Match of the Data

The best thing that ever happened to football   

A strategy memo definitely not found on the printer at Premier League HQ (because no one works in offices anymore or prints things out). But, if they did happen to have a Zoom call that they forgot to put the security settings on, what follows is a purely fictional account of a purely fictional presentation to a blue-sky thinking session by consultant Stu Richermore that might have been overheard by our crack investigative reporter Doug Out [is that good enough for the lawyers? - ed] … 

Die Another (Match of the) Day

Balls

An open letter to the new Director General of the BBC by Mr Daniel Forman.

Dear George,

Congratulations on your appointment and hope you've enjoyed your first few weeks in the job. You don't strike me as much of a football fan and you don't seem to have had much to do with sport in your long career at the BBC but I hope I'm wrong about that as I have something quite important to tell you: Match of the Day is about to die.

Dickheads #7 - Alan Shearer

'Hands up if you're a dickhead'

After Greg's Crazy Gang piece caused such a furore in south west London last week, we thought we'd piss off the north east this time. Welcome to Magic Spongers Mr Ryan Hubbard, who can be found at the excellent Ryan Hubbard's Modern Football and on Twitter.

I'm not really a man who hates people. I'll generally try to be nice to everyone I meet; even Nottingham Forest fans. Sometimes. But occasionally there are some people who get right on my tits. Wayne Rooney, Neil Warnock and Jedward to name a few; they all have the ability to do my nut right in - but I can cope with their minor dickheadedness. However, there is one man who stands hair, head, shoulders and, as Ramon Vega found out, elbows above the rest. Alan Shearer is the biggest dickhead I have ever had the misfortune of seeing. It has nothing to do with the fact he's a Newcastle legend; there are legends at Leicester too. And Newcastle is definitely one of the friendliest places that I've had the pleasure to visit. But there are many, many reasons why I reckon Alan Shearer is a dickhead.

Get Jimbo On The BBC

As responsible human beings, it is our obligation to back James Richardson as Adrian Chiles' replacement on Match of the Day 2. As if it wasn't bad enough that the BBC preferred Chiles to Jimbo in the first place, now that he's flounced off to ITV, they're in real danger of making the same mistake again. Remember Football Italia? Listen to the Guardian's podcast? Feel sorry for former Setanta employees? Enough said.

Jimbo is class. And most importantly, he's not Colin Murray. OR TIM LOVEJOY.

AC Jimbo. Change we can believe in.

Click Here