MichaelC

[Kevin Blake @kevinblake2011]

It’s here! Royal Ascot is my favourite week of the year and while it is a brutal beast to pull winners from, I’ll be trying to do just that every day in my @AtTheRaces column. You can read my day one thoughts and selections here: https://t.co/ygdf517ZyX

[Florian Ederer @florianederer]

I believe we now have evidence of FIFA's World Cup ticketing shell game: FIFA is colluding with third-party resale platforms for its own supply management.

Look at this SeatGeek map (secondary market!) for Saudi Arabia vs Cape Verde. The circled areas are not random single resale tickets, but large, contiguous blocks of seats: entire rows and swaths in sections 101/102, 112/113, 119/120, 134–137, 139, ...

The blue circles appeared weeks ago, then the purple blocks suddenly showed up a day or two ago, and the red blocks seem to have appeared recently too.

That's not what ordinary fan or even commercial scalper resale looks like who resell pairs, fours, and scattered seats. Instead, this looks like inventory being dumped in bulk onto secondary markets, at prices below FIFA's official site.

Why doesn't FIFA just lower prices on its own site Probably because official price cuts could trigger refund demands, chargebacks, or consumer-protection headaches from fans who already bought at much higher prices.

Instead FIFA keeps official prices high, avoids openly admitting the market-clearing price is lower, and moves unsold inventory through third-party resale platforms instead.

[MichaelC @mjoc13]

@livescore Graham Coughlan is coach of Waterford FC.

[Ramita Navai @ramitanavai]

Here is my BAFTA speech in full, with the important bit that hasn't been shown.

Also, a heartfelt thank you to everyone who supported us, and to our colleagues who rallied around us. And thank you to @BAFTA and the judges for a great evening and a great honour.

[Miguel Delaney @MiguelDelaney]

Special report: the great World Cup rip-off

- Fifa's central role beyond tickets
- Fifa REJECTED similar plans in 1994
- all decisions from president's office
- Fifa, the "safeguards", usher in a model club owners crave
- Fifa going against own statutes

https://t.co/sbtGYyUqZV

[Stephen Gibbons @Gibboanxious]

Michael (2026) ★★
“His Story Continues”
There have been other films titled Michael, the one where John Travolta plays a well-meaning angel, or most notably Markus Schleinzer’s excellent stark 2011 Austrian drama about a paedophile, which is far more accomplished and recommendable than this glossy new biopic. Antoine Fuqua’s Michael plays like a heavily sanitised, 100% hagiographic portrait of a deeply troubled man. If we take its framing at face value, Michael Jackson endured significant emotional and physical abuse from his father yet suffered no lasting psychological consequences, an oddly neat and dramatically unconvincing proposition. But very convenient for a happy ending and box office sales.
Who’s bad? Michael, the film itself. I went in expecting something that wasn't boring or bland. Maybe a spectacle and at least some energy, but what I got was a surprisingly inert, risk-averse experience. The movie consists almost entirely of estate-approved reenactments and reconstructed moments from Jackson’s life (you're better off just watching his concert footage and films). That approval extends to the music choices as well, which will undoubtedly help it commercially and may well make it one of the more successful biopics in recent years, regardless of its artistic limitations.
The result is a portrait that refuses to meaningfully engage with its subject. Jackson is presented in near-saintly terms, with little space for contradiction, complexity, or moral ambiguity. Anything difficult is smoothed criminally away or reduced to polished reconstructions that rarely feel lived-in or revealing.
Structurally, the film resembles a compressed career highlight reel. Scenes jump across decades with minimal emotional transition, creating a fragmented rhythm that prevents anything from properly landing. Even major milestones feel rushed, as if the film is constantly hurrying toward the next recognisable moment.
The constant use of Jackson’s music reinforces this sense of manufactured reverence. Rather than deepening the drama, the soundtrack functions as emotional shorthand, instructing the audience how to feel instead of earning those emotions through storytelling. Key sequences, such as the recreation of 'Thriller', are staged competently but lack genuine spark, insight, or discovery. I don't think Fuqua has seen Walk Hard: The Dewey Cox Story.
Visually, the film is serviceable but uninspired. Fuqua’s direction is flat and conventional, relying on standard coverage and safe framing. It feels closer to a high-end TV movie than a cinematic portrait of one of the most electrifying performers in modern history. Even moments that should carry energy or scale arrive muted.
That is the central paradox. Michael is built around extraordinary music and one of the most significant cultural figures of the late twentieth century, yet it struggles to make any of it feel alive. The legacy does most of the work, while the filmmaking contributes little beyond careful reconstruction.
Michael is far from a disaster, it'll probably end up being the most financially successful biopic of all time. But what it is is something more quietly disappointing: safe, overproduced, and hollow. It looks like Michael Jackson, sounds like Michael Jackson, but never comes close to understanding him. If wasn't a monster then he deserved a better film. And if he was, then well the sequel should be a deeply disturbing horror movie.

[Bohemian Football Club @bfcdublin]

#StopTheGame

[MichaelC @mjoc13]

@DavidJenningsRP @patcashhealy @Fairyhouse @jasontitley5 I do remember some issue with the finishing line being not straight but angled which cast doubt on the result before the photo confirmed the winner.

