RandoEFC

I'm not trying to point fingers at anyone really. This latest spate of racism on social media just reminds me of how disgusting so many of us actually are when you boil it down to key characteristics and is the latest thing to make me pretty depressed about the world around me. It feels right now that no matter how many well-intentioned people there are around that want to treat people the right way and share the truth with each other, they'll always be handily outnumbered by groups with a mob mentality that want to act out for reasons I can't understand. Like, at least when you repeatedly get away with stealing small items from a shop, you have new stuff, but with Cagliari repeatedly getting away with this racial abuse, what are they even gaining? What did they gain out of those chants to Lukaku? He scored anyway, they lost anyway, and they gave their club more bad publicity.

Souness has a history of seeming to criticise black players more than others. Yesterday alone he said nothing about Cutrone, says that Eriksen isnt the type to disrupt the dressing room but insinuates that Kean might be when he knows nothing about the player. Maybe it's a coincidence. I doubt he's actually actively racist but I'd say theres a very good chance he's subconsciously jumping to conclusions about players based on some sort of prejudice. He certainly didn't have any actual evidence or even claim that he's heard Moise Kean has attitude problems. He doesn't seem much like Balotelli to me. Seems very humble in the short time he's spent at Everton, the lad came over with his Mum so she could be there when he signed the contract. Balotelli was probably driving around Manchester chucking 20s out of the car by the time he was 19. And Italians tarring Kean with the same brush as Balotelli? I wonder why they might do that...

It's not even about other reasons. The best comparison is that Cutrone left Milan this summer for Wolves and happens to be white, yet he said nothing about "why would Milan let him go?". Yet with Moise Kean he makes out like there's attitude problems below the surface because why else would Juventus sell him? Neither him nor the other studio guest have done the research into how much Juventus have spent on De Ligt this summer or how much they pay Ronaldo a year. There's a reason that this exists and has done for a long time before yesterday.

Well according to Souness the only reason Juventus could have sold Kean is because there's "probably something a bit wrong under the surface". Clear what he was implying and he got slated on social media for it.

Vile. What century is this again?

VAR will never replace match officials. Never ever ever. It looks so far as if there is some hypersensitivity that officials have when it comes to overruling the match referee in the Premier League. The "clear and obvious" thing is a problem. I certainly seem to have a different interpretation of what's clear and obvious than the officials because we've seen lots of decisions not overturned which looked pretty clear and obviously wrong to me. This is an overriding issue with referees that completely outdates VAR. "The referee's word is final". Why? Referees are not robots, they are human beings, and there's nothing wrong with admitting a mistake. The 22 players around them make mistakes while millions watch on all the time and have to embrace it and move on. I understand that abuse of officials is a big issue in this country from grass roots to Premier League, but it doesn't help to put referees in this glass cage because it makes them come off as above reproach and maybe even arrogant through no fault of their own. In rugby the referees wear microphones so that the crowd can hear them explain decisions. In tennis you have umpires and line judges who get overruled by Hawkeye all the time, they dont burst into flames and they certainly haven't found themselves out of a job because of technology, and that's in a sport where you could quite easily get rid of all line judges and set Hawkeye up to just set a small alarm off every time a ball lands outside the court like the referee's watch for goal line technology. Football is a sport of a million grey areas so I can't see in any way how VAR should be a threat to referees. The implementation in the Premier League has indeed been controversial at best so far. However, the technology is not the problem, it simply can't be. The next step seems to be to change the clear and obvious thing. Their other problem is trying to use VAR to make black and white decisions, like with the handball rule that caught City out against Spurs. Football will never be black and white and trying to make it so is a waste of VAR. Judgement calls will always be necessary, and VAR should only be used to get a closer look from different angles if necessary. They also need to be braver about overruling the match officials in the stadium. Unless there's a massive ego culture amongst top referees that I'm not aware of, I can't imagine a referee being too upset about someone with a load of extra camera angles making a "better" decision than them. I don't imagine someone pig-headed enough to get annoyed or insecure that someone with more resources than them is overruling their split second decision has the self-awareness of professionalism to end up anywhere near refereeing a top flight match in the first place. Those are my key takeaways from what is still only four weekends into this huge change to the sport.

