All posts by h79snht.top

Take a look at the Arsenal team of 2011 and their record over the last 6 years. Not too bad for an average Premier League club – pretty good in fact, yet for a team who were dubbed the ‘unbeatables’ in their 2004-2005 campaign, failure to win a trophy in the last six seasons is quite simply not good enough.

Whilst Arsenal can point to a lack of funds in comparison with Chelsea, United and now Manchester City, along with a completely different ethos and transfer policy, the time for excuses about being in ‘transition’ have to stop. Wenger, at Arsenals AGM, called for more time, and passionately declared that despite the summer departures, the current team at Arsenal can fulfil their potential, if given the time to do so.

The problem however is that Wenger has been asking for more ‘time’ for several trophyless years now, and it must be asked if that question will soon become too familiar with fans who have ardently believed in Wenger and his team for so long, placing playing attractive football with flair above winning games 1 – 0 and a scrappy result. Obviously this has cost them multiple games in the past and although at times they are memorising to watch, the tag of a poor man’s Barcelona is not an unfair one.

Yes Arsenal can attack and play with style, but they have been lacking in grit and determination – a backbone to their team has been missing and although Fabregas cannot be called anything less than a brilliant player, a captain he is not. A major lack of leadership on the field has been something that has blighted Arsenal for several seasons now and whether Robin Van Persie is the man to fill this void remains to be seen.

Anyone with a footballing brain can make the statement that should Van Persie have been fit for the majority of his time at Arsenal things could have been very different for the Gunners. This season Van Persie has been their talisman and nothing short of world class, rescuing the team on numerous occasions and having a phenomenal goal to game ration of 2.38. However should Arsenal fail to make it into the top four and thus the Champions League this season, they may well have to add the Dutchman to their list of high profile departures.

Another point Arsenal supporters will make when looking back at last season in particular is that if they had beaten Birmingham in the Carling Cup final, their season could have turned out vastly different. Again whilst a valid point, much like pointing to departures, injuries and suspensions, football cannot be a game of what if’s. Arsenal’s main issue is that they have not got a good enough defence and Song does not look to be a massively convincing holding midfielder.

It cannot be ignored that losing Fabregas, Nasri and Clichy was a huge blow, as is the fact Van Persie and Vermaelen struggle to stay fit for an entire season. Players such as Jenkinson who got mauled at Old Trafford do display some quality, but to throw them in at the deep end and expose them so harshly is not what Wenger would ideally like to do.

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Arsenal clearly have quality within the ranks, not just in experienced players like Van Persie but also the young guns such as Ramsey and Wilshire. The supporters are right in sticking by both the manager and the club, with Wenger bringing through some serious talent during his lengthy tenure at the helm, and is right in saying that the team have masses of potential to fulfil.

Yet Arsenal sit third in the goals conceded chart with 18 goals shipped in from 9 games, and for a team that feels they belong in the top four, this is simply not good enough. Yes they have scored 15 goals in the same amount of games, but Arsenal’s problem has never been failure to attack. Wenger needs to stop with the excuses and finally instil some defensive stability into the team – otherwise a top four finish may well be beyond them and ‘in Arsene we trust’ may well not be the case anymore.

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England’s youth development has long been seen as lagging behind the rest of the top European countries. It seems as if every nation goes through a rut with their youth set-ups at some point, so what exactly can we learn from those successful nations, who have managed to turn their failing youth set-ups around?

There are many improvements that could be made to the English youth set-up by implementing some of the positive aspects employed by other nations. Other European country’s have coordinated national coaching systems which put them miles ahead of the UK. Nations like Spain and France have over ten times of the amount of qualified coaches with the UEFA pro-license than the UK has, which is obviously going to have an impact on youth development on a wide scale.

In Europe young players are given a fair shot, and clubs seem to get the transition right between the youth and senior team. European players tend to make their first team debut around age 21-22, but in England young players are often not given the chance, or they are judged upon Carling Cup and substitute appearances. Young players are given no time to mature, as instant results are demanded from fans and the media, and this lack of patience seems to be inherent in our footballing philosophy in this country. We need to get the important transition between the ages of 18-21 right, or we risk losing huge amounts of talent in the system.

