Rafa Benitez said he would quit Liverpool if Fernando Torres is sold. The Spanish striker could have been sold last summer to Manchester City if Benitez had accepted their offer – and there will no doubt be more enquiries coming in for Torres until the day he does actually leave.
But what is remarkable about the offer made to Liverpool last summer is the scale of the City bid: £70million for Torres plus and additional £30million for Javier Mascherano. Click to continue reading...

The World Cup is almost set in terms of the teams that will qualify and once the play-offs are completed it will be clear whether the likes of Cristiano Ronaldo, Thierry Henry and Franck Ribery will be present or missing. In the meantime, Sweden's talented forward Zlatan Ibrahimovic will certainly not be going to the World Cup after his country failed to qualify from the same group which saw eventual winners Denmark earn automatic qualification and runners-up Portugal reach the play-offs.

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Chelsea fans will already know that, last Friday, the Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS) granted Chelsea a stay in relation to the transfer ban FIFA imposed back in September. Since then, the papers have been full of wild and wonderful reports on who Gourlay, Arnesen and Abramovich are plotting to bring to Stamford Bridge when the transfer window reopens in January.

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Chelsea fans will already know that, last Friday, the Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS) granted Chelsea a stay in relation to the transfer ban FIFA imposed back in September. Since then, the papers have been full of wild and wonderful reports on who Gourlay, Arnesen and Abramovich are plotting to bring to Stamford Bridge when the transfer window reopens in January.

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Last week, I asked you to vote for you favourite 20 players of the decade, here in this very post, are the Top 100 players of the last 10 years, voted for by you, the readers and bloggers of the offside. First thing I want to say is thank you, everyone for the absolutely amazing response [...] Click to continue reading...

Bayern Munich fans are certainly not in a particularly good mood at the moment. The situation in the Bundesliga is far from hopeless but still disappointing, while Bayern will need a miracle of sorts to progress in the Champions League. Thus, some fans may be in disbelieve, some may question the coach or the players, others blame the transfer policy and a few probably just desperately hope for Ribery to return and make it all right again.

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Wayne Rooney

This parenting stuff is already harder than I thought. ... Meat. ... The kid doesn't like to play with fireworks nearly as much as I do and he doesn't even know how to use a toilet. ... Meat. ... I think he might be broken. Can you fix a broken kid with a screwdriver and a nail gun?

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Fernando Torres, Xavi, Andres Iniesta, Iker Casillas, Carlos Puyol, and David Villa head a Spanish heavy representation for the player of the year award. It's noteworthy that Torres is the only player who is not part of the Liga.

The English have Frank Lampard, Wayne Rooney, Steven Gerrard, and John Terry.

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You can watch Bayern Munich v Frankfurt Live online here.

Bayern Munich v Frankfurt
Bundesliga
Saturday 24 October 2009
Kick-off: 14:30 BST

Bayern Munich Preview

Bayern Munich are currently 6th in the Bundesliga, 7 points of the pace, and it has been their inability to finish games off that has cost them so far this season.

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Bordeaux vs Bayern Munich:

This match features the two leaders of Group A. Both sides have 4 points from two games and will be looking to take a strangle hold on the group in their next two fixtures.

Bordeaux hope to take full advantage of their home turf and upset the German giants before they meet again in a little less than a fortnight.

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With the Ballon d'Or nominations finally releasing this weekend, the headlines have mostly been devoted to the fact that world champions Italy have no representation whatsoever. But why blame the press for paying excessive attention to an irrelevant detail? After all, the award itself is destined to be heading Lionel Messi's way, which means very little is there to be talked about in terms of debating the winner, right?

