In what should come as surprise to no one Barcelona’s Lionel Messi is a deserving winner of the Ballon d’Or given to the European Footballer of the Year. Out of a possible 480 points given during voting, Messi earned 473 points. Pretty much summed up the type of dream season Messi had. Cristiano Ronaldo came in second and team mate Xavi finished third.
Was watching El Clásico on the weekend when it occurred to me. Who in the world has a better job than Jerzy Dudek? Think about it, the man must be making at least a million dollars and doesn’t have a damn thing to do. Even government workers must do more than Dudek.
You knowing being on the Real Madrid roster means living and traveling like a rock star. By the looks of the Real Madrid set up everything is first class. It’s unlikely their lunch spread is going to consist of Mortadella and day old bread. As an added bonus the only action Dudek was likely to see was during the Copa Del Rey and with Real Madrid being knocked out early he is set for the year. Just gotta show up to practice, roll around on the floor abit and hope Iker Casillas doesn’t get hurt. Here is a thumbs up to you Jerzy Dudek for having the best job not only in world football but the world period.
Blatter: Irish asked for extra spot
FIFA president Sepp Blatter has claimed the Football Association of Ireland asked to be included in the World Cup finals as an extra team following the Republic of Ireland’s controversial play-off exit to France.
Although Blatter ruled out the possibility of allowing a 33rd team into the competition, he admitted that the World Cup play-off system must be examined as a result of Henry’s handball and resultant controversy.
Can’t blame Ireland for exploring every avenue available to them but Ireland knows how FIFA works. Unless it’s seeding the playoff teams they don’t do anything on the fly. Sepp Blatter will pat Ireland on the back of the head and go “there there.”
Manchester United are set to make a surprise move for Manchester City defender Micah Richards, if the Eastlands outfit decide to offload the player as a result of his inconsistent form. Daily Mirror
Manchester United should not be surprised when Manchester City tells them no. The last thing Manchester City needs right now is to see Micah Richard return to an English international with rival Manchester United.
Chelsea manager Carlo Ancelotti says he does not expect to make any new signings in January, unless his side suffers any injuries. This is despite the club having the transfer ban imposed on it by Fifa for inducing Gael Kakuta to break his contract suspended by the Court of Arbitration for Sport. The Sun
Ancelotti doesn’t want to rile his players up heading into the transfer window. With everything running smooth at the moment the last thing Ancelotti wants his players to focus on is who may be coming into the club.
Cash-strapped West Ham are ready to offload England goalkeeper Robert Green in January if they receive a bid in the region of £5m. Daily Mirror
It’s not Robert Green fault West Ham keeps leaking into goals this season. Not that my opinion matters but Green would be my England number one come next summer.
New Portsmouth manager Avram Grant says that he will be searching for new players to help strengthen his side in January and boost their hopes of avoiding relegation this season. The Guardian
The problem is what type of players will Grant be able to attract considering the club is odds on favorite to be sent down.
West Ham striker Carlton Cole’s chances of playing for England at the World Cup in South Africa next year have suffered a major blow after it was revealed he suffered knee ligament damage during the Hammers’ 5-3 win over Burnley on Saturday and faces at least four months on the sidelines. The Sun
There goes rumours of a 20 million round offer coming West Ham way for Carlton Cole.
- What a week for Barcelona who have put to rest any doubts over who is the best team in Europe.
For a team with the firepower of Real Madrid they have been pretty silence on the goal sheet the last couple of weeks. Despite having their chances against Barcelona especially in the first half Real Madrid couldn’t beat Victor Valdes.
The game turned on it’s head with Zlatan Ibrahimovic coming into the game in the second half. One mistake by the Real Madrid cost them the game and Zlatan Ibrahimovic has now officially endeared himself to the Barcelona faithful. Even when Serigo Busquets was foolishly got sent off earning his second yellow card on a hand ball Real Madrid weren’t able to make a breakthrough as Barcelona takes the win and the lead in La Liga with a 1-0 victory.
- Holland and West Ham have always been called everyone’s second favorite team but anyone who watches Serie A has to be impressed with the way Genoa play football. In their derby match against Sampdoria saw Genoa take an early 1-0 lead. Right before half time Giuseppe Biava picked up his second yellow card and an early trip to the showers. Instead of coming out for the second half trying to hold on to the lead Genoa still took the game to Sampdoria which saw them extend their lead to 2-0 before things got chippy with Sampdoria earning two red cards themselves in a 3-0 defeat.
- It’s not the Champions League so Inter Milan found a way to win with a last gasp penalty strike by Diego Milito against Fiorentina. With Juventus losing Inter now find themselves seven points up on A.C Milan.
- Nice to see Ricardo Quaresma actually get a game in for Inter Milan.
- Speaking of players who have had a tough go of it in Italy, Klaas Jan Huntelaar finally broke out of his slump in big way with two injury time goals to give A.C Milan a 2-0 victory over Catania.