In other countries many smaller and lower league teams have proper world class academies. In the UK very few, outside of the likes of Leeds, Watford and Southampton from the lower tiers could claim to be genuinely world class. There is significantly less money thrown at the grass-roots in the UK, and that obviously is going to have a negative effect, compared to nations who are spending much larger amounts developing youth prospects.

If we look at other countries like Germany and Spain, they also tend to have more of a collective mentality. Clubs, instead of focusing on themselves, focus together on a common goal, to invest in the future of the national team. In Holland, clubs all train the same way focusing on technique and tactics, in a country wide method of education. Young players also have much more contact time than their English counterparts. They also have exceptional facilities and clubs are the beacons of their local community. In Holland there is also much more emphasis on fun in the game, something which seems to have been lost somewhere along the way in the English game, where winning takes preference.

All nations go through a rut at some point, but it is important to make changes to enable youth development to progress. About a decade ago Germany looked into how they could improve the game in their country. They put in place a strong structure between governing bodies-something distinctly lacking from the British game-and made significant changes to the game. There was a huge investment in German football, as well as improvements in stadia and facilities. It became a requirement for all Bundesliga, and Bundesliga 2 clubs to have youth academies which met certain strict criteria. The youth game in Germany now focuses on small sided games, prioritizing touch and technique and individual skills-just about the antithesis of the way the game is taught in the UK. In the UK players have been trained in a way that favours the physical, with power, size and strength dominating the English youth set-up, whilst technical play is simply neglected. Germany now have a thriving domestic league, with the core of its players coming from the German youth system, the changes and serious financial investment in the youth game, have clearly had a positive effect.

In some European nations there is also a tendency for youth academies to play in the lower leagues. In Spain, Barcelona and Real Madrid’s youth academies, or B teams, are filled with youngsters who play against senior teams at a much higher level than reserve team football. It is a highly competitive method of development, and is a great way for young footballers to gain experience, as well as improve their level and understanding of the game. When they are ready they then progress to the first team, and it is not such a big jump for a young player. They play against tough, experienced opponents in front of big crowds, and deal with media pressure on a regular basis, this helps them to adjust better to the game at the highest level. English players play fewer competitive games, in front of sparse crowds, and rarely get the chance to impress, especially at the big clubs. A system like the Spanish one is unlikely to be given the go-ahead by the FA, and it does pose problems with regard to wiping out the identity of lower league football in this country. However, it would certainly improve standards of young footballers, and make the transition to senior football easier for them. Spanish football was in a rut before its recent glorious period, and it has taken them 20 years for the changes they made to their youth system to pay off. By making changes they have ensured that youngsters have adopted a style of play to suit their level of skill and technique, and this fits in with the nations footballing philosophy as a whole.

In other successful European nations players tend to play on smaller pitches at younger ages, which seems to be very beneficial. In the UK children move to full size pitches far too early, which puts the emphasis on an athletic based game, favouring the physically gifted over the technically gifted smaller players. Under 11’s playing 11 a side on a full size pitch, with full size goals is frankly ridiculous, the players get little time on the ball, and it is often discouraging for a lot of youngsters. In Spain, Italy and France, they don’t move to full size pitches until around the age of 14, and by learning the game on a smaller scale players acquire the skills which have put them at the forefront of world football.

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It is the whole structure and philosophy that needs to be overhauled if we are to improve youth standards in this country. We need to change our whole attitude to football from the grass-roots up, with a system of education that improves on our technical deficiencies, teaching these skills at an early age. Our desperation for results and immediate investment-in mostly foreign players-has forced spending on youth development down the priority list and this needs to change if we are to see improvements in this country. It is difficult to say that what works in one country will work in another, but clearly there are some changes and positives that we can take from other countries, which would do nothing to further harm the state that English youth football is already in.

Do you think we should take on board some of the methods of other nations? Let me know your thoughts by commenting below or following me on Twitter @LaurenRutter for more comment and debate.

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There wasn’t too much wrong with what Tottenham did this season. It has only been in the past few months where they’ve begun to look unsure of Champions League qualification, and, coincidently, it came off the back of uninspired January transfer activity.

