Arsenal vs Man utd!!

The match between Arsenal and Man Utd was a treat to watch. The match was so entertaining that I was glued to my sofa witnessing each and every moment of the match.

Both teams started with an attacking mind set and Arsenal were rightly rewarded with a goal scored by French international midfielder Nasri. Before this game I have not watched much of his play but this guy really has what it takes to become a great footballer. The first half ended with Arsenal leading 1-0.

Second half too started with a bang and again Arsenal doubled their advantage thanks to Nasri. From then on Manchester Utd wanted to get back into the match so they started playing more aggressively pressing for a goal. They had to wait till the 90th minuted to score their first goal scored by full back Rafael who replaced Gary Neville.

Arsenal managed to win the match eventually and deservedly so.

Offside

This post is intended for all those who doesnt know what an offside is in football. An offside as flagged when the attacking team member is ahead of the defence line of the opponent team. This offside rule is applicable only when the play is in the attacking half of the particular team. It is the linesmans job to call for offside and the referee in the pitch is not allowed to give offside decisions. It is a very common tactic for all the teams defence department to enforce offside trap to their opponents. Plenty of team coordination and communication is required as if even a single member of the squad fails to connect the offside trap, the team will be in real big trouble.

Milan Derby

There are several intense and very fierce rivalry battles which are called as derby matches that happens across Europe. Some of the most intense and passion filled matches include the Merseyside derby, Manchester derby, Milan derby, Madrid derby, and many more.

Eventhough all matches have the same level of intensity and its almost impossible to predict a winner in these sort of match, I personally feel Milan derby is the pick of the lot. This is mainly because both of these teams are championship contenders unlike the other derbys in which one is a strong team and the other will be an average team.

The most recent Milan derby ended in favour of AC Milan with Ronaldinho scoring the solitary goal that made the difference.

More about the derby matches will be written in my next post.

Cheers

tactics or ability?

In today's football, whats more important? tactics or the ability of a player? If you look at english premier league its very obvious that games depend more on tactics than ability of a single player. Thats why we dont see the ronaldinhos, kakas, messis in English Premier League. If you see the other two leagues, Spanish and Italian, you will have some creativity in the moves and thats mainly beacause of ability of players like zlatan, kaka, del piero, messi and so on in their respective leagues.

Have your say. :)

Manchester United goals - August 2008

UEFA Super Cup
Manchester United [1 - 2] Zenit St. Petersburg

44' [0 - 1] P. Pogrebnyak > 0-1 P. Pogrepnyak
59' [0 - 2] Danny > 0-2 Danny
73' [1 - 2] N. Vidic > 1-2 N. Vidic

EPL

Portsmouth [0 - 1] Manchester United

32' [0 - 1] D. Fletcher > mediafire / rapidshare.com

Match Highlights

Manchester United [1 - 1] Newcastle United

22' [0 - 1] O. Martins > 0-1 Martins
24' [1 - 1] D. Fletcher > 1-1 Fletcher

Match Highlights


English Community Shield Season 2008/09

Manchester United [0 - 0] Portsmouth

Penalty shoot-out : [3 - 1]

Penalty Shootout - mediafire / rapidshare
Trophy Presentations - mediafire / rapidshare

Friendly (Pre-Season) Season 2008/09
Peterborough United [0 - 2] Manchester United
38' [0 - 1] R. Martin (o.g.) > 1-0 R. Martin (OG)
68' [0 - 2] D. Gibson > 2-0 D. Gibson

Friendly (Pre-Season) Season 2008/09
Manchester United [1 - 0] Espanyol

82' [1 - 0] F. Campbell > zShare

Highlights

1st half / 2nd half

Sensational Torres

Fernando José Torres is the latest darling of the Red part of Mersyside. The young Spanish star has been a revelation since signing from Athletico Madrid for a fee of around £25 million in a deal which saw Luis Garcia moving to Spain. Nicknamed "El nino"(The Kid) Torres joined Athletico at the age of 11 and he broke into the Athletico team in 2001 when the team was actually in the Spanish Segunda (Second Division). Though he did not have a great scoring season with only 6 goals from 36 games Athletico got promotion and Torres made his La Liga debut in 2002-03 season scoring 13 goals and in the very next season he was made the captain of the club becoming the youngest captain of Athletico Madrid and scored 19 and he made it to the Spanish national squad and has cemented his place till now with some commanding displays. And at the end of the 2006-07 season he moved to the Premier League. Torres had also cut his weekly wages of £ 103,000 in Spain to £ 90,000 in Liverpool.


His first match for Liverpool in a 2-1 win over Aston Villa and his first goal came at Anfield when they faced Chelsea since then he has been on a scoring spree netting 27 goals till date and 20 of them in League becoming the first man since Robbie Fowler last scored 20 in a season. He has been in total control in Europe with 4 goals so far in Champions League, a competition he dreamt playing in. He was instrumental in the team's win over Inter Milan at the San siro scoring a wonderful goal and sending the Reds into quarters. With Liverpool out the race for EPL title Torres will be totally focused on Champions League and will be hoping to have a good run, something his boss Rafa Benitez is a master at. At 24 this star has made the world take a note of him and sure there is going to be more from the "El Nino"

Euro2008 finals

Spain played some good attacking football and walked away as the deserving winners of Euro2008 and thus ending their 44 year title drought. Torres was the hero as his cool finish handed Spain the victory. Germany never really threatened but for a spell of 10 min past the hour mark.

Germany [0 - 1] Spain
33' [0 - 1] F. Torres : Link1 / Link2

Match Highlights
Part1 ,
Part2 .

Entire Euro2008 Compilation