March 2007 Archives

Watching Steve McLaren at his press conference after England's lugubrious victory over Andorra was like watching a man who had his soul sucked away. Ashen faced, fidgety, defensive, and most tellingly in-confident.

Coaching is not an exact science and when it comes to extracting the best out of your team, the X factor is your belief in your boys and in turn, their belief in you. It still comes down to that basic tenet. Great coaches like Alf Ramsey, Bill Shankly, Franz Beckenbauer, Tele Santana, Guus Hiddink, and Marcelo Lippi technically might be of the same caliber as many other coaches but they believed in something entirely different and are willing to go that far. It starts with the belief that your boys are the ones to carry out that vision.

Santana is a case in point. Brazil in the 80's played some of the most creative and free flowing soccer through players like Socrates, Zico, Falcao, and Eder. Players loved playing for Santana because he gave free reign to their attacking flair and instinct and thumbed his nose at the establishment that wanted victory through drudgery. Many credit Lippi's success to his belief in dark horses like Fabio Grosso and Andrea Pirlo in his strategy to revamp the defensive mindset of the Azzurris.

McLaren comes across as a suit. It is a shame because the best English player is Aaron Lennon who has done his time in the U-21s and needs his creative spark nurtured beyond club football. Unfortunately, McLaren appears too pedantic for that responsibility. Look at Lennon's genius (3:58) leading to a Tainio goal as Tottenham goes onto shell shock West Ham. It's there.

I think the concept of taking one for your country is too overplayed. Nationalism is a bit of an abstraction not easily understood by players overfed a diet of club football. Taking one for your coach might be the more direct route to success but then your coach has to inspire that quality.

While Romario is still waiting to get that 1000th goal the Costa Rican team has gone and beaten him to it.Rolando Fonseca, Costa Rica's all-time leading scorer scored the equaliser in a friendly against Chile which the national federation said was the 1,000th scored by the side since their first game in 1921.It was pretty good 1000th goal - a bicycle kick and all.

Drogba is doing his bit to unite the people of his divided nation.He took his African Player of the Year golden ball award to Bouake in the north of Ivory Coast to show to the people."I have come here to offer you a golden ball, it's the golden ball for the whole of the Ivory Coast." More on that story here.

McClaren's team struggled to eventually manage a 3-0 win over Andorra in a Euro 2008 qualifier on Wednesday.Gerrard finally scored two goals in the second half.Substitute David Nugent scored the third - it was more or less over the line anyway and he just kicked it further in ! Beleaguered McClaren has become the target of relentless hostility.The fans gave him hell during the match.They were chanting" we want McClaren out" even in the dying moments of the game.He walked out of a post match press conference saying "Gentlemen,write whatever you want to write". Report here.. and video of that here
England's goals below..

Raymond Domenech is not getting such a hard time from his countrymen.He chose to field a very young foursome in the french midfield in their match against Austria.Rio Mavuba was the oldest at 23 years ,Lassana Diarra and Alou Diaby came somewhere in between and Marseille playmaker Nasri was the youngest at 19 years.They put up a creditable performance in the 1- 0 victory. Karim Benzema guided Samir Nasri's freekick into the goal(video).

Bad news for Portugal.Cristiano Ronaldo is in doubt for Wednesday's Euro 2008 qualifier against Serbia in Belgrade after suffering a sprain in training Tuesday.He scored twice in their last game against Belgium.Just take a look at him in the video doing some warm up exercises.His speed is incredible.

Gary Lineker writing in the Telegraph here says that Ronaldo is on the fast track to becoming one of the all time greats - a player who has absolutely everything -a technique that is remarkable, truly sublime talent, and an extraordinary ability to operate at high speed which enables him to seemingly never slow up when he receives the ball but perform his array of tricks at full sprint.Lineker also has an fairly plausible explanation for the diving problem which Ronaldo suffers from every now and then.
Worth a read if you are a Ronaldo fan - and even if you're not one it's worth a read anyway...

Carolina for Kibera supports youth soccer and HIV/AIDS awareness in Nairobi, Kenya:

music by Django Haskins and The Old Ceremony

A new movie called "Maradona, the Hand of God" (or Maradona La Mano di Dio) by Italian filmmaker Marco Rissi will be released on March 30 in theatres throughout Italy.More on that here..

....and one to go. Romario scored his 999th goal against Flamengo in their 3-0 win at Maracana stadium.

Landon Donovan - seen here wearing USA's all new royal blue uniform -scored all the three goals for USA taking them to a 3-1 exhibition victory over Ecuador in Florida.
It was interim Coach Bob Bradley's third win in three matches which must be a pretty good record for an interim coach to have.If the U.S. keeps winning under Bradley, it's going to be awfully hard for USSF president Sunil Gulati not to make Bradley the full-time coach.
Donovan's total of international goals stands at 30, which ties him at second place with Brian McBride. Eric Wynalda holds the first place with 34 goals.
After his perfomance Donovan's critics may have second thoughts about whether he is capable of being a good leader after all.

Donovan said."At the end of the World Cup, as bad as that was for me personally, I feel like I learned a lot from it and I think I grew up a lot....I got married this offseason. That helped me grow up, and I'm now embracing a leadership role. I used to say, 'I want to be a leader, I want to be a leader,' but it's not good enough to say it. You have to show it."

Portugal dominated the game against Belgium.Nuno Gomes opened the scoring,Cristiano Ronaldo added two and Ricardo Quaresma scored the fourth.All goals came in the second half.

