Manchester United

Van der Sar is expected to be side lined for 7 or 8 weeks and leaves the door open for United’s Ben Foster and Tomas Kuszczak to fight for a starting place in Sunday’s Community Shield against Chelsea.

United manager Sir Alex Ferguson has started his mind games already and you can almost see his rival at Liverpool, Rafael Benitez seething after hearing Ferguson say that the main threat for the title will come form Chelsea and not Liverpool.

In an interview in The Sun Ferguson says of Liverpool’s title challenge:

“It will be hard for them to match last season, let alone improve on it. Other teams will know more about them. Liverpool had probably their best season for 20 years and still finished four points adrift. It has to be Chelsea as the main threat. Ancelotti will change how they play.”

Ferguson also talked up the potential of the players that he has at his disposal in the wake of the departure of Ronaldo and Tevez and says the club are ‘expecting a lot’ from the youngsters who have emerged over the past season.

But why is it that when Man City offered £100 million for Kaka, the majority of English football pundits, commentators and overpaid ex-footballers shook their heads and frowned at the idea that Manchester City were prepared to pay such a large amount of money for any one player.  But £80 million for Cristiano Ronaldo between Real Madrid and Manchester United has not received the same level of criticism?

I believe there are equal measures of hypocracy and snobbery.  It’s okay for Real Madrid and Manchester United  because they are two of the biggest clubs in the world.  As Alex Ferguson likes to tell the media when playing mind games against Chelsea, ‘Manchester United has history!’

And like when Roman Abramovich made Chelsea the richest club in the world with his own money, the Manchester City owner and member of the Arab Abu Dhabi royal family, 38 year-old Sheikh Mansour bin Zayed Al Nahyan, has unfairly been discrimated against as the richest clubs in the world have always paid large sums of money to prize the best players away from other teams.  It’s just not fair that someone can bully Ferguson and Manchester United around, is it?

There is an obvious elitist factor at play. Furthermore, surely it’s more acceptable for Manchester City and Chelsea to pay large sums of money for top players in this current climate than it is the likes of Manchester United.  Afterall, the Glazer Family bought Man United with borrowed money and have saddled that great club with allegedly £511 million of debt.  The sale of Ronaldo will not even pay 50% of this year’s interest repayment on Manchester United’s loans which allegedly stands at £45.5 million.

Kaka is one of the best players in the world.  But £56 million paid to AC Milan for the young Brazilian midfield playmaker, compared to £80 million for Ronaldo,  is a bargain.  Bayern Munich’s Frank Ribery and Liverpool’s Xavi Alonso were also on Florentino Perez’s wishlist at a recent press conference.  Those players have also been courted by Chelsea and Arsenal, respectively.

This summer’s transfer market has just got exciting.  Real Madrid have the money and the history to buy more top players, while Manchester City are going to find it more difficult to persuade the best players in the world to join them unless they are pushing 30 and are content with a massive weekly pay check and no European medals next season.

Manchester United will I assume look to replace Cristiano Ronaldo, maybe with someone like Frank Ribery; and if Carlos Tevez leaves Old Trafford they will most definitely need another striker to play alongside Wayne Rooney.  How about Stewart Downing and Jermain Defoe?

Arsenal need to strengthen their squad if they are prepared to put up a reasonable fight to stay in the ‘big four’ and Chelsea will have offered Carlo Ancelotti a reasonable amount of money to rebuild an aging team, if they are to mount a serious challenge for the Premiership or the Champions League.

Exciting times ahead this summer.

This season Chelsea had to overcome Liverpool in the quarter-finals to set up another encounter with Barcelona, and tonight, the stage is set for another epic encounter.  With Barcelona apparently playing the best pass and move ‘Brazilian style’ football in the world right now, against a Chelsea team that has regained its ‘never say die’ attitude of a few seasons ago, under the leadership of Guus Hiddink, it promises to be a great game of football.

I am looking forward to seeing Lionel Messi, as I believe he is the most naturally talented player in the world.  Due to Ashley Cole’s suspension it looks like Chelsea will switch Jose Boswinga from right to left back in an attempt to stop Messi. But with the likes of Samuel Eto’o and Thierry Henry to contend with, Barcelona will cause offensive problems for Chelsea however they line up.

I believe it is inevitable that Chelsea will concede goals at the Nou Camp, and their best line of defence will be to attack Barca and hope to score at least one vital away goal.

A score draw is the best chance I give Chelsea tonight.  But Barca thrashed Bayern Munich in the last round.

As long as they are still in touching distance come the second leg at Stamford Bridge, they will have a chance of reaching the UEFA Champions League Final, setting up the second all-England final (which will piss off Michel Platini) and make amends for last year’s final defeat.

