Physical Address
304 North Cardinal St.
Dorchester Center, MA 02124
Football has produced enough accidental comedy to fill entire books: managers arguing with journalists, players mangling percentages, commentators realising what they have just said and supporters turning every bad result into a joke before the final whistle.
This collection of funny football quotes combines genuine lines from managers and players with familiar football sayings and original BetBuzz24 one-liners. We have deliberately separated the real quotations from our own material because famous football quotes are copied so often online that invented or wrongly attributed lines can quickly start looking genuine.
If your humour leans more towards racing and betting, you can also browse our gambling quotes, horse racing quotes and horse racing jokes.
How we checked the real quotes
For the football personalities below, BetBuzz24 favoured club archives and established sports publications rather than anonymous quote pages. Original lines written for this article are clearly marked so they are never confused with something a manager or player actually said.
The Real Ones
20 Famous Funny Football Quotes From Managers
Managers are responsible for many of the funniest football quotes because they have to explain an unpredictable game immediately after it happens — often while irritated, delighted or completely exhausted.
“I wouldn’t say I was the best manager in the business. But I was in the top one.”— Brian Clough
- “I wouldn’t say I was the best manager in the business. But I was in the top one.” — Brian Clough Peak Clough: technically denying the boast while making an even bigger one.
- “If God had wanted us to play football in the clouds, he’d have put grass up there.” — Brian Clough Clough’s wonderfully blunt argument for keeping the ball on the ground.
- “We talk about it for 20 minutes and then we decide I was right.” — Brian Clough, on disagreements with players
- “The River Trent is lovely. I know because I have walked on it for 18 years.” — Brian Clough
- “Some people believe football is a matter of life and death. I am very disappointed with that attitude.” — Bill Shankly The famous line continues with Shankly joking that football was even more important.
- “If you are first you are first. If you are second you are nothing.” — Bill Shankly
- “Ay, here we are with problems at the top of the league.” — Bill Shankly, responding to a reporter who suggested Liverpool were struggling
- “Yes, Roger Hunt misses a few, but he gets in the right place to miss them.” — Bill Shankly
- “Laddie, I never drop players. I only make changes.” — Bill Shankly
- “If Everton were playing at the bottom of the garden, I’d pull the curtains.” — Bill Shankly
- “If you eat caviar every day, it is difficult to return to sausages.” — Arsène Wenger Wenger’s response after supporters had become accustomed to a very high standard of football.
- “At some clubs, success is accidental sometimes — but at Arsenal, it is compulsory.” — Arsène Wenger
- “I don’t need to die anymore because I know what it’s like to be at my funeral.” — Arsène Wenger Wenger joking about the tributes he received towards the end of his Arsenal career.
- “Please do not call me arrogant because what I say is true… I think I’m a special one.” — José Mourinho The 2004 introduction that created one of football management’s most durable nicknames.
- “I’m more scared of the swan than of football.” — José Mourinho, during the 2006 bird-flu scare
- “When you are 4-0 up you should never lose 7-1.” — Lawrie McMenemy
- “I had mixed feelings — like watching my mother-in-law drive over a cliff in your car.” — Terry Venables
- “I couldn’t be more chuffed if I were a badger at the start of the mating season.” — Ian Holloway
- “I never comment on referees and I’m not going to break the habit of a lifetime for that prat.” — Ron Atkinson
- “I was asked if I thought I was the right man for the job and I said, ‘No, they should have got George Graham because I’m useless.’” — Gordon Strachan
Cloughie
10 More Brian Clough Quotes That Still Sound Brilliant
Few managers fit a funny football quotes page as naturally as Brian Clough. His humour usually worked because confidence, insult and observation arrived in the same sentence.
- “Manchester United in Brazil? I hope they all get bloody diarrhoea.” — Brian Clough
- “Somebody sent me a ‘get well’ telegram that said ‘we didn’t know you even had one’.” — Brian Clough, recalling his time in a heart unit
- “Discipline in football is too important to be left to the players.” — Brian Clough
- “Players lose you games, not tactics.” — Brian Clough
- “I like my women to be feminine, not sliding into tackles and covered in mud.” — Brian Clough, a line that has aged considerably less well than his football jokes
- “Walk on water? I hope they don’t think I’m trying to take over from God.” — Brian Clough, in typically understated fashion
- “I want no epitaphs of profound history and all that type of thing.” — Brian Clough
- “Rome wasn’t built in a day. But I wasn’t on that particular job.” — Widely associated with Brian Clough
- “They say Rome wasn’t built in a day, but I wasn’t on that job.” — Common variant of the Clough line This is a good example of why football quotations often circulate in slightly different wording.
