Tomorrow night Chelsea travel to Birmingham in the replay of our FA Cup tie and Chelsea's team selection will be more than interesting as Roberto Di Matteo takes over until the end of the season.
Will he go with the norm or will be look to make an immediate impact?
It would be easy to pick the big guns, to get out there to get the win.

1. The laws of physics bow to Papiss Cisse. 2. He's also the classiest time-waster OTP has ever seen. Why not run down the clock with an outrageous lob, eh? 3. Richard Scudamore, give the public what they want! Let's get this Joe Jordan v Owen Coyle fight on. 4. The temptation to 'do an [...]

Mirror: Ken Bates: We have to MAKE top clubs respect the FA Cup

Angry Leeds chiefs want big guns fined, docked points and banned from Europe if they pick weakened teams

View the full story here: The Mirror

A news article on 2012-01-06 23:00:39 from: The Mirror

This news item has been reproduced from today's media.

So there were some very interesting results around Europe this weekend with the major stories making the headlines being Inter's 4-0 loss to Roma in the Serie A and Chelsea's surprising 3-3 draw at home with United.

Coming off the back of 3 poor results, Inter desperately needed a win to ensure they broke into the top 4 spot.

So Newcastle's new signing Papiss Demba Cisse and fellow Senegalese team mate Demba Ba netted goals for the Magpies in their 2-1 home win over Aston Villa yesterday. However, whats funny is that the same two players could not do the same for Senegal in the Africa Cup of Nations.

And this is interesting because African players have a tendency to perform well for their clubs, but when it comes to their national sides, it is a different story.

Having already end their six years title drought, Craig Bellamy now has a new target for his club, Liverpool, which is finishing in the top four place and eventually playing in the Champions League again.

Bellamy believes that after finally winning something again, it's eventually time for the Reds to get themselves back into the height of European club competition and that's obviously the UEFA Champions League.

Newcastle United's form this season have been pretty consistent, resulting in their excellent position in the league, sitting at sixth place with an open chance in chasing for the fourth place spot or at least finishing in Europa League zone.

This situation is obviously being acknowledged by Newcastle players, including their Argentinian center back, Fabrio Coloccini, who is excited with the situation but urged everyone to simply take one things at a time and shouldn't be thinking too far about what European competition the team will play next season.

(Note: Yes, I am aware this is not a Sporting Kansas City or LA Galaxy website. But when I heard that the two teams would be playing four hours away from where I live during the Chicago Fire's bye week, I jumped at the opportunity to cover it. Hope all of you enjoy it.)

There was a moment at the end of Sporting Kansas City's 1-0 victory over the L.

In terms of international friendlies, Schalke 04 falls somewhere between an English team with no strikers (Everton) and a Spanish team intent on reminding us they have nothing to play for (Madrid).

The Germans have stars. They also have some very intriguing young players who (gasp!) have gotten regular minutes early in their careers.

Photo credit: Baiji

Good afternoon! It's a glorious Saturday here in Red Bulls Land. Alas, our glorious club is in beautiful Montreal, Quebec, to take on MLS expansion side Montreal Impact (7:30pm ET, MSG, match notes here). It will be the second meeting of these two Eastern Conference rivals this season.