Premiership Preview--19. Hull City

The most profitable single game in the world was won by...no, not Manchester United...no, not the New York Giants...Hull City last season, as the Tigers' 1-0 Coca-Cola Championship playoff final victory over Bristol City at Wembley will net the East Yorkshire club an estimated $120 million when all is said and done. Longtime Hull player and hometown boy Dean Windass scored the winning goal for his club, allowing the 39-year-old striker, who was once sent off three times in one game, to experience the joy of playing in the Premier League one more time.

That large profit has barely been tapped into so far this summer by manager Phil Brown, but he's still managed to bring in seven players, several of whom will play significant minutes this season. George Boateng's arrival from Middlesbrough gives the club a solid, reliable defensive midfielder, a must-have for a team that simply doesn't have the quality to go toe-to-toe with many of the other Premiership outfits. Geovanni came off the bench a whopping 17 times for Manchester City last season, where he was blocked by more talented central midfielders like Stephen Ireland, Michael Johnson, Elano, and Dietmar Hamann, but he'll be a useful, experienced player for Hull. Bernard Mendy should start immediately at right back, and the on-loan Anthony Gardner will fight it out with Wayne Brown to start alongside Michael Turner at center back.

Jay-Jay Okocha, who was great for PSG, Bolton, and Nigeria as an attacking midfielder in his prime playing days, was released this summer, but appeared in only 18 games for Hull last season and is now 34 years old. He's the only loss of any note, so Brown has the same core group back and he'll look to make further improvements if necessary.

As Hull's defensive record last season will indicate -- 47 goals conceded in 46 games was third-best in the Championship -- their back line is their strongest asset and it'll only improve this year with extra competition for places. Tony Warner came over from Fulham on a free transfer, but he'll back up American-born Welsh international Boaz Myhill, the club's Player of the Year in 2005-2006, in goal. The 6'4" Turner started 47 games for Hull last year, and either Brown or Gardner, at 6'5", will play next to him, as I mentioned earlier. Ricketts is the incumbent at right back, having also started 47 matches a year ago, but he can also play left back and take over for Andy Dawson, who is decent but could get exposed by Premiership wingers. That would allow Mendy, who has plenty of top-level experience from his time at PSG, to slide in at right back, as I mentioned earlier, and the already-solid back four would improve even more.

Projected Starting Lineup (4-5-1):
GK: Myhill

RB: Mendy
CB: Turner
CB: Gardner
LB: Ricketts

RMF: Richard Garcia
DMF: Boateng
CMF: Ian Ashbee (captain)
CMF: Dean Marney
LMF: Geovanni

ST: Windass

Expect this lineup to change regularly, as Bryan Hughes will play some games at left wing, Nicky Barmby will play in central midfield, and Caleb Folan and Craig Fagan will also get their chances up top.

Hull's schedule opens nicely; they'll have a good chance to pick up points in at least three of their first four games, if not all four: Fulham, @Blackburn, Wigan, and @Newcastle. The Tigers have only three sets of consecutive games all year against teams that finished in the top six last season, with Everton and Arsenal involved twice each (November 20/27 and January 10/19, with a game against Aston Villa right before that on December 28), and Villa twice as well (Dec. 28 and then May 2, a week after Hull goes to Liverpool). This helps Hull considerably because there's no real long stretch of matches where they can't pick up points, but aside from that opening run and one in March (Mar. 4 @Fulham, Mar. 14 vs. Newcastle, and Mar. 21 vs. Wigan) there's no real long stretch where they can rack some points up either.

Bottom Line: There's a clear gap in talent between Hull and Stoke City, so expect the Tigers to be closer to safety than the basement. This team doesn't have any individual standouts but are 15-16 players deep, which helps considerably when the fixture list becomes congested during the winter. If they go into January with a chance to stay up, expect them to buy some more reinforcements, but unless someone can score upwards of 10 goals, I just can't see how they can escape the drop. They'll be an interesting, scrappy team to watch, but don't have the necessary offensive firepower.

Remember to check back tomorrow as the countdown to the top continues with my predictions for 18th and 17th place. Not much separates the two spots in terms of points, but they're worlds apart in terms of financial benefit.

Premiership Preview--20. Stoke City

August is finally here, and with it comes the final run-in to the start of the 2008-2009 Premiership season. You all know my preview plans by now -- I'll cover all 20 teams in the next 10 days -- and it all starts today. Without further ado, let's light this candle.

20. Finishing 2nd in the Coca-Cola Championship last season was a great accomplishment for Stoke City, the second-oldest club in the Football League after Notts County. The Potters hadn't played in England's top flight for over two decades, and their last showing -- 17 points in 1984-1985 -- set a record for futility that lasted 21 years. They'll be hoping for a better run this season, but the gap between the Premiership and the Championship is larger than it ever has been and it's going to be tough sledding for Stoke.

Tony Pulis is in his second stint as manager, taking the reins again in June of '06 after already leading the club from November 2002-June 2005. He's brought in striker Dave Kitson from Premiership-relegated Reading for $11 million, a record signing, and tall Nigerian midfielder Seyi Olofinjana, who's played the last four seasons for Wolves. Thomas Sorensen joined up on a free transfer from Aston Villa, where his services were no longer required after Brad Friedel and Brad Guzan were signed, and the Danish international should overtake the incumbent, Steve Simonsen, for the starting goalkeeper position.

Pulis hasn't lost anyone of consequence; he released club captain Dominic Matteo, but Matteo played only sporadically last season and had no place in this team. With Matteo gone, right back Andy Griffin will wear the armband in his third go-around with the club.

Midfield will be Stoke's strongest area, with Olofinjana set to occupy one of the central roles. Former Liverpool player Salif Diao will play in the "Makélélé Role" just ahead of the back four and behind his fellow African. Liam Lawrence, Stoke's Player of the Year last season, will be on the right wing, with the versatile Danny Pugh opposite him on the left. Depending on the opponent, you could see five in the midfield and a lone striker, and when that's the case, playmaker Glenn Whelan will be alongside Olofinjana in the center.

Projected Starting Lineup (4-5-1):
GK: Sorensen

RB: Griffin (captain)
CB: Leon Cort
CB: Ryan Shawcross
LB: Carl Dickinson

RMF: Lawrence
DMF: Diao
CMF: Olofinjana
CMF: Whelan
LMF: Pugh

ST: Kitson

Stoke jumps right into the thick of things; after starting the season at Bolton, the Potters will play eight consecutive games and 10 of 12 in which they'll be the clear underdog. Those 10 (in order): Aston Villa, @Middlesbrough, Everton, @Liverpool, Chelsea, @Portsmouth, Tottenham, @Manchester City, Arsenal, @Manchester United. In between the City, Arsenal, and United games, Stoke will need to win at home against Sunderland and get a result at Wigan. After their match at Old Trafford, Stoke gets four winnable games, the first two of which are at the Britannia Stadium against their fellow promoted clubs from the Championship, Hull City and West Brom.

January will be an extremely difficult month for Pulis' side, as away games at Chelsea and Tottenham are sandwiched in between visits from Liverpool and Manchester City.

The last two months of the season are where Stoke is really going to have to make a run at survival, and out of the eight games they'll play in that time, 12 points is certainly realistic and anything above 15 would be a bonus. That stretch brings home dates with Newcastle, Blackburn, West Ham, and Wigan, as well as manageable road games at West Brom, Fulham, and Hull City. Stoke finishes their season at the Emirates against Arsenal, so they'll want to be safely out of the relegation battle before making the trip to North London.

Bottom Line: Stoke City has very little chance to stay up. I think they'll give a better account of themselves than Derby did last season, but that tough opening stretch of games will put them in a hole that could very well be impossible to climb out of. There isn't as much talent in this team as there is commitment and work rate, which could be beneficial over the long 38-game schedule, but for Stoke to have a prayer, Kitson will need to take the team by the horns and score 10-12 goals.

