Click here (http://goal.com/en/news/12/spain/2009/11/09/1614584/exclusive-catalonia-coach-johan-cruyff-believes-football-can) to read more Click to continue reading...

Seven stories from The Offside and World Cup Blog this week: Nominate your player/manager football ubermen Gigi's Buffon's incredible Champions League save Ballon d'Or or FIFA World Player of the Year: Which is shinier? Norwegian homage to Brazilian airport ad The return of Johan Cruyff. To Catalonia. Click to continue reading...

While Maradona is busy making a shamockery of the Argentinean national side, the man who typically lurks behind Diego & Pele whether prudent or not in the discussion for the world's greatest ever player has returned to football. Johan Cruijff, arguably the greatest ever player/coach combination in football history, has returned to the bench Catalonia and don't you call it Spain.

Click to continue reading...

In the next weeks, Johan Cruyff will decide whether he'll make a return as team manager!! The ex Ajax and Barca coach has been invited by the Catalan federation to coach the national selection. Catalonia has a "symbolic" national team, which is excluded from official tournaments. The team plays one game Click to continue reading...

Cesc Fabregas' name has been synonymous with Arsenal in recent years. He is undoubtedly their biggest star and the most dynamic player that they have. His ability to see a gap and to pick out a team mate is now bordering on legendary status. Couple this with his new-found confidence in front of goal and you are looking at a player that even Arsene Wenger will find hard to replace. Click to continue reading...

Arsenal won the battle of the 4-3-3 as Wigan Athletic afforded the Gunners too much space in the centre of midfield to play their game.
_____________________________________________________________________________

Roberto Martínez would been have growing up in Catalonia around the same time Johan Cruyff was instilling his model of play at Barcelona and what was to become the very DNA of the football club.

Click to continue reading...

Zlatan is introduced to the Blaugrana faithful.

It's done and dusted; Stevie Wonder's lyrics convey it best. Ibrahimovich is a member of Barcelona FC. The Swede was met by 50,000 people at the Nou Camp after signing a five year deal that will keep him in Catalonia until 2014.

Zlatan Ibrahimovich made it clear that only Barca could have lured him away from Internazionale which had been his home for the last three seasons.

Click to continue reading...

Zlatan is East and West, North and South; he is a blend of different cultures and influences. In his journal he wrote that he doesn't have a problem with that, on the contrary he sees that as his advantage. His portrait goes as follows: a guy from the Balkans, born in Sweden, with southern mentality, America and western civilization oriented.

Click to continue reading...

To commemorate the 50th of anniversary of the Camp Nou, Barcelona contracted English architect Norman Foster to re-structure the stadium in 2007. His plan was to spend around €250m on remodelling and to expand capacity by 10,000. However... not everyone is impressed with Foster's plan, as it apparently fails to solve some access problems. Click to continue reading...

Throughout football's long and patterned history there has always been drama, excitement, heartbreak and jubilation. The Uefa Cup Final in 1995 when Nayim ridiculously scored from the half-way line past a disbelieving David Seaman; the 1999 Champions League Final where Ole Gunnar Solskjær's right foot will forever be etched into the memory of Manchester United fans.

Click to continue reading...

February 2007, the dawning of a great new era in Liverpool's history as Tom Hicks and George Gillett bought the club from the Moore's family. Promising massive investment and the funds for the construction for the new stadium that Liverpool needed, it seemed as if Liverpool were finally about to catch up with Manchester United financially under the stewardship of Kop Football Holdings.

Click to continue reading...

� With the Premier League race done and dusted and the Champions League trophy spending the summer in Catalonia, there's only one more piece of silverware on offer in the 2008-2009 season, and either Everton or Chelsea will lay claim to it tomorrow at Wembley. Who's in and who's out - Frank Lampard, Alex and Juliano Belletti are available for Guss Hiddink's alleged swan song as Chelsea's manager while David Moyes can select Phil Neville and Steven Pienaar, if he so chooses. Click to continue reading...

As Rome recovers from last night's hugely anticipated Champions League final, and celebrations in Catalonia finally begin to die down, did last night's match live up to expectations?
For the first 20 minutes, it appeared that another classic final was unravelling in front of us. A period of early domination from United indicated that the English side would go on to grab a comfortable victory - just as many of the English tabloids had predicted throughout the week. Click to continue reading...

The long story short: Athletic Bilbao [shameless advertisement: AB needs a blogger] and Barcelona are from Basque Country and Catalonia, respectively. Both would like independence, Spain would like to hold them close to its bosom for as long as possible. So when King Juan Carlos showed up as the national anthem was bellowing out of [. Click to continue reading...

After the game at Camp Nou, Barcelona are furious at the referees. They are accusing Chelsea of negative approach, lots of tactical fouls, that referee Stark overlooked. Coach Balugrane Pep Guardiola thinks that his team was damaged by the referees and that such details can decide duels in the closing stages of the competition.

Click to continue reading...

Guus Hiddink probably boarded his teams' private jet back to London feeling pretty satisfied with his players and with himself. The last team to walk away from the Camp Nou with a 0-0 result was Manchester United, under the same Champions League semi-final circumstances, just over a year ago.

Click to continue reading...

Today is St George's Day and most of us will still be going to work. As you may know, countries all over the world celebrate their patron saint, for example and the closest to us and probably the most well known, is Saint Patrick's Day for Ireland!

Here is an interesting quote from Wikipedia on the subject:

"Due to supreme shortshightedness and a virtually complete lack of pride in one's own country, St George's Day is not celebrated as much in England as other National Days are around the world; the English populace plods off to work as usual and pays scant attention to the day.

Click to continue reading...

Ex-Barca star and mega-hottie, Chelsea's Deco, has spoken about the upcoming Champions League clash between his current club and his former one. His point of focus was our star Lionel Messi, saying: "At the moment, Leo is almost impossible to stop. He is an incredible player and if he is on form, we can only wait and see who has the ability to stop him. Click to continue reading...

Another big Derby, this one in Catalonia where Español and Barcelona face off. Elsewhere, poor Sporting Gijon now face Villarreal, Real Madrid visit Real Betis, and Atletico Madrid host Sevilla.
Preview 1
Preview2 Click to continue reading...

For the past two weeks US soccer has tried to convince the Royal Spanish Football Federation to overturn their ruling and allow the team from Catalonia to play a friendly on Oct. 14, however they were not successful.
Even though the US had agreed to terms that would prohibit any of players called into the Spanish camp ahead of their Euro qualifier to take part in the match, the Spanish officials still believe that it is a bad move for their national team. Click to continue reading...

Originally the US Men's National Team was scheduled to play a friendly with Catalonia on October 14th at Camp Nou, but that has since been vetoed by the Spanish Football Federation. They made several reasons for this decision, one being that Spain plays a Euro-qualifying match the day before and two days later, and another is that the Catalonia side usually only plays around Christmas and occasionally once in May. Click to continue reading...