Captain Rooney Feeling The Pressure

Posted: November 29, 2015 in England, Football, Manchester United, Opinion, Premier League
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(Don’t shoot me! I admit it, I am the weakest link! I promise to try and improve, just don’t drop me!)

At thirty years of age, Wayne Rooney’s best days are a considerable way behind him.

At present he keeps being selected by Manchester United manager Louis van Gaal because he, rather foolishly, made him captain. Not only is Rooney a long way off being captain material, he is currently a long way off even being first team material.

Almost as soon as van Gaal decided Rooney was his captain at United, Mr Roy followed suit with England.

Now I don’t know what these two see in him on the training ground, but I do know what I see on the pitch.

Over the years Manchester United have had some great captains. The ones that stand out are the likes of Roy Keane and Bryan Robson, both of whom also captained their countries. Neither of them were shrinking violets and could be very vocal both on and off the field. Read the rest of this entry »

Manchester United Need Pep

Posted: November 29, 2015 in Football, Managers, Manchester City, Manchester United, Opinion, Premier League
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Pep Guardiola during Barcelona's elimination from the Champions League by Chelsea

(Pep on hearing the news that Louis Van Gaal had been appointed Manchester United manager!)

So if reports are to be believed Pep Guardiola would rather move to England as manager of Manchester United than Manchester City. Understandable, really.

Without wishing to offend any City fans, United are the size of club that Guardiola has become accustomed to managing. After Barcelona and Bayern, City would be a bit of a downwards step at this stage in their evolution.

In fairness though, City are the kind of challenge which should appeal to many managers. Almost limitless funds with the opportunity to create history at a club who crave the attention afforded to the likes of United, Real Madrid, Barcelona and Bayern Munich.

Bear in mind also that Pellegrini, like van Gaal, has a contract running until 2017, although I doubt City would suffer from any pangs of loyalty if Guardiola gave them the slightest indication that his immediate future lay at the Etihad. Read the rest of this entry »

City Win, United Don’t

Posted: November 28, 2015 in Football, Manchester City, Manchester United, Opinion, Premier League
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Manchester City were looking to avoid losing their third game in a row. With Sir Joe Aguero fit enough to start in a lesser game again and David Silva deemed benchworthy, the game not being important enough for him to start, Wilfried Bony was chosen to sit next to Silva and keep him amused with tales of what it is like to be an expensive substitute at the richest club in the world.

The result was only ever in doubt for about fifteen minutes in the second half when Southampton scored to make it 2-1 to City and there were a few nerves in the crowd. No worries though, normal service was resumed shortly afterwards when Kolarov, who spends nearly as much time in the opposition half as Aguero, scored with a good finish from a very good move.

Prior to all this, Kevin De Bruyne had scored a tap in and Delph had managed a deflected shot to register his first for the club. Read the rest of this entry »

Manchester United’s Football Is Puftile

Posted: November 28, 2015 in Football, Louis van Gaal, Managers, Manchester United, Opinion
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Louis van Gaal is known as the “Iron Tulip” by some people. Quite what he is known as by others is probably unprintable.

For all the scholars of chemistry out there, as you will know, the chemical symbol for iron is FE. So, if we take the letters from tulip, add fe and scramble them around a little, we come up with the word puftile. At least, it should be a word but it probably isn’t. It is probably meaningless. If it is meaningless then I claim invention of the word and deem it to mean any kind of football which is, well……er……meaningless.

Using that brilliant example of logic as a starting point, a word which has no meaning is like Manchester United’s football, puftile. (Notice how this word bears an uncanny resemblance to futile).

Under van Gaal United have developed a possession game which usually terminates when they lose possession. This they do regularly because there are only so many times you can go sideways or backwards before the pitch ends. At this point the ball will either go out of play, or be rashly passed to an opponent. On the rare occasions that United go forward it is usually to find there is only one player in the opposition penalty area competing with four or five defenders. Read the rest of this entry »

How Unfair Is The Premier League?

Posted: November 27, 2015 in Football, Opinion, Premier League
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When Manchester United take to the field against Leicester City on Saturday evening, one of their title rivals will already have played and another one won’t.

Assuming, possibly wrongly, that Leicester aren’t going to stay the course then, when they kick off against United at 5:30pm on Saturday, Manchester City will have already played and therefore, obviously, the result from their game will be known.

By the time Arsenal kick off on Sunday in their game against Norwich, they will be aware of the results of both Manchester teams. Is this unfair, or does it not make any difference?

