Chelsea started their five game pre-season tour of Asia and Russia with a 4-0 win over Chinese club Guangzhou Pharmaceutica. The club’s new coach Luiz Felipe Scolari sent a strong team on the field and they dominated the game giving the Chinese no chance. Salomon Kalou, Frank Lampard, Franco Di Santo and Shaun Wright-Phillips scored to secure the team’s victory.
Blackburns Rovers’ goalie Brad Friedel could be moving to Aston Villa if a replacement is found for him. The 37-year-old has expressed his wishes to move to another club and Villa and Manchester City have shown the biggest interest. He joined the Blackburns in 2000 and played 287 matches for the club.
War of words broke out between FIFA and the European Club Association (ECA) about releasing players under 23 for the Beijing Olympic Games. FIFA’s president, Sepp Blatter, said that clubs must release the players, while the ECA issued a statement saying that there was no legal obligation for the clubs to release them. While we wait for the outcome of this, one thing is clear, once again money seems to be ruling over the sport.
The Swiss star Valon Behrami is moving from Serie A club Lazio to English Premier League’s team West Ham United. The English club paid 10 million dollars for 23 year old Switzerland international who was born in then Yugoslavia. Behrami started in 64 matches for Lazio scoring four goals.
Arsenal defender Kolo Toure was taken to the hospital on suspicion of catching malaria during his trip to his native Ivory Coast. He fell ill during Arsenal’s tour of Austria. More tests need to be done, but if it is malaria he could very well miss the beginning of Premier League season.
As was reported yesterday Spanish club Mallorca was for sale and today they reached a preliminary agreement to sell the club to a British investor. Owner of pipe fitting company Fluid Leader Group Plc., Paul Davidson known as “The Plumber” will pay 57 million dollars in exchange for 93.6 percent of the club. Mallorca chairman Vicente Grande and the management will remain in charge of the club.
The Olympic Soccer Tournament starts on August the 6th but we won’t see too many well known stars playing there. Their clubs are refusing to release their stars even though the players have been nominated by their countries and showed desire to go to the Olympics. The Club’s main argument bad timing because it interferes with the beginning of the European Soccer season and the possibilities of losing players to injuries.
A group called Camorra which is branch of the Napoli mafia tried to purchase Seria A club Lazio. Roma’s police arrested 10 people in an operation called “Broken Wings.” Among the people who were detained is Napoli businessman Giuseppe Diana known for his connections to Camorra. Lazio won the Serie A title back in 2000 but has been struggling the last few seasons.
Real Madrid’s captain and Spain’s all-time leading scorer, Raul, is hoping he will return to the national team under new coach Vicente del Bosque. Raul who fell out of favor with former Spain coach Luis Aragones, played his last international match back in September of 2006. Del Bosgue was Raul’s coach in Real Madrid and Raul has this to say about the new Spanish coach. “He’s a person who can bring forward the work of the past years.”
The collapse of real estate markets is worldwide, hitting all walks of life and soccer is one of them. Several clubs in the Spanish Primera Liga with primary investors coming from the construction business are debt ridden and unable to pay their players. Just recently Real Mallorca’s president Vicenc Grande had to sell his controlling interest, after his company Grupo Drac filed for bankruptcy. Because some clubs decided to go into administration, most likely players won’t get paid.
North American Superliga which is made out of four teams from the MLS and four from the Mexico’s Primera Division is set to play the semifinals on July 29 and 30. Defending MLS champ Houston Dynamo meets CF Pachuca in Houston on July 29. New England Revolution will face Atlante of Mexico in Foxboro stadium on July 30. The SuperLiga Final will be played on August 5. Last year’s winner was CF Pachuca who defeated Los Angeles Galaxy on penalty kicks at Carson, Calif.
At the Beach Soccer World Cup tournament, Argentina who already qualified for the quarter-finals beat Cameroon Tuesday by a score of 3-0. Brazil beat Mexico 7-1 and have gone unbeaten in their last 70 matches. In other two matches, Russia outplayed United Arab Emirates 5-0 and Spain trashed Japan 6-1. The defending champions Brazil, Spain and Russia completed the line-up for the quarter-finals joining France, Portugal, Uruguay and Italy. The tournament is being held in Marseille, France and the final will be played on July 27th.
