World Cup Corner

Holland Under-21s sliced open their inept Serbian counterparts to register a 4-1 win, thus retaining the European U-21 Championship crown. Played in front of a 20,000 boisterous crowd, and watched by millions more worldwide, the Dutch have shown that they current possess the best and brightest young guns in Europe.

Maceo Rigters picked up the golden boot for Holland by scoring his fourth goal of the tournament. Sadly for 10 men Serbia, the damage had already been inflicted by Otman Bakkal and Ryan Babel.

Along with Rigters, Royston Drenthe and Ryan Babel are currently heavily linked with big summer transfer moves. Drenthe (player of the tournament) in particular has caught the eye of Newcastle’s new manager Sam Allardyce, so a move the Premiership seems inevitable.

One of the most watched teams this year was England, with several quality players such as Nigel Reo-Coker of West Ham, Steven Taylor and James Milner of Newcastle and Leroy Lita of Reading managed to keep up that old English tradition. Failing in the knockout stages to penalties. Along with the Dutch, I was expecting England to go all the way.

But the glory and prestige has stayed with the Netherlands. Who can be very proud of this young bunch of future stars. Those boys are a bit special!

If you are part of the football circle then you have probably heard of the word catenaccio, which means “dead-bolt” or “lock” in literal terms but it is interpreted as a very bad word referring to Italian football from the ‘60s and ‘70s that was negative at best. There are some tactical lessons to be learned from Catenaccio and any soccer coach should take these into consideration. However, Catenaccio can be a very good strategy to use for defense when it is correctly performed. In fact, the result of implementing Catenaccio may be one of the very best defensive strategies that exist in football. There is of course one good reason why Catenaccio isn’t liked by many soccer fans and that is as simple as the strategy keeps the other team from scoring.
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So another exciting Premiership season has come to an end. Congratulations to Manchester United for snatching the crown away from Chelsea. I think this finally lends credence to the old saying that “You cant buy the title”. Football winners are always about mentatlity, hunger, tactics and teamwork. While it certainly helps to have the best players, it doesn’t always translate into winners. Real Madrid and Chelsea are 2 very good examples. Here are the top 10 best signings of the 06/07 season that have made an impact on the English game.

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Sven Goran Eriksson, the previous manager of the English national team has declared his interest in the vacant Newcastle managerial post. Days after Glenn Roder has resigned, there has been intense speculation as to who will be the next toon boss. The current front runner is Sam Allardyce, although the likes of Alan Shearer, Mark Hughes, Juande Ramos have also been bandied around.

Sven’s agent, Athole Still told PA Sport: ‘There has been no contact whatsoever, but if Newcastle were interested in Sven-Goran Eriksson, I am sure Sven-Goran Eriksson would be interested in talking to Newcastle.’

My thoughts about this is that while Sven can show an impressive CV with regards to managing clubs, he is still seen as a source of embarrassing controversy (countless scandals during his England reign) as well as needing a large transfer budget to develop his squad. Thanks but no thanks Sven. I`ll much rather go for Allardyce or even Gerrard Hollieur. It’s time Newcastle steps away from the front page for all the wrong reasons.

Congratulations to Manchester United for wrestling the Premiership crown away from Chelsea to become the 2006/2007 champions of England. While I dislike both teams, given the choice between the two, I`d have to say the Man Utd were worthy winners. Chelsea with it’s unbelieveably deep pockets and extremely negative style of football will have to be content with the League Cup and possibly the FA Cup. The main standouts for Man Utd were Cristiano Ronaldo (who eventually swept all the domestic individual awards), Wayne Rooney, Paul Scholes and Ryan Giggs. The latter two of course enjoying somewhat of an indian summer and bringing much needed experience to the squad.

Didier Drogba of Chelsea and Ivory coast has been named the 2006 African Footballer of the Year on Thursday, beating out Samuel Eto’o of Barcelona, who would have won his 4th consecutive award.

Drogba, 28, is a first time winner and was captain of Ivory Coast when they reached the African Nations Cup final but lost out on penalties to Egypt. The Ivorians also participated in the 2006 World Cup tournament, where they made a good showing of themselves.

Full List of African Nations Awards:
African Footballer of the Year: Didier Drogba (Chelsea and Ivory Coast)
Team of the Year: Ghana
Club of the Year: Al Ahli (Egypt)
Coach of the Year: Manuel Jose (Al Ahli, Egypt)
Young African Player of the Year: Taye Taiwo (Olympique Marseille and Nigeria)
African club competition Player of the Year: Mohamed Aboutrika (Al Ahli, Egypt)
Women’s Footballer of the Year: Cynthia Uwak (Nigeria).

The Vatican is preparing to fight it out with priests in Rome…. over a game of soccer.

February 2007 marks the inaugural Clericus Cup, and the Vatican has registered to be one of the participating 16 teams. The final will take place in the Italian capital of Rome at the end of June.
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Romario. One of the deadliest strikers of all time. No tricks, no flicks, no lung bursting runs, no hardman tackles. Just a simple knack of being at the right place at the right time. It would be fair to say that he is the greatest finisher of his generation. The apex of that wonderful Brazillian team that won USA 94.

At 40 years of age and his prime years behind him, Romario made the shock transfer to play for Miami FC in the United Soccer Leagues, the US second division.

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Fabio Cannavaro and Marta were named FIFA World Player and FIFA Women’s World Player for the year 2006, following a poll of national coaches and captains.

Canavaro collected 498 points in the vote, in which 165 national coaches and 165 national team captains took part. France’s Zinedine Zidane (454), FIFA Player of the Year in 1998, 2000 and 2003, was second. Last year’s winner Ronaldinho (380), who has already triumphed twice, came in third.

Among the women, 20-year-old Marta, with 475 points, recorded a win over, Kristine Lilly (388) from the USA and Renate Lingor (305) from Germany.

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For the fifth time, Brazil have been crowned FIFA Team of the Year, leaving this year world champions Italy at the second place.

After the total of 788 international matches played this year, the top 10 teams on FIFA/Coca-Cola World Ranking are:

1. Brazil 1588
2. Italy 1560
3. Argentina 1551
4. France 1523
5. England 1359
6. Germany 1350
7. Netherlands 1305
8. Portugal 1258
9. Nigeria 1244
10. Czech Republic 1190

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