Calafiori injury worry + Rice and Saka in action in Dublin

Good morning.

I played 5-a-side for the first time in some months last night, and there is so much aching today I don’t even have the words for it. What a lot of fun though. And let me tell you something that didn’t happen.

At no point did an opposition player tumble through the air like an extra in a kung-fu movie, and land with their studs on the back of my calf. Because that, my friends, would be an absolutely ridiculous thing to occur, right? It sounds like something I just made up as an extreme example of something you never see on a football pitch, whether it’s 5s in Dublin or, I dunno, an international match between France and Italy.

WRONG!

Look at this nonsense. France’s Ousmane Dembele got tackled, then span through the air like said kung-fu extra, landing studs first on the back of Riccardo Calafiori’s leg. The Arsenal man was completely unaware, which is perfectly normal, because you don’t expect a footballer to spin through the air like that, using your calf as a goddam landing pad.

I saw this last night, and my first thought was ‘This is the kind of thing that could only happen to an Arsenal player’. Like, if a dog ran onto a football pitch and we all enjoyed the fun sight of a dog on the football pitch – evading capture and having a great old time – but the dog would somehow know which player was the Arsenal player, trip him up and break his ankle.

Thankfully, the initial prognosis doesn’t seem to be too bad for Calafiori. Italy boss Luciano Spalletti, says, “We need to assess Riccardo, but with our staff, we’ve a good chance to have him back with us for the next game.”

Which sounds better than I expected but I’m not going to relax just yet. The ‘with our staff’ is doing some heavy lifting for me. Are they just really great staff, or are they gonna Frankenstein his leg just to send him out in their next game? I will be keeping everything crossed.

William Saliba played the full 90 for France, but Italy ran out 3-1 winners on the night. Elsewhere, Martin Odegaard (and Erling Haaland) played 90 minutes as Norway drew 0-0 in Kazakhstan, while Gabriel played the full game in Brazil’s 1-0 win over Ecuador.

Today, it’s all eyes on Dublin as England take on the Republic of Ireland. Is it fair to call it the Declan Rice Derby? As we all know, he played 3 games in green before deciding to play for England, and Jack Grealish – expected to start today too – represented Ireland all the way from U17s to U21s (about 20 games in total) before doing the same. No doubt they’ll get some pantomime stick from the crowd today, and it’s also worth noting that England’s interim manager Lee Carsley made 40 international appearances for Ireland.

So, there’s a bit extra to this one, not least because sections of the English press are stirring things up because Carsley said he wouldn’t be singing the national anthem before the game. He said:

This is something that I always struggled with when I was playing for Ireland. The gap between your warm-up, your coming on to the pitch and the delay with the anthems.

I was always really focused on the game and my first actions of the game. I really found that in that period I was wary about my mind wandering off. I was really focused on the football and I have taken that in to coaching.

So it’s something that I have never done.

Whether you fully buy that explanation or not, the idea Carsley should be criticised for not singing is just nonsense. He is a former Irish international, and I think it’s a case of basic respect for his time in that shirt. It’s not as if he said he’s going to boo the English anthem, just stay silent. Also, just think about how this would play out if it were the other way around. An English international managing Ireland at Wembley singing the Irish anthem. They’d crucify him for that, so the hypocrisy from these jingoistic hacks is off the charts. Especially as a national anthem is just a song. Sing or don’t sing it, who cares?

Let’s just hope Rice and Bukayo Saka come through the game without any issues, and it’s likely to be a lively afternoon on the pitch at Lansdowne Road.

Right, I’ll leave it there for now. Pray for the Italian Stallion, and I’ll be back with a bit more tomorrow.