Check back this afternoon for my second preview of the day, #19.

Liverpool Draws Standard Liège, Arsenal Draws FC Twente in Champions League Third Qualifying Round

Just as its junior brother, the UEFA Cup, conducted a qualifying round draw this morning, the Champions League did as well with its Third Qualifying Round. We won't know the full slate of matchups until August 6, when the Second Qualifying Round finishes up, but the opponents for Liverpool and Arsenal have already been determined. While the two Premiership heavyweights should get through to the Group Stage, it's not going to be easy.

The road to another deep run in Europe's top club competition for Liverpool starts in Belgium, where they'll meet the defending Jupiler League champions, Standard Liège. We saw earlier that American defender Danny Califf and his club, FC Midtjylland, will be playing Manchester City in the next couple weeks, and Standard Liège has another American defender on their roster. Oguchi Onyewu, whose tenure at Newcastle in 2007 was uninspiring to say the least, is now back at Standard Liège, where he's appeared in 135 games since 2004 and been named to the Belgian First Division's Best XI twice and been Foreign Player of the Year once.

Standard Liège's captain is Steven Defour, a 20-year-old future star whose playmaking skills have earned him a starting role in the center of Belgium's midfield. He is probably his club's best player, but his teammate Milan Jovanović has scored 36 goals in 73 league games and is the domestic league's reigning Player of the Year. Alongside Defour in the midfield is Axel Witsel, the reigning Young Player of the Year in Belgium at the age of 19, who scored in his first senior international appearance for Belgium on March 26. You'll also find three Brazilians on Standard Liège's roster, including both starting full-backs and the vice-captain, who can play as a striker or on a wing.

Rafa Benitez has added some pieces to his team in an effort to seriously contend for the Premiership title this season. He'll be without Ryan Babel, Javier Mascherano, and Lucas for this tie as they are all taking part in the upcoming Olympics, but there is more than enough depth in the squad to adequately replace them for a short-term period. Benitez is well-known for tinkering with his lineup anyway, so it's no guarantee that those three would've played in both legs even if they were available.

Arsenal's opponent is also from a Benelux country; FC Twente finished second in the Dutch Eredivisie last year and is now managed by a familiar face to English soccer fans, Steve McLaren. The former Middlesbrough manager and England head coach had been rumored to take over at Twente since early May but was only formally hired on June 20. After the disgrace at Wembley against Croatia, confirming England's non-participation in Euro 2008, McLaren was fired. You can bet he has something to prove to the English media and to the country's fans, but his squad simply isn't good enough to beat Arsenal over two legs.

McLaren has a young Serbian center back, Slobodan Rajković, on loan from Chelsea, and Nikolay Mihaylov on loan from Liverpool. The former will likely start in this tie and have a large role for Twente this year, the latter sits behind 37-year-old club stalwart Sander Boschker on the goalkeeping depth chart but could compete for some playing time. Australian international Luke Wilkshire plays as a center midfielder for Twente, and former Everton youngster Bjarni Viðarsson will factor into the mix in that area as well.

Arsenal should overpower McLaren's team in this tie but because young players typically don't play their best on the road, you could see the Gunners struggle in the first leg. I have no doubt they'll win back at the Emirates, so it's just a matter of what the scoreline reads after the first game.

The following is the complete draw for this round. First legs will be played August 12 and 13, with second legs 14 days later on the 26th and 27th. As always, home teams are listed first, and the score in parentheses is the aggregate heading into the second leg of the Second Qualifying Round:

Anorthosis Famagusta/Rapid Wien (3-0) vs. Olympiacos
Vitória Guimarães vs. IFK Göteborg/Basel (1-1)
Shakhtar Donetsk vs. Domžale/Dinamo Zagreb (0-3)
Schalke 04 vs. Atlético Madrid
Aalborg BK/Modriča (5-0) vs. Rangers/FBK Kaunas (0-0)
Barcelona vs. Beitar Jerusalem/Wisła Kraków (2-1)
Levski Sofia vs. Anderlecht/BATE (1-2)
Standard Liège vs. Liverpool
Inter Baku/Partizan (1-1) vs. Fenerbahçe/MTK Hungária (2-0)
FC Twente vs. Arsenal
Spartak Moscow vs. Drogheda United/Dynamo Kyiv (1-2)
Juventus vs. Tampere United/Artmedia Petržalka (1-3)
SK Brann/Ventspils (1-0) vs. Marseille
Fiorentina vs. Slavia Prague
Galatasaray vs. Steaua Bucureşti
Panathinaikos/Dinamo Tbilisi (3-0) vs. Sheriff Tiraspol/Sparta Prague (0-1)

Winners in this round move on to the Group Stage, in which 16 teams have already booked places through their final league positions last season, including champions Manchester United, Lyon, Inter Milan, Real Madrid, Bayern Munich, PSV Eindhoven, FC Porto, Zenit St. Petersburg, Celtic, and CFR Cluj. The draw for the Group Stage will take place on August 28, and once again, you can find full coverage and increased analysis here. Once the draw is made, I'll post my predictions to advance to the knockout stages.

Manchester City Draws FC Midtjylland, Aston Villa Draws FH in UEFA Cup Second Qualifying Round

The draw for the UEFA Cup Second Qualifying Round was conducted this morning, and the two English clubs involved at this stage in the competition couldn't have come away happier. Both should defeat their respective Scandinavian opponents and advance to the First Round without too much difficulty.

After seeing off EB/Streymur in the last round, Manchester City will open this tie at home against FC Midtjylland. The Danish club finished second in their domestic league last season and have 4 points after 2 games so far in the '08-'09 campaign. Here in the US, they're most well-known for having former LA Galaxy and San Jose Earthquakes defender Danny Califf on the roster. Califf has carved out a nice career for himself in Denmark, having just moved to Midtjylland after spending two seasons at Aalborg BK, where he was the captain and and played in an Intertoto Cup with the club. He's played both of Midtjylland's games so far and has 20 caps for the US National Team.

Aside from Califf, there's no real recognizable name unless you're a fan of the club or the Danish Superliga. Three players on the roster, including Califf, have represented their countries at the senior level, and five Nigerians can be found on the first team.

As I said earlier, City should progress with relative comfort. Mark Hughes would like his side to effectively end the tie in Manchester before going to Denmark for the return game, so expect him to field a full-strength side on August 14 in the first leg.

Villa is coming off a 3-2 aggregate victory against pesky Odense BK, another Danish side, in the Third Round of the Intertoto Cup. Their 1-0 second leg victory was marred by a horrific injury to left back Wilfred Bouma, who looks likely to miss the first half of the upcoming Premiership season with a dislocated ankle.

Their opponent in this tie is Icelandic club FH, short for Fimleikafélag Hafnarfjarðar (you can see why no one uses their full name!). They finished 2nd in the 2007 Úrvalsdeild Karla, Iceland's top flight, season, and sit on top of the league by a point this year after 13 of 22 games. Because of Iceland's harsh winter climate, the league schedule runs from May to September, so FH will be in full form against a Villa side just getting the new season underway.

That advantage still won't be enough for FH, however. The club is comprised solely of Icelandic players outside of two Danes, and needed a 5-1 victory in the second leg just to put away CS Grevenmacher from Luxembourg in the First Qualifying Round. Villa has the quality to finish this thing up in the first game. With the small first team roster that Martin O'Neill has right now, I wouldn't doubt that he'll use a number of backups and young players in the second leg if the end result isn't in doubt.

Villa and FH have both requested the order of games to be switched; right now, the first leg would be played at Villa Park with the return match at Kaplakriki, which holds 6000 spectators but seats only 2200. According to a press release on Villa's official website, "both clubs must now speak to their individual football associations before making a formal request (to swap home games) to UEFA."

