World Cup Blog - Euro 2008 Championships

Will Anti-Italian Sentiment Ever End?

Julian — Wed, 31 Dec 1969 18:00:00 -0600

I'm getting incredibly tired of reading articles and having to sift through the enormous anti-Italian sentiment to find actual content. This happens all the time on British websites, and the latest culprit is WhoAteAllthePies.

Van Marwijk's shadow list of potentials.

Jan — Wed, 31 Dec 1969 18:00:00 -0600

Team manager Bert van Marwijk confirmed he uses a shadow list for potential Oranje players at last Friday's press conference in Zeist. The coach refused to publish the list, though. "It wouldn't do anyone any good to publish that list. It's not a fixed list either, so then I'd have

What It Takes To Play For The DFB-11

Nick — Wed, 31 Dec 1969 18:00:00 -0600

So what does it take to be nominated to play for the German national team? Well you have to be a German citizen of course and identify strongly with Germany for sure, but are there secrets to being consistently nominated or to get that crucial first nomination? Recently Aaron Hunt,

Löw Nominates Hunt, Müller, Kießling

Nick — Wed, 31 Dec 1969 18:00:00 -0600

For the friendly matches against Chile (Köln) and the Ivory Coast (Gelsenkirchen) Löw has nominated the England prospect Aaron Hunt, the mercurial Thomas Müller, the Bundesliga topscorer Stefan Kießling, and of course the ever present Thomas Hitzlsperger. Overall this is a good selection, but one wonders why a player like

The Dutch in Europe...

Jan — Wed, 31 Dec 1969 18:00:00 -0600

I don't think we'll win the Champions League this season. I'm sorry to break the news to you. But we're not doing too shabby in the Europa League and you have to start somewhere... Dembele tries... AZ Alkmaar is a club and a team in trouble. Replacing Van Gaal by Ronald Koeman

Call Ups for France vs. Ireland

Inara — Wed, 31 Dec 1969 18:00:00 -0600

France's do-or-die match against Ireland is just around the corner, with the first match taking place on November 14th in Ireland and the second taking place on the 18th at the Stade de France (boo...). I don't know about you guys, but I'll be praying extra hard that France don't screw up against a tough Irish team. Or else Raymond & Friends will be watching the World Cup just like the rest of us - from their living room couches.

Unsurprisingly, there aren't any big surprises in the squad. Aly "The Teeth" Cissokho gets his first call-up, but it was somewhat expected in light of Gaël Clichy's injury. Loïc Remy gets the nod in favor of Bafetimbi Gomis, but again, that's not really surprising because Les Bleus are currently short on wide players. Yoann Gourcuff and Sidney Govou return after missing out on the last qualifiers due to injury.

More notable are the absences. The biggest one is Patrick Vieira, who hasn't been playing regularly at his club and has also been struggling on and off with injuries. Though his recent performances were positive, Domenech didn't think it was enough to justify his inclusion in the squad (Vieira is not happy about that, btw). Franck Ribery is still out due to a knee injury, and despite Samir Nasri recently making his comeback for Arsenal after a long injury layoff, he was left out as well.

Totally unrelated, but here is an interesting fact I discovered the other day: Sidney Govou has scored 10 goals for France in 42 appearances. Compare that to Nicolas Anelka, who's scored 13 goals in 61 appearances. Three less goals with 20 less appearances - and I'm sure Anelka has had more starts as well. It's weird to think about Govou in a productive light, isn't it?

Full list after the jump.

Martin Jol, cult hero in Amsterdam (219 days to the WC)

Jan — Wed, 31 Dec 1969 18:00:00 -0600

The season is almost two months old and PSV and Twente are above Ajax in the tables. At the same time, Ajax hasn't impressed in Europe yet. That's too bad. But nothing more than that. Ajax might not play sensational against clubs like RKC or NAC, but there is almost no

The Revival of Calcio

Julian — Wed, 31 Dec 1969 18:00:00 -0600

For years all we've been hearing about is how great the English and Spanish clubs are, about how much better they are than our "aging" Italian clubs. Based on recent CL performances, that looks to be out the window.

Champions League: what have we learned...

Jan — Wed, 31 Dec 1969 18:00:00 -0600

1. If you take up too many projects, you can't watch CL games :-(. Or post enough articles on the blog. I missed a lot of action. Didn't see anything of the CL yesterday... 2. If you can sign Van der Vaart because Xabi Alonso leaves, you should! (Mr Benitez!!) Liverpool looks frail.

Russia make it to playoffs and draw with Slovenia

Nick — Wed, 31 Dec 1969 18:00:00 -0600

Hello all Russia fans. Sorry about not getting back to you sooner with a post. I will sum up the recent events and share my views and opinions in one entry. As all of you know Russia lost to Germany in Moscow and then drew with Azerbaijan in Baku to