Portugal's next door neighbours Spain didn't look too confident against Denmark but won 2 -1 anyway.(video)

While McClaren's stalwarts huffed and puffed and only managed a goalless draw at the end of all their labours a far more important football game was played out nearby.Kevin Mitchell writing about the game in the Guardian says...
"160 kids, aged between 10 and 14, from Arab and Jewish villages in northern Israel arrived in the capital to take part in the sort of cross-community tournament .
It was about football - and it wasn't about football at all. Playing in kit supplied by 16 English and Scottish league and non-league clubs, they provided a multicoloured mosaic as pleasing to the eye as those that decorate the temples of worship their parents regard as sacred. Except, consumed by the joy of their football, they left behind the prejudices that often go with religion."
The rest of this very poignant write up on what football should really be all about can be read here..
Articles in the Mirror and Independent on the same theme can be read here and here.

Ronaldinho's first goal in a 4-0 win for Brazil over Chile came off this penalty.The football friendly was being used as a warm-up for this summer's Copa America.

His second goal came from a free kick .(video) Kaka and Juan scored the other two goals.

Italy's Gianpaolo Pazzini recorded his name in the football history books on Saturday by scoring the first ever goal at the renovated Wembley Stadium against the England Under-21's squad. (Video)
Pazzini's goal came 25 seconds after the start of play and was the fastest ever scored at the stadium.He made his record even better by going on to score two more goals in the game thereby becoming the first player to score a hat trick in the new arena.
England's David Bentley will go into the record books as the first english player to score in the new Wembley.(video) The game ended in a 3 -3 draw.The videos of Pazzini's other two goals can be seen here and here.

"The executive committee is now convinced South Africa will be a good host for the 2010 World Cup.At our last meeting in December there were queries, hesitations, even doubts expressed by some members of the executive committee. Today, they all stood united behind South Africa and we are happy overall. They will also have the privilege of hosting the Confederations Cup in 2009 as a test event."...said Blatter among other things.Horst R. Schmidt, vice president of the 2010 organising committee is also quite firmly convinced that all is well and on schedule.

The flip flop over whether South Africa will be ready for the World Cup by 2010 continues..flip -yes it will,flop - no it won't,flip - yes it will,flop- no it won't etc...
Here's another look at the flop side...an article by Oliver Brown in the Telegraph on the current disarray regarding stadium preparations..

The clip shows James Morrison's foul on Ronaldo.Bonus - you also get to see Rooney of all people coming to Ronaldo's defense.

.....And Real Madrid are willing to cough up 80 million euros for Ronaldo.His response so far is "I consider myself a United footballer who is playing well and trying to help the team. If things keep going well, I want to stay here. I'm not a Galactico."

"The message is that everyone can do something to make the world a better place"....words from Zidane in his first appearance on a European pitch since retiring after the World Cup final.The "Match against Poverty" was between Zidane and Friends and Ronaldo and Friends.Zizou's team took the game 6 -2. Goals below include an acrobatic 2nd goal for Ronaldo and Co from Sonny Anderson.

For those keeping tabs on the Clericus Cup here is some more nail biting almost live action coverage of a game between the North American Martyrs and the Croatian Seminary.
North American struck first with a goal by co-captain Daniel O'Mullane, and took a 1-0 lead into halftime. But the Croats came back in the second period to tie the game, forcing the penalty kicks.
Croatia converted all five penalty kicks. The Martyrs scored three and missed one.An entertaining video summary of the proceedings can be viewed here...

A judge in Portugal has ordered Benfica to pay 600,000 euros in compensation to Porto for the sporting rights of Hungarian striker Miklos Feher.He died an untimely death at the age of 24 - suffering cardiac arrest while playing on January 25th 2004.A brief video tribute to him can be viewed here..

The hattrick he scored on the 10th of March had taken his tally to 995 goals.Now -believe it or not - he has scored another one...and this also happens to be his third hat trick in the new year.
For the sceptics here's video evidence of his latest effort.
His goal tally now stands at 998 - just two short of the magic number.Another hat trick and it will all be over -whether the fat lady sings or not !

Chelsea will face Blackburn in the semis of the FA Cup.The first goal against Spurs came in the second half from Shevchenko ....

...and it was followed by this one from Shaun Wright Phillips.

Robbie Keane pulled one back for the Spurs .(Video).In the other game Manchester United are through to meet Watford thanks to a controversial as ever penalty decision in favour of Ronaldo - which he then comfortably scored.(Video)

Meanwhile in the La Liga Frederic Kanoute scored from the penalty spot and Alexander Kerzhakov scored from some other spot to give Sevilla a 2-0 victory over Celta Vigo .This brings them level on 53 points with Barca but still behind them in goal difference.

...and Real Madrid made heavy work of defeating a 10 man second-bottom Gimnastic but eventually managed a 2-0 scoreline to take third place.(video)

Arsenal will be in a state of shock after a game that seemed to be heading for a draw suddenly turned into a defeat when Andy Johnson struck in injury time.(video)
Match report.

....as they win their first away game in La Liga in four months with a 4-0 thrashing of Recreativo Huelva .

Chelsea are still hot on the heels of Manchester United but are not getting any closer..

Goals from the Spurs 3 -1 victory over Watford can be seen here...
Paul Robinson must have embarrassed the hell out of rival goalkeeper Ben Foster when his long free kick bounced over Ben and went into the goal at the other end. You can get a better look at that here.....

Manchester United celebrated St Patrick's day like this.....

Romario scored three in a recent game for his club Vasco da Gama and says he needs another 5 to make it a nice tidy one thousand goals in all.The claim is being met with some scepticism and it is being said that Romario's creativity in juggling the ball on the field is matched by his creativity in juggling the records about the number of goals he has scored in the past.
Pelé is the only player known to have surpassed the 1,000-goal mark. He scored 1,281 goals in 1,363 matches, according to FIFA's Web site. Pelé said he respects Romario and views him as a great player, but doesn't hide his doubts about the 1,000-goal claim.
"The difference is that all my goals counted and are on the record," said Pelé, whose 1,000th goal came when he was 29 and in his prime.
But Romario at the age of 41 insists that another 5 are all that are between him and the champagne and the fireworks and the celebrations and perhaps the hanging up of the old boots at last.
Video of that last last hat trick here.