The United States National team player, Freddy Edu is going to Ligue 1 Club Monaco on a 1 year loan. Edu chose that move after Benfica’s coach Quique Flores said Edu doesn’t have spot guarantee on the first team roster. Edu made sporadic appearances for the club last season, scoring five goals.
2007 Uzbek league runners-up FC Kuruvchi made a serious offer to sign Barcelona’s star Samuel Eto’o. The signing will be short, for three or six months to help this club from Tashkent to win the domestic league and the Asian Champions League. A spokesman for the club said that they should know by Wednesday if Eto’o accepts their offer.
A halftime brawl at a Columbus Crew match with West Ham United on Sunday gave U.S. fans a little taste of the European soccer environment. Fans of both clubs scuffled and threw punches during what was billed as a warm-up match for Thursday’s MLS All star game. West Ham United beat Columbus Crew 3-1.
U.S. soccer star Abby Wambach had her first physical therapy Monday, after surgery last Thursday to have a titanium rod inserted in her lower left leg. Wambach broke her leg during a match against Brazil last Wednesday and is going to miss the Olympics, but hopes to return for the debut of the new Women’s Professional Soccer league in the spring.
Bayern Munich coach Jurgen Klinsmann said that striker Lukas Podolski is not for sale. The 23-year-old has been linked with a move back to his former club Cologne. But Podolski decided to stay with Bayern and had this to say “I am concentrating now fully on the season. I am looking forward to it.”
The Russian national team sensation at the Euro 2008, Andrei Arshavin may be heading to the English Premier League to join Tottenham. Dimitar Berbatov and Robbie Keane wish to leave the club and Arshavin would fill the void. His club, Zenit St Petersburg, has been contacted but Totenham said that Zenit’s asking price of 42.8 million dollars is too high a price for the English club.
San Jose played at home for the first time in two months, but couldn’t take advantage of it. Ryan Johnson scored the first goal in the match the 62nd minute by a header. But the Earthquakes couldn’t hold onto the lead, when eight minutes later the Rapids’ Conor Casey scored the equalizer in the 70th minute. The prospect of not winning again was too much for the Earthquakes coach Frank Yallop, who was given a red card for verbally abusing the referee and had to leave the field.
Chicago Fire vs Toronto FC 2-1
Chicago Fire beat Toronto FC and ended a five game win-less streak. Chicago opened the score in the fourth minute, but Toronto’s Abdus Ibrahim equalized in the 63rd minute. When it looked like the game would end in a draw, Chicago’s John Torrington slipped one under Toronto’s goalie, Sutton, in the 92nd minute giving Chicago that much sought after win.
Real Salt Lake vs Columbus Crew 2-0
Real Salt Lake won the match against Columbus Crew propelling them to the top of the Western Conference standings. Scoring began early when Argentine midfielder Javier Morales scored in the fourth minute. Robbie Findley’s goal into an empty net in the 78th minute secured the victory for Salt Lake.
Kansas City Wizards vs New York Red Bulls 2-1
The Wizards’ Jimmy Conrad opened the score for the Wizards in the 11th minute and his teammate Davy Arnaud added another in the 47th minute. The Bulls’ only response was a power-shot from Juan Pablo Angel from 10 yards out.
Chivas USA vs LA Galaxy 1-1
No winner in the Super Classico as they met for the second time this season. Chivas had a better opening and scored the first goal by Ante Razov in the 15th minute. LA Galaxy shined brighter in the second half which resulted in their goal by Edson Buddle, who put one in between the legs of Chivas’ goalie Brad Guzan, leveling the game in the72nd minute.
Unemployed and injured, Ronaldo will most likely be signing with Brazilian Team, Flamengo. According to Flamengo’s president, Marcio Braga, Ronaldo’s agent has agreed on a signing papers, after Ronaldo has finished his recuperation, and becomes fit again. It is the wishes of Ronaldo to finish up his career with his beloved team, Flamengo, and it looks like it will come to be.
The MLS Western Conference has a new leader. Real Salt Lake beat Columbus Crew by a score of 2-0, propelling them to the top of the Western Conference standings for the first time in the franchise’s history. Real Salt Lake opened the scoring in the fourth minute, from a kick by Javier Morales. Robby Findley added a second goal in the seventy eight minute on a pass from Kenny Deuchar. Salt Lake remaines unbeaten against the top four Eastern Conference Teams.
