Reviews Category
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Transfer balls: Arsenal get Isco, Bender, Navas and a Chelsea ‘sensation’
Arsenal transfer committee
Arsenal are being linked to a host of players. If it goes to form, Arsenal will buy one player at most this January, play him until he can barely walk, talk about his being in the “red zone”, before watching him hobble through the revolving doors at the crowded injury centre.
The Star says Arsenal are favourites to land Real Madrid’s Isco. The Star links to the Metro, which says Spain’s AS says Arsenal are on course to hire the 23-year-old. Maybe.
The Indy says Arsenal are in for …TEN players! They are: Mauro Incardi; Alex Pato; Grzegorz Krychowiak; Ruben Neves; Edinson Cavani; Alvaro Morata; Michy Batshuayi; Jese Rodriguez; Rico Henry; Daniele Rugani; Karim Benzema; Gonzalo Higuain; and William Carvalho.
The Telegraph also has Arsenal’s ‘Top 10 Targets’. They are (not including names previously mentioned above): Ilkay Gundogan; Adrien Rabiot; Riechedly Bazoer; Lars Bender; Vincent Koziello; and Andrija Zivkovic.
The Metro say Arsenal want Jesus Navas and James McArthur.
The Mirror says Arsenal’s top target is Charly Musonda. Who? Why, he’s the “Chelsea sensation”. Yeah, really.
Tally: 20 players.
Posted: 3rd, December 2015 | In: Arsenal, Reviews, Sports | Comment
Black Depression: Un-Nooh in nominative determinism break horror
Missed Un
At the UK Snooker Championship a case of nominative determinism. The player has only the black to pot to make a maximum 147 break and pocket £44,000 in prize money.
He misses. His name? It’s Un-Nooh – aka Un-Noooooooooooooooooooh!
Spotter: Mike Marshall
Posted: 3rd, December 2015 | In: Reviews, Strange But True | Comment
If we are at war with ISIS why is Shilan Ozcelik in prison?
Shilan Ozcelik is in a British prison? Her crime was to try to join the PPK in fighting ISIS in Syria.
In November, Shilan, 18, from north London, was stuffed behind bars following her conviction for trying to join the campaign against Isis jihadis in Syria.
Get your head around that, if you can.
Read this and wonder why she’s in prison:
There was no evidence Özçelik had joined the PKK, made contact with PKK members or travelled to Turkey or Syria before she returned to Britain from Cologne in Germany in January 2015 and was arrested at Stansted airport…
Sentencing her to 21 months in a young offender institution, the judge, John Bevan, described her as “a stupid, feckless and deeply dishonest young woman”…
She would have to live with the “long lasting consequences of a conviction for terrorism”, he added .
Better had she joined the British Army and then demanded they don’t bomb the enemy only from the skies, but also meet them face to face on the ground.
Her friend Mark Campbell puts it well:
“Her family who had contacted authorities for help to bring her home, instead found her being pursued with criminal charges. With the government trying to get support for launching attacks on Isis this is really not the time to be prosecuting a young girl whose intention was to fight Isis. It sends out completely the wrong message and I would urge the Home Secretary to release her now.”
It’s insane.
Get Your War On: Corbyn wins, Cameron immortalised and tweeters battle on
It’s war, then. It always is. Britain has entered the war in Syria. MPs voted, backing the bombing with a majority of 174.
The Daily Mirror says this is “CAM’S WAR”, nailing the battle to David Cameron’s lapels. Something in the history books for Dave, then, who had been relying on footnotes about ‘Sam Cam’ and ‘LOL’ to mark his place in the ledgers.
The Mirror leads with news that Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn “warned” that not everyone is in favour of fighting. Says Corbyn: “The Prime Minister’s approach is bomb first talk later.”
But they did talk and talk and talk in the Commons. For an age the talk was about Cameron’s comment that the naysayers were a ” bunch of terrorist sympathisers”. Labelling them all as such was crass and clumsy. Cameron might have surveyed the Opposition benches and been more pointed about those with “friends” in Hamas.
