The English Football Thread

[Vesper 27,282]

Herrera: I said ‘Jose, I’ll man-mark Hazard, even follow him to the bathroom’

https://theathletic.com/1856539/2020/06/08/ander-herrera-exclusive-interview-mourinho-van-gaal-woodward-psg-united-manchester-louis-pogba-alexis/

Ander Herrera is casting his mind back to the half-time break in the away dressing room in Manchester City’s Etihad Stadium.

During an abject first 45 minutes in April 2018, Pep Guardiola’s champions-in-waiting had sliced Manchester United apart, racing into a two-goal lead. They were, by then, one half of football away from sealing the Premier League title against their fiercest rivals. Jose Mourinho, a long-time antagonist of Guardiola, would surely have seen it as a personal affront.

And then came the interval. Taking their seats in the dressing room, United’s players let loose. It is hard to overstate City’s excellence in that first half. They teased and tormented their rivals. The home fans sang “Championes” and blue smoke bombs permeated the air. Many United supporters watching on feared that scoreline might double in the second period.

“Me too, me too, as a player,” Herrera sighs. “It is true. I remember at half-time, the dressing room was a funeral. The first 45 minutes, they were amazing. I remember saying to my team-mates, ‘At least we need to go out there and make some tackles. Let’s go and make it difficult for them. We are going to make it nasty for them’. But, in my opinion, they were not humble enough after half-time and we are Manchester United. I think they didn’t think about that. When you are playing the biggest club in the UK, one of the biggest in the world, you cannot sleep even for 10 or 15 minutes because in 15 minutes, we went 3-2 up. Paul Pogba scored two and was amazing. It was probably Alexis Sanchez’s best 45 minutes at Manchester United.

“After the game, we knew they had some T-shirts prepared to say, ‘We did it in the derby day’ so, I think sometimes Karma works! OK, we were not champions but we did not let them do it on derby day, as they wanted to.”

Herrera lets out a little giggle and briefly pauses. In the coronavirus pandemic, he has been deprived of these days of sporting exhilaration and, now at Paris Saint-Germain, he is coming to terms with the dispiriting reality whereby French football has been called off until next season. Legal challenges have arisen, most notably from Lyon, who stand to miss out on European qualification. PSG remain in the Champions League after qualifying for the quarter-finals just before the lockdown but in the absence of domestic football, players will be acutely short of match fitness if the two European competitions do resume in August.

“We do not know what is going to happen,” Herrera says. “We don’t know if we will play the Champions League or not. We do not know if the government is going to allow us to play in France. This is a mess but we, my family, are in Spain, so we are fine. Lyon and PSG are not in the best situation. They took the decision too soon. I think it was too quick to cancel and finish the league. They could have waited a little bit longer to see what was going to happen, and now we can see with Germany and Spain starting back up and they have even pushed the first games before they were expected to be.

“We will try our best to prepare by training — probably we will play some friendly games — but it will never be the same (fitness level). It is all we can do; to try to compete between ourselves in training. I agree with the president of Lyon, who said a few weeks ago that the situation is horrible for French teams. It is not fair. But the government decided to finish the league and we have to adapt.”

---

Herrera is an unusual interviewee in modern football. He does not obfuscate in his answers and he does not shirk topics. A regular in the stands at his boyhood team Real Zaragoza, he describes himself as “a football fan as well as a football player” and it is why an interview with him often feels more like a conversation than a prod and poke exercise.

He admits he finds the idea of football played behind closed doors “horrible” but he is quickly theorising about how the sport may differ. He is hoping to hear more conversations between coaches, players and referees through the TV screen. He expects teams who press fast and high, such as Liverpool, to find life more difficult without supporters urging them on, while the Bundesliga has thrown up more away wins than home ones so far since its resumption.

Herrera says: “Some teams really feel the atmosphere of their fans. Liverpool are one example. Osasuna in Spain get a lot of points because the stadium is small, the fans are really close to the pitch; because they put pressure on the referee. Every team will suffer in this situation but there are some examples where they will suffer even more. It is going to be a new sport. For example, I think more penalties will be scored than before. When you train penalties, you normally score but in the game, it is a different pressure because of the fans.

“My view is that football without fans is nothing but we are realising now that football is a business. It is going to be horrible for football fans and football in general but we have to find ways to enjoy it. The most important thing is that the virus, step by step, disappears. A lot of people make a living through football, so I hope it is the shortest time possible without fans.

