main

NewsSchedule

Champions League Matchday 2! Get Your Fixtures Here

September 28, 2010 — by Suman — 2

Matchday 2 - Tues Sept 28 & Wed Sept 29

Matchday 2 is upon us! Once again, all 32 teams will be in action–2 games in each of the 8 groups, for a total of 16 games today and tomorrow. As with all the group stage Matchdays, the 8 games on Tuesday featuring the 16 teams from 4 of the groups (Groups E, F, G, and H today), and 8 more games on Wednesday with the 16 teams from the other 4 groups. Champions League Matchdays are so grand they take up 2 actual days!

Fixtures for Matchday 2 listed below, along with live TV coverage (in the US); apparently all matches are being shown live on DirectTV, but we’ve just listed cable coverage, i.e., on the Fox Soccer/Sports channels–FSC, FSE, FSP & FSN.  See SoccerTVListing.com for a full listing.

See UEFA.com’s Champions League site for Matchday 1 results and group standings.

All matches kickoff at 2:45pm ET, except for one early match each day (12:30pm ET, marked with a * below):

Tuesday, September 28

Group E
AS Roma v CFR Cluj-Napoca @ Stadio Olimpico (Rome, ITA)
FC Basel v Bayern Munich @ St Jakob-Park (Basel, SUI)

Group F
Spartak Moscow v MSK Zilina @ Luzhniki Stadium (Moscow, RUS)*
Chelsea v Marseille @ Stamford Bridge (London, ENG) – FSN (=MSG+ in NYC?)

Group G
AJ Auxerre v Real Madrid @ Stade Abbe-Deschamps (Auxerre, FRA) – FSE
Ajax Amsterdam v AC Milan@ Amsterdam Arena (Amsterdam, NED) – FSP

Group H
Braga v Shakhtar Donetsk @ Braga Municipal (Braga, POR)
Partizan Belgrade v Arsenal @ FK Partizan Stadium (Belgrade, SRB) – FSC

Wednesday, September 29

Group A
Internazionale v Werder Bremen @ Giuseppe Meazza (Milan, ITA)
Tottenham Hotspur v Twente Enschede @ White Hart Lane (London, ENG)

Group B
Hapoel Tel Aviv v Lyon @ Ramat Gan Stadium (Tel Aviv, ISR)
Schalke 04 v BenficaB @ Veltins-Arena (Gelsenkirchen, GER)

Group C
Rangers v Bursaspor @ Ibrox Stadium (Glasgow, SCO)
Valencia v Manchester United @ Mestalla (Valencia, ESP) – FSC & FSE

Group D
FK Rubin Kazan v Barcelona @ Central Stadium Kazan (Kazan, RUS)* – FSC & FSE
Panathinaikos v FC Copenhagen @ Athens Olympic Stadium (Athens, GRE)

CommentaryNews

Weekend wrapup: The big dogs of Europe disappoint

September 28, 2010 — by Suman — 2

Un buen delantero...y un buen hijo tambien!

It was an interesting weekend in Europe, filled with unexpected results–the big dogs all across the continent came up short. Chelsea, Arsenal, Inter Milan, and Bayern Munich all suffered ignominious defeats, while Manchester United and Real Madrid could only manage disappointing draws. The only power that didn’t disappoint their supporters was Barcelona, which won convincingly. (Question: Are there other European club sides that rank with these six?)

In England, previously perfect Chelsea lost to Manchester City 1-0, the lone goal coming off a tremendous individual effort by Man City’s dogged and talented Argentine captain, Carlos Tevez. (Keep scrolling down for video of Tevez’s goal, among others.)

But the two sides chasing Chelsea in the standings failed to capitalize: Man U had to come from behind twice to salvage a 2-2 draw against Bolton. That was far better than Arsenal, who were shockingly down 3-0 against unheralded West Brom late in the 2nd half. Two late strikes by the young Frenchman Samir Nasri (a replay of one of which is included below) made the score a more respectable-looking 3-2, but Arsenal came off their home pitch with many more questions than points.

