footyfile provides a forum for the ramblings of one football fan...from punditry to FIFA to discussions of latest news from the FA Premier League, Serie A, La Liga and around the world this blog aims to cover the lot...lets see how well that goes then...check us out on twitter @footyfile
You learn something new everyday...this week Footyfile learnt a few things, amongst them was that for some reason the media and certain members of the upper echelons of the FA/Premier League hierarchy think that England and English teams have a God-given right to be the best and these small little teams like Athletic Bilbao have no chance of beating the mighty Man.Utd...
Not technically a footballer but getting this weeks award anyway is the Premier League Chairman Sir Dave Richards. If you're not aware of what big Dave came out and said this week you may have been under a rock...or not English and therefore don't really care what this silly little man said in Doha this week. To summarise his thoughts;
England invented football so England should rule it.
FIFA stole football from England.
UEFA were formed to support FIFA's stealing of football from England.
England are victimised.
English people like to get drunk so we should be able to get sh*t-faced in Qatar even though as a Muslim country alcohol is strictly forbidden (his basic argument seems to be "who cares about religion because we like a pint").
Even without alcohol, the English can still make a fool of themselves. (OK, strictly speaking he didn't say this...but actions speak louder than words)
Unfortunately, this kind of belief is far to widely held in England and the FA, and is the basic reason why the rest of the footballing world hates us...so well done Dave, way to help Anglo-FIFA relations...
Finally, vindication that you don't have to be able to perform thousands of kick-ups in order to be a quality player and this time its a little bit more robust than the standard "when do you ever need them in a game" (unless you're Jay Jay Okocha).
The FA have started to run a little competition between various footballers past and present seeing how many kick-ups they can do with a tennis ball...
The debutant players were Jordan Henderson and Alex Oxlade-Chamberlain who managed a fairly impressive 148 and 136 respectively. Since then Paul Merson managed 47 and Jill Scott 53...today however they released the footage of Spurs and Holland hero Rafael van der Vaart...obviously Rafa is hugely gifted and technically brilliant, after all, he is Dutch and thats what they do best...errr, obviously Rafa missed out on the keep-uppy training as a youngster since yer man can only manage 14
...suddenly my paltry back garden total doesn't seem too bad!
There is very little doubt about which player is recognised as the greatest player on the planet at this moment in time...whilst I don't think that Leo Messi's 5 goal haul against Bayer Leverkusen is his best ever performance, it was definitely something very special.
I will admit its something of a personality fault of mine that I don't like things that are over-hyped, and unfortunately Leo Messi is in danger of falling into this category, the reason he's not in it is because every single time I see him play he is different class. There are elements of his game that aren't great, and I think that the fear and awe of him is starting to play its part in his performances with players giving him too much space and too much respect and letting the little man exert his influence on the game.
Pundits and media often point to the difference between his performances for Barcelona and those for Argentina, but I think this is unfair. If you played both teams against each other sans-Messi, there is only one winner...Barcelona. Therefore it is inevitable that he plays better for club than country, because he is playing with better players, this gives him more space to play his natural game...just look at the man marking job done on him at the 2010 World Cup, any team who has employed that tactic against Barcelona has been ripped apart by the other nine outfield players.
Whilst the whole world were drooling over Leo, there was another South American adding to his already sparkling reputation...a lad called Neymar. Over here in Europe we don't get to see a lot of this young man, a video clip here, a Brazil international there and the obligatory transfer talk for any talented young South American player...true to form, video's surfaced of his latest effort in a hat-trick for his club side taking his tally for the season to 9 in 9 games...the second of which is particularly special;
Neymar is still only twenty years old, and because he has only played in Brazil he still has a lot to learn when he makes his inevitable move across to Europe...so this boy has got the potential to be something very very special...Leo is the king for now, but it won't be long until Neymar will be hot on his heels.
There have been a couple few contenders over the past few days, the closest challenger being Javi Martinez and Iker Munain fresh from helping Athletic Bilbao beat Man.Untied at Old Trafford positing pictures of themselves in a hotel room with one of Spain's most famous adult actresses (err...or so I've heard thats who she is...) and her two "friends"...and then promptly denying they knew who she was, which I'm not really sure makes the situation any better, neither do some of the actions being "simulated" in said pictures.
However, the two youngsters were trumped by Ricardo Fuller's stupidity in Stokes game away at Chelsea yesterday. For those who have not yet seen it, Fuller took exception to a fairly tame challenge from Branislav Ivanovic and so inexplicably decided to stamp on the prone Chelsea defender...now I know Chelsea's form has been indifferent of late, but you still wouldn't want to be playing them with ten men...
Unfortunately for big Ric, this isn't the first time he's done something stupid like this...
Apologies once again for the tardy nature of the post...but every cloud and all that, if it had not been for me being incommunicado for the majority of the week this little treat from Japan wouldn't have crossed my radar in time for goal of the week consideration.
I've stated before (more than once I think) that I'm not the biggest fan of a sloppy overhead kick...true enough a perfectly Trevor Sinclair-esque majestic leap followed by the crashing contact of laces on ball is one of the magical sights of the game, but this is why the sloppy, arms and legs Peter Crouch type overhead is borderline blasphemy.
However, every now and then something special comes along, and this week something special did in the form of this little beauty from South Korea involving a double overhead kick...thats right and overhead kick assist for an overhead kick finish...hows your tekkers!?
The modern footballer often gets labelled with the stereotype of not being the sharpest knife in the drawer...and in some cases just down right stupid. There are the exceptions, Clarke Carlisle's appearance on Countdown and Philippe Senderos' mastery of 5 languages (although the mastery of positional sense, timing, tackling, kicking, heading, running, offside and anything vaguely football related still appears to elude him), but sometimes they do nothing to dispel the myths.
Today we will focus on one such event with a horror tackle from HSV's Paolo Guerrero...this is the height of stupidity because not only is it a truly terrible and dangerous tackle, but there is absolutely no need for it...the 'keeper (yes 'keeper) is going nowhere and there is still almost the whole of the second half to go, which HSV then have to play a man down.
In an ideal world I would have Henri Lansbury's goal for England's U21 team against Belgium last night...cross or shot, doesn't matter, what a strike...but the internet has been blighted by copyright law, so on to the first ever edition of '2nd Best Goal of the Week'
And the winner of the inaugural award is from the Vietnamese league with Duoc Em Luong Van's effort...industrious people and this boy has literally kicked the p*ss out of this dead ball...