There Is Only One Sinnacle

Fabio Cannavaro recently gave his opinion that Inter’s Davide Santon should consider leaving in order to keep his national team place. When I heard this the first thing that popped into my mind is don’t bring a knife to a gun fight and it will only be a matter of moments before Jose Mourinho replies.

It did not take very long for Mourinho to give his own opinion on Cannavaro’s comments. Speaking to Inter Channel the Special One had these words to the 2006 World Player of the Year.

“Cannavaro is still a player, but he speaks as if he already were a coach or manager,” he said. “He’s making a mistake doing this, also because he’s forgetting something that doesn’t concern Inter.

“The same argument goes for Sebastian Giovinco, a player with his talent who plays so little should consider the choices for his future better,”

Basically Mourinho should of summed it up by saying mind your own business. Inter wouldn’t of sold Maxwell to Barcelona if they felt Davide Santon couldn’t handle a larger role this season. Loved the little dig regarding Giovinco, a player who everyone but Juventus feels should be playing more.

Portugal Had To Buy A Striker In Brazil – Jon Dahl Tomasson

The former Milan striker is unimpressed with the inclusion of the Sporting man in the Seleccao…

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Must admit even I had a laugh when Jon Dahl Tomasson blasted Portugal for calling up Liedson to the national team. In a press conference today Tomasson was quoted as saying

“They are needy for a real striker so they went to Brazil to buy one.”

“We do not do that in Denmark, or in the rest of Scandinavia, compared to what happens in the southern European countries. But that is fine by me.”

Fair play to Tomasson here as I can’t make a valid counter point to his comment. Portugal calling up the Brazilian Liedson at this stage of World Cup qualifying is going to make or break Portugal’s chances. Liedson will either be exactly what Portugal is missing. A striker who can actually score and knows how to find space in the penalty box. Or it will blow up in Carlos Queiroz face as not only the Denmark players but players on his own team will resent another foreigner playing for the Selecção.

Came across this while checking out thescore.ca and quite frankly since I’m not able to recover the two minutes nor the possible nightmares I may experience from watching this video neither should you. Back in 1990 when Paul Gascoigne could do no wrong some record producer must of thought “He plays football, I’m sure he can sing. Let’s make a record!” What happens next is a video which must of cost $500 to produce or a regular bar tab for Gazza back in the day.

White People Should Not Dance Without Obtaining Some Kind Of Permit First.

Now for a music talent we present former Liverpool man John Barnes who killed it during his rap for New Order’s World In Motion.

Barnes is now the coach of League One side Tranmere Rovers who are currently in 22th out of 24 teams in League One. You can make the claim Barnes was a better rapper than coach. Currently Celtic fans would agree with this statement.

Was reading an story on Southampton legend Matthew Le Tissier who recalled the tale of betting a prop in a Southhampton-Wimbledon match that almost went horribly wrong. Below Le Tissier recounts this story to British newspaper the Daily Mail.

“Spread betting had just started to become popular. It was a new idea which allowed punters to back anything from the final score to the first throw-in,” Le Tissier wrote in his autobiography Taking Le Tiss, serialised in the Daily Mail.

“Suddenly it was no longer a question of winning money. We stood to lose a lot of cash if it went much longer than 75 seconds before the ball went out. I had visions of guys coming to kneecap me. Eventually we got the ball out on 70 seconds. The neutral time meant we had neither won nor lost. I have never tried spread betting since.”

Moral of the story is there are no sure things in life. No matter how well you try to rig it beforehand. Part of me is also curious to see how many other players have also tried to take advantage of a Prop bet in the follow years?

FIFA Ban Chelsea From Signing Players Until 2011

The breach of rules revolves around former Lens player Gael Kakuta who was adjudged to have breached his contract with the French club when he signed for Chelsea.

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Wow, didn’t see this one coming down the pike. Arsenal fans can now simmer down about UEFA’s witch hunt since Eduardo’s two game ban for diving doesn’t seem so rough considered to this 18 month freeze on player transfers Chelsea faces. Obviously Chelsea will appeal but much like going up against City Hall the odds are stacked against Chelsea here. Don’t see FIFA backing down after putting it’s foot down on top teams trying to pick youth players against their parent teams will. The best Chelsea could hope for here is a reduced ban up until July 2010.

Spartak Moscow were put off buying Tottenham striker Roman Pavlyuchenko on deadline day because Spurs wanted almost £4m more than they paid for him a year ago. Daily Star

With the playing time Pavlyuchenko has received by this time next year Tottenham may be lucky to receive £4 million less for the Russian striker.

West Ham are looking at strikers Mark Viduka and Jan Vennegoor of Hesselink, who are both available as free agents (Daily Express).

Jan Vennegoor of Hesselink signed with Hull today. He looked done last year with Celtic

They also tried to sign Benjani from Manchester City on deadline day but could not track down his agent (Daily Mail).

Between this and Benjani falling asleep at the airport back in 2007 teams should not wait til the last day when making a move for Benjani.

Injury-plagued Owen Hargreaves has been named in Manchester United’s Champions League squad. The Sun

Considering Manchester United don’t have the toughest Champions League group it would make sense for them to ease him back into action there, instead of the league.