According to the Spanish media, the great Johan Cruyff is about to become Barcelona’s new sporting director. Barcelona’s president Joan Laporta is appointing Cryuff as a way to get the public’s approval of the job he has been doing. He is up for review in September and could be ousted if the support is not there. Johan Cryuff, also know as “The Savior” is wildly popular with local fans, from his days as player and coach of Barcelona.
Italian Serie A club AC Milan, is expected to finalize Ronaldino’s move from Barcelona to AC Milan next week. Experts are questioning AC Milan’s acquisition of Ronaldino in the face of his lack of playtime last season, due to his “so-called” injuries. Ronaldino played few games last season due to injuries that some felt were more mental than physical, putting into question his motivation and passion for the game.
“L’Enfant Terrible” of Argentine soccer, Diego Maradona, will become a grandfather in the latter part of this year. Maradona’s daughter Giannina Dinorah, and Argentine National player, Sergio Aguero are expecting a child. Atletico Madrid’s president, Enrique Cerezo said that if it is a boy, he will sign him on from the day he is born.
During an interview for Spanish newspaper Marca, David Beckham said that the three years playing with Zinedine Zidane was like a dream for him. Beckham also said “… for me he is the best player of all time.” Beckham played with Zinedine Zidane in Real Madrid from 2003 to 2006.
Winning the Euro 2008 propelled Spain to become the #1 ranking country in the world for the first time ever on FIFA rankings. Since the ranking started back in 1993, Spain is only the fifth country to reach the top spot in FIFA’s ranking. The others were Argentina, Brazil, Germany and Italy.
Russia made the biggest jump since the last rankings, up thirteen spots from #11 to #24. Croatia is up 8 spots, they went from the 15th spot to #7.
Greece and Honduras shared the biggest drops from within the top 50. Greece dropped ten spots down to #18 and Honduras dropped eleven spots down to #48.
The highest placed African team is Cameroon showing at #13, and Nigeria showed the biggest promise among the African Nations jumping eight points to #26.
Iran also showed an impressive jump in rankings up eleven spots, going from #48 to #37.
While the only top twenty team from CONCACAF is Mexico at #19, the United States continued its free fall, dropping nine spots to #30.
The South American powerhouses, Brazil and Argentina are both still in the top twenty but both lost ground in the rankings. Brazil dropped 2 spots from #2 to #4, and Argentina made an even bigger drop, going from the #1 spot to #6.
44 years of drought came to an end on Sunday night for Spain after they beat Germany 1-0 in the EURO 2008 final. Spain won their last major tournament title 44 years ago, beating the Soviet Union.
On Sunday, two different styles met. German efficiency against playful Spaniards. Both teams started rather cautiously, but the Germans were dominating the first fifteen minutes of the match. Then Spain slowly opened up their game and took over.
With David Villa being out with an injury, all eyes and hopes were on Fernando Torres and he delivered. In the 29th minute he caught a pass from Xavi, outran Lahm and flipped the ball over Lehmann into the net. Spain took a 1-0 lead and never looked back.
The second half saw Germany’s coach Joachim Loew making a couple of player changes. Lahm was replaced with Jansen, Kevin Kuranyi came for Hitzlspenger and finally Gomez for Klose. Despite all of these changes Spain was firmly in control of the match and created a couple of good scoring chances.
Germany continued to struggle till the end and so did their captain Ballack. He had a few good moments but just like the oldest man on the field, goalie Lehmann, he didn’t live up to his expectations.
Spain won their second European championship, Xavi Hernandez was named the best player of the tournament and David Villa is the EURO 2008 top scorer with four goals.
Spain played creative soccer, winning all of their matches, showing that you can play an attractive game and go all the way to the top.