Holders Sevilla will be playing Tottenham Hotspur in the UEFA Cup quarter-finals.Their entry into the quarters came through a very dramatic game against Shakhtar Donetsk which they eventually won 3-2 .
Sevilla trailed 2-1 and was on the brink of elimination until, in a last desperate gamble, their goalie Palop went forward in the fourth minute of stoppage time and headed in a corner to force an extra 30 minutes of playing time.An extra-time goal from Uruguayan Ernesto Chevanton then put them through 5-4 on aggregate.

You can take another look at Matuzalem's "scorpion kick" here....

Roman Abramovich completed proceedings related to his second divorce somewhere in Russia and announced the same with a press statement stressing that “Mr Abramovich’s corporate interests, including Chelsea Football Club, are not affected by the divorce proceedings.”
The third breakup on the cards has received this interesting write up in the Times on line titled .."Jose beware,billionaires just wanna have fun".

Dimitar Berbatov scores 2 in the Spurs 3 - 2 win over Braga and they move into the UEFA Cup quarter finals.

Frank Lampard's penalty was the only goal in the game against Manchester City yesterday.

Elsewhere Arsenal beat Aston Villa by a similar margin(video)

This goal from Javier Saviola gave Argentina a 1- 0 victory over France in a friendly last month and also helped them to the top of the FIFA rankings for the first time.

Rooney scored twice in Manchester United's 4- 3 win over the Europe XI.Ronaldo took a great free kick. Read more..

Mukul Kesavan discovers that Indian schoolkids are warming up to soccer, especially Premiership league. Arsenal is their choice because its players come from all over the world, it is a global squad with a plugged in global fan base which cosmopolitan Indian youth fit right into. Subsequently, their passion for cricket seems to be on the wane.

All of this points to the fantastic possibilities of soccer taking off in India but now it is up to the honchos in charge to take advantage of this situation.

Some youtube George Lucas has come up with this magnificent bit of coverage of another hard fought game at the Clericus Cup.In this game the North American College defeated a college of French seminarians by 4 goals to nothing.Many more relevant details of the game can be found here and the rest is on the video anyway......!

The earlier episode of this saga can be seen here.This one has a Chariots of Fire introduction.Worth a look definitely !

The Kenyan national squad can now participate in the Africa Nations Cup qualifiers and other international games. Fifa's Emergency Committee granted the conditional lifting of the suspension, paving the way for the team's match against Swaziland on March 24.

This is welcome news for Kenyan soccer but the word 'conditional' does not sound too promising. FIFA's interpretation of government intervention sounds extremely arbitrary and usually affects the less powerful soccer nations.

I may have been a bit too quick to condemn Arsene Wenger's sense of martyrdom as there are some numbers that bolster his perception that Arsenal does get the business end of the stick far too many times. Arsenal gets booked the most per foul committed. The discrepancy compared to other teams is truly astonishing.

For the numbers go to goodplaya and type in 'astonishing figures' in the search bar.

Hat tip to Sandrahn!

Sepp Blatter is upto his old tricks with his willing accomplice FIFA's vice president Jack Warner. At stake are 37 precious CONCACAF votes that Warner controls which should ensure Blatter's re-election this May. But Andrew Jennings discovers that Sepp Blatter needs to sweep a few things under the rug before all of this happens.

London Daily Mail – back page Tuesday 13 March, 2007

FIFA FINE TOP OFFICIAL’S SON $1 MILLION

EXCLUSIVE by Andrew Jennings

FIFA have secretly fined the son of a top official almost $1million for touting World Cup tickets last year.

Daryan Warner, son of vice-president Jack Warner, has also been told their family travel company is banned from dealing in tickets.

The deals, revealed exclusively in SportsMail last September, were set up by Jack Warner. His Trinidad-based company Simpaul Travel acquired more than 5,400 tickets from FIFA
and then sold them at huge mark-ups to package tour operators in England, Japan, and Mexico.

Warner diverted a further 1,700 tickets, allocated to the Trinidad World Cup team, to Simpaul. He was found guilty in early 2006 of breaching FIFA’s ethics code. He hurriedly disposed of his shares in Simpaul but his son Daryan continued as managing director and during the World Cup collected hundreds more tickets from the FIFA office in Berlin and passed them to touts.

A report to FIFA last June from auditors Ernst & Young alleged that the Warners stood to make profits of nearly $1 million. In strict secrecy, the executive committee imposed the massive
fine, equal to the expected profiteering, and ordered the money be donated to the charity SOS Children’s Villages.

The confidential minutes of last December’s executive committee meeting, obtained by SportsMail, reveals that by last Christmas, ‘despite numerous reminders from FIFA,’ only
$250,000 had been paid.

The extraordinary decision to impose the fine was suppressed. At a press conference on December 6 FIFA President Sepp Blatter would only say they ‘disapproved’ of Jack Warner’s
conduct and he should not let Daryan ‘abuse the position held by his father’ - and that the case was closed.

But it wasn’t. The secret deadline for the full payment of $992,652 is March 22, the next meeting of FIFA’s executive, but FIFA insiders believe that if no more money is handed over
there will be no further action. After all, Jack Warner controls 35, of the 207 votes available, that President Blatter needs for re-election at the end of May.

A FIFA source said: 'If there is no more money paid over I can't see that Blatter is going to take action. After all Jack Warner controls 35 crucial votes that will ensure Sepp Blatter gets a
third term.'

