Roll up Roll up! The Premier League circus is back in town

With a brand new logo that looks like Simba's passport photo the Premier League is back and with it the circus begins. The narrative has already been decided - this season's trophy is going to one of the Manchester clubs, and the mainstream media are going to make damn well sure of it.

The love-in has already begun and Jose Mourinho has returned to Demi God status despite overseeing Chelsea's worst season start since the Premier League began.

Since the Luis van Gaal era Manchester United have usurped Chelsea and become the Premier League equivalent of the Galacticos. With the 100 million pound spend on Pogba on the horizon potentially taking their total spend to £170 million it's fair to say that United's modus operandi has become spendus maximus. Yet the vast amount of money spent has yielded just one FA Cup. Jose Mourinho might be "the special one" but throwing money at the league will not necessarily bring instant success, as Luis van Gaal will testify.  

If Jose Mourinho is a Demi God then Pep Guardiola has been hailed as a Messiah, and on the face of it his CV matches the hype. But at Barcelona he inherited and maintained a system that was already in place, and at Bayern he inherited a team of superstars that had already won the treble. Manchester City are a different beast; the previous manager did well to win the Premier League and the capital one cup during his time there, but the squad Pep has inherited are older. Not to mention the serious questions about their keeper Joe Hart after his abysmal display in the European Cup.

Meanwhile Leicester, Tottenham and West Ham all had their best seasons last year and have kept hold of key players, their managers, and most importantly their philosophies. Leicester and Tottenham have the league's top scoring strikers in Harry Kane and Jamie Vardy; and West Ham have arguably last season's best player in Dimitri Payet. Although the coming season will be a tougher prospect, another fairytale from any one of these teams shouldn't be discounted.

Follow the Leader?

Follow the Leader?

 This is an article I wrote back in November 2015 after Tottenham's defeat against Newcastle and what a terrific season Moussa Dembele and Eric Dier had for Spurs. In Eric Dier I really believe that Tottenham have a future England capitain in their midst. Enjoy the read.

 Newcastle for the last few seasons have become our bogey team whenever we play them at home; so it could be said that Sunday’s result was on the cards. It also ended a run of 14 games undefeated, in which time we had only conceded 5 goals and had a goal difference of 13. This is testament to Pochettino, who in his 18 months at Spurs has toughened us up somewhat. Teams who play us know that they are in for a full BMF style workout. Pochettino ‘philosophy football’ is in full swing at Spurs and the game against West Ham is where we saw it executed superbly.

Since that glorious game under lights I have noticed that some teams are getting wise to this philosophy and are playing a smarter game. Chelsea, in their managers own words, ‘parked the bus’, West Brom kicked lumps out of us, and Newcastle executed a brilliant game plan.

So what do we need to beat teams like this and break our top four hoodoo? One word - Leadership: Hugo ‘the saviour’ Lloris is our deserved captain, leading by example in a similar vein to Ledley King. But I feel we need someone to take control of the middle park when teams prevent us from playing; someone with a little more experience who can calm down Dele Alli when he gets wound up (have you noticed how frequent this is becoming?), who can guide Carroll (or another academy graduate) through the match, and principally let others in the team know that the opposition have got our number.

So who can do this? In my opinion there are two contenders for this role:

Moussa Dembele An older respected member of the team who has come from the fringes to the forefront. His presence is highly valued by the team, feared by the opponent and adored by the faithful. He has cult hero status; strong, physical, and intelligent in how he reads the game. If he could be more vocal then I believe we would have a midfield General on our hands. His match winning strike against Anderlecht sums up how he can kill a team off when the pressure is on.

Eric Dier The story of how Eric Dier has risen from an underused central defender to defensive midfielder is one to behold, although not entirely unexpected. A graduate from the Sporting Lisbon academy, among alumni Nani, Cristiano Ronaldo, and Luis Figo (to name but a few), he has big game experience and great positional sense due to training in every position throughout his time there. He has passion, hunger and is the engine room of the centre of the park. His powerful strike to level us on the stroke of halftime was fundamental in our 4-1 victory over Man City.

 Pochettino’s Spurs have come a long way in such a short space of time, and I feel that we are on the brink of something special. Come match day, Pochettino can only stand in the technical area and for us to really push on, a leader is required on the pitch so we can finish the job.

It’s a funny old game...The Premier League returns

With the Tottenham V Everton game postponed due to riots in Tottenham you just knew that the opening day of the premier league would be as unpredictable and controversial as well, another riot in Tottenham. Luiz Suarez kicked off proceedings at Liverpool by completely missing a penalty and firing the ball over the crossbar into row Z. Eventually Suarez went on to redeem himself by scoring the first goal in this season’s premier league. Not to be outdone Sunderland’s debutant Seb Larsson scored what must already be the goal of the season with the sweetest volley to make it 1-1 the final score at Anfield.