“Now in Spain, they talk about the chance to play with 30 per cent of fans, which would be OK, I think. Some bars and restaurants can open at 50 per cent capacity, so why in a stadium which is so open, outdoors, you cannot have some people? Of course, you have to respect distancing. People must travel sensibly and go an hour before, in small groups. It would need to be organised well but it is better than nothing. Everyone has to put their hand up to help in this situation.”

Back home in Zaragoza, Herrera put his hand up early. He made a sizeable donation and collaborated with local councils to organise funding and shopping for local elderly residents shielding during the pandemic. It is a mission he has embarked upon with his usual enthusiasm and zest. One former colleague at United privately compared Herrera recently to former Liverpool defender and now pundit Jamie Carragher; in his enthusiasm for the sport, his depth of knowledge and, in the nicest possible way, he is always talking.

Over an hour-long conversation with The Athletic, he speaks openly about his five years at Manchester United. He details the “disagreements” with Ed Woodward that led him to leave on a free transfer last summer, reflects on the management of Mourinho, Louis van Gaal and Ole Gunnar Solskjaer, while also offering his opinions and insight on some of United’s most contentious players, including Pogba and Sanchez.

First, to the good times.

It can be easy to forget, amid the heightened emotions and all the setbacks, that Manchester United have enjoyed some rather good days over the past seven years. After signing for the club in the summer of 2014, coinciding with the arrival of Van Gaal, Herrera featured in many of these happier times. He started the League Cup final win over Southampton and subsequent Europa League final defeat of Ajax in 2017. He assisted Anthony Martial’s winning goal in the FA Cup semi-final victory against Everton in 2016 and then scored the winner as Tottenham were beaten at the same stage two years later.

Among United supporters, he is probably most fondly remembered for a series of duels against Chelsea, where Mourinho, having reinvented Herrera as a snap-at-your-heels midfielder, challenged the Spaniard to man-mark Eden Hazard. Most successfully, it came to fruition in a 2-0 victory over Antonio Conte’s title-bound side in April 2017. On the day, Herrera made one goal, scored another and threw a blanket over Chelsea’s main man.

Herrera says: “Jose and I both knew Hazard was the best player, by far, in the Premier League at the time, so if we wanted to win that game, we needed him not to touch the ball, or at least as little as possible. That’s what we agreed. I said, ‘Jose, I am ready if you need me to man-mark him, to follow him everywhere. If he wants to go to the bathroom, I will go with him because I want to win the game’. The most important thing in football is that my team wins, because then I go to sleep happy. It does not matter what you have to do, as long as you respect the rules and don’t do anything illegal.”

A month before, Herrera’s lines blurred a little.

United went to Chelsea in the FA Cup and his man-marking job on Hazard saw him receive two yellow cards and a dismissal inside 35 minutes. Despite the defeat, player and manager viewed their tactical plan as a success. “We were playing very well,” Herrera recalls. “We lost 1-0 but we had control of the game. Hazard was not playing really good that day. In a very strange decision by the referee, he sent me off around the halfway line. It was not even a violent foul. It was a normal foul; one of those you have 20 or 25 of in every game. But we knew after that game we did something good and we were going to get it right.”

On those days where you get it right for Mourinho, what is he like to play for?

“Mourinho is the best manager in the world when things go well. The relationship with the players, the way he treats everyone; I really liked his training sessions. Also, with (long-time assistant) Rui Faria, they were a fantastic team together. But it is also true, when he loses, he does not take it in a good way. That is true. And he accepts that! He does not hide from it. We have a great relationship. The first year was fantastic, we won three titles. The second year, we won 84 points in the Premier League and came second. We lost the FA Cup final but we played much better than Chelsea (that day), if you remember that game.”

The third season, however, was a calamity. United sacked Mourinho a week before Christmas as the team languished closer in points to the relegation zone than to the top of the table.

“It is true the last six months was a bit different,” Herrera begins, “because he had some disagreements with the club and the team was a bit, you know… when you see your manager has some confrontations with the club, you do not perform the same way. It is true. Everything affects the training session, everything affects the daily work.”

From the outside, I suggest, it appeared the problems began on the pre-season tour in the US and every Mourinho press conference seemed to add to the brewing tension.

“Yeah, I agree,” Herrera says. “Something was happening between him and the club. But I was just a player. I am no one to tell you or find out what happened (between them). I was just trying to do my job. But it is true, the same as you saw at that time, we were seeing the same. Something was happening between him and the club.”

