Business as usual at the Old Firm

Luis Suarez has apologized, Kenny Dalglish has apologized. Both have exhibited sociopathic behaviour for the last two months which has brought much opprobrium on them and the club. But at least their apologies should be taken in good faith.

Here we are not 24 hours later with Richard Williams still milking it for all its worth.

More shocks and surprises are on the cards with match day 3 of AFCON set to begin later on today. As things stand, co-hosts Equatorial Guinea and Gabon, Ivory Coast, Ghana and Tunisia have all sealed their places in the next round.

Friday's thriller between Gabon and Morocco that saw the Co-hosts win the game with the last kick of the ball probably has to be the most entertaining match of the competition thus far.

Photo: Courtesy US Soccer

Philly Soccer Page

Today marks the return of one series and the start of another. First, fresh on the heels of our series of raves, we begin our series of season reviews of every Philadelphia Union player who saw more than ten minutes of action in 2011 (sorry Morgan!

I'm going to take a small break from writing about Arsenal today to vent on a subject that has infuriated me since listening to the European Championship draw on Friday evening, and that is the supreme arrogance of English pundits with regard to the national team. We all know that England are forever overhyped before major tournaments, but it is the dismissive contempt for many of the other countries (those not called Spain, Germany or Italy) that winds me up the most.

The Homeless World Cup helps over 50,000 people in seventy countries across the world. And Scotland are reigning world champions. That's one of the reasons I'm doing this.
Our first debate post of the day with the argument provided by Kenny Millar. Follow Kenny on Twitter and to borrow from a book that changed my life:
"Sunday morning?

Praise continues to come in for Sir Alex Ferguson, and Mark Lawrenson writes of why we will never get a manager of his kind again.
Sir Alex Ferguson is a one-off and we will never get a manager of his kind again.
Ferguson has built six different and successful Manchester United teams.

At St James Park this lunchtime, Newcastle United beat Everton by two goals to one and in doing so leap-frogged Manchester United for a couple of hours, at least into second place in the Premier League table. Such a result may prove to be the tipping point for a rewriting of the popular perceptions of the competence (or otherwise) of Mike Ashley and, while the knee-jerk journalistic response is something along the lines of, "Yeah, but they have to play Manchester City, Manchester United and Chelsea next", it is difficult to argue against the simple point that a team can only be judged upon how it has already played, rather than the ones that it has yet to play.

First and foremost, the apparent landslide of Barca related stuff today is not intentional, amicis! So let's get moving.... on the wheels of the Blaugranas' new 'cotxes' (cars) of course! Last week, you saw AC Milan receiving the keys to their brand new rides, and before that, the Real Madrid guys channeled their Formula 1 alter egos at a go-karting event.

What are the odds Carlos Tevez DOES play for City again? Derek McGovern's Bets of the Day

Roberto Mancini has suggested Carlos Tevez may still have a future at Manchester City – as if that's the news he really wants to hear. Mancini says the wantaneck striker will be considered for first-team duty if he apologises for that Munich mix-up, but that ain't gonna happen.

Manchester City's table-topping form has impressed Tottenham Hotspur midfielder Rafael Van der Vaart but despite acknowledging that Roberto Mancini's men are the favorites, the Dutchman believes that managing egos will be a challenge at the Eastlands.

Van der Vaart could not manage to enjoy a break-through during his time at Spanish giants Real Madrid and although the 28-year old has been terrific since moving to White Hart Lane, he believes that rediscovering peak form may not have been possible at the Santiago Bernabeu.

Another game, another three points for Tottenham and Harry Redknapp. The old adage of winning while not playing well but picking up three points has been a distant stranger to Spurs in the past yet has held true for a handful of their recent encounters; so often have they been accused of being flat track bullies that it must almost be just as pleasing to edge past the likes of Blackburn while under-performing than it was to blast past Liverpool for Redknapp.

Why United should be very afraid of City in the Manchester derby

There are still, quite clearly, troubling issues at Manchester City that have arisen largely as a result of their accelerated rise up the league. A gang of superstars, many with egos even bigger than their pay packets, have been signed with the inevitable corollary of occasional discontent and lack of discipline.

Photo: Nicolae Stoian

Early Winter

With nothing left to play for in the 2011 MLS season, Toronto represented a fairly unpredictable opponent. Aron Winter could have used Saturday's match at PPL Park to continue the development of his new system and go for broke, attempting to play spoiler and steal a road victory.

