In the first part of our FM scouting series, we looked at United's new DP forward Hamdi Salihi. Now it's time to turn our attention to central defender Emiliano Dudar...

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What jumps out immediately is Dudar's marking ability and aerial power, the later of which, given his size, was to be expected.

Being slightly fearful of numbers, I'm not sure how the old recipe for success of 'win at home and draw away' stands up in modern times, now we have this new-fangled three points for a win, but right now it will do for me. As against Man City, against the Pool we stood up to the considerable pressure exerted by our rivals near the top of the league, emerging with great credit and in this case a point too.

Ducky's Note: Ratna Prashanth analyzes Cahill's signing and what it means for Chelsea

Finally, after a loooooong discussion of personal terms, Chelsea announced the signing of Bolton Wanderers' English-born central defender Gary Cahill. This is a much needed signing at a low price in January market, considering the fact that Chelsea have been having a torrid time with their defence the whole season.

Inter's slender 1-0 victory over their city rivals Milan last night threw them back in the title race. A 65th minute goal from Diego Milito was enough to hand Claudio Ranieri's men win the 204th edition of the Derby Della Madonnina.

Juventus who were level on points with Milan before last night's round of fixtures also failed to make most of their match against Cagliari as they were held to a 1 all draw at the Juventus stadium.

Their Words "They're getting the music. They understand that the pace internationally is much faster. The demand is much faster in terms of the concentration, speed of play, speed of thought, speed of implementing certain things." US National Team coach Jurgen Klinsmann. Other Sources Montreal's first choice in MLS draft is versatile - from The Kansas City Star's Randy Covitz: Where to play him?

Jay Spearing insists Liverpool will come back stronger when they return to Manchester City in the Carling Cup.
The 23-year-old midfielder was part of the side that lost 3-0 at the Etihad Stadium on Tuesday night in the Premier League, sinking without a trace despite City going down to 10 men in the closing stages.

SPANISH FOOTBALL back in serious action for 2012 with four SPANISH CUP 1º st leg matches played tonight. Seems the Xmas break has not been good for some Clubs as they were lacking spark & concentration, perhaps due to the extra calories, & some paid for it. Here is a quick summary of events, final results & scorers.

‘Oh, is there a match on darling?' It's sweet of Adriana to sound even vaguely excited on my behalf.

It's the first time today that I've thought about football. I've known for a while that I would be working late so I put it to one side, and anyway sitting next to Adriana for the afternoon's meeting is distraction enough.

Leading up to the Clasico this past weekend between Real Madrid and Barcelona, Paul Kennedy of Soccer America reported on what Jose Mourinho left his players with as their 10 secrets of success heading into this massive rivalry of world football super powers.
What will it take for Real Madrid to beat Barcelona in their much-awaited Clasico on Saturday at the Bernabeu Stadium?

AVB held his pre match press conference yesterday and was keen to point out that Chelsea will not be sitting back to try and keep a clean sheet to progress to the knockout stages tonight but will be going all out to win the game which is good to hear.
He said:

People have seen us play enough now to be sure we always take the initiative in games, We know that Valencia want to get something because a goal for them makes the game even more difficult for us, but we won't change our strategy just because it is an important game
We will take the initiative and we don't play counter attack or use the long balls.

Picking up another defeat against Liverpool at the Carling Cup in the midweek, simply made things tougher for Chelsea especially their manager, Andre Villas-Boas, who got intensive criticism recently.

Trying to calm things down, one of the Blues' main player, David Luiz, believed that his team is not actually in crisis but simply just having a string of bad results, which they're eagerly want to end in their two upcoming matches.

The in-thing at the moment, aside from rightly praising Robin van Persie for being a goalscoring machine, is to praise our new-found solidity at the back. While results have been good recently, I'd say it's more down to the form of our attack than any miracles happening in defence.

Looking at our form since the defeat at Spurs, we've only actually managed three clean sheets in ten games, hardly awe-inspiring, but victories have covered this up.

In arguably one of the most difficult press conferences he has ever had to face being a manager, let alone Chelsea manager, AVB admitted that our run has been unacceptable and continues to believe that he can turn things round.
Here are the key parts of the press conference yesterday:

"We have spoken about results – and results in football are key to a manager's sustainability.

