The final day - 70th minute update

Shevchenko forces me to eat my words. He scores at the Bridge. Chelsea are equal on points with United, but behind by 17 goals.
Reading are having a rocking good outing at Derby. 3-0, and they have done all they can today to ensure survival. Fulham can still pour cold water on such hopes by scoring […]

The final day - 60th minute update

Morten Gamst Pedersen scores for Blackburn. Birmingham are almost surely in next season’s Championship.
Cristiano Ronaldo delivers a top-draw free-kick, but Kirkland does even better to keep Wigan’s deficit to just one.
Michael Owen pulls one back at Goodison Park. A penalty. Everton are still favorites to wrest the UEFA Cup spot from Aston Villa.
Blatant penalty for […]

The final day - Half-time update

At half time, Manchester United lead Wigan by one goal and Chelsea by two points (and 18 goals). The Sky Sports commentator is still harping on about a ball that hit Rio Ferdinand’s shoulder. The replays suggest even the Wigan players did not seem interested.
Boro have doubled their lead over Sven Goran Eriksson’s Man City, […]

United!!!

Emerson Boyce brings down Rooney for a clear penalty.
Ronaldo sends Kirkland the wrong way, and more importantly, sends the ball the right way - goal-ward! Number 31 might just be enough to see the champions retain their title.
Elsewhere, Birmingham have the lead, but that might not be enough for the Blues. Everton are in pole […]

The final day - 30th minute update

Villa pull one back at Upton Park. Boro are ahead against Man City.
Ronaldo takes an excellent free kick, but Chris Kirkland does well to save it. Clearly, Wigan are in it for the fight.
Theo Walcott scores for Arsenal at Sunderland’s Stadium of Light. How lucky Roy Keane’s men don’t have to fight Arsenal on the […]

The final day - 15th minute update

West Ham lead Villa 1-0. This is a blow to Martin O’Neill’s UEFA Cup place chasing side.
Reading score at Derby County to move out of the relegation zone.
Paul Scholes receives a yellow card for a routinely mistimed tackle.
John Terry is injured and is replaced by Juliano Belletti.

Premier League - the final day

The final day’s actions in the FA Premier League starts in a few minutes. The big news from the JJB Stadium is that Wayne Rooney is back at the head of Manchester United. I expect United to win 3-0.
The relegation fight could be just as interesting. Promises to be a fabulous day.

Avram Grant

In trying to suggest stupid things with a view to change the rules after the game has been played, Avram Grant seems no different from Hillary Clinton.
Chelsea, the football club that is, are so boring this season, in that both their football and their manager are boring. At least when Jose Mourinho was around, folks […]

Relegation battle 2007-08

While the 2007-08 season has been one of the closest fought in recent years in the Premier League with regard to the top three, the relegation battle has been terribly interesting as well.
This isn’t new. A couple of seasons ago, we witnessed Bryan Robson’s West Brom miraculously survive the relegation dog-fight by jumping from 20th […]

Park Ji-Sung: the new Damien?

Thinking about yesterday’s game, it is tough not to make a particular comparison. I have already alluded to how Park Ji-Sung, the Korean midfielder was a lion on the pitch against Barcelona. The following video, a compilation of some of Park’s contributions last night, reiterates that view.
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Cometh the hour… cometh Man United!

In 1999, when Manchester United were playing the second leg of their semi-final tie versus Juventus away at the Stadio Delle Alpi, it required their captain Roy Keane to produce arguably the best performance ever by a player wearing United’s colours to propel them into the final at the Nou Camp. Keane has moved on. […]

IPL, EPL, UCL

The Super Kings beat the Deccan Chargers to extend their run to 4 games! Rock on, Chennai!
Lefties & T20
Selva has an interesting observation about whether left-handed batsmen have an advantage in Twenty20 cricket. One possible explanation, if this hypothesis were found true, is that most bowlers are naturally suited to bowl to right handers. In […]

Emile Heskey!

While United are still rejoicing over Owen Hargreaves’ free kick, Emile Heskey turns home a cross to hand Chelsea a draw that is just as good as a defeat! Four games to go; five points ahead; the title seems to fit ever so snugly into United’s bag.

A free-kick, frozen in time and space

In cricket, so often we see a shot played when the ball races to the fence, and no one needs to move - not the batsmen, nor the fielders. Often we hear commentators say, “Ah, a stand and deliver shot! No one moved.”
In football, one hardly comes across such moments. The game is always in […]

United

Rafael Benitez, the Liverpool manager, said earlier this week that Javier Mascherano was the new Roy Keane. In attempting to live up to his manager’s expectations, the Argentinian failed rather badly, by evoking only the bad side of the former United captain. Mascherano got himself sent off in the first half.
Liverpool fans would have you […]

United draw Roma again

Last week, I had ended a post looking forward to the Champions League draws by predicting that United could draw Roma again in the quarterfinals of the Champions League this year. And that this would settle all doubts about whether the draws are doctored. Surely now, this confirms everything.
The pick of the draw though is […]

Giant-killing weekend

The pain of enduring Portsmouth knock United out of the FA Cup was allayed by watching Barnsley dump Chelsea out of the competition a few hours later. But it was joy unbounded today as Wigan held Arsenal to a draw, so United retake the League by battering the Rams next weekend!
Portsmouth can now be called […]

Champions League 2007-08

For the second successive year, English teams are meeting with increased success in the UEFA Champions League. United, Arsenal and Chelsea are through already to the quarterfinals, and Liverpool look set to join them in a week’s time.
While English football, in general, is moving from one crisis to another (the national side’s poor form, a […]

Avram Grant

Avram Grant is one of the stories of the season in English football.
Most people expected Chelsea to implode after Jose Mourinho’s acrimonious departure from the club. On the contrary, Grant has been some kind of a calming influence at Stamford Bridge, with only two losses and five draws in the League since taking over from […]

Clinical

Manchester United’s ripping apart of Arsenal in the fifth round of the FA Cup today is the kind of clinical performance that has been lacking from the Reds over the past fortnight. With Ronaldo and Giggs not even featuring on the teamsheet, and Scholes, Tevez and Saha on the bench, United’s task seemed tougher than […]