Hulk has now left Porto to join Zenit St Petersburg. Before completing his transfer, he decided his
parting gift to the club could be a final goal and winding up every non-Porto fan in Portugal. With
Porto trailing 1-0 in Hulk's final match, a drop-ball restart after an injury which usually
protocol dictates should [.
Sam Cronin of the San Jose Earthquakes lying prostrate on the pitch makes a miraculous recovery
after getting struck by a ball kicked right at him by David Beckham. Those Herbalife jerseys worn
by the LA Galaxy do have magical healing powers.
Becks was angry at Cronin's time wasting tactics as the Galaxy trailed 3-4 with about a minute
to go.
Sam Cronin of the San Jose Earthquakes lying prostrate on the pitch makes a miraculous recovery
after getting struck by a ball kicked right at him by David Beckham. Those Herbalife jerseys worn
by the LA Galaxy do have magical healing powers.
Becks was angry at Cronin's time wasting tactics as the Galaxy trailed 3-4 with about a minute
to go.
David Beckham celebrated being left out of the Team GB squad for the London 2012 Olympics by
picking a fight with just about anybody he could during LA Galaxy's match against San Jose
Earthquakes. Typically of the man, he couldn't even give a petulant display of dissent without
showing off the accuracy of his passing.
It's fairly common knowledge that Rafael van der Vaart and Zlatan Ibrahimovic despise each
other, stemming back from an incident years ago during an international friendly in 2004 where the
latter went through the former with a horrendous tackle that left the pair teetering dangerously on
becoming 'mortal enemies' with Zlatan even once going on record as saying he 'wished he'd broken
Van der Vaart's legs.
During an Asian Champions League match last night, Al Jazira 'keeper Ali Khaseif managed to ping
a clearance off the 'spider' camera winching away overhead.
The game was duly restarted with a drop-ball, with an Esteghlal player returning the ball to
Khaseif in a sportsmanlike fashion, only for the dead-eye 'keeper to pick out the spider cam
again!
Well, that took long enough. All that haggling, only to eventually, finally, reportedly meet Joe
Allen's £15m release clause. Well done, Ian Ayre, you shrewd so and so.
Now then. I truly hate the "if he wasn't British..." or "if he were Brazilian/Spanish/nationality
du jour..." aphorisms that frequently fly around whenever Liverpool – or some other club – buy
a British player.
Preface
With Spain's (and Barcelona's) successes in recent years, possession is one of those concepts that
people have been spending a lot of time talking about - though what exactly possession is or how it
should be measured is less clear. In the post below, Andrew Brocker takes a look at two dimensions
of possession-based analyses: the amount of possession and pass accuracy.
So I have the joy of writing the post match for a game one of our beloved readers labelled as
"b-o-r-i-n-g". I could probably sum this match up in just a few words, but that's not exactly my
style, now is it? Read on after the jump for my half-asleep analysis and opinions. You know you
want to.
(Editor's Note: Our series of posts from Reading United and Villanova defender Kyle
McCarthy continues as he gives an inside look at training in the lead-up to gameday on one of the
top Premier Development League teams in the country.)
Last week I covered the events of a typical gameday experience, so it's only fair that I mention
the hard work and effort that we go through building up to that moment.
When you look at the numbers of this weekend's Revolution match against Toronto FC you realize
one thing very quickly: New England dominated the hosts in just about every major stat category.
Not only did the Revs LOOK like they dominated the game, the numbers back it up too.
The Revs had possession, loads of it actually, as well as more than a healthy share of attempts
on goal.
The Revolution took to the pitch at Gillette Stadium tonight looking for their first victory of
the 2012 season against an Eastern Conference opponent. In the end, they settled for a point-undone
yet again by poor defending on set pieces and a late goal. Tonight's result brings the Revs to
4-6-1 on the season, with 13 points, tied with Houston (3-3-4) in the standings.
Gunners we all have to admit that our football didn't live up to its reputation last season, we
weren't as good to watch as we were when we had Fabregas, Nasri and Jack Wilshere in the team.
I'm not complaining but -In My Opinion- our football wasn't as entertaining as before.
Untold regularly publishes reviews of the effectiveness and accuracy of referees in the Premier
League, giving each referee a percentage mark for his performance.
In addition we also publish regular articles on refereeing in the Premier League which have led
us to the view that there is something not quite right [.
Maura Gladys, as usual, with pinpoint accuracy on the state of the
USWNT
It's interesting what we talk about when we talk about the USWNT these days. The lineup is
stable, their form has been great, and there is little room to nitpick their play on the field.
To judge from post game comments by DC United coaches and players you might think the team's
major problem was that they didn't work hard enough. That description of events doesn't quite
capture what really happened. While Philadelphia may have played marginally harder than DC, the
real key was execution.
