There Is Only One Sinnacle

As most people who have read this site know few things annoy me more than Arsenal when to comes to football. So let me come right out and say this, WTF is taking so long for Arsenal to lock up Thierry Henry on a short term loan from the New York Red Bull.

Even more to the point why does it take Arsenal so long to do anything? It took them forever to sign Arshavin from Zenit three years ago. For some reason Arsenal got an extra two days to get that deal done. It also took them forever to finally sell Cesc Fabagas and Samir Nasri when everyone knew they were out the door. Of course Arsenal waited until the last day of the transfer window to sign players and now we have Thierry Henry.

This should be a slam dunk for Henry to make his return to the club that he loves. It would give new life to their fans and Henry can still add something on the field. Of course it wouldn’t shock me that this drags on so long that MLS season would start before Arsenal could close out this deal. It kills me knowing that Arsenal chief executive Ivan Gazidis was the number two guy at MLS for many years. You’d figure he be able to speed up the process but no I still don’t get to see Henry return to Arsenal when it makes too much bloody sense not to happen.

Catching up on events of the last few days another no doubter was the fact Manchester City asked the Ivory Coast FA to keep Yaya and Kolo Toure a bit longer before sending them off to play in the African Cup of Nations. Another no doubter was the Ivory Coast FA saying nope.

Obviously I don’t know how these back room dealings work but if there isn’t cash involved there sure as hell should be. I mean really if Manchester City says we will give you 500k to build a soccer field in the Ivory Coast if you let us keep the Toure brothers a couple of days longer do the Ivory Coast FA turn it down? Throw in an extra 100k into the back pocket of who runs the Ivory Coast FA and it sounds like a done deal to me. You know FIFA is going to turn a blind eye to any money being sneaked under the table.

When the news finally became official that Carlo Ancelotti will take over the reins at PSG no one should of been shocked the least of which being former coach Antonie Kombouaré. You have to feel sorry for the guy since Kombouare was a lame duck from the start. Mind you hurt feelings are quickly eased with his 4 million dollar payout.

Quite simple if a club like PSG wishes to jump into the elite of European football they need an elite coach and no one can doubt Ancelotti resume. Big name players are going to have a hard time jumping ship to PSG with a guy like Antonie Kombouaré in charge no disrespect to the man. Plus the club itself wants to send out a signal to the rest of the football world that they are a team on the rise. It’s like buying a million dollar house with a Toyota Yaris parked up front. It’s just not going to cut it. Ancelotti is a Ferrari in the coaching world so it was only a matter of time before PSG got their coach to take this project forward.

In a case which seemed like ages to complete the English FA handed Luis Suarez and eight game ban for his alleged use of a racism term against Manchester United’s Patrice Evra.

This case is a tough one to form an opinion one. What I do think however is that Luis Suarez makes it very easy by his actions to have a governing body like the English FA decide to make an example out of him. First off he isn’t the England captain, second Suarez’s one finger salute against Fulham and pulling a Mike Tyson with Ajax last year biting another player doesn’t help with his character issues. The English FA couldn’t be seen as soft against Racism and Luis Suarez is a perfect player for them to make a statement.

Liverpool fans won’t be happy losing far and away their best player but hopefully this is a signal for every other player to think twice before saying something racist in the heat of the moment.

You know me, every time a Portuguese team loses it effects me so now I am recovered from Porto not making it to the Champions League knockout stages. Moving on everyone who reads this state knows I love throwing dirt on Arsene Wenger but the man has had no luck with it comes to the Champions League. A.C Milan book ended with Barcelona during the last four years.

Of course my eye is on Benfica vs Zenit a match up which both teams will think they can win. It is what it is but if Benfica could of held on to Angel Di Maria, Ramieres, Fabio Coentrao this Benfica team could of been considered a top four team but hopefully this current Benfica squad can advance to the final eight of the Champions League.

Lyon (Fra) v APOEL (Cyp)

Napoli (Ita) v Chelsea (Eng)

AC Milan (Ita) v Arsenal (Eng)

Basel (Swi) v Bayern Munich (Ger)

Bayer Leverkusen (Ger) v Barcelona (Spa)

CSKA Moscow (Rus) v Real Madrid (Spa)

Zenit St Petersburg (Rus) v Benfica (Por)

Marseille (Fra) v Inter Milan (Ita)

It’s easy to harp about Barcelona and Real Madrid being better then everyone else. One of the many reasons why is because they are confident with being arrogant. Simply put Manchester United got what they deserved, crashing out of the Champions League. Manchester United didn’t beat Benfica or FC Basel in any of their four games.

Speaking on FC Basel, what a great performance. It’s amazing how FC Basel basically slapped Manchester United in the mouth with the early goal. Usually that wakes up a sleeping giant but Manchester United just couldn’t raise there game to match FC Basel.

I’m not going to go on about Manchester United thinking something is really wrong. Let’s not sound the alarm bells here. The last time Manchester United crashed out in the group stage of the Champions League (also with Benfica in their group) two years later they won the Champions League. Right now Manchester United have players who are on the team based on potential rather they players who deserve to wear the shirt week in and week out cause of talent on that day.

With Manchester City also crashing out is the EPL still the best league in Europe? As someone I follow on twitter wisely said so much for Ashley Young, Gareth Barry, James Milner leaving Aston Villa for Champions League football.

What a mix of emotions right now if you are a Ajax and Lyon fan after Lyon turned around a 7 goal difference to advance at the expensive of Ajax.

You are damn right I’m betting against Ajax this weekend

Real Madrid is just scary good right now. With Barcelona and Real Madrid playing like this I’m giddy for this Saturday.