Here's the complete draw, with all first legs to be played August 14 and the second legs played exactly two weeks later on the 28th. Teams listed first are home first:

Southern-Mediterranean Region
Široki Brijeg vs. Beşiktaş
Braga vs. Zrinjski Mostar
Lokomotiv Sofia vs. Borac Čačak
Vojvodina vs. Hapoel Tel Aviv
Aris Thessaloniki vs. Slaven Belupo
Litex Lovech vs. Ironi Kiryat Shmona
Deportivo vs. Hajduk Split
APOEL vs. Red Star Belgrade
Vllaznia Shkodër vs. Napoli
Maccabi Netanya vs. Cherno More
Omonia vs. AEK Athens

Central-East Region
Liepājas Metalurgs vs. Vaslui
Zürich vs. Sturm Graz
Stuttgart vs. Győri ETO
Lech Poznań vs. Grasshopper
Slovan Liberec vs. MŠK Žilina
WIT Georgia vs. Austria Wien
Young Boys vs. Debrecen
Legia Warsaw vs. FC Moscow
Dnipro Dnipropetrovsk vs. Bellinzona
Interblock Ljubljana vs. Hertha BSC
Sūduva vs. Red Bull Salzburg

Northern Region
Djurgården vs. Rosenborg
Queen of the South vs. Nordsjælland
Gent vs. Kalmar
Manchester City vs. FC Midtjylland
Honka vs. Viking FK
Haka vs. Brøndby
Stabæk vs. Rennes
Copenhagen vs. Lillestrøm
Elfsborg vs. St. Patrick's Athletic
Aston Villa vs. FH

The 32 winners from this round will advance to the First Round, in which they'll join the 32 teams that are already entered and the 16 losers in the Champions League Third Qualifying Round. The draw for the First Round will be made on August 29, and you can find full coverage of that here on English Soccer Talk.

What's Happened to Aaron Lennon?

With Tottenham's $30 million acquisition of David Bentley yesterday from Blackburn, it would appear that the meaningful tenure of Aaron Lennon, who was a boy wonder and the next big thing in English soccer just a few years ago, at White Hart Lane is over.

At 14, Lennon signed a cleat-sponsorship contract with Adidas, becoming the youngest player in Premiership history ever to do so. Lennon then became the youngest player to appear in a Premiership game -- 16 years, 129 days old -- when he entered as a substitute for Leeds, ironically at White Hart Lane against Tottenham in August 2003, right at the end of the West Yorkshire club's glory days. By the age of 18, Lennon had already played in 38 league games for Leeds, and it seemed like the sky was the limit for the speedy right winger.

Leeds then struggled with the most high-profile financial difficulties I've seen in any professional sport in a long, long time. A club that was a regular participant in European competitions and top-five team in England for most of the 1990's and into the early years of this decade suffered a dramatic fall from grace at the hands of inept ownership. The club was forced to sell a slew of quality players, most of whom were bought originally with money it didn't have, instead using loans to finance the deals, to pay off mounting debts, including Rio Ferdinand, Paul Robinson, Mark Viduka, Jonathan Woodgate, Lee Bowyer, James Milner, Scott Carson, Robbie Keane, and Alan Smith.

Lennon was sold during this period as well, as Leeds made a $2 million profit by moving the youngster to Tottenham in June 2005. He had a solid, if not great, year in his first season with Spurs, evidenced by the nomination by his fellow players for the PFA Young Player of the Year award, which was eventually won by Wayne Rooney. In October of '05, Lennon earned a call-up to the England U-21 team and after just three appearances for head coach Peter Taylor, he was picked in May for the 2006 World Cup squad by Sven-Göran Eriksson, despite having not even earned one senior cap at that point. The 19-year-old Lennon came off the bench twice in that World Cup, acquitting himself well for his age.

Lennon had another good year in 2006-2007, again being nominated for the Young Player of the Year award, although he again did not win. Tottenham obviously believed he was a big part of their future, signing him in January to a new contract that ran through 2012, replacing the first contract extension he'd inked in March of '06. At the end of the '06-'07 season, Lennon had established himself as a first-team regular under Jol, playing in 53 league games and 17 more in domestic cup competitions and the UEFA Cup combined.

He had it all: blindingly quick feet, a place in the England setup, a prominent role on a London-based club, good looks, and plenty of money. He was still very young, and although his skills were still raw, the vast potential was patently obvious. People were talking about him as the successor to David Beckham on England's right wing. He was playing for a club that was the best of the rest outside the "Big Four". With his slight stature (5'5", one of the smallest players in Premiership history) and build, he did have some difficulty staying injury-free in such a physical league, but when he was healthy, he was very good.

Then, as I talked about in yesterday's post, Jol was fired unceremoniously and replaced by Juande Ramos, who is the polar opposite of the player-friendly Dutchman. Ramos brought changes to North London immediately, making it clear that it was his way or the highway. He replaced England's starting goalkeeper and obviously a shoo-in starter under Jol, Paul Robinson, with longtime backup Radek Černý. He brought in a dietary and fitness staff to improve the poor consumption habits of the largely English roster and get them into top physical shape. He tried to put an end to the drinking culture that was and is a big part of the lives of British players.

His strict régime brought out the best in some players on the field, particularly Jermaine Jenas and Tom Huddlestone, but seems to have had a negative effect on others, like Lennon. After Spurs' Carling Cup final triumph over Chelsea on February 24, a group of players, including Lennon, went out to a nightclub and partied until the late hours of the next morning. Pictures of the players in various states of drunkenness and belligerence immediately surfaced in the media, and Ramos was not happy. From that point on, Lennon seemed to figure less and less into Ramos' plans, and his poor on-field performances and continued problems staying fit didn't help matters either.

Lennon's development has stalled considerably under Ramos, and now that David Bentley is in the mix, one would expect that Lennon may be on the way out. Ramos didn't spend big money on Bentley to sit him on the bench. He can't play two right wingers at the same time, and with the return from injury of Gareth Bale, who can play either left back or left midfield, and Giovani Dos Santos and Luka Modrić now on the roster, it's unlikely that Lennon would move to the left.

He's still only 21, so the potential is still there. He's got some mileage on his legs now, though, and most of the teams in the running for UEFA Cup places (Aston Villa, Portsmouth, Everton, West Ham) already have starters at Lennon's position. There seems to be an opening at Manchester City, another UEFA Cup contender, but it's unclear whether new manager Mark Hughes would be interested. This guy was a star-in-the-making and he's going to catch on somewhere, but he's probably going to have to take a step backwards in the short term to advance his career in the long term. For a player rated so highly as a youngster, it's fascinating how quickly his career seems to have regressed.

I'm On The Third Half

Yours truly will be on the airwaves again, this time joining my good buddy Johnathan Starling, host of The Third Half, to preview teams A-F in the Premiership. We recorded a couple solid segments yesterday afternoon, and the podcast will become available for download on iTunes at some point later today after its first airing on CSRN. You can also, of course, listen to the show on CSRN, and on Sports Byline.

It's a weekly, hour-long show devoted primarily to MLS and the Premiership, and I encourage everyone to have a listen to any of the first nine episodes that John has put out so far. I'm honored to be his first guest; it meant a lot that he asked me to come on. My spot comes towards the end of the hour, so keep your ears peeled for that, but enjoy the rest of the show as well.

I'll be back on The Third Half again next week, and possibly the week after, to talk about several more clubs as we get closer and closer to the start of the Premiership season. As I wrote here on Monday, my full previews start tomorrow here at English Soccer Talk, and I'm looking forward to hearing your feedback on the show and my team capsules.

Sour Grapes From Daniel Levy

After the gutless manner in which former manager Martin Jol was fired last October, only learning of his sacking through a text message sent to his nephew, I knew never to expect anything of significance handled with class by club chairman Daniel Levy. Levy had also repeatedly denied in public that he was going to replace Jol with Juande Ramos, and guess what, he did just that. During his tenure at White Hart Lane, Levy has developed an unflattering reputation with a significant contingent of Tottenham supporters and other higher-ups across the Premiership for relying on politics rather than doing what makes soccer sense.