Line up
Spain: Iker Casillas, Sergio Ramos, Carles Puyol, Carlos Marchena, Joan Capdevila, Xavi Hernandez, David Silva (Santi Cazorla, 66), Marcos Senna, Andres Iniesta, Cesc Fabregas (Xabi Alonso, 63), Fernando Torres (Dani Guiza, 78)
Germany: Jens Lehmann, Christoph Metzelder, Per Mertesacker, Philipp Lahm (Marcell Jansen, 46), Arne Friedrich, Bastian Schweinsteiger, Thomas Hitzlsperger (Kevin Kuranyi, 58), Torsten Frings, Michael Ballack, Lukas Podolski, Miroslav Klose (Mario Gomez, 79)
The Italian Soccer Federation fired national team coach Roberto Donadoni and replaced him with Marcello Lipi. The 60 year old Lipi lead Italy to the 2006 World Cup triumph. “I’m very ,very happy and very motivated,” said Lipi.
Arsenal’s striker Emmanuel Adebayor denied rumors about him moving to Barcelona. He insist on staying with Arsenal where he has three more years left on his contract. AC Milan has also shown interest in signing the 24 year old player from Togo.
The captain of the US national team, Carlos Bocanegro is going to French Ligue1. He signed with Rennes who finished sixth in the French Championship last season. Bocanegro spent the past five years playing for Fulham in the English Premier League.
Spain will have to do without their top scorer David Villa on Sunday’s final against Germany. Villa injured a leg muscle during the match with Russia on Thursday. He currently leads the EURO 2008 goal scoring competition with four goals.
The Texas derby saw FC Dallas draw 1-1 with Dynamo Houston for the third time this season. Houston’s Brian Ching scored in the 21st minute and Kenny Cooper tied the match on 1-1 in the 62nd minute. Houston is presently third in the Western Conference, while Dallas occupies the fifth spot.
The Czech Soccer Federation apologized to French coach Gerard Houllier for naming him as one of the candidates to coach the Czech national team. Apparently a fake e-mail was sent to the head of the federation saying Houllier was interested in the job. Czechs are currently in the process of replacing retired Karel Bruckner.
…and then there were two. Tonight the Russian team was no match for Spain who outplayed them and reached the finals for the first time in 24 years. Russia didn’t duplicate their performance against Holland. They had only a handful of chances in the first half. The second half belonged to Spain who opened the score in the 50th minute from a volley by Xavi.
“The Super Sub” Daniel Guiza who replaced struggling Torres, beat the offside trap to make it 2-0 in the 73rd minute. Ten minutes later another substitute, Fabregas, passed the ball to Silva who made it 3-0 on final.
The only blemish on Spain’s victory is the injury of their top scorer David Silva who may be out for Sunday’s final against Germany.
The Russian team definitely deserves accolades for reaching the semifinals. Gus Hidink did a good job with a team, whom only few people were giving a chance to get this far. Especially after they lost to Spain in the opening match of their Group D by a score of 4-1.
Spain will battle the Germans hoping to end the 40 year drought without a major tournament trophy.
Line up
Russia: Igor Akinfeyev, Alexander Anyukov, Sergei Ignashevich, Vasily Berezutsky, Yuri Zhirkov, Sergei Semak, Konstantin Zyryanov, Igor Semshov (Diniyar Belyaletdinov, 56), Ivan Sayenko, Andrei Arshavin, Roman Pavlyuchenko
Spain: Iker Casillas, Sergio Ramos, Carles Puyol, Carlos Marchena, Joan Capdevila, Andres Iniesta, Xavi Hernandez (Xabi Alonso, 68), Marcos Senna, David Silva, David Villa (Cesc Fabregas, 34), Fernando Torres (Dani Guiza, 68)
The Cinderella story is over for Turkey. They came from being down 2-1 to tie the match, but this time it was the German team who scored the winning goal in the last minute.
Turkey opened the match with speed and attack. Ugul Boral gave Turkey the lead in the 22nd minute after Jens Lehmann lost the ball and it went through his legs. Four minutes later Bastian Schweinsteiger came to the rescue to tie the match at 1-1.
Turkey who was missing nine players due to injuries and suspensions continued to dominate the match, while Germany’s full strength team struggled. Then came the 79th minute and Miroslav Klose scored his first goal of the tournament. Once again Turkey wasn’t finished and Semih Sentuck scored in 86th minute evening it up at 2-2. But the Turkish string of three consecutive comeback wins came to an end when Phillip Lehm shot past goalie Rustu Recber giving the Germans the victory.
Turkey were a better team but Germany was a more efficient team and that decided this thrilling match. Germany will meet the winner of today’s match between Spain and Russia.
