Replacement for Victor Valdes

So as you all know, Valdes has announced that he will not extend his contract with Barcelona, in which the current one will expire in 2014. Never before, you actually see news about Barcelona goalkeeper replacement and transfer rumors. Well, after reading bunch of articles, I just want to share a bit of my opinion.

Bye bye Victor!
Valdes is a great keeper. He is currently in the time of form-dip which cost us A LOT of craps and poor results. To be honest, I can still remember the day Di Maria stole the ball from Valdes' foot and scored. Damn, some painful memory. Anyway, since our defense is pretty inconsistent, it is really important to have a solid guard in front of the goal net. Victor have had a successful career at the Catalan club, and if wants to challenge himself somewhere else, then best of luck for him!

Pepe Reina
Oh for God's sakes, REALLY?! Dude, Reina is worse than Valdes. No, just a big fat "NO"for Mr. José Manuel Reina Páez.

David De Gea
Well, this dude is young. Age is good, but his goalkeeping is still not good. At least not good enough to be playing in Barcelona. I really see no point of buying in Manchester United 18mil goalkeeper. So another "no" for this young man. Well, at least De Gea can still do some skills with his feet :P

Thibaut Courtois
Now we're talking! This guy is young and awesome. He is definitely one of the goalkeeper that has the ability to replace Valdes. Plus, he is currently on loan and play in our Spanish friend: Atletico Madrid. The fact that he is playing the Liga BBVA doesn't require him to adapt that much if he comes to Barca. I'm totally "yes" for this man.

Manuel Neuer 
Hmmm... Good choice but he is almost an impossible target. He's currently playing in Bayern Munich and he will cost us a lot if he joins Barcelona. Neuer is really a good choice but we still need to consider his price first. So I'll leave this choice open for now, until I see his transfer price.

Marc-Andre ter Stegen
This man is great. He is just 20 years of age and already made appearance for the German national team. He helped Gladbach in the German league really well and seeing that his future is heading toward the positive way, I'll go for "yes" for this man.

Anyway, thank you Victor Valdes for all the contributions you made for Barcelona throughout your career and I wish you a good luck!

Visca el Barca!

Photo Credit: Telegraph, Caught Offside, Goalkeeper Magazine, Bundesliga Media,

GET WELL SOON TITO VILANOVA!

Another terrible news before Christmas. Hope that Vilanova can come back as soon as possible. You are a great coach!

Rise and Fall of RDM

It's official.  Roberto Di Matteo has been sacked! Staying in the club for about hmmm... 8 months, today, he's out.  Let's take a mini look back at one of his shortest career ever, Chelsea FC.

After Chelsea defeat against West Brom in March 2012, Chelsea announced the departure of Andre Villas-Boas, who is now Tottenham Hotspur manager, Boas' then manager took the position.  Roberto Di Matteo improved Chelsea in several ways.  He picked Chelsea up from hell, making Chelsea won against Napoli to allow the club to survive in the Champions League.  Chelsea performed well in the league, most of the time winning.  Another highlight was how he dig Torres to score consistently in the league.  Well, maybe.

Chelsea performed so well that they actually made their way to the FA Cup final.  They beat Liverpool 2-1 in the Wembley Stadium.  A club that had no future about two months ago, came back to twist and won the national cup.

However, winning the FA Cup wasn't the highlight of his career.  It was the performance in the Champions League.  Out of four teams, Barcelona, Real Madrid, Bayern Munich, and Chelsea, the Londoners considered as the underdog.  Chelsea received a probably the hardest mission of the season, they had to face Barcelona the semi-final.  With Di Matteo's "BUS" strategy, Chelsea was able to pick up a 1-0 win in Stamford Bridge.  In Camp Nou, Di Matteo's men also made big surprise and twists in the game with Torres scoring the last-minute goal, knocking the Blaugrana out of the Champions League.  Chelsea became one of the two team to play in the Final in Munich in May 2012.

After the finished with 6th in the league, Chelsea must win the Champions League Final in order to participate in UEFA glorious competition the following year.  Playing in Allianz Area, Bayern Munich's home, the chance was like impossible for Chelsea to win against the host, and also the home team.  Surprisingly, Drogba scored a header in the 88th minute to bring Chelsea levelled against the host.  Chelsea won against Bayern in the penalty kick out and also won their FIRST UEFA Champions League title.  History has been made, the Londoners will be participating in the 2012/13 Champions League.

