Not an awful lot has happened really. The selección landed in Bogotá on Sunday and Carlos Tevez gave a press conference alongside Juan Román Riquelme on Monday, in which he stated, among other things, that 'It will be a very difficult match, as it always is when Argentina visit Colombia in the qualifiers...

Famous scofflaw, coke fiend, and filthy World Cup cheater, Diego Maradona, can add "political visionary" and "social commentator" to his growing list of titles. Carnie Wilson Redux announced on Venezuelan Overlord Hugo Chavez's Sunday talk show that "I hate everything that comes from the United States. I hate it with all my strength." Later, Maradona said [.

You know, this video kinda reminds me of Beyonce's "Crazy In Love" except there's no Beyonce in it but a certain talented Argentinain known as Lionel Messi.A woman literally jumped down from the stands and popped up right in front of his face and the best thing is Messi was unfazed by it all, wasn't even shocked at all.Amazing!

Whatever you think of GOLTV's geordie commentator Ray Hudson's sometimes infuriating and always bombastic commentary, you couldn't ask for any more than his description of Riquelme in a Copa America game this week (note: obviously not the final). Matador - Look at him, so languid. Look at him walking. He's like a big beautiful zombie. Like [...]

The Asociación del Fútbol Argentino didn't think this one through much, did they? Scheduling a midweek fixture with mostly European players half-way across the world, I'm sure they got an earful from Sir Alex Ferguson, Frank Riikjard, and Rafa Benitez among others. Anyhow, the Albicelestes have already traveled to Oz, so there's little to be done at this point.

Just look at this happy portrait of Brazil winning Copa America 2007. It was a come from behind victory but nevertheless, they would only remembered as the winners in Venezuela.

Image source from ESPN

The Nike made shirt has their logo on the right chest and in the centre of the shirt is Megatone's sponsor logo, which sits inside the thick horizontal hoop of yellow that goes around the chest of the kit. Megatone also have their sponsor logo across the back of this new Boca Juniors home shirt.

Atletico Madrid gradually becomes the main expert on young Argentinean stars. The most prominent young player of those who still play in Argentina, Ever Banega from Boca Juniors, is expected in Madrid as soon as next season.

I've seen this list posted on a few sites and still can't believe how unbelievably retarded it is. First of all, what is FourFourTwo's criteria? The opinion of Nike, Adidas, and FIFA? They certainly didn't take all-round play into account, because Kaka is a second rate defender at best. That's why they have Gattuso on Milan. There's no doubting the Brazilian's attacking skills, but he's utterly useless and a borderline burden on the other end.

- Michel Platini has vowed not to meet directly with representatives of the G14 to discuss issues regarding the sport in Europe and added that he did recognize the association. Not smart, Michel. Being obstinate and unmoving in your position is only going to get a hostile reaction. Like or not, UEFA can not survive without the 18 clubs of the G14.

Brasil 3, Argentina 0 -- Copa America Final, Maracaibo, Venezuela As I feared, Brasil walked away Sunday with the 2007 Copa America. I thought it would be luck that pushed the Seleção to the trophy. It was hardly luck, they thrashed a surprisingly sorry Argentina team, a team that was clearly the tournament favorites throughout. To paraphrase 'Airplane', they, "picked the wrong day to stop

The October rankings are out and Argentina has returned to the top spot. They last held the #1 position in March of this year. Other movement has England again falling out of the top 10 after climbing to number 9 last month while Mexico took a bit of a slide to 15th. The US holds steady at 18, which is 11 spots hirer then they were last October. However the big news is Russia who pole-vaulted 10 spots to 16th overall.

Jogadores com Sentimento
Originally uploaded by Mauro Kinjo ¿Jugadores con sentimiento? tal vez, pero para sus colores natales de los cuales se es difícil de olvidar.
Esta foto lo demuestra, como, cuando Chelito Delgado se sentía cobijado por su hinchada en su Rosario Central, apoyaba a su camiseta desde la grada.

FIFA World Rankings has changed anew to reflect the results in the just concluded Copa America.