- Fabio Cannavaro you’ve had better days and have had a great career but Alessandro Matri made you look sick on Cagliari second goal. Their first goal was quite a strike as well.
- So I won’t be telling my grand kids about the 0-0 draw between Sporting and Benfica. It wasn’t one of those days which was watered down in the midfield but despite being a free flowing game no one on the pitch could break the dead lock.
- Nice run by Auxerre which sadly came to an end. After seven straight games with a win, P.S.G finally handed Auxerre a 1-0 defeat.
- Naturally the week I don’t bet on them Bayern Munich and Atletico Madrid win 3-0 and 4-0.
- While he doesn’t grab a lot of press on this side of the pond, FC Twente striker Bryan Ruiz is going to make himself and his club a lot of money. 11 goals in 15 games should get other teams to notice.
It would of been interesting to see what the reaction would of been if Portsmouth managed to walk away with a point against Manchester United. Technically Vidic’s shirt pull was a foul and the linesman was correct to give it. The flip side would be referees would be giving penalties on every long ball into the box. You can also look at it as if the referees called it to the letter of the law every once in awhile defenders wouldn’t be so quick to grab the jersey all the time.
Nice hat trick by Wayne Rooney who quickly erased any ideas Portsmouth had of grabbing a point with his early second half goal. I’m still waiting for such a game against an elite club.
What can you say about Ryan Giggs? At 36 he is still has good as he was at 31 when the wheels usually start to fall off for a player. Still worries me how Giggs is their best midfielder considering all the money Manchester United have spent in recent years.
Avram Grant sure throws himself into the fire. His first game in charge at Chelsea was a 2-0 defeat to Manchester United who has done it again to Grant in his first game at Portsmouth. I’ll give credit to Grant for one thing; usually coaches sit in the stands on a short week during their first game in charge, especially against a top team like Manchester United. Instead Grant took the bull by the horns, granted he got the horns but I’ll wish Grant luck the rest of the season.
Only West Ham can make a 5-0 lead feel unsafe. Always happy seeing Zola grab a win but West Ham won’t be scoring five goals every weekend but it seems like they will be giving up 2-3 goals no matter who they face.
When I heard Luis Jimenez was going to West Ham on loan from Inter Milan was expecting him to make an impact. It was a surprise to see Jimenez finally get on the score sheet for West Ham on the spot no less against Burnley. Jimenez did a useful job for Inter when Roberto Mancini was in charge but was out of sight out of mind for Jose Mourinho.
Drawing two or three games in a row is liveable. A coach can still claim his club is undefeated but drawing seven in a row is close to a joke. Manchester City should be putting teams like Hull away so when things like a late penalty are called it matters little to the overall game. The only time I can recall Manchester City putting the screws to someone was against Arsenal, aside from that they look like a collective of eleven highly paid players out there instead on a unified team out there.
In other words I find it unlikely Mark Hughes is the man to take Manchester City to the next level. I wouldn’t blame Manchester City one bit if they placed a call to Guus Hiddink in the coming days.
Very funny Jimmy Bullard with his goal celebration. Talk about a flare for the dramatic.
Considering everyone including myself was shoveling dirt on Phil Brown it’s amazing to see the turnaround for Hull this last month. When the press starts calling for your head usually it starts rolling on the ground soon after.
Wigan, three points in their last two games. Tottenham, four points in their last two games. Goals aside that’s the bottom line. I didn’t see it as the end of the world for Wigan when Tottenham kept kicking them when they were down last week. Great victory for Wigan this weekend against Sunderland. Not only did Wigan keep a clean sheet but also got one over on former coach Steve Bruce.
Wonder how the Wigan players felt when Steve Bruce left to Sunderland? Bruce is basically saying to those players I don’t think you’re good enough for my ambitious. Must make the win a little sweeter for those Wigan players who gave their all for Steve Bruce during his time in charge.
Who was the home team during the Aston Villa-Tottenham match? After Aston Villa opened the scoring they were very much on the back foot for most of the game. With all the chances Tottenham it was interesting Michael Dawson finally got one pass Brad Friedel but no denying the class of his strike.
As I’m writing this post, Jo is in an offside position somewhere.
Luckily for Liverpool they were facing a team with worst luck then them. When things go wrong you have things go against you like Javier Mascherano goal off Joseph Yobo. Everton may have been in control for long periods of the game but thanks for the clutch saves by Pepe Reina its Liverpool talking all the points. With Blackburn next week it might be a start of a turnaround for Liverpool.
I’m not going to beat up on Arsenal. I’ve said it many times before anyway. I’ll give credit to Wenger for at least saying this is the year Arsenal wins something but they were second best out there today. Chelsea is a group of men out there where as Arsenal is still trying to find their identity as football players. Once Drogba scored it was like taking a pin to a balloon as Arsenal were deflated from that moment on.
