RandoEFC

Vile performances from Pierre. I think they should swap him with Kvyat after the summer break and give him a chance to rebuild his confidence in the Toro Rosso.

Our final pre season friendly this afternoon. Weirder Bremen vs Everton. Our lineup is basically full strength: Pickford Coleman Mina Keane Digne Gomes Delph Richarlison Sigurdsson Bernard Calvert-Lewin

Is Kenny getting on well then?

I miss Rob Smedley and Jock Clear being race engineers.

Barkley won't be a revelation this season. Under no pressure in a bunch of friendlies with a manager putting his arm around him then sure, all of his raw talent will flourish and he'll look a world beater. Soon as he has a bad game or has any reason to doubt himself then he'll go missing for a couple of months and the cycle will reset. Even if he's excellent for a full season, which he just about managed when Martinez came to Everton and put his arm around him, told him to express himself, play with freedom, plenty more cliches where that came from, then as soon as the team lost momentum he hid from the ball for 18 months. It never lasts with Barkley. Unless Lampard has a new brain that he can stick between the lads ears for him, Ross Barkley is Ross Barkley.

Pretty much this. Had a lot of time for Mark Webber as well.

I thought he said in an interview that he hoped it didn't get used because he was sick all weekend.

He was very solid, would have preferred to keep hold of him permanently.

@El Profesor?

Wrong thread I think mate.

Their commitment to paying tribute to the 1950s went a bit far by deliberately re-enacting the 50 second pit stops from that era.

When things go wrong for Mercedes they do seem to go from zero to full meltdown in impressive fashion. I remember their double retirement in Austria last year. Today was next level though, more on the drivers than the team, but the 50+ second pit stop when Hamilton came into the pits was also pretty funny.

Nice to see from the retweets on my timeline that Liverpool Twitter gets as hysterical as Everton Twitter over meaningless pre season friendlies.

Probably back to Toro Rosso to swap with Kvyat or Albon if it's one of those two that take his place, which is what would probably happen. They don't have too many young drivers waiting for their chance in F1 so they don't want to take Gasly out of the sport, he's shown that he's a talented driver, he just clearly isn't ready for the senior team.

Gasly is on 55 points, 107 points behind his team mate and only 7 points ahead of Sainz in the McLaren. Borrowed time...

I only have Pikachus on my pyjamas.

Saw that yesterday, he really is an odd little man.

I feel like you're contradicting yourself here. I agree that Blackburn Rovers wasnt the same/as bad as American ownership, but that doesn't change the fact that being associated with the ruling families of those middle eastern countries who use football as a PR distraction is a lot worse than being owned by Glazers or FSG who at least only see their clubs as marketing enterprises for the sake of their own greed. It all goes under the same umbrella of the local community losing ownership over their own local football teams, but the City/PSG scenario is a whole lot further down the badness scale than United or Liverpool due to who they're involved with.

As if this is true

It's not about that though. Almost every club has foreign ownership now, but what sets PSG and Man City apart is the source of their money being directly linked to highly corrupt ruling regimes in countries which don't acknowledge basic human rights. They are major PR machines for those ruling families saying "look at our football clubs so that you aren't looking at what we're doing in our country". It's no coincidence that the clubs linked to these regimes, who are used to doing whatever the fuck they want because they own the police, legal institutions and basically anything that would hold a government or ruling family to account in a "normal" country, are the same clubs who stand accused of trying to skirt the financial fair play regulations through various loopholes and possible bribery, at least in City's case. They just dont know how to be told "no you can't do that" because to them it means "stick some more zeros on that number please". It's what they know. Man Utd fans probably don't get a lot of shit over the foreign ownership because of all of the clubs who have sold out to overseas tycoons, their fanbase (at least the actual Manchester fans) made a much bigger fuss about trying to fuck the Glazers off than any other club has done since, so they do have that going for them.

You might be right but Liverpool/scousers are an emotional bunch over this sort of thing. It's just a poorly calculated move from a PR perspective and surely not worth whatever minimal financial or social benefit the people behind this decision think it will bring the club.

More changes at board level following the stadium announcement yesterday. I know very little about the characters that were appointed to the board last summer but I do know that Keith Harris has a pretty poor track record in football. People who know more than me seem pleased with this.

It's been over Twitter all day. There are some tin pot clubs much lower down the pyramid called City of Liverpool FC and stuff like that who would have to change the name of their club (or something) if this were to happen. One of those cases where the extra few quid they'd make off monopolising Liverpool football merchandise wouldn't be worth the negative publicity of being perceived as the big nasty corporation stamping on the helpless local club teams. Greed is the word but I imagine the Americans will soon find out that that sort of thing doesn't tend to fly in a city like Liverpool. Most Reds that have commented on it are against the move from what I've seen.

I remember when he was driving the dog of a Honda in 2007/2008, he promised her that he'd propose if he won the world championship, then he won it in 2009 and never proposed .