Line up
Germany: Jens Lehmann, Arne Friedrich, Per Mertesacker, Christoph Metzelder, Philipp Lahm, Simon Rolfes (Torsten Frings, 46), Bastian Schweinsteiger, Michael Ballack, Thomas Hitzlsperger, Lukas Podolski, Miroslav Klose (Marcell Jansen, 90)
Turkey: Rustu Recber, Gokhan Zan, Hakan Balta, Mehmet Topal, Mehmet Aurelio, Ugur Boral (Gokdeniz Karadeniz, 84), Sabri Sarioglu, Ayhan Akman (Mevlut Erdinic, 81), Kazim Kazim (Tumer Metin, 90), Hamit Altintop, Semih Senturk
The Russian team scored two goals in overtime, outplayed the Dutch team and advanced to the semifinals. What an incredible story this team has been so far. Considered to be the underdogs, they overcame Sweden on Wednesday in a do or die match and they id it again last night against favorites, Netherlands.
Russia demonstrated superiority throughout the game and when they finally scored in the 56th minute from Roman Pavlyuchenko, it looked like the semifinals would be theirs. But, with four minutes to go Ruud van Nisterlooy tied the match on 1-1 and forced the game into overtime.
They continued to dominate the match and took the lead in 112th minute by Tobinski on a pass from Andrei Arshavin. Five minutes later Arshavin added one on his own, making it on final 3-1 for Russia.
The Russian team who lost to the Netherlands in the 1988 European final, qualified for the semifinals for the first time since the break up of the Soviet Union. Present coach of Holland, Marco van Basten played in that final and was tournament’s top goal scorer. Russia will play either Italy or Spain on Thursday.
Line up
Russia: Igor Akinfeyev, Alexander Anyukov, Sergei Ignashevich, Denis Kolodin, Yuri Zhirkov, Konstantin Zyryanov, Igor Semshov (Diniyar Bilyaletdinov, 69), Sergei Semak, Roman Pavlyuchenko (Dmitry Sychev, 115), Andrei Arshavin, Ivan Sayenko (Dmitry Torbinski, 81)
Netherlands: Edwin van der Sar, Andre Ooijer, Joris Mathijsen, Khalid Boulahrouz (John Heitinga, 54), Nigel de Jong, Rafael van der Vaart, Giovanni van Bronckhorst, Wesley Sneijder, Orlando Engelaar (Ibrahim Afellay, 62), Ruud van Nistelrooy, Dirk Kuyt (Robin van Persie, 46)
Turkey did it again. They came from behind to beat favorite Croatia last night, just like they did it with the Czech Republic and Switzerland. After a 0-0 draw in regular time, it looked like Croatia was heading for a victory with a last minute goal from Ivan Klasnic. Stunningly the Turks tied the match with only seconds to go. Semih Sunturk was the Turkish hero, scoring the decisive goal. Turkey’s coach had this to say “To lose a lead in such a short space of time would be a blow to any team. I knew they would be feeling it psychologically.”He was right, when the penalty shoot out came, the first two Croatian players Modric and Rakitic shot wide missing the goal. Arda, Senturk and Altintop scored for Turkey, while Srna was the only Croat who scored a penalty kick. The shoot out ended 3-1 for Turkey and they advanced to the semifinals for the first time in history. They will take on Germany next Wednesday in Basel. Turkey has a difficult task ahead, because four of their players are suspended and several others are out with injury.
Line up
Croatia: Stipe Pletikosa, Vedran Corluka, Josip Simunic, Robert Kovac, Danijel Pranjic, Darijo Srna, Niko Kovac, Luka Modric, Ivan Rakitic, Niko Kranjcar (Mladen Petric, 64), Ivica Olic
Germany reached the Euro semifinals despite the fact they were underdogs in the match against Portugal. Once again the Germans came through when it meant the most. They beat Portugal by a score of 3-2 and became one of the favorites to win the tournament. In a battle between Cristiano Ronaldo vs Michael Ballack, the German was the clean winner tonight. Ronaldo “The Great” was covered tightly by German defense and besides a few sky high free kicks not much else to show.
Germany started the match with speed, outrunning the Portuguese side. Bastain Schweinsteiger was back after being sent off in a match with Croatia. He made