Harry Redknapp says the club need to be bold in the transfer market to ensure they grab a hold of one of the Champions League spots on a permanent basis. Sure, but so does every club. Arsenal look to be moving ambitiously, as will Liverpool and Chelsea, too.

But despite their good run of form this season and the continued praise Harry Redknapp received for his squad, there was nothing spectacular about Tottenham’s squad in the first place. This was a team very much punching above their weight based off pre-season predictions and how they moved in the market last summer.

Emmanuel Adebayor was a good signing, but his days of getting 30 goals a season are long gone. And if you look past the handful of top players at the club, there is nothing else in the squad and there was no movement from the club in January to really fuel what was a fearless juggernaut for the remainder of the season.

Champions league is by no means out of the question, but if they do achieve it, it will very much have been a case of falling over the line. A disappointing finish to how they begun.

What this season has shown, however, is that any club with the right moves and inspired signings can close the gap on the top two. Newcastle have shown it by being in contention for a Champions League spot all season, and there was early talk of Spurs being title contenders. With a marquee signing, they surely would have closed the gap even further.

What is important, though, is for a club like Tottenham not to assume that big spending is the only route to a successful season. The Newcastle model has shown what can be done with very little extravagance, and players like Jan Vertonghen will show desire and ambition on a smaller spending scale. It should be a case of looking to untouched gold mines, again as Newcastle have done, and not be forced to overspend.

There’s not a lot that needs to be done, but along with Redknapp’s comments of being bold comes the necessity to be ruthless. Chasing a target needs to be fulfilled by completing the signing, and with that comes the almost inevitable outcome of a successful season.

Spurs were extremely close this season on making a lasting impression in Europe. The draw of the Premier League would have ensured they weren’t a one-hit wonder, as the case may be for some teams on the continent, but rather they’d be in a position to build much more quickly and with a lot more confidence of their position going into next year.

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Tottenham aren’t far off from going one better next season, but, as Harry Redknapp puts it, the club must show another level of ambition and drive in the transfer market.

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Rumours have been circulating this week linking highly strung Frenchman, Charles N’Zogbia, with a return to Newcastle in the summer. The talented French winger has picked up nine league goals and seven assists this season and he has been a key player for Wigan since he joined them in 2009. This was once again evident at the weekend where his two goals at the DW Stadium kept Wigan’s survival chances alive. Having fought off interest from N’Zogbia’s former club once this season Roberto Martinez will no doubt do all he can to keep the player in Lancashire, however if Wigan don’t avoid the drop it may be out of his control. Newcastle launched a bid in the region of £10 million on the last day of the January transfer window which was rejected by The Latics, but Newcastle seem willing to test Wigan’s resolve again. This raises the question, would bringing N’Zogbia back to Newcastle be a good move for Toon Army?

There is no doubt that N’Zogbia is a quality footballer who on his day can produce moments of magic and he would be a good edition to the Newcastle squad. The fans know what he can produce and he has proven Premiership pedigree, but do Newcastle need him? I wouldn’t say the club necessarily need him, as Newcastle already have Jonas Gutierrez and Hatem Ben Arfa. There are other positions that need filling more urgently than left wing within the current squad, such as a centre forward. Having said that I would probably say N’Zogbia is a better player than Jonas, as he has an end product to his game as well as the build-up play, something which Jonas lacks. N’Zogbia has a cracking cross and he can certainly shoot, whereas both of these attributes are, let’s say erratic in Jonas’ case.

I’m still undecided on whether bringing back a player who said he wanted to leave to reach a higher level of ambition, and then signed for Wigan, is the best move though. I think N’Zogbia used his fall out with Joe Kinnear as an excuse to engineer a move away from the club, so would the fans want to see a player who showed a lack of respect for the club return?

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If Wigan are relegated then N’Zogbia will almost certainly leave Wigan in the summer and bringing him back to St James’ wouldn’t be the worst bit of business if the deal was in the region £10 million. On the other hand, if Wigan avoid the drop they will probably exploit any potential sale of their best player and look to receive upwards of £15 million, a price I don’t think Newcastle should match.

