Is this Rooney's year? As of today Wayne Rooney has 4 goals in 4 league games for his club, and 10 goals for 9 games including cup play and internatioanl games. That's a scoring rate one would not expect Rooney to maintain, historically speaking. If you have read the football pundits about Wayne Rooney in any of the last several years, it will have been hard to avoid glowing characterisations of his football.

Craig Bellamy is one of the maddest footballers ever but no one can deny him that he is an absolute world-class player. People have often disregarded his footballing qualities and chose to concentrate on his fiery temperament which is basically what makes him such a great player.

When Cristiano Ronaldo left Manchester United over the summer, questions were asked about who would replace the ever-present match winner in Sir Alex Ferguson's side. Wayne Rooney has thus far proven the man to replace the world's greatest player, and Tuesday night against Besiktas he took that to a whole new level.

Not only do your Wizards look to snap a couple of streaks at Gillette Stadium, but the United States Men's National will take on El Salvador with an eye toward improving their standing in the CONCACAF hexagonal. Our match starts at 6:30 p.m. CT on Metro Sports, with the USA game at 7 p.m. CT on ESPN Classic.

Manchester United legend, Paddy Crerand, has recognised the improvement in home grown midfielder, Darren Fletcher. Crerand rightly states that Fletcher used to be singled out by United fans as a player who wasn't good enough, but then who would look good enough in comparison to Roy Keane and Paul Scholes?

International breaks are usually long and tedious affairs where we await news of potential injuries to our players. Thankfully this one passed without incident and none of them got injured.
Mascherano will probably be rested this weekend as he had to travel halfway round the world to play a couple of matches.

Fixtures have been released in Indonesia, bound to be changed, and two big games on the opening day. Arema v Perisja and Persiwa v Persipura.

Now why would you think I am worried about RSL making the playoffs?

But sometimes, you have to face reality. Real looked awful out of the blocks in Houston. It was as if RSL was still working at fifty percent effort at the start of the game while the Houston Dynamo was playing at high tempo.

If you want to save yourself time you might as well just cast your mind back to the first round tie away to Doncaster – five more goals, away from home, and despite the occasional early scare the gulf in class eventually told. Deja-vu all over again. It's not the Tottenham I grew up with I tell ye.

What is it about Liverpool FC and its cocky, self-congratulatory overconfidence whenever the team goes on a good run? The last few weeks has been filled with tedious eulogising in the press, but just like previous seasons, it has all come crashing down; and with the defeat to Fiorentina, Liverpool players once again look stupid after weeks of massaging each others' egos.

Ji-sung Park has signed a contract extension with Manchester United keeping the tireless midfielder at Old Trafford until 2012, according to his agent.

Park joined United from PSV Eindhoven in 2005 and has made 126 appearances for the club and has scored 12 goals.

Despite his lack of goals, his energy and work rate have seen him become an integral member of the squad, often being played in big games although generally not considered a first teamer.

3 perfect scores last week has given Damian a healthy 5 point lead over Damon while our guest predictors are already in danger of falling by the wayside. This week there are some big games to predict including 2 derbies from the Premier League that feature the top 4. We also have a top of the table clash in Germany, as well as games from La Liga and Serie A

This week's guest predictor is Marco who is a Juventus fan living in London.

This week languagecaster.com takes a look at Serie A - who are the favourites, the dark horses, the newcomers? We also take a look at all the football news from the past week and look ahead to some of the big games this weekend.

• Read our football news review in the good, the bad and the ugly
• Check out a new football expression in English for Football
• Follow the weekly predictions battle between Damon and Damian in the Predictions competition
• For learners of English check out our Football Language Resources page with:
• Football glossary (a huge collection of football vocabulary, football cliches and football phrases)
• Worksheets and transcripts from previous podcasts
  

Apologies for the lateness of this post. I mean it is very late, kick off is in like 20 minutes, so I am sorry about that. Please don't hate me.
I know most Gooners don't give a damn about this cup. Until Wenger selected the superkids, we were largely indifferent. But tell me you didn't care when we finished runners up in 2007 and I'll say you are lying.

The Seattle Sounders defeated DC United 2-1 last night in one of the better US Open Cup Finals in recent history.

The pace of the game was fast, the attacking was decent with plenty of chances and there was excellent goalkeeping as well. The 2009 US Open Cup Final seem to have it all.

When Two Tribes Go To War Rivalries are never made, they're born. Born in fire more often than not, but like a fire they can tend to die down after a while if they aren't stoked often enough. They can even go out all together, but as long as the ash remains, fresh kindling can always re-ignite it.

It has been 16 months since the „Special One" took over Inter's bench and now we are free to say that he made no impact. There hasn't been any progress and it is time for Massimo Moratti to ask himself what was wrong with Roberto Mancini.

The fact that Inter defended the title cannot be considered success and most of Italian football fans will agree with me on this.

QUESTION ON MY MIND
Will Richie Williams be the new head coach at DC United next season?
STARTERS
Tahiti has played in two U20 World Cup group stage games so far and lost them both 8-0. The first was to Spain. OK. But the second was to Venezuela, a country that barely plays the game.