Reuters Soccer Blog

Arsenal fans must keep their faith in Wenger

Mike Collett in London on why Arsenal fans should back their manager

Arsene Wenger is the most successful manager Arsenal have ever had, but unhappy fans have very short memories and incredible as it may seem, some Arsenal supporters were calling for his head on Monday.

Irate listeners to radio phone-ins and message boards posters vented their frustrations at Arsenal’s failure to end their six-year trophy drought after they lost 2-1 to underdogs Birmingham City in the League Cup final at Wembley on Sunday.

The messages said largely the same thing. Why hasn’t Wenger spent money on buying a top class goalkeeper and two reliable centre-backs to provide a stronger foundation for a team brimming with class, talent and invention in midfield and attack?

And, more surprisingly, some said it was time the 61-year-old Frenchman moved on.

That though, would be even more calamitous for Arsenal than the mistake that cost them the final on Sunday. Arsenal still have the chance to win three honours this season — the Champions League, the Premier League and the FA Cup.

A victory in any one of those would more than make up for this setback, devastating as it clearly was to Arsenal’s prone players at the end, although Sunday’s loss does highlight again well publicised weaknesses in the current squad.

from Left field:

Things may get worse before they get better at Liverpool … but there is a glimmer of hope

A damp squib of a performance from Liverpool in their League Cup defeat by Northampton Town was described by The Telegraph today as one of the most humiliating nights in the club’s history.

Given the (lack of) status the League Cup now enjoys that is probably stretching it a bit far – I don’t think it gets close to the FA Cup defeat by Bristol City , for example – but the whole dismal episode did add weight to the theory that things are likely to get worse before they get better for a club that once prided itself on striving for excellence in everything.

The problems at Anfield have been endlessly discussed. Hodgson is the first new Liverpool manager I can remember not to have significant transfer funds at his disposal and even when money was, apparently, made available by the sale of Javier Mascherano he was unable to find the forward he so obviously needed.

There is no immediate prospect of wealthy new owners coming in and solving the personnel problem, or getting the new stadium plan moving again.

Meanwhile, Fernando Torres looks less and less like the player who regularly made lives miserable for Premier League defenders and those who have come in to the first team – Milan Jovanovic, Christian Poulsen and the like – seem unlikely to win places in Anfield folklore, shall we say. Hodgson, inevitably, is coming in for criticism for a lack of panache on the field.

One fan, iandman, wrote the following on the official site forum after the Northampton game: “I've been a Liverpool fan for 30yrs and that's not going to change, however I felt I must write to express my absolute anger at the gutless, clueless performance put on last night against a team several divisions below us.”

"This is going to be a long season,” wrote yusuf, another supporter. “We are a mid table side, it really pains me to say it.”

UPDATE: Who can steal a march in the Predictions League?

The weekend’s Premier League action was overshadowed by the terrible injury to Arsenal’s teenage Wales international Aaron Ramsey at Stoke. We wish him all the best for his recovery.

Arsene Wenger’s shocked players managed to turn their minds back to the match and their 3-1 victory moved them to within three points of leaders Chelsea and two shy of second-placed Manchester United, who again had the prolific Wayne Rooney to thank for Sunday’s 2-1 League Cup victory over Aston Villa.

As for the predictions, it was a good week for the Asia Sports Desk and our Paris colleague Julien Pretot, who both scored nine.

Updated Reuters Soccer blog panel scores: Paul Radford 245, Patrick Johnston 228, Mitch Phillips 219, Neil Maidment 205, Mark Meadows 183, Simon Evans 183, Kevin Fylan 167, Mike Collett 163, Julien Pretot 160, Asia Sports Desk 151, Martyn Herman 141, Miles Evans 108, Sonia Oxley 99.

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THURSDAY’S ORIGINAL POST: While Manchester United are busy trying to win the League Cup against Aston Villa, leaders Chelsea will be looking to pull away from the champions in the Premier League.

United in the nick of time

Not for the first time this season, Manchester United stunned Manchester City in injury-time and clawed out a win that took them through to next month’s League Cup final against Aston Villa, while making a point to their ambitious neighbours.

Wayne Rooney’s late header was also a reminder that for all the weaknesses of this particular team, even with Cristiano Ronaldo gone to Real Madrid and Carlos Tevez off to Eastlands, United retain an uncanny ability to swing games their way in the face of adversity. Against the odds, they are somehow still on course for a treble.

Reaching this final will certainly have boosted their confidence, but defensive frailties — still everywhere to be seen even after Rio Ferdinand’s return to action — must worry United’s manager worry Alex Ferguson ahead of their Champions League last 16 clash with AC Milan.

On current form, Chelsea must be favourites to win the Premier League although United have a history of turning things round after Christmas, most memorably in 1999 when they capped a triumphant season with that 2-1 win over Bayern Munich in the Champions League final.

