I mentioned last week that future Villan Enda Stevens had been nominated for
the 2011 PFAI Player of the Year Award and I'm pleased to let you know that he was named the winner
in Dublin last night. Not only that, but Richard Dunne also scooped the Irish
Overseas Player of the Year.
Juergen Klinsmann raised a whole lot of eyebrows on August 25th when he announced 23 year old
Fabian Johnson would be included in the 23 man squad to play Costa Rica. Who is Fabian Johnson?
He's a holding midfielder/ central defender for TSG 1899 Hoffenheim and his US national switch
is possible because of his parentage; father is American while his mother is German.
Do you hear that? That's the sound of Premiership football (with the exception of Spurs-Everton)
rumbling closer. While we haven't been exactly starved for footy this summer (Womens World Cup,
Copa America, U21 Euro's etc) there is nothing like the Prem. Tomorrow the Trotters usher in the
new season with a trip to new boys, QPR.
The Udinese winger now doing duty for Chile at the Copa America has signed for £40m to be paid
in installments with a down payment of £25m.
His transfer fee has been seized by Arsenal who are now demanding a minimum of £35m for the
services of their captain. This puts another wrench in the proceedings.
Pre-season training starts today, and I am sure that you, much like me, are overjoyed as this
brings us one step closer to the regular season. I imagine that the players and coaching staff are
even more excited to get back to it, if only because they can share the wild stories of their
summer holidays with the rest of the class.
So Monday's here and Charlie Adam's not, but he also might be, or at least he's having the
world's longest medical at Melwood. Either way it's a continual failure for people who think they
know something and don't, and are so content to continue to disregard reality and push back what
they thought was happening yesterday but is actually happening tomorrow that they're really gonna
show you once he arrives.
A clever video promoting the U21 Euro Championships due to start in Denmark on the 11th of
June.
As four letter acronyms charged with organizing the sport of football, UEFA doesn't need any
help looking really, really good right now FIFA is, as ever, doing the work for them
indirectly.
This is a bit of confirmation they're top of the charts. An experience, not much a viral,
commissioned for the U21 Euro Championships in Denmark.
A couple of things today:
The main thing is that we are holding our breath on injuries today. Robin van Persie picked up a
thigh injury during his last international match, Nicklas Bendtner picked up an ankle knock, and
Kieran Gibbs had to return early from international duty with a groin issue.
