Internet Commentator

Root-less cosmopolitan

Gerry's not excited by the World cup and muses on who to root for seeing as Ireland won't be there. A lot of Irish people have adopted Poland, given the large amount of Poles here, many of whom will obviously be taking an interest in their team's progress. My default and partisan position at the moment is to root for Manchester United players, so I will be following Portugal (Cristiano Ronaldo), Holland (Edwin Van Der Sar at least*), Serbia&Montenegro (Nemanja Vidic), France (Mikael Silvestre, Louis Saha at least**), England (Gary Neville, Rio Ferdinand at least***), South Korea (Ji-Sung Park) and of course Argentina (Gabriel Heinze at least****). However, I like to think that I might find myself rooting for the team which plays the most appealing football - much as I did with the Czech Republic in Portugal 2004.

Incidentally, unlike Gerry, I don't consider Brazil a shoo-in for the title. For one, the last time a South American (or any non-European) team won the World Cup in Europe was Brazil in Sweden 1958. More relevantly, and tieing in with the post below, there are quite a few ageing, complacent members of the Brazil first team who justify their place on historical record, rather than current performance.

* - It seems unlikely Ruud Van Nistelrooy will remain much longer a United player.
** - We might yet sign Franck "Scarface" Ribéry.
*** - I'm still hoping Rooney rests his metatarsul at home.
**** - It would be great to see Javier Mascherano line up alongside Juan Roman Riquelmé at Old Trafford next season.

Back to the future

I note that former Real Madrid president Lorenzo Sanz has promised to reinstate Vicente Del Bosque as manager should his bid to be restored succeed. I'm not sure that the "old gang" are necessarily going to bring back the glory days, but it is surely a step in the right direction - that is: backwards - to recognise that Del Bosque's sacking was the point at which Real Madrid, the football team went off the rails. This seemingly obvious fact has been obfuscated by the fact that Real Madrid the marketing juggernaut has stayed resolutely on the rails. Nonetheless, footballing success is a necessary condition for retaining marketing prominence and it's been three barren years for los galacticos now. Another trophyless season and the "Bernabow" can kiss goodbye to the best part of that marketing revenue which will instead surely head to their deadly rivals from Catalonia.

In sacking Del Bosque, Fiorentina Perez seemed to have convinced himself that the manager, despite winning two league titles and two Champions' league trophies, didn't really do all that much but simply "let the players play". If this was the case,he might as well hire a similarly supine coach but one who was more presentable at press conferences. Enter Carlos Quieroz whose matinee-idol gnashers put Vicente's broken-piano-keys teeth to shame. Del Bosque may have been too modest and understated but Perez was deluded if he thought that a bunch of spoilt egotistical millionaires (albeit considerably less spoilt, egotistical or millionairish than the current bunch) could get it together to play as a team never mind get out of tricky fixtures, and win so many trophies on their own. In fact, the last thing you want any player to think is that he is a fixture in the team and never need justify his inclusion. Perez' policy seemed designed to maintain an entire eleven of complacent perfomers. In that sense it succeeded.

Old Old Trafford

Perusing Google maps yesterday, I was a little disappointed to discover, by zooming in on the Theatre of Dreams, that this satellite image is at least 4 years old. Note the UMBRO signage on the Stretford End seating:

in lieu of the Nike swoosh that's been there since 2002:

(Picture taken before the Charlton game three weeks ago)

Força Barça!

Hugh sets out his prediction for tonight's Champions League final:

I would like to see Barcelona win tonight's match, mainly because I think Ronaldinho is the most exciting player I've seen play live on telly.

However, I'm not allowing this to influence my prediction:

3-1 to Barcelona
Scorers for Barcelona: Eto'o (2), Deco.
Scorer for Arsenal: Ljungberg.

Like Hugh, I want Barcelona to win, albeit for a slightly different reason and I'm not going to let this influence my prediction either which is for Arsenal to nick it 1-0, goal probably by Henry. I know it will be a travesty but this is the outcome I fear my Arsenal-supporting brother (at the match tonight) will witness. Both finalists are reknowned for their attacking flair, however each has reached the final courtesy of a miserly defence, conceding a solitary goal from open play between them and that was scored against the Catalans. So, I'm expecting a more cagey game than is widely anticipated. That said, I still hope that Barcelona will confound my pessimistic prediction and vanquish the ex-invincibles in style - Força Barça!

Desperate, How Sven's

Unlike most of my compatriots I don't bear the England fooball team any animosity. Indeed I don't have to suffer the cognitive dissonance chosen by my fellow Irish United fans (along with their Liverpool and Chelsea counterparts) who find themselves cheering a Rooney miss or a Neville blunder so long as they are wearing the wrong colour shirt. Further, I don't buy in the slightest the standard Irish complaint that the English media would be insufferable in the event of any triumph. My response to which is to wonder if the person has ever experienced the cringing jingoism which attends RTE's coverage of any remotely hopeful campaign by the Ireland football team.