- “The River Trent is lovely.” — Brian Clough, possibly the beginning of football’s greatest self-confidence joke
Players & Football Logic
15 Funny Football Player Quotes
Some player quotes are funny because they were intended to be. Others became memorable because the sentence quietly defeated itself halfway through.
- “We must have had 99 per cent of the game. It was the other three per cent that cost us the match.” — Ruud Gullit
- “I would not be bothered if we lost every game as long as we won the league.” — Mark Viduka
- “I spent a lot of money on booze, birds and fast cars. The rest I just squandered.” — George Best
- “In 1969 I gave up women and alcohol. It was the worst 20 minutes of my life.” — George Best
- “I used to go missing a lot… Miss Canada, Miss United Kingdom, Miss World.” — George Best
- “I couldn’t settle in Italy — it was like living in a foreign country.” — Often attributed to Ian Rush One of football’s most repeated lines, although the exact origin is disputed.
- “The first 90 minutes are the most important.” — Sir Bobby Robson
- “We didn’t underestimate them. They were just a lot better than we thought.” — Common football quotation attributed to Sir Bobby Robson
- “Football’s football. If that weren’t the case it wouldn’t be the game that it is.” — Garth Crooks
- “I’ve had 14 bookings this season — eight of which were my fault, but seven of which were disputable.” — Paul Gascoigne
- “I’d like to play for an Italian club, like Barcelona.” — Often attributed to Mark Draper
- “I’d like to thank my parents, especially my mother and father.” — A classic football quote commonly associated with footballer interviews
- “Without being too harsh on David Beckham, he cost us the match.” — Ian Wright
- “It was like the ref had a brand-new yellow card and wanted to see if it worked.” — The sort of line footballers have been producing for decades
- “I’ve never wanted to leave. I’m here for the rest of my life, and hopefully after that as well.” — Alan Shearer
A note on old football quotations
Some famous player lines have been repeated for decades without a surviving primary interview. Where the wording or attribution is disputed, we flag that rather than presenting internet folklore as certain fact.
Press Conferences
10 Funny Football Quotes Born in Interviews
The post-match interview is a strange workplace. Somebody has just spent 90 minutes shouting, sprinting or making tactical decisions, and is immediately asked to explain everything coherently.
- “I’ve got nothing to say. Any questions?” — A line long associated with football’s driest press-conference humour
- “To put it in gentleman’s terms… we didn’t look our best today but we’ve pulled.” — Ian Holloway Holloway then extended the dating metaphor considerably further.
- “It’s an incredible rise to stardom. At 17 you’re more likely to get a call from Michael Jackson than Sven-Göran Eriksson.” — Gordon Strachan, on teenage Wayne Rooney
- “Twitching our ass.” — Louis van Gaal, providing his own variation on football’s famous “squeaky bum time” phrase
- “Are you an ostrich?” — Nigel Pearson, during one of the Premier League’s stranger press-conference exchanges
- “I would love it if we beat them. Love it.” — Kevin Keegan Not written as comedy, but one of the most endlessly quoted emotional managerial moments in English football.
- “Facts.” — Rafael Benítez, whose 2009 press conference turned the word into football shorthand
- “For John Terry, to die on the pitch would be glory.” — José Mourinho
- “If I walked on water, my accusers would say it is because I can’t swim.” — Berti Vogts
- “John Hartson’s got more previous than Jack the Ripper.” — Gordon Strachan
Football Language
20 Funny Football Sayings That Make Perfect Sense to Fans
Football sayings can sound completely ridiculous outside the game. Inside football, nobody questions why a team can park a bus, put the ball in the mixer and ask a striker to put his laces through it.
BetBuzz24 Originals
25 Short Funny Football Quotes and One-Liners
These short football quotes are written by BetBuzz24. No retired manager will suddenly discover we’ve put words in his mouth.
