Tag Archives: Manchester United

Football Weekly Extra: Super Saha stars as Everton stun Chelsea

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“James is back with another top-banana podcast featuring John Ashdown, Barry Glendenning and Paul Doyle. Midweek Premier League matches mean plenty of talking points: including Louis Saha increasing John Terry’s woe, Arsenal back to winning ways, and Aston Villa’s limited ambition against Manchester United. Sid Lowe is on the phone from Madrid with the truth about those Cesc Fábregas to Barcelona rumours, while James’s Italian round-up includes news of Ultras storming Lazio’s training ground.” (Guardian – James Richardson)

La Liga To Follow Premier League Television Revenue Sharing Model?

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“Despite the current financial crisis in English football, it’s not down to a lack of television revenue for the Premier League. Indeed, that revenue is the envy of the world, with the £1.782 billion deal signed last year for domestic live game rights alone. The Premier League’s deals are negotiated collectively; the threat of, say, Manchester United going it alone has long bubbled under the surface, but the overall size of the deals the League have managed to negotiate, and the long-term benefits of it for the Premier League as a whole, have kept even the biggest clubs behind the collective agreements.” (Pitch Invasion)

Why football clubs no longer flock to the January sales

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“Ajax Amsterdam’s general director recently tallied his club’s transfers, and came up with this estimate: only 8.3 per cent of the footballers Ajax had bought in the past decade had succeeded. Ajax’s Dutch rivals, he said, had done even worse. This January European clubs spent barely anything during the “transfer window”. English clubs forked out about £30m ($48m, €34m) on new players, their lowest for any January since 2003. German, Spanish and French clubs spent even less. The credit crunch has bitten soccer in the leg.” (Simon Kuper)

Sergio Canales – Spain’s hottest prospect

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“On January 9, Racing Santander’s 18-year-old attacking midfielder Sergio Canales scored two goals to defeat Sevilla and become seemingly the most desired young player on the planet. It has been reported that Liverpool, Chelsea, Manchester City, Manchester United, Arsenal, Barcelona and Real Madrid are all interested in him, while Vicente del Bosque reportedly hasn’t ruled out his inclusion in the Spanish squad for the World Cup.” (WSC)

Big Drop in Transfer Market

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“If soccer agents had powerful lobbyists working for them in the halls of government, you can be fairly confident they would be asking for a generous stimulus package right around now. Just as fears of an enduring economic slump can lead to a self-fulfilling prophecy in the real world, as consumers “feel poor” and hunker down to save, slowing or even negating growth, so too can the perception of imminent doom affect soccer clubs’ spending. And, when teams stop spending, the first to be affected are the agents and middlemen who grease the wheels of the transfer market.”
(WSJ)

Could Guardiola really follow Fergie?

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“Josep Guardiola is being linked with the job at Manchester United, which may be up for grabs at the end of this year or next. The contractual chicanery between him and Joan Laporta suggests he could well have designs on a position elsewhere, and in the very least, Guardiola has evinced an unwillingness to commit longterm to the Catalan giants. It’s rumoured he favours a move to England and the Premiership – a league he is reportedly a fan of.”> (Soccer Lens)

The Glazer Protests: Where Do They Go From Here?

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“It was one of the stranger sights of the season, for sure. During the League Cup semi-final between Manchester United and Manchester City on Wednesday night, a large number of (what to the untrained eye may have appeared to have been) Norwich City supporters seemed to have infiltrated Old Trafford and were sitting in their seats, cheering on Alex Ferguson’s team. It was, of course, nothing of the sort.” (twohundredpercent)

Barcelona’s record-breaking 2009 will be hard to repeat in 2010

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“For Real Madrid, the best thing about 2009 was that it did, eventually, draw to a close. For Barcelona, that could be their only complaint. Their task now is to dominate in another year too, to ensure that this is not a one-off, to build a lasting legacy. The cliche says getting to the top is one thing, staying there is even harder; that the second season is even more difficult than the first.” (World Soccer – 1), (2 -Barcelona’s Annus mirabilis will be hard to emulate)

Michael Owen rages against the dying of the light

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“Oscar Wilde memorably summed up the climax of The Old Curiosity Shop by remarking that “one would have to have a heart of stone to read the death of little Nell without laughing”. The modern reader may well have had the same reaction to Michael Owen’s exclusive interview with the Guardian at the weekend.” (WSC)

A Good Defense Isn’t Enough

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“The old adage about defenses winning championships is starting to look outdated. Across Europe’s leading football leagues right now, the major title contenders have ditched the defensive mindset traditionally associated with success in favor of a new adventurous line of attack, in which teams are far more interested in scoring goals than preventing them. The result has been a deluge of goals that has delighted supporters and sent statisticians scurrying to check the record books.” (WSJ)

A Brief Post on Post Post Colonialism

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“So, many have heard the news about Liverpool fans getting arrested for ‘racism’ after complaining about ‘Yank’ owners. While the Deficit Hawks (not GOP affiliates) in Manchester continue to protest against the Glazers, they at least have focused squarely on the family in question. At least as of late.” (futfanatico)

‘England’s bigger than Michael Owen anyway’

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“Michael Owen knows the question is ­coming. It always does. ‘England, ­England, England,’ he says, with sadness and affection, as if talking of a far-off place. The intelligence that has always burned behind his diplomatic exterior confronts its biggest test when the conversation turns to Fabio Capello’s policy of ­excluding the country’s fourth-highest scorer from the England squad.” (Guardian – Paul Hayward)

Arsenal, AC Milan come charging

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“You can blame the weather, I suppose. England’s deep freeze has wreaked havoc on the Premier League calendar, which is great for U.S.-based fans — there have been midweek (and therefore, mid-day) games galore, like Wednesday’s Liverpool-Tottenham showdown of underachievers. In the meantime, both the FA and Carling Cups have been raging on, and selected other European action — mixed in with some awesome African Cup of Nations games — have made mid-January a smorgasbord of excellent soccer. Plus, with everyone finally off winter break, we can start picking apart the leftovers again. Enjoy this week’s rundown — we recommend you nuke on high for two minutes, flip, then zap for another two minutes on medium.” (SI)