However, I cannot stand Sven Goran Eriksson who seems to typify for me the sort of ass-covering, underperforming bureaucrat who effortly rises through a large organisation by dint of presenteeism and presentation rather than talent. The sort of person who can either blame his failure on others or can plausibly explain away his mediocre performance, recasting it as the best that could reasonably have been achieved.

Given Eriksson's innate conservativism - sticking with players with whom he is familiar, no matter their current form or even fitness - it is surely a mark of desperation and not an uncharacteristic "gamble" (as Eriksson has tried to present it) that has seen him adopt Arsene Wenger's (surely tongue-in-cheek) suggestion this week to take Arsenal's Theo Walcott to the world cup. Wenger himself has deemed Walcott insufficiently prepared to meet the likes of Sunderland and Portsmouth. On what grounds can Eriksson be confident that the teenage striker is ready to face Sweden and Paraguay?

It is one of only a few bizarre selections. Much has been made of Aaron Lennon's inclusion, however the young winger has earned his place with a series of impressive performances for Spurs. This is more than can be said for a pair of defenders from Lennon's North London rivals. Ashley Cole has barely kicked a ball all season and his teammate Sol Campbell still struggles with physical and mental fitness. Perhaps I betray my bias here but surely Wes Brown would be a no-brainer? He has been very solid at the back for United this season and would provide useful cover for Ferdinand or Terry. He can also play at right back. But surely even worse than the selection of the Arsenal trio is that of Owen Hargreaves. This mediocre but "versatile" player - Sven's traditional go-to guy to pad out the squad - and not a self-styled "gamble" surely typifies the bland, familiar, safety-first nature of the Swede's regime as England manager.

Vieira back to Highbury

Well, for the Champions League quarter final anyway as his old club draw his new club. Lyon host AC Milan, Inter or Ajax will play Villarreal and Barcelona traverse the Iberian peninsula to play Benfica.

An overdue correction

Finally the travesty represented by Liverpool gaining and then being permitted to defend the Champions' League trophy has ended. This formerly prestigious trophy, once eagerly prized and won by teams such as Real Madrid, AC Milan, Bayern Munich and Manchester United has been degraded in recent years culminating in the nauseating spectacle in Istanbul last year:

Liverpool have just completed the worst ever defense of the Champions' League trophy and have hardly vindicated the throng which succeeded in shoehorning such unworthy champions into this years competition. By the rules which hitherto obtained, Liverpool, who finished in fifth place behind Everton, oughtn't have been allowed to compete and it's now clear that the rules were right and the populist bandwagon was wrong.

If this tawdry bagatelle is to acquire any of the lustre it used to enjoy it must be headed to Catalonia come May. Juventus have hardly impressed, progressing at the expense of Werder Bremen thanks to a gaffe from the German side's keeper and while AC Milan fairly convincingly beat Bayern, I still haven't forgiven them for their craven part in that charade last May.

The "Berna-bow"

Seems I'm not the only one annoyed about this. It's got Phil Ball's goat too.

Their lethargic and bland display was only marginally less annoying than the irritating tendency of all English commentators to pronounce Real Madrid's ground 'Berna-bow'. Quite how they have managed to invent this diphthong from the ending 'eu' is anyone's guess, but the sound has been spreading like wildfire through the British media for the last few years, and appears to be there to stay.

I'm guessing it's because whoever started this one off saw an imaginary 'a' between the e and u and, momentarily forgetting that French and Spanish are different languages, pronounced it the way they imagined it to be said in French.

Outclassed

On a 'pitch' that looked more rutted field, however they might gripe about "Patatas" Del Horno's red card, Chelsea were fortunate to go down only 2-1. A team which appears invincible in their own league were made to look very ordinary by the best team in Europe. Barcelona played with technique and confidence on the ball unlike anything seen in the premiership. In Ronaldinho and Messi, they had footballers who could take the ball forward in a narrow foot-wide strip along the touchline, or emerge from a crowd of three surrounding Chelsea players with the ball. But in Eto'o, Deco, Marquez, Motta and pretty much everyone else in hi-vis yellow on the pitch, they had players who could pass, or take the ball forward and beat opposing players. There were few negative, safety first sideways and backwards passes from the Catalans who seemed to just toy with the home team whom they could tear apart at any moment. It will be a travesty if they fail to win this trophy and it will further degrade a competition which has seen such unworthy 'champions' in the last two seasons.

Best fans in the world

Looks like the scum are living up to their name. Plenty of Liverpool fans were upset but the Times' Joe Lovejoy, while other media sources tried to claim that the scousers applauded Alan Smith off the pitch, told it like it was by relating the actual chants from the home fans, gloating at his sickening leg injury. Then there were reports of scousers were flinging excrement at the United fans. If that wasn't bad enough, some more fans, sinking to new depths even for the scum, tried to overturn the ambulance taking Smith to hospital.

You'd almost think Benfica's Tuesday night win at Anfield was karmic retribution.