British Invasion

The last five years have seen an immense improvement in the performance of English teams in Europe. Five of the last eight champion league finalists were English teams (Arsenal - 1, Chelsea - 1, Liverpool - 2, United - 1). The most notable feature of last season's champions league was, no English team was eliminated by a non-English team. Arsenal lost to Liverpool, Liverpool were eliminated by Chelsea and Chelsea were defeated by Manchester United. A similar pattern seems to be developing this season.

Football history shows, domination of a club or a set of clubs from a particular country often coincides with the domination of that country at the World/Europe level. For example, consider the Ajax team of the early 70's. They were the European champions in '71,'72 and '73. The Dutch international team were World-cup runners-up in '74 and '78 (thanks to Johan Cruijff). Bayern Munich were champions from '74 to '76. The German National team won Euro in '72 and the World Cup in '74. Another example, Juventus were European champions in '83 and runners-up in '85. Italian national team won the '82 world cup. In spite of the indomitable performance of English clubs over the last few years, England national team hardly showed any domination at the world level. Forget domination, they haven't even managed to qualify for Euro '08.

Thanks to the global transfer market, over the last two decades, the correlation between Club domination and National team domination reduced significantly. One, very obvious reason for the current English domination is their wealth. United, Chelsea and Liverpool all owned by billionaires can afford to buy the cream of footballers in the world. Though Arsenal does not have any rich owners, it has a stadium that makes more money than any other stadium in the entire world. Another gargantuan source of income for english clubs is the global TV rights. Putting the economic advantage aside, do English teams have the advantage of playing a more competitive breed of football week-in and week-out? Does this help them at the European stage? It sure is more physically demanding than other leagues (not including the Socttish and Irish leagues). It is quicker than other leagues - one of the main reasons for long adaptation time of immigrant players.
It would be very interesting to see the trend at European level, if FIFA and UEFA seek to impose a quota system on the immigrant players in a club.

Is the Quintuple dream on ?

The biggest question of all as the season approaches its finish line is not if Man Utd can retain the league title but it is if they can complete the historic quintuple. 

Firstly I would like to take this opportunity to point out to the readers that if at all Man Utd go onto achieve the ‘ Quintuple’ it wouldn’t be an unprecedented achievement but just a historic one. The famous Ajax team of ‘74/’75 won eight titles in a span of two years , so surely ,which ever way one looks at it , they either won the quintuple in an year or achieved the quadruple for two consecutive years.

 Is Man Utd actually capable of realizing the almost impossible dream of achieving the quintuple? I, personally, don’t think so. I don’t think any Man Utd fan would be extremely upset if they don’t finish tops in all the competitions as it is like asking a normal human being to be a superman for a day.

 As Sir Alex, himself, put it Man Utd should ride their luck for way too long to come out triumphs in all the competitions. If the premier league is an indication of a team’s consistency and ruthlessness, the cup competitions always require a slice of luck. A wrongly judged offside goal, a wrongly adjudged penalty, there are way too many things that can change a match in a flash. Last years FA cup tie with Portsmouth can always be used as a good case study when trying to illustrate the kind of luck that is needed to win the cup competitions.

Secondly, if Man Utd actually complete the quintuple this year, I would be as amazed at their success as any other neutral fan. I wouldn’t be awe struck at their achievement but rather I would be amazed at the opponents’ incapability to stop them from achieving that feat. Any honest assessment of Manchester United’s season so far will have one believe that they have been far from their best and have nowhere attained the devastating form that they displayed in abundance last season. They have been having a rollercoaster season by their footballing standards, brilliant in one, subdued in the next. While some players haven’t hit strides yet such as Ronaldo, Tevez, Rooney and Berbatov some, notably Anderson and Nani, are suffering from the proverbial second season syndrome.   To simply put, Manchester United haven’t yet hit fifth gear this season and look unlikely to do so. 

Is The League Title All United's?

First of all I'd like to apologize for not completing my previous post due to certain unforeseen circumstances. And now that its been a long time since, I wont complete it either. It wont make sense.

Moving on to today's post, I'd first like to say.....Its good to be back!

The other day I was having this conversation with a friend of mine who is a Pool fan. Well with these Pool fans my conversations generally spiral out of control, especially the football ones! This time it was a bit of a bringing her back to earth time.(Yes its a girl pool fan!! Can you believe that?)

With a good comfortable victory over Sunderland after the heartache of Middlesborough defeat, Liverpool are joint second on points in the table along with Chelsea. Her argument was that maybe there is still time for United to slip up and one of us to finally win the thing. I said its possible but not probable. Then I went on to put things into perspective. So I did some research and following are the findings.

Manu............P27....Pts65...GD36
Chelsea.........P28...Pts58...GD32
Liverpool......P28...Pts58...GD25

Therefore, United have 11 games to play whereas Chelsea and Liverpool have 10 each. The point difference is 7. The odds are stacked heavily against either of the chasing pack.

Now let us assume(make an ass of u and me). Here is how it goes for Chelsea and Liverpool. If either of them win all their remaining games(highly unlikely), they will be at 88 points. With United having 11 games to play, they will have to do either of the following.....

Lose 4 Win 7 (total 86) [extremely unlikely]
Lose 3 Draw 1 Win 7 (total 87) [highly unlikely]
Lose 2 Draw 2 Win 7 (total 88) [unlikely]
Lose 1 Draw 4 Win 6 (total 87) [highly unlikely]

for Chelsea or Liverpool to have any chance. The most promising is the third scenario. The unlikely one. In that scenario, goal difference comes into picture. So lets put that too into perspective....

United have lost 2 games all season both 2-1 losses so the avg goal difference when they lose is 1/game. While when they win the avg goal difference is 1.9/game. Hence in the above scenario, the goal difference tally will see a rise of 11.3 goals, lets say 11 for convenience. (Overall GD at the end of the season...47!)

Compare this to Chelsea's record. When they lose, they lose by an avg GD of 1.8/game. When they win, they win by an avg GD of 2.3/game. Since Chelsea have to win all 10 games, that makes it 23 GD in 10 games(Overall......55!!!) Chelsea will win the thing :)

Now for Liverpool's chances. When Pool lose, they do by an avg of 1.5 but when they win they do it by an average GD of 1.7/game. That takes their tally to 17 GD in next 10 games(Overall 42!) Liverpool will still be third :P

So there you have it. Chelsea are the only team in a position to challenge United for the title, and that position is on a tightrope tied between Mt Everest and Mt K2. Still enjoying the good times under Hiddink. Hope we do better in the UCL.

Have a nice day folks!