A little more under the radar, something was happening too — between Herrera and the club.

The midfielder’s contract was due to expire at the end of the 2018-19 season and it came as a surprise last spring when Herrera’s time at the club came to a close. It was particularly strange given his role in the instant recovery under interim manager Solskjaer, starting in significant victories at Arsenal, Spurs, Leicester and Chelsea before the Norwegian was given the job full-time.

Herrera starts by explaining Solskjaer’s impact: “The first thing to say is I do not like to make comparisons between managers, particularly as I had a great relationship with Mourinho. As soon as Ole came, he brought that smile to the dressing room. He was ready to listen to the players, he was more like a friend. He was a man who had, not long ago, been a United player. Everyone connected really well with him.

“He is, honestly, one of the best people I have found in football. I am still in contact with him because he is fantastic and deserves to be successful. You do not find too many people like him in football; someone so honest, so ready to help, always by your side. It doesn’t matter the situation; as soon as you work and give everything, he is there for you. That was his first quality; to connect very soon with the dressing room.”

Why, then, did Herrera leave behind a manager he likes so much? Reports suggested that PSG offered a bumper contract and at the age of 30, a five-year deal naturally appealed.

“It was not about money,” Herrera insists. “It was not about the duration of the contract offer. In my opinion, I waited too long (for an offer) and deserved more attention from the club. I was a player that gave everything. I never complained. I never went to the media to complain about anything. I never put a bad face to any manager, to any member of the board, and they waited until I had five or six months left on my contract.

“That’s why I had some disagreements with them. I tell you this but I also tell you that it is part of football, part of life, nothing personal at all. But you ask the question and I give my point of view, as a professional player.”

It seems, therefore, that it may have been a different resolution had United been proactive, rather than reactive?

“Yes, absolutely,” Herrera agrees. “I thought they were going to come two years before my contract finished, like most other clubs do. I expected them to come to sign a new contract after my club Player of the Year award in 2017 but they waited until I had six months left on my contract. I just felt sad. But, I repeat, and I really want you to put this so clear in this interview — that it is part of football, part of life. This is only professional and I have no personal problem with them.

“They had a different idea about the club, about the team, and I respect that 100 per cent. Even if I see Ed Woodward tomorrow, I’ll give him a hug because it is life. I had a great relationship with him. He is a very good man but we had some disagreements with our point of views about the team and about the club. That’s it.

“Every time I wore the United shirt, I was so proud. Every time I walked into Old Trafford, I was so proud to be part of that. I remember Sir Alex Ferguson used to travel with us sometimes for Premier League or Champions League games. When he is there, you feel this amazing aura, this sense in the room. You can feel how important he has been for the club. On that first day I signed for the club, I was in shock because I was signing for the biggest club in England — one of the top three or four in the world — and Sir Bobby Charlton was there waiting for me at the training ground. My dad (Pedro) was even happier than me.

“Dad played 200 games in the Spanish first division but Sir Bobby was one of the great players for him growing up. We were so thankful for the club and how I was treated for five years. In spite of what I told you before, how I was a bit sad for the final two years as they didn’t come to sign a new contract, I don’t have one bad word for the club.”

---

Herrera has adapted quickly to life in France, learning another language and securing a league title. United, meanwhile, did seem a midfielder short for much of the first half of this campaign, although they are now bolstered by the return of Pogba and January addition of Bruno Fernandes.

“When I stop playing football and when I am older,” Herrera says, “I do not want to regret anything. I don’t have time to think about what could have happened. I am thinking about the next day, the next challenge, because we have the best job in the world. It is as simple as that. I want to enjoy every single day of my career. And when you wake up every day and train with Neymar, Kylian Mbappe, Marco Verratti and Marquinhos — players who could win the Ballon d’Or one day — it is very easy to enjoy.”

As has become the norm in his career, a new manager has taught him a new position, as Herrera filled in at right-back for Thomas Tuchel earlier in the campaign. Herrera evolved his game from attacking playmaker under Marcelo Bielsa at Athletic Bilbao to a more regimented role for Van Gaal’s United, before becoming more defensive again under Mourinho.

It was under Bielsa’s guidance that Herrera first caught United’s eye, impressing Ferguson and club scouts in a mesmeric Bilbao display on the night the Basques won 3-2 at Old Trafford in a Europa League last 16 tie in 2012. United came close to signing him under David Moyes but then sealed the deal with Van Gaal in 2014. He has now built up a star-studded cast of coaches.