Levy demonstrated his own stupidity once again in the past couple days with his comments regarding Robbie Keane's $40 million move to Liverpool. He would have the public believe that Tottenham was a helpless victim in the matter, and big, bad Liverpool bullied his club around and railroaded him into selling the Irish striker:

"I have already made my opinion clear on the nature of this transaction. I don't regard it as a transfer deal - that is something which happens between two clubs when they both agree to trade - this is very much an enforced sale, for which we have agreed a sum of £19 million as compensation plus a potential further £1.3 million in additional compensation."

He also effectively accused Liverpool manager Rafa Benitez of tapping-up after Benitez had praised Keane's abilities in the media, although to be fair, he didn't pursue his claims any further than that. Liverpool made a donation to Tottenham's primary charity in acknowledgement that Benitez's comments were inappropriate, but that was unnecessary.

I don't see where Levy gets off saying any of what he said. He didn't have to sell Keane, who was under contract with the North London club until 2010. He had a choice in the matter, and he agreed to the move. Tottenham are in better financial shape than Liverpool as it is, so Spurs didn't exactly need the money. Liverpool didn't force Levy into anything. How can he not call it a "transfer deal", which, according to his own words, has to be agreed upon, when clearly it was. If it wasn't, Keane wouldn't be allowed to go anywhere.

To say that a potential $40.6 million is just "compensation" is insulting to those who work far harder than Levy for exponentially smaller salaries. It also implies that Keane was stolen from Tottenham without consent, and Liverpool just threw some money out of the rear window while escaping with the player to make everything better.

As for his comments aimed at Benitez, give me a break. What exactly is the definition of tapping-up? Robbie Keane is many things, some positive and some negative, but ignorant isn't one of them. He knows other clubs would love to benefit from his services. The guy is good for at least 15 goals per season, so of course he's in demand. His agent, Struan Marshall, also represents Steven Gerrard and Jamie Carragher, and Keane is good friends with both of the Liverpool stalwarts, who surely talked to Keane about coming to Anfield at some point or another. Keane supported Liverpool as a boy like many other Irishmen, and it was his lifelong dream to play for the club.

Levy is nothing more than a spoiled sore loser who whines and moans when he doesn't get his way. As he showed during the Jol situation and now with Keane, Levy is as fickle as they come. He possesses the wrong personal traits to succeed as an executive in professional sports, and Tottenham's accomplishments over the last three seasons (Carling Cup, two 5th-place finishes, and appearances in the UEFA Cup Round of 16 and Quarterfinals) have come in spite of him, not because of him.

"20 Teams in 10 Days" Premiership Preview

As hinted to in earlier posts, it's almost time for my second annual Premiership preview.

Beginning this Friday, August 1, I'll be covering two teams a day for 10 days, starting with the club I believe will finish dead last this year and working my way up in order to the eventual league champion. Believe me, these are remarkably thorough looks at each team, something that you won't find at many other blogs out there.

I'll start with a quick recap of a team's 2007-2008 season, then move on to player movement this summer, both coming and going. I'll combine that with analysis of the holdovers and give you a full starting lineup that, barring injuries or transfers that take place after I put out a team's preview, should take the field for that team's first game. I'll examine the team's schedule, highlighting their difficult stretches and stretches where points need to be picked up. At the end of each capsule, you'll see a "Bottom Line", where I'll briefly summarize (in a couple of sentences or so) what a team's chances are based on their roster and manager.

Remember, because the transfer window will still be open well after I publish these previews, they have to be taken with a grain of salt. For example, I picked Manchester City to finish 15th last season before Sven brought in Elano, Martin Petrov, and a few other pieces of his international puzzle. I can only base my previews on the players that are there at the time of writing, not on transfer speculation or gossip that I see or hear in the media. I also obviously can’t predict injuries; certain players are more prone to them than others, but I can’t account for things that haven’t happened when I’m composing a team’s outlook.

I look forward to doing this, and I hope you'll check back daily as we get closer to the start of the '08-'09 Premiership season.

Ashley Young's Goal Against Odense BK

A summer filled with video highlights here continues with Ashley Young’s stunning goal in Aston Villa’s 1-0 victory over Odense BK yesterday. The win sealed Villa’s place in the UEFA Cup second qualifying round, and Young sent the home crowd into raptures with this right-footed drive from his usual left wing position.

I know I sound like a broken record, but I won’t stop until people give this guy more love. Ashley Young was the best, and let me repeat, the best, winger in the Premiership last season after Cristiano Ronaldo, and although the players obviously agree with me as Young as voted into the PFA Team of the Year, far too many fans don’t appreciate how good of a player this guy truly is.

Believe me, I’m not praising Young simply because of this goal. Check the archives; I’ve been high on him ever since Villa’s first game of the ‘07-’08 season, at home to Liverpool. You can see a sampling of his quality here, but even this terrific goal doesn’t begin to do justice to Young’s full array of abilities. As the commentator on the video says, he is such an exciting player to watch, and you can mark it down here first: If England qualifies for World Cup 2010, Young will be a starting winger for the Three Lions come kickoff in their first group match.

"I'm on Setanta Sports" Will Return This Season

It looks like "The Special One" will still have time for fun and games this season after taking the job at Inter Milan. He's been busy this summer, already bringing in Amantino Mancini from Roma, and it looks like Portsmouth midfielder Sulley Muntari will head to the San Siro in the near future. Frank Lampard also could reunite with his former manager as Mourinho has made it clear he'd still love to have the Chelsea vice-captain.

Mourinho's sidekick and personal tool (on the show), Sven-Göran Eriksson, has a new gig to keep him occupied for a while as well. Eriksson is now the manager of the Mexican national team, which doesn't seem like a good fit, but money is money and Eriksson has never been one to turn a nice salary down.

These two, along with Wayne Rooney, Dave from Newcastle/Stoke, the "Voyeur", Rafa, Sir Alex, and other "special guests", will be back on Setanta during the upcoming season. I'm curious to see how the show starts off; it was clever and original when it debuted around Christmas last year, then turned stale and repetitive, then made a nice little push to bring me back on board towards the end of the season. Hopefully the folks at Setanta still have enough humor and wit in the tank to make this worth watching again.

Martin O'Neill Would Be Wise To Play Barry This Weekend

In one of my recent poll questions, which you can find on the left-hand side of the homepage underneath the blog archive, I asked which story you believed to be the biggest so far this summer. One of the choices was Gareth Barry and his desire to leave Aston Villa for Liverpool, and although I can't remember the exact number, it got its fair share of votes.

Villa is a club on the rise, with young but underappreciated stars in Ashley Young (I can't emphasize enough just how high I am on him), and Gabriel Agbonlahor, and some very useful players like John Carew, Nigel Reo-Coker, Martin Laursen, and Wilfred Bouma. They had the smallest senior roster in the Premiership last season, but the quality of their young players and middle-aged veterans was enough to surprise many outsiders.

Losing Scott Carson and Olof Mellberg is a tough blow for manager Martin O'Neill, who led this team to a 7th-place finish last year and a place in the Intertoto Cup this summer, but he's already been working the transfer market, bringing in Steve Sidwell from Chelsea and Brad Guzan from Chivas USA. O'Neill is also actively shopping for a right back, and is close to acquiring Brad Friedel from Blackburn if you choose to believe various reports.

Barry is Villa's captain and has spent just over a decade at the club. He has established himself as one of the top central midfielders in the Premiership, catapulting into England's starting lineup alongside Owen Hargreaves in the process. He's also capable of playing left back and on the left in a diamond-shaped midfield, and that kind of versatility is always a plus.

