North America
+ Toronto FC general manager Mo Johnston has said that the club has sent Canadian forward Ali Gerba home from pre-season training in South Carolina. “He’s worked hard but his play was not up to scratch,” Johnston said.
+ The Canadian Stretford End: Gerba-Gate shows the good and the bad of the Canadian National Team.
+ Red Nation: Stick a fork in Mo Johnston, he’s long past done.
+ The 24th Minute: No pressure Chad Barrett, but it’s all on you.
+ Marc Weber: Examining the “rift” in the Whitecaps front office over their MLS move.
+ The Impact have called a press conference for Wednesday where they will announce a change in the structure of the club.
+ MLS players would make big mistake with strike, AEG chief says.
England
+ Rafa Benítez gambled and won as Liverpool moved back up to fifth with a 4-1 victory over Portsmouth that was stylish as well as convincing.
+ Liverpool captain Steven Gerrard faces possible censure after cameras appeared to catch him striking Michael Brown on the back of the head in an incident not seen by the match referee during their 4-1 win over Portsmouth at Anfield.
+ Manchester United chief executive David Gill has launched a staunch defence of the business practices of the Glazer family in response to the growing campaign against them.
+ A student working part-time in an Old Trafford catering kiosk said he bought a green and gold scarf outside the ground and wore it during his half-time shift at last week’s Champions League match against Milan only to be sacked when he refused to remove it.
+ José Mourinho breezed back into Stamford Bridge last night to declare he was "home" and should still be Chelsea’s manager.
+ Paul Robinson’s World Cup dreams hang in the balance after scans revealed a significant tear in his calf.
+ Tottenham will sign midfielder Sandro for £9 million in the summer, according to Internacional president Vitorio Piffero.
+ Tottenham Hotspur midfielder Tom Huddlestone has signed a new contract which will keep him at White Hart Lane until 2015.
+ The consortium led by Rob Lloyd hoping to buy Portsmouth will begin negotiations in earnest on Tuesday after the property developer held preliminary talks with administrator Andrew Andronikou at Anfield on Monday night.
+ Sol Campbell has promised not to pursue Portsmouth through the courts for £1.7m in unpaid wages and image rights payments until a buyer has been found for the stricken club.
+ Calum Davenport will leave West Ham after agreeing a pay-off. The defender has been back in training after suffering horrendous leg injuries in an alleged stabbing.
+ Hull being relegated would leave club with a £21 million black hole.
+ Adam Johnson is likely to come into the England reckoning following David Beckham’s injury but Fabio Capello’s main concern is Aaron Lennon’s fitness.
+ Wembley Way, the approach to the home of English football, was built by German prisoners of war, according to a new documentary.
Spain
+ Jose Manuel Jurado’s brilliant late winner earned 10-man Atletico Madrid a narrow victory over mid-table rivals Osasuna yesterday.
+ Real Madrid have made Ashley Cole their No 1 target to fill the problem left-back position.
+ Real Madrid general director Jorge Valdano has revealed the club are in talks with Gonzalo Higuain over a new deal which he hopes will keep the striker at the club for the rest of his career.
+ Real Madrid head coach Manuel Pellegrini has dismissed rumours of dressing room unrest surrounding Kaka at the Bernabeu.
+ Sid Lowe: Anarchic and entertaining, Valladolid’s coach is not like the team.
Italy
+ Mario Balotelli looks set to leave Inter Milan at the end of the season – unless San Siro boss Jose Mourinho beats him to the exit door.
+ Italy boss Marcello Lippi has come out in support of Mario Balotelli after he was excluded from Inter’s squad for today’s match against Chelsea.
+ Daily Mail: Lucio — How a free spirit they call Horse learned to harness the power that broke Didier Drogba.
+ AC Milan were handed a silver lining following David Beckham’s injury when it was revealed Alessandro Nesta should be back in action in around a month.
+ AC Milan midfielder Clarence Seedorf has questioned whether team mate David Beckham will be able to motivate himself to return after the England midfielder ruptured his Achilles’ tendon playing at the San Siro at the weekend.
+ Serie A Round 28 Recap: AC Milan have Seedorf to thank.
