Brendan Timmons

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Real Madrid Castilla – Where the kids aren’t all right.

May 12, 2011

Another season and another catalogue of disappointments. Real Madrid C.F. is fast resembling a Ferrari without an engine:it looks good on the surface but it won’t be getting you very far, regardless of how synonymous it is with success. This campaign has yielded a solitary trophy for Los Blancos yet the squad is collectively worth […]

For the Sake of the Game: Who We Support and Why it Still Matters

April 29, 2011

What is the fundamental importance of football? The support of its fans. Brendan begins our three piece ‘For Sake of the Game‘ feature with an overview of the predicament modern football finds itself in, before a swift follow up through both sides of the debate later next week. A few years ago an advert appeared […]

Tribute Act: The Rise of the New Mourinho

April 22, 2011

We are all guilty of hoping there is a formula for success. In football, we convince ourselves that if we can just lure that influential manager, or that star player, or secure that lucrative investment, then days of glory will ensue. And then, just when the ingredients for prosperity seem explicitly obvious, a remarkable exception […]

The Thick Of It: Controversy, Politics and the FIFA Presidency

April 14, 2011

Anonymity is a characteristic after which many politicians yearn and are often eluded by. Let’s face it, whenever we discuss Silvio Berlusconi the many body of the conversation isn’t a thorough dissection of his political policies but rather a gratifying discussion of the ill-fated sexual ventures that frequently feature in his indulgent lifestyle. In football’s […]

La Liga Loca

April 1, 2011

By Brendan Timmons And so, they gathered round, the air crackling with anticipation at the Mestalla stadium whilst club and captain awaited in Málaga to hold aloft the club’s first league trophy in no less than 31 years. Given Rafa Benitez’s subsequently elevated eligibility and the fact that Real Madrid and Barcelona placed […]

Burnout Paradise: The Tale of the modern Brazilian.

March 24, 2011

There is a scene in last Christmas’ comedy Little Fockers in which Robert De Niro is seen to be frolicking in a ball-pool with Ben Stiller. Robert De Niro. Academy Award Winning Robert De Niro. The term ‘fall from grace’ will be readily and justifiably applied and, though such a dilemma is equally endemic […]

Financial Fair Play and You

March 16, 2011

Anyone well acquainted with a family game of Monopoly will be aware that it inevitably descends into one, or perhaps more, players tossing the board away and proclaiming, often justifiably so, that another participant has indulged in some financial irregularities, i.e. spending money which is not necessarily theirs to spend. Contrived though the analogy may […]

The Costs of Free Football. The tale of Rayo Vallecano

March 4, 2011

By Brendan Timmons There was a time, not so long ago, when the term ‘Beautiful Game’ wasn’t undermined by a potent hint of irony. Though the perception may be regarded as cynical, ‘beautiful’ hardly seems the appropriate adjective to attach to a sport so infested with disloyalty, hypocrisy and unrivalled self-indulgence. Yet, however […]

Hidden in the River: The tale of Erik Lamela

February 25, 2011

The tale, to the more astute among you, isn’t a wholly unfamiliar one. He resided in a residential suburb of Buenos Aires, Argentina, his childhood of the unspectacular variety and his appearance, but for his diminutive stature, was equally unremarkable. He may even have been regarded as an ordinary boy were it not […]

Leading the Galacticos

February 17, 2011

Once upon a time they reigned supreme at the helm of European football. Their perpetual affluence a subject of both awe and envy. They were regarded as the bar by which every other team would be measured. They were the embodiment of every other club’s deepest aspirations. They were winners. They were white shirts, black […]