The Sun says Corbyn “cosied up to IRA during its campaign of slaughter” and called Hamas and Hezbollah “friends”.
The Mirror says politicians from all sides demanded Cameron apologise. “12 times” he refused to do so.
Mirror columnist Kevin Maguire looks at the vote and concludes that Cameron “lost the argument” to bomb Syria. Very few journalists are good at maths. But to say that a 174 majority represent a moral defeat is monocular to the point to tunnel vision. Maguire then shares his observation that Cameron is a “posh Tory with no class”.
Maguire also agrees with Corbyn that attacking Islamic State will make us a target. Newsflash: we are a target.
The Mail says Corbyn was “crushed”. In all 66 Labour MPs voted against their leader, including Hilary Benn, who called he jihadis “fascists” and an “evil” that must be defeated. Corbyn was “ashen-faced” and “eviscerated”.
The Indy leads with Benn’s speech. Cometh the hour, cometh yet another Labour MP to show just how feeble Corbyn is.
The Mail says pro-war Labour MPs were sent pictures of dead kids and attacked online by hard-Left moralists. Stella Creasy MP saw her home and office marched on by “hundreds” of protestors. The Sun sees her tweet one righteous tweeter, “Seriously do one sunshine.”
You can’t beat ISIS on twitter, but you can call out a few bellends.
Let’s get our war on, then.
Posted: 3rd, December 2015 | In: Key Posts, Reviews | Comment (1)
NUS: Israelis are never killed by ‘terrorists’ and anti-Semitism not a problem
In 1972 Palestinian terror outfit Black September murdered 11 Israel athletes at the Munich Olympics.
Ilana Romano says her husband Yossef was tied up and castrated:
“What they did is that they cut off his genitals through his underwear and abused him. Can you imagine the nine others sitting around tied up? They watched this.”
She wants us to know what happened to the athletes before and after they were murdered.
But the Daily Mirror has a version of the story that should excite some readers:
The Mirror calls the murdered Israelis the “terrorists”.
The story has now been altered to read:
One of the nine Israeli athletes murdered by Palestinian militant group Black September was castrated and others were tortured during a 20 hour ordeal.
As you marvel at that error of fact, research and subbing (let’s be generous), the National Union of Students says that Israelis cannot be the victims of terror.
The Jewish News reports:
The National Union of Students has been urged to apologise over the “deliberate omission” of Israel from a list of countries suffering recent terror attacks.
An NUS statement read at its National Executive Committee meeting last night highlighted attacks over the past year by “paramilitary organisations” in Nigeria, Lebanon, Turkey, Afghanistan, Saudi Arabia, Pakistan, Kenya, Palestine, and Mali.
“Those who have perpetrated these attacks, have targeted people of all faiths, of all backgrounds and of all identities. Since the attacks, we have seen an increase in retributions places on Muslim communities here in the UK and around the world. We restate the NUS’ commitment to fighting Islamophobia.
“We mourn the victims of the attacks and stand in solidarity with the families and friends o al those affected…and stand in solidarity with citizens across the world who are suffering at the hands of violence and discrimination.”
Islamophobia gets more coverage and sympathy than the murder of Israelis. You might wonder why the NUS is not committed to fighting anti-Semitism, which in light of the attack on a Paris delicatessen and the Jewish-owned theatre is very real.
Posted: 2nd, December 2015 | In: Reviews | Comments (3)
Sarah Vine and online attacks on Gordon Ramsay’s ‘promiscuous’ daughters
For two days the Daily Mail has published this photograph of TV chef Gordon Ramsay’s four children: Jack, 16, Matilda, 14, Holly, 16, and Megan, 17. It was twins Jack and Holly’s joint 16th birthday party, and the family were gussied up for a party.
The Mail’s Sam Creighton said the children had been the victims of “online attacks”. And the paper had more to say. Cop a load of “14-year-old Matilda, wearing a black-and-white crop top with matching short skirt”, wrote Sam (age on application).
