I was very surprised to read several morning newspapers had adamantly expressed that Manchester City were about to play their last game under the management of Mark Hughes on Saturday. But the pre-match build up on both Radio 5 Live and Sky Sports Soccer Saturday appeared to underline that this was indeed the case.
Manchester City won the game 4-3 against Sunderland in another exciting goalfest. But on the final whistle Mark Hughes appeared subdued, and after congratulating each of his players he applauded the crowd and gave them telling goodbye wave.
Surprisingly, Mark Hughes claimed on Sunday that he had not been told until after the match that was to get the sack and be replaced with immediate effect by Roberto Mancini, who had been in the crowd at Eastlands.
Mark Hughes went on to say it was agreed at a pre-season meeting with the Manchester City owner, Abu Dhabi’s Sheikh Mansour, that a top six finish or 70 points was a realistic target for the 2009/10 season. After Saturday’s win Manchester City was in sixth place and on target to reach 70 points this season.
Furthermore, they had only lost two games all season. One to a last minute injury time winner against the current Premier League champions Manchester United (4-3) and last week to an inform Tottenham Hotspur (3-0), the best record in the Premier League Chelsea have already lost three games, Manchester United have lost five games, Arsenal have lost three games and Liverpool a whopping seven games – none of which have sacked their manager, yet!
They are also in semi-final of the League Cup. Manchester City’s first semi-final for 28 years!
The fact that Manchester City, not necessarily Mark Hughes, have spent £200 million of Sheikh Mansour’s money is apparently enough to sack a perfectly good young manager who I believe this season would have finished with a trophy and a very real possibility of guaranteed Champions League football next season, which in turn would have opened the door for some of the biggest names in world football to choose the blue half of Manchester over the red devils.
Too many draws and not enough wins was of course Mark Hughes’ problem. This I believe was caused by too many top quality attacking options and not a strong enough defence.
Panic buying led to inflated transfer fees for Jolean Lescott and Kolo Toure when the lure of money failed to capture John Terry’s signature in the summer. And to rub salt into wounds, former captain Richard Dunne, who was hounded out of the club by someone, is having a great season for Aston Villa.
Whether Mancini will continue to look for proven players in the Premier League or use his Italian connections to bolster a very weak defence we will see in the coming January transfer window.
Certain players definitely appear to have been bought on the request of Mark Hughes. Rocky Santa Cruz followed him from Blackburn Rovers and Craig Bellamy who had always been admired by Hughes since his days as manager of Wales I would be confident in saying had Mark Hughes stamp of approval. But remember how both Hughes and Robinho looked dumbstruck the night he was signed from Real Madrid?
Fitting then that in what appeared to be a final stand, Mark Hughes left Robinho and Emmanuel Adebeyor on the subs bench on Saturday and Rocky Santa Cruz and Craig Bellamy both had a great game and scored three of Manchester City’s four goals.
Roberto Mancini has managed Fiorentina and Inter Milan, where he won three successive Italian League titles and two Italian Cups, before being dismissed in May 2008 and replaced by Jose Mourinho.
Mancini definitely has the right pedigree to take Manchester City to the next level, and with the astute appointment of Brian Kidd as first team coach maybe Manchester City are looking to emulate the successful Anglo-Italian partnership of Jose Mourinho and Steve Clarke at Chelsea. But with several players – Rocky Santa Cruz, Craig Bellamy, Shay Given, Gareth Barry, Kolo Toure, Nigel De Jong, Shaun Wright-Phillips and Stephen Ireland – already stating how unhappy they are with the sacking of Mark Hughes, Mancini faces a baptism of fire as he prepares to take over the reigns for three games in quick succession, starting with an awkward game against Stoke City on Boxing Day.
At the beginning of the season I wanted Manchester City to break into the top four but now there’s a part of me that wants them to finish mid-table and get thrashed by Manchester United in the forthcoming League Cup semi-final!
Everton have confirmed the loan signing of Landon Donavon from LA Galaxy on a short term loan deal, with the player arriving at Goodison Park on January 2nd and returning to the USA for the start of the MLS season in March.
Not a great deal of time to make his name at Everton, but I am sure Donavon will fit the team like a glove. He has great pace and scores goals, but he is also an intelligent playmaker and not afraid of the physical side of the game, giving as good as he gets.
At 27 years old Donavon has made a record 120 appearances for the USA and scored a record 42 goals for the national team. He is consistently voted the USA Player Of The Year, which may not count for much but in the Confederations Cup earlier this year, Donavon was very impressive playing for his country, especially in the historic win over Spain, that finished the Euro 2008 winners unbeaten record.
