by Striker
TO paraphrase an old Gilbert and Sullivan ditty, “a soccer manager’s lot is not a happy one”, an adage that would apply this week in many quarters in both England and Ireland.
Beat the drop
May 9, 2013 By Leave a Comment
Roberto Martinez
By Striker
WITH just a couple of matches left for each team, the relegation battle in the Premiership is gradually turning into a red-hot contest, for, with Reading and QPR already condemned to the Championship, the identity of the third team to accompany them down is still right in the melting pot.
Aston Villa, just a few weeks ago, looked prime candidates for the drop, but, with some sterling displays since, have eased slightly away from the danger zone, and do look to have the capabilities for survival, as they are now on the elusive 40 points mark. Villa’s last two games are toughies, Chelsea at home, and their fellow strugglers Wigan away, and they would do well to get three points from these two games.
Down to business
May 1, 2013 By Leave a Comment
Harry Redknapp
by Striker
Well, here we are, in the closing weeks of the Premiership season, and one could not say that the fight for the title was, from mid-season on anyway, the guts and garters effort that you would expect to get from teams when there is obviously so much at stake.
United’s 20th title well-deserved
April 23, 2013 By Leave a Comment
by Striker
Man Utd or on course for another title
Well, you all will have noticed that all of the Premier League Saturday matches over last weekend had a 3pm start.
This was something of a first, as normally you would have an early game at 12:45, with another usually at around 5pm, all of course to accomodate the television channels, which was a grand thing, and really gave us the ongoing facility of seeing as many of the games as possible, and spending a Saturday afternoon steeped in soccer.
The dreaded relegation
April 17, 2013 By Leave a Comment
Harry Redknapp
by Striker
The results of last weekend have thrown the Premiership relegation battle into a little bit more of a quandary, for, as I mentioned last week, QPR and Reading already have the going down look about them, but as to who will accompany them into the limbo of the Championship is still, to all intents and purposes, up for grabs.
The dreaded relegation magnet has, on the bare evidence of points totals and matches played, now pulled six other teams into the mix, namely, Stoke, Newcastle, Norwich, Sunderland, Wigan, and Aston Villa.
The league needs characters
April 9, 2013 By Leave a Comment
by Striker
Well, wouldn’t you think that we had enough unusual characters in the top league already, especially when one looks at the weekly antics of the various managers trying to upstage each other, week in, week out, and playing the well known mind games before important matches, in an effort to psyche out their opposite numbers.
A fighting display
March 26, 2013 By Leave a Comment
by Striker
TALK about making everybody eat their words! Everybody! Well very nearly anyway, and for certain those who didn’t expect “Trapp’s Chaps” to get anything at all out of last Friday’s qualifier against Sweden, but, being the funny type of game that soccer is, our Irish lads bravely went out there and confounded their many critics, with a fighting display that would warm the cockles of any sporting heart.
Six-pointer for Trap
March 20, 2013 By Leave a Comment
by Striker
What could anyone make of Man City? One would have thought that having made the transition into what are called the “money” teams, that they would eventually go on to collecting some silverware, either in England, or indeed on the European shelf.
Under pressure
March 12, 2013 By Leave a Comment
Brendan Rogers
by Striker
As we head towards the last third of the English soccer season, one can see some signs of the extreme pressure that most teams are under, especially in the Premier League.
With some trying their utmost to survive in what they call the “money” division, and others endeavouring to win the only piece of the silverware left to them on the land of England, that of the FA Cup, which is still the oldest trophy in the wide world of soccer. [Read more...]
The merry-go-round
March 8, 2013 By Leave a Comment
by Striker
ONE of the real wonders of the current season is that Chelsea seem to have maintained their classy football standard, which has them steady in the top four places in the Premiership, especially when one thinks of the musical chairs that their directors have been playing with some of the top managers in the world of soccer over the years.