One day on and Sarah Vine, aka Mrs Michael Gove MP, is offering her opinion on the outfits. As you can see, Jack has been cropped from the family photo. Sarah opines:
Poor Gordon Ramsay – now there’s three words I never thought I’d write. The 49-year-old chef posted what he thought was an innocent picture of his children on a night out – and was hit by a tsunami of online criticism about his parenting skills. The problem was the girls’ outfits. Matilda, 14, in a stripy crop top and skater skirt; Holly, 16, in a slip of a sequin dress; and Megan, 17, also in a crop top and spangly mini-skirt.
A pox on that online criticism. Why can’t these people stop shining a light on children.
She continues:
‘Way too much skin,’ observed one critic; ‘keep their innocence a little longer’ suggested another; ‘those are some short skirts,’ said a third. I can certainly see what they mean…
The online comments which will have cut Ramsay most deeply, the ones that prey on every protective dad’s (and mother’s) darkest fears, are the ones that said his daughters looked like ‘hoochies’ — slang for promiscuous young girls.
Having repeated the words of those online attackers, Vine concedes:
…today it’s different in a way I’m only beginning to understand. The pressure to look a certain way is so much more intense. When I was a teenager, you hardly ever saw a photo of yourself. But in the age of photo-sharing apps such as Instagram, girls are constantly reviewing and analysing their appearance.
To say nothing of the horror of being commented on by middle-aged writers in the Daily Mail.
Posted: 2nd, December 2015 | In: Celebrities, Key Posts, Reviews, Tabloids | Comment
Caffeine-Use Disorder is as real as your hallucinations
Scare story of the day is found in the Daily Mail (natch.), wherein we learn of “caffeine-use disorder”.
Sophie Freeman asks:
But how do you know when your love of coffee has gone too far?
When you’re on a coffee drip? The answer is with boffins at Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore and the American University in Washington D.C.
Despite being the “most widely used psychoactive drug in the world”, caffeine can make you jittery, anxious and tense. A cup of coffee is the Daily Mail in liquid form.
As for the study behind the news of a new disorder to be treated by a new kind of therapy, the researchers surveyed 67 people. The coffee drinker were put on a “caffeine-fading scheme”, seeing their consumption reduced. They were given a booklet to “use between counsellor sessions”.
They were then locked alone inside their mum’s stuffy downstairs toilet for five days and invited to work through their delusions, nightmares and back copies of Readers’ Digest magazine.
Posted: 2nd, December 2015 | In: Reviews, Tabloids, The Consumer | Comment
Judge allowed defendant to be accompanied by his cat in court
To Chelmsford Crown Crown, Essex, where defendant Aiden Wiltshire, 72, is in the dock. To his side is his cat Taylor, perched in a wheeled shopping trolley.
ITV says Mr Wiltshire “continually stroked” his cat.
Wiltshire’s lawyer, Gavin Burrell ,says of the cat and this client:
“It’s a crutch which he relies on. It’s in a basket and not roaming free. I appreciate it sounds somewhat odd but there’s documentary evidence that the cat does provide emotional support for the defendant to cope.”
As the defendant left the court, the judge advised him “don’t let the cat out of the bag”.
The tin lid is place on this story when we tell you that Wiltshire, of Chelmsford, is accused of two offences of… stalking. He has not yet entered any pleas. His case was adjourned until the new year.
The cat is blameless, allegedly.
Posted: 2nd, December 2015 | In: Reviews, Strange But True | Comment
Arsenal: Alexis Sanchez performs hokey cokey to prove his fitness
How injured is Arsenal’s Alexis Sanchez?
He’s IN!
The Mirror: “Sanchez has handed Arsenal a huge boost ahead of Christmas the New Year.”
He’s OUT!
The Sun: “Arsene Wenger fears Alexis Sanchez may miss the festive programme.”
He’s SHAKING IT ALL ABOUT!
The Mail: “Arsenal are still assessing star forward Alexis Sanchez.”
In other words: he’s injured but the tabloids have no idea how badly.
Posted: 2nd, December 2015 | In: Arsenal, Reviews, Sports, Tabloids | Comment
Tabloids keep ISIS guessing when bombing raids will begin
When will Britain begin bombing Islamic State, formerly “so-called Islamic State”? The Mail says it’s 48 hours. The Sun says it’s 36 hours.
