Footy On The Med

Join us as we jump back in time to revisit the Mastermind Quiz John sprung on Alex during half-time of the Nice v PSG match. The game was a dull affair, but Alex was as sharp as ever. Enjoy! Recorded at the Allianz Riviera on Saturday on Saturday 5 March 2022.

The great  Stan Bowles  passed away on 24 February 2024, making QPR v West Brom a must for Alex. This was the first home game for the Rs since the death of the  club’s talismanic, legendary number 10 , and Loftus Road was duly packed to the rafters. QPR went into the game on the back of a run of good form but, relegation-threatened as they are, in need of a win, while victory would help the Baggie...

John was a snake in the Grasse this week as he slithered along in the rain to watch RC Grasse take on Toulouse FC2, or TFC2 as John rebranded them. Would TFC2 Manager J.C. Debu see his Debu'tants upset the league topping RC Grasse? Would the RC Grasse fans "tomber dans les pommes"? Well, no and yes. This match, which ends in a 0-0 draw, surprised the locals who must have been certain...

Sampdoria v Brecisa – no (couldn’t get tickets). FC Frejus Etoile v FC Aubagne – no (huge traffic jam on the autoroute, had to abandon the drive). Genoa Women v Hellas Verona Women – no (ran out of time to drive to Arenzano from Menton). FC Antibes v Cagnes Le-Cros – yes! Alex was undefeated by what seemed like the impossibility of seeing any football. He made it to Antibes, nearly froze to death...

HAC Attack! Yes, and there's no escaping a big fat true fact: John was  tout seul  for this trip to the  Stade Louis II . Well, alone save for the Monaco faithful, his friend Hamid and some Haribo-devouring kids. Without Alex, the Big Fella's French came on leaps and bounds. C'est le futur? No one knows, not even FOTM.  Monaco  V  Le Havre  was recorded at Stade Louis II on Sunday 4th ...

It’s The Grecians v The Gas! An obvious game for Footy on the Med. Why? Because The Grecians (that’s Exeter City to non-locals) play in Exeter, which is on the River Exe, which flows down into The English Channel – and from there it’s a hop, skip and a watery jump to the Med. The Gas (aka, Bristol Rovers, aka, The Pirates) can claim a similar maritime proximity to the Med. So Alex took himself to...

It’s a trip to  Marseille  for FOTM and a fixture to make the mouth water:  OM  v Monaco. It didn’t disappoint. From the tumultuous noise of the  Stade de Velodrome  to eccentric, and dramatic, refereeing decisions, not to mention a smasher of a Marseille goal and some slick Monaco attacking, this game was action-packed from start to finish. So much so that John, Alex and Young Trafford forgot bot...

It’s a Happy New Year from him, and a Happy New year to him, as John and Alex catch up after Footy on the Med’s festive hiatus. Alex is again marooned in a frozen land (England), but John is still roaming the Mediterranean or, at least, Menton. John updates Alex on key French football happenings. Alex tells John about  Joey Barton’s   crusade to rid the world  of  female football pundits . And the...

There are a lot of firsts in this episode of Footy on the Med. Let’s focus on the main one: it’s a trip to the  Fairmont Hotel in Monaco , to talk to the  Monaco Institute of Directors  about all things… FOTM. Stand by for unusual football footwear, the most benign ultras ever, a debate on whether the present is in fact the past or future (and therefore doesn’t exist), outstanding play by Liz, Van...

At last! Footy on the Med made it to Italy. Not to John and Alex’s home from home, the wonderful Stadio Luigi Ferraris, but to one of their other favourite grounds, the Stadio Communale in Sanremo. It may have taken half the 2023-24 season to get an Italian sortie under their belts but this was great little outing, thanks especially to a fine pre-match lunch at the nearby  Tiki Taka restaurant  an...

FOTM Rewind. It's not unusual for John and Alex to watch a game of football. It's not unusual for them to watch a game in a bar. But it's very unusual for Tom Jones to join Footy on the Med. Enjoy again the bizarre time when the greatest Welshman of all, and best singer of all time, turned up at La Vittoria in Menton for England 3, Wales 0 in late November, 2022.

With Stan By Me in town, the omens had to be good. Could John and Alex get to the cursed Allianz Riviera stadium and actually see OGC Nice play, without a hitch? The fearless duo went forth, the wise Stan at their side and, for good measure, the youthful vigour of Young Trafford also present. And lo! They made it! They got to Nice v Toulouse before the game, had what passed for a hot dog and final...

