Los Gladiadores de Pep Guardiola

Here I am, living proof of what I was saying (grumbling?) in my last post - the domestic football season is over (in most of Europe at least) and I'm still writing about football.

My defence is that I'm still filled with joy and excitement at Football Club Barcelona's UEFA Champions League victory last week so I hope you'll forgive me as nights like that don't come along very often (or ever for the vast majority of clubs).

I was reading a story that Barca coach Pep Guardiola had compiled and then played a video montage of some of the highlights from the past season to his squad, set against a backdrop of magnificent Roman architecture and accompanied by a soundtrack and clips from the Oscar winning film Gladiator.

Guardiola enlisted the professional support of Catalan broadcaster TV3 and also stipulated that 1) every squad member should be featured in the video and 2) he (Guardiola) should not.

For me, little details like this are the difference between a good coach and a great coach.

Guardiola will be a great coach.

'On Nights Like this Everyone is an Englishman' - Really?

What a season it's been for Football Club Barcelona. With the league title and domestic cup already secured last night they deservedly beat Manchester United by 2 goals to nil to lift the European Champions League trophy in Rome.

Aside from the opening 8 or 9 minutes Barca dominated the game and thoroughly deserved the win: even Manchester's manager Sir Alex Ferguson admitted that. Ahead of the game most of the English media allowed themselves to get a bit carried away - I heard various 'experts' claim it would be an easy win for Manchester, Barca couldn't defend, Manchester had too many attacking options, Spanish teams can't compete physically with English clubs etc etc. I suspect these views were formed on the basis of 1) watching Barca struggle to get past Chelsea in the semi and 2) watching Liverpool hammer Real Madrid earlier in the competition. How wrong they were.

I watched the game on Sky Sports (rather than the alternative ITV) and - all in all - I thought the coverage was excellent.

I've spoken before about how certain individuals in the broadcast team (presenter and pundits, commentator and analyst) annoy me and I'm sticking with my opinion, but even these guys couldn't (didn't) claim that it was anything other than a deserved victory.

I have no problem with favouritism or bias for the English team from an English broadcaster - it's to be expected that the coverage will be tailored to suit the vast majority of the audience - what I do have a problem with is when my intelligence is insulted by the 'experts' when they claim, for instance, that their team had been harshly treated by the match officials (see my previous comments regarding the semi final!).

On this occasion I felt that the commentary team got the balance just about right although one of the studio pundits nearly lost it when he suggested that Pique should have been sent off for a foul on Ronaldo: point of fact - it wasn't even a foul.

I'm now looking forward watching the DVD of the game with a Catalan commentary to redress the balance of bias.

Lionel Messi v Diego Maradona

At work last week we were discussing - at great length - who was the better footballer: Lionel Messi or Diego Maradona.

There is no doubt in my mind that Messi is currently the best player in the world - I know Christiano Ronaldo has the title and rightly so as during the 2007-2008 season, culminating in Champions League victory, he was out of this world.

Since the start of this season Messi has been untouchable as Barcelona have created a good lead at the top of La Liga, reached the final of the Copa del Rey and the quarter finals of the Champions League. Messi is averaging a goal a game and Barca are averaging 3 goals a game - a higher figure than any other club across the major European leagues. Last night, as Barca beat Malaga 6-0 Messi scored another wonderful goal that reminds us what a special player he is.

All of that said it's too soon to say if he's a better player than Maradona who maintained such extraordinary high performances over a long period of time. In Europe he transformed Napoli from also-rans to league and domestic cup champions in his first season - a season that he was also top scorer in Italy.

The following season he and Napoli won the UEFA Cup - at a time when this was a strong competiton. A season later and Napoli were again league winners. At Barcelona - despite a career threatening injury that kept him out for 9 months - he also won the Copa del Rey which, to be fair, was a poor return for his years there.

No, it's too soon to say that Messi is better - it'd be a bit like saying that Girls Aloud are better than The Nolan Sisters - time will tell.

Fortune's Always Hiding

“I fell in love with football as I was later to fall in love with women: suddenly, inexplicably, uncritically, giving no thought to the pain or disruption it would bring with it.”
Nick Hornby, Fever Pitch

Within the space of 5 hours yesterday afternoon/evening I was reminded why I love and hate football in equal measures.