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Any potential deal to bring the mercurial winger back to the North East could turn out to be a stroke of genius from Alan Pardew. N’Zogbia seems to be a more mature player now and he could have a prosperous second coming, much like Nolberto Solano did. However, I would still have reservations about bringing back a player who could be a disruptive influence and is likely to want to leave again at the first sign of trouble. Only time will tell if the recently capped French International will be seen in the black and white stripes again.

Sir Alex Ferguson has once again proved that you should never doubt him or his team, Manchester United. After beating Chelsea 1-0 at Stamford Bridge it looks like Man United will be the sole Premier League survivor in the Champions League and with a potential semi-final against Bundesliga outfit Schalke, you wouldn’t bet against Fergie’s men making the final either. Added to that United are seven points ahead of closest challengers Arsenal in the Premier League table and have an FA Cup semi-final with Manchester City to look forward to, but that isn’t all Fergie can win this year.

For all the talk of this being the weakest Manchester United team in years and that the Red Devils have hardly played well all season, just as always, things seem to be going pretty well at Old Trafford. The treble is a real possibility and is likely to be decided by two matches against City and Barcelona or Real Madrid, and once again they’ve proved they have the staying power and can pull a result out of the bag when it really matters. But then we never really doubted that, did we?

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Everything seems to be coming together at the right time. Nemanja Vidic and Rio Ferdinand played together at the heart of United’s defence for the first time in a while on Wednesday, while Wayne Rooney appears to be firing on all cylinders again. Add to that Nani’s form, Antonio Valencia’s return to fitness and the incredible veteran that is Ryan Giggs and Manchester United’s starting eleven is looking pretty strong. While Fergie’s team is showing their form at the right time, the Scotsman will hope the same goes for his horse.

Sir Alex’s horse What a Friend runs in the Grand National on Saturday and at 11/1 it’s one of the favourites. bet365 are going 150/1 about Sir Alex Ferguson landing the treble this season on the football front and winning the 2011 Grand National with What A Friend! bet365 spokesman Steve Freeth says “Fergie has been the scourge of bookmakers for years by winning countless trophies and a Grand National victory would make it squeaky bum time for us after offering 150/1.”

So can Fergie do the impossible and win the quadruple? At 150/1 it’s well worth a punt!

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Can Fergie complete a double this weekend? His horse What a Friend is 11/1 to win the Grand National. Make sure you don’t miss out on the biggest betting event of the year!

Tottenham Hotspur is a well-run football club. The solidity of their finances is a source of pride for the supporters. They hold a position at the business end of the Premiership and have done so without racking up mountains of debt. However, they may have reached a fork in the road. In order to continue progressing, or even to keep up with the clubs around them, they may be forced to seriously loosen their rigid wage structure.

The question of whether Spurs should discard their current successful system is a balancing act between footballing ambition and financial risk.

Abandoning the wage structure would allow Spurs to compete with the top clubs for the best players. There are suggestions that they have already considered this. The club’s top earners Modric, Bale and King are on around £70,000 a week, however no serious attempts could have been made to sign Sergio Aguero in January without leaping towards the £100,000 per week marker. £70,000 won’t bag you a star in their prime nowadays. When Spurs become linked with a world-class player, the first question raised is will the club be able to meet his wage demands.

The wage structure is also becoming restrictive in the retention of the best players. £70,000 a week will keep your players happy for a while if you get them young but it won’t keep them forever.

If Tottenham loosen the structure, they’ll be able to attract a higher calibre of player capable of bringing them more seriously into the crush at the top of the table. They can satisfy the ambitions of the club’s best players and their seemingly insatiable appetite for more money. There is a genuine risk that without this increased spending, the team may stagnate or even go backwards as players are lured away. It would be a great shame if the 2011 Champions League run is the pinnacle of this Tottenham side’s achievements.

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The cons of abandoning Levy’s safe and working business model can be seen throughout English football. Spurs would be faced with a rapidly escalating wage bill. The arrival of a couple of £100,000 a week stars would undoubtedly have a knock on effect on the wages of others at the club whether through highest earning clauses or renegotiated contracts. Nobody wants to see a situation like that at Newcastle 2 years ago, a squad bulging with £50,000 plus a week earners, with no love for the club, heading for relegation.

