Manchester United have taken control of their Europa League last 32 tie with Ajax, as a 2-0 win in the away leg sees them set to qualify for the next stage barring any shocks in the return fixture.
Second half goals from Ashley Young and Javier Hernandez sealed a comfortable victory, as Sir Alex Ferguson fielded a strong team at the Amsterdam Arena.
The Scottish coach was pleased to record the win, but was not overly impressed by his side’s performance.
“I’m delighted by the scoreline, but I thought it was a very ordinary performance by us,” Ferguson told Channel Five.
“We didn’t reach any great heights in the game, but we did improve in the second half and we probably deserved to win it.
“I didn’t think we played well at all. There was no rhythm to our game.
“Ajax can make it difficult with the way they play when they close their midfield up. They pressed the ball really well.
“We didn’t get any tempo to our game at all in the first half. In the second half, we did improve a lot, we missed some good chances.
“Not a brilliant performance in the second half, but good enough I think,” the trainer concluded.
The only downside to the victory is an injury to in-form winger Antonio Valencia, who has picked up a hamstring knock and will be out of action for up to a month.
“He has a hamstring injury unfortunately. It will be four weeks. It is a bad blow for us,” Ferguson concluded.
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United don’t play this weekend, with their next game the return fixture against Ajax at Old Trafford next Thursday.
Former Bologna manager Alberto Malesani has been appointed at the helm of Serie A rivals Genoa, the club confirmed on Monday.Malesani, 57, successfully kept Bologna in the top flight last season even as the Italian outfit plunged into financial crisis and failed to make player payments for months.
The wage backlog attracted a three-point deduction from Serie A, but in spite of it all Bologna finished 16th on the table under Malesani.
Having rejected the offer of a contract extension at the Stadio Renato Dall’Ara, Malesani will instead head east to take up the managerial position left vacant by Davide Ballardini.
He has signed a one-year deal at the Genovese club, with an option for a further season.
Malesani earned his stripes at Chievo Verona before stints at Fiorentina and Parma. He led the latter to the Coppa Italia and the UEFA Cup in 1999.
Since that time, the much-travelled manager has called the shots at Verona, Modena, Greek side Panathinaikos, Udinese, Empoli and Siena.
It is often said in football that English managers and coaches are not given the same opportunities as those from other countries. You will read in the tabloids (and often in the more respected papers as well) that these foreigners are taking jobs that our own are more than capable of filling with the same level of style, panache and experience. However, given a lot of what we’ve seen going on in football – and to a greater extent the press (let’s not underestimate how much they affect opinions) – I would argue that it is the foreign managers that are under more pressure and scrutiny and handed less time to prove themselves.
At the heart of this attitude, there is a desire to see the best that English football has to offer at the ‘top table’; in the top jobs. But this comes very close to xenophobia in some situations and leaves a very sour taste in the mouth. The simple fact of the matter is: foreign coaches are preferred simply because they are better. People may point to the likes of Alex Ferguson, David Moyes, and Martin O’Neill but let’s not kid ourselves; these men are ‘foreign’. Sure, they may live on the same island and speak (for the most part) the same language but they originate from completely separate nations; they are not English so by definition, they are foreigners. Sadly for Englishmen, they too are better than anything we can offer.
The press (and, I’m sure, more than a few people that read this article) will argue til they are blue in the face that English managers are as good as any other. That they are just not given the opportunities their foreign counterparts are but this is nonsense. Top jobs are awarded on merit, not nationality. Liverpool, Chelsea, Arsenal – three of the group known traditionally as the ‘Big Four’, have employed all of their recent managers (Avram Grant aside) on their track record and reputations, not based on their vicinity to the club’s ground. Any top English managers around at the time will have been considered, not overlooked. Take our own club as an example: we had a track record of employing exclusively from the British Isles. Before Gerard Houllier, we had Roy Evans, before him Graeme Souness and Kenny Dalglish. After Dalglish, Souness and Evans performed poorly, at best. Houllier, once given the opportunity to manage alone, performed near miracles in his first few years, repaying the faith of the club’s owners in its first coach from the continent. Benitez later went on to build on Houllier’s successes and performed actual miracles. Likewise, the likes of Chelsea and Arsenal had always stayed loyal to British coaches but once they turned to the continent they both experienced the best periods in each club’s history.