The FIFA ranking is in favor of Brazil and Argentina as their Copa America stint managed to trick the computations while Italy, France and Germany are drinking beers and chilling out awaiting their next game for the Uefa Euro 2008 qualifier.

Brazil has now regained the top spot in the FIFA world ranking jumping two places.

segundo gol de argentina - tiro libre de Riquelme
Originally uploaded by daniel vercelli En Buenos Aires Argentina las eliminatorias Sudamericanas se reiniciaron y nuevamente una victoria mas para los ches.
Kun Aguero que se puso como titular mayor con la albiceleste se estreno anotando gol de cabeza.
Después otro tiro libre de cabeza por parte de Riquelme que aun anotando goles con su selección tiene la cara triste.

Tevez Receives a Red Card
Originally uploaded by Milan Time Al coco Basile no le sienta bien pisar tierras Colombianas, es mas jugar contra Colombia sea donde sea.
Colombia despachó 2-1 a la albiceleste en el estadio El Campín de Bogotá con un gol de Dayro Moreno ya por acabarse el encuentro, destrozando el récord de Argentina en esta eliminatoria.

Things I really liked about the first round of games:

• the lack of diving
• not too many dirty fouls
• lots of goals
• teams who try to actually play football

I'm a bit put out that the second round has seen some of this degenerate a bit. But anyway, on to the news.
In Group A, Uruguay beat Bolivia 1-0, while Venezuela had a scrappy 2-0 win over Peru.

7/12/2007
Afshin Afshar, lastkick.com

Fans, yesterday's Copa America match between Argentina and Mexico was, at least for the first 60 minutes, one of the more entertaining matches I have watched in this year's tournament.

If you were not watching the match, you must've lost one of the nicest goals of this year scored by none other than Lionel Messi.

Seriously, the dude's got a screw loose when it comes to losing. I'm sure American fans won't need to be reminded of the Elbow Massacre of 2002 - though, come on now, be honest, it is pretty difficult to resist wanting to do grievous bodily harm to Cobi Jones isn't it? Then he goes and shoves his own Barca teammate (Messi) to the ground during a scramble for the ball in Mexico's 3-0 Copa America semifinal defeat.

Was this the same Brazilian team that lost to Mexico in their opening Copa America game? Was this the same Argentinian squad that had mopped up every opponent they'd faced on their way to this tournament's final? The bottom line is you can never count out the Samba Boys and they shocked the soccer world this afternoon [...]

Steven Goff, over at Soccer Insider reported a few days ago that it looked like MLS was going to dumping their senior/youth international distinction for foreign players, instead going with a foreigner or not approach. According to Goff MLS teams will have 8 foreign slots with no age restrictions starting next season.

Festejo Lanús Campeón Torneo Apertura 2007 02 12 07
Originally uploaded by altodeporte Hay pocas fotos del festejo o del Lanus campeón, por eso pongo esta.
El equipo chico aplasto al grande y en la 18ava fecha Argentina , literalmente tiene un nuevo campeón.
De verdad que da gusto ver este tipo de festejos.

In Manchester United they think already that one Tevez is not enough, they want two. Alex Ferguson announced that the club would love to sign Carlitos' younger brother, Miguel Tevez (17), who currently plays for reserve of Boca Juniors.

- Maradona and his 1986 World Cup-winning Argentina teammates have agreed to an unofficial rematch with the English side that El Diego scored the 'Hand of God' goal against in the quarterfinals of that competition. Peter Reid, a member of the English squad, had this to say:"This is our chance to show what we can do and get a little bit of revenge." Sounds kind of sad to me, old men not being able to let bygones be bygones.

Los aficionados del Boca Juniors no tardaron mucho en contestar a los de River, por lo de su segundo barrio, la respuesta , la verdad era obvia.
via

Not so long ago Javier Saviola was linked with a possible move to Old Trafford, however that didn't happen and so Real Madrid decided to scoop the tiny Argentinian from the clutches of nemesis Barcelona for free.

This is interesting news as Barcelona took Eto'o ( a reject at Madrid) and propelled him to superstardom, can Madrid do the same for Saviola?

