Decoding and demystifying football

Nature of Football

On language, stats, and football

Americans call aubergines ‘eggplants’. For those familiar with the deep purple skin of the vegetable(?), this seems peculiar. To British ears, it’s one of those “oh, America!” things to roll ones eyes at and quietly mock, like ‘pants’ and ‘soccer’ and the missing ‘u’ in ‘colour’. And then you

Is this the death of formations (as we know them)?

Our dark crime thriller opens… The shadow of Pep Guardiola looms large over the bleeding body of Formations. He covers the body with the cardigan he discarded earlier, now sodden, storing his bloodied knife in his cargo trousers. It was a methodical kill, but he doesn’t need to disguise

Is football a 'weak link' sport?

Once upon a time, there was a book called The Numbers Game, by David Sally and Chris Anderson. In it, among other things, was a chapter on football and O-ring theory, teaching a young generation of nerdy football watchers two things. One: the story of the Challenger disaster, which tragically

Why we could be close to a return of hoofball

As the ex-pros from the ‘80s made us very well aware a few years ago, nothing is new under the sun in football. ‘Pressing’? They did that. And pretty soon footballers of the ‘90s will be lining up to tell us how they used to specialise in the trendy tactics

Red cards

There’s something about the mechanics of tackling and what makes them dangerous that I’ve wanted to write for a while. Southampton vs Burnley finally provided the perfect example. In the modern age, we’ve grown used to the idea that studs high up on another person’s leg