Chelsea spent huge heck of money on 8 different superstars, hoping to have another amazing season.  Overall, Chelsea spent 89 million pounds on Eden Hazard (35mil), Thorgan Hazard (0.8mil), Marko Marin (7mil), Oscar (28mil), Cesar Azpilicueta (7mil), and Victor Moses (10mil).  With that amount, Di Matteo knew that he cannot screw up his damn great team.

Chelsea started the new season campaign brilliantly.  Throughout 2 months, Chelsea captured all wins and only one drew.  Hazard and Oscar performed fantastically.  However, here comes the dip...

On October 29th, Chelsea faced their first "controversial" defeat agains their arch-rival, Manchester United in Stamford Bridge.  The undefeated streak ended by Sir Alex Ferguson's men.  Chelsea also performed poorly in the Champions League despite the 5-0 win at FC Nordjylland.  After their first defeat in the league, Di Matteo's men was not able to pick themselves up resulting in 2 draws and the latest defeat at West Brom.

With news surrounding Di Matteo's position, the Italian led his men to Juventus on November 20th 2012.  Chelsea came out with an epic 3-0 defeat against the Italian Champions.  A day later, the club announced his departure from the club.  That escalated quickly... From a Champions League winner, now a jobless manager.

So who will be the next manager of the Blues? Guardiola? Benitez? All I can say is bye bye Di Matteo, I don't like you that much, but good luck with your future.  For this coming week, we cannot get our eyes of Chelsea news.

Good luck and have fun.

Photo Credit: Mirror Football, The Offside, NYTimes, Dailymail, Eurosport, Chelsea FC

Chelsea 2-3 Man United: That was one hell of a game!

If you meet any football fans walking around today, you'll probably ask that person "did you watch the game last night?", most of them will probably say that he/she did watch the game, unless that person happens to be either a dude with no-tv at home or a guy who doesn't give a shit about that game.  However, this is where all the fun starts, the reaction after the answer.  If you happens to talk to a Chelsea fan, that person will probably say a lot of negative things about referee decisions or some might even go deep to "cheat" from the United side.  Anyway, here's my opinion on this game.

First of all, the game is very fun.  Full of excitement and you can't really take off your eyes for any minute.  Man United were sharp in the first 15 minutes, 2 goals.  Both goals were contribute by Robin Van Persie, although the first one was an own goal from David Luiz.  I think nobody can really argue that United were very sharp and played very well.  Chelsea received a freekick just before the half-time, which Juan Mata just curve it in.  Epic goal!

The fun part started when Ramires scores an equalizer for Chelsea in the middle of the second half.  That was when Chelsea really shows that United's defence is still a pile of crap.  2-2 was the score.  Then at one point, Ashley Young broke through Chelsea defence which made Ivanovic sprint to reach Young.  Young fell down and Ivanovic shown red.  Well, that was not cool.  Personally, I think that that shouldn't have been a red.  Yes, Young was the last person but that light touch isn't that much.  And as always, Young overacted.  But okay, decision can't be changed (unless you happened to play against Juventus).  So thats one red for Chelsea.  At that point, I thought to myself that United HAS TO WIN because one defensive wall has been eliminated from the game.

Not long after, Torres got a chance to break through and goes down in flash.  The ref walked to him and Torres was the second player to be shown red in the same night.  Well, this one is hard since Torres already had one yellow.  But like Sir Alex said, he could go through and score but he chose to fall down.  I do not that Evans deserved a foul, but a yellow to Torres?  That was kind of harsh.  But too bad, you can't dive or overact (unless you happened to play for... nevermind).  So by the 70th minute, its 9 against 11.  United kept attacking until they received their reward in the 75th minute when Javier Hernandez scored.  That was an offside goal, but I do not want to comment on that.  Done.  Chelsea tried hard but failed to score an equalizer.  United defeat Chelsea at the Bridge for the first time in 11 years (Premier League only).

During the match, I also read Twitter feeds and Facebook pages.  Most of their posts were about how United bribed their referee (Mark Clattenburg).  Personally, I don't think there were any bribe or cheat, but most decisions were going against United's opponent and it seems really awkward nowadays.  Just think about it, in the past two years, most of United's big games, there were always controversies and most of the time concerning referee decisions.  I can list some off my head now.

