Thursday Hoddle of Coffee for March 9, 2017

Happy Thursday, CFCers.

It’s a late night of writing for me for my other gig with Gaming Nexus, and let me tell you something: navigating through a fifteen page review guide full of information that ranges between “Vital information I should have read before playing” and “A seven year old could have figured that out” may sound fun, but there are times that driving my head through my desk doesn’t sound like a bad idea.

I needed a little distraction from writing this review up and figured I’d hop on CFC to see if the Hoddle had come up yet. Unfortunately, no hoddle was written for today, but it happens. We’re all busy people and we have different obligations to handle. Given that I’m usually a night owl, I figured I could lend a hand and write something up. I don’t want to be boring though and say “Hey, we forgot so here’s a hoddle for you guys to chat.” I have to write something of substance, at least in my mind.

I’m not a tactics junkie, though, and I tend to inject humor into most of what I write. It’s probably why I enjoy writing the Bat Country articles on here where I can openly make fun of stupid rumors that we all know 99% of the time won’t come to fruition. So, instead of doing a breakdown of something we’ve watched, here’s a little introspective on myself because I’m bored and wide awake at three in the morning.

I’ve been writing on Carty Free now for a year and a half. I still remember my first actual article for the site, a simple write-up about the odds of Morgan Schneiderlin leaving Southampton and whether or not he was going to end up Arsenal, Manchester United, or Tottenham. As I’ve mentioned before, I also write about games and have done so for over 10 years now. A part of me hates that I never pursued journalism as a day job, mainly because the pay early on is just not great unless you get lucky and land a dream gig (Spoiler: This doesn’t happen with journalism).

While I work in IT as my day job that is slowly sucking the soul right out of my body, writing has always been an escape for me. It reminds me that I found something during my childhood that I enjoyed, was somewhat good at, and could lose hours at a time if I allowed myself to do so. When I’m not writing on here or GN, I keep my regular writing skills sharp over on Reddit’s /r/writingprompts. I took a couple of creative writing courses throughout school and they were almost exclusively built around the premise of that subreddit: Here’s a sentence or an idea and it’s the writer’s job to build a story out of it.

This isn’t meant to be a PSA or anything, but I wouldn’t have truly latched on to writing without some support growing up. If you know someone that has a passion, whether it be a friend just looking for a change or perhaps your own child who is showing interest in something, be sure to support them. I love that I can try to bring you distraction throughout the week with interviews from other sites, articles making fun of transfer rumors or trolling Chelsea fans during matches on Twitter. Writing is an escape for me, and while I do hope at some point to write a story I can publish to see just what my imagination can come up with, it’s always cool to know that there’s an audience here that will read my work, no matter how short or long it ends up being. So, without being sappy or anything, thank you for reading.

And now the “news”....

Barcelona make impossible possible with historic UCL comeback over PSG - (ESPN FC)

I took the day off yesterday and watched this batsh*t insane match. Michael Caley’s xG map for this about sums up everyone’s thoughts:

Controversial PK calls fuel Messi, Barcelona - (CBS Sports)

The preview lede for this is “Did Suarez and Neymar dive? Probably.” I think we can scratch that last word out and swap it with “definitely.”

Christian Pulisic scores in UEFA Champions League - (Washington Post)

CHOO CHOO! ALL ABOARD THE HYPE TRAIN! IT’S FILLED TO THE BRIM WITH CHEESESTEAKS, DEEP DISH PIZZA, COCA-COLA, AMERICAN PALE ALES, AND FREEDOM!

Seriously, though, Pulisic is so good.

Before I turn it over to you in the comments, can we all agree that PSG may need a new badge after yesterday’s collapse? Let’s go with this for starters:

Enjoy your Thursday, everyone!