“But I do not want to be a manager — and I will tell you why. The manager is probably the most unfair position in football. You can work so hard —you can give your life, you can think about the opponent, you can work 24 hours — and after all that, if the ball hits the post and goes out, probably you will be sacked.

“I cannot say, ‘100 per cent, never’ because you never know, but I am not thinking about that. I probably will have a position in football because it is my life but to be a manager, it is so difficult. I like to have some empathy with managers and it is so difficult to have a dressing room, to try to control 23 or 24 egos. Every player has his dad or his mum who thinks he has to play every game for 90 minutes, every player has a brother who thinks he can do it better than the manager. What I know is that the managers I have played under are examples for other coaches.

“It was a big change, from Bielsa to Van Gaal.  They are both offensive coaches. They want to win games through possession but the way they do it is completely different.

“Bielsa wants players moving all the time, looking for space, breaking the defence by running into space. Van Gaal wants order and control by staying in your position and controlling that space on the pitch. Bielsa wants movement all the time and he does not understand possession of the ball if it is not to score goals. If you are winning 2-0 or 3-0, he wants you to score the fourth or the fifth because he does not understand football in a different way. He just wants you to keep attacking. If you are winning, he thinks the best way to close the game is to keep scoring goals. Van Gaal, he thinks differently. When you are winning 1-0 or 2-0, he wants to control the game, he wants to keep the ball and not put the ball at risk.

“I had a lot of conversations with Van Gaal, because I was used to playing under Bielsa. Whenever my team-mates had the ball, I was looking for the space and to move all the time. But after one or two months, I realised Van Gaal was looking for a different thing. He wanted me to stay more in the position and keep the ball.

“It was amazing to have those conversations with Louis, because he is like a teacher for other managers. He was very receptive. He has an image in front of you guys, the media. It is sometimes true that in front of some people or the media, he can look very rude (direct) as he is a strong man. But I found a man with a huge heart. That is my experience with him — a great person.”

Herrera’s former team-mate Wayne Rooney recently suggested Van Gaal was harshly dismissed by United two days after winning the 2015-16 FA Cup final. Could he have gone on and built a great United team?

“No one knows,” Herrera says. “What I do know is Mourinho came and we won three trophies the next season. We were successful when he left, that is the truth. I enjoyed it with Van Gaal but under Mourinho, I found a new position on the pitch and learned to do new things.”

Herrera’s success under Mourinho was not shared by all of his team-mates. Most notably, Sanchez arrived midway through the 2017-18 season. Yet the Chilean forward, currently on loan at Inter Milan, scored only five goals for United. Inside the dressing room, Herrera watched on as bewildered as the rest of us.

“Sometimes, in football, there is no explanation for every single thing that happens,” the midfielder says. “Alexis is one of them. He came from Arsenal. He used to win games by himself for Arsenal. I remember watching him because Arsenal were our rivals for titles and the top four. I saw them losing games 2-0 and Alexis would score two and they’d win the game. He’d score the winning goal.

“It shows football sometimes has no explanation. How can a player, who one month before, two months before, is the best player by far in a big team like Arsenal… then he comes to United and he doesn’t perform? I have no explanation.

“He trains good, he is a good professional, he tries to improve. In training sessions, you can see his quality. He scores a lot of goals. In front of the goalkeeper in training, he was lethal, scoring goals, goals, goals. He fights if he loses the ball, he runs back and wins the ball, so he had everything to succeed at United, and he didn’t do it. The only thing I can tell you is that I have no explanation.”

It would not be a conversation over recent times at United if Paul Pogba is not mentioned.

The Frenchman was once described by the Italian newspaper Gazzetta Dello Sport as an “NBA athlete with Brazilian feet”.

“But I would add something else,” Herrera interjects. “‘An NBA athlete with Brazilian feet and the combinations of a Spanish midfielder’. He can combine really well — he can do one-two, very quick at high speed. He does have a good attitude.

“I give you my opinion: I don’t know what other players say but he is a midfielder that has everything. If you see other midfielders in the world, they may have some qualities — control of the ball, long shots, passes, tackles, box-to-box — but Paul can do all of this, plus head the ball, score goals, make recoveries, one against one… everything.

