Team of 2016: Leicester City

Team of 2016: Leicester City

It should come as no surprise that Leicester have taken the Football Reflective’s team of the year accolade. Greatest Achievement in League Football covered that story but the title explains all you need to know. Their Premier League success defied all reason and logical, it was the thing of movie scripts. But 2016 is a calendar year, not a season, and this means some will question the choice and put forward others.

The main rival comes from the idea Portugal deserve it for winning the European Championship. There are a number of problems with this. Ignoring the direct comparison – Portugal were never 5000/1 outsiders and they did have the best player in the world fighting their cause – the gulf across class and expectation was never stacked against the Portuguese.

The reason it appeared like they’d overcome insurmountable odds was because how lacklustre they were from one game to the next. They only qualified from the group stage because of the expanded tournament format, finishing third, failing to win a match.

Ronaldo saved their Euros with two goals and an equaliser against Hungary to make it 3-3. Hardly capturing the imagination like a side tipped for relegation that only lost three games all season.

If Portugal want an example of a great upset, a team clinching the Euros against all the odds, they should think back to a final they featured in. Sadly for them, they were on the losing side as Greece took the trophy in 2004.

The Ronaldo story, of winning the Champions League and Euros, gives false gravity to Portugal’s performance. Leicester’s triumph was self-contained and all-encompassing.

But the start of a new season in August 2016 reset a number of things. The expectations were dulled down and the wildly inaccurate pre-season predictions from a year before started to come true. Nobody expected Leicester to retain the title, very few even tipped them to finish top four.

The extra matches in the Champions League cited as the main stumbling block. Those observations have largely come to fruition. Leicester are having the season domestically that Claudio Ranieri predicted twelve months previous. He’ll be genuinely relieved to see forty points this year.

Bizarrely, it is the added Champions League matches that warrant them Team of the Year status. Just like when they stormed the Premier League, they have defied convention and opted out of the usual acclimatisation period clubs require in Europe.

Some will say the changed seeding format favoured the champions but they earned that right and have made the most of the draw. What took Manchester City several years has been accomplished by Leicester in a handful of games. And for a lot less money.

It was the only way to maintain the dream – improbable title defence aside. Europe are a year behind the news and may struggle to work Leicester out in time. It wouldn’t be a shock to see them progress beyond the Sevilla tie, after that, all bets are off.

Could 2016’s “greatest sporting achievement ever” be surpassed by a club floundering at the bottom of the Premier League table taking the Champions League in 2017? Sounds impossible . . . but so did Leicester winning the top flight of English football.

We all should have learnt not to bet against the team of 2016: Leicester City.

Book of 2016: Nomad – Alan Partridge

Book of 2016: Nomad – Alan Partridge

Okay, before we begin, Nomad isn’t the best literary book you’ll ever read, or even the standout performer of 2016. But it is Alan Partridge, on his best form. That alone deserves all the accolades thrown at it. It’s the best humorous book since I, Partridge: We Need to Talk About Alan.

Alan Partridge has enjoyed a renaissance in recent years. Steve Coogan is no longer trying to distance himself from the character to gain validation for his talent. Perhaps we can thank the critical success of Philomena for this? Since then he has fully embraced Partridge in a feature film, more Mid Morning Matters, Welcome to the Places of My Life, and Scissored Isle.

Throughout these its clear the character still works and he understands how to keep it relevant. It’s been a long time since I’m Alan Partridge but the essence of what made that show works still exists but the Partridge Universe has grown since then. Alan has become the thing of comedy folklore.

Nomad is Alan’s tale of recounting his father’s unfulfilled footsteps. He constantly reminds you, it isn’t for a TV show or exposure. The reason he decides to go on a walk is to connect with his deceased father. They were never close, as he explained in his autobiography, but when he discovers an old box of possessions in his loft it plants a seed.

His father, it appears, should have attended an interview at Dungeness Power Station but got a letter confirming his non-attendance. In the same box were receipts from the day of the journey, signposting his stops at petrol stations (one with a blot of blood). This allows Alan to plot a route. He decides to embark on the same journey.

Why it has to be on foot has nothing to do with a new TV show. The chasing up of a TV producer is more coincidence and ensuring the British public get to experience the pilgrimage.

Interspersed between the main narrative are chapters that further expand on Partridge myths featuring real life celebs, meaning a few new stories come to life. The fictional accounts range from the reoccurring Eammon Holmes and Bill Oddie, to a random David Essex footnote, and a rant aimed at Noel Edmonds.