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The race for South Africa is heading down the final stretch and with the end of each round of fixtures comes the inevitable relief of those nations whose qualification has been secured. Notwithstanding the final set of group stage qualifying fixtures to be played later this week, below are the winners and losers if the road to World Cup 2010 ended today:

Still a couple of summer holidays up for grabs

South America (4; top placed in group) – Brazil, Paraguay, Chile, Argentina

With Uruguay and Ecuador breathing down their neck, Maradona's Argentina face a crunch tie in Montevideo in front of 73,000 baying Uruguayans, that will determine if Aguero and Co.

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Lots and lots of stuff today. Had to be selective:

• Barca insists it will get Cesc one day.
  
• Zenden confident of Sunderland deal.
  
• AC Milan might axe Gooch?
  
• Chamakh desperate to leave France.
  
• Galaxy could loan Beckham AND Donovan.
  
• Benayoun not leaving Reds for City.

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It never fails. Every interlull brings the inevitable 'Cesc-to-Spain' stories. Cesc to Barcelona, Cesc to Madrid, Cesc to Malaga, etc... Now, apparently, following their loss to Sevilla, Madrid once again are making noise. Arsenal have reportedly received bids of up to £60m for Fabregas over the last two seasons and each time the player and the club rejected them.

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With Paulo Guerrero and Mladen Petric sustaining long term injuries, Hamburg are facing a forward crisis of epic proportion. The weight of a team that is tied on points for the league falls on the shoulders on young Swede Marcus Berg. No matter who Labbadia might sign, bring up from the reserves or shift, Berg is still the only proven striker the Dinosaurs have.

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With the first quarter of football almost over in most leagues around Europe, now is a good time to measure the current progress of some of the giant clubs on the continent. Actually, analyzing the success or failure of clubs in general won't be nearly as exciting as identifying a more specific object of analysis.

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This week's Champions League play had upsets, scintillating football, and another two goals for Cristiano Ronaldo.

On my first shot at predicting results I was able to predict the correct result (not necessarily score line) of eleven of the sixteen matches.

But enough about me, the biggest stories from this week has to come from the woes of the football supporters from Milan.

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(video highlights di Bayern Monaco-Juventus)
BAYERN (4-3-3): Butt; Lahm Batsduber Van Buyten Braafheid; Ottl Schweinsteiger Muller; Ribery Klose (76' Gomez) Robben (46' Olic). A disp. Rensing, H. Altintop, Breno, Pranic, Gómez, Tymoschuck. All. Louis Van Gaal.
JUVENTUS (4-3-1-2): Buffon; Grygera Chiellini Legrottaglie Grosso; Marchisio Felipe Melo Camoranesi (90' Tiago); Diego (60' Poulsen); Iaquinta Trezeguet (75' Amauri). Click to continue reading...

Bayern Munich vs Juventus:

Definitely the most anticipated match of this week's Champions League play, this is a meeting that we have seen many times over the years. They do not usually live up to expectations as you can see from their previous score lines:

19.10.04 Juventus 1 Bayern 0

3.

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Lots of good stuff:

• Messi to sign a mega-deal with Barca.
  
• United give new deal to Park Ji-Sung.
  
• Ribery hints to new Bayern deal.
  
• Juve may keep Trezeguet too.
  
• Viduka back to Australia?
  
• Milan to axe Ronaldinho?
  
• Adriano back to Europe?

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Now that the transfer window has closed in the footballing world, I can not think of any move in German football that has gotten me more excited than the transfer of Arjen Robben from Real Madrid to FC Bayern München. Other than being the "biggest" club in Germany, I never really had a good reason to [. Click to continue reading...

When the £80m transfer deal for Cristiano Ronaldo was confirmed United fans were writing out their shopping list of players they wanted Sir Alex Ferguson sign. We could do with another winger, another central midfielder, another striker, maybe a right-back, but our transfer kitty meant we could buy as many players as we wanted.

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Football365 | All The News | Football News | BLUES BUYS BANNED UNTIL 2011Talk about some stunning news from out of nowhere. Either the editors at Football365 are having some fun with us in the wake of the transfer window closing and their being no more sensational stories of immediate interest or FIFA have over-reacted to something that doesn't seem to merit it. Click to continue reading...

