30 h. ago Liverpool’s title stumble shows strength of Premier League, not its weakness | Barney Ronay

Fulham were excellent in beating the champions-elect and credit should be given to the mid-table tier’s progressionHere it comes then. The much‑promised collapse. The improbable, but somehow also deserved and collectively willed disintegration of these champions by default. Something like that anyway. Tell you what though. Fulham are good aren’t they? And particularly so, it should be said, for a team that started the day 10th in an apparently mediocre league. Or is that not part of the story?At the end of a fun, boisterous 3‑2 victory for Marco Silva’s excellent, vigorous upper‑midtable team the talk will of course be about Liverpool, and not necessarily in a very flattering way. Continue reading...

Politics

40 h. ago St Johnstone vs Celtic LIVE score and goal updates from Premiership clash at McDiarmid Park

Brendan Rodgers' team will move one step closer to the title with a win in Perth against Simo Valakari's struggling Saints

Politics

40 h. ago St Johnstone 0 Celtic 0 LIVE score and goal updates from the Premiership clash in Perth

Brendan Rodgers' team will move one step closer to the title with a win in Perth against Simo Valakari's struggling Saints

Politics

40 h. ago St Johnstone 1 Celtic 0 LIVE as Nicolas Kuhn denied certain leveller by heroic defending

Brendan Rodgers' team will move one step closer to the title with a win in Perth against Simo Valakari's struggling Saints

Politics

40 h. ago St Johnstone 1 Celtic 0 LIVE as Reo Hatate blazes over from Jota's cut back

Brendan Rodgers' team will move one step closer to the title with a win in Perth against Simo Valakari's struggling Saints

Politics

5 d. ago It’s unfair to blame Liverpool for being the best team: that's how you win titles | Barney Ronay

It has been an odd, slow bicycle race of a season, but this is hardly the fault of Arne Slot’s impressive league leadersThere was an extraordinary moment in the seconds after Diogo Jota had scored the only goal of this Merseyside derby, as the home supporters seethed and writhed, bodies tumbling, a wave of noise barrelling around the Anfield stands.At which point a lone middle-aged man could be seen emerging from the seats, waving his fists in the direction of what must have been the fourth official, making wild but oddly precise spectacles gestures with his fingers, all the while being hurled back by the combined efforts of three men in orange jackets. Continue reading...

Society

1 week ago Infantino’s $1bn prize: act of commercial disruption disguised as benevolence | Barney Ronay

Fifa president’s talk of the Club World Cup promoting access and equity is simply double-think to disguise another land grabIt takes a while for the voice to emerge from the background haze, a mist of generically noodling electronic music, the kind of music that comes filled with a comforting sense of death, hold music from the executive euthanasia clinic.Finally the voice emerges, whispering through your headphones in that familiar rich, reverent Euro-tone, like being spoken to by the sun. This is a voice that says: I am here to command. But I am also just a conduit for a divinity that flows through me and into you. Although mainly, and let’s be absolutely clear, through me. Continue reading...

Politics

2 w. ago Gareth Southgate nails his big lecture in a victory for competitive caring | Barney Ronay

Former England manager may not be right about everything but he remains a good man, fulfilling a role others have vacatedSay what you like, and the haters – we know this about the haters – will continue to hate, are in effect defined by their hating. But Gareth Southgate has now finally delivered on the biggest stage of all.This is of course a reference to the stage at Senate House library, venue for Big Gate’s big Dimbleby lecture, recorded in front of an audience of silent, rapt, nodding people, and broadcast this week on the BBC. This is what elite big-lecture managers do. They seize the moment. They shut out the noise. Gareth at the Dimbleby? Absolutely nailed it. Continue reading...

Sport

2 w. ago Thomas Tuchel’s first task is to solve England’s main problem: Harry Kane | Barney Ronay

Kane had an awful Euros, largely because of his positioning. The new head coach must address this, and the signs are he will So far there has been something astringent and quietly refreshing about the pared-back stylings of Thomas Tuchel’s new England. There are natural caveats to this, not least the built-in obsolescence of the entire Tuchel project (cautious tactics; he’s a German m8; not picking that player I like, etc, etc). But, for now, the lead-in to the reassuringly generic England double-header against Albania and Latvia has been closer to a soft launch than any other head coach era.There will be no roaring, no medieval morris dancing tactical revivalism, also no agonising over the meaning of Albion, no old maids cycling to mass, no West End stage play about a gangly German pragmatist and his efforts to impose the 3-4-1-2 formation. Instead this feels like what it is: an 18-month deal, less the blooming of a new romance, more workmanlike middle-aged dating app. We’re all gr...

Politics

3 w. ago Newcastle’s Carabao Cup win: part feelgood story, part PR triumph for dictator state ambition | Barney Ronay

Supporters are left with a choice of being a conduit for Saudi state propaganda or walking away and letting it winWell, that’s the nice bit done. Warm feelings, heritage bonds, a cocoon of distracting noise. Wembley is such a different place on these domestic cup days, certainly compared with the Cliff Richard concert vibe of a midweek international.And that feeling was there right from the start of the Carabao Cup final on Sunday as Newcastle were awarded their first corner, drawing the most extraordinary outburst of noise, static, shared energy from one end to the other, filling all that empty Wembley air. Continue reading...

Politics

3 w. ago Dan Burn’s odyssey grants Newcastle their own special slice of football history | Barney Ronay

The only locally born starting player for either side proved the catalyst on a day where classic cup final magic won outSometimes football just can’t help itself. Even now, in its glazed and managed state, plaything of propaganda machines and sharp-fanged hedge funds, it will still give you these moments, will follow its own gorgeously hammy storylines.Here it gave Newcastle a story that couldn’t have been more perfectly styled and finished: a Dan Burn day for a Dan Burn team at a Dan Burn Wembley, and a moment before half‑time that seemed to paint the entire world a deep rich shade of Dan Burn. Continue reading...

Events

3 w. ago France v Scotland LIVE: Score and updates from Six Nations title decider as England hope for favour

Fabien Galthie’s team will win the title with victory over Gregor Townsend’s side

Politics

4 w. ago Amorim persists and gives United fans a glimpse of a working plan | Barney Ronay

After the pre-match protests about the owners, Amorim saw his wing-backs combine in what could be a taste of things to comeWith 53 minutes gone at Old Trafford, Manchester United’s home support was treated for one brief, flickering moment to a glimpse of the Amorim-shaped universe, a vision of what might yet come to pass.Out of nowhere, on an afternoon that had felt to that point like a competently staged practice event, United’s wing‑backs Diogo Dalot and Noussair Mazraoui appeared in a wide pincer, surging towards the Arsenal goal, a living breathing incarnation of the Amorim blueprint. Left wing-back Dalot dug out a cross. Right wing-back Mazraoui counted his strides and placed a measured volley just too close to David Raya. Continue reading...

Politics