CHANTILLY BASE AND A LION’S FACE
Four more sleeps. That’s how many are left before England kick off their Euro 2016 campaign against Russia this weekend, unless you count the daily 40 winks your favourite tea-timely email (other time zones are available) catches on the porcelain throne in Fiver Towers. In which case it’s eight. And having arrived in northern France and checked into the well-appointed former Chantilly digs of Max Zorin, located alongside the famous neighbourhood racecourse, Mr Roy and his players went for a morning gallop at the Stade de Bourgognes, where a bespoke synthetically reinforced pipe and slit drained pitch with fibresand reinforcement has been installed, topped off with a carpet of green grass grown from seeds flown in especially from the FA’s St George’s Park headquarters. With all that attention to detail coupled with a tacit disregard for local French herbe, what could possibly go wrong?
Those players gadding about on this impressive sward were also flown in from the FA’s St George’s Park headquarters and were gently put through their paces after posing for a photo and attempting to stifle yawns as a group of local children greeted them with a rousing rendition of God Save The Queen. Looking on from the sidelines was an as-yet-unnamed team mascot, a cuddly toy lion that Chris Smalling appears, for the time being at least, to have been tasked with minding after losing some unspecified but no doubt bantertastic forfeit. Given the stunning lack of footballers’ imaginations, we reckon he’ll end up answering to the name of “Liony”, although we won’t mind if England’s players adopt our suggestions of “Clarence” (one for Daktari fans) or the more culturally iconic and relevant “Lionel Blair”. Considering one recent well documented social media wind-up involving England strikers Jamie Vardy and Harry Kane, we’re guessing Mufasa won’t be an option.
Doing his own passable impersonation of the MGM lion roaring into the assembled TV cameras, Mr Roy had imparted a message to his players on Monday. “The message is that we’ve got to approach this tournament without fear, we’ve got to show confidence in ourselves,” he said. “I would like the players to show as much confidence in themselves as we, the coaching staff, have in them because we know we do have a lot of very talented footballers.”
They also have a lot of very young footballers, having pitched up in France as the youngest squad in the tournament, with Marcus Rashford still so young that the game against Russia kicks off 30 minutes after his bed-time. “I don’t believe age has got anything to do with it; it’s how you play as a team and how you gel as a team,” said Daniel Sturridge, who had to interrupt his press conference after becoming distracted by a rogue spider climbing up some photographer’s shirt. Elsewhere on the training ground, Vardy was showing no signs of being distracted by talk of his mooted move to Arsenal and is now expected to wait until after the Euros to make any formal announcement on the difficult decision he has to make regarding staying with champions Leicester or moving to a lesser team for more money.
QUOTE OF THE DAY
“The club regrets the circumstances which led to Dr Carneiro leaving the club and apologises unreservedly to her and her family for the distress caused. We wish to place on record that in running on to the pitch Dr Carneiro was following both the rules of the game and fulfilling her responsibility to the players as a doctor, putting their safety first. Dr Carneiro has always put the interests of the club’s players first. Dr Carneiro is a highly competent and professional sports doctor. She was a valued member of the club’s medical team and we wish her every success in her future career. José Mourinho also thanks Dr Carneiro for the excellent and dedicated support she provided as first-team doctor and he wishes her a successful career” – the Chelsea club statement after reaching a settlement with Eva Carneiro over her constructive dismissal claim. Carneiro has also agreed to drop a claim of sex discrimination and harassment against Mourinho.
FIVER LETTERS
“I’ve spent my lunch break running stats on the group stages of major tournaments to see what we can expect in terms of excitement this summer. I have two main findings to report: the first is that counter-intuitively, the average goals per game increases steadily between the first game of the group stage and the third, so if the first round of games is terrible, don’t panic. The second, more amusing fact is that in the 13 tournaments they’ve qualified for since 1986, England have been in the lowest-scoring group nine times and the second-lowest scoring group three times. Oh for the halcyon days of 2004” – Steven Chicken.
“Never under-estimate the power of The Fiver. My letter on Friday complained about Charlton’s lack of a manager and now I read that we have appointed Russell Slade. To whoever is pulling the strings out there, please note that I also complained about our useless owners. So anything you can do in that regard would be much appreciated. PS: you can forget about finding a Blackpool fan on Soulmates. I tried it once and all I found was a Taxpayers’ FC fan who expected me to pay for everything” – Robert Darby.
“I recently noted in the Big Website article about Eva Carneiro’s constructive dismissal case against Chelsea FC, that the court have called a ‘Portuguese swearing expert’ as a witness. No one ever told me one could make a career as a swearing expert! Why were we never informed about this in our school career guidance sessions?” – Dan Makeham.
• Send your letters to the.boss@theguardian.com. And if you’ve nothing better to do you can also tweet The Fiver. Today’s winner of our prizeless letter o’the day is … Robert Darby.
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RECOMMENDED LISTENING
Fresh off their night at the Palladium, AC Jimbo and co are back with the first preview pod from Euro 2016 Football Daily. Le Woof!
RECOMMENDED VIEWING
Everything you need to know about the 10 Euro 2016 venues.
BITS AND BOBS
Newcastle midfielder Moussa Sissoko wants nothing to do with the Championship. “I gave everything there for three-and-a-half years,” he honked. “I hope that today [Newcastle] will be smart enough to understand that to continue my development I need to keep playing at the highest level.”
Argentina opened their Copa América Centenario campaign with a 2-1 win over holders Chile, with Ángel Di María dedicating his goal to his late grandmother, who passed away hours before the game. “It was for my grandmother and my family that are having a difficult time,” he said.
Meanwhile, Uruguay FA chief Wilmar Valdez has a right funk on at having to play the tournament in the USA! USA!! USA!!! “Yesterday it became very clear that it is arranged for Mexico,” he parped after El Tri dished out a 3-1 beating to his team.
Borussia Dortmund have snaffled Turkish tyro Emre Mor on a five-year deal from FC Nordsjaelland.
Russell Slade has leapt out of the frying pan at Cardiff and into Charlton. “It’s an exciting challenge. I feel like I’m coming to a Championship football club,” he whooped, ignoring the obvious.
Norn Iron 1-0 boss Michael O’Neill isn’t worried by the apparent groin-twang Kyle Lafferty suffered in training. “He just twisted it a little bit as he slid in,” he trilled.
And Dulwich Hamlet – yes, Dulwich Hamlet – have agreed a sponsorship deal with Kinleigh Folkard & Hayward, offering free season tickets to those who buy or sell their homes through the estate agents’ local offices.
STILL WANT MORE?
David Squires will be here twice-weekly during Euro 2016. Here’s his first preview cartoon.
Get your top 20 transfer window targets here.
England and the lost art of defending. By Amy Lawrence.
We prodded sent Michael Butler to a Euro 2016 sticker swap shop. Here’s what happened.
Our Euro 2016 Experts’ Network continues with team guides for Turkey, Republic O’Ireland and Sweden. Plus profiles of Hakan Calhanoglu, Darren Randolph and Emil Forsberg.
Henry McDonald visits the Norn Iron 1-0 fans heading to France on a high.
How to run the perfect Euro 2016 sweepstake.
Pepe stars in this week’s edition of The Gallery.
Oh, and if it’s your thing … you can follow Big Website on Big Social FaceSpace.