More a tale of life than football, by Darshan Joshi

Idiots, some might say, believe everything they're told, mostly out of complete ignorance. Idiots learn, though. With some education, even a dunce with the propensity to behave only in a way befitting a Shakespearean jester will have in himself instilled the wit to argue a personal theory.

Manchester United are on something of a roll this season. Having despatched ‘top' sides Arsenal, Spurs and Chelsea and scoring an astonishing fourteen goals against them in the process, the current incarnation of United looks absolutely irresistible. The remarkable thing is that on paper they look significantly weaker than in previous seasons.

For some reason Persib seem to think the identity of their next coach is a big secret. The fact that it's all over the internet will be a minor irritant ahead of their big announcement so to soothe their egos I'll play along.
Persib will say the coach is Croatian and they will identify him later this week.

Hey, it's Michael Ballack. Long time no see.

Welcome back

Michael Ballack was highly admired around these parts during his time at Chelsea. We, like Carlo Ancelotti, felt he deserved a short-term extension with the club. I, for instance, offered the following after learning of the announcement of his departure in early June 2010.

Gareth Bale: Younes, I'm worried. My career is at a crossroads. I feel that I've proved myself at club level, I've attracted interest from a number of sides and realistically, after my performances against Inter I could have gone anywhere.

But I decided to stay at Spurs.

Ha llegado el verano y los equipos de fútbol se preparan para la próxima temporada entrenando duro y haciendo fichajes.
Sin embargo los jugadores no son los únicos que entrenan para estar a punto ya que los responsables de sus alter egos virtuales en el mundo de los videojuegos. Los desarrolladores de juegos de fútbol en la próxima temporada y 'Pro Evolution Soccer' apuesta por llevar la inteligencia artificial al extremo.

Rodeado de los mejores jugadores del mundo, Pedrito pasó a ser Pedro pero conserva la tranquilidad con la que llegó desde las Canarias a las inferiores del Barcelona. Guardiola lo tiene como ejemplo de humildad ante un vestuario millonario que invita a egos desbocados. Ambidiestro, goleador, PR17 es el único jugador de la historia del fútbol que marcó al menos un gol en las seis competiciones oficiales de clubes durante una misma temporada.

Lazio, perhaps more than any other Italian side, have made some tremendously interesting moves in the summer mercato. "Interesting," that is, because acquiring two strikers and swapping fullbacks and potentially goalies is quite the gamble, a roll of the dice that could see the club challenge for the top or fall apart into a mess of distraught egos and poor decisions.

Normally, the lack of awareness of the modern footballer would be pilloried, particularly at a big club with big egos like Real, but what person sees a line of people standing at a path and decides to hop the wall anyway? How is that in any way a bright idea? Clearly UCLA has admissions standards issues.

By FRANCO PANIZO

If seeing Mexico lift a second consecutive Gold Cup trophy was enough to leave a large gash in U.S. men's national team fans' egos, watching El Tri's youth team win the U-17 World Cup just two weeks later was probably like rubbing salt in the still-fresh wound.

Rio Ferdinand tweeted earlier today 'Pre season training is in full effect! Hard running + football today....legs are feeling it! #stayonyourfeet after the long runs!' He recently, in the past 20 minutes or so, followed this up with 'Muscles are aching from pre season #oooff! (I love it though).

As ever, all too many politically correct, don't-muss-up-the-carpet type of tip-toeing through the wonderful landmine fields that are pressers and interviews. Fortunately it's the summer, when egos can swell and transfer moves can be made with the slight utterance of a few words.

Fernando Gago and Thomas Muller know of what we speak.

Inter Milan have announced that Gian Piero Gasperini will serve as manager next season. What Gasperini lacks in experience, he makes up for in success. As manager of Genoa, Gasperini earned promotion to Serie A before leading Genoa to a Europa League qualification. Gasperini signed a two-year contract with Inter today.

Barton and Bendtner's Battling Egos - AFR Podcast Ep13 iTunes / Soundcloud / RSS

Oliver Sparrow, Dominic Vieira, and Eric Beard run rule over everything going on in the world of football from the past week.