Jeremy Corbyn says ‘NEVER!”
Good old, Jezza. Loose lips sink ships, and all that.
Posted: 1st, December 2015 | In: Reviews | Comment (1)
Court rules a BMW motorbike will not give you a 2-day erection
BMW – ‘But Mine Works’
Can a BMW give you a two-day erection? The Marin Independent Journal learns the truth:
Wolf claimed he suffered an acute case of priapism – a painfully prolonged erection — after riding his 1993 BMW motorcycle for two hours. He claimed the vibrations in the “ridge-like” motorcycle seat caused the condition that lasted several days, so he sued BMW North America and the seat manufacturer, Corbin-Pacific Inc.The lawsuit claimed product liability, negligence and negligent infliction of emotional distress. Wolf said he was forced to seek treatment at Marin General Hospital and then with other specialists.
On Tuesday – in a 14-page decision laced with medical language about Doppler ultrasounds, tumescence and aspiration of the corposa cavernosa — a three-judge 1st District Court of Appeal panel affirmed a San Francisco Superior Court decision to dismiss the case.
The judges found that Wolf’s appeal “fails to comply with the rules of appellate procedure” by failing to cite the relevant cases or statutes, and it “contains no intelligible argument.” The panel ordered Wolf to pay the defendants’ costs on appeal, a sum?
File under: two stroke.
Posted: 1st, December 2015 | In: Reviews, Strange But True | Comment
Driver who killed teenager didn’t have a licence because he’s blind
Hector Arroyo, 68, called police to tell hem he’d hit a deer while her was out driving. He had;’t. He’d hit and killed 13-year-old Helina Dirba.
Arroyo told Detective James Maltby he didn’t stop because he didn’t have a licence. Why not? Well, his licences was revoked because he’s “legally blind”.
Arroyo is charged with involuntary homicide-manslaughter with a vehicle, driving while licence suspended causing death and failure to stop at the scene of a crash causing injury or death.
Posted: 1st, December 2015 | In: Reviews, Strange But True | Comment
Arsenal balls: the media crisis that isn’t
Arsenal have a lot of players injured. But some how they’ve managed to give themselves a fighting chance of progressing in the Champions’ League and sit just two points from the Premier League summit.
No disaster, then.
But to the Mirror Arsenal are in a “Greek tragedy”. Needing to beat an ordinary Olympiakos side by two clear goals or score three and win, the paper says the Gunners’ chances are reduced by injury. They are in “crisis”.
Read the rest of this entry »
Posted: 1st, December 2015 | In: Arsenal, Reviews, Sports | Comment
Transfer balls: Chelsea in for Manchester United’s Thomas Muller
The Mirror says Chelsea have joined the hunt for Bayern Munich’s Thomas Muller. In “Muller In.. Mauler Out”, the paper says the German will replace Diego Costa, the Blues’ charmless striker.
According to Darren Lewis, Chelsea face a challenge from Manchester United for the superb Bayern star.
Why Muller should want to leave the German champions nicknamed FC Hollywood for life with Mourinho’s vanity project or Louis Van Gaal’s dullards is something former Germany captain Lothar Matthaus can’t work out.
“He does not need United or Xhelsea,” says Matthaus. “Barcelona perhaps could use him, but I don’t know whether he can deal with their game. He started his career at Bayern and I think he should end his career there.”
The Premier League is a bubble. The tabloids pretend it’s better than it is, talking up the money-bloated PL, linking the world’s top players to English teams more in hope than reality.
For instance, this drivel remain on the Daily Express site:
Such are the facts.
Posted: 1st, December 2015 | In: Chelsea, manchester united, Reviews, Sports | Comment
Listen to Manchester’s Beetham Tower groan and hum in the wind
If you listen you can hear Manchester’s Beetham Tower grown in the wind.