In theory the Warners could be reported to Lord Coe, new head of FIFA’s Ethics committee, for the ticket rackets and the failure to pay the fine. But it’s unlikely that the 24-man executive committee will publicly humiliate Warner and authorise an investigation. Coe’s hands are tied; he can’t make an ethical judgement on the Warners unless there is a complaint.

Read the secret FIFA report on the Warner ticket rackets and the Million Dollar Fine at www.transparencyinsport.org

.....for the obscenity he used against the referee in the Chelsea Spurs match?
A strong case that Jose not be given an indulgent pardon but rather be given a just punishment can be read here....

Kaka broke the Celtic hearts the other day with that extra time goal.This time the heartbreak came from a more unlikely source.Ugo Ehiogu beat Artur Boruc with this overhead kick giving the Rangers their first win at Celtic Park in the last two years.

This goal from ( now who's calling me fat ?)Ronaldo was not enough to keep Inter from winning 2 -1 and taking their lead over A C Milan to 33 points in the serie A .
And he does look fat - goal or no goal.

All the games these days seem to be ending in draws with nailbiting second halfs (halves ?)and spectacular last second equalisers.Man U and Middlesbrough was followed by Barca vs Real Madrid. And here's the latest edition of the same. Chelsea vs Spurs ..going all the way upto the spectacular late equaliser from Salomon Kalou. Highlights.....

Match report

Lets look at the other leagues and find where the Premiership stands.

The Serie clubs have played a couple of matches less than their English counterparts. Their numbers suggest a similar pattern in that the haves (AC, Roma, Lazio, Palermo) have combined for +100 and the have nots (Ascoli, Reggina, Parma, and Messina) are -63 in the hole. A total goal swing of 163. But take a look at the middle, which is where all the action is taking place in this years’ Serie. This is an active and pushy group of 12 with a goal swing of 113 (+38 and -75). Even when you factor in the point deductions of Milan, Fiorentina, and Lazio it does not change the overall picture very much.

The La Liga clubs are three games behind and the upper tier Sevilla, Barca, Zaragoza, and Valencia combine for +77 and the bottom four Levante, Bilbao, Gimnastic, and Sociedad concede -64. Compared to the Premiership, the top four Liga clubs don't score as much but the bottom four give away just as many. The Liga's middle tier has a more graded transition with 29 goals scored and 41 goals against. The Liga GD suggests less overt disparities between clubs as compared to other leagues.

The Bundesliga has fewer clubs (18 clubs) and has played fewer matches (each club has played 25 games). But we can still find a discernible pattern looking at the GD. The Bundesliga shows no obvious lower tier. It has an amorphous middle tier with a huge tail. The top four Schalke, Stuttgart, Bremen, and Bayern have a +64 while Bochum, Frankfurt, Bliefeld, and M'gladbach bottom out with -35. After the first four clubs there are no particularly good or bad clubs that standout. It is a middling league with a few top level teams.

For the stats go here >>

The big four Premiership clubs walk away with the lions share of the revenues filling their already swollen coffers to be used for expensive transfers. The sort of transfer money that could keep some of the smaller clubs solvent, many who are a transfer away from bankruptcy. But how does it translate into a difference in performance? Examining the goal differential provides a clue.

Look at the goal differential of the four big clubs. 29 games into the season, Manu Utd, Chelsea, Liverpool, and Arsenal combine for a whopping +129 goals. On the other end, Wigan, Charlton, Watford, and West Ham struggle with a deficit of -90 goals. This is a mind numbing 219 goal swing between these two groups. The larger group in the middle (12 clubs), a sluggish middle class show a wimpy 61 goal swing (+18 and -43). You could not make a better case for two Premierships. The GD is the equivalent of the GINI co-efficient, a measure of the economic equality of a country. In short the rich get richer, the poor get poorer and the disparity greater. This is not even a Spencerian "survival of the fittest" because it has gone beyond that. We are not just talking relegation, it is a decimation of the doormats.

What does all this mean? As with every historical narrative, it depends on who has that power. At this point of time, the top four clubs are defining "English" soccer. In this narrative it is easy to overlook the trio of Hammers that brought England its most glorious moment. Maybe this little statistical interlude also provides a glimpse into two Englands.

Lionel Messi scored an equaliser in the final minute to complete a hat-trick and earn 10-man Barcelona an exhilarating 3-3 home draw against Real Madrid on Saturday.( video)
13.17 minutes of Lionel Messi vs Real Madrid can be seen on this youtube clip here....

Manchester United scraped a 2 -2 draw against Middlesbrough in the FA cup quarter final.Rooney scored first.Middlesbrough equalised and went into the lead with great goals from Lee Cattermole and George Boateng .Ronaldo got the equaliser for Man U through a dubious penalty awarded to them for handball in the goal area.(Video)

Why do I get this strange feeling that Steve Nash might do more to promote soccer in this country than Beckham will?

Steve Nash, Phoenix Suns star trains with NY Red Bulls

Steve Nash, the Phoenix Suns point guard, perennial All Star and the NBA's two time MVP is the raison d'etre for the Suns success. He is only the second foreign born (South Africa) player to be awarded the MVP title, the first being Hakeem Olajuwon, and is probably a future Hall of Famer inductee. The Suns are the most exciting team to watch with their high octane attack behind Nash's unpredictable no look passes and clutch three point shooting. But when Nash is not shooting hoops he turns to his other passion: Soccer.

