The story of the Premier League this weekend, told in five goals. Get some.
It says a lot about this season of the Premier League when the goal that may very well have delivered the title to Manchester United (it's February, mind you), was followed by a celebration in which the goal-scorer pretended to wipe his own ass. It's a bittersweet symphony, this life.
The story of the Premier League this weekend, told in five goals. Get some.
The January transfer window was sad and weird. Between Harry Redknapp and Tony Fernandes gambling the financial sustainability of Queens Park Rangers on Christopher Samba and Loic Remy saving them from relegation, to West Ham owner David Sullivan claiming to have been threatened over transfer fees, to the whole Peter Odemwingie–trying-to-force-through-his-transfer-to-QPR-by-driving-to–Loftus Road debacle — an act his West Brom manager called "total lunacy." — it feels like things are truly falling apart. The transfer system in England is in desperate need of reform and oversight. There are too many agents, too many add-on fees. There's too much backstabbing and backroom wheeling-and-dealing. With the exception of football's most wealthy (Chelsea, Man United, Manchester City) or most reckless ('Arry!), most clubs are lucky to escape the January window without losing talent or tarnishing their reputations. Rarely do they actually improve their standing.
The story of the Premier League this weekend, told in five goals. Get some.
We all know about The Kobe Assist. I'm starting to wonder if there's such a thing as the Suarez Assist. This happens when Liverpool forward Luis Suarez drops his head and tries to dribble through three or four defenders at a time. Like a homing beacon, more and more defenders come to the ball. Now Suarez, for all his qualities, is not Zidane. He's not pirouetting around players as much as he is clawing through them. Once he gets to the box, he's a piranha. But something happens when all this attention is focused on Suarez: Other players are left on their own. And as Suarez insistently tries to weave through this growing armada of defenders, the ball tends to ricochet away from him, off defenders. And a few times this year, it's bounced to another Liverpool player who has somehow benefited from Suarez's selfishness. In this instance, Jordan Henderson is the main beneficiary.
The story of the Premier League this weekend, told in five goals. Get some.
This match had me thinking about money. The £62 Arsenal charged visiting City fans to visit their (more or less) £400 million stadium. The approximately £70 million spent by City to Arsenal for players like Emmanuel Adebayor, Samir Nasri, Kolo Touré, and Gaël Clichy. I thought about what the Premier League table would look like if Robin van Persie had gone to Manchester City instead of Manchester United. I thought about the letter, written on Arsenal letterhead, sent to the Premier League from Arsenal, Tottenham, Liverpool, and Manchester United, demanding more stringent financial regulation in the free-spending top flight of English football — a salvo against the seemingly unlimited investment pouring into Chelsea and City. I thought about the rumor that bottom-dwelling QPR were going to pay Marseille striker Loïc Remy £96 thousand a week to help them out of their relegation battle, while Arsenal haggled with Theo Walcott over whether the England international should be making £90 thousand, and wondered how in the world Arsene Wenger was going to keep even this sub-par group of Gunners together. It was quite an interior monologue, honestly.
For the three returning players on the U.S. under-20 national hockey team this year, the memories of the 2012 World Junior Hockey Championships were painful indeed. Forward J.T. Miller, defenseman Jacob Trouba, and goaltender John Gibson were part of an American squad that had come into the tournament last year with high hopes and optimistic projections. Instead, the team ended up seventh out of 10 teams, avoiding the embarrassment of relegation but not the sting of missed expectations.
This year, though, it was a different story.
(h/t 101GreatGoals)
The story of the Premier League over the holiday season, told in five goals. Get some.
All happy Arsenal players are the same. All unhappy Arsenal players are unhappy in their own way. Over the years, players have left the North London club due to matters pertaining to the head (Robin van Persie knew he needed to leave the Emirates to win trophies), the heart (Cesc Fábregas ultimately wanted to return to his boyhood club, Barcelona), and the wallet (Samir Nasri makes more as a bit player for Manchester City than as the focal point of Arsenal). The club's latest contract fiasco is interesting, though. It's about identity, both of the player, Theo Walcott (and how he perceives himself), and of the club itself.
The story of the Premier League this weekend, told in five goals. Get some.
Robin van Persie's injury-time game-winner against City in the Manchester Derby. As free kicks go, hell, as RvP free kicks go, you won't be playing this over and over in your head. Not like this thunderbolt against Fulham from the Dutchman's Arsenal days ...
With 20 minutes left in Wednesday night’s game at Vancouver and the Galaxy down 2-0, L.A. coach Bruce Arena decided to put in Jose Villarreal. It would only be Villarreal’s second professional appearance. The 18-year-old, one of L.A.’s two "Homegrown" players, hails from Inglewood — that’s right … Inglewood — and MLS actually allowed the Galaxy to bend some of the rules around signing Homegrown players so they could protect him from getting bought by a European club.
Titi! This is from today's New York Red Bulls–Chicago Fire game. New York won the match, 1-0, off the back of this WONDER STRIKE from Thierry Henry, who clearly still has it (and by "it" I mean the ability to peel the bark off the goalpost with an all-laces shot). Henry wound up being taken out of the game later because of a hamstring problem. Seriously though, you score something like that then you rest your hamstrings for the rest of the fiscal year. Take a bow, son!
Yo, check out David Beckham's goal from Saturday night's Galaxy-Timbers MLS match:
This! This is what would happen if hockey were called by soccer announcers! Shouts to the Internet. (h/t Puck Daddy and Donnie Kwak (@KwakaFlocka).
The return leg of the Western Conference semifinal playoff series between the New York Red Bulls and Los Angeles Galaxy is easily the most interesting game that will be played in the history of the league (11 pm EST, ESPN2). I know you might be tired of hearing that case being made for every single game that David Beckham has been involved in, but this time it might actually be true. The match-up involves the league’s richest teams, the most famous players, and the biggest television markets. The story lines behind the game make it just about the most compelling MLS game that a casual fan could finally decide to watch.
Major League Soccer is never must-see-tv for general American soccer fans. It’s not really about the perception of a ‘low quality of play’ as compared to top tier leagues, or the lack of familiarity with the majority of the players. Americans just watch individual soccer matches because they want to feel like they are watching something with ‘high stakes’, knowing that they aren’t going to miss an important moment.