The gaps between movie and recent TV shows are filled in. We get to know what happened (to a degree) with Geordie Michael. His recent love life, which was a subplot in Mid Morning Matters, gets a further mention. Lynn is here, though he never says her name. Forbes McAllister’s death (Knowing Me, Knowing You) is even addressed in a footnote.

His version of events we’ve seen on screen are retold. Through the eyes of Alan, Alpha Papa is a completely different story.

Annabel Swanswim even gets a mention for the keen-eyed fan. Along with Fernando, Sidekick Simon and the trio of Julia Bradbury, Clare Balding and Michael Portillo have supporting (if very small) roles. It all adds colour to the life of a man that is now embedded in the public consciousness.

One liners come think and fast, too many to list and it’d be unfair to rob them for those that are yet to read the book. But you know you’re onto something special when lines like: So you’ll forgive me if my gast wasn’t exactly flabbered, are accredited to Paul Ross from 1990.

And the grammatically challenging: People were letting their hair down. But the only thing Partridge was letting down was ‘not his guard’.

Similes are especially good throughout, like: throbbing like a frog’s neck. And the fear that a ‘welly on’ is pensioner slang for an erection. The quirks and observations litter the pages. He takes aim at all classes and pokes derision at things that are so not Partridge (The Great British Bake Off).

Needless to say (…I had the last laugh), it doesn’t run as planned, Partridge’s personality requiring the sort of nourishment destined to always evade an honest run at success. His failures somehow further the character. It’s like when Del Boy and Rodney became millionaires, the magic of the comedy left them. Alan is the perineal loser, it’s what makes him endure and become endearing.

Book of the Year? Alan would probably say, “It’s the best book since Bravo Two Zero by Andy McNab.”

Album of 2016: Here – Alicia Keys

Album of 2016: Here – Alicia Keys

Choosing the album of the year wasn’t an easy task. Based purely on performance and production, the accolade would have gone to Radiohead for A Moon Shaped Pool. But music is about more than the aesthetic culmination of a sound. Alicia Key’s Here the proves this rule. It isn’t the product of years of evolution and refinement, it’s a new world that serves as an introduction to the real Alicia.

Before things slow down on the sixth track, “She Don’t Really Care_1 Luv”, there is a sense of stepping into Alicia’s authentic world, perhaps for the first time. The opening words demand attention (“I’m the dramatic static before the song begins / I’m the erratic energy that gets in your skin”) to “The Gospel”, a song that rolls along with an urban message and a street sound. It acts as a precursor to the entire album. The sweet piano, radio-friendly vibes are gone.

That’s not to say she has downplayed her natural talent on the keys, it’s now a tool used to give drama in the right places and emphasis like no other instrument can muster. Her vocal style has duly been adapted. In parts, like the album, it is raw. The openness, the imperfection, hearing the breath as she pushes messages into the microphone, or it break as she sings “Hallelujah”, surpass a polished mainstream offering.

With this record, she has finally given voice to her opinions, her character. “Blended Love” clearly comes from experience, talking about stepchildren and family. “Holy War” is a semi-political statement, reflecting these uncertain times. “Girl Can’t Be Herself” is the record that soundtracks her online push for women to go without make-up, be natural.

Cynics will point out it’s easy for one of the world’s most beautiful women to adopt the natural look, but they’d be missing the point and highlighting why Alicia has been championing the idea.

It should be noted there was nothing wrong with her previous offerings. The majority of Alicia Keys albums will stand the test of time. This one just redefines her while capturing the world now. “Kill Your Mama” isn’t a song that could have worked on a softer, commercial album.

Periodically the album cuts away to interludes, these add to the personalised structure. Without making this the whitest review ever of Here, it also makes one think back to The Miseducation of Lauryn Hill. That debut album perfectly got the idea of the artist and her sound over. It changed a genre in the process.

Here incorporates R&B, hip-hop, and soul traits into a wrapper of Alicia’s design. It’s an album that transcends her previous works and acts as a reboot for what’s to follow.

The clue was on the album cover. Quite regularly she is seen in a headwrap on social media, on the cover her natural curly locks spring to life unhindered. She’s Here. No longer the young piano playing virtuoso that’s falling or a girl on fire, but a woman with a strong voice and opinions to deliver.

The next time she provides them can’t come soon enough.