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Footballers of today who could be the angry, biased pundits of tomorrow

BIASED? Dour? Permanently irate? When Keane and Carragher hang up their mics, we’ll need those qualities. But which current players will be the pundits of the future? 

James Milner

Don’t let his reputation for being soul-numbingly boring fool you. James is keeping his fire damp to erupt into match analysis as a nakedly Liverpool-boosting voice of reason. No matter he’s from Leeds and has played for half the Premier League, not now he’s got YNWA tattooed on his neck.

Harry Kane

Kane marks his territory by headbutting Alan Shearer on day one. He then sits silently for the rest of the broadcast – kitted out in black turtle neck, gold chain and signet ring – with the quiet menace of an East End gangster, occasionally threatening to have Daniel Levy ‘done’ if Spurs don’t win the league this season.

Marcus Rashford

Exhausted from a career as elite footballer and moral compass, Marcus uses retirement to cut loose. No matter what the match, he says ‘Yeah, but could they do it on a wet night in Stoke while also spearheading a grass roots campaign to end child food poverty?’ Unanswerable.

Jamie Vardy

Arsey Leicester striker Jamie ‘chat shit, get banged’ Vardy could soon be bringing the non-league chip on his shoulder to the BBC. And with his wife appearing in reality shows and glittering high-profile celebrity court cases, they’ll continue to be a sad, quiet echo of Posh and Becks.

Sergio Ramos

Real Madrid’s ever-furious captain, delighted that Lineker can’t send him off, will bring his bulging neck veins and pumped physique to scream with incandescent rage about pro-Barcelona bias during FA Cup games between Everton and Lincoln City.

Lionel Messi and Cristiano Ronaldo

Joining together like a morose Latin Saint and Greavsie, the pair will focus withering contempt on every single player in the world for not being as good as them. ‘Shit pass, shit goal’ Messi will say, as the World Cup is won. ‘I scored better with my cock,’ Ronaldo will mutter. As it continues, they drink.

'Men are intimidated by you', and other lies to tell your perpetually single female friend

FRIENDS with a fundamentally undateable woman? Reassure her that it’s not her fault even though it is with these lies:

‘Men are intimidated by you’

This one’s a classic, switching the blame for her singledom from individual men to the whole of mankind, and even then it’s because she’s too awesome. It’s how you’d reassure Maleficent that she’ll find love. Loads better than ‘men don’t like you’ which doesn’t have the same girlboss connotations.

‘There’s someone out there for everyone’

Self-evidently false. Loads of people are such twats that not even other twats want to date them. Still pushing the idea that their ideal match is in LA, Brisbane or Tahiti is comforting and beats the truth that no-one wants someone who takes their shoes off on public transport.

‘These are your fun years’ 

The same cut-and-paste chat on the same boring dating apps, fun? Use your imagination to spin this blatant lie into a half-truth with stories of thrilling dates, crazy nights out and all the men who wish you’d shagged now you’re settled down. Make sure your partner’s not listening.

‘You’re right to have high standards’

Everyone should have reasonable standards. Ending up in relationships with coke dealers or edgy stand-up comedians isn’t something you’d wish on anyone. But demanding a bloke making over £100k who loves Disney and doesn’t mind going to bed at 9pm? Maybe she could lower the bar just slightly.

‘You just need to put yourself out there’

Unless your mate’s so shy and retiring she’s invisible this is just instilling false hope. If you put up a 48-sheet poster by a busy junction with a picture of her captioned ‘I eat with my mouth open and hate dogs’ you’d definitely get some interest, but only from fetishists.

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