Reuters Soccer Blog

Soccer Break Friday – R.I.P FA Cup?

When I was in a French campsite in the 1990s a Dutchman caught wind of the fact I was English and immediately asked “Do you know the scores in the FA Cup semi-finals?”

Ask most football fans about what day in the season they looked forward to the most in the past and the FA Cup would have often topped the list, but the grand old competition is on the wane.

This year, four Premier League fixtures will be played before the trophy-starved Manchester City and Stoke City take to the Wembley turf for a shot at glory, the irony being Manchester United could clinch the league title about 20 minutes before their bitter city rivals try to win their first piece of silverware since 1976.

Is this farcical and disrespectful to the FA Cup or a sign the times-are-a-changin’? Money rather than trophies seems to rule modern football, so it’s no surprise to see the lucrative Champions League taking over as the ‘must win’ competition.

Off the pitch the red half of Manchester had a pleasing day after announcing their revenue was up by 30 per cent. The Red Devils roll on.

Over to the ongoing FIFA corruption scandal, and president Sepp Blatter has written a letter to Italian newspaper Gazzetta dello Sport about his re-election bid on June 1. 

The talk in Africa is that one of the executive members embroiled in the affair, Issa Hayatou, should step down from his role as one of African football’s most influential figures. Agree?

Soccer Break Tuesday

Short and sweet today with little news on Monday and plenty of action to look forward to this week.

Manchester United will look to stretch their Premier League lead against Newcastle United on Tuesday, though will their Wembley antics distract them? ‘A hole lot of trouble for United’ read one headline.

The week’s big game, big being an understatement, is Real Madrid v Barcelona in the Spanish King’s Cup final. Jose Mourinho, silent before last Saturday’s ‘clasico’ which prompted a walkout by media in protest, has a tactical dilemma. Play with caution and risk the wrath of former club great Alfredo Di Stefano or attack and risk a hammering from Barcelona’s slick forwards.

What would you suggest the Portuguese coach does?

A recap of the past few days looks at Villarreal’s push for Champions League football next season in La Liga after Monday’s 1-0 win over Real Zaragoza, and the usually dogged Stoke City’s five, yes five, goal FA Cup semi-final win on Sunday against Bolton Wanderers who are enjoying a great season in the Premier League.

To round off the best of Tuesday’s reads, Toronto is being hailed as the new ‘epicentre’ of Canadian soccer and click here for a debate on developing youth talent.

Finally, which is your favourite stadium? Browse this site for venue reviews and post your thoughts on grounds you have visited. The Nou Camp in Barcelona does pretty well.

Soccer Break Friday – Clasico fever rises

Only one day to go now until Real Madrid face Barcelona in La Liga for the first of four ‘clasicos’ between Saturday and May 3. Excited? You will be now…

Barcelona destroyed their fierce domestic rivals 5-0 in November, and although the gap at the top of La Liga remains difficult for Real to peg back, they looked a very difficult team to beat against Tottenham Hotspur in the Champions League quarter-finals.

So, Real to narrow the gap, Barcelona to cut through Jose Mourinho’s men, or an edgy draw?

A former Real player David Beckham knows all about the drama of Barcelona meetings, and the England man is in the news in the MLS. Here’s a wrap of other games. Oh and here’s another Beckham story, it appears Fulham aren’t the only ones making statues of famous people.

On Thursday it was Portugal’s night in the Europa League, where three team progressed to the semi-finals. Villarreal took the fourth spot for a truly Iberian domination of Europe’s second tier competition.

This weekend in England there’s the FA Cup semi-finals and Manchester City’s time is surely now. Lose to Man Utd and manager Roberto Mancini could face a nervous wait to see whether he retains his job for next season. Triumph and they will face either Stoke City or Bolton Wanderers in the final, which you would have to fancy them to win.

One fan hoping for a Bolton victory has flown in from Australia, read more here.

Soccer Break Monday

Good day everyone and welcome to a new week. Following a great weekend of footballing action and with so much at stake over the next few days in Europe, there is plenty to discuss.

Let’s begin with a look at the FA Cup quarter-finals, and please add the weekend of April 16/17 to your diaries as the Manchester derby will make its way to Wembley for the semi-finals while Stoke face Bolton.