But as my colleague Martyn Herman said, Rooney is carrying United at the moment with a punishing workload and if Ferguson’s team are to cover themselves in glory again, someone will need to step up in the run-in.

PHOTO: Manchester United’s Michael Carrick (C) celebrates with team mates after scoring against Manchester City during their League Cup win in Manchester, Jan. 27, 2010. REUTERS/Phil Noble

What are United’s quintuple chances now?

Manchester United manager Alex Ferguson dismissed the suggestion in his usual style.

After beating Spurs on penalties to win the English League Cup final on Sunday he was asked if United could complete a “quintuple” of trophies.

“It’s a media thing,” he shot back. “I’m not getting carried away with it. We’re keeping our feet on the ground.”

But with FIFA’s Club World Cup and the League Cup already in the trophy room and with the Champions League, Premier League and FA Cup all realistic targets, it is not just a media thing. It’s a real possibility. Throw in the Community Shield and it becomes a sextuple. Or a “double treble” — which sounds good if you are winning it or even drinking it.

Former United striker Frank Stapleton is among many who think Ferguson has assembled the best squad United have ever had – and although they failed to break Spurs down in 120 goalless minutes at Wembley, they still had the nerve, guile and experience to ease to a 4-1 victory in the shootout.

Spurs manager Harry Redknapp believes they can do it too.

UEFA Cup becomes an irrelevance for clubs like Spurs

Twice UEFA Cup winners Tottenham Hotspur are most likely heading out of the competition after a 2-0 first-leg defeat at Shakhtar Donetsk in the first knockout round on Thursday.

The fact they fielded a ‘B’ team was not surprising. Manager Harry Redknapp had already stated several times that Premier League survival and the League Cup were his priorities. After the game Redknapp said: “I had a 17-year-old playing tonight and I will probably have four playing next week.”   The reason they will play with an under-strength team in the return leg next Thursday is that it comes three days after a crunch league match at Hull City and three days before their League Cup final against Manchester United.

Spurs have already lost to the Old Trafford side in the FA Cup fourth round after selecting a weakened team so it will be a welcome change for their fans that the starting lineup for the Wembley final will be the strongest they can muster.   The irony is that it was their surprise victory over Chelsea in last year’s League Cup final that got Spurs into the UEFA Cup in the first place. The delight that the supporters took in qualifying for a European campaign has been soured by the fact that it was not a priority to try to win the competition.

Fans spent their hard-earned money stumping up for tickets for the group stage matches only to find that the competition has almost turned into an irrelevance.   Of course, if Spurs were not struggling near the foot of the Premier League, cups would be more important but it is a sad indictment of the UEFA Cup’s standing that a team with a proud European history have had to relegate the competition to an irritant.

There will be a 48-team group stage in the competition next season when it is renamed the Europa League. I doubt Harry will be relishing the prospect.

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Friday afternoon question: Should domestic cups be scrapped?

Real Madrid were knocked out of the King’s Cup by third-tier Real Union this week and Chelsea lost to second division Burnley in the Carling Cup, but which sides were really celebrating?

Chelsea would much rather concentrate on the Premier League while Real need to focus on the Champions League after two defeats.

In Italy, the Coppa Italia is fast becoming one of the biggest jokes in football. The last 16, the first round where the big clubs enter, has been spread across a two-month period for various strange reasons.

Wednesday’s game between Udinese and Reggina was played in mid-afternoon and from the television pictures I could not see a single fan in the stadium. There were probably a few die-hards behind the camera but they saw one of the most error-ridden games in history.

The Cup is realistically the only trophy Udinese and Reggina can win this season and yet even they played reserve sides. 

Top players were also rested in the other domestic cups this week, which surely diminishes the achievements of the smallers sides who cause ‘upsets’ and don’t gain as much revenue as they used to now that most competitions are no longer over two legs. 

Retirement beckons for doddery League Cup

The League Cup came through a difficult birth and a forgettable youth to enjoy a long, proud middle age but the time has come for this doddery old relative to be shuffled off into retirement.

When it was launched in the early 1960s the new, midweek competition was pretty much ignored by the big clubs, as evidenced by Rotherham and Rochdale reaching the first two finals.

In 1966/67 the format was changed, the final switching from a two-legged affair to a one-off Wembley showcase, and with the subsequent additional carrot of a place in Europe for the winners, it eventually became a serious tournament.

Throughout the 1970s, 80s and early 90s a League Cup winners’ medal was something worth having and the idea of Liverpool, who won it four times in a row from 1981 while still managing to compete and win in Europe, fielding a weakened team in the competition would have been preposterous.

However, the arrival of the Premier and Champions Leagues and the associated money, meant it quickly lost its appeal for most of the top-flight clubs.

Current Liverpool manager Rafa Benitez changed all 11 players from the team who drew with Stoke in the league last weekend for Tuesday’s home game against Crewe, while Manchester United and Arsenal were not far behind.