Euro Revision #1: Manchester United v Fiorentina

With the Champions League Final at Wembley looming, here's the first of a new Magic Spongers mini-series looking back at our favourite European games: Twisted Blood's Andi Thomas gets alarmingly hot and bothered about Gabriel Batistuta.

Manchester United 3-1 Fiorentina, 15 March 2000

I don't know a single football fan that doesn't have a special place in their heart for Fiorentina; there may be some (Juventus? Empoli?), but I don't know them. I suspect that this is, on some fundamental level, down to the sheer purpleness of their kit. Other purple sides are available, of course – Anderlecht, Germinal Beerschot, and a load of others I'd never heard of until I asked Twitter (Saprissa of Costa Rica, anybody?) – but nobody is as richly, as fundamentally, and as gloriously violet as the Tuscans. And, at the turn of the millennium, we got to watch that wonderful purple draped across the shoulders of a seriously tasty team.

There's No Other Holloway

"Yeah thanks for nothing dickheads"

As the final weekend of the Premier League approaches with little to sort out at the top, attention has turned, like a drunk man’s eyes, to how tight things are around the bottom. That Sky will doubtless bill the last day of the season ‘Survival Sunday’, is total rot though, as the only accolade the teams that survive will receive is to be immediately made favourites to go down next year. Make no mistake, friends, Sunday will be about relegation, players looking dejected and grown men crying, but also, hopefully, Blackpool having a massive party.

Odd Talisman Out

Without wishing to alarm anyone, Liverpool fans are pregnant. All of them. Not with lazy, curly-haired stereotypes (although you never know, I suppose), but with expectation. The potency of the second Kenny Dalglish era is powerful stuff.

The rise to fifth (now down to sixth after the Spurs defeat) from 12th in the space of four months has been achieved without former talisman Fernando Torres and, more recently, with club captain Steven Gerrard sat in the stands. While Gerrard came out all guns blazing last week, he hasn’t played a game since 6 March and can only ‘pencil in’ a return for the first day of pre-season. The big question for Liverpool is how Gerrard fits back into what has become a very efficient, very effective starting XI.

Absolutely Brooking It

A man stands in a field, alone save for the deserted country road behind him and the rolling hills ahead. A dignified man, he looks around to see he is alone. He unzips his flies. He starts to piss. The gentle breeze, which before had rustled the leaves on the trees and had the corn swaying lightly on its stalks, picks up. Much to his chagrin, the wind flares still further and he gets a bit of piss on his trouser legs.

The harder he pisses though, the more the wind whips around him and the wetter his trousers become. Exhausted, he zips himself up. He's covered in piss. Trevor Brooking sighs and makes his way back to his car.

Brighty's Vested Interest

And here we were thinking we could go on holiday. If you haven’t read this latest piece of tripe by Mark Bright, please take a moment to do so while Magic Spongers cracks its collective knuckles and prepares for a bit of Brighty-panning, the nation’s new favourite sport.

While we never went quite as far as assuming that Brighty had an on/off switch, this latest offering, combined with his general inability to form coherent sentences while commentating on the match between Cardiff and QPR, made us think that someone at the Metro is either trying to stitch him up big time or is so in his thrall that they will print whatever piece of buffoonery comes out of the man’s mouth.

Arsene Around

Let’s start with an analogy. It’s May. The sun periodically breaks rank from the accompanying cloud, illuminating a quaint Yorkshire village in a radiant glow. It is the spring fete: the children are enjoying the rides and games and the adults are gorging on food and ale. Each year, there is one tradition that has been the centrepiece of the fete for generations. A game of skill, not to mention a little chance, which can turn humble men into folk heroes. It is called the Apple Lob. Simply, competitors must stand some 20 yards away from a target, armed with succulent apples they have spent the past year lovingly preparing for this moment. And then they must hit the centre of the target, scoring points in the process. Three points are gained for hitting the smallest target in the very centre of the board. One point is awarded for hitting the larger target circling that.

FC Barcelona. Not Arrogant. Just Quite Arrogant

"ARGH! How dare you twat my ideological superiority?"

Sid Lowe’s interview with Xavi earlier this year got us thinking, and not only because the outpouring of emotion on Twitter made us wonder if Sid had died (at the very least mind you, his back must be black and blue after all the slaps it received). In fact, it was that for all Xavi’s joyful enthusiasm, there was a sneaking hint of something else. A creeping sense that the line between admitting the clear fact that Barcelona are superb, and then being all arrogant and self-righteous about it, was getting a bit blurry.