So much for the miracle horse placenta treatment that was suppose to get van Persie back in 4 to 6 weeks. Not exactly the news Arsenal wishes to hear ahead of their all important match against Chelsea tomorrow. Shame if you are a Dutch fan never knowing if the likes of Arjen Robben and Robin van Persie will stay fit for a month never mind a season. Below is the confirmation on the Arsenal website indicting van Persie long term injury.
“Robin van Persie returned to Arsenal on November 22nd following an ankle injury sustained whilst on international duty with Holland. The injury was expected to keep him out of action for between four and six weeks.”
“Upon his return, the Arsenal medical team conducted a thorough review of his scans, his early injury management and the treatment he had received. Having scrutinised these in detail and assessed the response of his ankle, the Club’s medical team concluded that further investigation and opinion was required.”
“Advice was sought from the leading ankle specialist Mr Niek van Dijk, who confirmed that more extensive damage had been suffered than was first diagnosed. In order to repair his ankle, Robin will undergo surgery next week in Amsterdam to reconstruct the ligaments. The Club’s medical team anticipate that a full recovery will take between four and five months.”
The final qualifying games for the World Cup last week may of been bigger than this weekends clashes but I couldn’t enjoy those games. This weekend I get to kick back and enjoy some marquee matches. In England we have the Merseyside derby between Everton and a Liverpool team on the ropes after being knocked out of the Championship League. Then Arsenal after losing to Sunderland last weekend go against Chelsea in a huge test for the gunners. Will Arsenal be able to defeat Chelsea and shown the naysayers this could be the year or will it be another year for this forever young Arsenal side?
In Portugal you have Sporting Clube de Portugal vs Benfica. New coach for Sporting in Carlos Carvalhal, who is only on a one year contract (with a club opinion). Carvalhal can go along way to securing a long term future with Sporting with a win against a Benfica side who are licking their wounds after last weekends cup exit to Vitória de Guimarães.
This reminds me. We get a lot of soccer in North American. A vast amount more compared to ten years ago but unless you get the premium international channels (if your cable/sat provides offers it) you are still missing many great games. Just look at this list right off the top of my head.
Sporting vs Benfica
Benfica vs Porto
Celtic vs Rangers
River Plate vs Boca
Galatasaray vs Fenerbahce
Ajax vs PSV
AEK Athens vs Panathinaikos
If I was in charge of Setanta I’d feature an European game of the week featuring teams from outside of England/Spain/Germany/France/Italy/Russia leagues currently shown by football broadcasters in North America.
Moving on Italy we have the derby between Genoa and Sampdoria. Italian head coach Marcello Lippi will be in the stands to watch this heated contest but even if Antonio Cassano scores five he won’t be going to South Africa.
Finally, Barcelona may be more than just a club but the El Clásico is without a doubt more than just a game. The eyes of the world will be watching Lionel Messi and the real return of Cristiano Ronaldo. I’m afraid to hype this match up as I’m fearful of this game not living up to it but my guess will be a 1-1 or 2-2 draw which will suit league leaders Real Madrid just fine.
Enjoy the games everyone.
Chile OK for World Cup after club backs down
Chile’s spot at the 2010 World Cup is safe after a local club withdrew legal action that had drawn the ire of FIFA and put the nation’s status in international football at risk.
FIFA had given Chile’s football association (ANFP) 72 hours to make Rangers drop a court case that disputed their relegation from the Clausura championship, or else risk a FIFA suspension and the prospect of forfeiting their World Cup berth.
FIFA doesn’t waste any time regarding matters which directly concern them. Things like video replay (which I’m against, extra official manning the goal line I’m for) may be years away but it only took 24-48 hours before Rangers stopped their court case which would of prevented Chile a rightful place in the World Cup.
Chelsea close to £100m deal to sign Aguero
Intermediaries have put together a £100 million “package” deal to take Argentine international superkid Sergio Agüero to Chelsea in the January transfer window.
The £100 million includes the player’s salary which will be scaled up to reach nearly £250,000-a-week in the final years of the proposed Chelsea playing contract, the £40 million transfer plus near-£10m add-ons related to Chelsea’s success, meaning a near £50 million transfer fee, with added agents’ fees.
Love the creative accounting in this headline. It almost reminds me of when David Beckham signed a “five year $250 million dollar” deal with the LA Galaxy when in reality the Galaxy were paying only $25 million and the rest were in endorsements. The figures are technically right but just blown up to make the story look more important.
I can understand why Chelsea are interested in Sergio Aguero as he is the best player out there not attached to an elite club but have no idea how he fits into the Chelsea lineup for English game for that matter. Then again that is for the coach to worry about, not me. It wouldn’t shock me however if Sergio Aguero had the same impact with Chelsea as Juan Sebastián Verón did.