(Barton Sqaures Up to Arsenal's Debutant Gervinho)


Mean while down in West London QPR’s welcome party was soon in tatters as they were given a 4-0 beating by the 'mighty' Bolton Wonderers. But perhaps the most controversial game of the day has to be between Newcastle and Arsenal. Where not only were there some appalling haircuts on display by Joey Barton & Alex Song. But Joey Barton then decided to take it upon himself to lift Arsenal’s Gervinho off the ground (after he had appeared to have dived in the box) and then ferociously shake him. Gervinho responded by giving Joey Barton a well deserved slap round the face, which saw him sent off and Joey Barton fall to the ground in impeccable theatrical fashion. It goes without saying that a mass bar room brawl between the teams then occurred. This leads me to conclude that if these football players were doing it live on TV in front of millions worldwide, then no-wonder these kids are rioting in the streets... Just take a look at their so called role models.

Are West Ham really better off with Sullivan & Gold?

Today West Ham face a battle for their premier league lives. Regulation looks a given unless they win today.

But could this have all been avoided?

When Sullivan and Gold arrived at their 'boyhood club' it was hailed as a 'homecoming'. They basked in their new found spotlight and they promised to bring immediate changes for the good of the club.

Their first change was to axe Gianfranco Zola a perfectly capable manager who not only kept them in premier league but had the dressing room on side. Indeed Zola is a man well respected in football and in a world full of prima donna's and big ego's he has managed to endear himself to the public as a good, honest nice guy

The hasty decision to replace Zola with Avram Grant has certainly come back to haunt them. You could say that the omens were always there as at glance Avram's C.V doesn't make for good reading, as if West Ham get relegated they will be the second team he's taken down in back to back seasons.

Sullivan and Gold may have had perfectly good intentions when arriving at West Ham. But if they carry on like they are they might find it hard to fill up their brand
new, shiny Olympic Stadium






An Empty stadium awaits West Ham if they get relegated.

Is John Terry really the right man for the job?

Strong, brave, passionate, vocal it’s a no brainer he’s perfect for the job right? However this is also the man who will happily sleep with his fellow team mates girlfriend, which is hardly an attribute that will unite the England dressing room.

As much as we all like a Roy of the rovers captain that will pump is fists in the air and throw his body on the line. This is surely a terrible decision by Capello who Less than a year ago removed the captaincy from Terry due to his off the field antics and now he seems to giving it straight back to him on a plate.

All this has come at the expense of Rio Ferdinand, who in the last few months has endeared himself to the public due mainly to his mass presence on social networking site twitter. As at present he has a following of 659,179 fans. With many admiring him as he comes across as a down to earth, calm and responsible guy. Surely this is the man we want at the helm? Granted he was banned from international football for missing a drugs test, but he has served his ban and gone on to become the Man United captain and is very much respected figure in the game.

With many fans and pundits still fuming after England’s shambolic exit from the World Cup Fabio Capello would be wise to reconsider his current candidate of choice.

Arise Sir Redknapp?

I must confess that when Harry Redknapp (above) first came to Spurs I wasn’t exactly doing back flips with celebration or hailing the new messiah. On the contrary I felt that we could have maybe found someone with more winning credentials and a higher success rate in terms of winning trophies. Not to mention the fact that he comes across a bit dodgy and the term ‘brown paper bag’ is a phrase often coined when our ‘Arry is around.

However this all changed within two minutes when I saw his first press interview at Spurs. The passion and enthusiasm shown was something I hadn’t seen in a Spurs manager since Terry Venables and like Venables he came across as someone who can motivate players and get the best out of them.


At the time of his appointment Spurs were looking like relegation fodder, languishing at the bottom of the Premier League and to quote a typical Harry phrase

‘We had just 2 points from 8 games’

Within two weeks of his arrival we had beaten Bolton, dragged ourselves out of relegation and came back from 4-2 down to draw 4-4 against Arsenal in an epic game at the emirates.

Fast forward on to today, Spurs have progressed on to the Quarter Finals of the champions league. Having knocked out AC Milan and beating the champions Inter Milan in the process and in turn cheeky chappy Harry has become the first English manager to get this far in the worlds best club tournament. This feat has brought on heavy speculation that he will be the next England manager and although I’d hate to see him leave the lane, I think that he fully deserves it

Now this is by no means an ‘Ode to Redknapp’ but surely he deserves some sort of acknowledgment for what he has done so far. As nowadays good English managers are a dying breed and what Harry Redknapp has done at Spurs has put him up there with the best of them.

Crazy Italian pundits

If this isn't bias jornalism then I don't know what is.

