The return of the Carling Cup had plenty of entertainment to offer and although there will always be those who dismiss the value of English football's fourth-tier competition, there were several important lessons to be learned from what we saw this midweek.

Lesson 1: Hargeaves can come good: Roberto Mancini's signing of injury-plagued Owen Hargreaves brought the inevitable slew of crock jokes, especially in the wake of the infamous YouTube videos featuring the former Manchester United and Bayern Munich midfielder.

Come on now, Revs, don't go getting me all excited and optimistic again! Fool me once.. or.. err... 4 times.. shame on you, but fool me a 5th time... you get where I'm going. Needless to say, I was quite shocked to hear on Saturday night that won, against FC Dallas no less. Unfortunately, I was unable to watch the game until last night, so forgive my delay in getting this piece up.

OK, so he's six foot six tall, has won 75 caps for one of the world's leading sides and is a (relative) bargain at £7.6 million. But is Per Mertesacker really the answer to Arsenal's woes?
Sunday saw their defence totally outclassed by Manchester United and so I'm not sure a slow, lumbering centre half would have been all that much help, to be honest.

Transfer Rumors: Nasri Is The Man For City - originally posted on Soccerlens.com

For much of the summer, Arsene Wenger had to field questions about the futures of Cesc Fabregas and Samir Nasri, trying to ward off the speculation and likelihood that arguably Arsenal's two best players would be leaving the Emirates Stadium this summer.

As we predicted last week, the fact that Giuseppe Rossi will remain at Villarreal has seen Juventus switch their attention to Mirko Vucinic who has now joined the Turin giants from fellow Serie A side Roma.

While the list of prospective targets starts to dwindle, could Spurs look to Italy again and make a move for Fiorentina striker Alberto Gilardino?

Photo by ISIphotos.com

By AVI CREDITOR

WASHINGTON -- The shock of Monday's trade that forced Dwayne De Rosario to change addresses for a second time this season hit just about everybody involved.

De Rosario seemed blindsided by the deal.

Juan Pablo Angel was supposed to have been the missing piece to the Galaxy's puzzle, the prolific scorer who would continue to blossom under Landon Donovan and David Beckham.
But as he prepares to face his former team, it looks like that team saw something the rest of the league hadn't quite expected.

A day before the Portland Timbers host the first home game in their Major League Soccer history, the club has signed its first Designated Player.

The Timbers signed Colombian playmaking midfielder Diego Chara to a DP deal on Wednesday. Chara, 25, was formerly with Deportes Tolima in his native Colombia, where he was a key component of his league's most-potent attack.

In recent interviews to kick off the 2011 season, Commissioner Garber stated often that he is pressing for referees to make more consistent calls on fouls. He seems to gloss over the matter of improving refereeing to cover up the bigger issue that there is not enough scoring. His position seems to be that hard-line refereeing is needed in order for the offense to open up and for more goals to be scored.