Flashback to April 2023 to when John and Alex conspired to surprise Hammer Donna in Pisa Tuscany with tickets to that afternoon's Pisa Vs Bari match. Donna was caught completely off-guard by John's theatrics, ably aided and abetted by Donna's long-time partner-in-crime and fellow Hammers fan, Clarent & Sue. Pisa, Sunday 23 April 2023.

It’s a special edition of Footy of the Med as QPR diehard Alex takes himself – and fellow sufferers – to Loftus Road for  QPR’s  clash with  Bristol City . Both teams have new managers but the home side’s form is by far the worse. Can new Hoops boss  Marti Cifuentes  work a Loftus Road miracle, in the form of the club’s first home win for what feels like a decade? Spoiler alert: no. But sometime p...

Rewind two-years-and-one-day ago. Alex drives to Nice airport to pick up John. He waits. And he waits. John's plane is late, and then suffers from a lack of stairs. There's nothing for it: once again, Alex must push on without his pod partner.

It’s Footy on the Med with a difference for this episode – and not just because John O’Hare was sunning himself in Italy and unable to be present.  Sans  The Entertainer, Alex ‘Alex Wade’ Wade and Young Trafford decided to broaden their knowledge of Mediterranean football by witnessing Nice Femmes v Lens Femmes. This was a D2 clash in French Women’s Professional Football, played not at the Allianz...

The late, great Billy Aitken was a fine footballer who could count Juventus and AS Cannes as among the teams he managed. And it was during à Cannes match that the thoughts of Billy prompted John and Alex to muse on human mortality. How long is too long?

What has the Rugby World Cup got to do with Footy on the Med? Quite a lot, as it happens. From founder of rugby William Webb Ellis’s resting place being Menton, France – the Mediterranean home of FOTM – to some of the crucial games in the current contest being placed in Marseilles’ magnificent Stade de Velodrome, connections between the oval ball and the musings of Alex, The Entertainer and Young...

You turn up to watch a football match, and who sits next to you but none other than former British Prime Minister Boris Johnson? This was Alex’s fate at the Allianz Riviera, home of Nice and (apparently, though as yet unseen by FOTM) Mefi the eagle. Our fearless part-journalist, part-lawyer dealt with the interloper well, but where was John? Have a listen to find out.

Five Go to  Cagnes-sur-Mer … Well, they had to, given prohibitive pricing (Monaco v Marseille) and an unforeseen sell-out (Nice v Stade Brestois 29) for contender fixtures. But the five – Alex, John, Young Trafford and special guests Newcastle Dale and Stan By Me – were treated to a decent game when home side  Cagnes-Le Cros  took on  Fos sur Mer  in the 4th round of the Coupe de France. Given Dal...

In a new and occasional series called FOTM Funnies, Footy on the Med’s newly appointed quality control expert, Newcastle Dale ‘Brown on the Town’ Ale, selects the funniest moments from the past two seasons of surreal endeavour. First up, it’s the time Alex admitted to failing to get a job as a carrot picker, only, at a Cannes game, to run into the very man who’d turned him down all those years ago...

Season 3 of Footy on the Med is barely underway, and already a sense of atavistic, primeval competitiveness threatens to tear asunder the gentle bonhomie shared by John, Alex and Young Trafford. For lo, the tireless trio decided to text their knowledge of all things FOTM via a quiz at – where else? – the ML Lounge in Garavan, Menton. Did it all begin with beers? Of course. Did it all end in beers?...

It's a FOTM newbie! And a FOTM extra! Roll up for On The Med, Sun! (Featuring: Marseille)

It’s a trip to  Grenoble , but why? Grenoble is not known for being on the Med. Even someone who had a very tall ladder, and a telescope, would not be able to see the Med from the top of the tallest building in the Alpine city. But in  Grenoble Foot 38 , they have a football club in Ligue 2 – and that means they play two teams from the Med,  Ajaccio  and  Bastia . The fates conspired, and Alex and...

What’s logic got to do with it? In their quest for certainty John and Alex now know one thing: all roads begin and end at the  Stade Louis II . The allure of  Monaco’s biggest stadium  once again proved irresistible, and the same can be said of  AS Monaco  in their second Ligue 1 fixture of the 2023-2024 campaign. The home side romped to an easy 3-0 win against Racing Club de Strasbourg Alsace, th...