There was drama in Spain (see photo), Barcelona’s thriller in Sevilla ending 1-1 to see their La Liga lead cut to five points.

Could Real yet pip them to the title? And will Real’s highly sought after coach Jose Mourinho remain at the club?

This is a huge week for the Madrid side, who play Olympique Lyon for a place in the Champions League quarter-finals. If statistics are your thing, read on here for the low down ahead of the four last 16 second leg ties this week.

Another two clubs badly in need of a last eight spot, are holders Inter Milan and 2010 runners-up Bayern Munich who were drawn together in the last 16. Will Bayern give their coach Louis van Gaal an end to the season to remember after the Dutchman announced last week he would leave at the end of the season?

The news that dominated the weekend was of course the devastating earthquake and tsunami in Japan. Sport, in particular football, is doing its best to bring some cheer to the people, in however small a way.

Soccer Break Friday

Friday. That means almost weekend. Which means yet more football. When does it ever stop? We don’t want it to though, especially with some cracking FA Cup games in store as well as Europe’s top sides slugging it out in their respective leagues.

First however, here’s our take on the Europa League action on Thursday. Some nicely poised ties, though it was not a good night for Liverpool or Manchester City, or Mario Balotelli for that matter.

This blog argues Balotelli is damaging his Man City career. What do you think? Balotelli is undoubtedly talented, just not consistent enough. Perhaps time will tell.

As for Liverpool, the Europa League is their only realistic chance of silverware this season. Was it disappointing to see so little urgency at the start of the game? Or do you feel the league match against Manchester United took a great deal out of Kenny Dalglish’s men?

For any Liverpool fans, would you prefer to have a storming end of the season in the league and finish in the top four (thus guaranteeing a chance to qualify for the Champions League) or win the Europa League? Have a read here for all things Anfield.

Over to my colleagues now to give their expert previews on all things Europe, from La Liga to Serie A then Ligue 1 to the Bundesliga.

Finally, the FA Cup. Still the greatest cup competition out there? Debatable, but for all his medals at Man United, midfielder Michael Carrick badly wants to raise the famous old trophy aloft.

Everton and Moyes running out of options

By James Illingworth

Sympathy for the plight of their rivals may be kept to an absolute minimum by the red and blue halves of Liverpool but even the staunchest of Kopites should spare a thought for David Moyes.

Having seen his side claim partial revenge for their 2009 FA Cup final defeat by knocking Chelsea out on penalties last month, Moyes could not prevent first division Reading ending Everton’s cup run in the fifth round on Tuesday.

Forced to operate a sell-before-you-buy policy and with the club failing to attract investment, the 47-year-old Scot is beginning to cut an increasingly frustrated figure.

“We let the supporters down tonight, we didn’t play well enough and we got what we deserved,” Moyes told Everton’s website. “We didn’t have enough, enough craft, enough guile to break them down. I thought we did try to take the initiative but we weren’t good enough.”

Without star performers Tim Cahill and Marouane Fellani, whose ankle injury will keep him out for the rest of the season, the Blues’ limited squad was exposed against Reading.

They remain a team capable of matching any side on their day, but without significant investment, Everton will surely stay on the fringes of the Premier League’s top teams.

Chambery’s French passion underlines renaissance of domestic cups

Fifth division Chambery’s stunning win over top-flight Sochaux to reach the French Cup quarter-finals has got a lot of people talking and I think it’s fair to say domestic cup competitions around Europe are enjoying a bit of a resurgence.

As this week proved with other games, Cup shocks are nothing new in France – something I knew before moving to Paris on Monday — but the fact newspapers and fans are stilll excited about Chambery’s run speaks volumes.

A packed little stadium for a game played in the midweek afternoon, a huge front page picture in L’Equipe and non-soccer fans mentioning the win in lifts all go to show that there is still magic in the Cup.

The FA Cup in England has taken a bit of a battering over recent years but minor league side Crawley Town being drawn at Manchester United in the fifth round and moneybags Manchester City needing 30 million pound striker Edin Dzeko to salvage a draw at third division Notts County has brought back a lot of romance.

In Italy, where the Italian Cup has been derided for years, top teams are suddenly playing their main sides in the competition and not rotating.