Nash has been sighted playing pick up soccer in New York's Chinatown on Saturday mornings and works out with the NY Red Bulls team during their training season. He has also treated fans to a bit of his considerable soccer skills during the All Star break. He took off with friend Dirk Nowitzki, Dallas Mavericks forward and fellow soccer aficianado for the World Cup in Germany to watch the matches and the final. Nash has also weighed in on the Beckham move to the LA Galaxy. Here is his intelligent response to all the hype.

There are many theories that pundits have come up with for Nash's success but when you deconstruct them, they are all a subset of the omnibus theory: The soccer theory. And Nash is the first to acknowledge soccer's advantage in developing his superb basketball skills.

Steve Nash said people tell him that he "looks like a soccer player playing basketball." In a radio interview he talks about soccer and its similarities to basketball, " the same angles, timing, and using space to your advantage." There is truth in his words. Many foreign born NBA stars who come from strong soccer playing countries seem to show much more creativity than their American counterparts. We see it in Dirk Nowitzki and Manu Ginobili (who unfortunately seems to have picked up the less salubrious aspects of soccer) Nash feels that is so. `You see it a lot in international players the influence soccer has had.

``It allowed them to gain an advantage somewhere along the line. Whether it be agility or footwork, or passing angles and finding creative ways to get the ball either to the basket or to pass it to someone. I think there is something to be transferred from each sport.''

Nash is a die hard Tottenham supporter and grew up watching the Spurs with his father, a Tottenham native and himself a professional soccer player in the South African league before the Nash family migrated to Canada. Nash also comes from a family of soccer players with brother Martin Nash, a winger for the Vancouver Whitecaps and representing Canada (30 internationals). Sister Joanne was the captain of the University of Victoria soccer team. Nash attended St. Michaels University School, and as a junior was named British Columbia’s most valuable player in soccer. A spot on the Canadian national team was his for the taking before he discovered basketball.

Nash's passion for soccer is not limited to playing pick up soccer and watching matches. He has indicated that he is interested in a future future offer for Tottenham. He is a wealthy man and his chunk of change would be welcome if a consortium were to bid for the Spurs. Plus, the common rap with all these buyers from across the pond taking over Premiership clubs is that they have no love or historical connection with the game, purely a financial motive. Nash's love for soccer is not merely lip service. His interest in buying out of the Spurs might sound like a pipe dream to some but that is what many felt about Nash's aspirations to be a future NBA star. He has always had the courage of his convictions even though it has earned him adverse controversy.

Check out Steve Nash's mad soccer skills at the All Star break >>

Obafemi Martins scored four more goals this season since Shourin wrote this post on him sometime in February.He scored 2 more in Newcastle's 4 - 2 victory over Dutch side AZ Alkmaar and he's getting plenty of postive feedback from Newcastle boss Glenn Roeder. Highlights of the game below.

Bobby Charlton showers high praise on Cristiano Ronaldo as the prospect of an all-English European Cup final remained a live one after the quarter-final draw kept the English teams apart.If all goes according to plan it would be the first all-English final in the history of the European Cup.
"Ronaldo has just been fantastic," said Charlton. "It takes great players to grab the bull by the horns and lift people and he has been doing that recently.
He does things I have never seen anybody else do. And the one thing he does do is he is as tough as hell. If you clatter him, it doesn't bother him too much, he'll carry on. His goal at Fulham was just marvelous and I think he has been a than even people here realize."

I am a great supporter of Arsene Wenger and I find his commitment to nurturing Arsenal's young players a refreshing change from a resume builder like Jose Mourinho. He brought out his U-21 and U-19 squad to play Chelsea's senior squad in the Carling Cup and the young lads acquitted themselves magnificently. But Wenger's whining about the referees has gotten out of hand. It is one thing rebutting Sam Allardyce's grandstanding but you really get into a bit of a cesspool when you accuse the referees of lying.

In US politics we have our vast right wing and left wing conspiracies (VWRC and VWLC) but Wenger's contention is that the referees are a cabal constantly plotting to trip him up. There is one standard for him and different standards for the rest. Wenger victimizes himself and worse still enjoys this misery because in the end he can claim that refereeing decisions did him in. It is now a mantra in France that Wenger would go further if it were not for the bleeding Brit referees. An atavistic form of the Norman invasion is being played out. Mourinho on the other hand loves dishing out pain to the referees. Guess who got away easier in the Carling Cup debacle. The sadist or the masochist. Chelsea is motoring on to the FA Cup final, meeting with Valencia, and still have a whimper of a chance at the Premiership. Arsenal's season came to an inglorious end with suspensions and injuries.

The FA found Emmanuel Adebayor guilty of threatening conduct and has suspended him for a fourth game in addition to the three that he is currently serving. What are the odds that this would not have occurred if Wenger had not accused the assistant referee of lying?

Born in Marseille just like Marseille's favourite son Zinedine Zidane as well as sharing Algerian ancestry, it is inevitable that Nasri is often compared to Zizou. Wishful thinking you might say but seeing this 19 year old's nifty ball skills and crafty passing, the comparison does not appear that premature. There are flashes of Cristiano Ronaldo and Fabregas which of course makes him all the more attractive to the big clubs. But with OM's new owner he might want to stay a bit longer and mature before he moves on.

Now you see why Wenger wants this duo in Arsenal. He has to fight off Milan and Real to get them.

Jack Kachkar, L'OMs new owner

L' OM's fortunes have been on the wane for over a decade since Bernard Tapie's 1994 match fixing scandal led to the club's brief second division relegation. Their chairman, Adidas owner Robert Louis Dreyfus took over in 1996 but he was largely an owner in absentia with an open checkbook leading to many expensive and unsuccessful transfers. The club lost money and never had much success except for reaching the UEFA cup final in 1999 where they were beaten by Valencia. L'OM's last French Ligue title was in 1992. During this decline L'OM became known as a feeder club churning out talented players like Didier Drogba who was offloaded to Chelsea in 2004 for a record fee of 24 million pounds primarily to offset some of OM's operating loss. The OM fans are reputed for their loyalty and pack their stadium (one of Europe's largest with 65,000) through disappointing season after season.