Of course, the thing that usually instigates this discussion is an English manager getting the sack and recently a press favourite – Sam Allardyce – was sacked by Blackburn. An unbiased mind would look at all the facts and see that he underachieved and had them playing some of the ugliest football around. The media see it as an indictment of these crazy and impatient foreigners that won’t give the English a chance. Yet, if you look at the coverage of Roberto Mancini and Carlo Ancelotti’s situations in recent months you can’t help but notice a distinctly different attitude; there is almost a delicious glee to the way the media report on how Ancelotti appears to have lost control of the club and how Mancini can’t keep his players or the owners happy. The press seems to have little faith in these two men, despite sharing 4 Serie A’s, 5 Coppa Italias and 2 Champions League’s. That kind of track record should buy both these men more time. If they have one bad season, they should at least be given another to rectify the situation but they won’t. The tabloids won’t allow it while there is a chance that one of their favourites might get a crack at one of these jobs.
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Even England manager Fabio Capello has lost the press, after England’s ‘finest’ once again failed to turn up at a World Cup. It seems that the claims that ‘if this man can’t make England World Cup winners, then we’ll know the problem is with the players’ has swiftly been forgotten. It seems that his track record of 7 Serie A titles, 2 La Ligas and a Champions League now mean nothing; he didn’t win the World Cup with a bunch of overrated prima donnas so his 30+ year managerial career counts for nothing. If you take a look at the man touted to potentially – eventually – replace all three then you see either a symptom of the problem, or an example of the problem itself: Harry Redknapp. Years of self-promotion and press-promotion have made him what he is today: an arrogant, smarmy, self-impressed under-achiever. Some people forget but this man has been in management over 30 years. In that time, he has won an FA Cup. He has also qualified for the Champions League once. Oh, he has also seen several of the clubs he’s managed relegated too. Yet, he is the best we have to offer and the press would have you believe he is the best in the country.
Similarly (and where I get to the point of how this affects Liverpool), Roy Hodgson can seemingly do no wrong. Nothing is ever his fault; every defeat is met with excuses and buck-passing. Liverpool fans have been getting criticised all season long for wanting Roy Hodgson sacked. After the team’s 8th league defeat of the season on Wednesday, the ground was resounding with boos, all of them directed at one man: the manager. There are few left that think he should be given a bit more time. These few are the press and they will happily see Liverpool run into the ground before they will change their opinion of the man. This is what we’re up against.
What scares me most is that once Hodgson finally does go, the press will again be pushing for an Englishman to be given a chance, and I’m sure the likes of Allardyce and Redknapp will be mentioned. I know who my choice will be and he has been hounded by the press ever since he made it clear he wouldn’t be towing their line; he is a prime example of how foreign managers are given much less time to turn a situation around, despite his previous record. He is currently on holiday on Merseyside, so he’s within a stone’s throw of the ground as well. However, should he be overlooked if and when the top job in the country again becomes available, I will still prefer a foreign manager, and unless the whole culture of English managers (and the quality of them) changes sometime soon, I always will.
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Read more of David Tyrer articles at Live4Liverpool
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I’ll set the record straight now, I’m not a big fan of the Israeli, so if I were to get him in a real life Secret Santa, I would be looking around the room to swap as quickly as possible. If truth be told, I want him to be out of a job for Christmas, but that just isn’t in the spirit of the season is it?!
In that vein, my Secret Santa present to Avram Grant would probably be paying for his bus fare to the Job Centre. I mean, I can’t handle the thought of the man being out of work, but if I knew his travel expenses were covered, then I could rest a little easier over the Christmas period!
Obviously we are only talking in jest here, but if you picked Avram Grant out of the hat for Secret Santa what would you buy him? A new striker perhaps? Remember money is no object here!
At the weekend the FA Cup 4th round treated us to a couple of shocks, most notably Leyton Orient beating Championship high flyers Swansea and non-league Crawley defeating Torquay to set up a fairy tale tie with Manchester United at Old Trafford in the 5th round. There also looked to be a shock on the cards at St Andrew’s as Coventry City raced into a 2-0 lead against Birmingham City, only for the Blues to stage a comeback and secure a 3-2 victory.
Coventry City’s second goal, a towering Richard Wood header from a Gary McSheffrey corner in the 26th minute, saw the Championship team establish a two goal lead before the Sky Blues were overpowered by their Premier League opposition. As Wood powered his header past Birmingham City goalkeeper Kevin Doyle, FootballFanCast.com was featured on the electronic advertising boards behind the goal as St Andrew’s.
See for yourself on the 36th second of the video below as FootballFanCast.com scores in the 4th round of the greatest cup competition in the world, the FA Cup!
Since Norwich have been in and around the top six places in the Championship, the debate has been whether they are really good enough for the Premier League, are they ready for the Premiership and would they survive, if they were to go up?
