Posts Tagged ‘La Liga’

Why I Haven’t Blogged In A While

Thursday, April 2nd, 2009

As I said in my previous post, an extremely busy stretch at work kept me from posting things. There were about two weeks at Revlon that I was practically twiddling my thumbs, then the dam burst with projects. On top of that, I picked up three REALLY big freelance projects, keeping my busy not only nights but weekends, which kept me from watching matches.

Thing is, my weekends were not THAT busy. I could have stepped away for bit and watched some footie. I’ve also got a DVR which allows me to time-shift a boatload of games…I just never seemed to do that. For a minute, I though that my time as a soccer fanatic was over.

Then I started to recap the last few weeks in my head. While it may have seemed that I wasn’t watching recorded games, it turns out that I was wrong there. I watched a TON of games, particularly in La Liga. I watched a seemingly beaten-down Real Madrid go through a phenomenal rebirth of winds while simultaneously watching a fatigued Barcelona club go on a ridiculous string of draws and losses. Real Madrid may not win the league this year, but they DEFINITELY have a chance to take three points from Barcelona at the May 3rd superclassico.

I witnessed Liverpool’s annihilation of Manchester United in the best match of the year. Many believed that Liverpool manager, Rafa Benitez, couldn’t pick his best team of eleven players but it seems that team is gelling right now. Doubt that they’ll win the EPL trophy this year though.

Of course, there was the Champions League, where the round of 16 has come and gone. Inter Milan’s out. Real Madrid’s REALLY out. And we’re all hoping for a Barcelona – Man United match in the final, which seems possible.

Palmeiras
But best of all, GolTV is now carrying Brazilian club level football from the Sao Paulo state…and I LOVE it!!! Jumping back to rebirths for a second, I have been born-again thanks to Sao Paulo football, especially since I have access to Corinthian club games, which I can watch the great Ronaldo. But while Corinthians are great, I’ve decided to support the the Palmeiras club after watching them play. These games, I’m not missing.

So I watched a decent amount of football, just not a lot of English Premier League football. And this brings up an interesting point.

See, the EPL promotes itself on a scale much grander than any other football league in the world. Said promotion has created a strong customer demand for access to as many televised games as possible, particularly in America. The American cable and satellite operators know all this so they try to sell as many sports packages with EPL access as they can to customers. All of this means that whenever an American begins to get into football, they are most likely to be exposed to EPL football first.

This happened to me. When I first got in to footie, all I knew was the Premier League. Thanks to the Fox Soccer Channel and GolTV, I watched at least two EPL games over the weekend along with the Barcelona and Real Madrid matches in Spain. Then we brought a condo and got satellite subscription with Setanta, meaning that I now had access to all games played by the EPL’s big four teams every weekend. And since the condo increased our monthly expenses, we had no problem substituting football for our weeklong entertainment in lieu of going out as much.

Now after two years of being a football nut, I’ve realized the the English game is just not that exciting as the game in Spain and Brazil and Italy and France and many other regions. Don’t get me wrong, I love Chelsea and am curious about how Man U, Arsenal, Liverpool and Hull are doing, but not enough to give all five of these teams all of my weekend time. And now that I’m getting into the Brazilian game, the Italian game and (sorta kinda) the French game, I just cannot get into the EPL as much as I did in the past. As a result, I will budget my time around the really good games from ALL leagues, while using the internet to keep up with standings and fixtures of others. This means that whenever Man U plays Arsenal, I’ll be in front of my TV. But I’ll be somewhere else when Man U play Stoke City.

Don’t misunderstand me here. I absolutely do NOT hate the British game. It’s just that with the three soccer channels that I have, I have access to so much more football now. And when you watch all types of football from all types of leagues you start to notice the difference in styles of play, and the British style football is just not as exciting right now. It’s as if I’d been listing to my parents record collection all my life and have now discovered punk rock and rap music.

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Raul: Real Madrid Image Is Damaged

Thursday, January 29th, 2009

Raul Gonzalez
According to Real Madrid forward Raul Gonzalez, the recent resignation of the club’s president, Ramon Calderon, has assisted in damaging the club’s image. He states:

“There are situations that one cannot control. The most damaged things are the image and the history of the club. It is clear that we are not happy and the club has to present another image to the outside world.”

This isn’t the whole quote so go over to Goal.com and read the entire article. But my personal opinion is that while Calderon’s quitting certainly sucks, it hasn’t had any effect on Real Madrid’s image. Had he stuck around, their image would still be tarnished.

Real Madrid has been plagued with injuries since the before the season began and Wesley Sneijder got hurt in the Emirates Cup. Injuries have shifted Arjen Robben, Sergio Ramos and Raul himself in and out of match play and have also put Ruud van Nistelrooy and Mamadou Diarra (two of the team’s linchpins) out for the whole season. None of these are nickel-and-dime losses.