“But of course, if you want to become the best midfielder in the world, it is about consistency. You have to do it day in, day out. He is a good guy. He wants to do it. He does train well. He has to do it every day.”

Herrera senses similar potential in United strikers Marcus Rashford and Anthony Martial, who have both, in periods of this campaign, demonstrated renewed quality and consistency.

He says: “They have the quality to be among the top 10 in the world. Why do we admire Lionel Messi or Cristiano Ronaldo, or Hazard, who I also think is one of the best in the world? We admire them because they keep that form for a long time. If they do it, they will become… maybe not Messi or Cristiano, because they are unique in the history of football… but they can be top five or top 10, but they have to do it for a long time and keep it up.

“It is the same for Paul. Rashford is on his way to doing it. And Paul can be the best midfielder in the world if he keeps playing those games where we are all amazed by him. But to keep it at that level is the most difficult thing in football. To keep at it it Sunday-Wednesday-Saturday, every time.

“If those three can do that, Manchester United will win the Premier League soon, for sure.”

[Jase 43,479]

 

[MoroccanBlue 5,192]

Verdict in July.

Worth noting, verdicts take typically between 3-6 months. 

 

 

[Atomiswave 6,072]

47 minutes ago, MoroccanBlue said:

Verdict in July.

Worth noting, verdicts take typically between 3-6 months. 

 

 

As long as they get to serve 2 years without CL its all good.....the fine is worth jack shit.

[MoroccanBlue 5,192]

With such a quick verdict timing, I can't help but think City brought nothing to the table. Nothing refutable against the evidence UEFA had, hence the quick verdict.

Least I'm hoping. 

[Vesper 27,282]

6 minutes ago, MoroccanBlue said:

With such a quick verdict timing, I can't help but think City brought nothing to the table. Nothing refutable against the evidence UEFA had, hence the quick verdict.

Least I'm hoping. 

That or Sheik Mansour doubled the bribe.

[MoroccanBlue 5,192]

Dele Ali banned for one game due to his coronavirus tweet. 

Great. Misses United match 

[Atomiswave 6,072]

2 hours ago, Vesper said:

That or Sheik Mansour doubled the bribe.

Nahh they are in the spot light, many parties have eys on this now. They are fucked my friend.

[Magic Lamps 11,445]

2 hours ago, MoroccanBlue said:

Dele Ali banned for one game due to his coronavirus tweet. 

Great. Misses United match 

Corrupted fA swooping in to save Utd a CL spot. I still don’t get why such a political Organisation like FA is allowed to run the PL. should be managed by a commercial organisation in which every club has same voting rights. Like in Germany where DFB who are just as corrupted have nothing to say over DFL who are running the league. 
Still, might have dodged a bullet. Spurs are better without Ali anyway.

[Atomiswave 6,072]

32 minutes ago, Magic Lamps said:

Corrupted fA swooping in to save Utd a CL spot. I still don’t get why such a political Organisation like FA is allowed to run the PL. should be managed by a commercial organisation in which every club has same voting rights. Like in Germany where DFB who are just as corrupted have nothing to say over DFL who are running the league. 
Still, might have dodged a bullet. Spurs are better without Ali anyway.

When the chairman of FA comes out and says that epl needs udt being successful and at the top then you know the shit stinks. And ever since it came about that city will get banned they did their utter best to hand them a CL place....thats not by coincidence. When big money started coming in it was bound to get corrupted...goes hand in hand. Its rotten to the core.

[killer1257 3,282]

I think Spurs played better without Alli before Covid 19 started

Gesendet von meinem SM-G920F mit Tapatalk

[Vesper 27,282]

Premier League player names to be replaced on shirts by Black Lives Matter

https://www.theguardian.com/football/2020/jun/11/premier-league-shirts-to-show-support-for-black-lives-matter-and-nhs-minute-silence-coronavirus

A minute’s silence will be held before each match in the first round of the restarted Premier League to honour those who have died with Covid-19. Heart-shaped badges paying tribute to NHS workers will be embroidered into team kit, and various measures of support for the Black Lives Matter movement were also agreed upon at Thursday’s meeting between top-flight clubs.

The Guardian understands that the league will have no problem if players or teams wish to take a knee before games, as some clubs have done before recent friendlies. The names on the back of players’ shirts will be replaced, for at least the first set of games, by the words Black Lives Matter, following an initiative driven by club captains this week. One club explained that their kit staff had been primed to order shirts reflecting the change.