Germany
+ Raphael Honigstein: Ultras up the ante as Hertha pay for sins committed in a former life.
+ Hertha Berlin president Werner Gegenbauer does not believe the position of coach Friedhelm Funkel is under threat. The Hertha board met on Sunday night to discuss the club’s predicament.
+ Franck Ribery has rebuffed Bayern Munich’s first approach to commence negotiations over a new contract and told them to wait until the end of the season.
France
+ Samir Nasri has admitted that he fears he could lose out on a World Cup place because he is being played out of position.
Scotland
+ Graham Spiers: Scottish referee in danger of looking biased towards Rangers.
Brazil
+ Tim Vickery: Fitness the key for Brazillian success.
Weber I think is on the right track in the Province article.
Vancouver has developed some good players through the academy but its sent nearlly all of them over seas. That doesn’t exactly fit the mantra of a club that wants to produce talent for its first team.
I think the players will still see the benefit in going there overall even if the road goes through MLS first as opposed to Europe.
Ali G – not up to scratch? That’s what he did all off season – laid on the couch and scratched is expanding gut.
Mo Jo past due? Sounds like a recycled article. Just switch the names and you’ve got last year’s pre-season reports as a template.
Hertha Berlin – if that happened in England, the Euro ban would be fast and thick.
Kid fired over Green and Gold – I’m no fan of the Glazers, but the “Glazers are picking on little kids” stories are getting silly.
I can’t think of a workplace on Earth where you can walk in wearing anti – boss attire and get away with it. I have a Union and permanent contract, but walking in with a “my boss sucks” pin would be insubordination, and at the very least grounds for censure. My refusal to take it off would escalate the issue. If I didn’t have the contractual security I enjoy, I’d probably never get through the doors again.
Imagine if Joe, KJ and Jams waltz into the studio on Sunday next year with “go watch EPL on SPORTSNET – NOW!” shirts on, they wouldn’t make it out of the quick commercial break.
Gerrard – how in the world does he get away with that? Premeditated, vicious, very illegal. But he’ll get off. He always does.
SB
Balotelli has been butting heads with Murinho for a while. He even came out last season and said that he was a fan of AC Milan as a child. If Moratti thinks that Murinho will leave Inter rather soon he will not sell Balotelli unless he receives a very large bid.
It’s good to see the MLS owners finally come out an voice some opinion. It’s been all players so far and while I think that the owners do make money it’s time the owners come out and remind people why they are fighting. Or else it just looks like they are the bad guys.
Joe – Linking to SerieAWeekly now! Very nice.
BishopvilleRed – Gerba has actually lost weight over the off season. Coming in 15lbs lighter than last year.
Nice one—the Roots Manuva reference is quite apt this time!
Roots Manuva??? Seriously, Joe???
10 points have been allocated to your coolness, sir! Word.
Bishopville Red: Totally agree with you about Gerrard. Although, Rooney gets away with it too. The FA needs to call these things more fairly, or at least penalize everyone in the same manner.
”Gerrard – how in the world does he get away with that? Premeditated, vicious, very illegal. But he’ll get off. He always does.”
vicious, yes. premeditated, no. but he should be suspended. i know i would be wanting to see someone suspended if he did that to a player on a team i support.
Loved the Jose Mourinho pre-match press conference, “I keep winning important things and they keep winning something, they won ahhhh, they they won an FA Cup” (the laughter in the background says it all).
If that’s not taunting then I don’t know what isn’t.
Everyone if you have the chance watch the Inter v Chelsea match today, I know I will and I’m looking forward to it.
Poor from the FA in regards to Gerrard’s elbow. So what if the referee saw the incident and didn’t book him. Attwell is a poor official and if he saw the incident and didn’t give a straight red for violent conduct, they should boot him to the Championship.
The real point in all this is the realization that the FA’s rules are awful especially in these situations, it relieves them from making any big decisions regarding star players.
And yes everyone still dislikes Michael Brown.
I’ll minus 10 points from myself, as this is the first photo I didn’t get the reference to. What am I missing? Does he sing about hitting Micheal Brown in the back of the head? I’m lost.
That kid who got fired totally deserved it.
Would you expect to keep your job if you wore a McDonald’s hat to Burger King and refused to take it off?