I predict 2-1 to Barcelona in a fiery, fast and furious game of football.

When the draw for the quarter finals was made, I was assured of Manchester United’s path to the semi-finals but Porto completely outplayed Man Utd in the first half at Old Trafford on Tuesday.

Manchester United were lucky not to have conceded more goals in the first half but gave a better account of themselves in the second. After taking the lead, Porto had to come from behind to draw 2-2.

Manchester United looked tired and were most definitely missing star players, especially Rio Ferdinand as they looked very wobbly in defence.  I still fancy Man Utd to go through to the semi-final after the return leg next Wednesday, though to do so they will have to become the first English club to beat Porto in Portugal.

The winners of that tie will play either Arsenal or Villareal who drew 1-1 in Spain on Tuesday.  The Spanish midfielder Marcos Senna ran the first half and scored a great goal to give Villareal a first half lead.  But Arsene Wenger’s team-talk in the interval led to a more positive approach by Arsenal in the second-half with both Cesc Fabregas & Theo Walcott seeing much more of the ball.  Arsenal also appeared to cancel out Senna’s superiority, and deserved the equaliser – a superbly taken acrobatic goal by Emmanuel Adebayor.

Arsenal will be favourites to proceed when the teams meet for the second leg at the Emirates Stadium next Wednesday.

Bayern Munich beat Sporting Lisbon 12-1 in the last round, and Barcelona scored four first-half goals in their home league against French champions Lyon, in the last round.  So this quarter-final was either going to be a goalfest or a dull 1-0 affair.

I only heard reports on the radio of this game, but it sounded like Bayern Munich were completely outplayed in the first 45 minutes, as Barcelona once again scored four goals in the first-half.  I love the way Barcelona play expansive, entertaining football.

It seems an age since Chelsea and Liverpool haven’t played each other in the UEFA Champions League; and the only advantage to have between their previous Champions League encounters has been the second leg home advantage.

Liverpool started the brighter and Fernando Torres scored after 5 minutes.  But instead of stunning Cheslea, the early goal gave them the opportunity to play a more attacking formation, and immediately they began to dictate the game.

Frank Lampard was pushed into a more advanced position, similar to Steven Gerrard, and had a great game, while Gerrard’s threat was completely nulled by an excellent performance from Michael Essein.

Branislav Ivanovic was the unlikely hero as he scored with headers from corner kicks either side of the break.  Didier Drogba put the icing on the cake as Chelsea completely outplayed a stunned Liverpool, romping home to an amazing 3-1 win at Anfield.

Chelsea look favourites to meet Barcelona in the semi-final after their quarter-final second legs next Tuesday.

What’s the odds on another Chelsea v Manchester United Champions League Final?

Manchester United play Porto, probably the weakest team left in the competition; and certainly nowhere near as strong as they were when they last knocked Man Utd out of the Champions League and went on to become Champions of Europe under the guidance of Jose Mourinho.

The tie of the round has to be the favourites Barcelona up against the goal fest German champions, Bayern Munich.

What is for sure, it won’t be a Liverpool v Barcelona final as I had previously predicted.  If they overcome Chelsea and Bayern Munich respectively they will meet in the semi final.

UEFA Champions League 2009 Quarter Finals Draw:

Villarreal v Arsenal
Manchester United v FC Porto
Liverpool v Chelsea
Barcelona v Bayern Munich

UEFA Champions League 2009 Semi Finals Draw:

Manchester United/FC Porto v Villarreal/Arsenal
Barcelona/Bayern Munich v Liverpool/Chelsea

Chelsea did well to twice come from behind against a good Juventus team, and further showed their new-found togetherness under the leadership of Guus Hiddink.

Manchester United and Alex Ferguson saw off the challenge of Inter Milan and Jose Mourinho without an overly impressive performance, while it was squeeky bum time for all Arsenal fans as they had to endure a penalty shoot-out against Roma, which had all the fun of the roller-coaster when Eduardo missed the first penalty.

But it was Liverpool who, once again played exceptional football to thrash Real Madrid 4-0 at Anfield.  An amazing 5-0 win over two legs.

The other teams to qualify for the UEFA Champions League quarter finals are Villareal and Barcelona (Spain), Porto (Portugal) and Bayern Munich (Germany) who set a new Champions League knock-out stage record by thrashing Sporting Lisbon 12-1 on aggreagate.  Yes, Sporting Lisbon may have been the weakest team to make it through from the group stage, but the fact that they qualified proves they were no mugs!

I personally think Barcelona will be crowned Champions of Europe in May, and if they avoid them in the quarter final draw (to be made on Friday 20th March) I now think they might be facing Liverpool in the final.