World soccer update

Leaving aside Serie A for a moment, there was a lot of soccer played this weekend. The major matches include:

Chelsea 2 - Tottenham 1 (see photo above-- a goal was awarded to Chelsea despite the fact that the ball didn't cross the line)

Arsenal 1 - Manchester United 0-- The Premier League title race is not quite over yet.

Real Madrid lost to Real Zargoza, but then Barcelona lost to Real Sociedad.

Corinthians 1 - Palmeiras 1 (6-5 on penalties)-- Corinthians move on to face Santos in the finals of the Campeonato Paulista.

Video below

AEK defeated PAOK in the Greek Cup finals 3-0. The match ended a few minutes early due to rioting fans (see videos below)

Below are actual match highlights

Champions League update: Arsenal 2 - Barcelona 2 (first leg)

This game had everything-

• An early bombardment of scoring chances by Barcelona (only some of which are shown in the video)
• Two nice goals by Ibrahimovic
• Goals by Theo Walcott and Cesc Fabregas
• Three players who will miss the second leg due to suspensions-- Fabregas, Pique, and Puyol
• Fabregas fracturing his shin while taking the game-tying penalty kick

Champions League update: Mind-boggling mistakes lead to mind-boggling goals

Porto 2 - Arsenal 1

Porto's first goal was nothing more than a single mistake by the goalkeeper, Lukasz Fabianski. Porto's second goal was a bit more complicated, because it involved multiple mistakes. Arsenal defender Sol Campbell's back pass to the keeper was picked up by Fabianski (one mistake), which resulted in an indirect free kick for Porto. Fabianski then handed the ball directly to the referee (yet another mistake) who allowed Porto to quickly restart the game and score.

Bayern Munich 2 - Fiorentina 1

In the Bayern Munich-Fiorentina match, the mistakes all belong to the referee and linesman. On Bayern Munich's first goal, the referee had called a penalty before the ball went in the net, so he disallowed the initial goal. Luckily for everyone involved, the subsequent penalty was made, so the score turned out 1-0 as it should have. Bayern Munich's second goal is even simpler-- the fault lies completely with the linesman, who failed to call Klose offside.

Match report: Portsmouth 1 - Arsenal 4

Things have been tough for Portsmouth lately:

• They lost to Arsenal 4-1 yesterday. According to the announcers on my television set, Portsmouth have not beaten Arsenal in any competition in over fifty years.

Below: Eduardo is about to score Arsenal's first goal. His free kick will ricochet off the leg off one of the Portsmouth defenders and into the net.

• The team are currently in last place in the Premier League.
• Portsmouth have gotten a new owner and manager this year. Despite these moves, there is a real possibility that the team will go bankrupt this winter. I am not sure what will happen if that takes place. At the very least, the club will have to sell off most or all of their best players during the January transfer window.

Above: Fans protest at last night's match

Below: Portsmouth manager Avram Grant, in happier days

What I have been reading lately #38

Fever Pitch by Nick Hornby

Fever Pitch is Nick Hornby's account of being an Arsenal fan from 1968 to 1992, when the book was written. It is definitely the best book ever written about being a sports fan; it is probably the best book ever written about sports; it may be the best book ever written. I have read it five times-- 1998, 2002, 2005, 2008, and 2009.

Since 1989, I have kept a list of all the books I have read. Here are the books I have read more than twice*:

Books I have read three times:

• The Long Night of Francisco Sanctis by Humberto Constantini
• My Last Sigh by Luis Bunuel
• Kitchen Confidential by Anthony Bourdain
• Ball Four by Jim Bouton
• Confessions of a Raving, Unconfined Nut: Misadventures in the Counter-Culture by Paul Krassner

Books I have read four times:

• Catch-22 by Joseph Heller
• The Electric Kool-Aid Acid Test by Tom Wolfe
• One Hundred Years of Solitude by Gabriel Garcia Marquez

Books I have read five times:

• Fever Pitch by Nick Hornby

* The number of books I have read twice is at least sixteen, if not more.

The Premier League season has begun: Everton 1 - Arsenal 6 (Eduardo scores!)

This season, there are three English clubs that are thought to have a chance of breaking the Premier League stranglehold held by the top four teams (Manchester United, Chelsea, Liverpool, and Arsenal): Everton (because they try hard and make do with less), Aston Villa (I'm not actually sure why), and Manchester City (because they are owned by members of the Abu Dhabi royal family and have a lot of money to spend.)

Unfortunately, Everton had their first match of the season today, and things did not look good. They were annihilated 6-1 at home by Arsenal, and, obviously, looked terrible in the process. One happy note, however (at least for Arsenal) -- Arsenal's final goal was scored by Eduardo. Eduardo has not scored a Premier League goal since February of 2008 due to a hideous leg injury he suffered later that month in a match against Birmingham City.

