Hot Prospects: 13 English young players to watch in 2012 is a post from: Just Football

Who says there's a dearth of English talent coming through at youth level? After disappointment for England's youngsters at international level in 2011 here are 13 youngsters tipped for great things in 2012 and beyond courtesy of Aidan R, editor of England Football Blog.

No boss, I don't want to go to a press conference.

For all the talk of boring group stage, at least this season's one has been slightly different. It wasn't the walk in the park it was the previous few seasons. Praise is given where praise is merit. Olympiacos, Marseille and Borussia Dortmund provided stiff resistance but we've managed to come out on top.

Sometime during the last week there was this article on the Arsenal website with a few comments from Benayoun. The Israeli skipper said that he can understand the reasons for not getting regular starts and was happy to contribute whenever he got a chance.

They say you don't change a winning team and we are on a good run so it is very difficult to get into the team.

What are the odds Lampard's on the Chelsea bench against City too? Derek McGovern's Bets of the Day

The writing is on the wall for Frank Lampard and this time it's not the kind he likes to see – ‘Today's Specials'. By relegating him to the bench for Tuesday's Champions League match against Valencia, Chelsea boss Andre Villas-Boas has already achieved the impossible – he's turned Fat Frank into a peripheral figure at Stamford Bridge.

Last night news broke that Chelsea will be willing to listen for offers of around £20m for Fernando Torres in January as long as someone can match his reported £150K per week wages. The story continued that Chelsea had already put the feelers out around Europe amongst the elite to see if anyone wanted to take him.

After Frank Lampard came on and scored the winner against Manchester City in the week, he was asked after the game about being on the bench the last couple of games. His response made headlines in the media and was spoken about on here. Lampard's response was of surprise as he said straight after the game:

"I want to play, simple as that, I'm as fit as I've ever been.

When people use the word 'saga', it's usually in relation to a beloved film franchise or some centuries old epic tale, however this saga doesn't take place in a galaxy far far away or in the pages of history, it all started when a world class footballer decided to swap the red half of Manchester for the blue.

Liverpool: Maxi 53′
Blackburn: Adam (og) 45′

Liverpool drop points again at Anfield, failing convert their late surge into a winning goal against a stubborn Blackburn Rovers side. The return of Steven Gerrard and two late chances got our hopes up, but in the end it was the same frustrating story we've seen from Liverpool so many times in the past year.

The Sun more specifically, English media in general is at it once again. Peep:

CHELSEA last night confirmed their players are under orders to involve Andre Villas-Boas in their goal celebrations.

No words needed. Just Dave Chappelle and a microphone.

Players are people. If you prick them, they bleed. Despite a professional existence that involves getting kicked, not all are invincible shoulder-goal-popping memes. They have feelings. If they sit on the bench for not scoring goals, then their confidence dips and they score less goals. It's a brutal cycle.

Barcelona have suffered a huge blow on the injury front as striker David Villa fractured his tibia in their 4-0 World Club Cup semi-final win against Al Sadd. After being dropped to the bench for Saturday's 3-1 El Clasico victory against Real Madrid, Villa started alongside Lionel Messi and Pedro in a three-man attack against [.

Seamus Coleman is one of a number of young Irish internationals focused on making the Ireland squad for the Euro 2012 finals in Poland next summer, but all must convince Ireland boss Giovanni Trapattoni to include them on the European adventure.
The Everton defender is one of a number of players fighting to make Trap's final 23 man squad for the Group C games against Croatia, Spain and Italy.

Why Liverpool must draw clean line under Suarez row or risk soiling the club's name

Around now it's customary to hand out jokey awards based on events in the past footballing year. But after such a year, and particularly such an ending, jokes are out. For weeks the game has struggled to come to terms with Gary Speed hanging himself.

By Alan Duffy

After just four first team appearances for Chelsea, with three of those coming from the bench, Sam Hutchinson decided to retire from football in 2010 after suffering a serious knee injury. This was a tragic tale of a youngster, highy-rated by his former manager Jose Mourinho, who had to give up his dream.

In a move that hardly came as a surprise, D.C. United has passed on the option to buy Charlie Davies' contract from French club Sochaux.

The club announced the decision on Thursday, but it had been clear for months that Davies future didn't lie with D.C. The team is still in talks with Davies about potential options, but if Davies does return to MLS in 2012, it would be on loan to another team in the league and not D.

