Friday goal action
Quaresma v Belgium. Can Porto hang on to him this summer? He’s strongly linked with Chelsea but he could be just the player Arsenal need.
Arsenal should have some fun with Reyes
Everybody knows that Jose Antonio Reyes adapted to life in England like a polar bear in the tropics and he’s been talking again about how much he wants to stay with Real Madrid.
In fact, I would suggest that he’d stay with any club in Spain, even Real Betis (sworn enemies of Sevilla) rather than return to Arsenal. With that in mind Arsenal should test out his desire to remain in his own country and set him a series of challenges.
Arsenal - “Ok Jose, we’ll sell you to a Spanish club but first you have to eat this plate for of worms”
Reyes - “Si, si, a mi me gusta los gusanos!”
Arsenal - “Now, wipe those bits of worms off your teeth. Now you have to strip naked and run around Placa Catalunya in Barcelona shouting “Madrid is, like, totally awesome and Barcelona is full of wankers. Viva Franco!”
Reyes - “Arriba!”
Arsenal - “Finally, you have to sit in a room and listen to every single Phil Collins album of all time!”
Reyes - “So, when do you want me back?”
Steve Gerrard is currently the most unpopular man in England
Why? His two goals have kept Steve McClaren in his job.
At half-time, it didn’t look good for the man dubbed “McClown” by the ever-brilliant Sun. The crowd was rocking with chants of “Steve McClaren is a wanker” and “There’s only one David Beckham”. And then the square-headed mug from Liverpool had to ruin it with two pretty decent goals.
David Nugent then added £1m onto his pricetag and a hell of a lot onto his own popularity by stealing a goal from Jermain Defoe.
None of the above can detract from another abject England performance, and I know plenty of fans who were hoping we’d fail to win tonight simply to see the back of McClaren. To be honest, if anybody’s job should be under threat, it’s Brian Barwick: the man who appointed him.
It’s not McClaren’s fault he’s crap…
McClaren’s irreversible slide from ‘mediocrity’ to ‘lunacy’ continues
It sure has beeen easy getting our shots in at Steve McClaren and his merry band of head-hanging malcontents these past few days (fun, too). But just in case any of you were working up to ‘Oh well, let’s give Stevie something resembling a break’, I direct you to news that McClaren was going to drop Owen Hargreaves and again jam the midfield with Steven Gerrard and Frank Lampard, had the latter not busted his wrist in practise.
Putting aside the well-worn (and generally well-received on the ol’ innernets) argument that Lamapard and Gerrard are an unworkable pairing, this little gem forces us to wonder what it takes to get cut from the starting England squad. Hargreaves has been consistenly solid in England’s deep midfield since his coming out party during last summer’s World Cup; Lampard has gone 17 months without scoring in a competitive match for England. The hell…?
And please, don’t give me any ‘Well, it’s just Andorra’ stuff. Thanks to England’s incompetence, this is now a Big Game, and if England actually drop points tonight the grumbling of the past week will quickly turn to blood-thirsty howling. Play your best side and get on with it, guys.
John Terry, however, offered support for his much-maligned Chelsea teammate, claiming he is still a ‘big’ part of the national side.
Yeah, real ‘big’. Not big as in ‘always comes through when it counts’, but big like, ’Hey Frankie, we’re off to Curry Dome, want to come with for a bucket of chicken tikka and some pilau?’ (Man, those fat jokes are never going away, are they? Zing!)
What’s up, Newsnow?
No doubt many of you know about Newsnow, a site that aggregates news stories by category. So, if you were a fan of Chelsea you can go to their Chelsea newsfeed and see all the latest stories about your club.
Since Left Back began last October I have been trying to get the site added to Newsnow. I have submitted it countless times and received no response.
I sent emails asking if there was something lacking technically that I needed to fix. I sent emails asking if they could tell me why the site hasn’t been added.
To date I have not had the courtesy of one reply from Newsnow and all the while they add new football blogs, many of which are splogs.
This site does not carry Google ads, it does not publish ridiculous over-hyped headlines designed to draw hits and therefore clicks for their ads, it’s an honest, group blog about football that, despite their refusal to list it, is gaining a readership. Obviously being listed on the biggest aggregator in the UK would help but our interest is only in finding a wider audiece, not making money like some of these ‘blogs’.