Photos-- Above: Everton goalie Tim Howard fails to stop Arsenal's first goal by Denilson. There would be more.

Below: Eduardo scores an otherwise-meaningless goal in the 88th minute.

What I have been reading lately #27

I just finished reading Dave Roberts' book The Bromley Boys: The True Story of Supporting the Worst Football Team in Britain.  This book is a fine example of a genre that they don't really publish here in the United States-- fan memoirs.  Roberts writes all about the 1969-70 season for Bromley, a time when he was 14 years old and completely obsessed with the local amateur squad.  

Checking back through my records, I count five separate books that I have read that fall into the category of football fan memoirs.  Here is my ranking of these five books.

1.  Fever Pitch by Nick Hornby.  I know that this book is quite well-known (even here in the USA), is all about Arsenal, and was even made into a movie about the Red Sox!  But it's still a fantastic book-- any fan of any sport could relate to Hornby's account of the completely ridiculous interconnection between his own personal life and the success (or not) of his team.

2.  My Favourite Year, edited by Nick Hornby.  This collection was published by When Saturday Comes a number of years ago and consists of short essays by a number of writers about their favorite seasons of their favorite teams.  I picked this up for a few dollars in a remainder bin at the University of Washington bookstore a few years back, and it has gone on to be one of my favorite books.  Because of this, I now spend way to much time scouring through remainder bins at bookstores hoping that lightning will strike twice.

3.  The Bromley Boys by Dave Roberts.  He makes my sports obsessions seem mild in comparison.

4.  Manchester United Ruined My Life by Colin Shindler.  A great title, obviously, but it was hard to have a lot of empathy for a Manchester City fan (and a whiny one, at that).

5.  Believe in the Sign by Mark Hodkinson.  This book is about a young man obsessed with Rochdale, his local, hapless Division 4 team.  I actually really liked this book when I first read it.  In fact, I liked it so much I contacted the author via email.  But when I pointed out an inconsistency involving the television mini-series Roots, Mr. Hodkinson claimed that it was part of a "fantasy sequence."  I'm not really interested in reading fantasy sequences in fan memoirs.

Random Pictures

Barack Obama... America's president to be. YAY!

This is the Spanish national football (soccer) team after winning Euro-2008. They lifted their ancient coach, Aragones, and bounced him up and down! Hehe!

This is AC Milan's owner, Silvio Berlusconi holding one of Milan's many trophies!

This picture is from this weekend's game, Arsenal v. Liverpool. This is just weird.

Best for last. This is from this weekend's game, Milan v. Udinese. Kaka' in one goal's celebration ran over to the injured Gattuso. He looks like he is wearing a towel as a scarf. They are so awesome!!!

P.S. Christmas is in 3 days. This will be Luca's first Christmas. (For those of you who don't know, Luca is Kaka's son, duh!)

No goals today

(Above- Nicky Butt, #22 for Newcastle, holds off Chelsea's Deco)

Today's results in the English Premier League:
Liverpool 0 - Fulham 0
Chelsea 0 - Newcastle 0
Aston Villa 0 - Manchester United 0
Manchester City 3 - Arsenal 0

So the top five in the Premiership tables scored a grand total of zero goals today. (And, yes, I did spend three-plus hours of my life watching. But, honestly, it was entertaining seeing Newcastle play defense for 90-plus minutes at Stamford Bridge while the petulant Chelsea fans got annoyed with their team. And it was also exciting to watch Man Utd. held without a goal.)

What in the world is this thing?

I missed it, but my daughter saw it going into half-time of the Arsenal - Hull City game today.

Oh yeah, and Hull came back to beat Arsenal 2-1. Meanwhile, after the game, Arsenal skipper Arsene Wenger was so upset that he referred to Hull as "West Brom".

Hull City's Daniel Cousin celebrates his go-ahead goal

Newcastle owner Mike Ashley drinking a beer

Arsenal 2 - Newcastle 0. As most of you already know, it is actually illegal to drink alcohol within sight of the pitch as football match in the UK.

And now it appears that Ashley may face legal consequences for his actions - http://www.telegraph.co.uk/sport/football/leagues/premierleague/newcastle/2660366/Newcastle-owner-Mike-Ashley-faces-possible-Police-action-over-pint---Football.html (Updated 9-2-08).

FA Women's Cup

In case you missed it, Arsenal beat Leeds 4-1 earlier in the week to win their record-setting ninth FA Women's Cup. Arsenal had about two-and-a-half million shots in the first half but the Leeds goalkeeper, Carly Telford stopped them all. In the second half, though, Arsenal scored three times in five minutes and that was that. (To give you an idea of how well Telford played, she won the player of the match award despite giving up four goals in the second half.)



For more information about the match, click on the link below:








http://www.guardian.co.uk/football/2008/may/06/womensfootball