Meanwhile, on the Continent, Inter Milan and Bayern Munich, last season’s Champions League finalists, and the clear favorites to win their respective domestic leagues, both lost as well. Bayern lost 2-1 to minnows Mainz, while Inter went down 1-0 to AS Roma–a club with a rich history, but this year’s edition had struggled at the start of this season.

But last year’s Champions League finalists and their respective pursuits of finishing atop Serie A or the Bundes Liga are secondary compared to the annual epic struggle between Barcelona and Real Madrid for the La Liga title.  The drama d’Espana is especially intense this year, as Real Madrid have of course brought in The Special One, whose tasks are to win the Champions League and La Liga–any less will be considered a failure by the demanding Madridistas–and by Mourinho himself.  But Mourinho’s Madrid failed to bring the flair, being held to a very surprising scoreless draw against Levante.  Meanwhile, Barcelona beat Athletic Bilbao 3-1, slipping ahead of Real Madrid in the table, though still second to surprising Valencia.

For more on these matches, check the links below–and the videos.

CommentaryNews

Intrigue! Passion! Brazil!!!

September 24, 2010 — by Sean

From our man beneath the Southern Cross comes the skinny on the impetuous Brazilian phenom Neymar and the storm he’s kick up around him. Plus, World Cup 2014 plans with a sinister undercurrent? Big thanks to Mark Gannon for keeping us all in the loop.

Step back, for I am Neymar.

In the game against Atlético Goianiense in Goiás on Wednesday of last week, the coach of Santos, Dorival Júnior, wanted a different player to take a PK.  Neymar had a fit, cursed out the coach, and supposedly continued his tantrum in the locker room.

Dorival did not put Neymar on the list of players for Santos’s next game, against Guarani over the weekend.  But then when he refused to put Neymar on the list for yesterday’s (Wednesday’s) game against Corinthians, he was fired.

Mano decided to leave Neymar off the seleção for the two upcoming as-yet-unspecified friendlies in Europe, but made it clear that when Neymar starts getting attention for the way he plays instead of other things, he’ll be back.  Mano said Neymar’s return depends only on Neymar.

It was reported that Neymar didn’t speak during a Santos practice today (after Mano’s latest list was released), and was consoled by a teammate after the other players had left.

Just to add a little extra spice, Andres Sanches, the president of Corinthians, suggested that São Paulo FC was somehow involved in Dorival’s removal, because SPFC wanted to hire Dorival.  I’m not sure what SPFC could do to force the ouster of a coach at Santos, but this should generate some interesting talk.  It’s a shame I missed the lunchtime soccer discussion show on TV BAND and the late-lunchtime sports show on Globo today.

It’s interesting to me that Andres dislikes SPFC so much.  The traditional arch-rival of Corinthians has been Palmeiras, but Andres seems to have some kind of “thing” with São Paulo.  He was involved in making sure SPFC’s stadium wouldn’t be used for the World Cup, especially the opening ceremonies.  The last I heard is that Palmeiras’s new stadium, on which construction has just begun, will be one World Cup venue and Corinthians’s new stadium, on which construction has not yet even started, will be another.

There has been talk about changing the Corinthians stadium (“o Fielzão”) to give it enough seats to host the opening ceremony.  I’m not sure where the CBF currently says it intends to have the opening ceremony.  It might end up being somewhere other than São Paulo, which would be a shame.  I’m still not in favor of holding the final in the Maracanã, but I don’t think any other stadium was even really considered.  I’ll be willing to let it slide if one condition is met: if Brazil is not champ in 2014 with the final in Rio, no carioca can ever again be in the CBF.

CommentaryNews

Messi Injury Not So Bad Afterall

September 21, 2010 — by Sean — 1

It does send shivers down the spine.

At the very end of a pretty entertaining match between Atletico Madrid and FC Barcelona, Czech defender Tomáš Ujfaluši came in late on everyone’s favorite player Lionel Messi, and stomped on his ankle something awful. Messi went down in agony and held his hands over his face, crying as he was stretchered off the field. Fortunately for fans of the beautiful game, there is no break or dislocation, and the little peanut should be back in about 10 days.