76. Football tactics are simple until your team concedes.
77. Every fan is one replay away from becoming a referee.
78. VAR: removing uncertainty one four-minute uncertainty at a time.
79. My tactical analysis improves significantly after seeing the result.
80. The easiest chance is always the one somebody else misses.
81. Form is temporary. Screenshots of predictions are permanent.
82. Every 0-0 has somebody insisting it was fascinating tactically.
83. A two-goal lead is comfortable until your team has one.
84. Injury time lasts exactly as long as your anxiety requires.
85. Football fans forgive almost anything except a short corner that fails.
86. There is no confidence quite like being 3-0 up from the sofa.
87. Every missed penalty creates 30,000 people who definitely would have scored it.
88. The referee is neutral until he gives something against us.
89. A clean sheet is beautiful unless you needed both teams to score.
90. The transfer window turns everybody into an accountant.
91. Football rumours are facts wearing running shoes.
92. Possession is nine-tenths of football analysis and none of the final score.
93. Nobody remembers your xG when the ball is in Row Z.
94. The perfect time to make a substitution is always five minutes earlier.
95. Supporting a football club is an unpaid position with compulsory overtime.
96. The table never lies, except when I don’t like what it’s saying.
97. Every derby begins with form being declared legally irrelevant.
98. Football is 90 minutes plus however long your team needs to ruin your weekend.
99. The manager has lost the dressing room. Nobody has checked the corridor.
100. A world-class finish is a lucky goal when scored against your team.
Match-Day Posts
20 Funny Football Captions for Instagram and Match Day
For anyone looking for short funny football quotes for Instagram, WhatsApp or match-day posts, these are also BetBuzz24 originals.
101. Match day. Rational thought postponed.
102. Ninety minutes. Several unnecessary emotions.
103. Today’s tactical plan: complain convincingly.
104. Supporting the badge and questioning every decision.
105. Weekend mood depends on eleven strangers.
106. Calm before kick-off. Terms and conditions apply.
107. VAR check: happiness pending.
108. Here for the football and unreasonable optimism.
109. Away day mathematics: distance irrelevant.
110. Three points would improve the atmosphere.
111. Prediction made. Excuses prepared.
112. Just one normal football match. Please.
113. Ninety minutes of pretending I’m calm.
114. Today’s formation: hope with two holding midfielders.
115. Nothing personal, referee. Except everything.
116. Clean shirt. Questionable football opinions.
117. My weekend has entered injury time.
118. The beautiful game and some very ugly defending.
119. Football first. Logic after the final whistle.
120. See you next week for exactly the same emotional mistake.
Football Folklore
Why Famous Football Quotes Are Often Misquoted
Football sayings spread long before social media. A remark made on radio, television or in a newspaper could be repeated for years before anyone had an easy way to check the original interview.
That is why some famous funny football quotes exist in several versions. Even genuinely famous lines can gradually change punctuation, wording or context as websites copy one another.
Our rule is simple:
where an official club archive or established publication supports the wording, we are comfortable attributing it. Where a line is famous but its origin is less certain, we tell you rather than pretending the attribution is proven.
Funny Football Quotes FAQs
What are some famous funny football quotes?
Famous funny football quotes include Brian Clough’s claim that he was “in the top one”, Bill Shankly’s many Liverpool and Everton one-liners, and Arsène Wenger’s comparison between football expectations, caviar and sausages.
Who has the funniest football manager quotes?
Brian Clough, Bill Shankly, Gordon Strachan, Ian Holloway, José Mourinho and Arsène Wenger have all produced memorable funny football manager quotes. Clough and Shankly are particularly well documented because club and media archives preserve many of their lines.
What are some short funny football quotes?
Short funny football quotes work best when they capture familiar match-day behaviour. Examples include “Prediction made. Excuses prepared”, “VAR check: happiness pending” and “Football first. Logic after the final whistle”.
What are some funny football sayings?
Funny football sayings include “park the bus”, “put it in the mixer”, “a game of two halves”, “he gave 110 per cent”, “a cultured left foot” and the timeless “the next goal is crucial”.
Can I use these funny football quotes on Instagram?
Yes. The lines marked as BetBuzz24 originals can be used as football captions or social posts with credit. Historical quotes should retain the name of the person who actually said them.
Are all famous football quotes genuine?
No. Some football quotes are supported by club archives or contemporary reporting, while others have circulated for decades with uncertain wording or attribution. BetBuzz24 identifies doubtful cases instead of presenting every internet quote as established fact.
Where can I find funny horse racing quotes?
BetBuzz24 has a dedicated collection of funny horse racing quotes featuring jockeys, trainers, racing humour and original race-day lines.
