Reuters Soccer Blog

Soccer Break Tuesday

Spring is here and love should be in the air, but instead all we’re left with is bickering managers.

Fabio Capello and Jose Mourinho are no strangers to controversy, so it’s no surprise to see them at it again, though the timing is odd. Mourinho still has it all to prove at Real Madrid over the next two months, while Capello has yet to truly inspire confidence in England fans.

What do you make of Capello’s captaincy decision after handing the armband to Gareth Barry, days after excluding him from the squad to face Wales?

And Real fans, does it annoy you to see Mourinho flirting so openly with other jobs?

Back to action on the pitch, and on Tuesday there will be a special reason to watch England’s friendly against Ghana. Read more here.

Another special occasion will take place in Japan when the national team play a J-League select team to raise funds for the stricken victims of the tsunami and earthquake earlier this month.

A Different League takes a look at Ireland and whether they are strong enough to qualify for Euro 2012 from a formidable group including Slovakia, Russia and Macedonia. Thoughts?

United beware: City look ready to make a lot more noise

Rarely can a defeat, and such a heart-breaking one at that, have been greeted with so much enthusiasm by the losers as Manchester City’s 4-3 reverse at Old Trafford.

Sports professionals are forever banging on about “taking the positives” from setbacks but for everyone connected with City, their performance and the whole occasion on Sunday showed that they really will be a force to be reckoned with over the next few months and years.

Despite being shorn of several of their best players and going behind after two minutes, City hung on to United like a terrier with a mouthful of trouser.

Every time United shook them off with a goal, they came back with a tighter bite. Even when the champions were peppering their goal during a period of dominance in the second half, City stayed in the game.

They were felled by Michael Owen’s 96th-minute winner, sparking wild scenes on the touchline and some enjoyable jousting from the managers.

Current England rugby manager Martin Johnson has said that he felt sure England would win the 2003 World Cup final after seeing how Australia celebrated their semi-final win over New Zealand and United’s joy, even allowing for the dramatic nature of the finale, was a few notches up on anything seen in a derby win for decades.

“They seemed quite excitable at the end which shows you what this win means to them,” said Mark Hughes. “It was reminiscent of some of the scenes with Brian Kidd and Alex Ferguson in days gone by and I saw Gary Neville running on the pitch like a lunatic.”

City’s spending spree makes sense in battle for fourth place

There’s been a fair bit of speculation, here and elsewhere, about whether Manchester City could actually win the Premier League title but a more realistic goal is a top four finish. That being the case, the summer spending spree seen by some as being brash and uncoordinated is actually very shrewd.

Look carefully, and what City have managed to do, with the recruitment of Gareth Barry from Aston Villa and Emmanuel Adebayor and Kolo Toure from Arsenal, is to weaken two of their rivals for fourth place.

Last season Villa and Arsenal fought tooth and nail for that position and with his transfer policy Mark Hughes has struck an early couple of blows in this season’s fight.

Note that City also have their sights on defender Joleon Lescott from Everton, another team with Champions League aspirations.

Add to that the hugely satisfying signing of former Manchester United forward Carlos Tevez and there would seem to be a pattern to their spending spree — even if results are not yet going their way.

Can Manchester City win the Premier League?

Fuelled by millions of petro-dollars from the apparently bottomless pockets of their Abu Dhabi owners Manchester City have spent the summer accumulating what is beginning to look, on paper anyway, a squad that will challenge for the title.

Significantly, the players bought by manager Mark Hughes are tried and tested in the Premier League which augurs wells for City’s chances of shaking up the established pecking order in English football.

Opposing managers must have watched with a growing sense of awe and no doubt a little envy as Roque Santa Cruz (Blackburn Rovers), Carlos Tevez (Manchester United), Emmanuel Adebayor (Arsenal) joined to form a formidable looking strike force while defender Kolo Toure (Arsenal) was recruited to beef up the back four and England midfielder Gareth Barry signed from Aston Villa.

Consider the likes of Robinho, Craig Bellamy, Shaun-Wright Phillips, Wayne Bridge and Micah Richards, who were all part of last season’s team, and City already boast arguably the strongest squad in the Premier League with the transfer window nowhere near closing.

But can they win the league? Are the new recruits going to bridge the 40-point gap between champions Manchester United and City last season or eben the 20-odd extra points they will need to challenge for a Champions League spot.

Aston Villa manager Martin O’Neill certainly thinks so.

“City might not be favourites to win the league, but they should be,” O’Neill said last week. “They have as good a chance as anybody of winning it.”