From the live-action shot it looked intentional. Ujfaluši came in very late and from the angle it seemed as if  he came down on Messi’s foot. Upon further inspection it looks like a real ankle breaker. The big man did issue an apology:

“I’m sorry. I would like to publicly apologize, because, honestly, it wasn’t my intention. I tried to go for the ball, but naturally, with the speed he had, he also could not stop and I was unlucky as my foot stepped on his ankle.”

Messi had, of course, been running around the pitch as he pleased before this. The first half was standard Barça—they controlled the ball 70% of the time (actual stat!), and whenever they lost it they seemed to win it back immediately.

The second half was more even, with Atletico clearly trying to wedge themselves back into the flow. They’d never wrest control though, not with Forlan gone missing, and Simão and Kun similarly nonexistent up front. Mainly they played more aggressively (ahem) and pulled off a number of dangerous set pieces before the crushing tackle on la pulga put them to ten men.

It ended 2-1 in favor of the away side, but it really could’ve been more with the chances Barça manufactured. Pep thinks so too, and more:

We are happy with the Atletico win and it could have finished 5-1 with the number of chances we had,” said Guardiola. “However, we are sad about the Messi incident. It is not only Cristiano Ronaldo (of Real Madrid) who needs protecting. The referees should protect all the players.

CommentaryNews

Arsenal find some luck before it turns on them

September 20, 2010 — by Sean

Darren Bent

If you haven’t heard, the gunners haven’t won a cup for a few years now and the team and its supporters are restless. Their lack of hardware has been generally chalked up to their youth and inexperience – they may be fun to watch, but in the grind-it-out fixtures they’ve been beaten into submission. Beyond their lack of physicality, I’ve always though they’ve missed that key bit of luck that sees top sides through to championships.

I honestly thought Fabregas’ opening goal was a sign that their fortune was about to change. His goal, which rebounded off his foot and into the net from a preposterous distance, seemed like just the thing that would break the back of a stubborn Sunderland side. Of course, Fabregas would soon go off with a hamstring injury aggravated by his goal-scoring motion, Alex Song would pick up a soft first yellow and was later ejected from the game, Rosický would miss a PK, and Darren Bent would score in the 95th minute to undo what would’ve been a great win against a Sunderland team that has caused Arsenal to drop points in their last few campaigns.

What has last weekend brought them then? Their injury list expands, they miss out on two points while Chelsea and United plowed through with the full haul, and they start playing twice a week what with the Carling Cup and the Champions League. It’s still early in the season of course, but have they already bled their shallow pool of luck?

NewsSchedule

What to Watch This Weekend (Sept 18-19)

September 17, 2010 — by Suman

The Dutch are so charming

We’re back with the 2nd installment of this weekly feature, and once again we use as a starting point WaPo SoccerInsider’s post listing of all the matches that are televised this weekend–approx 50 matches!  From that list, here are a handful that we’ll try to watch, and why:

Saturday, Sept 18

Sunderland-Arsenal 12:30 p.m. FSC (Why? To see if Arsenal can keep their hot streak going, after putting away Bolton Wanderers 4-1 last Saturday and then demolishing Portuguese side Braga 6-0 on the Champions League Matchday 1 mid-week.  To see if Cesc Fabregas has in fact escaped the space-time continuum.  And going the other way, to see Baby Jet running up front all by himself, as he did quite effectively in South Africa–and perhaps to see him do his dance.)

Sunday, Sept 19

Manchester United-Liverpool 8:30 a.m. FSP (Why?  To see if Liverpool can make a case that they belong among the top tier of the Premier League–or to see if Pepe Reina (who was spectacular last week, after a couple spectacular fails in the preceding weeks) right?  To see if Man U can do better than draw against a team they really should beat (as they did last week against Everton, and again mid-week against Rangers).  To see if Wayne Rooney get back on track.)

Atletico Madrid-Barcelona 1 p.m. ESPN Deportes (Why?  To see if La Liga table-toppers Atletico Madrid, led by Diego Forlan and his golden locks, can shrug off a surprising Europa League loss .  To see which Barcelona side shows up–the one that lost at home to Hercules last week, or the one that tapped circles around Braga mid-week.)