As I'm sure all of you read or heard about a couple weeks ago, Barry was banned from training and club premises by his manager and fined $120,000 (two weeks' salary) basically in response to Barry's public comments regarding his desire to move to Liverpool. Barry has made it fairly clear that he'd like to go to Anfield and play in the Champions League with his good friend, Steven Gerrard, and questioned O'Neill's commitment to bringing in more firepower.

Barry also called O'Neill out right after Euro 2008, saying the manager had time to be a television pundit but not to reach out and communicate with his captain. Liverpool and Villa have been discussing a transfer all summer long, but the two clubs haven't been able to agree on cash valuations or player swaps combined with cash to get the deal done. O'Neill has admitted that although he would like Barry to stay, for the right price, he could leave.

On July 16, though, Barry returned to training, three days before Villa went to Denmark and picked up two critical away goals in a 2-2 draw against Odense BK in the third round of the Intertoto Cup. An obviously unfit Barry didn't play in that game -- Stiliyan Petrov got the start in the holding role behind Steve Sidwell -- but did appear in Villa's friendly victory against Walsall two days ago. He was booed, and maybe rightfully so, by his club's supporters, but played an hour in his effort to work towards full match fitness.

The second leg of the Villa-Odense tie will be played this Saturday in England, with the hosts needing either a victory or a 0-0 or 1-1 draw to advance to the UEFA Cup second qualifying round. O'Neill said today that he was considering playing Barry in the upcoming game:

"I think that in terms of fitness the game on Tuesday will have brought Gareth on, so if he's mentally tuned in and he wants to go and play, why not?

'He will be in contention for Saturday. He's a quality player and that's what we're looking for. I have never not been impressed with him in two years as to his attitude on the football pitch.

'In fairness the Intertoto gives us that chance to get into the UEFA Cup, which we set out to get into by one way or another, and Gareth was a major part of that last year."

He then added:

"Deep down we would all love him to stay at the football club. We haven't heard back from Liverpool for some time and we're not exactly sure where we all stand.

'When people say people are in limbo, I don't think that applies to anybody more than ourselves. We don't know whether to move forward or not with it. It's a long-running saga and I wouldn't mind it ending one way or another.

'My preference - and hopefully I'm speaking for a lot of Villa fans, if not all of them - is that we would like Gareth to stay at the football club. That would be great because it will be hard to replace him."

So, where does that leave us?

O'Neill should insert Barry into the starting eleven for Saturday's match. As the manager, his responsibility is to field the lineup he believes gives the team the best possible chance to get the result. There is no question that Gareth Barry is one of Villa's best players and would immediately bring that cool, savvy demeanor into an otherwise young and inexperienced -- at least in European competition -- team. He links up very well with his wide players, Young and some combination of Nigel Reo-Coker, Shaun Maloney, and even Agbonlahor on occasion, but also takes corner kicks and free kicks from the right side. Villa is deadly off the set piece with Laursen, Carew, and Zat Knight in the air, and Barry's in-swinging balls are always dangerous.

By playing Barry, O'Neill is also forcing Liverpool's hand, saying that unless Rafa Benitez comes up with a satisfactory offer to meet the valuation, Villa simply won't sell and will retain the services of their captain. Liverpool seems to want Barry desperately for some reason (if you go back to early May in the blog archive, you'll see why I don't believe he's a necessary piece to Liverpool's puzzle), so they're going to have make a decision sooner rather than later. The closer we get to the start of the Premiership season, the more Villa can dictate the situation and the more they can raise the desired price.

I think you'll find that as we move forward, the mutual hard feelings between Barry and O'Neill, which seem to be more of disappointment than anything else, will begin to evaporate. If Barry stays at Villa, the fans will eventually welcome back one of their club's most loyal players. They don't seem to understand or appreciate that when players want to change teams, it's usually business more than it is personal. Liverpool would be able to pay Barry more and give him a chance to compete in the Champions League, but that doesn't mean Barry has lost his love for Villa and his respect for their fans.

Martin O'Neill should bring Gareth Barry back into the fold this weekend. The Birmingham-based club have the ability to break into the top four with just a couple more impact signings, definitely at right back and possibly at right wing, and need a bit more depth. They have the talent right now to be a serious contender in the UEFA Cup. I believe Barry will get his wish to play in the Champions League at some point, and possibly next season for Villa if he stays where he is now.

It all starts on Saturday, though, and I'm extremely interested to see whether or not the skipper is leading the team out of the tunnel.

Update (07/26 -- Noon): Barry is amongst the substitutes named by Martin O'Neill. He's opted to use the same starting lineup that drew 2-2 last week.

Update #2 (12:30 PM): Barry is coming on after a horrific-looking ankle injury to Wilfred Bouma. Barry presumably will go to left back, showing the versatility I mentioned earlier in this post.

Solid Signing for West Ham

West Ham sealed their first major signing of the summer today, bringing in 23-year-old Switzerland international Valon Behrami from Lazio for $10 million.

Though clearly not to the same extent as Chelsea in their acquisition of Deco earlier this month, West Ham got away like bandits with what they paid for Behrami. He'd been originally valued at $22 million by Lazio, according to England's Daily Mail, but because his contract was expiring and could've soon left without the club receiving compensation, the Italian side opted to take what they could get.

He's a young 23, meaning that for his already relatively young age, there's not a lot of mileage on his legs like there is with some other wingers in the same age bracket -- Cristiano Ronaldo, David Bentley, Ashley Young, and Behrami's Swiss teammate, Tranquillo Barnetta, are just a few well-known examples who have significant first-team experience under their belts.

He's a very versatile player, something that West Ham can't have enough of given their horrific injury record in recent seasons. Behrami can play at right back if necessary, but is a natural winger and capable of playing both on the left, where he can cut inside with his right foot, and the right, where it's easier for him to serve balls into the box.

At 6'1", a rather tall height for his preferred position, Behrami is quicker on the ball than one might expect. Don't get me wrong, he doesn't have the fast-footed, change-of-direction moves like a Cristiano Ronaldo or a Robinho, but he can get down the field in a hurry if given the opportunity. He's also adequate with his left foot, so he'll demand more space from Premiership full-backs than someone who basically only uses one foot for everything.

If you saw him play for Switzerland, for whom he has 15 caps since making his debut in 2005, in Euro 2008 this summer, you had to have come away impressed. He started all three games for the Swiss opposite Barnetta, and along with Hakan Yakin, those three players really stood out for a country that had very little to offer going forward after the loss of Alexander Frei to a knee injury.

Behrami will bring his Champions League experience with Lazio to East London, where his new club has been starved for success in Europe for years now. West Ham has done absolutely nothing outside of England since 1999-2000, when they were joint-Intertoto Cup winners and reached the second round of the UEFA Cup, where they bowed out to Steaua Bucureşti. Now with Behrami, Freddie Ljungberg, and Craig Bellamy on board, the Hammers hope to make a serious push to get back into European competition.

The one major knock on Behrami is the fact that, like Ljungberg and Bellamy, he is injury-prone. There is a reason he hasn't played as many first-team games as the players I mentioned earlier and isn't because Behrami doesn't have the talent, it's because he's had a problem staying consistently healthy. If the "Swiss David Beckham" can get over that hump, he's going to be a very good player for Alan Curbishley and West Ham.

Arsenal Is Now a Selling Club

Every day, I start off the morning surfing around various sites and checking for interesting stories or issues relating to, most often, the Premiership. You all know by now how much I despise the summer (in the soccer world, that is, not in real life) and the gossip used as filler to pass the time until August, when the new season kicks off.

Two leading media outlets in this country -- ESPNsoccernet and CSRN -- have raised the question in recent days of whether or not Arsenal is now a "selling club". Soccernet's Norman Hubbard believes Arsenal could be for the next 20 years (http://soccernet.espn.go.com/columns/story?id=555120&sec=england&root=england&cc=5901), while my colleague at CSRN, Johnathan Starling, takes the opposite viewpoint and doesn't believe Arsenal is a selling club even now.