Not a very nice way to talk about all those teachers.

Back to school tomorrow.

Djokovic, Federer and Nadal safely into the last 16. Djokovic vs Wawrinka is the tie of this round. Defending champion Osaka got past Coco Gauff to reach the last 16. Serena still in too, could be a rematch of last year's Osaka-Williams final. Jo Konta is the last British interest and faces the 3rd seed Pliskova next.

All fair new inclusions I think. Also wouldn't play Barkley in a deeper midfield role. Henderson and Winks are probably your best pairing there. Hopefully Delph can get a good run of games for us and put himself back in contention as he's another one who will do a decent job in there. Any XI you pick out of that lot shouldn't struggle against Bulgaria anyway and certainly shouldn't struggle against Kosovo.

Finally. Bolasie next please.

Bleurgh, no thanks. Fix the racing and we won't need these gimmicks.

The state of politicians today. Yet every single one of these will get voted back into their seats at the next election because party loyalty matters more to the electorate than the integrity of the individual candidates.

It's not even about Leave or Remain. It's just a totally cynical coup, get Brexit done regardless of how dodgy your tactics are. If this was over anything else then there would be full blown outrage but since the day this referendum was put forward nobody gives a shit about morals, immigration, imports, exports, the pound or the euro, the backstop, a trade deal. 90% of people on both sides just care about being on the side who wins. Remainers just want to have it overturned and say "told you so" at the "closet racists" who voted to Leave, while Leave voters just want to be vindicated in their vote to Leave and their bleating about "Remoaners" and "Project Fear" to be proven right. Another question I have is how is Dominic Cummings, the man who ran the Vote Leave campaign that was found guilty of breaking electoral law, a) not in jail and b) allowed to work in Downing Street again. Where is the accountability? Why aren't the media absolutely destroying Boris for bringing this man who broke the law to help put the country in this ridiculous situation into his spare bedroom? I'm just done with the whole thing. The electorate is stupid, and the only thing the referendum has achieved so far is shown the government that they can basically get away with whatever the fuck they want because even when you blatantly lie to the entire country and are found guilty of doing so, as long as you play enough parliamentary games that are "technically legal", you can select your own prime minister without an election, you can shut the government down whenever it suits you and you can employ known political criminals to advise you on the timings of your "technically legal" tactics. I'm disgusted by the whole thing. I could swallow Leave winning the vote even though I voted Remain but I can't swallow the grossly inappropriate and undemocratic way in which the government is trying to achieve a result that a bare majority voted for three years ago with not just an absence of information available to them, but information which the courts have found to be outright lies by the people who not only got off with complete impunity but have actually found their way to running the country.

How anyone can say it's acceptable to do that regardless of which side they stand on is beyond me. People actually want to vote MPs into the House of Commons so that they can have no impact on the final outcome of the biggest decision this country has faced since the World Wars, so that a Prime Minister who nobody apart from a few hundred Tories voted into number ten can dictate the country's final decision?

There are certainly some Leave voters who would have voted Remain if they knew what was coming but there are also a large number of people who would still vote Leave, the majority even. If there was a second referendum now, Remain would probably win, especially if it was stated that Leave = No Deal, but it wouldn't be by the landslide you might expect and it wouldn't even be a certainty. I think this is happening though. I can't see Johnson asking for an extension so we will leave the EU on October 31st, probably without a deal, unless Corbyn can somehow overthrow the government before then, which seems impossible and while I would vote Labour personally, Corbyn forming a government, and another unelected one at that, presents a whole litany of different issues in itself. It might well be that the Queen has her say before all is said and done. I hope it doesn't have to go beyond a refusal to prorogue parliament so that something at least gets thrashed out in the House of Commons where all points of view are represented. The best thing for the country would probably be another delay, a general election, and a new government formed to deliver whatever it is the public have voted for, be that no deal, remain, people's vote or continued negotiations for a deal.