If those three aren’t enough for you, here are 2 bonus matches, both on Sunday:

Hercules-Valencia 11 a.m. ESPN Deportes (Why? To see if can Hercules can shock the world two weeks in a row. To see Valencia, who is playing as well as anybody: 2-0 in 2 La Liga matches, and an easy Champions League win Tuesday over Turkish club Bursaspor.)

Feyenoord-Ajax 3 p.m. ESPN Deportes: (Why?  Just to see an Eredivisie match, featuring two of the top clubs in Dutch football.  Here’s a bit of history on their rivalry–hat tip to Coach Larry for that link–and another account of their rivalry here, from where we borrowed that charming photo above.)

NewsSchedule

UEFA Europa League – Fixtures & Results

September 16, 2010 — by Suman — 1

The Europa League has pelotas

As Sean wrote last week, “It’s tough to care much about the beginning of the European footballing season. After the buzz of the World Cup and the always fun transfer drama, club football’s jerky starts seem less urgent.”  But with the Champions League getting started over the past two days, and now the Europa League kicking off today, there are really just too many appealing matches to keep up with.

To be brutally honest, we (or rather I) don’t really understand the Europa League–who qualifies and how and why?  Who knows.  But at the end of the day, it means midweek games between the (not-quite-)top clubs in Europe.

So w/o further ado, here is the link to the fixtures and results.

Notable results: Man City beats Salzburg 2-0 in Austria, but La Liga table-toppers Atletico Madrid lose…to Aris Thessaloniki FC?! We don’t know anything about the latter side..though we think it’s a safe to assume they’re Greek. Villareal also lost to Dinamo Zagreb (we did learn from @SoccerInsiderthat Jozy Altidore got a full 90mins in that match), while Dynamo Kyiv drew with FC BATE Borisov at home…

Well, there are too many matches to give a full run-down. There are 48 teams in this league (split into 12 groups (A-L) of 4 teams each), and they all played today on Matchday 1, so that means 24 matches!  Matchday 2 is in two weeks, on Thursday September 30, with 24 more matches.

NewsSchedule

Champions League – Day 2 Fixtures (& return of the liveblog?)

September 15, 2010 — by Suman

It was a fun afternoon yesterday, flipping channels between the 4 games we eventually found on the dial, and we’re looking forward to this afternoon, when it looks like we’ll be able to flip in between 3 of today’s 8 matches (on FSC, FSE & FSP).

We’ll most likely be watching Cesc Fabregas (left) lead Arsenal against visiting Portuguese side Braga, but no doubt we’ll also look in on Mourinho-led Madrid hosting Ajax of Amsterdam (FSE), and Premier League powerhouse Chelsea visiting Slovakian side MŠK Žilina (FSC).  And we may just break out the liveblog this afternoon..

Here’s the full list of today’s fixtures:


Wednesday, September 15 (all games kickoff at 14:45 ET)

Group E
Bayern Munich v AS Roma @ Allianz Arena (DirectTV; rebroadcast on FSE at 19:00 ET)
CFR Cluj-Napoca v FC Basel @ Stadionul Dr. Constantin Radulescu (DirectTV)

Group F
Marseille v Spartak Moscow @ Stade Vélodrome (DirectTV)
MSK Zilina v Chelsea @ Pod Dubnom (FSC; rebroadcast on FSP at 17:00 ET)

Group G
AC Milan v AJ Auxerre @ Giuseppe Meazza (DirectTV; rebroadcast on FSC at 21:00 ET)
Real Madrid v Ajax Amsterdam @ Santiago Bernabéu (FSE; rebroadcast on FSC at 17:00 ET)

Group H
Arsenal v Braga @ Emirates Stadium (FSP; rebroadcast on FSE at 17:00 ET & on FSC at 19:00 ET)
Shakhtar Donetsk v Partizan Belgrade @ Donbass Arena (DirectTV)

Newer PostsOlder Posts