https://twitter.com/GLAMBO1905/status/1506388222225653761

Nani

Classic.

Nani's a legend.

That was probably one of Ronnie's best ever goals too.

I've no idea who the last two pages of conv were about, you lot have spent way too much time on here.

Some weird bloke on the Spurs board. I don’t know who he is, but he’s incredible.

SE85 being a priick again I see.

You can tell a lot about a person’s character and intelligence by their views on rich people and mental health.

Ash Barty retires at 25.

How grate would it be to be able to retire at that age.

Seems like she just had enough and felt like she'd achieved everything she wanted to.

Fair play to her.

It’s a shame as she’s a grate player. She said she’s just not got it in her physically anymore, sounds like she wants to spend more time with family. Maybe she’ll just play cricket in Australia.

I didn't know she played cricket.

Bruno seems set to sign a new contract. I wonder if that was discussed with Ten Hag in his interview?

I think she’s amazing at golf as well. Unreal sportswoman.

Does he? You’d suspect something like that would be discussed. Then Ten Hag told them he’s off to Madrid.

Russia has submitted bid too host euro 2028 or 2032

In other news Mar-el-Lago has invited the Democrat Party 2 hold there convenshun their

That’s some classing trolling from the Russian FA.

The Russian soccer president sed they were not ‘overly optimistic at present’

No shiiiit.

Bet it gets paid off

Then Ten Hag told them he’s off to Madrid.

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Seems like it went very well anyway.

Ten Hag is waaay too forward-thinking an appointment for FloPo.

I'm hugely surprised by the Barty thing.

One of my first thoughts was that she might've been 'invited' to retire by Australia's anti-doping authority.

My second was she might have been diagnosed for multiple sclerosis or some such.

Third, which is the one I settled for, was that someone's threatening to out her as transgender.

Wouldn't be the first time the Aussies are caught ball-tampering.

comment by it'sonlyagame (U6426)
posted 11 minutes ago
I'm hugely surprised by the Barty thing.

One of my first thoughts was that she might've been 'invited' to retire by Australia's anti-doping authority.

My second was she might have been diagnosed for multiple sclerosis or some such.

Third, which is the one I settled for, was that someone's threatening to out her as transgender.

Wouldn't be the first time the Aussies are caught ball-tampering.
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wouldn't be surprised if it's for a dubious motive, that will come to light in a few years

I think it ties in a bit with the discussion about elite athletes and mental health from earlier. Seems like the dedication needed to compete is waning which is why she’s retiring. She said she’s physically spent, but I don’t know enough about her physical condition to comment on that.

I think a lot of tennis players really fack themselves up by playing at the highest level for so long. Andy Murray is facked, for example. Wouldn’t surprise me if she wanted to avoid that.

That’s not limited to tennis players mind. Pretty much every ex-NFL player has Parkinson’s, all the ex pro NBA athletes don’t have any knee cartridge and a lot of the ex-pro PL footballers end up taking a BT sport or Sky Sports job - so everyone has serious side effects!

Yeah, Daz, mental health has really come to the fore as a topic of discussion in top-level sport. And the truly sad part is that I think that what we are getting to know doesn't even begin to scratch the surface.

I met a kid a few years ago, only about 17 at the time, whose mum had decided when he was just a small kid to mould into a pro player. When I met him she'd sent him to a boarding school-come-tennis academy in the south of Spain. Even at such a young age, he felt like he was just an instrument for his mum trying to live out her dream. He actually told me that in as many words. What I later found out through my niece, who he'd been dating at the time, was that he was also totally facked up in the head as a result. There are probably loads of young tennis players and kids in other sports whose childhoods are ruined by parents who dream of making international sports stars of them.


Anyhow, I've no idea obviously as to what's made Barty retire, and no particular reason to doubt her other than the fact that elite sport is so rotten, but all power to her if she's done it for the right reasons.

I reckon we'll get to a stage in a few decades when all the athletes of the 2000s/2010s start dying early due to the pressures put on their heart with excessive loads of caffeine, PED's and putting their bodies under ridiculous stress for about 20 years solid when their bodies weren't even close to fully developing.