Posted: 30th, November 2015 | In: Reviews, Strange But True | Comment
Tristram Hunt MP ‘Beyond Excited” Stoke to get a Pizza Express
Labour MP Tristram Hunt says he is “Beyond Excited’ to learn that Stoke is to get a branch of the Pizza Express restaurant chain.
BEYOND EXCITED!
Tristram Hunt is not a parody – why would anyone bother to make him up?
Clickbait football: Manchester United and the ‘Jamie Vardy’ reject
In Clickbait Football, the Metro has news on the Manchester United “reject” who could have been Louis Van Gaal’s Jamie Vardy.
The paper’s headline declares:
Stats: Man United reject proving he could’ve been LvG’s Vardy, he’s smashing records in Europe
Is it Lee Chadwick?
No. It’s Javier Hernandez. And the record he’s setting is:
Chicharito’s six Bundesliga goals immediately make him the highest scoring Mexican in German top division.
Wow!
Posted: 30th, November 2015 | In: manchester united, Reviews, Sports | Comment
Chelsea balls: Costa tosses his pink toys and misses Mourinho
Diego Costa is more entertaining off the pitch than on it. The Chelsea striker “threw his substitute bib at Jose Mourinho and his toys out of the pram” after being dropped, says the Mirror in “Diddums Diego”.
The Independent agrees that Cost tossed his bib “at Jose Mourinho”.
Which he didn’t. If he did, then he missed.
The Sun says Diego was in a “rage” at being dropped for Chelsea’ match at Spurs. After the boring 0-0 draw, Costa went and sat on the team bus on his own.
The Mail calls him “stroppy Costa”, adding that Chelsea ” looked better off without him”.
The Express says Costa’s future at the Blues is in the balance.
As for Mourinho, well, he opined: “If he wants to hurt me it would not be with a bib. I have a good relationship with him. Diego is physically fine, no problems. He works well, every day his mood is positive, he is the positive guy in the team. I do not expect to have a player on the bench jumping and shouting because he is not playing.”
Best save the hissy-fits for the management team.
Leicester City striker Jamie Vardy gets the Hollywood movie treatment
Jamie Vardy, Leicester City’s can’t-stop-scoring striker, is to star in a Hollywood film, says the Sun. Well, not him, but an actor playing the 28-year-old footballer.
And who might that actor be? Well, the Sun lines up Robert Pattinson, Andrew Garfield and Zac Efron.
To which the first question is: has anyone in Hollywood seen Jamie Vardy?
And then the season question: is Vardy’s catchphrase ‘Chat Shit Get Banged’ a working title?
Posted: 30th, November 2015 | In: Celebrities, Reviews, Sports | Comment
Princess Charlotte photos: three eyes, a comb-over and everything sponsored
Pictures of Princess Charlotte occupy the front pages of the Mail, Telegraph, Mirror and Express.
The Mirror says the child’s hair is “light brown – somewhere between the colour of Kate’s darks locks and William’s blond ones”.
The Mail says the photos taken by “proud Kate” show a child with a “sweep of dark hair and sparkling eyes”, making her “most definitely her mother’s daughter”.
Some confusion about the hair, then.
The Mail can’t make its mind up about anything – the headline to Rebecca English’s story on Kate’s mini-me tells us Charlotte’s a mini-him
The Mail than further contradicts itself by saying Charlotte’s “twinkling blue eyes are inherited from her father.” Maybe she has one of Wills’ eyes and one of Kate’s?
Make that three eyes, because the Mirror says “six-month-old Charlotte seems to have inherited her late gran Princess Diana’s big blue eyes”.
The Mail notes how she sits “unaided in a shabby-chic-look armchair” at the family’s 10-bedroom Anmer Hall pile. She is “gazing almost wistfully at something in the distance…perhaps her nanny, Maria Borrallo”, or perhaps at grandpa Charles whose talking to a pot plant and looking at her for traces of his own features.
The Express concludes that the child looks a “Lotte like her mum”. It assures all paparazzi that Charlotte is a “natural for the camera”. Phew!
The Mirror makes it a multimedia event, somehow noticing from two photos that Charlotte is “shrieking with delight”.