Chelsea goalkeeper Petr Cech is dumbfounded by the heavy criticism heaped at manager Andre Villas-Boas in the wake of the club's recent struggles, arguing that the manager cannot run on the pitch and prevent errors made by the players.

Cech's teammate Florent Malouda made the same assertion before the disappointing 2-1 defeat to Bayer Leverkusen last night but Villas-Boas maintained that he must take the responsibility on his shoulders.

Chelsea boss Andre Villas-Boas has refused to let the increasing pressure on his team get to his head, insisting that there is reason to stay optimistic despite a heart-breaking 2-1 defeat against Bayer Leverkusen in the UEFA Champions League.

The Blues took the lead at BayArena through a fine Didier Drogba strike at the beginning of the second half but failed to hold on to it as substitute Erin Derdiyok punished them with a header before Manuel Friedrich delivered a last-minute knock-out punch.

Let's be honest when it comes to David Luiz everyone has their own opinion (including Gary Neville!). Some people say he should be playing week in, week out. Some people say he shouldn't. Some people think he should be playing at right back and some others believe he should be playing as a holding midfielder.

Let's begin this morning with team news ahead of tonight's game against Borussia Dortmund.

Just to maintain the balance of the universe, Abou Diaby's return to the squad comes as Tomas Rosicky drops out, having picked up a 'small thigh strain' in training. Diaby hasn't played yet this season having undergone surgery on his ankle in the summer and I suspect he'll start from the bench.

Where to begin?
There are times when perhaps we should just hold our hands up and say well done to both teams, neither deserve to lose. Go on, share the bloody thing. Won't happen though. We demand winners and where there is a winner there must be a loser. The crying shame of sport.
On 18' with Indonesia leading 1-0 through Dwi Cahyo Gunawan I turned to the wife and said Malaysia would win.

Note: There is a print link embedded within this post, please visit this post to print it. | Subscribe: Weekly Football Phrase

Each week the languagecaster team will explain a football phrase or cliche for learners of English who love the sport. On this week's show we feature the phrase headless chicken.

French football expert Ben Lyttleton has today talked about how well Newcastle have done, with their concentration recently in buying French-based players. Alain Traore could arrive in January? With the game against Manchester City coming up on Saturday, Newcastle are getting some good publicity for their terrific start to the season.

Video highlights and reaction Match report By the numbers

So the progress and the momentum continued yesterday with a win so routine it made you sit up and realise how long it's been since we won a game quite so easily. Having beaten us here last season West Brom clearly decided that was enough and really didn't offer much at all.

Despite feeling joyful after picking up a big win against their city rival on the weekend, Manchester City's midfielder, James Milner ordered his teammates to not exaggerating their victory against Manchester United.

Milner ordered his colleagues to keep their feet on the ground and don't lose their concentration in the upcoming matches since the famous win over United only gives them three points in the table and the title didn't end after that match.

Bayern signing Jupp Heynckes was the best thing to happen to Toni Kroos. The prototypical wunderkind to come out of Germany's reformed youth system, needed Heynckes to pop up at Leverkusen, to finally play his long awaited breakthrough season in the Bundesliga. Now that the two are reunited at Bayern, he could well establish himself at the top of German football, both at Bayern and the German national team.

I am starting to become a bit concerned at how poor my predictions have been so far this season, and this weekend's Rome Derby is no exception. But I am, however. prepared to give myself something of a mulligan for my most recent failure.

At the end of the preview I wrote last week, I managed to sneak in a little caveat concerning my feeling that Roma would win.

It was a display which fell quite firmly into the category of "Typical England". What should and can could easily have been a comfortable win in Montenegro last Friday night ended with a scrambled draw and a red card for Wayne Rooney, leaving the team's qualification for the finals from a distinctively mediocre group looking just a little more limp than it might otherwise have done.

Morning all, and it's into the Interlull we go.

One of the worst things about our form at the moment is that it makes Interlulls seem almost welcome. It's a chance for some re-grouping, for players to go off and clear their heads a bit, and for the manager and his staff to reassess where we are.

Arsenal midfielder Alex Song has urged his teammates to play with more concentration in order to reward the faith of the club's supporters while also relieving manager Arsene Wenger of the heavy pressure that has been heaped on him in recent months.

Song, who was one of the Gunners' only standout performers during Sunday's 2-1 derby defeat away to the Spurs, admitted that the players have repeatedly let the fans down and in order to become more consistent, they must take a close look at themselves to mitigate the rising number of concerns.