Without the guarantee of Champions league football, it is a huge and reckless gamble to drastically up the club’s spending. The top English clubs are in eye-watering amounts of debt and Spurs have done fantastically well thus far to compete without being sucked in. The club is safe and could even maybe spend a little more without pushing itself into a position of boom or bust. Daniel Levy has run Spurs incredibly carefully up until now, it would be foolish of him to risk everything for short term success.

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So what should Tottenham do? Is this the most competitive they can be without plunging into an abyss of debt? I believe that Spurs should continue to keep it tight, keep buying young players if they have too, but keep getting the best they can afford. Spurs can get stars without breaking the bank, it just takes a lot longer. Levy runs a tight ship and I still believe he can take it forward without sinking it.

It’s a great shame that £70,000 a week can’t get you the players you need but it’s good to see Tottenham attempting to climb the right way.

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Since Premier League clubs revealed the list of free agents they’ve released, a host of players have embarked on a summer long hunt to find a new team. It’s an exciting time of the year as clubs battle it out to find the best players to improve their team without breaking the bank.

With so many top players either looking for pastures new, written off through injury or just deemed surplus to requirements at their previous clubs, there is now a wealth of talent available on the cheap. From experienced campaigners looking for one last hurrah with a promoted side to aspiring youngsters looking for their big break with a European challenger, there is enough talent to select an entire side capable of turning a few heads in the Premier League.

Having sifted through the dross and found the gems, it seems only natural to practice my fantasy football manager skills by placing these bargain basement stars into a cohesive unit that would threaten the very best sides.

Below lies the best available XI players that can be signed for next to nothing plus a substitutes bench for those that didn’t make the first team but are still worthy of a place on the shortlist.

Click on Gomes below to to see the best Bosman XI available in the Premier League

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A multitude of theories have been propounded in order to explain England’s dismal showing at this summer’s World Cup. Unsurprisingly, the chief scapegoats have included manager Fabio Capello and the players responsible for the side’s last-sixteen exit. However, England’s display is reflective of a range of problems with the domestic game.

Many have pointed to the influx of foreign talent and its effect upon the domestic game as detrimental to the development and progress of English talent (and its knock-on effect upon the English national side). Whilst the number of Englishmen starting for Premier League clubs is dwindling (figures for 2007/08 showed that 34.1% of all starting players in the Premier League that season were English), the increased prevalence of foreign youngsters within English academies indicates that opportunities for young English players to make top-level breakthroughs are becoming even more scarce, meaning that the pool of players available for the England manager is becoming even smaller.

The spending power of the likes of Chelsea, Manchester City and Manchester United, means that competing at the highest level is tougher than ever. Through prudently scouring the world’s best young talent, Arsene Wenger has managed to buck this trend, with the rise to prominence of Cesc Fabregas vindicating the virtues of Wenger’s approach. Arsenal’s ability to compete on a comparatively small budget has sparked a string of imitators, with Chelsea and Liverpool the most high-profile Premier League clubs to follow suit. Players such as Dani Pacheco, Daniel Ayala and Gael Kakuta have all benefitted from this Premier League transfer policy.

This practice has worried the Football Association’s development director Sir Trevor Brooking. Concerned by its increasing prevalence, Brooking stated: “When we set up the academies, we understood the challenge (posed by clubs) bringing in the best overseas talent in the older age groups. What we didn’t quite understand is that that would start to fill up the academy areas and stifle the growth there. Longer term it is extremely worrying.”

Although the ‘foreigner’ argument is often lambasted for its xenophobic overtones, one cannot deny the correlation between the number of home-grown players within a domestic league and international success. Speaking of this link, Brooking said: “If you look at Italy when they won the last World Cup, I think they had over 70 per cent of their league made up of domestic players. Spain, France, Holland, they’re all up there in the 60 per cents. The more that goes down, and the pool of choice reduces, we must come under pressure.”