Black Lives Matter badges are also likely to be displayed on shirts, along with their NHS equivalents, although their exact placement is yet to be finalised.

The issue of what happens if a player removes his shirt to reveal a slogan in support of the movement was raised, after referees expressed concerns about the appropriateness of issuing a mandatory yellow card in such cases. Officials are expected to be asked to use their discretion.

 

[Atomiswave 6,072]

16 minutes ago, Vesper said:

Premier League player names to be replaced on shirts by Black Lives Matter

https://www.theguardian.com/football/2020/jun/11/premier-league-shirts-to-show-support-for-black-lives-matter-and-nhs-minute-silence-coronavirus

A minute’s silence will be held before each match in the first round of the restarted Premier League to honour those who have died with Covid-19. Heart-shaped badges paying tribute to NHS workers will be embroidered into team kit, and various measures of support for the Black Lives Matter movement were also agreed upon at Thursday’s meeting between top-flight clubs.Europe's major leagues prepare for restart – Football Weekly Ext

The Guardian understands that the league will have no problem if players or teams wish to take a knee before games, as some clubs have done before recent friendlies. The names on the back of players’ shirts will be replaced, for at least the first set of games, by the words Black Lives Matter, following an initiative driven by club captains this week. One club explained that their kit staff had been primed to order shirts reflecting the change.

Black Lives Matter badges are also likely to be displayed on shirts, along with their NHS equivalents, although their exact placement is yet to be finalised.

The issue of what happens if a player removes his shirt to reveal a slogan in support of the movement was raised, after referees expressed concerns about the appropriateness of issuing a mandatory yellow card in such cases. Officials are expected to be asked to use their discretion.

 

This shit wont help in the end, you need a proper system installed, proper punishment instilled and most of all proper training and psycological tests done.

[Vesper 27,282]

The whistleblower whose leaks led to Manchester City’s Champions League ban

https://theathletic.com/1866642/2020/06/12/whistleblower-hacking-manchester-city-rui-pinto/

To his enemies, he is a criminal. A bandit with a laptop and an anarchist’s lust for chaos.

To his supporters and sympathisers, he is a hero, a moral crusader who was brave enough to shine a light upon the shadowy hinterlands of the world’s favourite sport.

In the world of Rui Pinto, the man behind the Football Leaks revelations, nothing is ever cut and dried. He has gained access to tens of millions of private documents yet he is adamant he is not a hacker. His lawyers call him “a great European whistleblower” but he also stands accused of attempted extortion. To describe him as a complex character would be to undersell things by an order of magnitude.

This much, however, is crystal clear: Pinto is unlikely to slip into irrelevance any time soon.

For a start, we are still feeling the aftershocks from a series of exposes published by German magazine Der Spiegel, based on information shared by Pinto. Manchester City, who are awaiting a verdict from the Court of Arbitration for Sport on their appeal against a two-year Champions League ban, can attest to the far-reaching consequences of Pinto’s actions — UEFA’s original investigation into the club began shortly after documents and emails obtained by Pinto were published in November 2018.

Then, there is Pinto’s own legal situation, which continues to be the source of much controversy, particularly in his home country. The 31-year-old spent over a year in custody in a Lisbon prison after being extradited from Hungary in March 2019. During that time, the number of charges against him grew from six to 147, before being reduced to 90. In April, he was released on house arrest, without access to the internet.

He has yet to stand trial.

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Pinto grew up in Vila Nova de Gaia, on the rolling hills opposite Porto, Portugal’s second city. As a boy, he was obsessed with football, holding a special passion for FC Porto. His mother died when he was 11. In the years that followed, he became distracted at school, preferring to stay up late at night on his computer.

Hindsight can be a blunt instrument but those who knew him seemed to sense something different about him, even then. “It’s very, very difficult to characterise Rui,” one of his former teachers told the New Yorker. “If he wanted it, he would probably be the best pupil from the class but he was not.”

This chimes with the image painted by Christoph Winterbach, one of the journalists at Der Spiegel who later worked on the Football Leaks stories. He describes Pinto as an “autodidact” — someone who felt his intelligence was best cultivated alone rather than within bounds set by an authority figure. “Rui certainly is a deep, self-conscious thinker,” says Winterbach. “He embraces a do-it-yourself mentality. He very quickly grasps and remembers the context of complex matters.”

