By Chris Wright

A pair of beautifully-taken goals from the Yaya Monster (the footwork before the second of the two is definitely worth another look) and a penalty both won and dispatched by Mario Balotelli saw Man City cruise to victory over a bare-bones Villarreal side that put in the worst performance by a Spanish club in Champions League history (© Martin O'Neill).

This Could Be Par for the Course in 2012 (Photo by Dan Dickinson)Tomorrow, September 30, marks the end of the 2012 Red Bulls season ticket renewal period. Those RBNY fans who have not renewed their seats - either by payment in full or via an installment plan - will surrender them when the clock strikes twelve Friday evening.

By Chris Wright

As we saw yesterday, SWP threw down the gauntlet and instigated a Manchester City-wide planking epidemic with the vertical door-based plank he posted on Twitter a while back...

Micah Richards seized said gauntlet, then clambered atop a tactics board for this audacious but sloppily-executed attempt.

By Chris Wright

You can almost feeeel the hate flowing through Porto's new kits for 2011/12, as modelled by Emperor Hulk and his cronies.

Some feeble-minded gooch has disabled embedding on the video, so we're afraid you'll have to wander outside Pies' safe confines to check it out.

We have arrived at the stage of the summer where one begins to mentally tick off checkpoints for the maddening methadone of pre season. In the last seven days, two of my traditional tick boxes have been inked. The release of the season review DVD (bet this year's sold like hot cakes. Any chance of a reduction if we only buy up to February?

By Chris Wright

'Scandal' has broken out in this morning's Il Corriere dello Sport, who claim that Lionel Messi, both Gab and Diego Milito and cape-wearing crime fighter Martin Palermo attended a 'sex and alcohol' party in their native Argentina which was being hosted by local reality TV strumpet Xoana Gonzalez.

By Chris Wright

Birmingham's acting chairman Peter Pannu is not a happy bunny, and for good reason.

As you may be aware, Brum manager Alex McLeish resigned in time-honoured fashion by email yesterday with one eye on the Aston Villa vacancy.

Pannu and his cronies on the City board are feeling understandably jilted after having recently tied up deals for three new players that were sounded out by Big Eck himself, who chose to do a e-runner while negotiations for a fourth new face (Danny Koevermans from PSV) were ongoing.

Stop me if you've heard this before...the Houston Dynamo have no creativity in the midfield and forwards that simply cannot consistently finish chances. I've said that, or something similar, far too many times this season but the sad fact is that game in, game out it's the truth for Houston. It's not like they aren't getting chances on goal, they just can't do anything with them.

Given the uproar around the recent happenings at FIFA, you'd think that something new and horrific had happened, but corruption has been at the core of our governing body for years. It's just that now we're reaping the fruit of our ignorance and, as a footballing family, we have nobody to blame but ourselves.

By Chris Wright

In an attempt to justify the fact that the West Ham top brass decided, with one game left to play, that sacking Avram Grant in the tunnel at the DW Stadium was the classiest course of action to take, vice-chairwoman Karren Brady has spoken out in defense of her reprehensible cohorts claiming that the board did everything in their power to support Grant this season.

Sepp Blatter whose cronies are the ones square in the eye of the present bribery allegations is now flapping his gums about corruption.

Yes, all window dressing for an election year. FIFA is very, very concerned about Lord Triesman's allegations against some very high ranking executive members.

AP Photo/Eric DraperIn light of the recent news about Qatar acquiring the hosting responsibility for the 2022 World Cup through bribery, it is best for FIFA to award Soccer's biggest event to the U.S., who took the second most votes.
This whole thing stunk from the beginning. It didn't make sense Qatar could win FIFA's bidding process on merit alone.

There is no way the Federal Government could have staved off Peter FitzSimons, Roy "NRL need more TV money" Masters, Rebecca Wilson and all the Melbourne cronies who love to boot the football code.
The Feds couldn't have ponied it more money after that World Cup debacle, the A-League crowds plummet and code woes in general - if we hadn't been handed, ney gifted the Asia Cup 2015
Now the sweet review will ensure more money for football - this will help this country party with our Asian friends and be beamed into all those Asia homes - er just like AFL and NRL.

Looks like the Biebs has some talents apart from moon-walking across the stage and singing about love and courting women at the ripe old age of 17. Ahead of a sold out performance Wednesday evening at the Palau Sant Jordi, the Canadian heart-throb decided against playing in the sandbox, and instead paid a visit to FC Barcelona's training session.

FIFA's bluster from Swiatzerland doesn't seem to be having much effect on the Liga Primer Indonesia with news now that Arema's Singapore duo, Noh Alam Shah and M Riduan, have had talks with the LPI about a possible move there when the window opens in May.
The pair are slightly peeved about the continued problem of late salaries.

The turgid saga with the PSSI is finally drawing to a close. FIFA have, apparently, said the current incumbent Nurdin Halid may not stand for re-election and while the PSSI are quite rightly waiting for confirmation, calling it 'gossip' we do seem to be approaching the end game.
For now the imbroglio continues as people jockey for position and influence but it seems more a question of when and not if we can look forward to life post Nurdin.

It takes a big man to admit when he's completely, categorically incorrect.

Well, I came out with a bit of egg on my face after wrongly predicting that Liverpool would cling on to Fernando Torres until the end of the season. Taking into consideration Torres' mediocre form this season, persistent nagging injuries, and desire to exit to what he essentially described as a better club, New England Sports Ventures wagged its tail at the £50 million bone waved in front of its face by Chelsea owner Roman Abramovich and sent its star goal scorer packing last night.

As far as the Spanish sporting press goes, a good rule of thumb to abide by is that, if the twin Catalan-based newspapers Sport and El Mundo Deportivo aren't running with another 'Barcelona make us giggle like schoolgirls' cover story, then there must be a potentially devastating ruction to try and undermine over at Real Madrid.

-Jason Davis
First, a few needed statements of belief to set things up: One, I don't believe Chuck Blazer is an unintelligent person, or, if you prefer because we live in a world where nuance is dead and buried in an unmarked grave, I don't believe Chuck Blazer is an idiot. Two, I don't believe Chuck Blazer intentionally works against the best interests of American soccer unless he's totally convinced it will benefit CONCACAF as a whole, as the confederation is officially his constituency (see the new qualifying structure).