By Phil Gregory

A resurgent Sunderland side lie in wait for Arsenal on Saturday afternoon, though a 7-1 drubbing of Blackburn could prove to be the catalyst for revitalising our own campaign. The draw at Bolton recently means that we really must be getting the three points from Sunderland if we are serious about catching [.

After that emphatic drubbing of Blackburn Rovers, Arsenal face a tricky trip to the Stadium of Light to face a rejuvenated Sunderland side who are currently eighth in the table, just seven points behind Arsenal. Sunderland have been in great form since the arrival of new boss Martin O'Neil and one could assume that the [.

Granada have hired former Atletico Madrid coach Abel Resino to replace the sacked Fabriciano Gonzalez and try to save the La Liga strugglers from making an immediate return to the second division.

"Granada CF announces the hiring of Abel Resino as the red and whites' new coach until next June 30," the club said in a statement on their website.

Fulham Football Club seem to be on a roll since the Festive Period in England and Clint Dempsey has been right in step with his team. Dempsey scored a hat trick in a 3rd round FA Cup game against Charlton Athletic on Saturday defeating them 4-0. Despite the 5-0 drubbing by Manchester United on December [.

Liverpool host League One strugglers Oldham to-night with the home side looking to put right the wrongs of their 3-0 drubbing at Manchester City. The tale of the tape of these two side's are as follows:

MATCH FACTS
Liverpool have won the FA Cup on 7 occasions 1965,1974,1986,1989,1992,2001 and 2006.

United are back in full stride, and their game against Wigan at Old Trafford on Boxing Day should really be a stroll in the park. Bookmakers are not surprisingly offering a best price of just 1.17 about them after impressive victories over QPR and Fulham in their last two games. Victory at Craven Cottage meant that Sir Alex Ferguson's side have now won all 8 games against bottom-half opposition this season, and only a brave or madman would back against them making it nine in his one.

The festive programme kicks off in the EPL on Monday with 14 teams taking to the field to run off the turkey.

Traditionally when you look at the Premier league fixture list at this time of year, the schedulers have taken their time to make sure that teams (and more so fans) don't have to travel too far.

By Amy Eustace

"People just don't know how good Lucas is," prophesised Rafael Benitez, three years ago to the month. It was December 2008, and Liverpool had found themselves in a somewhat unfamiliar position by recent standards. Top of the table, ahead of the pack and with just one defeat for the first half of the season away to Spurs, the only problem was a smattering of frustrating draws.

By Chris Wright

Chasing a huge goal difference swing and needing POAK to beat Rubin Kazan elsewhere, the odds were against Tottenham making it through to the knockout phases last night, but they held up their end of the bargain by racking up an impressive drubbing of Shamrock Rovers at the Tallaght Steven Pienaar, Andros Townsend (a real beauty, well worth watching the highlights for), Jermain Defoe and Harry Kane all bagging a goal apiece.

FC Barcelona booked a place in the final of this year's World Club Championship final against Santos courtesy of an easy 4-0 drubbing of Qatari Club Al Sadd. It was a mismatch from the beginning and the only question was by what margin FC Barcelona will emerge victorious. But the match didn't end up so well for us, with David Villa being substituted midway due to injury.

Didier Drogba and Salomon Kalou's imminent January departure for the African Cup of Nations, along with the sale of Nicolas Anelka to Chinese Super League Club Shanghai Shenhua has left manager André Villas-Boas facing a possibly head-scratching dilemma.

The loss of these three household names could force goal-shy Fernando Torres back in to the equation at Stamford Bridge, a move which some would consider a risk.

Bayern Munich are Autumn Champions. Barring a highly unlikely flurry of goals for and against the right teams. More than the virtual trophy, Bayern will cherish the three-point gap, they opened up at the top of the table, taking maximum advantage of the slip ups of both Borussias.

Goals, goals, goals. With Liverpool wasting chance after chance, profligacy to blame for home draws with Norwich, Swansea, and Sunderland as well as away losses to Stoke and Fulham, the number of goals scored has become both millstone and mantra, a clear problem in obvious need of fixing, the major fault keeping the side from reaching its full potential.

