<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?><rss xmlns:dc="http://purl.org/dc/elements/1.1/" xmlns:content="http://purl.org/rss/1.0/modules/content/" xmlns:atom="http://www.w3.org/2005/Atom" version="2.0"><channel><title><![CDATA[TwoThreeFive]]></title><description><![CDATA[Football Insights, Fan Voices Unite]]></description><link>https://www.twothreefiveblog.net/blog</link><generator>RSS for Node</generator><lastBuildDate>Fri, 01 May 2026 21:23:53 GMT</lastBuildDate><atom:link href="https://www.twothreefiveblog.net/blog-feed.xml" rel="self" type="application/rss+xml"/><item><title><![CDATA[The True Champions of Europe: An Alternative History of the European Champions’ League]]></title><description><![CDATA[So, the Qatari sportswashing project in Paris finally paid off. After all that time and money, Paris Saint-Germain finally confirmed itself as the best team in Europe last season, beating Internazionale by the widest margin ever seen in the final of the European Champion Clubs’ Cup — or Champions’ League, as UEFA now calls it. Seeing an authoritarian government’s propaganda tool conquer the competition wasn’t fun; but in pure football terms, there was something nice about that final: it was a...]]></description><link>https://www.twothreefiveblog.net/post/the-true-champions-of-europe-an-alternative-history-of-the-european-champions-league</link><guid isPermaLink="false">69b0b73f8433d5064644cfdc</guid><pubDate>Wed, 11 Mar 2026 03:18:37 GMT</pubDate><enclosure url="https://static.wixstatic.com/media/nsplsh_4b445a572d5f664d73754d~mv2_d_9762_3854_s_4_2.jpg/v1/fit/w_1000,h_1000,al_c,q_80/file.png" length="0" type="image/png"/><dc:creator>Robert Gregory</dc:creator></item><item><title><![CDATA[Double Trouble? Assessing the impact of cup competitions on league performance]]></title><description><![CDATA[Introduction In 1955, when the Sunderland A.F.C. was in the running for both the FA Cup and the League Championship, the club’s first-team players held a meeting in which they discussed which competition they should concentrate their efforts on. When one player suggested that they should go all out for both, captain Len Shackleton dismissed the proposition. “Can’t be done,” said the international inside-left. “Never been done.” The players agreed that the Cup, then the competition that...]]></description><link>https://www.twothreefiveblog.net/post/double-trouble-assessing-the-impact-of-cup-competitions-on-league-performance</link><guid isPermaLink="false">69b0b3124b8043385bd428a3</guid><pubDate>Wed, 11 Mar 2026 00:23:22 GMT</pubDate><enclosure url="https://static.wixstatic.com/media/nsplsh_a831309212b24278b957b11566ad28cd~mv2.jpg/v1/fit/w_1000,h_1000,al_c,q_80/file.png" length="0" type="image/png"/><dc:creator>Robert Gregory</dc:creator></item><item><title><![CDATA[Language, Truth and Logic on the Football Pitch]]></title><description><![CDATA[Association football is famously known as The Beautiful Game; yet its language, at least among the English-speaking peoples, must by now have become the ugliest attached to any sport anywhere. I refer not to the rude words roared at each other by spectators and players alike, of which I myself make liberal use during matches, but of the technical vernacular of the game itself, in particular the terms used to describe playing positions. These, it seems, have been growing progressively less...]]></description><link>https://www.twothreefiveblog.net/post/language-truth-and-logic-on-the-football-pitch</link><guid isPermaLink="false">69a7969ba29c2f981473d472</guid><pubDate>Wed, 04 Mar 2026 04:05:22 GMT</pubDate><enclosure url="https://static.wixstatic.com/media/6f9c38_a6fdc135c87c4c1e8d93f5498997468b~mv2.png/v1/fit/w_480,h_600,al_c,q_80/file.png" length="0" type="image/png"/><dc:creator>Robert Gregory</dc:creator></item><item><title><![CDATA[Two sides of a sphere: The importance of attack and defence in different positions]]></title><description><![CDATA[Introduction At its beginning, association football was only barely an organised sport at all. In the FA’s first set of laws, there were no stipulations as to the number of players, or how long they were expected to play for. There were prohibitions against holding, hacking, tripping, pushing and certain kinds of footwear; but there were no fixed penalties for breaking these laws and no match officials to enforce them. The only mention of a free kick was in Law 8, which gave the right to...]]></description><link>https://www.twothreefiveblog.net/post/two-sides-of-a-sphere-the-importance-of-attack-and-defence-in-different-positions</link><guid isPermaLink="false">69a78448e84025d87ea76416</guid><pubDate>Wed, 04 Mar 2026 01:45:56 GMT</pubDate><enclosure url="https://static.wixstatic.com/media/nsplsh_2f06ce6afcae4b3fbf0c4ac3d88412e2~mv2.jpg/v1/fit/w_1000,h_1000,al_c,q_80/file.png" length="0" type="image/png"/><dc:creator>Robert Gregory</dc:creator></item><item><title><![CDATA[Three Points or Two? Comparing Ranking Systems in League Soccer.]]></title><description><![CDATA[Introduction Now that I’ve analysed the relative merits of different tie-breakers by comparing their correlations with primary performance indicators, I thought I’d go one step further and turn the microscope on those primary indicators themselves. From the Football League’s first season in 1888-’89 until its eighty-second in 1980-’81, it operated on the twin assumptions that a draw was half as good as a win, and that no one game in a round-robin competition should count for more or less than...]]></description><link>https://www.twothreefiveblog.net/post/three-points-or-two-comparing-ranking-systems-in-league-soccer</link><guid isPermaLink="false">69a77d91a29c2f98147397ec</guid><pubDate>Wed, 04 Mar 2026 00:57:58 GMT</pubDate><enclosure url="https://static.wixstatic.com/media/nsplsh_ca6927ead83d4f568e084d9e2a7b7f17~mv2.jpg/v1/fit/w_1000,h_1000,al_c,q_80/file.png" length="0" type="image/png"/><dc:creator>Robert Gregory</dc:creator></item><item><title><![CDATA[Goal Difference or Goal Average? Comparing Tie-Breakers in League Soccer]]></title><description><![CDATA[Introduction 	In 1888, twelve of England’s most prominent professional football clubs agreed to arrange home-and-away fixtures amongst themselves each season. The driving purpose of this exercise seems to have been not competition but collaboration: by ensuring that each member of this self-selected elite would be able to host a minimum number of games against opposition good enough to attract the public, the clubs in question could help to secure one another financially. Nevertheless, the...]]></description><link>https://www.twothreefiveblog.net/post/goal-difference-or-goal-average-comparing-tie-breakers-in-league-soccer</link><guid isPermaLink="false">6999c46e8133563068c3f45c</guid><pubDate>Sat, 21 Feb 2026 15:31:12 GMT</pubDate><enclosure url="https://static.wixstatic.com/media/nsplsh_f49520afb125451684a9ba87c3b2a9fb~mv2.jpg/v1/fit/w_1000,h_1000,al_c,q_80/file.png" length="0" type="image/png"/><dc:creator>Robert Gregory</dc:creator></item></channel></rss>