When you simply look at the Gunners' domestic and international prestige, not to mention the fact that they're a perennial top-four team in the Premiership and a participant in the Champions League, it would be hard not to agree with Starling. More often than not, success doesn't come cheaply, and sustaining success is even harder to do without spending money.

We've seen this in England with Chelsea, a mid-table team until Roman Abramovich bought the club and invested hundreds and hundreds of millions of dollars to launch Chelsea to the status it enjoys now. We've seen it with Portsmouth, who you could count on to finish in the lower half of the league until a wealthy Franco-Russian-Israeli businessman, Alexandre Gaydamak, became the sole owner of the club in July 2006. We've seen this here in the States with the New York Yankees and now the Boston Red Sox, and especially in college football and basketball, sports traditionally dominated by larger, public, well-endowed universities.

Upon closer examination, though, Arsenal doesn't fit that same mold anymore. To me, they're still a successful club, although those with different definitions of success have every right to disagree with me, but they're not doing it in the same manner as any of the teams mentioned above.

It seems like too many people attach a negative stigma to the term "selling club", and they're wrong for doing so. Look, soccer is a business just like any other professional endeavor: it's all about the bottom line, money. How much money can you make, or perhaps to put it another way, how much money can you save while not compromising your high standards and still putting a good product out there for the consumers.

There's nothing wrong with being a selling club, just like there's nothing wrong with buying every player in sight if that's what you want to do. It's a personal choice made by those in charge, the ones spending the money.

Arsenal just moved into a new ground, Emirates Stadium, after spending decades at Highbury, which had become a charming but antiquated and out-of-date stadium for the North London club and their large fanbase. It takes a lot of money to build new, state-of-the-art stadiums, and the Emirates was no exception -- cost of construction was roughly $860 million for a stadium that can seat 60,355 people. That may be chump change when compared to the new Wembley Stadium, also in London, which took four years and over $1.5 billion to construct, but still, the Emirates didn't come cheaply.

To pay back the loan required to build the Emirates, Arsenal needs to bring in a surplus of $48 million a year for the next quarter century. Ticket prices are rising every year and fans who love their club will deal with it and pay the extra money, but that alone isn't going to completely repay the debt. Arsenal also has to rely on bonus money from playing in the Champions League and from finishing at the top of the Premier League, not to mention merchandise sales and other financial efforts that are based off the field.

Manager Arsène Wenger has earned a well-deserved reputation over the years of having one of the keenest eyes for talent in the game. He buys players when they're young, often times in their mid-to-late teens, and cheap, then brings them through Arsenal's youth system and, if they develop sufficiently, into the first team. If/when they play well enough at the highest levels, raising their values, and if/when Wenger sees fit, he sells them off, thus making a huge profit on his original investment. He then takes that money and spends it on more young players, and then the cycle repeats itself again. Remember, this is a man who holds a Master's degree in economics; he knows what he's doing.

We've seen this model most recently with Lassana Diarra, who was sold to Portsmouth last winter, but perhaps most famously with Patrick Vieira (signed for $7 million, a relatively large sum by Wenger's standards, then sold to Juventus for nearly $27.5 million) and Nicholas Anelka (signed for $1 million, then sold to Real Madrid only two years later for just over $44.5 million). We're going to see it continue the future with players like Kolo Toure, who was signed for just $300,000 from Belgian club ASEC Mimosas, Cesc Fàbregas, who joined as a 16-year-old from Barcelona, and perhaps as soon as later this summer with Emmanuel Adebayor, who came to Arsenal from Monaco for a reported $6 million but could be sold for anywhere upwards of $50 million.

He is loyal to his players, but only to a certain degree. He'll stick by them when it suits him and the club, but when he believes it's time for them to go, even if they'd essentially devoted their lives to the club and contributed significantly to the club's success like Thierry Henry, Freddie Ljungberg, Robert Pirès, and Martin Keown all did, they go.

Wenger refuses to pay his players a salary that would break his traditional wage structure, meaning that no matter how good Cesc Fàbregas becomes, it's likely Arsenal won't pay him what he could make at that same point in time as, for example, Inter Milan, AC Milan, Barcelona, Real Madrid, or Manchester United. Wenger would rather sell Fàbregas to one of those big clubs and take the transfer fee and replenish the already-thriving youth system he's helped create.

He had the opportunity to raise Mathieu Flamini's wages when other teams became interested, but he declined and let Flamini walk to AC Milan without getting a pound in return. Instead of paying Flamini, a very good holding midfielder with the ability to get forward, what he could get elsewhere, he let his fellow Frenchman go, showing his steadfast desire to stick to his guns.

Wenger beat the likes of Manchester United and Everton to bring in Aaron Ramsey from Cardiff, who's only 17 and, in a not-so-coincidental anecdote, will wear #16 with Flamini's departure. Ramsey is an extremely talened (for his age) center midfielder, which Arsenal have plenty of already, and probably won't play more than a handful of games for Arsenal's first team this season. He may make a couple appearances in the Carling Cup, which Wenger seems to use as a glorified training ground for his young players, but likely won't play in the Premiership. Wenger may or may not be around for many more seasons, but there should be no doubt that if in three or four years, Ramsey could bring a substantial return, he'll be moved elsewhere.

Even the cost of Arsenal's high-profile signing this summer, 21-year-old Samir Nasri, formerly of Marseille, was basically offset by the sales of Aliaksandr Hleb to Barcelona and Gilberto Silva to Panathinaikos. The net sum of players brought in compared to the net sum of players sold is generally very close to equal for Wenger, and rarely does it exceed more than $10-12 million, which is play money these days in the Premiership.

Like I said earlier, this is an interesting issue that had been brought to my attention recently. Arsenal doesn't buy established, big-name players like Chelsea, and won't pay to keep players at the Emirates when they become superstars. It's a personal philosophy that Wenger and club executives clearly believe in, and even if the fans don't agree, it's not necessarily about them. Yes, the club has the responsibility to provide its customers with a capable product, but at the end of the day, those who foot the bill are the ones who get to make the decisions, not those who benefit or don't benefit from those decisions.

In Arsenal's case, a clear pattern has emerged during Arsene Wenger's tenure and it's one that favors young players over veterans, cheap over expensive. It has brought the club success, but the question is, can they maintain that success in a global soccer market fueled by large amounts of money more so now than ever before? We'll see.

Scott Carson’s Questionable Move to West Bromwich Albion

After yesterday’s posts, I’m sure you all know how much I hate the “silly season” and how I can’t stand to hear the constant gossip and rumor mill concerning player transfers during the summer. Unfortunately, that doesn’t mean I don’t hear or read any of it; it’s everywhere and practically impossible to avoid.

Out of all the goalkeepers I’ve heard being bandied around thus far and/or ones that have already made moves — Brad Friedel, Gomes, Mark Schwarzer, Paul Robinson, Robert Green, etc. — Scott Carson is undoubtedly the best of the bunch. He’s also only 22 years old, and with the widely accepted notion that goalies don’t hit their peaks until their late 20’s/early 30’s, the sky could be the limit for Carson. He’s shown a lot of ability early in his career, and the potential to improve even more is clearly there.

That’s why I was surprised when I, to steal a line from U2 in “Sunday, Bloody Sunday”, heard the news today. Carson signed a four-year contract with West Brom, a newly-promoted team who paid Liverpool $6.5 million for his services, a fee that could rise to $7.5 million based on performance-related criteria.

Carson spent time on loan at Premiership bottom-feeders Sheffield Wednesday and Charlton Athletic before joining Aston Villa for the entirety of last season. As someone who watched Martin O’Neill’s club very often last year, I can tell you with 100% certainty that if it wasn’t for Scott Carson in goal, Villa wouldn’t have finished seventh in the league and be playing in European competitions in ‘08-’09. No one is as high on Ashley Young and Gabriel Agbonlahor, among others, as I am, but if all things were equal and Villa played exactly the same way last year with Stuart Taylor or Thomas Sorensen between the sticks instead of Carson, they’re not even a top-10 team, simple as that.