Everton fans should be ecstatic, but I doubt they will be very keen to let him go back to the Galaxy.
FIFA World Cup 2010 sponsors Castrol have taken the sacred game of football to new extremes with their own brand of Extreme Football, designed to take the sport into the Extreme Sports Arena.
Castrol ambassador Martin Keown and his former Arsenal team mate Nigel Winterburn were selected to put two university teams through their paces with football matches taking place on ice and sand.
Filmed against the glamorous backdrop of Basingstoke’s Planet Ice, the two teams under the weathered eyes of two Arsenal defensive stalwarts took to the ice for a bone crunching showdown that yielded eight goals. The first encounter was followed by a trip to the South West as the teams descended on a windswept and rain soaked pitch on Weston Super Mare’s beach front to once again tackle football in its most extreme.
Martin Keown said of the extreme experience:
“The week was one big experiment; we took good players and threw them into extreme situations that would push them to the limit. Both days were shot in extreme cold and the players’ bodies really suffered. They may have been cold and wet but this whole exercise really helped to bring them together as a team and show you what real football fans will put themselves through for their love of the sport.”
and Winterburn added:
“This was a hilarious week. To begin with I didn’t believe it would be possible but having seen it in practice everyone had a great laugh and the players loved the challenge. Both the ice and the sand took football into an extreme environment that I have never seen before and should be really interesting for football fans ahead of the World Cup.”
The project was shot in November over a one week period and the results are currently being shown as a four part series on Sky Sports and Sky1, between December 5th and 20th. All four episodes can be viewed online at Castrol Edge Extreme Football.
Wolverhampton Wanderers manager Mick McCarthy is under fire from the clubs loyal fans following his team selection for last nights 3-0 loss to Manchester United at Old Trafford.
The three thousand travelling fans who had made the trip to Manchester chanted ‘We want our money back’, amongst other choice words, when the Wolves team was announced, with no less than ten changes from the side that beat Tottenham 1-0 at White Hart Lane on Saturday.
The argument was further fuelled as United turned in another ‘under’ performance but easy winners, with Wolves fans claiming that a ‘first team eleven’ could possibly have got something out of the game.
The outspoken Wolves manager Mick McCarthy as expected strongly defended his team selection, while claiming to understand the fans frustration, he said; “I have a squad of 21 to pick from and I regard them all as first-team players. It was my strongest team – because it was a team with fresh legs.”
McCarthy who obviously had one eye on this coming weekend’s fixture against Burnley added, “I can understand the fans reaction, but at the end of the season I will be judged on whether Wolves have stayed in the Premier League or not.”
Most fans would agree that a win against Burnley would erase the memory of last night’s game, but should a manager have the right to field a team of non-regular players?
As McCarthy says, he considers his entire squad as first time players and there is really no argument to that, as long as the manager really believes that he has picked his best eleven players for any particular game. There is no way that McCarthy would have expected his selection at Old Trafford to upset Manchester United.
Liverpool’s season goes from bad to worse, after insisting that they would focus on the Premier League following their disastrous Champions League campaign, Rafael Benitez’s team lost that focus in the second half against Arsenal at Anfield, and they paid dearly for it.
For the first forty five minutes it was all Liverpool, they could barely put a foot wrong. Steven Gerrard’s dramatic dive after William Gallas had caught him probably cost him the penalty that Liverpool should have been given, but both Gerrard and Torres created plenty of chances against an Arsenal team that really was poor.
Mascherano was monumental for the Reds and Dirk Kuyt was busy as ever, deservedly giving them the lead just before half time. Something strange happened at half time and the teams switched characteristics, suddenly Liverpool couldn’t string a couple of passes together and Arsenal finally looked something like resembling the wonderful young team that Arsene Wenger keeps promising to deliver.
Arsenal equalised when Glen Johnson claimed an own goal and from then on they were the tormentors, terrifying what has become a fragile Liverpool defence. The old adversary Arshavin scored the winner but as in the first half there were many chances not taken.
Wenger allegedly lost his temper at half time and it worked a treat with the Gunners showing great belief and composure in their comeback. Wenger says his team are ready to fight for the title ‘mentally’ now and on this evidence he is right.
I’m amazed at Liverpool’s fortunes this season or should I say misfortunes! Following this defeat Liverpool are actually talking about attempting to make the top four come the end of season, something I would not have considered a few months back.
