Murb\’s footballing views

In light of Sam Allardyce being sacked by Blackburn, it got me to thinking. What is more important to the average football fan, winning football matches, or playing football that is pleasing to the eye?

Fair enough you have the exception to the rule in world class managers like Alex Ferguson and Pep Guardiola, where you can get the success whilst still playing good football, but if it came down to it, what would you rather have at your football club?

It could be argued that Blackburn weren’t having much of either at the time Allardyce departed being in the bottom half of the table, but give him his dues, when he left, Blackburn were 3rd in the form table over the last 6 games with 4 wins coming in that period. You have to remember that success doesn’t come overnight. You only have to look at what big Sam did at Bolton over a long period of time to see what he is capable of.

With all due respect, a club like Blackburn is never going to have that much money to spend on players (short of an Arab or rich American coming on-board), so they need to get  a manager who can do it (and is happy to do it) on a shoestring budget and Allardyce comes into that category.

Would Blackburn fans – or any football fan for that matter -  be bothered about the style of football if they were constantly coming in the top 6 of the premiership and having a good run in the cup competitions?

Being a Luton fan I love it when we play good passing football, but over the years I have seen us lose more often than not and think to myself that as long as we won, I wouldn’t mind how it came. Yeah it’s great to win by playing good football but surely winning is the be all and end all in this profession?

What would be really interesting, is if Man Utd ended up winning the title by playing terrible football, would they sack Alex Ferguson?….

Murb

The weekends snow has caused havoc across Britain’s footballing program. Games being called off, games being abandoned halfway through, people being stuck on the roads unable to get home, Soccer Saturday and Match of the Day being diluted to the point where it was barely worth watching and countless others. However one less important thing (or more important depending on how seriously you take it) has been overlooked. Fantasy Football.

This might sound pretty trivial and not very important in the grand scheme of things, but since every other piece of news regarding the snow has been about games being called off, I thought I would take it from a different angle.

Take for example the league that I am in, only 2 games thus far have survived the snow, with Man City v Everton still to be decided (at the time of writing). I had one Sunderland player and one Blackburn player out of 11 players and 4 subs that played, and if the Man City v Everton game does go ahead then I have 3 Everton players getting me points so fingers crossed that survives.

The games will eventually be replayed but from my experience people take Fantasy Football very seriously. There is big money involved in some leagues, and to the people at the top of the money tables this weekend, the postponements must be devastating for them. Countless people across the nation who are playing for bragging rights over their friends will be relying on luck to see them through this weeks (non) fixtures.

With none of the big 3 playing this weekend, Ryan Nelsen could end up being the top scorer for this gameweek that is how crazy it has been. Most people have Chelsea, Man Utd, Arsenal or Spurs players in their teams and with good reason, however the fantasy managers who are gonna be having the best of it this gameweek are the people with Sunderland, Blackburn and West Ham players. How times change.

For those of you with teams in Fantasy Leagues I hope you have been lucky enough to get away with minimal disruption and better luck next weekend.

Murb

Having waited with baited breath for the decision on who will host the 2018 world cup, I have come to the conclusion that the time for change is upon us.

It has nothing to do with the fact that I am extremely dissapointed that England failed in their exceptional bid to host the tournament, but more the way the whole process works and it’s vunerability to corruption.

22 people get together in a secluded room and discuss the fate of the multi billion pound biggest sporting event in the world. Too much secrecy and too easy for high ranking palms to be greased.

Now being English I am going to be a little biased even I admit that, However, even I was impressed with the efforts of the English bid, and i’m sure more than a few heads were turned in the process.

We are the spirtual home of football. Football is a religion in our country and our passion for the game cannot be questioned. Can the same be said about Russia? We have the facilities and Stadia to host the tournament tomorrow, do Russia? We have the transport links to make getting around for both fans and people particpating in the tournament easy. Do Russia? Our bid was said to be the best technical bid, the project that would be the lowest risk and even our amazing presentation was lauded by people the world over. Our future King showed up to back the bid, our most recognisable footballer of recent times also attended as did the Prime Minister of the country. What more can it possibly take?

All that being said England receieved 2 votes and one of them was from our own delegate. With all of the above taken into consideration one of 3 possible scenario’s has taken place. Scenario 1 – FIFA is corrupt; Scenario 2 – FIFA has a personal agenda against England; Scenario 3 – FIFA believed Russia had a better bid than England. I know which scenarios my money is on and it’s not the third one I can assure you.

A governing body such as FIFA has a responsibilty to be fair to every nation and it’s personal issues with England are clear for all to see.