All of which goes some way to explaining how a history undergraduate — he never finished the degree — with no formal IT qualifications could end up obtaining and sifting through the data that formed the basis of the first set of Football Leaks in 2015.

At that stage, Pinto was living in Budapest, working as an antique dealer. He was publishing on a rickety Russian blog platform and says that his information had been leaked to him by disgruntled football insiders. It was the start of a tidal wave: by the end of 2018, he had supplied Der Spiegel and their partners in the European Investigative Collaborations group with more than 70 million documents, rewriting much of what we know about the business of football in the process.

Look at the clubs and individuals mentioned in the investigations and it is not difficult to understand why Pinto might be regarded by the establishment as an irritant at best, a walking time bomb at worst.

There were frothy tales about bizarre clauses in players’ contracts: a “no red boots” rule imposed on Rafael van der Vaart by Real Betis, for instance, or Liverpool’s insistence that Roberto Firmino could be sold for £98 million two years before the end of his deal at the club… as long as the buying club was not Arsenal. Even more amusing was the suggestion that Real Madrid had played down the scale of the transfer fee paid to Tottenham for Gareth Bale and preserved Cristiano Ronaldo’s status as the world’s most expensive footballer in 2013.

Then were the knottier, more consequential stories on the tax dealings of Ronaldo, Jose Mourinho and Mesut Ozil; on the movement, led by Bayern Munich, to start a breakaway European Super League; on City and Paris Saint-Germain’s compliance with financial fair play; on a rape allegation against Ronaldo. This is by no means an exhaustive list but it hints at the scale of the waves made by one man (Pinto has repeatedly claimed that he did not work alone but responsibility for the leaks has thus far fallen on his shoulders alone).

Bayern Munich denied being involved in breakaway discussions, UEFA dropped their case against PSG and Ronaldo, who has always denied the rape claims, has never been charged.

Yet Pinto’s supporters argue that the weight of the legal case against him is in large part down to his revelations about Benfica, Portugal’s biggest team. They claim that a sequence of explosive emails released in 2017, appearing to reveal widespread corruption at the club, prompted a web of officials sympathetic to the Benfica cause to close ranks. Benfica have always maintained the corruption claims are groundless.

Ana Gomes, a politician who represented Portugal in the European Parliament for 15 years until 2019, has been one of Pinto’s most vocal advocates. “Rui Pinto revealed things about all of the big clubs in Portugal,” she says. But she adds that as Benfica are the best-supported club in Portugal, they have an advantage even within the justice system.

In the tribalistic world of Portuguese football, it was no great surprise that Pinto’s motivations were called into question. The fact that some of the Benfica emails were first sent to Porto, their main rivals, did little to persuade Pinto’s critics that he was not simply trying to cause trouble, perhaps even to the benefit of his own team. Beyond that, there were two obvious chapters in his story that seemed to cast doubt on his moral rectitude: a 2013 police investigation into two suspicious bank transfers that led to an out-of-court settlement with Caledonian Bank and the alleged attempted extortion of a third-party ownership fund named in Football Leaks (Pinto has protested his innocence in the latter case).

The alternate view, of course, is that Pinto was simply holding power to account — that he should be treated as a whistleblower and protected by the state. Revered, even. “Rui Pinto should be the pride of Portugal,” his French lawyer, William Bourdon, told Publico magazine earlier this year. There have been protests in Porto; a group of supporters snuck into parliament in March to shout for his release.

“He is already seen as a hero by many in Portugal,” says Gomes. “But I hope that the legal system does him justice. He may have committed some crimes but they must take into consideration the extraordinary public service he has done.

“I have the impression that his work with Football Leaks was very important in the development of his political conscience, his understanding of what a whistleblower is. Today, I do not doubt that he is well aware of what he has done. I do not doubt all that he acted in the public interest. It was a conscious act of citizenship.”

Winterbach, who travelled to Lisbon to interview Pinto late last year, echoes that view. “Rui’s love for football and his disdain for the dirty business surrounding the game seems genuine to me,” he says. “He never tried to influence the spin of the articles that were written based on his material. He just wanted lots of journalists to work with the data [and run with it]. I believe his idealism has not been shattered yet.”

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The outlook for Pinto appears to have improved slightly in the past few months. The stance of the Portuguese authorities, who were initially more focused on building the case against Pinto than using his information, has softened. It has been reported that he was moved to house arrest after agreeing to provide the passwords for 10 hard drives that the police had seized but had been unable to decrypt.