The reaction to Tottenham's Goal and Milan's disallowed goal is priceless

and desereves an oscar!

Enjoy!

Gennaro 'The Clown' Gattuso

Before I watched Tuesday night’s game I held the view that Italian football was
Classy, technical, sophisticated and even as Ruud Gullit would say ‘sexy’ but after Gattuso’s performance against Spurs this view has quickly been diminished.

Hacking up players willy nilly and almost foaming at the mouth Gattuso behaviour was more like one of those crazy Looney tunes character rather than a critically a acclaimed football player. Indeed wearing his red and black jersey comparisons to an overgrown Dennis the Menace from 80’s comic ‘The Beano’ would not be far off the Mark. His final display of petulance came with a flying head butt to Tottenham’s assistant manager Joe Jordan which to be fair probably did more Gattuso damage than Joe as Joe didn’t even seem to batter an eyelid.

Albeit Gattuso’s has gone on to apologise, can Michel Platini and his cronies at UEFA HQ really tolerate this sort of behaviour? As if this was to happen in the terrace or even the streets Gattuso could have found himself up in the dock on a GBH charge.

Premiership Phycho

Now, I don’t normally do book reviews, but when I stumbled upon Premiership Psycho by C.M Taylor I thought what hell. A fantastic book, which had me hooked from start to finish. What I liked the most is that it was not the usual rags to riches tripe that we have become accustomed to in football books\films


On the contrary, far from being a 'Roy of the Rovers' type good guy, the main character 'Kev King' is an arrogant, paranoid serial killer who also happens to be a top footballer living the highlife in his cosy Essex pad. His girlfriend is a celebrity wag and his agent is a dodgy as Arthur Daley.

A very, funny and clever book that manages to expose the nonsensical, celebrity lifestyle of a top footballer while at the same time revealing the dark inside thoughts of a serial killer

A must read for football fans and will have you howling with laughter on your daily commute

Transfer madness

Ah the January transfer window. It never fails to disappoint with a total of 215 million spent in just 31 days, this could have helped George Osborne get us out of this financial mess that we are in. Alas the money was spent on overpaid footballers

Shock buy of the window has to be the 35 million quid spent on Andy Caroll. But perhaps even more shocking is that he arrived in Merseyside in a chopper which is something that Barack Obama would have been proud of.

While Andy Carroll was getting out of ‘ze choppa’, Fernando Torres was bombing it down the M1 to wrap up his ‘dream’ move to Chelsea for a bargain price of just 50 million! Abromovich, again flexed his financial muscle by splashing a further 21.3 million on David Luiz taking their total spending up to a mere 71.3 million.

Not to be outdone the sheiks at Man City Spent another 20 million on Wolfsburg hit man Edin Dzeko, while Spurs had a cheeky bid for Phil Neville rejected.

Whether these players go on to prove themselves and help their teams win the league is remains to be seen, as currently the top two teams in the premier league Manchester United and Arsenal haven’t spent a thing. This may go to show that spending ridiculous amounts of money on marquee players won’t necessarily win you the league.



(35 Million Pound man Andy Carroll with new manager Kenny Dagliesh)

Keys takes a hike

With Andy Gray gone, Richards Keys (above) has followed his old pal and left Sky Sports...To be honest it was about time too as had this saga continued any longer it would have surely ruined what little integrity there is left in the game.

Listening back to the comments about Female Referee Cian Massey and seeing some of the footage. I got the impression that these two had become complacent and somewhat caught in their own hype. Granted they have done an excellent job, but this doesn’t give them the right to have such an abhorrent attitude towards women in the game. The comments were like something from the 80’s …..50’s even where men were men and women stayed at home and ironed

Only 20 years ago we were having the same debate about race, black football players were seen as incapable, lazy and too aggressive and faced torrid abuse from the terraces, but they continued and persevered and went on to prove that they are just as good as their white colleagues and players like Ian Wright, John Barnes, Paul Ince
and Andy Cole have gone on to become house hold names and hold legendary status at their respective clubs.

The comments from Keys and Gray were no different from what we were hearing 20 years ago and I know some may argue that this is just a bit of banter, but if these guys had stayed at sky sports then it would have sent out a statement that this sort of behaviour is accepted. Don’t get me wrong this is not a crusade. But times have changed and sky sports who have moved on with their all singing and dancing technology (3D Broadcasting) need to do the same with their attitude towards women.

The Magic of the FA Cup

Ah the FA cup, that quirky, old fashioned, cup competion that gives hope and a day out to all clubs that take part in it.

This was certainly the case for Charlton Athletic fans. The N-Power league 1 outfit had a F.A Cup clash against their London rivals Tottenham Hotspur and they were going to enjoy every minute.