I tweeted this morning how happy I am about the fact Portugal are even in Euro 2012 so whoever they ended up facing would be gravy. As a 3rd seed I knew the chances were good Portugal would be placed in a tough group and beating drawn with Germany, Holland and Denmark confirms they are in a tough group.

You know what however it’s not really that bad. This is Euro 2012 after all, this is the best of the best. You can’t side step good teams until the Semi Finals like you can in the World Cup. Portugal plays Germany in the first game. If they lose they can two other kicks at the can. If Portugal plays Germany and loses in the knockout stages like in Euro 2008 you are packing your bags. Basically whoever makes it out of the group gets a crack at the weak Group A teams. Not exactly a bad trade off.

Hopefully we keep on owning the Dutch, We gain revenge on Denmark of Euro qualifying, We gain revenge on Germany for knocking us out of Euro 2008 (this one won’t be easy) and hopefully if they advance maybe Portugal can get some revenge on Greece for Euro 2004. Then we lose in heartbreaking fashion in the semi finals.

Below are a list of the groups and a schedule of games.

Group A: Poland, Czech Republic, Greece, Russia
Group B: Netherlands, Denmark, Portugal, Germany
Group C: Spain, Ireland, Croatia, Italy
Group D: Ukraine, France, Sweden, England

Match schedule
All kick-offs CET, Ukrainian time is one hour ahead

Friday 8 June 2012
#1: POL v GRE, 18.00CET, Warsaw
#2: RUS v CZE, 20.45CET, Wroclaw

Saturday 9 June 2012
#3: NED v DEN, 18.00CET, Kharkiv
#4: GER v POR, 20.45CET, Lviv

Sunday 10 June 2012
#5: ESP v ITA, 18.00CET, Gdansk
#6: IRL v CRO, 20.45CET, Poznan

Monday 11 June 2012
#7: FRA v ENG, 18.00CET, Donetsk
#8: UKR v SWE, 20.45CET, Kyiv

Tuesday 12 June 2012
#9: GRE v CZE, 18.00CET, Wroclaw
#10: POL v RUS, 20.45CET, Warsaw

Wednesday 13 June 2012
#11: DEN v POR, 18.00CET, Lviv
#12: NED v GER, 20.45CET, Kharkiv

Thursday 14 June 2012
#13: ITA v CRO, 18.00CET, Poznan
#14: ESP v IRL, 20.45CET, Gdansk

Friday 15 June 2012
#15: SWE v ENG, 20.45CET, Kyiv
#16: UKR v FRA, 18.00CET, Donetsk

Saturday 16 June 2012
#17: CZE v POL, 20.45CET, Wroclaw
#18: GRE v RUS, 20.45CET, Warsaw

Sunday 17 June 2012
#19: POR v NED, 20.45CET, Kharkiv
#20: DEN v GER, 20.45CET, Lviv

Monday 18 June 2012
#21: CRO v ESP, 20.45CET, Gdansk
#22: ITA v IRL, 20.45CET, Poznan

Tuesday 19 June 2012
#23: ENG v UKR, 20.45CET, Donetsk
#24: SWE v FRA, 20.45CET, Kyiv

Wednesday 20 June 2012
No matches

Thursday 21 June 2012
#25: 1A v 2B, 20.45CET, Warsaw

Friday 22 June 2012
#26: 1B v 2A, 20.45CET, Gdansk

Saturday 23 June 2012
#27: 1C v 2D, 20.45CET, Donetsk

Sunday 24 June 2012
#28: 1D v 2C, 20.45CET, Kyiv

Monday 25 June 2012
No matches

Tuesday 26 June 2012
No matches

Wednesday 27 June 2012
#29: W#25 v W#27, 20.45CET, Donetsk

Thursday 28 June 2012
#30: W#26 v W#28, 20.45CET, Warsaw

Friday 29 June 2012
No matches

Saturday 30 June 2012
No matches

Sunday 1 July 2012
#31: W#29 v W#30, 20.45CET, Kyiv

I know you missed my Jose Mourinho propaganda but I couldn’t pass up this cover of the latest Rolling Stone in Spain with the Special One on the cover.

What an awful headline and awful story to talk about. You must really have no shame running an article like this.

A couple of months ago I wrote a pissed off article on Andre Villas Boas warning him about the sharks that come with taking over Chelsea football club. Part of the reason I wrote that of course was I wished he stayed another year at Porto but another is the fact I knew Andre Villas Boas was walking into club that needed to let go of the old guard and bring in a new era.

I’ve said it a million times that when a new coach takes over a team he needs to make his mark but sending someone packing. Everyone else usually falls in line but on the flip side I can’t blame Villas Boas for taking a year to see what he had before deciding on the shape of his team.

The problem lies with the fact most Chelsea coaches don’t get along time to take stock of their club and the English press doesn’t help matters by going after Villas Boas like a shark seeing blood in the water. Why doesn’t the British press go after the old guard of Chelsea who for the 3rd coach have flopped in November/December? (Ancelotti in 2010 and Scolari in 2008) These Chelsea players had it so good under Mourinho who even something went wrong took the heat onto himself or blamed everyone under the sun but his players. The likes of Frank Lampard, John Terry should be answering hard questions and no beating Wolves 3-0 doesn’t change everything yet.

If Chelsea expect Andre Villas Boas to cook the meal than they better let him shop for the eggs in the grocery store next summer. It’s easy to play football manager but screw it I’m going to do it regardless. They are the players who should go in the summer.

Petr Cech (They didn’t pay that money for Thibaut Courtois to loan him out every summer.)
John Terry or Frank Lampard (one needs to go, one could stay. I can’t decide which one)
Didier Drogba
John Obi Mikel
Florent Malouda
Salomon Kalou
Nicolas Anelka