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While Jake Paul’s big fight against Tinpot Mike Tyson on Friday is almost certain to be the most talked about sporting event featuring a Social Media Disgrace influencer to be staged this week, it won’t have been the first one. The sweet science has long since lost whatever credibility it had as a sport, with promoters finding new ways to debase it in their chase to the bottom line. Football has always purported to be above such publicity-grabbing stunts. Even if those who run and play it are as rapacious in their pursuit of cash as any of the smooth-talking hucksters behind the decision to put a long-past-his-best Tyson against some internet wonk 31 years his junior. A supposed meritocracy on the pitch at least, places on elite professional sports teams are supposed to be earned through blood, , sweat and tears, even if the inexplicable, ongoing presence of [insert your favourite team’s worst performing player here] in the lineup suggests otherwise.

And I’m so sick, so sick of those coaches saying, ‘Oh yeah, but the intensity [of the flamin’ A-League]’... OK, we will talk about someone who won the World Cup, won the Euro, [Bigger Cup], played in England for 10 years. He wasn’t quick, he wasn’t the strongest. So despite that, he was one of the best players in the world. And we’re talking about A-League intensity? You must be kidding. Put horses on the pitch, they will be running – but they can’t kick a ball, and they can’t play. They can’t pass the ball. Seriously, I’m disgusted to hear that kind of stuff” – it’s fair to say Juan Mata’s Mr 20%, Fahid Ben Khalfallah, is not best pleased with Western Sydney Wanderers boss Alen Stajcic’s sparse use of the 36-year-old Spaniard.

Bird-watchers fond of crying fowl will know that the coot (not the Coote ) is clad almost entirely in black and, according to the RSPB, it ‘patters noisily … and can be very aggressive towards others’. Unlike the soon-to-be-rarely-seen Coote, the coot’s conservation status is secure and still has a future in which to ruffle feathers and stick its beak where it shouldn’t” – Mark McFadden.

Many years ago I was working in the kitchen of a hotel in the picturesque Peak District, where once a month a pair of stocktakers would arrive to ensure all was above board. On one occasion, one of the auditors turned out to be a football referee. As the morning went on it turned out he had recently sent off a feisty Norwich forward, describing him as ‘a mouthy little man’. Obviously my head chef took great pleasure in having me wait on them hand and foot purely for the joy of watching a Norwich supporter slowly lose his mind” – Phil Withall.

After the sunny and lovable Gary Lineker, Match of the Day needs a change; after all, as we look around we see that life in general is getting less sunny on every dimension. So what better candidate to reflect the new world we live in than our old friend José Mourinho? There we would have him, glaring balefully at his invited punters and treating their banalities with due sardonic bitterness, sneering at the camera and daring us to carry on watching. It would bring the end of the world a little closer, but since it’s almost here, what would that matter?” – Charles Antaki.

Totally fair to assume Gianni Infantino pulled the idea of a Supporters’ Shield out of his behind (yesterday’s Football Daily, full email edition), as this expanded Club World Cup appears to have been conceived in a similar fashion. However, the Supporters’ Shield is one of the most organic things about MLS, yet also quintessentially MLS because it has been co-opted by the league and means precisely squat. Teams don’t get stars over the crest for the Shield. That comes from an MLS Cup victory, which is subject to a Russian roulette-style playoff system the league changes almost every year in what is usually marketed as exciting, but actually ensures a number of the franchise owners in the playoffs are guaranteed one home match to squeeze their fans’ wallets. It’s a level of creativity Infantino clearly takes some inspiration from” – Colin Durant.

Can I be the 1,057th person to ask how if ‘it started to rain on the 17th day of the second month of Noah’s 600th year’ that he managed not to ‘walk on dry land again until the 27th day of the second month of his 101st year, some 375 days later’ (Andrew Kluth, yesterday’s Football Daily letters ). Does Noah lie about his age on Tinder too?” – Peter Storch (and 1,056 others).

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Bridget Phillipson’s call for a culture change in schools is long overdue, say readers

I am delighted to hear Bridget Phillipson speak of the need for a culture change in schools ( Phillipson to ask schools to end exam ‘tunnel vision’ and look to wellbeing, 6 November ). As a grandparent, I have been appalled by the anecdotes I’ve been hearing about academy schools. It is clear to me that schools have lost any focus on their pupils’ wellbeing. It appears that they are treating children as numbers to be processed rather than as individuals with personal needs and characters. In large part this may be down to resource shortages, preventing teachers from doing what they should do.

