If you are somebody who reads my ramblings regularly, you’ll have noticed that I have been quite conspicuous by my absence. If there is anybody out there who finds what I have to say on football moderately interesting, firstly, you’re a mentalist 😉 But secondly, apologies if you’d been wondering if I fell into a dark well somewhere and only Sting and a collective of do-gooders could save poor Timmy/Chrissy-O’Toole.
The truth is, I just haven’t had time in the last week or so, because I’ve been getting up early each morning to sample the delights of what the Canadian Rockies had to offer, before spending a bit of time in New York at the beginning of this week, before arriving back in Blighty yesterday mid-morning. So for me, normal service resumes from today, although admittedly I’m a little later than usual on my ramblings, on account of a bit of a lie-in related to jet lag.
So, what’s been going on since I last spoke to you, my friends?
Well, we all know the World Cup is now well underway, and I have to say it’s been rather handy having the games on during normal times for me over the last 12 days or so. matches basically on from around 1 pm each day and, because of the fact that this competition is happening over different time zones, you never quite know when there might be a kick off. But what I have noticed is that both Canada and New York have actually embraced this more than I thought. There’s advertising everywhere, there’s plenty of attention being paid by the people of the cities I’ve been in, but there’s also been plenty of interest in the press. I thought they’d be a bit ‘meh’ about it all, but no, it appears “soccer ball” is having a positive effect.
I do think the volume of games is a bit ludicrous, though. This competition should never have had an expanded format, and as for those intolerable ‘hydration breaks’, I mean, come on, let’s just admit what they are: An opportunity for US TV to cram in more adverts. I’m absolutely loving the booing of the breaks that is going on. Please do more of that, fans at the games, not that it’ll make much difference to that horrendous human being, Infantino.
I’ve, of course, focused on Arsenal-related involvement, most of which has happened with England, although I was in New York for the Ghana game and decided that a wine bar was a better option. I think I got that one right, because looking at the highlights, it was hardly what you’d describe as a ‘cracker’. I also managed to catch the Ecuador game against Curacao to see our boy Hincapie play, but it was hardly one for the ages. The Canada vs Qatar game was better, although mainly just to see goals, because up until that point, my short bursts of watching games (normally 20 minutes here or there whilst The Management has been getting changed) haven’t exactly borne much fruit for me.
I don’t think the quality of this World Cup has been great, and I think a lot of that can be put down to the fact that a lot of these players are knackered. Especially the ones that play in England and go deep in competitions, so seeing the likes of Rice in a heavy strapping is not surprising at all. Last season he played 55 matches and had just under 4,500 minutes of football in those legs. He got just over a week off and is now expected to do 90 minutes for England twice in a row. It’s not ideal. Tuchel appears to be somebody who is very mindful of the fitness of his players, with Saka being used sparingly so far, so my hope for the game at the weekend is that we don’t see Rice take to the field at all. England can’t afford to break him, and if it means he gets a rest and can recover from any knock, then it’s just as good for them as it is for us. Having done a very basic online search, it appears as though the next England game – if they beat Panama – would be on 1st July, with S[ky Sports suggesting it could be Cape Verde.](https://www.skysports.com/football/news/12016/13479783/englands-world-cup-2026-fixtures-schedule-and-tournament-route-to-final-how-three-lions-could-lift-trophy-on-july-19) If that plays out and England win the group, then we’ll be talking about a solid 8 days between England’s game against Ghana and their round of 32 game. That’s a fair bit of time for recovery so let’s hope Tuchel is sensible with Rice and his rehab.
As for the other players, Kai seems to be doing alright, Brazil dented Scotland’s hopes of qualifying so Big Gabi and Martinelli progress, whilst I enjoyed seeing Martin Odegaard bang a big drum for Norway the other day. Leo was the best player on the pitch for Belgium when they drew with Iran, but that doesn’t really say a lot to be fair. I managed to catch a lot of that game and the Iranians will be kicking themselves for not making more of the man advantage that they did. Belgium are one of those weird teams; I look at the stars they have and think that they might go far, but I guess when you look at the age profile of those stars, it’s probably not going to be a team that goes too deep in this competition, I don’t think. They’ll probably go through in second place after they beat New Zealand, but I think that’s probably as far as they’ll get – just the gut feel I have.
And that’s about it for me for a bit of a re-introduction into the blogging stuff for today I think. I’ll get back into more Arsenal-centric stuff tomorrow as I get back into the swing of things, but for now, have a great day and if you’re in the UK – STAY HYDRATED PEOPLE!