On not watching football and (un)following Arsenal

TFN Editor Hugo Greenhalgh discusses his relationship with football since moving to America and (un)following Arsenal…

A humorous tweet was doing the rounds this week on Arsenal Twitter. The official account tweeted that it was only one week until domestic football resumed to which one fan responded, “Can you make it 2 I’m quite enjoying myself at the moment”.

A few days later, I found myself saying something similar. Catching up with a friend back in England, we started to talk about what we were looking forward to this summer. I replied, “the football season being over.”

Following Arsenal from any corner of the globe in 2017 has quickly turned into an abject misery. The season peaked in September with a 3-0 victory over Chelsea. The losers that day responded by changing their system and look set to clinch the title in emphatic manner; Arsenal, the winners, find themselves in familiar surroundings – out of the Champions League and clamouring to get back into the top four. The love affair with Alexis Sanchez is over; the closest I’ll likely get to a Chilean red next season will come in a glass bottle. Continue reading

Claudio Ranieri and the sunk cost fallacy

TFN Editor Hugo Greenhalgh on the sad reality of Claudio Ranieri’s sacking…

A few weeks, a group of friends and I were discussing the “sunk cost fallacy”. The theory is as follows: once a cost is “sunk” (ie. it cannot be recovered), we should never make a decision based on what has already been invested. For example, there is no point persevering with a bad film if you aren’t enjoying it – better to forget the time you’ve already wasted and watch something else. This kind of thinking can also apply to our personal lives; if a relationship is no longer enjoyable and run its course, we shouldn’t let the emotions we put in in the past affect the future. Continue reading