To deal with these losses, Real Madrid have brought new players into the mix, including their palace coup of plucking Klaas-Jan Huntelaar from Ajax. They’ve also brought in ex-Tottenham Hotspur boss Juande Ramos in the hopes he’ll lead the team back to the top of the La Liga table. Factor these recent additions in with their preseason signing of Rafael van der Vaart, and it appears, from a birds-eye view, that their issues are on their way to being repaired.

But something I’ve learned about football this season is that any new club additions need time to acclimate to the team system before they start yielding the dividends (instances such as Fernando Torres yielding dividends his first day at Liverpool are rare). Yes, the Real veteran players are doing well along side Juande Ramos, Huntelaar and van der Vaart. But they committed a sloppy loss against Barcelona and are getting low-scoring 1-0 wins, as always. Change may have to come to America, but it has yet to reach the Santiago Bernabéu stadium.

Still, some positive results have come from Real Madrid’s moves. They currently hold the No. 2 spot in La Liga, which is tough to do in one of the world’s most competitive football leagues. They also seem to be on the comeback trail from of all their losses with five consecutive wins as of this post. Sneijder, Raul, Robben and Sergio Ramos are healthy, van der Vaart is finding his role, and both Huntelaar and Juande Ramos are settling in.

All this being said, FC Barcelona is No. 1 and holds that lead by 12 points. For them to lose the lead requires that they go on a four-week string of losses and/or draws as Real goes concurrent string of wins, and that’s a doubtful chain of events. And as healthy as all those Real Madrid guys are, Lionel Messi, Samuel Eto’o, Thierry Henry over at Barca are REALLY healthy and are practically scoring in their sleep. The general consensus among many in the football community is that Barcelona has the league title sewn up, so much so that four-and-a-half months before the season even ends, bookies are already making payouts to those that bet on them winning the whole season.

This isn’t the end of the world for RM. Teams from all levels of sports have bad years, and dynasties such as the Jordan-era Bulls or the Brady-era Patriots are not frequent occurrences. But for the past decade, Real Madrid have been a footie powerhouse, taking in three La Liga and three Champions League trophies. They’ve been able to easily snag the best of the best players for their squad, including Zinedene Zidane and Ronaldo. Now it appears that the La Liga championship is out of their reach, that they’ll nail down the second 09/10 Champions League spot at best and both Cristiano Ronaldo and Kaka dismissed them when they tried to acquire them (not so much Ronaldo).

With their rushed signings yet to play out in full, the injuries and having to deal with an ostensibly unstoppable Barcelona, Real Madrid simply isn’t the dominate Spanish club that it’s been for the past two years. They are smack dab in-the-middle of a fall from grace and I think that is what’s hurting their image. More so than Calderon quitting.

Is this the end of Real Madrid? Good Lord, no. This is just Barcelona’s year and not Real Madrid’s, and it’s been the other way for a while now. Things are different now for RM and it may be like that for another year or two if Barca keeps up at their current rate. Welcome to football.

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“Old Horsey Face” Nistelrooy is out for the season

Thursday, November 13th, 2008

Ruud van Nistelrooy
Makes me wanna cry….for about 2 minutes.

On one hand, this bites. After David Beckham left Real Madrid in ‘07 for the LA Galaxy, it was Ruud van Nistelrooy that stepped up to take his place. Not in the midfield mind you, but as a strong supporting player that can score. With the team struggling this season, this is an ill-timed loss and on a more personal note, Ruudy’s my second favorite RM player after Iker Casillas. But on the other hand, history has proven that Real Madrid can win without him. And as proof of this, I’ll simply point to last season, when Ruud was injured for a looooooong time, yet the team went onto win the La Liga championship without him by more than enough points.

I’ll be honest though: Barcelona appears to have the league championship sealed this year when you look at the following parallel. Barca and Real Madrid have traditionally held the top two spots in La Liga and they usually end up competing for the league cup towards the end of the season. A big reason that Madrid took the cup last year was Ronaldinho’s implosion and somewhat early defection from the blaugranas…without him, Barcelona didn’t have a chance. The same may hold true for RM not having Ruddy in the strike position.

But the truth is, no one knows what’s going to happen in football. One thing that I’ve learned in this journey is that the footie game is much more unpredictable than other sports. Yeah, there were a lot of sports surprises this year. The New York Giants beat the seemingly impenetrable New England Patriots in the Super Bowl. The Philadelphia Phillies won the World Series while competing in one of the toughest MLB divisions. And after years of being second best at Wimbeldon, Rafael Nadal (one of Real Madrid’s most staunch supporters) snatched that trophy from Roger Federer’s hands. All these examples, however, are inconsistent ones-ones that happen during one big game (or seven in the case of the World Series) whereas an entire football season, it seems top me, is chocked full of surprises. This season is no exception.

My point is: while it may appear that Barcelona can now make room for another league trophy, Real Madrid may surprise all of us this season, regardless of this loss.

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Real Madrid Is The Clutch Team Of Its Generation

Saturday, November 8th, 2008

Real Madrid

Seven days ago from this post, superclub Manchester United won a squeaker of game in England against the recently-promoted but always surprising Hull City Tigers. The final score was 4-3 and, truth be told, it shouldn’t have been anywhere near that close! Man U held the lead for almost the entire game, only to surrender two goals as the game drew to a close. Yeah they got a win but a sloppy one…so sloppy that United keeper Edwin van der Saar publicly stated that his team needs to get it together, especially against teams like Hull City which just refuse to give up.