And on its goes. But what’s also bizarre about this story is the number of brand’s checked. Kate uses a Canon EOS 5D Mark II (Express) camera. Charlotte wears a dress by Liberty (Express) and ribbed baby pink tights by Amaia Kids (Mail). She looks at a Jelly Cat Fuddleworth Puppy (Mirror).
Is everything sponsored? Let’s hope so. It’s high time the Creosote Royals paid for themselves,
Posted: 30th, November 2015 | In: Key Posts, Reviews, Royal Family | Comment
Premier League footballer in Sun schoolgirl stunna sexting sensation
Which part of this Sun headline excites you the most?
Premier league star meets uniformed schoolgirl in street… then sends pics of his manhood just hours later
If it’s the part of the uniformed schoolgirl, then you might wonder if the Sun is approving in this observation or damning?
After all, the Sun does love a young woman in a school uniform.
Here’s former Page 3 stunna Sam Fox, who never was upbraided for slapping on a gym slip:
And there was this story:
The Sun told its readers:
“St.Trinian’s back with a bang – And they’re as wild and sexy as ever – FIFTY years after they first charged through the crumbling corridors of their school, the girls of St. Trinian’s are back. And they’re as wild and sexy as ever.”
Adding:
“In an exclusive interview, Everett and Firth discuss our ‘pervy’ attitude to school uniforms and revealed how they overcame their public feud of 23 years to star in the film.”
And the tabloids carried this ad for Ryan Air:
Now, about that manhood…
Note: the woman referred to in the Sun’s headline is 18-year-old.
Posted: 29th, November 2015 | In: Reviews, Tabloids | Comment
Transfer balls: Liverpool in for 7 Dortmund players (and one plays for Manchester United)
The Metro reports Liverpool manager Jurgen Klopp as having said “nothing stopping Liverpool grabbing Marco Reus and Mats Hummels”.
Is that really what he said? Because last January the Metro reported that Reus had agreed to join Real Madrid – which he hadn’t done:
That balls was written by Jamie Sanderson, who is also the author of this latest news:
Sanderson adds:
Klopp has revealed he could sign the pair, because there’s no clause in his exit contract from Dortmund preventing him.
He could buy any Dortmund player for Liverpool, then. Indeed, in another article the Metro says Klopp wants to bring Neven Subotic to Liverpool.
That’s three Dortmund players. The Express spots Klopp’s shopping cart and adds Mats Hummels, Henrikh Mkhitaryan, Sven Bender and Ilkay Gundogan.
Can it be that Klopp will buy seven Dortmund players? We soon learn that the manager said:
…there could be a possibility – if we need a player then we could try. At this moment there is nothing to talk about. But there is no agreement that we can’t do business with Dortmund. There’s also no agreement that we can’t sell players to Dortmund!
One problem is that Hummels plays for Manchester United. He doesn’t? But we heard that he signed for them. We read that news in the Metro:
Such are the facts…
Posted: 29th, November 2015 | In: Liverpool, Reviews, Sports, Tabloids | Comment
ISIS and the nanny State agree: smoking is punishable by death
Can we relate to ISIS? Yes, says Brendan O’Neill, we can because they are like the worst of us.
Both are punishable by death
He notes:
ISIS hates everything about the West. Except the nanny state. It loves that. (Top: ISIS anti-smoking poster. Bottom: European anti-smoking poster.)
Death to the smokers!
Record Thief Returns Stolen Stone Roses LP After Finding God
A born-again Christian regrets stealing vinyl from Out On The Floor Records in London’s Camden Town 10 years ago. The thief realised that his religion looks unkindly on stealing, so he parcelled up the goods and sent them back to the shop.
He slipped this note between the record sleeves:
“Dear – when I was a teenager, I pinched a few records from you, about 10 years ago. I became a Christian not too long ago and wanted you to have these records – I hope you can put them to good use. Sorry, with regards.”
The haul includes records by The Cure, The Smiths and The Stone Roses.
Let us pray:
Posted: 29th, November 2015 | In: Reviews, Strange But True | Comment
