Cannon Fodder News and Links: Back again

Hi everyone! Many thanks to Paul for covering for me while I was attending to some family stuff that needed taking care of and an absolutely brutal workload this week. Let’s get right to the foddering!

Abbie Mood (a goalkeeper herself!) writes for Unusual Efforts about the art of saving a penalty kick.

Mario Balotelli ‘shopped his face onto the Mona Lisa, because why not?

Gabriele Marcotti writes for ESPN about why it’s going to be tough for Real Madrid to win back-to-back Champions League titles, as I’m sure they’d like to do this year.

Tottenham and Leicester City begin their UCL campaigns at home to Monaco and away to Club Brugge, respectively today.

Manchester City’s home match against Gladbach was postponed because of lightning, or something.

Is Jose Mourinho holding back Paul Pogba? Check out Samuel Luckhurst’s piece in the Manchester Evening News.

Speaking of, apparently Mourinho texted Paul Pogba every day in an attempt to fend off a manager of a “big club” who wanted Pogba’s services elsewhere. I dunno about you, but daily text messages from Jose Mourinho would probably make want to throw my phone into an active volcano.

These Football Times has a great piece about unlikely intercontinental hero Eamon Zayed. Who? Read on.

Apparently this U.S. Hot List is neither about attractive players nor about an “operation hot brother” rescue mission, but a list of player form. Who knew! Jozy’s on fire and Julian Green is apparently cooling off.

The expansion draft is returning for MLS’ two new teams (Atlanta United FC and Minnesota United FC - in a country where it’s actually called soccer so you should be ashamed to call yourself an FC (don’t @ me)), albeit in a modified form. I hate these, because IF YOU WANT TO JOIN THE LEAGUE FIND YOUR OWN PLAYERS.

And finally, Manchested United fans traveling to Feyenoord for their Europa (hahahahahahahahaha) League match this week have been advised to dress “conservatively” and not wear their club colors.