “panicked” while Micah Richards said the decision was hard to fathom.
“The referee had a brilliant game today until this moment,” the former City defender said. “I don’t understand. He puts the whistle to his mouth, he waves it on but stops to play advantage. Grealish is clearly through but then he stops the play, which I just don’t understand.
“The evidence is there for all to see. He didn’t blow it the first time but then Grealish is through and he blows it to stop play. He’s cost him a one-on-one chance with the keeper.”
Roy Keane, the former Manchester United captain, claimed City should have been more frustrated about Tottenham’s equaliser. “He’s made a mistake,” Keane said.
“There’s been a few out there today. It’s a poor call, he’s played advantage and give him credit for that, but then he’s stopped it and made a mistake. It’s a poor decision but City should be the critical ones who let Spurs off the hook.”
Link: https://www.telegraph.co.uk/football/2023/12/03/erling-haaland-man-city-tottenham-referee-fury-simon-hooper/