Football

Puts another score on Chelsea...

lol.
Seriously though. How will Thrushy cope if Madrid were to get an early goal from a set piece?

We're still in with a chance and frankly to be challenging at all is beyond anyone's belief. Just have to win our final 2 games. We are really missing Henderson, lucas isn't effective in that position

It's still a good season with 3rd... although it doesn't feel like it right now

Yep it was very silly of Henderson to get sent off like that. We definitely missed his pace and workman qualities against Chelsea :(

andyp, it was both gutting and strangely exciting to see modric and bale excelling for Madrid, especially modric who'll have a big role to play come the final with alonso out. Why he and Ramos weren't subbed as soon as the game got to 3-0 I don't know.

Ancelloti said said something about a game at 3-0 not being over in the CL...

At Punnage, it wasn't the final, and away goals count double, Bayern would have had to have scored five in the end. And after the first two went in, they didn't look like scoring one. The pace and execution of Madrid's counter attacking was a wonder to behold and they looked like scoring at will. He could have subbed Ramos and Alonso before half time and still walked it..

lol.
Seriously though. How will Thrushy cope if Madrid were to get an early goal from a set piece?

He'll change his game plan. Like he always does. You can say and hate all you like but Mourinho knows tactics like no other manager does. To an extent he's reactive to the extreme. His teams are not always the most exciting teams to watch but they certainly are effective. I hate to say it but the Real Madrid team that won the league in 11-12 was probably the mos exciting team to watch ever. The speed in that squad was breathtaking.

Corny, is it barca, real or atletico you support? I always forget at this time of year...

Marky, was expecting you and the Chelsea brood to be in the Effra on Sunday, does that mean you'll be in there tonight?

And I'll tell you as I have done before, I'm a fan of football worldwide, and have a soft spot for many sides, an ever expanding list as I come into more contact with the history and legends of clubs.

And for this match, I'll be supporting El Pupas, against Mourinho's anti football. Not saying Atletico are glorious exponents of expansive attacking football, but I love their underdog status in La Liga, the fact that in the year that their most successful manager Luis Aragones died that they might do the Liga and Champions League double. That Diego Simeone who was a mainstay of the team that won La Liga in 96/97 now manages this team on the verge of the double, that Kun Aguero scored some crackers for them, that Diego Forlan rehabilitated his career and reputation at Villareal first but most notably there, after the english press had written him off as shite.

And that if they do make the final it will be a chance for them to take on their city rivals which will make it super tasty, and Simeone will get the chance to do his version of this speech from Aragones.

In the dressing room before the 1992 Copa del Rey final against Real Madrid, Aragonés picked up a bottle of Coke. "If you don't win today, I'll stick this up my arse," he shouted. "You've got to do them. This is the moment you've been waiting for: Real Madrid and at the Bernabéu. They've been sticking it up our arses for so long, now it's our chance to stick it up theirs." He pointed at the tactics board and said: "See this? Well this is irrelevant. What matters is you. Forget tactics, it's Real Madrid. Get out there and stick it up their arses!" They did, too.

I agree with most of your points, other than the Forlan felating.

Liar.

2 girls in my house right now.. I have to pick my football watching battles... this isn't high on my list

And I thought it was only Oligarchs or Muslims who could have two women at the same time...

And Kenyans

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-africa-27206590

And I thought it was only Oligarchs or Muslims who could have two women at the same time...

I'm not a morman either

the wife's sister has been staying helping me look after her since the motorcycle accident

Ah.

Dirty bugger...

Fair play though, if the first team is carrying an injury why not bring on a sub.

Marky, was expecting you and the Chelsea brood to be in the Effra on Sunday, does that mean you'll be in there tonight?

And I'll tell you as I have done before, I'm a fan of football worldwide, and have a soft spot for many sides, an ever expanding list as I come into more contact with the history and legends of clubs.

And for this match, I'll be supporting El Pupas, against Mourinho's anti football. Not saying Atletico are glorious exponents of expansive attacking football, but I love their underdog status in La Liga, the fact that in the year that their most successful manager Luis Aragones died that they might do the Liga and Champions League double. That Diego Simeone who was a mainstay of the team that won La Liga in 96/97 now manages this team on the verge of the double, that Kun Aguero scored some crackers for them, that Diego Forlan rehabilitated his career and reputation at Villareal first but most notably there, after the english press had written him off as shite.

And that if they do make the final it will be a chance for them to take on their city rivals which will make it super tasty, and Simeone will get the chance to do his version of this speech from Aragones.

In the dressing room before the 1992 Copa del Rey final against Real Madrid, Aragonés picked up a bottle of Coke. "If you don't win today, I'll stick this up my arse," he shouted. "You've got to do them. This is the moment you've been waiting for: Real Madrid and at the Bernabéu. They've been sticking it up our arses for so long, now it's our chance to stick it up theirs." He pointed at the tactics board and said: "See this? Well this is irrelevant. What matters is you. Forget tactics, it's Real Madrid. Get out there and stick it up their arses!" They did, too.

tl;dr

Plasticus Maximus

Corny; Renaissance Plastic

©Sid Lowe.

We can all copy and paste...

Jaw, glad to see you're reading the same sid lowe articles that I am...

Always have and always will. Giles Tremlett and Sid Lowe are hugely entertaining on any subject related to Spain. Read Ghosts of Spain if you want some more background to Spanish culture corny.

Jaw, added to the kindle wishlist..

Good man. You're a man of the world, I think you'll enjoy that.

We're so close to moving to Microcosm that I've not chased on donations in months and months and last year stated that we were ticking over, month to month: https://www.lfgss.com/post3743785-430.html

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We are actually working on the Microcosm export and import scripts now, and so it is close. But it's still not tomorrow and our present costs are real.

The big issue: We've actually lost money every month for the last 6 months.

Our revenue comes from 2 places:

1) Affiliates (when you click on links to eBay, Rapha, Chain Reaction Cycles, Wiggle, etc and then subsequently buy something, they give us a kick back).

2) Donations (the PayPal subscriptions).

Affiliates has counted for about 70% of the costs for quite a long while, and donations cover the rest.

The affiliate revenue varies by season, dropping in the winter and regaining in the summer. And usually the summer revenue offsets the losses over winter and everything works out fine.

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The problem today is that the affiliate revenues collapsed in November (as expected, it's seasonal), but didn't then recover in Jan, Feb, Mar or April. In fact they've been between a third and half of the expected amount.

Meaning that I've personally subsidised the forum costs since November believing it would start to recover in January and have fully recovered by March. This hasn't happened.

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Todat we are about half of our usual revenue for this time of year. Meaning the losses aren't being made up and I knew a crunch was coming.

As it stands, we do not have enough money in the bank to pay any of the costs this month. The crunch is here.

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And I personally cannot subsidise the shortfalls (I only receive a take home wage of £850 per month and my credit card has been taking the hit when LFGSS falls short).

We basically need to recover the revenue we've lost through donations... which means either:
1) Encouraging more people to help out
2) Encouraging those are helping out to help more
3) Some generous sod has a couple of grand spare just to put us back to above zero and cover the shortfalls of the last few months

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My personal view is always going to be the "keep donations low, and voluntary, and encourage more people to help out".

So I'm going to change the site header and basically do a pledge drive for most of May.

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But if you are donating already and can afford to up the amount or frequency (i.e. from a beer a quarter, to a beer a month)... then that would be incredible.

Rather embarrassed it's got this far. Each month I've watched the affiliate revenue expecting the bounce after the Christmas slump, but it just hasn't happened.

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Cross posted in case you hadn't seen it yet.

Tags?

Thin. Fucking. Ice.