However there is reason for optimism as they now have a new owner. Canadian-Syrian businessman Jack Kachkar recently announced that he had bought out Dreyfus share and was set to takeover as OM's chairman. This has been in the works for a while and many OM fans were waiting for this announcement. Kachkar's takeover was in question because club authorities and French financial officials questioned some of his business dealings but these have been cleared. Kachkar is the CEO of Inyx, a pharma company headquartered in New York City.

Kachkar's immediate concern would be to find a new coach and he is keen on bringing England's ex-coach Sven Goran Erickson on board. Kachkar on his new club "I am passionate about football and I have been a Marseille fan for a while now. I appreciate its history and the support of the fans for their team."

The draw for the Champion's League Quarter Finals yeilded the following combinations.

AC Milan vs. Bayern Munich

PSV vs. Liverpool

AS Roma vs. Manchester United.

Chelsea vs. Valencia

Every four years we have cricket's version of the World Cup and this year the West Indies is hosting it. The premiere event in the cricketing world, the ICC Cricket World Cup starts this March and goes on for a month. The term West Indies is a quaint throwback easily recognizable to anyone familiar with British colonialism and cricket (these two entities are inseparable) and refers to the countries of Jamaica, Trinidad and Tobago, and Barbados to name a few of the former dozen English colonies. When one refers to the West Indies playing cricket it is these ex-colonies rather than other parts of the West Indies such as Cuba, Haiti, Puerto Rico, Martinique and Dominican Republic ruled by a host of other colonial powers where cricket is rarely played.

Jamaica, Antigua, Trinidad and Tobago and the rest of the British West Indies are all independent entities but form a loose confederation when it comes to playing cricket. A phenomenon very distinct from how these countries represent themselves separately in soccer or the Olympics. The Windies as they are called were at onetime considered the Brazilians of soccer, an unstoppable force. Anyone familiar with cricket will instantly recall legends like Garfield Sobers, Lance Gibbs, Rohan Kanhai and the three W's, Weekes, Walcott, and Worrell. Their dominance began in the 1960's and for the next twenty five years they ruled cricket. As with Brazil their talent was unbounded and unfettered. The beaches of the West Indies was dotted with children playing cricket just like the Copa is filled with Brazilians showing off their skills in soccer, hoping to be the next Zico or Pele. Growing up in India, where cricket is a passion we felt the truly awesome power of the Windies over the years. The steadiest opening pair in Gordon Greenidge and Roy Fredericks, the power of Viv Richards repeatedly hooking balls for six against an impotent Indian attack, the dancing feet of Alvin Kallicharan elegantly cover driving the ball, a diminutive Malcolm Marshall who could extract lethal pace from even the most lifeless of Indian pitches and whose vicious bouncers were one reason why batsmen wear helmets, the gazelle like grace of Michael Holding, and the spectacle of almost 7' tall Joel 'Big Bird' Garner swooping down and bowling from a stratospheric 11' . And we have not even mentioned Clive Lloyd who swat balls imperiously with the heaviest bat in business. It made no difference who coached the Windies or who faced them. Yep, in those days we were lucky if a test match went beyond the third day. Even a second rate 1980's West Indies team decimated by its stars leaving for the lucrative Kerry Packer league was streets ahead of any other team. West Indian cricket was bolstered by Michael Manley, the Jamaican PM, and a vocal proponent of Pan Caribbean nationalism who saw it as an important part in coalescing against US intervention in the region just as Kwame Nkrumah did soccer in the nascent rise of African nationalism against the British. But with Manley's death in 1997 the differences between these countries sharpened. Cricket took a nosedive as a group of disparate and incohesive West Indian players led by the supremely talented Brian Lara met with a series of defeats. The infallibility of the West Indies had ended.

At the same time soccer enjoyed an growing popularity since the 1970s when Jack Warner, Trinidad and Tobago's soccer association president promoted it as a sport that opposed the remains of a colonial legacy and identified it as a sport for the blacks and the dispossessed. In contrast, cricket was always the sport of the elite and the Trini Indians who saw themselves as outside of nationalist politics. Much of soccer's surge in the Caribbean can be attributed to Warner who is now one of FIFA's vice president and the president of CONCACAF. Warner's good work to promote soccer has been tarnished with charges of financial impropriety and nepotism for which he is being investigated. Jamaica and Trinidad and Tobago also benefited by a strong diasporic representation in English and the USA playing for their leagues or in the varsity teams and coming back to do duty for their national squads. The Reggae Boyz squad took advantage of this phenomena with Robbie Earle, Jamaica's hero in the 1998 World Cup who scored his country's first ever goal against Croatia, also playing for Port Vale and Wimbledon. Ricardo Gardner, Dean Burton, and Frank Sinclair, members of the 1998 squad were either born in England or played for clubs there. Trinidad and Tobago's Shaka Hislop, a hero to his countrymen in the 2006 World Cup (who can forget his goalkeeping in the Sweden game) came to the USA and attended Howard University winning the NCAA title in 1988. As did Stern John who joined Columbus Crew after completing his college. Dwight Yorke, T&T's captain played for Aston Villa, Man Utd, and Blackburn Rovers. Carlos Edwards joined from Luton Town. There were a number of player from the Scottish League including Russell Latapy, Jason Scotland, Brent Sancho, Densill Theobald, and Collin Samuel. In fact, there is a great story of many Scottish fans making the trip to Germany to cheer T&T, their adopted team against their rivals England. Soccer appeals to many in tiny and isolated T&T because it helps connect with the world and its billions that follow the global game rather than follow what appears to be an echo chamber of ten nations playing a game that smacks of a protracted colonial hangover.