I play a bit of football a couple of times a week - last night saw an appearance in goal for a team made up from friends from work who compete in a local 5-a-side league. Our results so far this season haven't truly reflected our performances (copyright just about any football player who's team gets regularly beaten) but despite that I was looking forward to the competition and the exercise. After taking the lead courtesy of a goal from the team captain after just 30 seconds I felt exilerated: finally we were going to dominate a game I thought.

Twenty minutes later, having conceeded 16 goals with just one more scored in our favour I felt really low - even my best save of the night went unrewarded as the referee gave a goal saying that the ball had crossed the line. The 20 minute drive home was once again spent blaming the referee for the result (again, copyright just about any football player who's team gets regularly beaten!).

Home - and after a cup of tea, a bath and a roast dinner, in that order - I felt better and settled down to watch my team (FC Barcelona) in action on TV. After 25 minutes they were winning by 2 goals to nil and the world seemed a better place.

With 5 minutes of the game left it was 3-3 and I somehow knew worse was to come ... in the 89th minute an uncharacteristic mistake from the Barcelona captain led to a winner for the opposition. Sixty seconds later the referee blew for full time and a defeat.

Thankfully, after 8 years of marriage my lovely wife has learnt not to even try to offer words of consolation and after a period of silence I got up, left the room and went to bed - only to lie there for about 2 hours trying to come to terms with my Sunday afternoon and evening.

I'm playing again tonight, a different venue with a different bunch of lads and it'll be different this time.

Won't it?

Super Sunday?

The weekend is all about football in our house - watching football and occasionally playing football (more of this later). That said, I'm becoming increasingly disappointed with Sky Sports selection of matches for the Super Sunday marathon.

Todays programme includes another uninspiring choice of fixtures - Fulham v West Brom followed by Newcastle v Everton.

Tell me why, as a neutral football supporter, I would set aside 4 hours of my day to watch these games. The Fulham v West Brom game will, I predict, be a very cagey game with no more than a couple of goals at most. If pushed for a prediction I'd say 1-0 to Fulham. Next up will be what I predict will be an equally tight game at Newcastle where again I suspect we'll see a low scoring game with probably just one goal seperating the two teams: this time I predict a 1-0 win to Everton. In terms of impact on the league table I think it's fair to say Fulham and Newcastle will finish mid-table, West Brom will get relegated and Everton will finish sixth.

Having watched football now for 30+ years I know that you don't need a bag full of goals for a good game but the standard of football played by teams outside of the top 4 or 5 just isn't of a very high standard. To add insult to my apathy both games will be hyped up in advance by Richard Keys, Andy Gray et al and afterwards they'll try to convince me that both of the games were great examples of why the Premier League is 'the best league in the world' (sic).

I know thanks to online streaming I've got access to pretty much any game from any country around Europe (and beyond) for free but I don't want to go down that route. My solution would be to follow the Spanish television model - every weekend the top four games are shown on terrestrial and subscription channels (so we might see the games across BBC and Sky or Setanta) with all of the other games shown on Pay per View for around £8 per match. This way, the neutral gets to see the matches that matter - from the top of the table - whilst the club supporter who can't get to a game can see their team in the comfort of their own home.

Will it ever happen - who knows? A few years ago who would have thought that we'd have the choice of 8 Champions League matches on a single evening but thanks to Sky Sports (see, credit where it's due) I can choose to watch any game that I want and I just hope that in the next few years coverage of our domestic game will follow suit.

Richard Keys - Attention to Detail

Richard Keys from Sky Sports 'Super Sunday' annoys me.

The thing that annoys me most about him, at the moment at least, is the way he pronounces 'Gijon' - as in Sporting de Gijon - when promoting Sky Sports coverage of the Spanish football league (La Liga): 'coming up later tonight it's Barcelona versus Sporting Dijon (sic)'.

He pronounces it Dijon as in the capital of Burgundy, France. Considering his full time job is to present football I'd expect a little more attention to detail.

It's pronounced He-hon.