So it looks like Boris is actually going to try and go ahead with the proroguing thing to stop MPs from fighting a No Deal outcome. I know there are idiots on both sides of the debate but there are genuinely people in this country who don't see the irony in calling people pushing for a second referendum "undemocratic" while supporting an unelected Prime Minister to subvert the House of Commons to force through the result of a referendum decided by a 52/48 margin where the winning side's campaign was found to have broken electoral law.

2019-2020 Season - Round 1 Update Position - Player(s) - Points 1 - @nudge - 6 points 2 - @RandoEFC / @Dan / @SchalkeUK / @...Dan / @CaaC (John) / @Bluewolf / @Teso dos Bichos / @DeadLinesman / @Lucas / @Eco / @Storts - 4 points 3 - @Stick With Azeem / @JOSHBRFC - 2 points 4. @Rucksackfranzose / @Stan / @Batard / @Mel81x / @Viva la FCB / @Pyfish - 0 points

How many houses are they going to knock down this time?

I don't think Mercedes would risk the fireworks of Lewis vs Max. It would be good for the spectator though in my opinion. It would stop each race being Hamilton win as the default position, and we probably would get some fireworks. It would be especially interesting if we get to 2021 and another team has stolen a march on Mercedes under the new regulations. If I could guarantee that Red Bull, Ferrari and Mercedes would have similar performance for a season then my preference would be more towards keeping Max in one team, Hamilton in another team, and Vettel and Leclerc in another.

The Honda engine appears to be really driveable, by that I mean functional in the acceleration/traction/torque package. Red Bull seem to be the strongest in the field in low speed sections which speaks to a good package in their engine's acceleration (and downforce and mechanical grip) even if they're still catching up a bit in the horsepower department.

Weird one, I wouldn't read too much into it as even if he's leaving it won't be until 2020 begins. They did say they would decide on Hamilton's team mate during the summer break which is over halfway done now. It was supposed to be between him and Ocon but if Ocon goes to Renault then perhaps there would be a left field option we hadn't considered to go into that seat. Russell or even Verstappen as a big shocker. I doubt it though, I'm 70% sure it will be Bottas still, 20% Ocon, 10% some wildcard third option.

Just came across this. Very classy letter all around from Fergie but what's striking to me is him talking about how they used to struggle finding world class strikers due to their wage structure at the time.

There must be something they can do. Anyone sending racist tweets to players like that should have their account instantly closed and their email address blacklisted from all social media websites. Can't see that happening though. It's also a fine line to tread, if they start picking up on certain words that get posted as part of edgy jokes or just as every day remarks and end up barring a few people they shouldn't have then the "free speech" kick off will be major. Ideally the solution is for people to stop acting like cavemen but that's just unrealistic.

I'm only messing about mate, hence the ninja face. All generations of the fanbase are the lifeblood of the football club. Things change over generations though. The kids waving flags today will be 50 year old men and women themselves one day sneering at whatever the next generations start doing at football matches. It's the circle of life. I definitely get where you're coming from overall. I personally don't think plastic flags are going to make a huge difference to anything, if I was there on Saturday I'd probably have been reluctant to wave mine as a self-aware grown man, but probably would have joined in to acknowledge some of our fans trying to make an effort to improve the atmosphere. But why I'm seeing it as a positive is that I'd rather see people trying to do something than nothing at all. They got a lot of kickback on social media before the game and tweeted that if it goes down like a lead balloon they'll try something else. The fact that they've tried out plastic flags specifically is irrelevant to me, what matters is they're trying to do something positive for the fans and the team. This is the key point though, it wasn't done by the club itself. It was done by a small independent group of fans who put a group together called The Originals towards the end of last season. This isn't a commercial thing by the club, even if they've obviously had to approve it being set up. I'm all for it, Goodison's atmosphere has been criticised by our fans and other fans over the painful last few years, someone is trying to do something about it and if their first attempt was a bit cringeworthy then so be it, they've said they'll try other things to help get the place rocking again if the first things they try don't work.