Carson was very impressive for the Birmingham-based club, probably the best English goalkeeper last season after Portsmouth’s David James, who revived his club and international career with his performances in goal. Carson thrust himself into the senior national team discussion after racking up 29 appearances at the U-21 level, second-most in England’s history.

Everyone remembers his competitive debut for England, when his horrible start allowed Croatia to jump out to a lead they wouldn’t relinquish in do-or-die Euro 2008 qualifier for the Three Lions at Wembley, but I’m not sure why people would expect much more out of a young man being thrust into a high-pressure situation like that for the first time in his life. The truth of the matter is after those early mistakes, he actually played reasonably well for the rest of the game and gave England a chance to overcome the deficit.

West Brom is going to struggle to stay up next year, to say the least. I don’t want to give too much away now regarding my Premiership picks, but suffice it to say that I believe the three teams who got promoted from the Championship last season are going to have a very short stay in England’s top division. Out of those three, West Brom has the best chance to survive, but let’s be honest. Take a look at their squad right now, even with the summer signings that have cost the club $27.5 million, and tell me who, besides Stoke City and Hull City, they can finish ahead of. Fulham? Maybe, but I don’t think so. Wigan? Nope. Sunderland? Not with Roy Keane at the helm.

Look, I understand that Carson had to leave Liverpool. He was never going to be their first-choice keeper, at least not as long as Pepe Reina was there. I get it. But West Brom is not good enough for someone who played basically every game for a European contender (Carson played 35 league games, he was ineligible for the two against Liverpool and missed another due to a red card, I believe) and at 22, established himself as, at the very least, a genuine candidate to be England’s next goalie after James calls it quits. If he would’ve waited just a couple more weeks, a possible player/cash swap involving him and Gareth Barry might’ve been on the cards between Liverpool and Villa.

He’s going to get peppered this year. No longer will he have stalwarts in Martin Laursen and Olof Mellberg ahead of him to win almost every ball in the air. Instead, he’ll have to rely on the likes of Pelé (no, not that one, the one from Cape Verde), Leon Barnett, and Marek Čech to clean up the mess in the back. Please. Give me a break.

I can’t see how this is going to be a good season for Carson and his development, but at least he’ll have plenty of work. I can’t see him staying at West Brom after this season and certainly not if they’re relegated. At that point, I’d expect him to head back to a bigger Premiership club, one that has more to work with.

Joseph Yobo’s Brother Released by Kidnappers

About two weeks ago, I wrote a story about the kidnapping of Norum Yobo, the brother of Everton’s solid center back Joseph Yobo, and how incidents like that involving high-profile African players and their families have become too all-too-common in recent times. While the situation obviously didn’t look too good at the time, the good news was that more often than not, the situation was resolved peacefully — and that’s a relative term — as long as the ransom was paid.

I’m happy to report that Norum was released last night and is back safely with his family, all according to Joseph’s personal manager, John Ola Shittu. Shittu confirmed to kickoffnigeria.com that after spending 12 days in captivity, the majority of which were spent without the two friends who were taken at gunpoint as well, Norum is OK, at least physically. He declined to elaborate on the presumed ransom demand made by the kidnappers and how much of it was paid, but there was no reason for him to do so.

Shittu did, however, release a brief statement:

“On behalf of Joseph and the family, I want to say a big thank you to Everton Football Club. They were very supportive in every way possible, especially the chairman (Bill Kenwright), who was calling on a daily basis to find out how things were progressing.

Joseph is very happy to see (Norum), but he is still down emotionally, still shaken. Right now, he just wants to get himself emotionally ready enough to get set for pre-season training.”

At the end of the day, as much passion as we have for it and as much time as we dedicate to it, soccer is a game. There are more important things to worry about than Cristiano Ronaldo’s transfer gossip or whether Samuel Eto’O will play in Uzbekistan this season. When it comes down to it, those are really only trivial topics and aren’t worth as much publicity as they get. No one I know in the media spent much time at all talking about Norum Yobo and the problems that continue to plague Africa, and this was only one of many life-or-death situations that go on daily and monthly and yearly on that continent.

I’m glad that the Yobo family has now been reunited, and hopefully Joseph, Norum, and Albert (the older brother) can go on with their lives in as normal a fashion as possible. Like I said, this was just one crisis and it’s great that it was averted, and hopefully it can serve to illuminate the ugly underbelly of Africa that much more. We appreciate the terrific talent of African players in Europe, especially in the Premier League, but tend to ignore their backgrounds and the places in which they grew up, and we can’t continue to do that.

TV Schedule for 2008 Big Ten/ACC Challenge

On April 15, I posted the matchups for the 10th annual Big Ten/ACC Challenge, an event won by the ACC every year so far. Member schools from that conference have gone a combined 56-30 over that span, thoroughly dominating their brethren from the Big Ten en route to the Commissioner's Cup.

You can take a look at that post here (http://englishsoccertalk.blogspot.com/2008/04/2008-big-tenacc-challenge.html) for more information about the competition itself, but the complete TV schedule was announced today so I want to get that out there right now.

Once again, all 11 games will be televised -- 2 on ESPNU, 5 on ESPN2, and 4 on ESPN -- and they'll take place during the first three days of December.

As I'm sure you all know by now, I'm a huge Michigan Wolverines fan, and if you didn't know that, trust me, you'll be hearing a lot about them as we get closer to college basketball season. Michigan is a Big Ten school, all of which will be highlighted in bold. Like always, all tipoff times are Eastern.

Monday, Dec. 1
Wisconsin at Virginia Tech (7 PM, ESPN2)

Tuesday, Dec. 2
Ohio State at Miami (FL) (7 PM, ESPN)
Iowa at Boston College (7 PM, ESPNU)
Clemson at Illinois (7:30 PM, ESPN2)
Duke at Purdue (9 PM, ESPN)
Virginia at Minnesota (9:30 PM, ESPN2)

Wednesday, Dec. 3
Indiana at Wake Forest (7:15 PM, ESPN)
Penn State at Georgia Tech (7:30 PM, ESPN2)
**Michigan at Maryland (7:30 PM, ESPNU)**
North Carolina vs. Michigan State (from Ford Field in Detroit) (9:15 PM, ESPN)
Florida State at Northwestern (9:30 PM, ESPN2)

Once again, Michigan's been relegated to ESPNU, which is a relatively big insult in my opinion. Michigan-Maryland should be a much more compelling game than either Penn State-Georgia Tech or Virginia-Minnesota, not to mention Florida State-Northwestern, so frankly I'm a little bit surprised that the TV schedule worked out like this.

The most high-profile matchup is North Carolina-Michigan State, without question. It will be played at Ford Field, home of the NFL's Detroit Lions, but will still basically be as good as a home game for Tom Izzo's Spartans.

UNC will be the #1 ranked team to start the season; there will be no doubting that with the returns of Tyler Hansbrough, Ty Lawson, Danny Green, and Wayne Ellington, and the addition of two highly touted incoming freshman standouts, Tyler Zeller and Ed Davis. The Tar Heels are the clear favorite to win the NCAA Tournament next March, but Michigan State is always tough. This game will surely be a sight to see.

The other big game to keep your eye on is Duke-Purdue. If it was being played at Cameroon Indoor Stadium, the toughest place to play in all of American sports for visiting teams, Duke would likely come out on top, but it isn't. Coached by Matt Painter, Purdue is a team on the rise and will be a contender for the Big Ten title this season. They've been young and successful over the last two seasons, but they're expecting to make the jump to the next level and make a deep run in the Big Dance. Duke is Duke: they were young last year as well and with that season to gel, they'll be back at their usual perch at or near the top in the ACC.

I can't wait for this competition. I think this may just be the Big Ten's year to finally break through, and hopefully Michigan helps their conference pick up a win on the way.