[MichaelC @mjoc13]

Have to introduce a shot clock in the football. #gaa

[Squinter @squinteratn]

1/6 Anatomy of a newsroom.
I've been looking at two @BBCNews reports from recent days.
One is on the killing of six American soldiers in Kuwait.
One is on the funerals of 165 schoolgirls killed in southern Iran.
They're a textbook example of how narratives are carefully formed.

[Seth Abramson @SethAbramson]

You'll see a lot of bad analysis claiming Trump's third illegal attack on Iran is merely an attempt to distract from scandals at home.

PROOF will shortly publish a book-length report establishing that the current war with Iran is not disconnected from the Trump-Epstein Scandal.

[Chris Gore @ThatChrisGore]

I used to marvel at new tech and now I'm just over it. This encapsulates how I feel about any new app or tech device these days.

[Fran Mallon @FranMallon1]

Shatter being caught out producing AI antisemitic material and trying to say it was produced by someone else

The man is shameless and an embarrassment to the Jewish faith

[Racing TV @RacingTV]

🗣️ "He's entitled to take his chance. He loves the place."

@HenryDeBromhead tells @ablairwhite13 more about his squad for the 2026 Cheltenham Festival, including Envoi Allen's final run in the Cheltenham Gold Cup

Watch the full feature on our YouTube channel 📺 👇🏻

[Tony Evans @TonyEvans92a]

Ratcliffe Is The Billionaire Voice Of A Brain-Dead Generation And United Deserve Better https://t.co/APE6PgCoYc

[Bohemian Football Club @bfcdublin]

TOMORROW (Wednesday) 6pm 🚨

BFC x Kneecap merch drop - another drop of our 2026 away shirt (all adult & junior sizes) collaboration with @KNEECAPCEOL will go on-sale for global delivery tomorrow (Wed 11th) at 6pm Irish time. 🕙🔴⚫️🟢⚪️

Raising funds for ACLAÍ Palestine. 🇵🇸

Be fast as once again, we expect them to go very quickly…

🚨IMPORTANT: Please ensure all sizes & contact/delivery details are correct when ordering as these can NOT be amended after. Be especially careful if you use an autofill feature.

Adult: https://t.co/U1WeLqiHc9

Junior: https://t.co/iOcKuwsvzd

[MichaelC @mjoc13]

Cyclists are forced to dress like construction workers as cars speed past with impunity

https://t.co/sSwJqjNk8V

[Marina Purkiss @MarinaPurkiss]

I deleted my post from before…

I thought it was fake

So I went to WH Smith and here it is

An unbelievable attempt to sanitise this man and normalise what’s he’s done.

[Liz Webster @LizWebsterSBF]

🚩🚩🚩Newly released Bannon–Epstein messages (2017–19) show Epstein was giving daily strategic advice to Steve Bannon while Bannon and Farage were building a transatlantic far-right project.

Epstein wasn’t just a social acquaintance. He was in the room, digitally, for the construction of modern populism.

Farage’s partner, Laure Ferrari, literally co-founded the Brussels organisation (“The Movement”) that Bannon used to build a European nationalist network.

Who helped shape the money structure and the logistics? 👉Jeffrey Epstein.

Epstein advised Bannon on:
– how to avoid FARA disclosure
– how to use 501(c)(4) dark-money non-profits
– how to shield political operatives with media shells
– how to keep funding “opaque”
– how to structure a European revolution without legal exposure

This was not small talk.
This was political engineering.

Bannon told Epstein he was working with:
“Nigel, Boris and Rees-Mogg… the guys are trying to move on May today/tomorrow.”

This places Epstein inside the communications chain of the plot to topple Theresa May, while Brexit was at its most volatile.

Epstein also:
– Offered Bannon the use of his island and homes for political strategy
– Arranged accommodation, flights and meetings
– Critiqued Bannon’s media appearances
– Acted as a sounding board on Europe, Salvini, Le Pen’s allies and the gilets jaunes

He was not a spectator.
He was an influencer.

In other words:
🔹 Mandelson: embarrassing proximity.
🔹 Farage: political collaboration through Bannon.

Farage wasn’t merely around the Epstein orbit. He was inside a political machine Epstein helped shape.

And look at the substance:

– Bannon called Farage “the face” of the European far-right project
– Farage’s partner built the Brussels shell
– Farage brokered the meeting that handed it to Bannon
– Epstein provided the dark-money blueprint

This is not gossip.
This is architecture.

Farage sells himself as a man who “took on the elites”. Yet the newly revealed truth is far darker:

His Brexit project was intertwined with 👉Bannon, Epstein, US dark-money networks, Salvini, Le Pen’s bloc, and the hardest edge of the global far right.

Brexit was never anti-establishment.
It was never grassroots. It was never patriotic.

It was a transnational authoritarian project, backed by billionaires, extremists, and a convicted sex offender with global influence.

And Farage was right at the centre of it.

If Mandelson had emails showing Epstein advising him on political strategy, funding routes and foreign influence operations, the country would erupt.

Farage has exactly that except worse.
Because the stakes were Brexit and the reshaping of Europe.

And that truth is finally out 💥

https://t.co/PUZZQlY30S