OK, so I'll admit I'm not in my most cheerful of moods. I've been absent for the better part of this week, trying to see some justice done here in Hood County, Texas. But alas, what I got instead was a heavy dose of injustice in the courtroom, if I may say so myself. I won't bore you all with the painful details, but what I really needed was 12 jurors from this soccer game in Portugal a few years ago:
Hopefully I can relax and blog a bit, and find my happy place again.

Photo: Earl Gardner

Raving about Roger Torres is as natural as dooping for Union fans. Ever since he made his first chicken-armed run onto the pitch, the teenager has been an electric presence.

But it is one thing to create electricity and quite another to control it.

Blossoming

In 2011, Roger Torres grew from a player with skill into a skilled playmaker.

With Lucas out for the rest of the season and Steven Gerrard out until January at the very earliest, Liverpool and Kenny Dalglish face an extended run with their two best midfielders sidelined. The club reacted by recalling Jonjo Shelvey on Wednesday, though few expect he's returning to regular starting minutes at Liverpool despite his success on loan with Blackpool, and even fewer would see him as a direct replacement for Lucas in any case.

Finally, we've come to the end of my rather lengthy interview with former Seattle Sounders play-by-play voice Arlo White. In the first two parts, he dealt with some of the big picture stuff both about his time here and what led to his departure. In the final installment of the interview, many of the questions were generated by our readers.

A bit of surprise in the Newcastle side today to face Chelsea, as Peter Lovenkrands has been drafted in to replace the suspended Jonas Gutierrez, and Sammy Ameobi is on the bench. And that's the only enforced change from the team that started against Manchester United last Saturday, and miraculously came away with a well earned point.

Lindegaard, Smalling, Vidic, Ferdinand, Evra, Nani, Jones, Carrick, Young, Rooney, Hernandez

Bench: De Gea, Evans, Giggs, Park, Welbeck, Fletcher, Valencia

"CONFIRMED LINE-UP: Villa vs United" was originally published at The Republik of Mancunia.

When Liverpool signed Andy Carroll for £35m, I'm sure the expectation amongst many fans was that he would be starting most games for the club. It hasn't worked out that way, and the former Newcastle man is spending more and more time on the bench.
Most managers would receive major flack for keeping the most expensive British player of all time on the bench, and many would (probably) be fearful of invoking the ire of the board, which would obviously want to see some return on investment.

1. So we're barely in December and we've already won as many games away as we had done all of last season. Whilst the scoreline meant we had a nervy ending to the game, it was a convincing performance that was worthy of victory. Whilst I don't think dominating a team in the top half away from home is anything to be sniffed at, it is frustrating to see us struggle to put games to bed.

Kickoff from Craven Cottage at 8:00PM GMT/3:00PM EST

Ways to Watch:

Live on Sky Sports 1 in England and ESPN2/ESPN3.com in the US.

Wiziwig.eu
MyP2P.bz
StopStream.tv
ATDHEnet.tv
FromSport.com
FirstRowSports.eu
KiwiSportz.

Despite scoring against Chelsea in his last game, Maxi Rodrigues has been dropped by Kenny Dalglish for the Fulham game, which marks the third time this season the Argentinean has been dumped on the bench after scoring.
Here is the team:
Reina, Johnson, Skrtel, Agger, Enrique, Henderson, Spearing, Adam, Bellamy, Carroll, Suarez.

LFC at Fulham – Carroll, Bellamy and Suarez start

TEMPTATION didn't get the better of Kenny Dalglish as he has kept Maxi Rodriguez on the bench for tonight's trip to Fulham. The Liverpool manager has still picked what is very much a positive line-up, with Andy Carroll, Craig Bellamy and Luis Suarez in from the off.

Andy Williams, the last remaining original member of the expansion Real Salt Lake's inaugural 2004 season, announced his retirement today. The 14-year veteran will join RSL as a member of its technical staff.
From MLSoccer.com:

Williams, 34, was the last remaining member of the original RSL team, joining the club with the first pick of the 2004 MLS Expansion Draft and spending the rest of his playing days representing the Claret and Cobalt.

Took a little while for me to get this post out due to all the stuff that's been going on since Sporting KC's season ended. But here's a look at my post season grades.
Korede Aiyegbusi - INC - Only played 94 minutes for KC in league play this year, not enough to warrent a grade.
Davy Arnaud - C+ - Missed quite a bit of time after having hernia surgery, and once back found himself as a back up to the midfield trio of Cesar, Espinoza, and Zusi.