Soccer with its TV and merchandising rights has also proved to be lucrative to these players and the respective soccer federations. The cash strapped West Indies Cricket Board on the other hand has had to undergo a financial crisis after chief sponsors Cable and Wireless pulled out imperiling future tours by the players. The players supplement their meager salaries given by the board with the more substantial endorsements given by sponsoring companies. This sort of problem does not arise in soccer as the diasporic Jamaican and Trinibagoans play for the richer English and US clubs and the soccer federations are not responsible for their salaries.

We called it foolhardy when Rafa Benitez sent his squad a week before the game against Barca in the first leg, knowing the combustible nature of some of his players. And it was as all the critics feared, true, as after a drinking binge, a sozzled Bellamy decided that Riise was a giant golf ball worthy of launching into the green. Some of his equally addled team mates cheered on his under par performance. It all became a matter for the police blotter. Of course, there were consequences to be paid and the question was would Bellamy be included in the squad. Benitez kept faith. In hindsight, it was the best thing that happened to this Liverpool team. That and the return of Momo Sissoko. Bellamy sparked off this Liverpool team scoring a goal and setting up Riise to score the second. Again, Liverpool did what it does best. Rousing itself against adversity. Although, they lost the return leg at Anfield, Liverpool kept Victor Valdes on his toes. But this Liverpool team is finally playing as a team minus the finger pointing and head wagging earlier in the season. Plus, Sissoko's return has helped immensely.

In contrast, Man Utd look sluggish and with Larsson's departure, Saha and Solsjaer injured, they look pretty thin upfront with just Rooney. Sir Alex might comfort himself that he has Giggs and Ronaldo to land a strike. But if the only goals that they can get are Giggs sleight of foot against no name Lille then they are in deep trouble. They did not look particularly impressive against Lille in the return encounter even with the win. Larsson scoring the winning goal proving that they need someone like him to progress deeper. Chelsea managed to eke out an unconvincing win against Porto, a grudge match in which Mourinho's former club did almost enough to prove that they were better than the man who put them on top in 2004. Helton's poor decision making let them down in the end. Chelsea's defensive problems should get sorted out with Terry's return. But Chelsea's problem is that every club knows the unbelievable pressure that they are playing under, in their desire to stamp themselves as Europe's best team. The cracks were evident in their match against Porto as Chelsea came under pressure and looked ragged. So much so that Mourinho had to remind his players at halftime to "enjoy that pressure."

I see Liverpool return to the finals as they did in 2005. And surprisingly, I would pick Bayern Munich or Roma to meet them. Bayern has slipped in under the radar as all the prattle has been about plebian Schalke and Werder Bremen in the Bundesliga. But they played the most entertaining soccer against Real. Podolksi is back. Roy Makaay was quicksilver with his 11 second goal. Bayern's attack was pugnacious and unrelenting as Poldi hit his stride. And if Mark Van Bommel can pull out a Cesc Fabregas performance consistently then he can burn everyone with his crisp passing. Roma's biggest advantage is that they sense their moment in the sun after years of being bundled out. Totti has served notice to Gattuso, bring it on if the draw indeed pits the country bumpkins against patrician Milan. Roma has the right man in Totti, who always plays big in the matches that count. And Doni is undoubtedly the best goalkeeper so far in the Champions league.

Arsenal and Arsene. Again one pretty pass too many. Tele Santana would have been proud because even with all the injuries and suspensions, the Gunners still played the most pleasing but in the end, ineffective soccer. Alex giveth and then taketh right back. It has been that frustrating a season for them.

"If there was a Champions League trophy for sheer guts and determination, we'd win it," said Celtic Coach Gordon Strachan after their resolute and stouthearted performance against A C Milan.This goal from Kaka was eventually scored in the 3rd minute of extra time.Kaka had taken 25 unsuccessful shots at goal in the 90 minutes of normal time.

...was scored by Gilberto Silva for Arsenal against PSV Eindhoven in Sept. 2002 in a time of 20.07 seconds.

The fastest one was scored yesterday by Roy Makaay 10 seconds into the game between Bayern Munich and Real Madrid.(Video)

Lille curbed their natural instincts and stayed on the field for the entire duration of the match and lost again.Henrik Larsson headed in the winner for Manchester United .Match report

Arsenal - PSV Eindhoven ended in a 1 -1 draw and Arsenal are out of yet another competition.Goals here and match report here.
Real Madrid joined Arsenal on the wrong side of the quarter final line up after losing their game against Bayern Munich by 2 goals to 1. Match highlights here.

Lyon suffered their first home Champions League defeat since Ajax in October 2002.Roma's first goal from Daniele De Rossi was ruled out by the referee Manuel Gonzalez for a foul by Totti .Totti made up by scoring in the 22nd minute. Mancini did a dizzying series of step overs in front of Reveillere before scoring the second goal.Even Cristiano Ronaldo would have been impressed ..!

Barcelona's defence of their Champions League crown ended in a whimper. They won the game against Liverpool 1 - 0 but it was not enough to get them into the quarter finals because of the away goals rule.Elsewhere Michael Ballack kept Chelsea's and Mourinho's dreams alive as his late goal earned them a 2 -1 win over Porto (video)

Sevilla's coach Juande Ramos's headache would have been better after seeing his side back on top of the Spanish Primera division after with their 2-1 win over Barcelona.Highlights below include Ronaldinho missing a penalty for a change.Not very good for their self confidence.Barca face a tough challenge as they take on Liverpool tonight.Juande Ramos meanwhile may be getting ready to fill Mourinho's shoes ?

