Telly refs, thoughtful Nunez and selfish United.

Football, football, football.

Hello, and welcome to this week’s Football, bleakly.

No more pundit refs, please

I rolled my eyes when “Michael Oliver, it’s not about you,” began being belted out by the Chelsea fans (and the Arsenal fans probably, it feels like something they would do) on Sunday. Refs clearly have one of the hardest jobs going, one that, ironically, has been made considerably tougher thanks to the rollout of VAR. As someone who writes for a living, I understand the threat that automation and AI pose to working life, but at least, for now, I get to choose when to use ChatGPT – it’s not lurking in the background, ready to step in whenever a colleague thinks a different turn of phrase could have been more impactful.

Saying that, it is quite hard to disagree with the idea that refs want more attention than they give on when Britain’s broadcasters keep giving them jobs as pundits. Seconds after whatever non-consequential decision prompted all of Stamford Bridge to begin berating Oliver, ex-ref Dermot Gallagher was brought in to tell us all that, yes, the decision was right anyway.

Football punditry is already at a low ebb so it’s an odd choice to go “how do we make Martin Keown more interesting? I know, let’s hire the administrative assistant who used to tell him off as his co-host.”

"Oh, fans are furious because they’re left in the dark during VAR discussions unless Peter Drury paraphrases them to us like a medium getting a message from the other side? How about we get a bloke who isn’t in the VAR room but feasibly might once have been to give his insights?”

It’s hard to say why it’s so annoying, but it just feels like another unnecessary gimmick by broadcasters desperate to differentiate themselves. Like plonking all the pundits in the centre circle so they can slag off the warming-up players within earshot or letting Noel Gallagher cosplay as a commentator. They mistake people continuing to tune in as approval rather than the fact that they have no other choice – like the manager of a motorway petrol station seeing the continued purchase of £8 Ginsters pasties as validation that hungry drivers love overpriced shit food.

Nunez, the overthinker’s striker

Can I shock you? I love Darwin Nunez. He is the overthinking man’s striker and, therefore, he is my striker. While he doesn’t carry himself with the aura of a man who is plagued by existential terror, give him more than a second to think about scoring and it’s clear he’s one of us. Take his goal against Aston Villa on Saturday night. Bursting through the line, he’s one-one-one with Martinez before anybody else, giving him an extra second to think before touching the ball. Cue the heavy touch of a man who has just begun wondering if this is all there is. Then, with no time to think, he rifles the ball in from a ridiculous angle. Later on, through again, the majority of the Aston Villa half to wade through and all the time in the world to wonder where to place the ball or think about every mistake he’s ever made or question whether this is really what he should be doing with his life. Cue the clueless shank over the cross-bar of a man who is busy mentally replaying the time he accidentally put Foundations by Kate Nash on the Jukebox of a rough East London pub.

The people deserved Ruud van Nistelrooy’s Manchester United

Club-legend takes over as caretaker manager, wins a few games, gets hired full time and implodes is a well-trodden path. Solskjær, De Rossi, probably others. Therefore, it is deeply selfish of the Manchester United owners to deny us Ruud van Nistelrooy’s destiny. United’s 3-0 win over Leicester made it three wins from four for the Dutchman, which should have been more than enough to give him a comically long contract. Pathetically, Jim Ratcliffe has made the seemingly sensible decision of hiring a very highly-rated manager from Europe. Coward.

Is there anything better than six-a-side in your thirties?

I’ve got plans to write a very long sentimental piece on the joy of playing football in your thirties when you’re rubbish but all the stigma of being rubbish has gone and you can just enjoy the last few years of lugging your increasingly creaking body around an inner-city 4G pitch. In the meantime, here’s a sensational goal scored by my good friend and new Substacker,

David Joey

, as my team secured only our third win of the season.