We thought the Omar Bravo rumors were dead, but it turns out that they in fact are not. A Tweet today from Jorge Ramos with ESPN Deportes said "Omar Bravo will not play again in Kansas City problems with the coach." A few days after we heard that Peter Vermes and Bravo had a conversation with what was said to be a good conversation and a week or so after news came out that Bravo wasn't going to go on loan, this news comes out.

Last season was a mixed campaign for many Spurs players and Aaron Lennon was one of those who ended the year with his Spurs career seemingly at a crossroads.

The season was punctuated with brief highlights including his winner over Liverpool while the low points seemed to start with his late withdrawal from the side to face Real Madrid at the Bernabeu.

Liverpool's 1-0 defeat against Fulham leaves the club five points adrift of fourth place, and it's now looking like an uphill battle for Champions League football next season. Kenny Dalglish's team has put together a great unbeaten run over the last two months, but as we saw again last night, some of Kenny's decisions are mystifying to say the least, and they continue to cost the club valuable points.

David N'gog, born April 1st, 1989, turned 22 earlier this year. Andy Carroll, born January 6th, 1989, also turned 22 earlier this year. Last season with Liverpool, N'gog started nine matches in the league and made a further 16 substitute appearances, playing a total of 1057 minutes. He scored twice, once every 529 minutes—or roughly once every six games.

Vito Mannone who replaced Fabianski in the Aresenal goal after 25 minutes probably wishes he was still on the bench after he tried to clear a David Fuster shot with his foot instead of just catching it, a mistake which gives Olympiakos a 2-0 half-time lead in Greece.

Chelsea took another massive step forward in my eyes last night and received the added bonus with news that Genk had held Bayer to a draw - meaning we topped our group and avoided a nightmare draw in the next round!.
We had wondered if we could build on the Newcastle performance and result, wondered if we could step up on the biggest night of our season so far to ensure that we qualified for the next stages of the Champions League and wondered if by leaving Frank Lampard on the bench - AVB had made a big mistake.

By Chris Wright

Call off the witch hunt and alert the FA, we've come into possession of definitive proof that Luis Suarez is innocent vis-a-vis his charge over making an 'inappropriate gesture' toward the Fulham fans at Craven Cottage last night.

As you can plainly see from this book used to teach kids Makaton (a kind of sign language), Suarez was merely indicating to the Fulham bench that he wouldn't be stopping to shake hands after the game as he was desperate for the potty.

Reports are gathering momentum of a proposed move for Inter Milan's Argentinean striker Diego Milito and while the stories may go the way of many suggested links, the pieces of the jigsaw do seem to fit at least.

Milito has been at Inter since 2009 and became an instant hero with the home fans in a spectacular debut season that culminated in him scoring both goals in their Champions League final win over Bayern Munich.

No Movil in Chicos game today

s/o to Daaaave for alerting me, between roasting people on SCUSA.

I honestly didn't think he'd come up here and play in the game, and so maybe he was up here given he didn't even come off the bench. I stand corrected.

Kickoff from Anfield at 3:00PM GMT/10:00AM EST

Ways to Watch:

Live on Fox Soccer Plus in the US.

Wiziwig.eu
MyP2P.bz
StopStream.tv
ATDHEnet.tv
FromSport.com
FirstRowSports.eu
KiwiSportz.com

Liverpool:

Team sheet when it's released

Bench:

QPR:

Team sheet when it's released

Bench:

Kenny Dalglish seems determined to stop the *proven* combination of Luis Suarez, Craig Bellamy and Maxi Rodrigues playing in the same team, and has named a side with Maxi and Suarez starting, and Bellamy on the bench.The full team:Reina, Johnson, Enrique, Skrtel, Agger, Adam, Henderson, Downing, Maxi, Kuyt, Suarez.

Arsenal coach Arsene Wenger has ruled out signing Chelsea's Brazilian defender Alex despite recent rumours that the club was in the market looking for a defender.

Alex who is set to leave Chelsea in the winter transfer window has struggled for regular play under coach Andres Villa-Boas and even if it were true , a move to Arsenal would probably see him continue to warm the bench and evntually leave due to Wenger's harsh policy on age.