Dimitar Berbatov's 90th minute free-kick against West Ham.

All the 7 goals of that match here.

Highlights of the Real Madrid vs Getafe match that ended in a 1 -1 draw during which Beckham injured his right knee.[He whacked it into an advertising hoarding - which when you think about it is kind of ironical..!] He will as a result be missing the Champion's league match against Bayern tomorrow [ McClaren was going all the way over to Munich to watch him play] ..more irony.The injury will also possibly delay his MLS debut.Reyes and Higuain were the other two players injured.

Gary Lineker thinks its time to bring Beckham back into the England squad - especially in the light of his "world class" free kick skills.
After seeing this video - who could object..!

Drogba and Kalou did the scoring and Petr Cech pulled of some great saves at the other end to keep Chelsea on the trail of Manchester United

Fabregas manages one of the misses of the century against Reading .

Arsenal won 2 -1 (video) and Liverpool went down by a goal in injury time to Manchester United after playing really well until then.(video)

The English Premiership is all set to to follow the example of tennis and introduce Hawkeye technology to end uncertainty over goal-line decisions - so that everyone can then be totally certain when a ball is completely over the goal line or not completely over the goal line and so live happily ever after.
But there's a spaniard in the works. Spanish tennis player Rafael Nadal has been complaining that hawkeye caused him to lose a match in Dubai recently....!
“Today (Thursday night) I lost the first set in the last point because I saw, and the referee (umpire) knows because he saw the ball outside,” Nadal told reporters.
“The mark of the ball was still on court and it was outside but in the challenge it was in, so that’s unbelievable.”
According to the disappointed Spaniard, even umpire Roland Herfel agreed the ball was out, but umpire’s are instructed to go with the HawkEye call.
“I say to him, ’look, the ball is out’, and he say ’I know’.
So it looks like that happy ending is going to be delayed for a while ...

No one has said anything about Blatter for awhile on this blog so here he is again - irritiating the hell out of at least 3 sets of people .Lens president, Gervais Martel was deeply angered by what Blatter said without blatting an eyelid - namely that the Stade Felix Bollaert in Lens, where United fans were pushed against metal fences last week, should not have been used for a Champions League game.
Then we have the Colombian President Alvaro Uribe who wasn't too pleased about Blatter's less than flattering comments about Colombia's chances of hosting the 2014 World Cup.
And finally there are a whole bunch of disappointed people here who may have had hopes that the 2018 World Cup would be held in England.

Wenger is sticking to his gun(ner)s.He had called the assistant referee a "liar" for claiming Emmanuel Adebayor punched Frank Lampard in the brawl at the end of the Carling Cup.He stands by his comments.Lampard says he wasn't punched anyway.

"The referee and the linesman made a big mistake and I am able to prove it," Wenger said. "Adebayor did not punch Frank Lampard and did not intend to and we can prove it."
And you can vote here....

A bow to the Premiership and its selling power as it rules the roost in global viewership. But if Didier Drogba deserved the African player of the year award so equally did Mohammed Aboutreika leading El Ahly to an unprecedented fifth Africa Nations Cup. In the Club World Championships El Ahly came a superb third behind some classic Aboutrieka goals. We do not know how much El Ahly pays its player but I am confident the $45 million that Chelsea paid for Drogba's transfer would cover the operating costs of El Ahly for the next decade. If you are talking of an African player playing in the Premiership shining a bright light on Chelsea then look no further than Didier Drogba. If you are talking about an African player playing in Africa and shining a bright light on African soccer then it does not get much better than Mohammed Aboutreika. One does wonder at CAF's selection criteria and what goes into making it. If the stats are right then an estimated 80 million people or more worldwide watch Drogba score goals against another Premiership club live every weekend. Aboutrieka's fame is through You Tube. You see how stacked it is against Aboutreika.

An injured Samuel Eto'o finished runner-up without donning Barca colours for most of the year?? Was Frederic Kanoute's fine form leading La Liga with 18 goals and Sevilla to a hair's breadth of the pole position inconsequential? I happened to watch Barca lose to Liverpool in the Champions League and the camera panned to a miserable looking Samuel Eto'o in street clothes. At that point if someone would have told Eto'o that he was the second best African player he probably would be violently sick. Michael Essien might be Chelsea's hummer but the untiring legs of Ivory Coast's Aruna Dindane and Mali's Seydou Keita are propelling Lens to a respectable second in the French Ligue.

Replace the current slate of winners with these three or four that I have mentioned and the CAF would have done more to recognize the strength of African players who have done more for African soccer playing in lesser known leagues and in the sum total of all parts they measure up just as well as Didier Drogba and more so then Samuel Eto'o and Michael Essien.

Didier Drogba was named 2006 African Footballer of the Year .Samuel Eto'o came in second and Michael Essien third.A youtube compilation of some great goals from Drogba here and an interesting kind of picture of him receiving his award here.( He's dressed in some kind of traditional African formal outfit and not scowling for a change ..!)

Sevilla coach Juande Ramos had to be carried of the field on a stretcher after he was knocked unconscious by an ice filled bottle during their King's Cup match against city rivals Real Betis.Video here
The match was abandoned after the incident.
Sevilla doctor Adolfo Munoz said the 52-year-old had fortunately not suffered any neurological damage.
And the minister for Sports Jaime Lissavetzky said the following...
"The (Spanish soccer) federation and the (state-run) Anti-Violence Commission must act with the greatest rigor, and of course the government will do its utmost to make sure that action of the greatest rigor is taken." etc..

Not a good time for Arsenal fans.Benni McCarthy's late goal (video) for the Rovers saw the gunners being dumped out of 2 competions in four days.Match report.