shorts archive
please send us your football shorts (no, no - not literally) : click here
Chelsea in Moscow... the aftermath
That Sky Sports News Interview
A Rotten Guide to Arsenal
Mr Lydon waxes lyrical in Highbury... with a Dutch Bloke
Joey settles in...
Somnambulists
In these days of declining grammar and phenomenally excessive use of the phrase “squeaky bum time” goalfood was reassured that journalistic standards are being upheld with David Lacey’s piece in The Guardian on Saturday (12.04.08) which authoritatively pronounced:
“Arsenal’s problem all season has been that, while they have often attacked like a dream, they have too often defended like somnambulists.”
Not a phrase you hear every day on what we still endearingly call the terraces, but the temptation to borrow it and casually drop it into the next half-time critique over a pie, may prove just too much, if only to watch the reaction.
Jesus saves! . . . and steps aside
Simon Heath Harvey
Custodians of the onion bag lend me your ears – the secret of the penalty save has finally been unlocked.
Forget reading the hips, scrutinizing the plant foot, watching the penalty taker’s head or getting a set square to measure the angle of his body, forget all that. Apparently, it’s all down to that double bluff stuff which parents do with their footballing kids every weekend. Scientists from Hong Kong University (aren’t they all) watched videos of 200 spot kicks and came up with the following, according to a report in the latest issue of Psychological Science (available from all good news agents but no free gifts on the front I’m afraid).
Keepers can save more penalties if they intentionally stand to one side of the goal. When goalkeepers stood just slightly off centre strikers were 10% more likely to aim at the side with more space. Goalies are therefore advised to stand off centre and, get this, the crucial margin is said to be 10cm . . . or 4 inches for pre-metric keepers.
I believe this new research stands up to rigorous academic scrutiny, especially if the penalty takers are eight or nine-years-old and, last time I looked, there weren’t too many of those in the Prem. Eager to steal a competitive edge, I do expect Messrs James and Robinson to have their rulers out on a regular basis.
Expect new research to reveal that strikers are 10% more likely to score if they pretend to read Psychological Science magazine.
“This sort of thing doesn’t happen in Parsons Green…”
goalfood in no way condones football hooliganism, and of course sympathises with any innocent victims who get caught up in it (no sympathy at all to the perpetrators). However, we couldn’t help a wry smile when reading this report of a “pre-arranged meet” between Chelsea and Tottenham (ahem) ‘firms’. Why? Well, just check out the profession of the understandably terrified eye-witness…
click link - mob-handed
The You Tube ball boy
In case you’ve not seen it before (and we never tire of seeing it)…the ball boy who does what ball boys worldwide dream of doing…only this one gets away with it…
click link - he shoots…he scores!
You Tube classic misses
You Tube is full of these, to save you some time, we’ve picked one of the best selections…
click link - Ronnie Rosenthal, you are not alone
Cardiff aggro…
Official club sites…the home of the bland. Or are they? We wish we could find the classic article on the Leeds site where Ken Bates quoted Derek & Clive, but alas it appears to have been deleted from their archive. So we’ll have to settle for this…ok, it’s 18 months old now, but this article on their dispute with WBA over Jason Koumas is still a hoot. Don’t you wish your team’s site was as informative & opinionated?
click link - “A player’s livelihood and career may be ruined…”
Buried by progress…
This’ll bring a tear to the eye of the over-30s amongst you. Created by a Forest fan concerned by their proposed stadium move, it’s a moving trawl through those grounds that are no more…
click link - what did you do on the terraces grandad?
Mark E. Smith reads the football results…
…and finally Cyril? And finally Esther…for newer goalfooders who didn’t catch this as we first posted it a year or two back…the Fall’s main man in a memorable encounter with Ray Stubbs & co….
click link - 50,000,000 Fall fans can’t be wrong
danny baker: we salute you!!!
as football phone-ins become ever more ubiquitous / tedious, we salute the master. remember danny baker’s original 6-0-6…where instead of calling in to whinge about your manager / star striker / blah blah bloody blah, a typical programme would start with an invitation from danny to “call in and tell us the coldest you’ve ever been at a match…”. the remainder of the show would be a wondrous stream of football consciousness indulged in by db and his equally inventive / knowledgeable listeners
well, we’ve stumbled across this here site…we don’t know if danny and his “people” are behind it, or whether it’s a fan site…what we do know is that it gives you a chance to relive some vintage baker phone-in calls, some of the best football radio ever…
vintage baker
Random World Cup
Simply loads of fab Germany 06 stuff, well woth re-visiting