The Circus - 19 July

Slower, lower, less

The people in charge of making the London Olympics look shinier than shiny brass button shining in the shiny sunshine have come up with a novel way to fill stadiums for the football competition – remove the seats.

Organisers will remove 500,000 seats from Olympic football stadia because people are uninterested in seeing a watered-down and compromised competition as part of a global event meant to exemplify the notion of faster, higher, stronger.

Obviously marketers have not focused enough public attention on the fact that Michael McGlinchey will be in action for up to three whole matches. Michael McGlinchey!

The same fans not watching the Olympics are also not watching the Ukranian Premier League which is a shame because, apart from missing Michael McGlinchey, they missed seeing this own goal:

Not only a sensational strike but the most benign goalie The Circus has ever seen.

Dancing Zlatan Brazilians named after figures of popular culture are in vogue, with Spurs interested in a metamorphosing superhero and Chelsea about to nab a puppet who lives in the trash... and it isn't Steve Kean.

But if there is one footballer who should have cartoon characters named after him, it is newly signed Paris St-Germain player Zlatan Ibrahimovic. He even has all the zingy one-liners ready to rip.

"It's true I don't know that much about Ligue 1", said Ibrahimovic, "but Ligue 1 knows who I am".

Quite.

And with repartee like that, Zlatan is less likely to have to rely on the his impromptu street dancing skills to attain notoriety in France:

The best since Tom Jones

A quirk of the nomination system has resulted in Welshman and occasional footballer Les Davies being nominated for UEFA's footballer of the year award.

Journalist Dave Jones, UEFA's man in Wales, nominated the Bangor City striker as Europe's best player, which in the end was enough for inclusion in the preliminary list.

Davies, nicknamed The Truck for his ability to beep when running backwards, now sits alongside the likes of Lionel Messi, Cristiano Ronaldo and Andres Iniesta, none of whom have automotive nicknames or have scored nearly as many goals in the Welsh Premier League.

Rhys Griffiths, rival WPL striker who has out-scored Davies in seven of the last seven seasons, is still waiting for his nomination.

Spoken word

"I got up at seven in the morning and I came home at nine at night. I was exhausted, I was so tired. I wanted to cry, and kick all the things around me. I came home and I wanted to do all that, but I couldn’t because my daughter was at home."

- Liverpool striker and non-nominee for UEFA's player of the year award Luis Suarez details the unfathomable sacrifices of professional footballers at a time when he was forced to defend allegations of using racist language toward Man United's Patrice Evra.