Well time will tell in the answers to these key questions, but at this stage of the season there is quite simply no place for fear or insecurity, the team has earned the chance to compete for a place in arguably the best league in the world.
There is no doubt that the team would need to be strengthened, but just like this season there will be players who will step up to the challenge. What is not in question is the strong team spirit, excellent manager and ambitious board. Although, Norwich may have progressed quicker than many people expected, Premier League football is a key objective; Norwich already has a stadium that can hold 27,000 fans in addition to impressive youth and training facilities.
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The Championship this season has been tight and there has been no stand out teams, this represents a fantastic opportunity for Norwich to grab a place in the top two. Big teams like West Ham, Wolves and Wigan could be relegated from the Premier League and make the Championship very difficult next season. Not to mention big spenders like Hull and Leicester looking to break into the top six.
Some people forget that Norwich are no strangers to the Premier League and were in fact one of the founder members. Those early days of the Premier League included some inspired performances from the Canaries. The real highlights being an impressive third place finish and a run to Europe that included a now famous victory against Bayern Munich.
Since, then Norwich have enjoyed one further spell in the top flight in the 2004/5 season, and although the team were relegated that season, they would have learned a lot about the Premiership. These experiences should ensure that Norwich City are prepared for the challenges of the Premier League.
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Changes will need to be made, but I’m sure that promotion to the Premier League is crucial for the club to progress. Time will tell if Norwich can maintain their place, but even if they can’t the financial rewards on offer will still be massive and it’s a chance they simply can’t afford to pass up, because who knows when they will get another opportunity.
So in the past few years, we’ve had allegations of bungs, bribes, match fixing, false advertising in the case of Torres and Carroll – strikers? Well they certainly do not do what it says on the tin, and now the latest storm for football to weather is that of tax perks.
It was reported over the weekend that HMRC are more than a little curious about the ‘secret perks’ that footballers are enjoying at the courtesy of clubs and their owners. It is not just holidays or even cars that are interesting HRMC, oh no – they are even asking about health benefits and intimating tax could be paid on these.
Basically it is anything that are ‘benefits in kind’ so it is not wages obviously, which footballers in the UK get absolutely crucified on already, especially in comparison to other countries, but the ‘perks’ they are receiving, and the ever greedy HMRC state that they would not enter into such investigations if they did not feel a great deal of money could be reaped from it.
That alone illustrates not only how serious they feel about this issue – why wouldn’t they, a further chance to fill their chest with gold – but also how successful they feel they have the potential to be. If you rack your brains, it is not hard to think of which ever club you support, your favourite player and a benefit he has received from the club – it may not be a holiday or a car, perhaps it is just accommodation for a few nights on arriving in England, whatever it is, there are more than enough examples, and the HMRC have cottoned on to this.
Now don’t get me wrong, I am not sitting here asking you to cry into what is left of the beer from New Year for the footballers who have so much in comparison to the rest of us, and I am fully aware that it is not just footballers who pay a huge amount of their earnings to the HMRC, not to mention the fact that we are also expected to pay tax and national insurance on the ‘benefits’ we get – but before this turns into a rant about the government and our tax system, I am simply highlighting the fact that it is not even just football in which the taxation differs massively in the UK to other countries.
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Rafael Nadal for example has chosen to forgo playing at his usual Wimbledon warm-up tournament of the last few years at Queen’s in London, in favour of Halle in Germany for the next three years due to the difference in tax on the payment and winnings – England take half the appearance fee and also a substantial proportion of their world wide endorsements – determined on how much time they spend competing in the UK.
Is this right for Rafa to do– no it is not, and when I read this a few months back I was disappointed in Rafa for prioritising the money over anything else, but at the end of the day, it is a vital factor for sportsmen these days, and do we really want to isolate the UK even further by attempting to seize more of the wages the footballers earn?
Eventually, they will become like Rafa Nadal and chose to play their trade in La Liga or elsewhere – it is hardly like England can compete with the weather, the winter break, the women – I could go on, and as a country we do not want the best talent to go elsewhere – we want it here.
Do I feel good attempting to defend footballers over their astronomical salary – no I do not, and this is not what I am trying to get across here, but at the end of the day, if you have the choice between playing abroad paying less tax on firstly your wages and then your ‘benefits’ or in the UK where you are heavily taxed on all of these, which would you go for?
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As the Premier League reaches its quarter stage, many players have excelled and impressed in the opening nine games with some high score demolitions and last gasp winners. However, some players have not been up to expectations and this is a chance to name and shame.
