After defeats in The Champion’s League it will be a welcome return to The Premier League for both Tottenham Hotspur and Manchester City.
Spurs managed to lose a game they should have won over in Italy and City managed to lose a game they were expected to win in Manchester.
The other teams involved in Europe all won and will be hoping to carry that form back into the domestic competition.
Arsenal and Chelsea both won in Big Vase whilst Manchester United and Liverpool won in Big Cup. (more…)
Nice one Gareth! His latest wheeze is that anybody expecting to play for his England team in the future should be playing regularly at their club.
He did leave the statement open to a little interpretation in that if, for example, he wanted to pick a team made up entirely of players from the Championship, then this would not represent a problem.
If he sticks with Premier League players then his team will not be competing at the top, (not that it has done anyway since 1966).
If he puts his new rule into immediate practice then his next team will contain Jordan Pickford, Kyle Walker, Kieran Trippier, Harry Maguire, Dele Alli, Harry Kane and some Vanarama Conference League players. (more…)
Firstly, we have to start this little monologue with the assertion that we think José Mourinho is doing an OK job at Manchester United. It isn’t perfect but we don’t think we could have reasonably expected much more out of the first two seasons in charge.
We were happy with the three trophies in his first season, even if none of them were “A list”. We appreciated that the team would slide down the table somewhat in their quest for Europa League glory so the sixth place finish was acceptable, particularly as the winning of Big Vase meant automatic qualification for The Champion’s League.
The following season saw an improvement in league form and finish but very little, if anything, else. Second place was a decent ending to the season but didn’t mask the fact that United were 19 points behind City. (more…)
Can Chelsea really afford to sell Eden Hazard? Can they afford not to? It’s the age old question of whether the player wants to leave and if he should be kept against his will.
Hazard has recently expressed a desire to play Champion’s League football which, having only missed two seasons during his time at the club, is a little selfish.
Now, with Maurizio Sarri in charge, Manchester United and Arsenal looking nothing more than average and only Tottenham, Liverpool and Manchester City to concern them, Chelsea should be fairly confident of a top four finish this season meaning that he would return to Europe’s top competition next time out. (more…)
When he was first appointed, José Mourinho was not universally accepted as being the “right man for the job” at Old Trafford. Some supporters, bored almost lifeless with the type of football served up by David Moyes and then Louis van Gaal, thought that Mourinho was just more of the same.
The majority, however, just wanted van Gaal out and Mourinho in based on the fact he was a proven winner with every club he had managed and United, having been starved of any serious success, (with van Gaal’s FA Cup win being the only exception), since Sir Alex Ferguson retired, were happy to oblige. (more…)
Anthony “Marmite” Martial is reaching a crossroads in his career at the ripe old age of 22.
He is adored by some fans, hated by others. He is criticised for his demeanour which is, in fact, very similar to that of his manager. He is criticised for his lack of workrate. He is considered by some to be lazy, a player who only wants to be involved in the nicer aspects of a football match.
He didn’t do enough to convince Didier Deschamps that he was worth a place in the French World Cup squad although, in fairness, they did pretty well without him. (more…)
Everybody expected the Russian bubble to burst eventually, even the Russians. The positive aspect of their resounding defeat by Uruguay was that it was inflicted at a stage of the competition whereby they had already qualified for the last 16.
The question now is whether the players and coaching staff are good enough to raise their game when playing another top quality team. They managed it fine against Saudi Arabia and Egypt, both of whom have now exited the competition, then they failed their first real test when meeting Luis Suarez, Edinson Cavani et al.
Having lost that game 3-0 to goals from Suarez, a Denis Cheyshev own goal and Cavani, there are still some positives to be grasped. (more…)
After all the pomp and circumstance, 2018’s ethics World Cup finally got underway when the hosts met Saudi Arabia in the opening game.
The enigma that is Russia, not only as a football team, but as a country, continues to confound the logic of most sane people. How can a land boasting a population of around 145 million and with such a long history of playing football, a country whose population loves the game, unlike the early days in America, be so poor at actually playing it?
They are currently ranked 70th in the world, only three places above Saudi Arabia! On that basis the result of the opening game was really quite a surprise, particularly when taking into account the fact that the hosts had lost their previous seven. So a 5-0 win was a most welcome start for them. (more…)
Poor little Manchester United are considering expanding Old Trafford so that they can increase their rip-off seating potential to more than 80,000 fans because they don’t currently make enough money!
The additional seating would be installed in the Sir Bobby Charlton stand which raises a couple of issues when taking the surroundings into account.
Firstly, there is the fact that there are houses very close to the ground behind this stand and, secondly, there is also a railway line. For any lengthy construction work to take place there is no way the ground could stay open for matches because of the problems this would cause to residents and commuters. (more…)
Following our recent article suggesting four players who would benefit from being sold and the interest it created, we are moved to follow up with another three who should join them on the transfer list.
As José Mourinho reads this, in between scanning the transfer rumours and trying to remember whether he paid his tax in Spain or not, he will no doubt be thinking how much sense it would make to rid his club of the following, if at all possible: (more…)
WHY SAY ANYTHING? 