Is there no measure of quality at Newsnow and shouldn’t a website which is in the communication business be able to answer at least one of many polite emails sent to it over a period of 6 months?
Over to you Newsnow.
Nothing will change for England tonight
Even a team as goalshy and out of form as England wil stick at least 5 or 6 past Andorra tonight. That’ll probably mean a reprieve for Steve McClaren and England’s woes will continue the next time they play anybody half decent.
Fact is England replaced Sven with Svenlite, a man whose talents amounted to keeping a mid-table team in mid-table with the odd cup run thrown in.
It’s obvious Scolari was the best choice but the jingoism of the press pack prevented that ever happening.
One thing to bear in mind though is that maybe the quality of English players has fallen in recent years. There was a time when England had a panel of strikers that would have been the envy of most countries. Shearer, Sheringham, Wright, Ferdinand, Fowler, Cole, Merson and more.
Nowadays there’s Wayne Rooney, who hasn’t scored for England for three years, Peter Crouch, Andy Johnson, Jermaine Defoe and the always injured Michael Owen. Hardly the same is it?
Must be because of all them damn furreners in the Premiership.
Moritz Volz: not a tosser
In a pretty good interview with Guardian Unlimited’s Small Talk, Fulham defender Moritz Volz discusses a wide range of topics and, unlike so many pro athletes whose sub-articulate assholery we are forced to endure, manages to come across as a pretty cool guy. He even takes the mick out of himself for the whole German-and-loving-David-Hasselhoff thing.
Oh, and he’s a big fan of sunny-slick teen soap The OC. Which means, as a pleasant treat, we have an excuse to gaze upon the nubile perfection that is Rachel Bilson:
I heard she even likes football. (Okay, that’s not technically true, but hey—you’re the one who feels the need to rationalise this.)
Arsenal and Chelsea fined £100,000
In a statement today the FA have fined both Arsenal and Chelsea £100,000 for the Carling Cup handbags. It does seem a little harsh though. Compare it to the following:
Tottenham Hotspur FC
Tottenham Hotspur FC v Middlesbrough FC
FA Premier League, 5 December 2006
Denied breach of FA Rule E20(a) – failing to ensure that its players conducted themselves in an orderly fashion.
Result: Charge proved. Fined £8,000 (£4,000 suspended for 12 months) and warned as to future conduct
Middlesbrough FC
Tottenham Hotspur FC v Middlesbrough FC
FA Premier League, 5 December 2006
Denied breach of FA Rule E20(a) – failing to ensure that its players conducted themselves in an orderly fashion.
Result: Charge proved. Fined £4,000 (£2,000 suspended for 12 months) and warned as to future conduct
Thanks to Vivb for sourcing the info. And I’m sure if you went digging around you’d find far worse incidents punished with much smaller fines. Is this the Sky Sports News justice Arsene Wenger was so upset about?
McClaren is mental
Someone who has watched a lot of international football called me and said it was as good a display of football as they had seen over the entire weekend - McLaren at a press conference yesterday.
Who knew Stevie Wonder had a direct line to the England manager?
Spot the lie
Given Steven Staunton’s previous performance as Ireland manager which of these Lee Carsley quotes rings most true for you?
Moments after the Wales game Carlsley was asked about the way the team was set up and what instructions they were given. He said:
He just named the team, and didn’t really go through any roles to be honest.
Afterwards, it was claimed the quote was taken out of context and Carsley said:
Everyone knew their roles in the team. He’s a good manager to play for, we’re well prepared and we’re enjoying it.
Now, let’s not forget that Premiership player Carsley was completely ignored by Staunton so he could play the likes of Jonathan Douglas (bottom of the Championship with Leeds). It was only after a campaign by the Irish media that the Everton player was brought back into the squad.
Reports of training sessions being amateurish and old fashioned have abounded and clearly this Ireland team is not one that plays good football or looks like they’re capable of it. They may not be the best bunch of players Ireland has ever had but with a decent manager they might not look as if they’re making it up as they go along.
The second quote is obviously designed to calm the waters ahead of Wednesday’s game with Slovakia but it’s obvious to anyone with half a nose for the game that Staunton is miles out of his depth. Perhaps the best thing for Ireland, in the long term, would be a loss at Croke Park as it would precipitate a change of management and this time the FAI would have to appoint somebody who did little more than put out the cones at Walsall.