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FOOTBALL

🪩 Kieran Strippier

Sure, Kieran Trippier occasionally pops his head round the door at Newcastle strip club For Your Eyes Only. The DJ plays good tunes, and the barman makes a mean amaretto and coke.

But that does NOT mean the Magpies’ defender is in there getting lap dances like some kind of sleaze bag.

At least that’s the line coming out of his camp, after a £9,663.45 bill from with his name on it surfaced this week.

The receipt - which included 76 dances at £100 each, 38 dances at £50 each and, weirdly, two Appletisers - was apparently the work of his friends.

A source told the tabloids:

And I for one believe him!

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FOOTBALL

🥇 Spur of the moment

If any current player was going to replicate John Terry’s full kit Champions League celebration, it was Sunday roast main man James Maddison.

The Spurs midfielder missed out on Wednesday’s final through injury, but was still there at the final whistle in shirt, shorts and socks.

In his defence, he claims he was ordered to wear the kit in order to collect the winner’s medal and - unlike Terry - he did draw the line at popping on a pair of shin pads.

Still, he had the audacity to cut in front of actual finalists Son, Romero and Bentancur in the medal queue, which resulted in those players missing out because UEFA hadn’t provided enough.

Ah well. Son might not have his medal, but it’s still been a fantastic week for him.

South Korean Police have finally arrested the woman that has allegedly been blackmailing him for the past year.

According to The Upshot’s Seoul bureau, she approached him last June, claiming to be pregnant with his child and demanding money for her silence.

She then trousered £200k from the Spurs captain, which does suggest she wasn’t a total stranger…

FOOTBALL

☀️ Bilbao baggins

Speaking of incriminating evidence, imagine it was a rough day back at work for this fella on Thursday morning.

You can watch the full, NSFW clip here.

Sound on to hear a weary onlooker say “that’s someone’s dad,” with a heavy sigh.

FOOTBALL

🇻🇦 Better the devil you know

When you elect a Yank pope, there’s every chance he’s gonna have some dodgy relatives.

Maybe a sinister Mormon cousin, or a MAGA brother with an alarming tally of posts on Truth Social.

Or, it turns out, Eric Cantona.

According to a new study by French genealogy experts, Pope Leo XIV and King Eric are distant cousins, connected via a marriage way back in the 16th century.

Although not sure Eric will be invited to the Vatican for a wafer and a chalice of the blood of Christ any time soon.

After getting banned for kung-fu kicking a fan back in ‘95, Eric went on French TV to deliver a bizarre rant about Catholics murdering people during the Crusades, before turning his ire on Pope John Paul II:

“Je lui pisse au cul.” Or, in English, “I piss in his arse.”

FOOTBALL

🎭 Rush ado about nothing

With his no-nonsense finishing and his police constable moustache, we never pegged Liverpool legend Ian Rush as a patron of the arts.

But middle age can do funny things to a bloke, and these days it seems Ian is a musical theatre enthusiast. Sort of.

In possibly the strangest news of 2025 so far, Rushy has put his name to a 90-minute, score-settling musical, created entirely on AI in the style of Hamilton.

Across three acts, “Rush for Justice” details his legal battle against a Surrey scaffolding company and a small Wigan law firm, while also laying into Robbie Fowler, Jamie Carragher, the Athletic, former MP Tracey Crouch and others.

The musical is premiering in Cannes this week, but don’t expect Rushy to be brushing shoulders with George Clooney or Nicole Kidman. The screening is very much not affiliated with the actual festival, and is instead taking place at a rental property in the city.

For the full backstory into how and why this has happened, you can read Martin Calladine’s excellent thread here.

Or - if you have far, far too much time on your hands - you can listen to the whole musical here.

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AND FINALLY…

💼 And he’ll be bringing his deputy, Alan Twatt