Another example of FIFA’s incompetence came very soon after the 2018 bid was announced, when they announced that the mighty footballing nation of Qatar had won the right to host the 2022 World Cup tournament. Tell me that has nothing to do with money! Qatar have never even qualified for a World Cup and whilst I have nothing against them as a nation, I feel the tournament would have been much better suited elsewhere.

The Qatar bid for the record, was the only bid to be deemed high risk both for health and safety and for the ability to successfully host the tournament.

FIFA have nobody to answer to and regulate themselves. Something needs to be done to change the way the decision is made. 22 men secretly talking about where to hold the tournament doesn’t cut it anymore. People can too easily be bribed by wealthy nations and without transparency who knows what else FIFA are cooking up.

I am calling for a change and hope that other people realise that this is for the best and isn’t just sour grapes from an England fan.

Murb

Hi Guys, i’m back now and after achieving my own personal mission of going out to the states to do some football coaching, I now have some time on my hands in order to put the footballing world to rites again. Watch this space!

What a difference a year – and more importantly a good manager – makes.

Last year (2008) England fans were crying into their pints and contemplating a summer without their team in a major international championship. Mclaren was holding an umbrella, England allegedly didn’t have the players to challenge for major honours, and the bad taste that Sven left during his reign of incompetence, was still in all our mouths. Croatia had humiliated us on our own patch and life it seemed couldn’t get much worse.

Now it’s 2009 and enter the FA’s latest “saviour” of English football Fabio Capello. I don’t mind admitting that I was a bit skeptical at this appointment, considering Capello has never been involved in English football, not to mention his lack of international management experience. I for one was hoping Mourinho would take the reigns and show everyone that it wasn’t the players that were lacking, it was the direction given to the team by the manager/coaches. Seems we didn’t need Mourinho to do that after all.

My skepticism didn’t wane during the first few Capello led England games. I didn’t see anything different to his predecessors who had so woefully carried the nations hopes on their shoulders over the last decade. I guess old habits die hard as I just couldn’t see how things were going to change in the drastic manner that they needed to in order to turn things around. Much to my surprise they did

One hugely successful World Cup qualifying campaign later and the nation can once again have pride in their national team, getting revenge on Croatia and Slaven Billic in the process.

The thing that excites me most though, is not just that we have qualified, but the manner in which we have qualified. I couldn’t recognise the team that were wearing the three lions shirt. We looked organised, we looked in control and Gerrard and Lampard can actually play in the same team after all. We haven’t looked this good since Euro ’96 where we got to the Semi Finals only to get beaten on penalties by our long time nemesis the Germans.

This is where the similarities end though for me. I never thought I would hear myself saying this so soon, but we do actually have a very good chance of winning the World Cup. We have the strong and self assured manager to deal with the ego’s of big time footballers. A manager who can make the ballsy changes that need to be made during an important game. We have genuine world class players in the squad; a team that age wise should be hitting it’s peak. We also have an English public desperate to win after so many near misses and poor campaigns over the years.

Whilst some will argue that we say this every time a major championship comes around, this time is genuinely different, and I for one will be putting my money where my mouth is and backing England to do something they haven’t done since 1966. The good times are finally back so let’s enjoy them while they last.

Murb442

Being a supporter of a lower league team, I have always wondered which trophy Premier League supporting teams would rather win, the Premiership or the Champions League.

With English teams being so dominant in the Champions League of late, it seems the Premiership is higher up on a lot of football fan’s priority list. Gone are the days where teams like Real Madrid, AC Milan and Bayern Munich were nigh on impossible to beat, and more often than not these days, there are more English teams in the final 4 than anyone else. In some cases – especially in the last few years – the semi finals have consisted of 75% english teams.

Whilst this is good for English football, I must admit the lack of the big European names leaves me feeling a bit dis-satisfied. With the greatest of respect, we can see matches like Man U v Chelsea every year in the Premiership. The whole point in it being the biggest competition in European football is so that the best of England can pit their wits against the best of Italy, Spain, Holland, Germany etc.

So has the title of “best  in Europe” and the millions that come with it taken a back seat in favour of domestic glory? Until the best teams in Europe get their act together I fear so, but like history would suggest, each team and each league have their periods of dominance and one thing is for certain, things always change.

Hello all,

I love talking about everything football and support Luton Town. My views can be controversial at times but I am a true believer in speaking your mind, whether people agree with you or not. If everyone had the same opinions it would be a pretty boring world. Feel free to post any comments and look forward to speaking with like minded football fanatics.

Enjoy