Portsmouth goalkeeper David James has been told to keep his mouth shut and carry on playing after complaining that being at the Premier League’s bottom club could cost him a place at next summer’s World Cup. Daily Star

Portsmouth is right. Mind you if David James is conceding goals left and right this year it doesn’t bode well for a World Cup place.

Arsenal’s Nicklas Bendtner turned down Barcelona, Inter Milan and Bayern Munich to sign a new deal at the Emirates, says his father, who is also his agent. Daily Mirror

The Daily Mirror should of said written it like this. “Nicklas Bendtner turned down Barcelona, Inter Milan and Bayern Munich to sign a new deal at the Emirates, says his father, who is a liar.”

In front of a decent crowd of 20000 considering the short notice this game was put together Benfica comfortably defeated Celtic to win the inaugural CNE Cup. With this being the international break many of the top players on both sides were on international duty. Add to this fact Celtic manager Tony Mowbray showed his lack of interest in this friendly by staying at home, leaving the coaching duties to assistant Mark Venus.

Full credit to Benfica manager Jorge Jesus however who played most of his top players to the delight of the Benfica fans who wouldn’t normally get up close and personal to the club they support. Keirrison and Javier Saviola were examples of this. Also taking part were the likes of Angel Di Maria, Javi Garci and defender David Luiz. After Kieirrison opened the score after three minutes Celtic leveled just before halftime as Paul McGowan scored the equalizer. Come the second half Benfica class compared to a weaken Celtic side just took over with Ruben Pinto ended up scoring the winning goal and former Barcelona/Real Madrid striker Javier Saviola sending the large Portuguese crowd home happy with Benfica third and final goal on the match.

Rummenigge: Franck Ribery Will Not Leave Bayern Munich For Real Madrid in 2010

After Real Madrid failed to secure the services of Bayern Munich star Franck Ribery this year, reports surfaced that a deal had been struck that would see him go to the Bernabeu in twelve months’ time.

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You can call Bayern Munich a lot of things. Foolish isn’t one of them. It makes no sense for Bayern to have an agreement in place with Real Madrid. What happens if Ribery steals the show at next year’s World Cup? His value will sky rocket so it would be foolish to have a price agreed upon already. Besides even if Ribery doesn’t light up the next World Cup it’s a pretty good fall back plan being able to count on Ribery in your lineup next season.

Frustrated Reds forward Babel eyes Ajax return

Babel, an £11.5m signing from Ajax in the summer of 2007, has become an increasingly peripheral figure at Anfield and after starting the opening day defeat to Tottenham Hotspur, the Dutch international has played only 14 minutes as a substitute since.

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Ryan Babel time at Liverpool reminds me of Thierry Henry’s time at Juventus. I’m not saying Babel is going to go on and have anywhere close to the career Henry has but it’s clear much like Herny time in Juventus that Babel is ill suited to life with Liverpool.

Tottenham chairman Daniel Levy vetoed manager Harry Redknapp’s late loan swap attempt on transfer deadline day, which involved winger David Bentley and Manchester City’s Martin Petrov. Another loan swap involving Tottenham’s Alan Hutton and Sunderland’s Anton Ferdinand also fell through. The Independent

Don’t see why Daniel Levy would veto any of the two deals. David Bentley has dug a hole so deep for himself that he can see China at this point. A player like Petrov could of been very useful on set pieces plus his crossing ability is top notch. Alan Hutton didn’t do himself any favours when he fumbled the ball leading to Birmingham’s goal last week. Besides anytime you can move a right back for a centre back it’s in your benefit to do so.

Redknapp was also interested in West Ham defender Matthew Upson but was put off by the £15m valuation. (Daily Mail)

I could of seen why Daniel Levy would of wanted to veto a Matthew Upson transfer. £15 million is a lot of money for a player with two maybe three good years left.

Sunderland manager Steve Bruce had a disappointing transfer deadline day as offers for Wigan’s Maynor Figueroa, ENPPI wing-back Ahmed Al Muhammadi and free agent defender Lucas Neill all failed. The Sun

Steve Bruce will still sleep well at night with his signing of Michael Turner. Those players mentioned above would fall under the list of nice to have but neither was going to vault Sunderland into a top six place on their own.

Stoke ran out of time in their attempt to sign Bayern Munich right back Christian Lell after the player could not be located by the German club. Daily Mail

Just have this visual of Christian Lell turning his cell phone off and crawling under his bed on deadline day.

Nicolas Anelka’s future at Chelsea is under scrutiny as the striker, whose contract runs out in the summer of 2011, is angry that he will not be offered a new deal this season. Daily Star

Just about everyone could of guessed Nicolas Anelka was going to be mad at some point during his Chelsea stay.

Newcastle goalkeeper Steve Harper has told owner Mike Ashley that he needs to start spending money on players if the club are to return to the Premier League next season. Daily Star

Smart move on Harper’s part to say this on deadline day.

Hull striker Daniel Cousin picked the wrong moment to have a pop at manager Phil Brown. The Gabon international, who thought he was off on loan to Burnley, called Brown’s tactics “bizarre and illogical” before the proposed switch fell through. The Sun

Going to be a long season on the bench for Daniel Cousin.