Peter McC

[Ziggy_Sobotka @Ziggys_Duck]

20 years ago today, The Wire Season 4 Ep1: “Boys of Summer” premiered on HBO.

Arguably one of the best cold opens in TV history.

[Everton @Everton]

Seamus Coleman – one of our greatest-ever servants and captains – has announced his proud Everton playing career spanning more than 17 years will come to an end when his contract expires next month.

Thank you for everything, Seamus. 💙

[Sky Sports Premier League @SkySportsPL]

Jordan Pickford with an OUTRAGEOUS stop 😳🛑

The Sunderland boy enjoying himself at St James' Park 😏

[Novak Djokovic @DjokerNole]

Lost for words 🇦🇺

[Kiernan Dewsbury-Hall @KDH__8]

That away end.. permanent memory. 💙

[PDC Darts @OfficialPDC]

"THAT IS THE SECOND BEST LEG YOU WILL EVER SEE IN YOUR LIFE!"

THAT IS ABSOLUTELY SENSATIONAL! 🤯

Luke Littler produces perfection on the Winter Gardens stage!

📺 https://t.co/ZboV9dF4Ji
#MatchplayDarts | SF

[Portugal @selecaoportugal]

🤍

[Rolling Stone @RollingStone]

Sly Stone, one of the most influential and groundbreaking musicians of the late-Sixties and early-Seventies who smashed the boundaries of rock, pop, funk and soul, has died at age 82
https://t.co/hduMRci9Jx

[Tennis TV @TennisTV]

GOATS WATCHING GOATS !

🐐🤝🐐

@TeamMessi in the house to watch @DjokerNole at #MiamiOpen

[Keely Allan @KeelyAllan]

Denis Law, Dad and George Best #footballlegends 🕊️

[EuroFoot @eurofootcom]

🇮🇪✨ 16 years ago today, Everton signed Seamus Coleman from Sligo Rovers for just £60k...

To this day, he's still playing for them. One of the biggest Premier League bargains!

Coleman is also currently one of Europe's longest serving players. 👏

[Henry Winter @henrywinter]

Imagine the amount of good that football could do with £50m? For the same amount that it reportedly spent on lawyers last year the Premier League could fund 100 3G pitches, five in the vicinity of each of its 20 clubs. Imagine the impact on local residents’ physical and mental health, possibly even on talent ID?

Imagine what good football could do with £50m in making ticket prices more reasonable, especially for particular age-groups like 18-24s who generate much of the atmosphere (and TV rewards clubs handsomely for atmosphere). Fans, many struggling with rising prices during a cost-of-living crisis, would feel better about the Premier League and feel less a cash machine to be plundered at will by the elite. Imagine loyalty being rewarded. Imagine if even £5m was earmarked for subsidised away travel.

Imagine what £50m, which is paid out of the central PL pool, would do if invested judiciously throughout the football pyramid, especially in EFL academies which nurture those who go on to star for Premier League clubs like Raheem Sterling (QPR), Jadon Sancho (Watford) and John Stones (Barnsley).

The Premier League spent £15m more on lawyers in 23/24 than its admirable Charitable Fund distributed the previous season to 90+ club community organisations from National League to Premier League. The Fund’s a fantastic initiative, one of the biggest sporting charities in the world, and the Premier League is rightly proud of its impact, including supporting a workforce of 6,200 people “dedicated to improving the lives of people in their local area”. Imagine how many more lives they could improve if legal disputes were handled more swiftly and without battalions of barristers. If only brief meant brief.

The Premier League could be spending the same amount on lawyers in an 18-month period as it has invested in the life-changing Kicks projects over the past 18 years. Kicks tackles crime levels and youth disenchantment. More than half a million kids across 4,900 venues have benefited to date. That helps the country more than pouring millions into legal disputes. That also helps the country by providing a platform, and free coaching sessions, for those who end up playing for their country like Sterling, Marcus Rashford and Declan Rice.

The Premier League, of course, needs legal representation which doesn’t come cheap. Ditto the clubs. Increasingly some of the legal battles involve Magic Circle law-firms. Big club owners want big-name lawyers. The Premier League has to follow suit. The level of legal expertise is impressive, and some of the finest minds in the country are involved, but everyone seems to have forgotten that it should be a sport. That's not naivety. That's frustration that the game is being taken away from fans and communities.

English football has badly lost its way. It's worth all involved in the myriad disputes remembering that football should be about those striding out of the dressing-room, not those heading into the courtroom.

Heaven knows what the Manchester City case will cost in legal representation. On both sides. When the dust finally settles on this lengthy case, and ongoing expensive PSR disputes elsewhere, the Premier League and its constituent clubs have to agree some form of truce on legal battles, especially on time involved which inevitably adds to the lawyers’ bill.

The 20 clubs and the executive are stronger together. All the in-fighting within the Premier League comes at a price, to unity, to the authority and credibility of the league and to funds which could be more constructively spent elsewhere. The Premier League is a magnificent sporting competition, and the community departments do transformative work, but bad blood between members, and some with the executive, damages it. Just stop it.

The astonishing amount spent on lawyers provides another reason why there is widespread support for a regulator to bring sanity to proceedings. And that will be led by a top legal mind, too. Lawyers are increasingly taking over English football when the game should be about players and supporters, and when £50m could do so much good for the game and the community. #EPL #EFL

[Novak Djokovic @DjokerNole]

Srbijo,

Uspeli smo!

Volim vas,
Nole ❤️ 🥇

**
Dear Serbia,

We did it.

Love, Nole ❤️🥇

[Channel 4 News @Channel4News]

How has England’s NHS fared under Conservative governments?

@C4Ciaran and @FactCheck have been crunching the numbers.

[Bennetts @bennetts_]

Win ANY 3 pairs of On Running! 🎄

1. Retweet this tweet
2. Follow @Bennetts_ 🔑

Winner announced 17th December 10AM, when On Running will be available on our site - Good Luck! 🏆

[VisualGame @avisualgame]

Most goal contributions in the major international tournaments over the last 35 years.

[Zarah Sultana MP @zarahsultana]

Good riddance @PritiPatel.

You were an unspeakably cruel Home Secretary and won’t be missed by anyone with a shred of decency 👋🏽

[Marina Purkiss @MarinaPurkiss]

This abomination makes me want independence

…and I’m not even Scottish

[633 Stag Trail Road 🤌 @pityforyourself]

A scene from The Sopranos (S4E10, 2002, HBO)

[Jake Mills @Jakemills1]

Leighton Baines and Seamus Coleman in tear at the end. This is what is means.