However, there seems also to have been a drive among senior school leaders to adopt fashionable policies such as “zero-tolerance” attitudes to misdeeds and the insistence that every pupil must carry a report card at all times. These cards are marked every time the child is considered to have offended, and if certain points thresholds are exceeded, detention, isolation or other punishment follows.

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We take a look at every Liverpool game officiated by the referee who has been suspended for a foul-mouthed video tirade against Jürgen Klopp

Liverpool 1-1 Burnley (11 July 2020): The game David Coote references in the video. In his first time refereeing a Liverpool match, Coote rejects Andy Robertson’s claim for an 83rd-minute penalty when caught by Jóhann Gudmundsson. Robertson, clearly audible with the game played behind closed doors during lockdown, labels the decision a disgrace. “What’s the point in having you?” he adds. Jürgen Klopp confronts the referee after the final whistle to complain that his goalkeeper, Alisson, was not afforded enough protection. The Liverpool manager said: “We were angry with the referee but we have to criticise ourselves first for not finishing the game.” The draw ends the newly crowned champions’ hopes of becoming the first top-flight team to finish with a 100% home record since Sunderland in 1891-92.

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Dr Luke Brunning says young people need to develop the skills and capacity to navigate intimacy both online and offline

It was heartening to see Siân Boyle drawing attention to changing attitudes around dating apps, and concerns about loneliness and fertility ( Modern dating is broken – and that’s a hidden factor in England’s fertility crisis, 7 November ).

I run a research network exploring the ethics of online dating, and have heard many users voice the alienation and hopelessness that they feel in using some dating apps. A broader social conversation about the impact of these products is timely.

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Twenty-nine-metre tall fir destined to be chopped down and transported to St Peter’s Square in the Vatican

Environmental campaigners in Italy’s northern Trentino province have started a campaign to stop the felling of a 200-year-old fir tree intended to form the centrepiece of the Vatican’s Christmas decorations.

The so-called “Green Giant” is 29 metres tall and is due to be chopped down next week in a forest in the Ledro valley before being transported to the Vatican and positioned in St Peter’s Square, where it will then be unveiled on 9 December.

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There are eight Swedens around the world – and the northern European nation is determined to prove it’s the original and best

Name: Sweden.

Age: First settled roughly 10,000 years ago.

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The British arthouse cinema chain has changed hands. Its new American owners would be wise to ignore industry gloom and invest in discerning movie audiences

Who wants to buy an arthouse cinema chain? That question may seem unexpected now that being depressed about post-pandemic filmgoing appears to be the industry’s default position. But the sale of the Curzon cinema group to New York investment company Fortress – part of a foreclosure auction of assets belonging to current American owner Cohen Realty Enterprises – has been met with a lack of surprise, still less alarm, in the industry and within the Curzon group itself, who reportedly regard the new owner as more likely to invest and to nurture long-term growth than the current proprietor. Fortress bid $5m [£3.9m] for Curzon, and insiders are calling it a “bargain”.

This is one of the UK’s prestige cinema companies with a history going back to 1934, now with 350 employees, 16 venues and 58 screens. It consolidated its position in the arthouse marketplace with its acquisition of Artificial Eye in 2006 and the launching of a streaming service in 2010 and this integration was boldly masterminded by its outgoing CEO Philip Knatchbull, the dapper, urbane leader with a movie-aristocrat and actual-aristocrat background – he is the son of producer John Brabourne and grandson of Lord Mountbatten. Knatchbull announced his stepping-down last year but is expected to stay in post until this month, and the Fortress sale would appear the right moment to go.

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Exclusive: Previously unpublished official data shows Raac found at 235 DfE sites, most of which are primaries

Hundreds of primary schools in England are still at risk of collapse from crumbling concrete, according to previously unpublished figures.

Official data, which the Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO) found had been wrongly withheld by the Conservative government, confirmed the presence of reinforced autoclaved aerated concrete (Raac) at 235 Department for Education (DfE) sites, most of which were understood to be primaries.

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Exclusive: Previously unpublished official data shows Raac found at 235 DfE sites

Hundreds of schools in England are still at risk of collapse from crumbling concrete, according to previously unpublished figures.

Official data, which the Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO) found had been wrongly withheld by the Conservative government, confirmed the presence of reinforced autoclaved aerated concrete (Raac) at 235 Department for Education (DfE) sites.

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