RVP plans his Emirates getaway if Arsenal scrape along

" I still have almost two years left, so for the moment that's fine. I'm happy with my contract. I can't look into the future. I can't see us talking now because we are so busy. "

What exactly in these words sets off the exit alarm?

Jose Mourinho admits he is worried about Real Madrid's current form but said Wednesday's 0-0 draw was down to Racing Santander's negative tactics. After the narrow Super Cup defeat to Barcelona, Madrid looked in good form at the start of the season as they scored ten goals in their opening two La Liga games against Real Zaragoza and Getafe.

Jose Mourinho admits he is worried about Real Madrid's current form but said Wednesday's 0-0 draw was down to Racing Santander's negative tactics. After the narrow Super Cup defeat to Barcelona, Madrid looked in good form at the start of the season as they scored ten goals in their opening two La Liga games against Real Zaragoza and Getafe.

A walk in the proverbial park. The boys mixed it up well for the most part at the Stadium of Light against a Sunderland side well, let's be fair here that was shit. Asamoah Gyan off to the oil fields, too? Steve Bruce. Man, the guy's in trouble.

Making a point

Improvement.

Union

So, no Union game on Sunday because of Hurricane Irene. What's a Philly soccer fan supposed to do? Support the Independence in Saturday's WPS Championship Final (CSN, 4pm), that's what.

Looking at the title of Kerith Gabriel's excellent piece in today's Daily News, "Union's youth has not been served," it would be easy to expect a rant about how some deserving young players on the Union roster are not getting enough playing time.

Photo: Guido Gaeffke

Union

Judging from the reaction on Twitter, last night's Supporters Summit was a great success. Check out our report and look for Earl Gardner's photo essay later today.

The Union Dues has a report of their own.

One of the results of the summit will make Twitter followers happy: Sebastien Le Toux will join Twitter next week.

Funny thing about this transfer window is that teams have seemingly stocked up on redundant players rather than addressing clearer needs. Also, we've seen a further concentration of players at the top as the biggest clubs fill out their 25-man rosters with full internationals while clubs below them are looking to academy and youth players to play a larger first-team role.

Okay all Geoff and I are trying to ramp up our game day coverage so here goes the first edition of Quotes, stats and links. After every game I will be compiling all the quotes, stats and links that pertain to the game just played, and only that game.

Quotes:

Head coach John Spencer

On the overall result:
"I think that we took on opportunities at the right moment.

Call it a hangover, call it a trap game, call it a gut punch. There are lots of negative adjectives you can use to describe the Seattle Sounders' 3-1 loss to the Houston Dynamo on Saturday in hot, humid and nasty Robertson Stadium.

It was, easily, the Sounders' worst performance of the MLS season.

The Audi Cup finished this past week and there were few positives for Milan to take back to Italy. The team lacked sharpness, effectiveness in midfield and at times lacked in concentration at the back. Amongst the negatives were the performances of Antonio Cassano. A great talent no doubt, the Italian looked well behind the [.

The third and final part of a random collection of players I'll be keeping my eye on as this SPL season progresses. Today a player each from St Mirren and Dunfermline.
Nigel Hasselbaink, St Mirren"If football was played in the air," an old sage of Easter Road once told me, "then Paul Fenwick would be Pele.

Very nice goal from the U19 Romanian team, but they lost 1-3 to Spain. The goal is the first of the four, and was the only one worth watching from this clip:
szólj hozzá: Romania 1-3 Czech republic
Legal but unethical play from Palmeiras player, Kleber, against Flamengo
Peru first goal against Colombia was a wonderful one at the 102nd minute, meaning very strong concentration and an excellent finish, taking advantage of bad goalkeeping
Suarez second goal in the semi-final worth mentioning, mainly because of the counter attack as a whole and the wonderful pass, more than the finishing itself
Wonderful skill by Friorentina, if it was to Ronaldo or Messi, it would make millions of hits in one day
Argentina U20 wonderful free kick vs.

David Beckham -- Getty ImagesBy Charlie Corr
ESPNChicago.com
Since taking over the Chicago Fire's coaching duties, interim head coach Frank Klopas has preached about strengthening the defense on set pieces.
The Fire had not allowed a set-piece goal during Klopas' first seven games at the helm.