Leeds United vs Bournemouth: A Microscopic Clash in the Colosseum of Meaningless Significance by D. Lockhart, Senior Correspondent, Dave’s Locker Somewhere between the Brexit hangover and the TikTok apocalypse, 22 men in fluorescent socks will chase a sphere across a rectangle of chemically enhanced grass in West Yorkshire. The planet, meanwhile, will keep spinning at…
It was, in the end, a very American sort of dénouement: the Federal Bureau of Investigation—an outfit that once chased bank-robbing folk heroes through the Dust Bowl—announced it had finally arrested one of its own for allegedly tipping off the Minneapolis police officer who murdered George Floyd. Special Agent McKinley, a man whose career arc…
Watford 1–1 Hull City: A Global Summit of Modest Ambition By Our Man at Vicarage Road, Nursing a Lukewarm Pie and Diminishing Faith in Humanity The world stage rarely stoops to the modest plastic seats of Vicarage Road, but Saturday’s 1–1 draw between Watford and Hull City proved, if nothing else, that geopolitics and relegation…
The last time a single American linebacker caused this much trans-Atlantic chatter, the Berlin Wall was still standing and fax machines were considered cutting-edge espionage tech. Yet here we are in 2024, and Lavar Arrington—retired gridiron demigod, part-time philosopher, full-time podcast provocateur—has somehow become the unofficial yardstick by which the rest of the planet measures…
When Bayer Leverkusen’s chartered bus rolled past the Reeperbahn at 2 a.m. on matchday, the players probably mistook the red lights for brake lights. Welcome to Hamburg, where even the brothels close early to catch the late kick-off, and FC St. Pauli—pirates of the Bundesliga—prepare to mug Europe’s newest juggernaut. For the globe-trotting couch potato,…
Fred Dibnah, Steeplejack of Empire and Last Man to Hear the World Before It Got Too Loud By Our Man in Bolton-by-Satellite Bolton, England – The planet’s remaining chimneys are now Instagram backdrops for artisanal coffee or luxury flats, but there once lived a man who climbed them for sport, stripped them brick by brick,…
Mainz 05 vs Borussia Dortmund: A Provincial Dust-Up in the Global Coliseum By Our Correspondent, somewhere east of the Rhine and west of existential despair When tiny 1. FSV Mainz 05 host the corporate fever dream known as Borussia Dortmund, the planet keeps turning, missiles keep flying elsewhere, and your crypto portfolio keeps hemorrhaging. Yet…
Mainz 05 vs. Borussia Dortmund: When David Forgets His Slingshot and Goliath Stubs His Toe By the time the final whistle blew in Mainz, the planet’s attention had already moved on: Tokyo salarymen were dozing on the last train, New York traders were refreshing their Bloomberg terminals, and a lone analyst in São Paulo was…
Robert MacIntyre: A Scot’s Bagpipes at the World’s Dinner Party By Our Man in the Cheap Seats, Geneva Bureau OCH, THE IRONY—while the planet’s hedge-fund demigods were busy shorting each other’s Caribbean bunkers, a 27-year-old left-hander from Oban (population: slightly more than a mid-sized Zoom call) quietly hijacked the Canadian Open last weekend. Robert MacIntyre,…
Hovland: The Quiet Norwegian Who Convinced the World to Change Its Mind By “Sven the Cynic,” Oslo Bureau Chief, Dave’s Locker OSLO—On a drizzly Thursday that looked like every other Thursday since the glaciers retreated, the Norwegian Nobel Committee announced that Dr. Petter Hovland, 57, had won the Peace Prize for “re-engineering global consensus at…
Max Verstappen Slums It in GT3: The World Champ’s Glorious Downgrade to the Sport’s Midcard By the time the sun rose over the Ardennes last Sunday, half the planet was already arguing on the internet about whether Max Verstappen racing a GT3 car is a heroic return to grassroots motorsport or the automotive equivalent of…
Sir Nicholas “Nick” Faldo—knighted for services to backswing orthodoxy and the ancient British art of looking mildly peeved—turns 66 this summer, an age when most men buy a red convertible or discover yoga. Instead, Faldo has spent the year touring television compounds from Augusta to Abu Dhabi, dispensing 140-character wisdom like a caffeinated oracle and…
