United & Off The Pitch

My beloved Blades sent out a press release this week. They’ve teamed up with a company called Off The Pitch. OTP appear to do data analysis around the business of football. I’m not into business data of any sort, but I do know when there’s some corporate BS being used, and this press release was full of it.

But of course it was, because when I went to the ABOUT US section of OTP’s website, I was greeted with this:

Did someone drop the word “media” in there just for shits and giggles? Or am I missing something to do with the English language here? Because however I try to phrase this punctuation-free header, I can’t get seem to get it to make sense.
At the very least, surely if you’re going to use “is”, you have to use “medium“, right?

Basically, it seems to me that we’re buying this package so we can pay less for our players and pay our players less in the future.

But then the press release is packed full of boardroomisms and buzzwords:

Carl Shieber, Sheffield United’s Head of Football Administration, expressed his enthusiasm about the partnership: “Our partnership with Off The Pitch opens a realm of opportunities for Sheffield United. It provides an invaluable platform for benchmarking against other clubs, both domestically and internationally. This alliance is a step towards a more analytical approach in our business, commercial development, and player trading strategies.”

“Alliance”, “Platform”, “Benchmarking” and “Strategies”. Nice try, Carl.

But then OTP CEO Mads blows him away with this spiel:

Mads Meisner Christensen, Co-founder and CEO of Off The Pitch, shared his thoughts on this significant agreement: “We are excited to equip Sheffield United with a diverse range of tools to enhance their operational efficiency. This partnership is set to provide Sheffield United with a strategic edge in the transfer market, helping them to identify and leverage market inefficiencies for optimal results.”

Blimey! “Leverage” alone is worth 10 points! “Optimal” and “Strategic” are just the icing on the cake.

The thing is, how are we supposed to have any sort of edge – strategic or not – in the transfer market, when it seems like most of the clubs in Europe are using this same system? Did we pay more for the gold edition or something?

I don’t pretend to get it. I don’t have to get it.

But if we could just use plain English from now on, I would have more chance of getting it.

Summed up

With the visit of my dad from the UK, we were able to enjoy Christmas 2.0 this morning. No point in posting gifts back to the UK when there’s someone coming over who can take them back. No point in posting anything to South Africa, full stop.

If I could be summed up in garments, then this would be very close to a perfect fit (no pun intended). Henderson’s Relish Tee, the iconic (and now “Retro”, sigh) 1990 Sheffield United away shirt, and a 6 Music Dad cap (IYKYK).

Add in the Mushy Peas and the Bassett’s Liquorice Allsorts and I’m clearly totally predictable.

And also very happy. Thank you.

You can’t win

Ah. The magic of the Third Round of the FA Cup. A wonderful opportunity for the smaller clubs to take a pot shot at the big boys.

And it’s great if you are a smaller club. Nothing to lose.

Get hammered? Well you were up against top class opposition. Internationals.

Lose? Plucky performance. Well done. On to the next league game.

Win? Write your names in the giant killing history books. Sutton United. Ronnie Radcliffe. Fucking Wrexham.

Of course, it’s the other way around if you’re the big club. No-one is saying anything incredible about Lille, despite this result:

Literally, you can’t win.

But we did.

Last Night

Didn’t win.
Actually unlucky to lose.
Tactically very sound.
Defended well.
And a couple of… let’s say… “convenient” decisions for the opposition:

Lol. Diplomacy with sarcasm. I love it.
Someone doesn’t want to get himself into trouble on his first day back.

But he’s right, because, for example, while we all love a good tackle, that Darwin Nunez scissor action on Jayden Bogle was clearly a foul in the modern era. And by “the modern era”, I mean last night.
On a muddy pitch with jumpers for goalposts and clodhopper Mitre boots back in 1986? Sure. Fantastic.
But there are a lot of things you could do then that you simply can’t do now. And that was certainly one of them.

That said, we were playing a good side with some quality players. And Joe Gomez. It’s always a bit of a wake-up call to the reality of the other world in the Premier League when the opposition bring on a €45m Dutch signing to replace their other €45m Dutch signing because they needed some extra cover for their defence for the last five minutes, but for once this season, we punched above our weight and there were plenty of positives too. It was good to see a return of some passion and some drive. The confidence was clearly still missing: when you have young strikers who have proven that they can score goals and they’re not shooting, well, we know why that is. But a few more of those performances, a goal or two, and maybe it’ll return.

We move away from football for a short while now, ahead of the next round of fixtures which are [checks notes] a whole 48 hours away. I do so hope that everyone is happy with that situation.