The Champions of last year have been embarrassed by their rivals; however they have inflicted similar defeats of their other rivals. Some teams have underachieved so far and some the complete opposite but there is no denying that some players have just been poor. Whether it be missed chances, lack of effort, goalkeeping howlers or defensive mistakes, plenty of performances have raised eyebrows this season for good and bad reasons and here is a list of the top 10 players that have disappointed so far this season.
Click on Roger Johnson to unveil the top 10 players to have disappointed this season
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List compiled by Brad Pinard
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Arsenal are facing a battle with Real Madrid with both clubs hunting the signature of highly-rated Lille star Eden Hazard, the Mirror understands.
The Gunners have been chasing Hazard for over two years and failed to sign the Belgian schemer during the summer as he strived to replace Cesc Fabregas and Samir Nasri after they departed the Emirates.
It’s now emerged that Madrid’s director of football, Zinedine Zidane, has singled out the 20-year-old as the next Galactico and even tried to convince Lille to ignore any approaches from North London.
Bernabeu legend Zidane has made Hazard the number one transfer target for Los Merengues and is prepared to go all out to convince the midfielder to make the move to Spain.
That could prove to be a huge blow to Arsene Wenger’s aspirations of bringing Hazard to the club, with the La Liga giants a more attractive proposition than the crisis-stricken Gunners.
The Frenchman has endured a testing few months of late, losing Cesc Fabregas and Samir Nasri in the summer before overseeing the club’s worst start to a season during his 14 year tenure.
News of Madrid’s interest in Hazard will come as another bitter blow to his future plans and he knows it will be a huge task to convince Hazard to snub La Liga for the Premier League.
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It is no surprise that after Manchester United’s disastrous display in the Carling Cup quarter final this week, that the Old Trafford club have come in for a rough ride. Headlines have declared the youngsters not good enough and even some of the old guard including the likes of Viv Anderson and Lou Macari, have had their say. Sir Alex Ferguson was obviously fuming at the performance, but will be the first to demand there to be no knee-jerk reaction. But should he be concerned about the quality of United’s next generation?
Talking to MUTV, Viv Anderson quite simply declared United’s youngsters “not up to the tasks that everyone thinks they are”. Quite a statement to make on the clubs own television channel. In his defence, judging by the defeat at Upton Park, he’s right. But the youngsters aren’t the only ones: Darren Fletcher was unusually poor, John O’Shea was wasteful going forward and anonymous defensively, whilst Ryan Giggs did his best to remind everyone that it was his 37th birthday not so long ago.
What stood out more from a United fans point of view was the fact that these senior players did little to appease the trouble the younger players were having. Fair enough, the defence were given a torrid time against Carlton Cole, but you would expect a central midfield partnership of Fletcher and Anderson to be able to keep quiet a full-back come playmaker like Jonathan Spector. So let’s not be so hasty to pile all the blame on the likes of Johnny Evans, Chris Smalling and Fabio.
When put all together, Fergie’s kids have a long way to go before they can safely call themselves the next generation. However when playing alongside Rio Ferdinand or Nemanja Vidic, Chris Smalling has looked more than comfortable, whilst with a decent run of games, which would mean staying injury free, you’d expect Fabio to mature the way his brother, Rafael, has done.
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Fergie is obviously a fan of Gabriel Obertan and it’s fair to say the potential is there. Bebe on the other hand; well, we will have to wait and see. £7 million on an unknown quantity was a gamble, and Ferguson doesn’t like to be wrong. Expect to see more from him despite the last horrific 45 minutes of football the Portuguese forward played.
What will always go against the next generation at United is that they will always be compared to crop of talent which once came through the ranks and dominated all before them. Admittedly, they don’t match the quality of a young David Beckham, Paul Scholes or Ryan Giggs, but let;s be honest not many footballers do.
The kids will be given a second chance. Ferguson, in all his wisdom will call it a ‘learning curve,’ whilst behind closed doors I’m sure the players won’t be allowed to forget in a hurry what happened against West Ham. Luckily for them, though, the United manager puts a lot of faith in his younger players and would not agree with what the likes of Viv Anderson have had to say.
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The warning signs are there for Ferguson that maybe some of his prospects would already class themselves good enough to stroll into a place like Upton Park and demand the win. The laboured way in which they played on Tuesday illustrated that they just weren’t up for it; an attitude not welcome at a club like Manchester United.
Be that as it may, his reaction won’t be to go selling players in January just off the back of one defeat. The result and performance was nothing short of embarrassing for Ferguson but they have a lot to learn. The reason why his young-guns will still be at Old Trafford until next summer at least is because he has faith in their ability, and who are we to argue with him? Not good enough? I’d say the future still looks bright at Old Trafford.
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