Witch hunts, apathy, delusion and greed, all pathetically wrapped up in an unshakable belief in a divine right to win. Recognise it? Of course you do. Unfortunately it describes many so-called Arsenal supporters, who today stand supreme amongst football folk in their ability irrespective of the injury situation and short of any real knowledge of the internal politics or financial situation facing the club, to defame our great clubs name just by confessing their poisonous support.

2:45pm ET, live in the US on Fox Soccer Plus
Last four head-to-head:
0-3 City (a) 01.03.12
1-1 (h) 11.27.11
3-0 Liverpool (h) 04.11.11
0-3 City (a) 08.23.10
Previous rounds:
Liverpool: 2-1 Chelsea (a); 2-1 Stoke (a); 2-1 Brighton (a); 3-1 Exeter (a)
City: 1-0 Arsenal (a); 5-2 Wolves (a); 2-0 Brum (h)
Last three matches:
Liverpool: 5-1 Oldham (h); 0-3 City (a); 3-1 Newcastle (h)
City: 2-3 United (h); 3-0 Liverpool (h); 0-1 Sunderland (a)
Goalscorers (Carling Cup):
Liverpool: Suarez 3; Maxi 2; Bellamy, Carroll, Kelly, Kuyt 1
City: Dzeko 2; Agüero, Balotelli, Johnson, Hargreaves, Nasri 1
Referee: Lee Mason
Guess at a line-up:
Reina
Johnson Skrtel Agger Enrique
Spearing Adam
Bellamy Gerrard Downing
Carroll
Yes, it's the Carling Cup.

Is There a Trophy in That Bag?Dear Santa,
I've tried to be good in 2011. I kept my cursing at incompetent MLS referees to a minimum (6 times per game, max), gritted my teeth and got through a mostly horrible Red Bulls season, and supported my team home and away despite a long string of embarrassing performances and management screw-ups.

After 10 days of disappointment, United's woeful week was topped off by a Champions League exit. Crystal Palace came to Old Trafford and managed to get away with a win. Yes, fair enough... Mickey Mouse Carling Cup. They managed a ...
This is a content summary. Visit http://www.epltalk.com to read the entire article

Another Monday morning and off to work for many faced with the negative banter that an Arsenal defeat brings. But worse, not just any defeat the Spuds have turned us over, years of disingenuous crowing at our North London neighbours is coming home to roost today. All that "I can't wait to get to work" of previous years, doesn't work so well today does it?

The Carling Cup is a funny competition. It seems to creep up on you at the start of the season – especially if you are in Europe – and there is no grand fan fare ahead of each round like there is with the FA Cup.
Teams generally pick reserve sides, while the fans vote with their feet, leaving matches looking decidedly grim in half empty stadiums, especially if a Premier League side is at home.

Golden Ball anyone? 3four3 will be looking to hand out some hardware to the nations best college player.

I've seen numerous lists of top college players/pro prospects in the last few weeks and quite frankly they've made me laugh. The same robotic big athletic players are being hyped up and called the nations top players.

Diego Maradona kisses the Argentina shirt after reaching the final of Italia 90. 20 years later, he went on to manage Argentina and told the press to suck his dick after qualifying for the World Cup in South Africa.

After joining the club from Juventus months earlier, Attilio Lombardo was seen kissing the Crystal Palace shirt during a 3-1 defeat to Aston Villa.

So, how much stock are you taking from the statistic 'Ipswich Town have lost two out of three games'?
At the risk of stating the obvious, it's not a great start! And if you include the fact that Town have already been dumped out of the Mickey Mouse Cup, it looks even worse.

Its seems that Town's Barmy Army is once again divided.
One half are angry that Paul Jewell played a second choice team last night, effectively dumping us out of the one ray of joy we had last year - the Carling Cup.
The other are relieved, if bothered at all, that we don't have to worry about losing players to injury and exhaustion in 'The Mickey Mouse Cup'.

That's right, folks; to go along with the laundry list of accomplishments the Metro Bulls have attained in their illustrious history, you can add 2011 Emirates Cup Champions to it. Now while it's no La Manga, it ranks right up there with the Mickey Mouse Cup of 2010. Hey, this is about the only Red Bulls news I can get excited about nowadays, so get off my back.

World Cup champ, Euro champ, Germany 2006 coach, Bayern Munich, blah, blah, blah.

Looks great from 10,000 feet, huh? That's the resume/pedigree trap. Don't fall into it, because it loves to claim victims.

Hopefully it's understood by now that sparkling player resumes don't correlate with quality coaching.

SOURCE: REPUBLICA
KATHMANDU, July 17: Nepali national football coach Graham Roberts on Sunday claimed that All Nepal Football Association (ANFA) is not providing proper training facilities to the team and alleged that ANFA itself wants to lose the 2014 World Cup Qualifying match against Jordan.

Having a catch with Mickey Mouse in Disney World! Ahead of next month's Disney Cup International Youth Soccer Tournament, featuring over 200 teams from 16 countries, Kaká traveled to Orlando to promote the event. Joining him were three NFL players Bryant McFadden of the Pittsburgh Steelers, Travis Johnson of the San Diego Chargers, and Greg Jones of the Jacksonville Jaguars and it's safe to assume they had absolutely no idea who this boy-faced guy was.

Brazilian attacking midfielder Kaka signs an Adidas Footballfor Mickey Mouse, while also getting in some American Football practice.

Brazilian attacking midfielder Kaka signs an Adidas Footballfor Mickey Mouse, while also getting in some American Football practice.

By Chris Wright

Another day, another video of Kaka playing a bit of 'girly, rugby-with-shoulder pads Yankball' (as my Dad would have it) with 83-year old Disney stalwart Mickey Mouse...

There you go.

Video: 101GG

So, what to do with my review copy of the new book about ESPN, Those Guys Have All The Fun?
First off, I have to confess I did once work for ESPN - at least the website. I wrote for the soccer section of the site during the period when John Skipper, now the head honcho of the whole ESPN shebang, was running the website, but as a freelancer, I never had any inside contact with ESPN culture.

Two semifinals gone (one actually exciting, sorry Hammers fans for that tough extra time loss) and we're on to Wembley at the end of February with Birmingham City and Arsenal for the league cup. This one's been traditionally contested by mid-table teams since its seen as a mostly meaningless achievement, that is until they changed the format to reward the victor with a Europa League berth (previously winners would gain entry to the UEFA Cup tourney).

The Carling Cup is still a much derided competition, scoffed at and labelled a 'Mickey Mouse' Cup. And while I agree it doesn't have the charm of the FA Cup or the glamour of the Champions League, that claim is usually made by those who are knocked out or see their reserve players play in [...]

No, I'm not talking about the latest Robert Ludlum novel. I'm talking about the fact that a member of the RBNY squad seems to have disappeared from the club's roster without any explanation whatsoever. Yes, take a close look - a certain long Bosnian name beginning with "U" is missing. Sinisa Ubiparipovic, who was drafted by RBNY in 2007 and made a respectable 84 appearances over four seasons in New Jersey, has been cut, traded, sold or his contract may simply not have been renewed.