WHY SAY ANYTHING?

The domestic season isn’t over yet for Chelsea or Manchester United. The European season isn’t over yet for Real Madrid and Liverpool. So some fans still have celebrations in waiting and some have disappointment around the corner.

Both of the aforementioned seasons are over for Arsenal and they will hope for better next time out with their new manager who, hopefully for them, will have more of a clue about winning in Europe than Stubborn Old Man appeared to, despite his twenty-odd attempts!

FA Cup…..

In the FA Cup final, Chelsea will play at “home” in London against Manchester United. This further example of London bias should hold no fears for the Manchester club as, in the semi-final, the cretins who pass themselves off as the FA, decided that their game against Tottenham Hotspur should be played at the temporary home of Tottenham Hotspur, a very fair decision indeed!

United won that one and everybody who isn’t a Chelsea supporter will be hoping they can win this one, not least to cheer up Sir Alex Ferguson who, by that time will be sat up watching the game on a large screen TV somewhere, playing with his phone whilst simultaneously nodding off at the excitement of it all!

Chelsea, of course, still have a bit of work to do in the Premier League in as much as they need to win their remaining games and hope that Liverpool and Tottenham don’t win theirs, a scenario which would see them sneak into third place and a spot in the Champion’s League next season. It’s a bit of a long shot as the two teams above them have, what would appear to be, eminently winnable games left, but a long shot is better than no shot at all.

Champion’s League…..

The Champion’s League final features Liverpool for the second time in the last thirteen years. No mean feat when considering that the person who engraves the winner’s name on the Premier League trophy hasn’t had to write “Liverpool” in all of it’s 26 year history!

Can they beat Real Madrid? Yes, they can! Will they beat Real Madrid? No they won’t!

The reasoning behind our prediction is that Real Madrid are experts in wining trophies in general and this one in particular. Jürgen Klopp’s Liverpool have appeared in two cup finals since he became manager and they have lost them both, (he also appeared in four cup finals whilst in charge of Borussia Dortmund and lost three of them!)

We see no reason, unfortunately, for this trend to be bucked at any time in the near future.

World Cup…..

The other big final on the horizon is that quadrennial international injury window called the World Cup.

Having read that Brazil are now among the hot favourites to win it, our mind was cast back to that 7-1 defeat to Germany in the previous tournament in Brazil. How can they have improved that much in just four years? England haven’t improved at all in 52 years yet Brazil go from being hammered at home, admittedly by a decent team, to one of the favourites for the trophy this time around! Gareth Southgate take note. Keep an eye on Brazil as they obviously know what they are doing!

The real favourites will win the competition even though, as is always the case, the “experts” are giving us all sorts of reasons for other countries winning it. Germany just have the right mentality, the right players and, most of all, the right manager for this type of mini-league/knockout football.

So come the end of July Germany will be the new World Champions as well as the old World Champions, Manchester United will be FA Cup holders and Real Madrid will have won the Champion’s League.

You read it here first!

And finally…..

Among the favourites, apparently, to replace Arséne Wenger at Arsenal are Max Allegri and Luis Enriquez. Both of these are subscribers to the “Jose Mourinho style of football” and are rumoured to have his poster on their wall at home.

This means there won’t be as much of the exciting football of Wenger’s earlier years but, on the positive side, there won’t be as much of the losing football seen during his latter years.

So at least Arsenal fans would be getting a decent manager from day one, unlike United’s supporters who had to wait for three years and some of them are still moaning!

Here’s the list of starters according to the London Evening Standard:

Manager Odds

Massimiliano Allegri
11/5
Luis Enrique
11/2
Zeljko Buvac
6/1
Carlo Ancelotti
6/1
Eddie Howe
9/1
Brendan Rodgers
11/1
Mikel Arteta
12/1
Joachim Low
16/1
Gary Megson
16/1
Leonardo Jardim
22/1
Thierry Henry
25/1
Patrick Vieira
25/1
Julian Nagelsmann
25/1
Paulo Fonseca
33/1

It’s good to see that there is more chance of Gary Megson becoming the next Arsenal manager than Patrick Vieira!