The Sigla Blog

The 2008 European Championships kicked off yesterday and Fústar has started a chronicle of matches, with the odd player profile and nostalgic recollection thrown in. I’ll be adding posts, and my first - on why I’m supporting Poland - appears today to coincide with their first match later. Yes, I know they’re playing Germany (the […]

Yes, it’ s cruel image (rapidly circulating today, no doubt), but in the absence of any penalty footage - which UEFA have very kindly pulled from YouTube - it works. But then football is the cruellest of games, especially when it ends the way it did last night in the Champion’s League Final. I watched […]

Thank you Paul Scholes for that magnificent goal (clip here, You tube have pulled lots of the good quality ones). It may have been his only Champion’s League goal this season, but Christ did it count. No thanks to United for causing me a mild coronary for the last 10 minutes of the match, when […]

Last night, after switching over from the dire Man United V Lille match to watch Life on Mars, my brother, who was at the game in France, sent me update texts. Not about the travesty of non-action on the pitch or longed-for goalflashes, but about the chaos that went on in the ground. This […]

After Ireland’s neck was just about saved last night in their weedy 2-1 win over part-timers San Marino, I find out this morning that I’ve got tickets (through the FAI lottery thingy I applied for) for two of the next Euro 2008 qualifiers. Which two? Wales and Slovakia.
For €105.
Not even Germany - although […]

Myself and my brother are both Top Gear fans so we’re wishing Richard Hammond a speedy recovery after his horrific crash. In the meantime, I missed a classic show first time around, so the bro dug out the youtube clip of Paul McKenna hypnotising Hammond into forgetting how to drive a car - there’s no […]

Oh dear. Poor San Marino have been hockeyed 13-0 by Germany in their Euro 2008 qualifier. Podolski, one half of their World Cup scoring duo (with Klose), knocked in four. In one way, the result makes Ireland’s 1-0 loss last Saturday seem very dignified; in another it puts the fear of God in me […]

Q: What do Bloc Party, Belle & Sebastian, DJ Shadow, Sparks, Gang of Four, Radio Soulwax, Yo La Tengo, Lou Rhodes from Lamb and the Unabombers have in common?

A: They all clash with the Ireland v Germany European Championship qualifier which kicks off at 7.45pm. Oh the inhumanity.
Does anyone know if there will be a […]

Less than a week in to our Fantasy Football league and already I’m thwarted by injuries (3) and a suspension (1), and was forced to offload Jamie Carragher. Fingers crossed Cech is back for Chelsea at the weekend, and for poor Sunderland as Roy Keane comes to the rescue as their new manager. Is […]

The Premiership kicks off this weekend and anyone with even a passing interest in the beautiful game has probably signed up for Fantasy Football. I’ve been doing it for years, and this year, I’ve signed up for Sluggerotoole’s league and a (male) friend invited me to join the League of Gentleman. Both are hosted via […]

Currently racing up the French charts is ‘Coup de Boule’, which literally translates as ‘headbutt’. The video is here and another one complete with even more Zidane footballing trangressions can be found here:.
If anyone can translate any of it, feel free to share.

First it’s the musicians-and-writers overlap, now it’s writers and footballers. This article by Roger Cohen compares Zinedane Zidane to the protagonist of
Albert Camus’ 1942 novel The Stranger. It’s worth a read and Cohen kicks things off by saying:

“In The Stranger, the existentialist novel by Albert Camus, an alienated French-Algerian man, Meursault, kills an Arab on […]