Plus five points for cheerful naiveté, but… c’mon.
Who’s selling these green and gold scarves? If the club is selling to the fans then buying them would surely defeat the purpose?
Seedorf is going to outlive us all isn’t he?
nonick, the song in question is called “Witness the Fitness”, something you wouldn’t be witnessing watching Ali Gerba at the moment.
@ Sairax,
I believe that the Manchester United Supporters Trust is selling the Green and Gold Scarves.
No way the Galzer’s would sell them, ever.
@Macht: Thanks. Forgot about the Trust. That makes more sense! :)
@sportsfan
Premeditated means he planned to do it – as opposed to it being reflexive or in the moment.
He ran up behind the player and elbowed him – I don’t think anyone can claim that’s not thuggish.
But if he can get away with it in a public bar, then I see no reason why he would be censured on a football field.
Liverpool players don’t usually get the sharp end of the stick it seems.
TFC 1
G-d, if I have to hear how Chad Barrett is “still young” or has “a lot of potential” etc. I’m gonna barf. He’s not 19, he cannot score more than a few goals (however he can miss more than a few chances), and he doesn’t do enough otherwise to warrant a place.
TFC 2
If Ibby doesn;t weigh more than 95 lbs this year, do not put him in the line-up.
TFC 3
MLSE/Anselme has waited too long (just like the Leafs did with JFJ)…. yes Mo must go but shoulda been gone already…. go back to Rangers
Gerrard is a dick…. he should be in jail already for the sucker punching of the dude in the bar.
Jose Mourinho; as of today the love affair is over.
CSKA Moscow = Central Sports Army Club Moscow (aka Red Army)
I could be wrong but I don’t think they call it “Cheska” Moscow….. pass it on
@ Joseph,
I know what premeditated means. That was not premeditated. Brown was trying to get in Gerrard’s way and got an elbow for it. Should’ve been suspended though.
Glad you guys enjoyed the Roots Manuva.
nonickname says:
“I’ll minus 10 points from myself, as this is the first photo I didn’t get the reference to. What am I missing? Does he sing about hitting Micheal Brown in the back of the head? I’m lost.”
Gerba, plus I just saw “Aaron Lennon’s fitness” and the song just popped into my head. So up it went.
The Impact news is non-news.
They took all the players they had in Trois Rivieres’s team in CSL and brought them to Montreal and got a new franchise. Doing this in mid -march is totally bush league since the Attack organization wont be able to get probaly a team together in that short time frame since most players have already started training for summer.
I would have more respect for them had they done this earlier on.
So what they did was basically bring their farm team from TR to Montreal.
Woopee do.
This is a step back for soccer in quebec.
Instead of a having high caliber soccer in TR and Montreal, now we are back to Montreal only where the farm club will get less notice than a high school team.
As for academy, another cosmetic change.
Last year, when the Attack won the Canadian League final against Serbian White Eagles (good game….this stuff should be televised instead of poker), they voluntarily fielded a team of U23 players (keeps the costs down you know) with a few first team bencher throwin in for fitness sakes.
Now, the Academy will STILL feature mainly young players (the same ones) and will feature signed impact players like 3rd string goalie Andrei Badeascu who is 26yrs old I believe and a few other players either working back from injury or needing some playing time.
They dont play other academies or youth teams, they still play teams as before who have older players so there is nothing stopping them from doing it the same way this year that they did last year.
I just dont like the way they are doing the exact same thing as before, fielding a team EXACTLY like they did last year and being told that this is somehow different.
I think its a step back because soccer visibility is limited to Montreal again.
Gerba’s atittude and fat ass get the boot?
Wow….i am so stunned. Not.
The Beckham news can only be considered good IF he isnt invited to hang around the WC and bring his media circus along. Getting that annoyance out of the way was totally worth his season ending injury.
We can now talk about football instead of haircuts, tatoos and commercials.
My dark horse picks? Serbia and Argentina, the first for their fine defense and just take a look at the choice of forwards Argentina has.
Arsenal vs Barcelona will be my own personal WC.
I tried explaining this to an NBA fan by telling him its “Like watching the early 2000′s Kings play the late 2000s Suns.”
I’ve already planned taking that afternoon off.