The reduced number of Englishmen featuring for England’s top clubs also highlights a worrying trend. A look at the squads of two remaining World Cup teams, Spain and Germany, along with that of England demonstrates how the existence of domestic players within top teams is linked to the strength of the national side. Germany’s World Cup squad includes 12 players who featured for one of the sides that finished within the top three of the Bundesliga last season. Similarly, Spain’s squad features 15 players who featured last season for Barcelona, Real Madrid or Valencia. By comparison, (including the withdrawn Rio Ferdinand) England’s squad included just seven players who had turned out for a top-three Premier League side last season.

The game’s regulations supplement the benefits of signing young, foreign players. The complicated laws concerning football contracts in countries such as Spain and Italy mean that opportunities are rife for English clubs to secure cheap, young foreign talent. Bringing in talent from across the continent means that clubs can circumvent domestic FA regulations which prevent any club from bringing players to their academy who live outside the radius of a 90-minute drive from their home ground. Is it any wonder that clubs resort to such measures?

Although Arsenal failed to provide any players for England’s World Cup squad, the fruits borne by their youth policy have certainly justified Arsene Wenger’s model of development. With clubs looking to secure their own interests, they’re under no obligation to promote and facilitate the success of the national side. The FA must look to incentivising the benefits of spurning young foreign talent if the national side are to have any tangible success in the near and distant future.

Follow me on twitter at www.twitter.com/zarifrasul

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Click on image below to see the GERMAN babes at the World Cup

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Manchester United manager Sir Alex Ferguson believes the advantage lies with his side after the draw with Marseille in their Champions League tie.Ferguson admitted the 0-0 stalemate at Stade Velodrome in Wednesday’s first leg was far from entertaining, but the Scot said knowledge that a win at OId Trafford in the second leg on March 15 would guarantee progress to the last eight was comforting.”The result is fine, I think it was a fair result,” Ferguson said.”I don’t think Marseille presented any great problems to us in an attacking sense, they only had one strike on goal.”Ferguson heaped praise on defensive pair Chris Smalling and Nemanja Vidic for quelling the French club on their own turf, allowing them no time or space to construct forward thrusts.”I thought our two centre-backs were very good. In the first half both teams cancelled each other out. Nothing really happened in the match and I don’t think it was a good match to watch,” he said.Marseille manager Didier Deschamps agreed with Ferguson that United had the upper hand heading to Old Trafford.”I am very happy with my players because they have done their best tonight as Manchester United showed what a good team they are,” Deschamps said.”Maybe we will have an opportunity to score in the second leg. It is not a bad result for us but it is a good one for United.”Marseille’s defence was able to limit the influence of English Premier League leading goalscorer Dimitar Berbatov, and Deschamps said the clean sheet was one aim of their encounter.”It was very important we didn’t concede a goal and we did that. It was a tough, hard game because Manchester United are a good team. It was not easy. We had a very good time in the second half for 20 or 25 minutes but we didn’t find a goal,” he said.”At the end it was more difficult because United changed their system to 4-4-2 and we were behind the ball a lot. They had some players missing but those who came in were excellent. It shows what a high level they are at.”

Fulham will continue their pursuit of Martin Jol on Wednesday by meeting representatives of the Dutch coach's current club Ajax.

Chief executive Alistair Mackintosh is in Amsterdam to meet with Ajax officials as he attempts to negotiate the release of the former Tottenham manager.

Jol is believed to be keen to return to the Premier League to replace Roy Hodgson in the Craven Cottage hot-seat.

The Cottagers have been without a manager since Hodgson joined Liverpool almost three weeks ago, since when Ray Lewington has been in caretaker charge.

On Tuesday, stories from the Netherlands claimed the 54-year-old had agreed to stay with Ajax in principle after the club agreed to his demands that new players needed to be signed before the start of the 2010-11 campaign.

However, it now appears that Ajax are refusing to negotiate and the two clubs are at an impasse.

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Ivory Coast coach Sven-Goran Eriksson has also been linked with the vacancy at Craven Cottage as have United States coach Bob Bradley and Switzerland's Ottmar Hitzfeld.Subscribe to Football FanCast News Headlines by Email