David Villa's long injury layoff doesn't seem to have affected his shooting power. The Barcelona
star, out of action since breaking his leg last December, has been back in training and pelting the
ball at reserve keeper Jose Manuel Pinto. He might not yet have his accuracy, but he's got the
power. A shot that [.
David Villa's long injury layoff doesn't seem to have affected his shooting power. The Barcelona
star, out of action since breaking his leg last December, has been back in training and pelting the
ball at reserve keeper Jose Manuel Pinto. He might not yet have his accuracy, but he's got the
power. A shot that [.
The study of football, and its players, is perhaps best accomplished by evaluating efficiency.
Of course there are many methods of such evaluation – ranging from weekly player ratings on the
typical "start at 6" scale to full scale statistical analysis.
In this article we look at football clubs in Europe's top four leagues the English Premiership,
La Liga, Serie A and the Bundesliga and analyse their offensive and defensive efficiency so far
this season.
Cristiano Ronaldo vs Online Football Fans: A Live Football Skills Challenge - originally posted
on Soccerlens.com
Last year Castrol EDGE presented Ronaldo Tested to the Limit, an award-winning documentary that
showed the Portugal and Real Madrid forward showcase his strengths in a series of captivating
challenges in the most scientific examination of a player ever undertaken.
Real Madrid dismantled Osasuna, winning 5-1 with two goals from Cristiano Ronaldo. His first was
an absolute rocket blast from considerable distance and, in one of the most Cristiano Ronaldo goal
celebrations ever, he pulled up the leg of his shorts and pointed to the thigh that just generated
that impressive display of power and accuracy.
Seattle it is, and we couldn't be more proud. Montero, Alonso, Rosales, and the league's biggest
fan base? This isn't a desperation pick. This is destiny.
And if we're wrong – if you show us up, Seattle – there are 18 other teams more than willing to
carry this flag. We'll change this up as needed (accuracy is our prime value).
You've probably read a hundred times by now that the MLS Western Conference is 9-2 versus the
East so far this season. It's been less remarked that the two wins are by the Houston Dynamo and
that Houston is a pretty tenuous Eastern Conference team. They're the westernmost team in the
conference, are only a few miles east of the Western Conference's FC Dallas and they were in the
West up until last season, when the MLS head office made the perverse decision to 'balance' the
conferences by giving them an equal number of teams for exactly one season before the addition of
Montreal unbalanced it again in favor of the East.
If John Henry is as serious about Liverpool being successful as we want him to be, he needs to
be stark raving mad by now.During yesterday's match, I was in the middle of a conversation with a
friend who asked what happened to the Liverpool that ended last season (2010-11).
A lot has been said these last few days about the apparent "implosion" of Manchester City's title
quest this season. And if The Guardian is to be believed, Roberto Mancini has six games to
save his job. So what went wrong for Mancini and the Citizens?
Data can help settle arguments, so I thought I'd take another look at some basic performance
indicators to see how the City's performance developed over the course of the season.
Yesterday we looked a basic passing statistics over the first four games. In the scatter plot
below, we can see a simple pattern emerge along positional bands, much as Rolando De Aguiar
demonstrated in a post last December looking at passing statistics from 2011.
Since MLS made available detailed match statistics provided by OPTA early in the 2012 season,
PSP has published a number of posts in which we try to better understand what was happening on the
field with the Philadelphia Union through the use of various statistics. These posts have been
something of an evolution, ranging from a closer examination of what happened in a particular match
in order to better understand what went right or wrong, to trying to understand larger trends, be
they for the team as a whole, across positions, or for individual players.
What can we learn using the match stats from the Chalkboard at mlssoccer.com's Match Center
about the Philadelphia Union's 3–1 loss to Portland Timbers in Monday night's season opener?
Passing and shooting
Portland had a greater number of passes and a better passing accuracy percentage with 482 passes
with a passing accuracy of 72 percent.
Adidas Predator Lethal Zones Football Boot - originally posted on Soccerlens.com
Earlier this week, adidas finally launched the Predator® Lethal Zones boot after weeks of
teasers and sneak previews. The new Predator® Lethal Zones boot, designed to be a complete ball
control boot for shooting, passing and dribbling, is composed of five, super-light (SL) rubber and
memory foam 3-D zones, each designed to support perfect ball control.
The top 3 NBA free-throw shooters of all-time are white guys, Steve Nash, Mark Price and Rick
Barry. Five of the top 10 overall are white, with Larry Bird and Scott Skiles as part of the list.
Many people would consider Peja Stojakovic as white; he is also in the top 10.
