Since it's the Silly Season, we're grinding the rumor mill over here at Starting Eleven:
- Rafa Benitez will not be fired at Liverpool. Instead, to solve the club's ever-inflating debt,
LFC will be sold to Barcelona and Liverpool will officially become FC Barcelona-Liverpool. See,
since Barcelona pulled out of its MLS-Miami deal, they have all this petty cash hanging
around.
Zakumi: 2010 World Cup Mascot
It's so close we can almost smell it. The 2010 World Cup is just weeks away and football junkies
the world over may rejoice. 64 games crammed into a 32 day schedule and the best players on the
planet strutting their stuff on the grandest stage of all. But it is not only the Messis and
Cristiano Ronaldos of this world who get the chance to display their talents.
Bright, sunny days such as today in New York City remind me what I love so much about soccer.
Lush, green grass.
Warm, balmy weather.
Dust being kicked up from the tracks of football players.
It's the sight, smells and feelings of playing the sport that drive one to identify so much with
the Messis and Ronaldos of the world, who'll be vying for the world's richest sporting prize in 11
days time.
Less than two weeks. That's how little time there is before the greatest spectacle in football
kicks off. I can't put into words just how excited I am for this years World Cup. Right now I'm
dividing my time equally between slavishly trying to lead Netherlands Antilles to glory in the FIFA
World Cup game on Xbox, reading up on every single piece of information I can gather from
Johannesburg and just generally drinking myself into a stupor to numb the emotions and while away
the time.
In the third part of our brief series on England at the 2010 World Cup, Mark Murphy reports
on his four-yearly bout of schadenfreude and how England at least managed to give some people a
degree of pleasure this summer.
The most virulent Scottish nationalists may want 27th June declared a public holiday after
England's World Cup exit in Bloemfontein – or, failing that, 18th June, the day of England's draw
with Algeria.
Here's a stat for you: Real Madrid's total transfer spending this century has 10 digits and
three commas. Marca calculates that since Florentino Perez first took over as President in the
summer of 2000, the total of combined transfer fees paid out comes to a wallet-weakening
1,022,000,000 euros. That's a billion euros.
The Saturday Skills #5 Riquelme, Rivelino, Robinho and more is a post from: Just Football
On this week's Saturday Skills a variety of tricks from a number of the games
luminaries and greats, including some names you may have heard of: both Ronaldos, Riquelme, Zidane,
Rivelino, Robinho and more.