With the likes of Arsenal, Man United, Chelsea and Liverpool not splurging on deadline day and with only Man City really spending big big money, was this a transfer window that failed to deliver? Or was this an expected knock on effect of the financial meltdown?

Obviously a fair few big transfers have been conducted during the opening of the transfer window but more often than not the big deals have involved big players leaving the Premier League with Cristiano Ronaldo and Xabi Alonso being two such instances.

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The royal club from Madrid have probably regretted selling excellent Dutchman Arjen Robben. The new Bayern starter had a dream debut at Allianz Arena, where he got the chance in the second half against current champions Wolfsburg and made the best possible use of it.

„Flying Dutchman" inherited the jersey with number 10 on it from his compatriot and natural-born scorer, Roy Mackay.

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1. Kissing the ref? What now?
2. Ribery ad with a deer? Huh?
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A fair bit of activity flying around as deadline day appoaches for the big European Clubs. There's usually a couple of big surprising moves on the last day, and while I wouldn't expect anything quite like last season's deadline day, I suspect a few people will be changing clubs at the last minute. One man [. Click to continue reading...

Real Madrid and Bayern Munich have reached an agreement for the transfer of Arjen Robben for 25 Million Euros. Although Real Madrid's coach Manuel Pellegrini wanted Robben to be part of his team, the club needs to sell some of their players to recoup some of the money that was spent this Summer.There are rumors that this move is in preparation for the arrival of Ribery to the Spanish capital, Click to continue reading...

Real Madrid and Bayern Munich have reached an agreement for the transfer of Arjen Robben for 25 Million Euros. Although Real Madrid's coach Manuel Pellegrini wanted Robben to be part of his team, the club needs to sell some of their players to recoup some of the money that was spent this Summer.There are rumors that this move is in preparation for the arrival of Ribery to the Spanish capital,

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I'm back ladies and gentlefolk. There have been some cock-ups over the past few days with Aamir's posts and I have been unable to correct anything because I've had no access. Apologies for that.

By the way, thanks Aamir for filling in over the past few days.

Now, onto the main story this week; we scored another three goals to secure our passage through to the Champions League group stages Eduardo has become somewhat of a hate figure in the press (see the headline) for diving to win a penalty.

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I am utterly convinced that Yohann Gourcuff is the star of tomorrow and that Milan made a huge mistake by letting him go. Four goals and two assists in three games in Le Championnat for the French midfielder is already an impressive tally and there are no signs of him slowing down. Somewhat depending on his World Cup 2010 I wouldn't be surprised to see him wearing the colors of Chelsea or Man United next year.

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FC Bayern are off to their worst start since 1975, failing to secure a victory from their first three fixtures. Supporters in Bavaria are in panic mode as they watch rivals Hamburg and Leverkusen claim top spot in the league. How does a football club keep its supporters from losing their heads? Beer. Click to continue reading...

FC Bayern are off to their worst start since 1975, failing to secure a victory from their first three fixtures. Supporters in Bavaria are in panic mode as they watch rivals Hamburg and Leverkusen claim top spot in the league. How does a football club keep its supporters from losing their heads? Beer. Click to continue reading...

I would have thought that Franck Ribery and Franz Beckenbauer now finally agree on something. The French sensation should have been sold. Der Kaiser has watched new manager Louis van Gaal take a measly 2 points from his first 3 matches, and, following this weekend, the kings of German football are sat in a rather peasant-like 14th in the Bundesliga.

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The Champions League draw was bit of anti-climax, wasn't it really? No Ronaldo Old Trafford reunion, no Jose Mourinho return and not even a tasty tie with Juventus or Rangers for our English clubs. Instead the so called ‘big four' can be relatively happy with their respective groups and as much as Michel Plantini wont like it, should find themselves safely through to the knockout stage.

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