Football Filtered #6
Hello and welcome to my latest look at what has been passing through the football filter this week.
The Champions League dominated most of the back page headlines this week, with plenty of fall-out between the four games and the four English clubs involved.
Liverpool’s inspirational skipper Steven Gerrard injured his groin in the 3-1 defeat to Chelsea and THE GUARDIAN reports that he now may miss a crucial part of the Reds run-in.
John Terry meanwhile has accused the Liverpool players of influencing the referee during the Anfield clash in an article in The SUN. Terry was booked for a challenge on Pepe Reina and will now miss next week’s return at Stamford Bridge. Terry only believes he was booked because of the reaction of Liverpool players, who surrounded the referee asking him to brandish the yellow card. Liverpool are up against it in the second leg and football odds suggest they will go no further in the competition but the absence of Chelsea’s influential captain gives them a glimmer of hope.
A few weeks ago Man United appeared to be coasting towards a quintuple and barely looked like conceding a goal let alone losing a game. But after a disastrous few weeks things have changed quickly, the gap at the top is down to just a point and their Champions League hopes are hanging by a thread. The INDEPENDENT tries to examine what just has gone wrong at United.
Across Manchester and perennial bad-boy Craig Bellamy told the DAILY MAIL he would happily clean the other players’ boots if it meant prolonging his City career. Some people may say they would rather have him cleaning boots than be on the pitch, but that debate is for another time!
Headline of the week? Adriano: I’m not dead
Inter’s troubled Brazilian striker reassuring us in THE SUN that he is not dead, but is, in fact, alive and well at his mother’s house in Brazil Well, I’m glad we cleared that one up.
The best excuse for losing a game has to go to Brazilian side Cruziero, who blamed their 4-0 defeat to Estudiantes in the Copa Libertadores on the traffic! ESPN reported that the match kicked off 40 minutes late after Cruzeiro were forced to take an alternative route to the ground after the Buenos Aires-La Plata highway became blocked.
And finally…..
Never the best of friends, North and South Korea clashed on the football field last week, with the South winning 1-0. That wasn’t the end of things though as North Korean officials accused their Southern counter-parts of poisoning their players, according to this story from REUTERS. This was an accusation flatly denied by South Korean officials of course.
With North Korea causing global outrage by launching long-range rockets last week, it is another clear example of how politics and sport don’t mix, and while they can be competitive on the football field, their disputes need to be cleared up around the negotiating table.