I am sure like me, many of you were surprised when you saw the result of Wednesday's Champions League match between French side Olympique Lyon and Dinamo Zagreb of Croatia.

However, it is now emerging that Olympique Lyon's 7-1 drubbing of Dinamo Zagreb in the Champions League on Wednesday could have been as a result of a betting scandal.

I had the honor of working with Robbie Church for four years at Duke University, and not only is he one of the top coaches in the women's game, but is also one of the true gentlemen in the sport.
Although his Duke Blue Devils fell short in the national title game to Paul Ratcliffe and Stanford, it was clear that Church has firmly placed his Duke side among the nation's elite.

Tunisian giants Espérance will make their maiden appearance in the FIFA Club World Cup following their second CAF Champions League title win, their first such title for seventeen years, which was achieved with a 1-0 aggregate victory over Moroccans WAC Casablanca in the final. Should the Tunis based side overcome the challenge of Asian champions Al Sadd in the quarter-finals, a glamour tie against UEFA Champions League winners FC Barcelona will be on the cards for one of Africa's most famous clubs.

By JOHN BOSCHINI

It's the kind of stuff Hollywood was built on.

Last season, a staggering nine goals were produced in a snowy quarterfinal clash between then-No. 1 Louisville and No. 8 UCLA, as the Cardinals squeaked out a 5-4 victory on their way to a runner-up finish.

Yesterday evening, Emmanuel Adebayor scored a couple of goals in Tottenham Hotspur's match against Aston Villa to help Spurs climb to third place in the Premier League, displacing Newcastle United.
The result, hewn from the grass at White Hart Lane, had a profound effect on the Londoners' coach, Harry Redknapp, who has since tipped his club to claim their first league title since the 1960/61 season.

By JOHN BOSCHINI

Real Madrid entered the fifth matchday of UEFA Champions League already having qualified for the knockout rounds, so a more subdued performance from the Spanish giants wouldn't have been a complete surprise. That's not quite what happened, though,.

An ice age ago Arsenal played their last game, would I be correct in thinking we beat WBA? And our last away fixture was .... remind me?

Before the Interlull

Very excited to see us back playing Norwich. Lovely town, good beer and pubs, beautiful countryside.

6 games, 6 wins. 20 goals scored, 1 conceded. That was the month of October for Real, very probably the best European team right now.

They beat Lyon in Bernabeu 4-0 two weeks ago, and we haven't changed that much since then: Lisandro is still missing, as are Grenier and Pied.

What do we have here? A drubbing by Arsenal at Stamford Bridge? Who would have thought this would be the case two months ago? In a game that could have ended 10-9, it was great ...

Terry testing to see if the ground is soft enough for a tumble

There are ways to make this piece an epic one. Considering the result, it would not be too hard to do that but also because of the result, there's no need for any of that. The 5-3 drubbing we dished out to Chelsea at Stamford Bridge should take all the headlines and praises.

Return of the Comeback Kings

It is rare in football that one result ever goes on to be defined as a turning point in the season of either team involved. While the concept is frequently discussed, the reality in terms of the performance of the team lies more firmly in their continued application and sustained confidence.

Arsene Wenger believes that Chelsea will be a biggest test for the Gunners to see how much they have really improved since the 8-2 drubbing by Manchester United. He believes that Chelsea are one of the top teams but Arsenal will be "having a go" at them to see if they can nab some goals [...]

www.youtube.com/watch?v=LxkZGK85nt0 Manchester United fans will probably not want to watch this video as it may be too painful for some, but YouTuber JohnGME has analyzed a few of the goals from the 6-1 drubbing by Manchester City to expose the...
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Why it's finally time for United to move on from Rio

Rio Ferdinand has been a superb player for Manchester United and one of the best England defenders of his generation. But he looked weary and defeated during the drubbing by Manchester City on Sunday. Something tells me the promotion of Phil Jones and Chris Smalling to regular places in the United defence may be about to be accelerated.