News that Pinto was behind Luanda Leaks — the release of a slew of documents that pointed to questionable financial dealings by Isabel dos Santos, Africa’s richest woman — has not harmed his reputation. “I think Luanda Leaks has been very important,” says Gomes. “It showed people that it wasn’t just about football — that this wasn’t motivated by rivalries between fans.”

Then there was a recent interview given by Luis Neves, the director of Portugal’s national criminal investigation agency, who hinted that a more collaborative relationship could be in the offing.

“Throughout my life, I have worked with collaborators, people with whom we have created bonds of confidence, who bring us information that is very relevant,” Neves told newspaper Diario de Noticias. “Pinto is a relatively young, educated person who is concerned about protecting society — about questions of equality and social justice. That is important.

“He will respond to the court, which will decide which crimes he did or did not commit, what punishment he will face. My hope for Rui Pinto, like anyone accused of a crime, is that he can return to a normal life.”

It might be slightly too late in the day for that. It also seems unlikely that this tale will draw to a quiet close whenever Pinto does take the dock. “This fight is far from over,” he told Der Spiegel in December, and to hear Winterbach’s memories of that meeting in the prison is to get the sense that Rui Pinto may not be done with the world of football yet.

“I remember him storming into the room, beaming with joy to see us,” says Winterbach. “He’s very charismatic and even in that stressful situation, you could see the twinkle in his eyes.

“He avidly follows everything that happens in the football world and he’s ready to make his case in front of the court.”

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Friday June 12 2020 Football Nerd

United and City are quick off the mark. Newcastle are not By Daniel Zeqiri Saint-Maximin will want to help Newcastle mend their reputation for slow starting   Such is the football fan's inclination towards baseless optimism, every supporter will believe their team is uniquely well prepared for the Premier League's resumption. In the absence of performance data from training sessions, is there any evidence to suggest which teams will be fast re-starters? The only available comparison to a three-month hiatus caused by a global pandemic is the break between seasons in non-tournament summers, and how teams begin the following campaign in August. The importance of flying out of the traps has changed over the course of the Premier League era. Sir Alex Ferguson famously remarked that title challenges begin in February and Manchester United were masters of timing their run, like a champion jockey keeping a horse on the bridle before picking off the field in the closing furlongs. Arsenal lost four matches before the turn of the year when they won their first title under Arsene Wenger in 1997-98, with 13 victories in 14 games propelling them to the summit in the second half of the season. This pattern changed when Jose Mourinho arrived at Chelsea in 2004, who prepared his team to start the season in top gear. They won consecutive titles by establishing early leads and holding their rivals at bay. Pep Guardiola and Jurgen Klopp have taken things to another level, setting a relentless pace and making 100-point seasons feasible. Based on the opening day fixtures from the past five seasons of domestic football, City and United have been the best starters winning all five games. Of course, some of the 20 teams currently in the Premier League have had seasons in the Championship during this period but their results have still been considered.   Unsurprisingly, United have the best opening day record across the Premier League era, losing just five of 28 and beating Chelsea and Leicester City in their last two openers. Chelsea have punched below their weight on recent opening weekends. A 2-2 draw at home to Swansea in 2015 was the start of Mourinho's demise and two years later they were beaten by Burnley at Stamford Bridge. This season, Frank Lampard's reign began with a 4-0 loss at Old Trafford. Arsenal are another team who tend to teeter on the brink of crisis every August due to injury problems or a transfer saga. They have lost four of their last seven opening day fixtures - including home defeats by Aston Villa and West Ham - but have had some difficult starts including Liverpool and Manchester City at the Emirates. By far the worst starters however, are Newcastle United, with just one point from their last five opening day fixtures. That includes their season in the Championship under Rafael Benitez when they lost their first two games - away at Fulham and at home to Huddersfield. Newcastle's last two opening day fixtures have been at home to Tottenham and Arsenal, losing both.

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https://www.goal.com/en/news/liverpool-wont-go-down-as-one-of-the-great-all-time-english/1we67i0efqe9m1cwblj2rkfec8

This wont go down well at scouse land....though spot on he is for once.

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Its lovely but so bored of hearing about them lol. Yes it'll be empty..yes they'll eventually one day have a parade..should we all be jealous at their year no! Do find it funny how they seem to think the reason the were calls for the season to be called off is so they wouldn't be champions. Itd be interesting but more to do with people dying and all...