NORWAY? YES WAY
Because nobody ever mentions them when the subject of Bodø/Glimt comes up, Football Daily knows neither the imaginary line of latitude they are located within nor the population of the small Norwegian town they call home. Despite our lack of knowledge, we remain mightily impressed by their scorching recent run of form in Bigger Cup. While the one major blot on their copybook in their maiden campaign remains a draw with Tottenham in a match they really ought to have won pulling a sled, Bodø/Glimt have put that particular embarrassment behind them to record five successive wins in Europe’s top-tier competition, not so much bloodying the noses of Manchester City, Atlético Madrid, Inter (twice) and Sporting as splattering their lofty reputations all over the back pages like a dropped tub of herring guts.
Given the outstanding quality of their performances leading into Wednesday’s win over the Portuguese champions, the only surprise about their latest emphatic victory is that it still had the capacity to surprise folk who haven’t been keeping tabs on their progress through the competition. Not for the first, second, third or even fourth time this year, their players greeted the final whistle with little more than knowing smiles and nods of acknowledgement for a job well done. Football Daily has often embarked on wilder celebrations upon the successful completion of Wordle or our fortnightly Big Shop with the very bare minimum of fuss.
Asked after the 3-0 win, by his largely unknown and unheralded one-touch, pass-and-move counter-attacking maestros, if he thought Bodø/Glimt’s latest victory would send shockwaves through European football, the team’s head coach gave every indication that he couldn’t give two hoots. “It’s easy to be satisfied when you get to where we are now, and that’s not a trap we should go into,” roared Kjetil Knutsen, who has been in charge of the side for the past eight Spurs managers and counting.
“We’ll evaluate what was good and what was less good, and that’s really what we’ve done in good and bad periods.” The evaluation of what was “less good” about the increasingly familiar tale of a European heavyweight turning up at the 8,000-capacity Aspmyra Stadium, only to get humiliated by Europe’s most patronised team, is unlikely to take long. While there’s no secret to Bodø/Glimt’s recent success, their exalted rivals seem almost comically incapable of bringing it to an end. While the Norwegian domestic league is due to kick off this weekend, their opening two games have been postponed so they can focus exclusively on their European adventures. At the rate they’re going, they’ll have a 12-match Eliteserien backlog to clear by the time they’re crowned champions at the Púskas Arena in May.
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QUOTE OF THE DAY
“I always knew that I had some responsibility, and I had to carry myself in a certain way and behave myself in a certain way” – Clyde Best talks to Jacob Steinberg about leaving Bermuda at 17 for West Ham, the abuse he faced and the film documenting his career as English football’s first black superstar.
double quotation mark As a Liverpool fan, I fully support the Union of European Clubs’ wish to create a fairer financial landscape across the continent’s leagues and make elite club competitions less predictable (yesterday’s News, Bits and Bobs, full email edition). After this week’s Bigger Cup games it’s clear the Premier League needs all the help it can get” – Mark McFadden.
double quotation mark Another compelling reason for Spurs to sack their manager (yesterday’s Football Daily) is so that we can be spared any more puns based on his last name. The first few thousand were fine, but the last million or so have gotten tedious. The original Tudor dynasty was dissolved on 24 March 1603: let’s hope we don’t have to wait until 24 March of this year for this Tudor to be sacked” – Richard Hourula.
double quotation mark On the subject of the Spurs interim manager’s jacket initials (yesterday’s Football Daily), could I suggest he tries turning it off and on again?” – Barry Goodwin.
double quotation mark Having recently taken my nine-year-old son to his youth basketball game at Shady Grove YMCA, only to be told that it was at Shady Grove Elementary School, and then finding out that it was actually at Shady Grove Church, I can empathise with the Barcelona fan who ended up at the wrong St James’ Park (yesterday’s Football Daily, full email edition). Of course I was only about 20 miles away from the correct venue, not 366” – Pete W.
If you have any, please send letters to the.boss@theguardian.com. Today’s prizeless letter o’ the day is … Mark McFadden. Terms and conditions for our competitions, when we run them, are here.
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