Topics include: Copa Libertadores, the latest in transfers and signings in the Premier League, La Liga, and Serie A, the CONCACAF Gold, Youtube's decision to stream all of Copa América, the madness going on between Aston Villa and Birmingham, the talent on show in the UEFA U21 tournament in Denmark, Arsenal Magazine's twitter getting hacked, hipster and egomaniacal Joey Barton, Marcelo Bielsa reportedly agreeing to become Athletic Bilbao's new manager, FIFA's fixture date farce, Budweiser being the sponsor of the FA Cup, and more.

A newbie to dexy's ranks, I thought I'd come in with a bang – well sort of. This season's been one of the strangest in recent memory. Gone are the stoic battles between two or maybe three formidable outfits – we now have about 6 teams in the top rung of our league, all of which could realistically challenge for top spot ove the next decade.

Often times, great athletes need great egos in order to drive them to excel beyond that which they may do otherwise, to be become the great athletes they are. It's a part of the process.

Usain Bolt is a great athlete. He also has a great ego. Really, really great ego.

Apparently he's suffering from delusions too, as he claims to be good enough to play for Manchester United when he hangs up his track spikes and tight-fitting onezie.

Suck it Benfica St. LouisTORONTO FC (15th) VS. SPORTING KC (18th)　BMO FIELD - SATURDAY 7PM ETTV: TSN　
THE KICKABOUT:- What is more devastating: a massive 10-game road trip; or, coming off a humiliating 6-2 loss at home and being decimated by injury and International duty?

Arsene Wenger can be a lot of things, but interesting is one of them. (Feels good to start off the day fresh with a solid backhanded compliment.)

Actually, he's quite an interesting man outside the boundaries of the season, which makes one thing there might be a little bit of gamesmanship with his in-season commentary.

With Harry Redknapp having done a fairly decent job at Spurs, many football pundits have now decided that he will be the man to take over the England job after the Euro 2012 tournament.
However, with Chelsea manager Carlo Ancelotti cruelly yet expectedly sacked yesterday by ruthless owner Roman Abramovich, it has emerged that a shock contender for the Blues managerial job could well be the man from Tottenham.

Yes, indeed, England's Brave John Terry celebrated his 500th Chelsea appearance on Saturday against Tottenham.

The Captain is only the fifth player to reach the 500-game landmark for the Blues: alongside legends Peter Bonetti, Chopper Harris, John Hollins, and the vice-captain, Frank Lampard.

Dan here.

As the season runs to a close, it appears (trying not to count chickens here) that we have 3rd place within reach. Surely at least we know we will feature in Champs League next season.

For this reason, instead of talk being on the league table and the rest of the season, most of the faithful seem to be discussing the futures of our players and particularly manager into next year.

The Barry Bonds trial is in full swing as baseball season prepares for opening day. The trial continues to steal headlines from the purity of what baseball used to be and the Roger Clemens perjury trial looms ahead to steal even more.
The steroids era is over for boosting ridiculous player egos, but the disgraces continue.

It seems every week there is speculation about an Arsenal player leaving the club.
Most of the time we hear that Cesc Fabregas is on his way out. His Barcelona DNA, alongside Xavi and Iniesta, is dragging him back to Catalonia quicker than you can fart.
Nicklas Bendtner is always linked away with a move away too.

Photo: Daniel Gajdamowicz

Union

Peter Nowak is among the 25 on the Player Ballot for the 2011 class of the National Soccer Hall of Fame. Congratulations!

The Brotherly Game quotes a report from Monday in Guatemala-based Prensa Libre that says Carlos Ruiz was in discussion with the Union but terms could not be reached.

Contrary to previous arrangements Polonia Warsaw players (Sobiech, Sadlok, Jodłowiec and Mierzejewski) won't play in the friendlies against Moldova and Norway. This shows a total disregard for the interest of the national team from the Polonia owner Józef Wojciechowski and basic communication problems between him and PZPN.

I suppose the real answer to the question asked in the title of this article is neither, but that's not a good headline. Dalglish isn't doing much different, but the players in his squad are up for it again. John Aldridge, Liverpool's best striker in Dalglish's first spell in charge of Liverpool has commented that Dalglish didn't have to manage the team last time around as they were just simply the best players in the league.

In the wake of Darren Bent's shock transfer to Aston Villa Sunderland manager Steve Bruce attempted to side with the fans by declaring his dismay at the strikers transfer.
Bruce said he felt ‘massively let-down' by the forward, who completed his £18million move to Villa Park on Tuesday.