Running late for my train to see the game I jumped on the first carriage available at Liverpool Street which was packed full of Charlton fans in Party mode.Their optimism was sky high and the banter was thick and fast with one fan claiming that the score would be 5-0 while another shouted excitedly ‘ there’s only one team in London’.

To be fair Charlton gave a good account of themselves in the first half of the game.
This I believe was down to the downright loyal support of their fans who managed to out sing the spurs fans. Every time a Charlton player had a shot on goal the Charlton fans were at a delirium. And the half time score of 0-0 had Charlton fans singing there hearts out

10 minutes into the second half Charlton were 3-0 down but this didn’t stop the Charlton fans oh no, chants of Charlton ’til I die were relentless and the fans never lost hope. 10 minutes later it was 3-0 to Spurs. The Charlton didn’t even batter an eye lid at this and proceeded to sing ‘we gonna win 4-3’


Alas Charlton went on to lose 3-0. But as they Charlton fans clapped off their team with a standing ovation it dawned on methat this really what the FA CUP and supporting your team is all about just enjoying the experience for what it is win or lose

Up the Addicks!

Bent to Villa

Now When I heard about this I nearly knocked over my cup of tea, not only because it came from completely of the blue but the fact that someone was actually willing to pay 24 Million! Darren Bent will indeed prove to be a good signing for Villa and may yet prove to be a shrewd move for Gerard Houller. But the question is … If the premier leagues most in form player (Rafeal Van Der Vaart) was brought for 8 Million is Darren Bent really worth 24?



The Million Dollar Man

The Yeah Game

Can you guess How many times this Chelsea fan says yeah?


send all answers in on a postcard yeah!

Premier League result of the week

Newcastle 3 Liverpoo1 1

Newcastle finally managed to get it right where it matters the most, the pitch.
Their 3-1 beating of Liverpool FC put an end to a turbulent week at the club which left them 8th in the league and just 5 points off a European qualification place.

Although this was an impressive victory for Newcastle, Liverpool were abysmal. Their performance was lacklustre and they looked just a shadow of the team that has won 5 European cups and 18 League titles. Their star player ‘Fernando Torres’ emphasised this as he failed to convert his half hearted attempts on goal. Newcastle on the other were a sharper, stronger and a more compact unit. They raced into the league within 15 mins with a 'Kevin Nolan' free kick which instantly relieved some of the pressure on Newcastle new manger Alan Pardew.

Kuyt equalized on the 49th min to give Liverpool some hope and it was looked like Liverpool might nick an away point despite Newcastle being the better team. But all hope was put to bed when unlikely hero ‘Joey Barton’ struck on the 80th minute to put Newcastle 2-1 up. Andy Caroll then put Liverpool out of their misery with a possible candidate for gaol of the season with a blinding shot from 20 yards to make it 3-1 to the magpies


Andy Carroll Celebrates his stunning strike

Catch of the Day

if carlsberg did football celebrations then.....

Looney Toons

The saying goes that 'nice guys finish last' and this has certainly been the case for for Ex Newcastle Manager Chris Hughton, who he has become the first premier league manager to get the sack this season.

Having lead Newcastle into the Premier League as winners of the Championship (Divison one) Chris Houghton has quietly stamped his mark on the club. At present they sit tenth in the Premier League and have been victorious against Arsenal(away) as well as giving Aston Villa a 6-0 beating at home. I’ll be the first to admit I'm not one of Newcastle's biggest fans as I just can not fathom the hype that surrounds the club,however with Chris there I was beginning to warm to them. I was even starting like to their joke of a chairman Mike Ashely

But in true Newcastle form the club have embarrassed themselves by making this awful decision. Granted, Chris wouldn’t have won them the league but at least he brought them stability and substance which is something Newcastle have lacked since their messiah’s (Kevin Keegans') first stint.

This could turn out to be a masterstroke by Newcastle but in the meantime the saga that is the ‘Toon Army’ continues.




Chris Hughton looks up to the sky in disbelief.

Don't mess with Redknapp

Rule number 1: Never call Harry Redknapp a Wheeler Dealer!



on

All hail Gareth Bale!

just in case you missed it ... here is another chance to see Gareth Bale's awesome hatrick against Inter Milan

Enjoy!

AEK Athens

I went to Athens recently and found a new team to support. My friend told me they are not the best team but I support Tottenham Hotspur FC so what’s new? Apparently they don’t have a ground and the fans are rowdy (they were banned from their Europa cup game again Dundee UTD), but I don’t care I just like their logo so I brought a lighter and key ring home. Next time I will by their shirt, maybe they can play in the football stadium used for the Olympics? But judging by the below video it’s probably not a good idea.