This is partly because of unusually stretched squads this season due to injuries but also Inter Milan’s treble last term showed how important the Cup could sometimes be. It’s also getting tight at the top of Serie A for Champions League places so a Europa League berth through the Cup could be very handy.

Real Madrid and Barcelona have been taking the King’s Cup very seriously and their predictable meeting in the final will be billed as one of the biggest ever battles between them given there is direct silverware at stake.

Kenny makes cute move in turning to Clark

Kenny Dalgish resisted the temptation to surround himself with Liverpool “old boys” on Monday when Steve Clarke was named as first team coach at Anfield.

It was an astute decision by Dalglish to hire his fellow Scot whose background work at Chelsea as assistant to the high-profile Jose Mourinho was a factor in the London club’s back to back titles in 2005 and 2006.

Liverpool fans were probably expecting some familiar faces to re-appear in the fabled Liverpool boot room, and that may still happen as the list of former players offering their views on the way forward is a long one.

It was hardly the return Dalglish would have wanted at Manchester United in the FA Cup on Sunday as his side went down 1-0 to a dubious penalty and had talismanic skipper Steven Gerrard shown a straight red card for a reckless tackle.

However, Dalglish will know that the important work starts on Wednesday when Liverpool travel to Blackpool for a re-arranged Premier League fixture that was snowed off when Roy Hodgson was still in charge.

That match will tell Dalglish much more about the challenge he faces in the next few months.

With Gerrard soon suspended and Jamie Carragher injured, he will want to see some backbone from some of the club’s senior players. Fernando Torres has too often “gone missing” this season and Dalglish will expect the Spaniard to show the same workrate he praised him for against United.

Liverpool have been here before, and a sacking may not be the answer

“For 25 years Liverpool were Britain’s most successful and consistent football club. For four of those years we were also the most successful club in Europe. No one has an automatic right to success but you can be sure we will all be doing everything in our power to achieve those levels again. We owe that both to our own supporters and our own history.”

The above quotation* is from the statement released by then Liverpool chairman David Moores following the resignation of Graeme Souness in January, 1994 after an embarrassing defeat to a second division club in a third round FA Cup replay.

Plus ça change, eh?

Liverpool have tried everything over the past 16 years to regain their status as England’s top club. They tried reviving the spirit of the Boot Room by appointing Roy Evans, looked outwards to the more technical and pragmatic Gerard Houllier and when that didn’t work out chose the coach with the best club track record they could find in Rafa Benitez, the man whose Valencia team had impressed management and senior players so much.

There have been successes along the way … the Houllier treble, Istanbul and a handful of other trophies but no league title since the days of Kenny Dalglish. Put simply, Liverpool are no closer to regaining their status as “Britain’s most successful and consistent football club” than when Souness waved farewell to Ray Houghton, Steve McMahon and Peter Beardsley and failed to bring in players with anything like the same quality.

So what next? Speculation is growing that the club may turn to Dalglish as an emergency short-term replacement for Benitez but Mssrs Hicks and Gillett would do well to consider whether a costly change would really help the club or just give the media another twist to a story they are telling with some relish.

from UK News:

Share your memories of Sir Bobby Robson

The death of Sir Bobby Robson, England's most successful manager after Sir Alf Ramsey, had been expected given his long battle with cancer, but his passing still jolts.

The son of a miner, Robson's career was characterised by dignity, loyalty and hard graft and no little success.

As a player he won 20 England caps, but it was as an innovative manager that he will be best remembered, notably his success in guiding England to a World Cup semi-final in 1990, when his side came agonisingly close to reaching the final.

Before his stint with the national team, Robson managed Ipswich for 13 years, guiding the Suffolk club to FA and UEFA Cup success and twice led the Portman Road side to the runners-up spot in the old First Division.

At Ipswich, Robson brought in two Dutch players -- Arnold Muhren and Franz Thijssen -- who helped forge Ipswich's reputation as a passing side playing attractive and enterprising football.

After stepping down as England manager in 1990, Robson then went to Holland, where he managed PSV Eindhoven, before going on to coach Sporting Lisbon and Porto in Portugal and then Barcelona in Spain.

While he was at Barca he helped to preside over the development of the Brazilian striker Ronaldo, before he returned to England to manage Newcastle in his native north-east.