Football (Soccer) Thread

[Valmy]

It's a good day.
Sunderland finally win at Wembley at the 10th time of asking and at about the same time as the final whistle is blown my son emerges.

Happy birthday Tyr Jr!!

The mother is doing fine I take it?

[Jacob]

It's a good day.
Sunderland finally win at Wembley at the 10th time of asking and at about the same time as the final whistle is blown my son emerges.

Congrats!

[The Larch]

It's a good day.
Sunderland finally win at Wembley at the 10th time of asking and at about the same time as the final whistle is blown my son emerges.

Truly an auspicious omen. 

[Sheilbh]

Congrats - both on the Sunderland victory and the kid

[mongers]

Congrats - both on the Sunderland victory and the kid

It's quite possible Tyr will end up siring more children than Sunderland have top flight wins.

[Grey Fox]

Congrats Tyr.

Weird thread to announce in.

[Josquius]

Thanks all.

It's quite possible Tyr will end up siring more children than Sunderland have top flight wins.

I think we are a bit old and poor for that :p
I'll settle for more than Sunderlands FA Cup victories.

Congrats Tyr.

Weird thread to announce in.

Priorities :p

I thought to post elsewhere too but I don't want to spam the world. I'm conscious I've been mentioning its coming overly much of late in the real world at least. Hopefully haven't hijacked here too much!

[Admiral Yi]

Weird thread to announce in.

Word. 

Choose between "Sunderland won and I have a son" and "I have a son and Sunderland won."

[celedhring]

Congrats Tyr! 

[Josephus]

Congrats TYR on the Sunerland win. I look forward to seeing it on Sunderland Till I die.

oh, and the kid thing too. awesome.

[The Larch]

So, in today's call up for the Spanish national team Luís Enrique pulled one of his (almost mandatory at this point) rabbits out of a hat by calling up an almost unheard of player. This time it was a goalkeeper called Robert Sánchez that plays for Brighton that I'm sure thay 90% of Spain had never even heard of before today.

So, this Robert Sánchez turns out to be a 23 y.o. from Cartagena, Murcia, that has been playing for Brighton since he was 15 or 16, and been through the traditional British merry go round of loans at lower level clubs (he was at a League One team last year and at a League Two one the year before). He's never been part of a Spanish youth team and only started featuring for Brighton's first team this season, in which he was like the 4th or 5th keeper at the beginning of the season, but he managed to start for the team for the first time in November and has been the club's regular starter since then.

Given that so little was known about him, some wild-ish speculation started to brew amongst our sports journalists, and rumours of him having gained British citizenship after living there for so long, and given that he was uncapped for Spain would make him eligible to play for England if called, so this would prevent that, but it turns out that that wouldn't be possible because apparently the Home Nations federations have some kind of internal agreement under which they'd never call up players just by having citizenship and require either some familial roots in the country or having lived there since quite young.

To be honest, even considering myself to be quite knowledgeable about football, I had no idea about this agreement. It seems to be quite an unnecessary hurdle in modern football, and it effectively prevents these teams from increasing their talent pool. What's the point of it, to prevent poaching between the Home Nations?

[Sheilbh]

I've no idea nad never heard of that - though I read a great piece by Carl Anka in the Atlantic on how we're moving a little bit away from the more strict rules to reflect people's actual identities (and desire to play international football). I think it was led by the Moroccan and Algerian federations who had young players who were not going to play for France but wanted to play for Morocco and Algeria.

But it's now easier for individuals to make that shift - I think part of it has been lifting the number of caps they need before they're sort of kept to one nation. This should really help countries with diasporas - so I think the Jamaican national team are quite optimistic/excited about the Premier League players they're signing up for passports, similarly I think Aaron Wan-Bissaka has declared for DRC. I know British Nigerians are disappointed that Bukayo Saka has declared for England not Nigeria

On Sanchez - I've not watched lots of Brighton but they are the team that's breaking football stats. I think they are relatively good defensively (though I think because they keep the ball well and restrict chances rather than anything he's done) and have an insane xG but they cannot finish to save their lives. So I think on "expected points" they should be 5th, but they're actually 16th

[celedhring]

I hate Expected Goals and all those attempts to moneyball football so much, you Brits created this sport, why do you intend to ruin it? 

[The Larch]

I hate Expected Goals and all those attempts to moneyball football so much, you Brits created this sport, why do you intend to ruin it? 

I think this tendency actually comes from the US, but it's in the UK where it's paid the most attention in Europe.

Regarding the agreement, according to Wiki it's as follows:

The criteria for eligibility to represent a home nation is:

A Player who, under the terms of art. 5, is eligible to represent more than one Association on account of his nationality, may play in an international match for one of these Associations only if, in addition to having the relevant nationality, he fulfils at least one of the following conditions:

a) He was born on the territory of the relevant Association;

b) His biological mother or biological father was born on the territory of the relevant Association;

c) One of his biological grandparents was born on the territory of the relevant Association;

d) He has engaged in a minimum of five years education under the age of 18 within the territory of the relevant association.
— Home nations agreement

So, what this basically does is prevent outsiders from qualifying to play for the Home Nations, right? It doesn't matter if you have the citizenship and have lived in the UK for ages, you'll never be eligible to play for any of the Home Nations unless you were born in one of them, have a blood relation to one of them or have been raised in one of them since you were in your early teens. I saw some examples of players who back in the day were rumoured to want to try to play for England if this had been allowed but were prevented by this agreement, such as Arteta and Almunia, as well as many French players who played in the Premier League for ages.

[Sheilbh]

Interesting - that all seems pretty reasonable to me.