Most assists since the start of last season in Europe Top 5 leagues:
28 — Michael Olise
27
26
25
24
23
22
21 — Lamine Yamal, Mohamed Salah
Olise has played 850 fewer minutes than Salah and 501 fewer minutes than Yamal.
this is such facts and i've seen it firsthand
my mates older sister is a corporate recruiter for a fortune 500
few drinks in at christmas she started talking
"you want to know how many of those linkedin jobs are real?"
i said yeah
"maybe 30%. and thats generous"
she pulled out her phone
showed me the backend of their ATS
4,200 applications for a "marketing coordinator" role
position was filled internally 3 weeks before they posted it
"so why post it?"
"legal. we have to show we tried to hire externally. diversity metrics. plus the data"
"what data"
"emails. phone numbers. work history. salary expectations. we sell anonymised reports to consulting firms. and keep the rest for future roles we also wont hire for"
i asked how many CVs she actually reads
"for entry level? none. AI filters. if you dont keyword match in the first 8 seconds youre in a black hole"
"what about the people who make it through?"
"depends. if someones internal referral is in the pile we usually just pick them. the interviews are theatre"
i asked what shed do if she was job hunting
she laughed
"i wouldnt apply online. ever. id find the hiring managers linkedin, find their email pattern, and send something directly. or id get someone inside to drop my name before the role goes live"
"so the application is pointless"
"the application is a formality. the decision happened weeks ago. youre just being processed"
she said something at the end i think about constantly
"people treat job hunting like a meritocracy. send good CV, get interview, get job. it hasnt worked like that in 15 years. the system is designed to handle volume, not find talent. if youre playing by the rules youre already losing"
600 applications per role
30 seconds of human attention
the rest is database filler
stop applying
start bypassing
the front door is a trap
the side door is where deals get made
Reminder that this is all because Trump is mad that the Norwegian Nobel Committee (not the Norwegian government) didn’t give him the Nobel Peace Prize.
He cannot handle being told “no” because he’s a toddler and is now starting a war in retaliation. This is who MAGA claims is the most peaceful president in history.
🚨 Danny Imray has been caught up in Crystal Palace’s political struggles and left in limbo.
Imray is a personal favourite of chairman Steve Parish but coach Oliver Glasner overlooked him - again.
@reluctantnicko
Ruben Amorim explaining his philosophy in 2024.
“The power of the STRUCTURE means you can change formation.”
Don't fall for INEOS/Glazers PR spin abt SJR, Wilcox, Vivell & Berrada wanting him to change. They knew RA's system before they hired him.
➜ 3 points behind a team who spent €500M in the summer
➜ Fighting for 🇪🇺 places
➜ Team with most shots on target in the PL
➜ 2 draws after missing 8 starting players
➜ He was told there would be NO signings in January
The way they treated Ruben Amorim was 𝐈𝐍𝐒𝐀𝐍𝐄 🔴🤦♂️
My understanding of the situation:
>Ashworth (DoF) wanted to keep Ten Hag until they fixed the club structure, it didn't work out & they both got sacked
>Berrada (CEO) took charge of the appointment picking Amorim whilst Wilcox (HoR) disagreed but obviously didn't have the power to decide/influence/overrule
>Wilcox then got promoted (DoF) & has run the club on a day-to-day basis meaning everything is aligned through his work... except for one decision
>Amorim then requests proven signings in the transfer window (Martinez & Watkins) whilst the club stick with the desire to bring in the best talent possible creating a disconnection between expectations of a COACH vs. MANAGER
>Wilcox & Amorim then fall out due to a lack of adaptability from the manager which the former was reportedly concerned about when appointing the latter
You simply cannot make it up.
Berrada picked the manager [Amorim]
Wilcox lead player recruitment [Didn't want Amorim]
Now there's tension between Wilcox / Amorim for the manager to change what he's doing.
But he's been fed two messages from start -> present day.
A MESS.
There’s a reason why you have never seen me put Howe in conversations around the elite. There are fundamental strategic issues in his approach that simply don’t work for a team aiming to be around the top of the league consistently.
Howe’s idea in possession is heavily based on creating through underlaps and overlaps via the positional rotations in the wide triangles FB–CM–W. This is a great tool to have, but Newcastle are overly dependent on it. This, in correlation with the fact that Howe primarily plays with constant double width in his 4-3-3, naturally forces his team wider. You will very rarely see a Newcastle player receiving between the lines facing forward in settled play, which requires a lot more carrying and baiting from the back four combined with zonal pinning, rather than the constant pass-and-move sequences in the wide triangle. This severely impacts the central and half-space (objectively the most valuable area of the pitch) threat Newcastle are able to generate.
The most worrying aspect is the lack of temporal awareness. Newcastle go long far more often than they should, even when there is a clear free man in the build-up. This, in turn, drastically limits the amount of control they can generate. These strategic issues are also aligned with the physical expenditure required from the players. When you combine this with the fact that Howe has a very strong bias towards out-of-possession attributes in recruitment, it makes the perfect combination of a coach who can occasionally get into Europe but ultimately cannot challenge at the very top consistently.
This is the most important part: he’s admitting reality.
He wants the ideal 3-4-3, but he knows this squad can’t execute it consistently without massive spending. So adaptation isn’t weakness, it’s intelligence. Playing Amad changes the whole dynamic because he gives you aggression and intent, not just structure.
Same formation on paper, completely different behaviour on the pitch. That’s what people miss.