Slightly tweak a few facts, and I just watched the Spanish translation of this game. In one of the greatest La Liga games that I’ve seen in a while, Real Madrid pulled out an AMAZING 4-3 win over the recently promoted Màlaga.

No doubt about it, los blancos needed a win after the week they’ve had. A loss to Juventes on Thursday capped off one of the most pathetic Champions League performances in recent memory. This is on top of a season that’s seen Real Madrid just barely remain in the top five of the Primera División. They’re losing games that they should be winning. Keeper Iker Casillas, long the rock of the team and one of my heroes, is playing at an almost collegiate level. Injuries of key players aren’t helping matters. All of this has spurred talk that current RM manager Bernd Schuster is about be ousted and replaced by either Frank Rijkaard or Juande Ramos (Just and FYI…Juande Ramos?!?! Not snowball’s chance in hell of that happening).

With the Juventes loss fresh in their minds, they needed a win over Màlaga if only to maintain their confidence. Like Hull, Màlaga are a team recently promoted to the top flight of La Liga from the league below (the Segunda División). Everyone expected them to pretty much suck like Hull, yet they’re in eighth place as of this post. They got there by pulling out some surprising wins and draws and this match was almost one of those. They put three goals past Saint Iker (a rarity) and held the lead for a big chunk of the match. With Ruud van Nistelrooy, Arjen Robben, and Raul out because of injuries, a Sergio Ramos red card put Madrid on the brink of another pathetic loss as they faced Màlaga’s aggressive striking style a man down.

But Gonzalo Higuaín, the Reggie Miller of football, responded by spanking four balls to the back of the Màlaga net (yeah, four). Two of them were penalties but four goals are four goals, no matter how you spank ‘em. As many footie pundits say, football is a results-oriented business and the end result of this game was Real Madrid scored more than Màlaga.

Gonzalo Higuain

And, yes, Higuaín rightfully deserves to be compared to Reggie Miller. Like the retired Indiana Pacers shooting guard, Higuaín is a definitive clutch player. Like Miller, Higuaín gets the points when they’re really needed. Like Miller, Higuaín usually gets these points at the end of the game, making it all more dramatic. Most profoundly, like Miller, Higuaín is consistent about all of this. I can recall five games last season that he snatched victory from the opposing team last season, the most memorable being the Osasuna match where his clutch goal clinched the La Liga Championship for Real Madrid.

Higuaín deserves accolades for the clutch wins he provides to RM, but he’s not the first provide them to the club. I may have been a hardcore footie fanatic for only a year-and-a-half but I’ve seen them pull out some amazing out of the blue back-from-behind wins with plays by Mahamadou Diarra, Roberto Carlos, and yes, even David Beckham. Like Hull City did against Manchester United, Real Madrid refuse to give up. Unlike the Tigers though, Real Madrid refuse to give up and get a win out of it. No other footie team is better in the clutch.

It’s this last point that’s made me rethink my current love affair with Hull but that’s for another post.

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Real Madrid loses to Arsenal in the Emirates Cup…no surprise

Sunday, August 3rd, 2008

As we all know by now, an Emmanuel Adebayor penalty shot resulted in Arsenal taking Real Madrid out 1-0 in the Emirates Cup. News outlets and bloggers alike seem to be focusing on two things: Wesley Sneijder’s injury and how Adebayor is slowly starting to redeem himself with Arsenal supporters after trying to hop over to FC Barcelona.

The Adebayor stories deserve notice. Overall, UK football fans are loyal to the whole club before the individual player and Arsenal fans are legendary for having a fanatical loyalty to their team (because of this fanatical loyalty, some people-not me-have nicknamed Arsenal supporters "scientologists" ). When a player on their team turns on them, which Emmanuel did in a way, the fans will show their displeasure as they did when they booed him during the Arsenal/Juventes match. The PK is slowly getting him back into Arsenal fans good graces.

As a staunch Real Madrid supporter, the Sneijder injury peaks my interest more than the Adebayor story. Why? Because I’m not surprised that they lost. Yes, I have only been watching European footie for a short period of time, but in the time period that I’ve been watching it, I don’t think that Real Madrid are as good as many other do…they’re good but not great. They won the 2007/08 La Liga title by a landslide because the second best team in the league (Barcelona) imploded halfway in into the season, not because of brilliant pitch moves. Yes, they won the 2006/07 title but not until the last day, and their even having a chance to win that day was a real uphill battle. And let’s not forget the ‘08 Champions League tournament when Roma took them out of the competition and barley broke a sweat doing it.

My point is that Real Madrid need Sneijder badly, even if Pretty Boy Ronaldo joins the club. Wes is an outstanding midfielder that provides excellent support to his strikers, be they Van Nistelrooy, Raul, or any one of the two Ronaldos. The sooner that his back, the better.

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