Steven Pienaar is Making a Difference

First off, let me explain why I’ve been lacking on the actual content side of things lately.

I hate the off-season in all sports, but especially so in soccer. There is no other sport with a “silly season” as public and pronounced as soccer. Papers and media outlets with little else to talk about speculate on rumors about where players are headed, who managers want to sign, where managers may take another job, and other similar topics. I read conflicting reports all the time. I see “quotes” from players in one place, go to another, and see something different from that player where he was quoted originally. Gossip and rumors run rampant and to be honest, I’m really not interested in that.

I like to see things confirmed — signed, sealed, and delivered. Sure, I’m game for discussion and debate as to where I think a player will end up and what’s the right fit for that player, but I try not to fall into the trap the media sets to attract readers or sell papers, whatever their medium is.

Take, for example, the Cristiano Ronaldo saga this summer. If I believed everything I saw or heard, he would’ve left for Real Madrid weeks ago. I could care less what Roman Calderon and Ronaldo’s family and David Beckham and Carlos Queiroz have to say. It’s an absolute joke what this man’s life has turned into. It’s a media circus, and nothing has even happened yet one way or another. If you’ve wondered why, unlike some of my colleagues in the blogosphere, I haven’t once touched on this “will he/won’t he” situation, it’s because I try and hold myself to a higher standard than what tabloids and gossip pages have to say, and I just don’t want to take the easy way out and be associated with that style of journalism.

That’s why my summer posting frequency has been rather light and will likely continue to be so until later this month and into August, when I’ll be doing my second annual “20 Teams in 10 Days” preview of the Premiership. Don’t get me wrong, if something happens in the soccer world, especially in England, I’ll cover it and give it its just due, but for the most part, I refuse to get caught up in rumors and half-truths. That’s just a personal choice.

Anyway, now that that rant is over and done with, I want to get back to Everton midfielder Steven Pienaar, who is featured in the short video above. Pienaar is a South African international and has appeared 35 times for his country since making his début in 2002. He was born in Johannesburg, the largest and most populous city in South Africa, and grew up in a small town just outside the city limits. Johannesburg is the country’s economic hub, but like every other big city in the world, it has its problems with crime and also has some poor, run-down districts within.

As Pienaar will explain, he grew up in one of these areas and started playing soccer on a surface that wouldn’t even come close to passing for my elementary school recess field. He understands, as I detailed in my earlier post about Nigeria’s Joseph Yobo and his brother, who was kidnapped, that soccer is basically the only way out athletically for kids in South Africa. These children need to have something that they love to do and is logistically easy to do, because if they don’t, there is a very good chance that they’ll become part of these high crime rate statistics and contribute to Africa’s struggle to develop into a truly 21st-century, modern continent.

Pienaar also talks briefly about the state of the South African national team and how they are looking with the 2010 World Cup, set to be hosted in their country, right around the corner.

Yossi Benayoun's Beautiful Goal Against Tranmere Rovers

Another day, another video clip.

Take a look at Yossi Benayoun's superb curling effort in Liverpool's 1-0 victory over Tranmere yesterday. The Israeli international will be making a push for more playing time in midfield with the likely departure of Xabi Alonso, Ryan Babel's recovery from injury, and Javier Mascherano's absence to play for Argentina in the upcoming Olympics. Goals like this help make a claim for more run-outs.

David James Interview with Shaka Hislop

Well, David James' afro and full beard are still going strong -- in fact, they look better than ever.

Portsmouth's goalkeeper was the best at his position in the Premiership last year, and as he was voted as such by the players in their Team of the Year, it obviously isn't just me who thinks very highly of James. As far as I'm concerned, he can do whatever he likes with his facial hair and the hair on his head as long as he continues to do the job he did last season.

In this interview with ESPNsoccernet's Shaka Hislop, a solid netminder himself in his playing days for several English clubs, including Pompey, and internationally for Trinidad & Tobago, James talks about his disappointment and frustration about England's failure to qualify for Euro 2008, his excitement about the addition of Peter Crouch and the strike duo of Crouch and Jermain Defoe, and addresses the issue of the lack of young goalkeeping talent in England.

It's about 8 minutes long and provides some interesting insight, so I highly recommend that you take a little time out of your day and give it a whirl.

How Carlos Queiroz’s Departure Affects Manchester United

You can’t blame Carlos Queiroz one bit for answering the call from his country. He’s 55 years old, and if he didn’t take this job now, he may never have gotten another chance, especially with Jose Mourinho already on the record as saying he intends to finish his managerial career with the Portuguese national team.

His record in the past as the top man for both club and country has been less-than-stellar, particularly at the senior level. Again, you can’t blame him for seizing this opportunity to prove himself and to show that he can be successful outside of the large shadow of Sir Alex Ferguson.

Queiroz’s acceptance of the Portugal job has left Ferguson without his right-hand man just five weeks before the start of the Premiership season. There are several candidates in-house that will almost assuredly be considered by Ferguson to fill that assistant’s role — Brian McClair and Mike Whelan chief among them — but none that seem to have the same working relationship and mutual understanding that Queiroz and Ferguson have.

Manchester United will be seeking to win their third consecutive Premiership title, a remarkable feat that the club also achieved from 1998-2001. There is no doubt that United wouldn’t be in this position without Cristiano Ronaldo, who has developed into the best player in the world during his tenure at Old Trafford.

Queiroz was largely responsible for convincing Ronaldo to remain at the club after the incident with Wayne Rooney at World Cup 2006 threatened to permanently sour his relationship with English fans. Queiroz visited the star winger in Portugal immediately after that tournament, and the rest (back-to-back league titles and a a Champions League title) is history. Queiroz has also made his best efforts to drive Real Madrid off Ronaldo this summer, accusing the Spanish giants in no uncertain terms of tapping him up and comparing him to Christopher Columbus, who both Spain and Portugal claim sailed for their respective nations. Simply put, it’s well-documented that Ronaldo and Queiroz have a close relationship.

Queiroz, too, played a significant role in Manchester United’s acquisitions of Nani and Anderson, who both speak Portuguese, last summer. Nani is the natural successor to Ronaldo, if and when he does leave, and certainly has a bright future ahead of him. He’ll play more this season than he did last year, allowing the veteran Ryan Giggs to rest and conserve whatever he has left in the tank. Anderson will do the same for Paul Scholes, who simply can’t go box-to-box on a regular basis like he could in his prime. Anderson can, and is the central midfield general that Manchester United is really lacking.

At 66, there’s no way Sir Alex Ferguson is involved with the day-to-day affairs of the club as much as he once was. He can’t be expected to do everything 100% anymore, and that’s not a knock on him, that’s just the natural effects of age. Having Queiroz right by his side allowed Ferguson to concentrate on the big things, delegating the lesser but still important responsibilities to a man who was on the same page as him. Ferguson has also never been known as a master tactician by any means and again, at his age, it’s unclear how up to speed he is with everything else going on in the European game, knowledge that is necessary for United’s Champions League campaigns.

With Queiroz gone, Manchester United will take a hit. He is widely regarded as one of the top, if not the top, assistant managers in the world, and he can’t just be replaced like-for-like. He has significant influence in Portugal, obviously, a country that produces some of the best young players on the continent, which Manchester United has exploited in recent years. He is almost a second father to Ronaldo and while that may not change, his absence from Old Trafford may push Ronaldo over the edge in his desire to play for Real Madrid.

United fans would be unwise to not take this seriously and assume that the train to another Premiership trophy will simply continue full speed. The club has been able to stay at an extraordinary high level after parting ways with several high-profile players in recent years — Roy Keane, David Beckham, Ruud van Nistelrooy, etc. — but I’m not sure they’ll be able to do the exact same without Queiroz at Ferguson’s side. Money can buy you more talent on the field, but it doesn’t work that way with coaches.