The El Clasico teams of Barcelona and Real Madrid have continued their battle for superiority at the top of the Spanish Primera Division this season, with both facing tricky fixtures over the next three weeks.

Valencia v Real Madrid

Valencia finished third last season and on their day have the ability to take on the big two; they host Madrid on Saturday 19th November at the Mestalla.

It was a weekend to forget for a number of European sides who suffered shocking losses. In England, the news of the day was Sunday's 6-1 home drubbing of Manchester United by city rivals Manchester City.

Across the continent, things were not too good for Bayern Munich, Lyon, Chelsea, Barcelona and Juventus.

Key Stats
League Position: 16th, 1 W, 3D, 3L, 9 GF, 8 GA, +1 GD, 6 pts
Away Form: 2 D, 1 L, 2 GF, 3 GA
Last Meeting Arsenal 0-0 Sunderland (March 5, 2011) (Premier League)

Well, we're back to our regular programming.

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(From the Bushman Archives)
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- Throughout the day, the QPR Report Messageboard has news updates, comments and perspectives - even links to other board comments of interest re QPR matters (on and off the field) along with football (and ONLY football) topics in general.

In less than 72 hours, Anfield will be host to an epic Barclays Premier League battle that has drawn fierce passion from all corners of the globe.

While Sir Alex Ferguson has toppled the Kop off it's perch by clinching Manchester United's nineteenth EPL title, the fire will not burn any less stronger when England's two most successful clubs clash heads at Merseyside.

Yesterday's round of AFCON qualifiers marked a huge upset for traditional African football powerhouses Nigeria, South Africa and Egypt who saw their hopes of making it to the 2012 African Cup of Nations end dramatically.

For Nigeria, a 2-2 draw at home against Guinea was not enough to see them through to the finals.

Frank Lampard showed just why he remains an important part of the Blues title quest this season as he scored an impressive hat-trick in Chelsea's 5-1 drubbing of Bolton Wanderers.

One thing i really like about huge wins irrespective of the team is the headlines that come out of them.

To be honest, I feared another Old Trafford-like drubbing at the hands of Spurs today. I couldn't see us conceding less than three goals and was sure Emmanuel Adebayor would continue his good record of scoring in North London derbies, this time for the enemy.

In the end what we got was arguably more depressing; a pretty even game in which the better side edged it through just doing the simple things properly.

The Rueful Rest: If the rumours are true, we're going to be seeing a lot of this one. Frank isn't the kind of boy to express his frustration at being benched in the traditional manner, but to those trained to spot the signs, his pretty pink protruberance is indicative of a troubled mind.

By IAN HOLLIDAY

Just one match into his tenure at Inter Milan, Claudio Ranieri has already done something his predecessor Gian Piero Gasperini was unable to do: win.

Inter got two goals in the last nine minutes of its match at Bologna to pull out a 3-1 win.

Lucas Leiva believes that Liverpool's consecutive 2-1 wins against Brighton in the Carling Cup and the Wolverhampton Wanderers in the Barclays Premier League have effectively allowed the Reds to put two recent setbacks behind them.

A 1-0 reverse at Stoke City, which was followed by a 4-0 drubbing at Tottenham, prompted many pundits to write off the Merseyside outfit's chances of returning to the UEFA Champions League next season but Lucas is confident that his teammates are back in the hunt for a top-four finish.

Brighton 1-2 Liverpool: Craig Bellamy scores first goal since Anfield switch as Steven Gerrard returns from injury

Liverpool skipper sees action for the first time since March and Spaniard Vicente makes Seagulls debut, as Reds make wholesale changes following drubbing at the weekend

View the full story here: Goal

A news article on 2011-09-21 20:43:00 from: Goal

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

Just when you thought all hope was lost, New York goes out and does this. A win, honest to God, a win. For the first time since the July 6th drubbing of TFC, the Red Bulls claimed all three points and boy did it feel good. Granted, it got a bit nervy there and it wasn't the pretty display by any stretch of the imagination, but isn't that what it's all about?