It was business as usual for the top two teams in South America as Argentina beat Mexico 3-0 while it took penalties for Brazil to overcome Uruguay.

Here are the highlights from the two semi-finals (Messi's goal was brilliant)

Brazil stun tournament favourites Argentina 3-0 to win the Copa America for the second time in a row, showing off their ruthless side of attacking and silencing critics for their style of play.

A fourth minute goal by Julio Baptista and an own goal by Roberto Ayala took Brazil to a commanding 2-0 before halftime, and Daniel Alves then scored the third goal to seal the title for the defending champion.

This kid is something. With a defender close to him, he can actually chip the goalkeeper with sublime skill. A must watch goal. Enjoy !!

argentina, Copa America, lionel messi

News first. Argentina have named an unchanged starting line-up from the 11 who defeated Mexico. Brazil are likely to field Elano in place of the suspended captain Gilberto Silva.
A few wise words from the players. Mascherano:

No-one has an advantage. We will play with eleven players, and so will they. I think if Brazil have reached the final there is a reason for this.

Argentina looked to be the stronger team during the whole tournament, but in the end, Brazil came out on top. It was an evenly played first half but thanks to an amazing goal by Julio Baptista and some Brazilian luck in the form of an own goal by Roberto Ayala, the Samba Kings went to the break feeling very good.
Argentina came out hunting for a goal in the second but Brazil still dominated.

Members of the Chilean U-20 team found themselves in a real donnybrook with Toronto police officers and stadium security last night following their 3-0 loss to Argentina. One member of the Chilean side (they didn't say whether he was a player or not) was even tasered, according to an AP report. It was an ugly end to [...]

A few days after I posed the question of what was going on with the Wizards and Eloy Colombano, I find out today that his signing is expected to be announced later today. It's taken them a while to get this done, but Colombano will apparently be ready to play next Sunday when the Wizards take on New England. Colombano will be classified as a Youth International under MLS rules.

It has been officially announced today, the Wizards have announced the signing of Argentine forward/midfielder, Eloy Colombano. According to the article, Colombano will be wearing number 16. It will be interesting to see what he brings to the Wizards. Hopefully he turns out to be a signing this season like Juan Toja or Luciano Emilio and not like Luis Tejada

I've been up since 5 A.M. previewing international friendlies that are, in the very least, interesting and may be entertaining to watch as well. Here's a recap of those previews.
Japan vs Cameroon - I'm confused. Now it'll be on at 6:45 AM EST? Okay, well, if that's the case, with my sleeping habits, or lack thereof, I should be able to catch this one.

No disrespect to Africa, Asia, and North America, but the two best footballing continents are easily Europe and South America. The real question is, if you were to take the best players from those two places, who would win? First, which players to use would need to be decided.
The South America side would be much easier to choose than Europe only because most of the players would come from either Argentina or Brazil.

- Mark Zeigler of the San Diego Union-Tribune has written a great piece about the US Soccer Federation, it's recent history between the players and former US Women's head coach April Heinrichs, and the hiring process of Greg Ryan. Apparently Ryan was the one coach that none of the players wanted. Click on the link to read the rest, it's well worth it.

The 25th October 1997 was an historic day in the history of football, and today we arrive at its tenth anniversary. Because ten years ago today, in the Monumental, Boca Juniors beat River Plate 2-1. Historic for what exactly? No, my fellow River fans, it wasn't the last time we lost a superclásico (the unbeaten run [...]

11/24/2007

Another moment of magic by Lionel messi in the World Cup 2010 qualifying game against Columbia. Columbia won 2-1, but Messi showed once again why he is one of the more exciting young players in the world.

Colombia 2-1 Argentina (0-1 Messi)
Uploaded by MoreGoals

And the award for the least surprising award of the year goes to... Kaká - winner of the 2007 Ballon d'Or.
I guess even the most ardent fan of Cristiano Ronaldo or Lionel Messi's talents wouldn't have felt cheated seeing the AC Milan midfielder pick up the Football of the Year award, and would have just accepted it as the 'correct result'.