Football News

Posts Tagged ‘Premier League’

Today we are going to honor one of the best goalkeepers in the Premier League. ¿Do you know who we are talking about? We refer to Petr Chec, the Chelsea´s goalkeeper the team that recently won the Champions League.

Chec has won the best Champions League Goalkeeper Award on three occasions. He has also won the Golden Gloves of Premier League Award and he has been recognized as the Best Goalkeeper in the World by the International Federation of Football History and Statistics.

In addition to that, Chec is a reference for his country, where he has won seven times the Czech Republic´s Golden Ball. With this kind of track records, it is no wonder everybody considers him the strongest link of his National Team.

His level of excellence does not stop hear. His professionalism gets to the point of studying all penalty shots from the Bayern´s players before the final of Champions League. Will he do the same for his National Team? It’s better not to underestimate him and see what happens.

Chief Executive League Manager´s Association Richard Bevan says that Chelsea´s owner decision to sack Andre Villas-Boas is an embarrassment to the Premier League.

In nine years Chelsea´s owner Roman Abramovich has hired, and fired, eight managers, with Villas-Boas being the last of the saga.

According to Bevan “What´s for sure is the club, despite unlimited wealth, haven´t yet worked out how to build a successful football club”

On the other hand, Villas-Boas claims that he was not given enough time to connect with the players and to take his plan into the next level.

And now the question is… who will replace the Portuguese?

Roberti Di Matteo second in command up until now will be in charge of the team; at least until the end of the season, but the speculation dance has already begun. The two names that sound the most are right now the top rated managers in the world, playing in the same League: Real Madrid´s Mourinho and FC Barcelona´s Pep Guardiola. The first one has already made clear that he wants to return to the Premier, and Guardiola has not renew his contract with FC Barcelona yet, in fact, is taking him longer than ever to decide over his future in the club.

Who, at the end, will have the courage to become the ninth manager in nine years in a team full of aging players, owned by a capricious multimillionaire difficult to please?

Allegations of racism in the Premier League are sadly becoming news. One of the most shocking incidents involves Liverpool´s Luis Suárez, who allegedly racially abused Manchester United´s Patrice Evra in a match that took place October 15th in Anfield.

If you are not familiar with what happened, it appears that Suárez kicked Evra, and when Evra asked why he had been so aggressive, Suárez reportedly said that “because you are black”. But the accusations do not stop here. The English Football Association report indicates that Suárez is alleged to have said “black” to Evra seven times in two minutes.

This not the only case of this nature taking place in the Premier league. Also in October, Chelsea´s John Terry reportedly used a racial slur against Queens Park Rangers Anton Ferdinand, although Terry denies it.

The English Football Association has already taken actions against both players, Terry and Suárez. Suárez has been banned for eight games; Liverpool has until January 13 to appeal if the club decides to do so. Terry faces a criminal charge, and his case will be heard at a London magistrate´s court in February.

But whatever the outcome, we can only conclude that it is a real shame that we have to continue talking about this issue, and now involving such great players from such emblematic teams. We hope that racism disappears, not only because of the popularity of the people involved in these incidents, or because the Olympics are getting closer, but because it is the right thing to do, and because London has to show the world that it is a city that embraces its multicultural component with maturity.

The most anticipated football game of the weekend, El Clasico, finished leaving behind any doubts that FC Barcelona continues to be the best team in the world, beating Real Madrid (1-3) at their own home.

The match started, surprisingly enough, with one of the fastest goals in El Clasico history. Víctor Valdés sent a pass into midfield that ended up in Benzema´s feet, scoring just 22 seconds from the start.

But Barça, far from going down, started to play the way they know, being always truthful to their own style. Slowly but surely they started dominating midfield and that´s how in the 30th minute, Alexis scored the equalizer after a great assist from Messi. Another mistake, this time on Madrid´s side, ended up with Marcelo scoring an own goal in the 53th minute. And then, in the 66th minute, a great team play finished up with a diving header by Cesc Fàbregas.

It was an easy win on Barcelona´s side, and a complete shock for Madrid. And now Barcelona is in Japan, ready to win the Club World Cup, but first would have to beat Al Sadd, the Asian Champions on Thursday´s semi-final in Yokohama.

England´s Clasico

Manchester City visits Stamford Bridge. The City are the Premier League leader, and after being kicked off the Champions, they will focus on maintaining their flawless league record. The Blues are 10 points behind and currently on fifth place, but, they did what the City couldn´t, and are still up and running in the European Realm.