Let’s assume that both Manchester clubs lose. I know that is unlikely but it could happen. Would this then determine the tactics Arsene Wenger employs against Norwich? If he knows he can gain three points on the other two, then surely he will go for the win. If, however, the two Manchester clubs draw, then Wenger is likely to play with the intention of not losing as the last thing he would want to do is drop points when his rivals only picked up one each. If they both win then he has to go for the win. Read the rest of this entry »

Manchester United According To Paul Scholes

Posted: November 27, 2015 in Football, Manchester United, Opinion, Premier League
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After a very successful playing career spanning twenty years with Manchester United, during which time Paul Scholes said, ‘good morning’ in the morning and, ‘goodbye’ at the end of the day, and very little else, he has now decided that he has more to say.

The shy, ginger haired one who shunned interviews stating that he was a very private person who just wanted to be with his family, is now one of the most public people in football.

He appears on BT Sport regularly, he appears on ITV when they have anything to show. He comments on the Premier League, the Champions League and England internationals. In fact, for someone who spent twenty years avoiding the TV, he is now like a Cistercian monk released from his vow of silence and is determined to take advantage of the platform he denied himself for all those years. Read the rest of this entry »

MLS: Gerrard And Lampard Need To Settle Down For A While

Posted: November 26, 2015 in Football, MLS, Opinion, USA
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The MLS season is over for Frank Lampard and Steven Gerrard. Their respective clubs, New York City and LA Galaxy failed to make the play-offs meaning an early holiday could be enjoyed by our intrepid adventurers.

So, what do they both do? Hightail it back to England to appear on Sky TV and BT Sport, that’s what they do.

Full of remorse for not being able to stay in the US of A for longer, but there was no need of course, their season was over.

What drivel! If, as they say, they are not doing the Columbus run for the money, then why are they doing it? Why do they need to appear more on British television now than they did when they were playing? Why do millionaires always want more?

Firstly, they could both have stayed in England. They would have made less money but, judging by how quickly they both scuttled back home, they would have been happier. Read the rest of this entry »

Manchester’s United & City Show How Not To Do It

Posted: November 25, 2015 in Champions League, European Football, Football, Manchester City, Manchester United, Opinion
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Manchester City had already qualified for the knockout stage of the Champion’s League by the time they arrived in Turin to play Juventus.

This had been achieved by their fine away form in beating both Borussia Moenchengladbach and Sevilla and was in no way thanks to their patchy home form where they had already lost to tonight’s opponent. Unfortunately, their patchy home form became their patchy away form and they lost 1-0 at the Juventus stadium.

Manchester United knew, when they arrived at the Lowry hotel in Salford, that beating PSV Eindhoven tonight would mean that they would qualify for the next round as well.

Their passage had been based on reasonable home form where they have already beaten CSKA Moscow and Wolfsburg, not their patchy away form where they had only collected one point. Unfortunately, their patchy away form became their patchy home form and they drew 0-0 in a boring game at Old Trafford. Read the rest of this entry »

George Best Remembered

Posted: November 25, 2015 in Football, Manchester United
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During the 1960’s I was lucky enough to go to Old Trafford every other week. I say lucky enough but, apart from in 1967 when they won the title, I didn’t see a very successful team but I did see a lot of very entertaining football.

Those were the days of Best, Law and Charlton, the three remembered more than any others for the attacking football United fans still crave to this day. It should be noted though, that United had other internationals in that team. Harry Gregg played for Northern Ireland, Shay Brennan and Tony Dunne were both international full backs. Nobby Stiles, still remembered from England’s world cup winning team and David Sadler was another occasional international. Pat Crerand was a regular for Scotland and even David Herd managed 5 caps

There were other players who didn’t achieve international status because, in those days, the majority of clubs had eleven British players so there was more competition for each of the home countries. Read the rest of this entry »

Arsenal & Chelsea Win

Posted: November 24, 2015 in Arsenal, Champions League, Chelsea, European Football, Football, Opinion
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Before the game against Zagreb, Arsene Wenger was reported as having talked up the Europa League, saying it was a respectable competition which should be taken seriously. This opinion smacks of the pessimist preparing for his team’s imminent participation in a competition Arsenal would surely stand far more chance of winning than the Champion’s League.

Before the game against Maccabi Tel Aviv, Jose Mourinho was talking about finishing in the top four and winning the Champion’s League. This opinion smacks of the optimist who, through nothing more than blind faith and an inordinate amount of confidence in his own ability, expects his team to succeed even after a very poor start to the season. Read the rest of this entry »

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