1. Manchester United 1-0 Liverpool [FA CUP 2011] - Gerrard sent off and undeserved penalty. (Howard Webb)
2. Manchester City 2-3 Manchester United [FA CUP 2012] - Kompany sent off and United handball in the box.  (Chris Foy)
3. Liverpool 1-2 Manchester United [PREMIER LEAGUE 2012-13] - Shelvey sent off and controversial penalty.  (Mark Halsey)
4. Chelsea 2-3 Manchester United [PREMIER LEAGUE 2012-13] - Ivanovic and Torres sent off and United's offside goal.  (Mark Clattenburg)

Although I believe there were no bribery, it will nice if FA are willing to investigate the issue, just for the sakes of angry fans.  Honestly, Chelsea happened to be the team that is stronger last night, but because of De Gea, United are still safe.  The gap in the Premier League now is just 1 point, this is going to be real damn fun.  I'm going to end my post here.  Just watch, United is going play Chelsea again this midweek.  Let's hope for a peaceful and fair game. 

Good Luck Everyone!

Image Credit: Zimbio, Guardian, and BreakingNews

Season Analysis so far... [Oct 2012]

Hi again.  Didn't update this blog for quite a long time, due to my works and other stuff.  So a quater of the season has passed, and we are the top of the league (hoo-ray).  But the sad thing is, its JUST a quater of the season, another 7 months to go.  8 points lead [against Madrid] isn't an easy thing.  So here, I'll analyze and criticize everything that happened so far this season.

We started the campaign very sharp.  We won 6 matches straight.  We drew our first game in the El Clasico (Oct 7th).  This is a big contrast to our arch-rival, they started the campaign very poor.  That's how we are still 8 points above Real Madrid.  However, it seems to be that 22 points we gained from our 8 matches, its damn hard.  Harder than its suppose to be.  We won each games, usually in a goal margin of 1.  And how many games that we need to comeback or score in the last minute of the match. It's not right for the so-called "best team in the world".  We conceded TOO MUCH.  But it is still understandable since 3 of our main defenders are injured.  And yeah, putting Alex Song in the back was not a wise decision.  And goalkeeper?  No comments.  Although I do wish him to return to his top-from in a very near time.  A lot of goals conceded came from shitty mistakes, but okay, we still need you, so don't give up.

About our attack, this year, Messi seems to participate more in all goals.  Not just scoring, but also provide beautiful assists and mind-blowing passes.  He is currently the top scorer, 11 goals.  However, the problem is, who is the best to play with Messi.  Villa?  He's good, but pretty slow and pretty out of form as well.  Pedro?  This kid is inconsistent, but is still crucial to the team.  A sharp scorer.  Alexis?  Oh man, this guy is seriously out of form.  Tello? Now we're talking.  This guy provides good assist and is improving match-by-match.  Sometimes, you can even put Cesc or Iniesta in such position, if we really need to. What Tito is doing is very clever, rotating players every matches.  This is a brilliant way to test the abilities of each players and improve the form.  Just think about it, have you ever seen Messi being benched?  Well yeah, it happens during Tito's time.

Overall, I just wanted to say that I'm really proud of FC Barcelona and looking like the 2012-13 should be a good one for us.  But still are still struggling in many ways.  I hope that when our crucial players are back from injuries and forms, Tito will find a way for us to be an invincible team once again.  Good luck to everyone!

Visca el Barça!

Photo Credit: Zimbio

After the Spanish Super Copa Result...

So there you go, Real Madrid won the Spanish Super Copa 2012 over Barcelona.  Congratulations to Real Madrid.  However, as a Barca fan, I do not feel disappointed at all (party because I really expected this result).  The 2-legged games was amazing, full of action and goals.  Many people are saying that "this is the end of Barca's age," I disagree.  The score of 4-4 isn't an ugly score at all, in fact, both team really have a hard time beating up each other.  Madrid didn't OWN Barca, and vise-versa.  Madrid won through away goals, which personally, doesn't prove me that they are better than us, neither we are better than them.  8 goals equally shared, epic.

Liga campaign just started.  Barcelona has 6 points out of possible hmmmm... 6.  While Madrid only has 1, which is kind of awkward.  But its just the starting of the season, so we shouldn't judge any team.  However I find that Madrid are struggling with their past two games, which Mourinho claims that it is all the problem with defence.  Barcelona opened their campaign with a 4-1 win against Sociedad at home, with a goal from David Villa (yay!).  Barcelona struggled their second game against Osasuna, but still flicked the result and beat the home team with the score of 2-1.  Osasuna is pretty tough, we lost 2-3 last year.

I have a feeling that this year (2012-13) will be a very fun and exciting season of Spanish Liga BBVA. Unlike last year where Madrid thrash Barcelona 9 points by the end of the season.  I expect to see some twists and unbelievable results coming.

Visca el Barça!

Sorry for a quick post today.  See you again later.

Tito's First Exam

So tonight is the El Clasico!

A lot of changes occurred for both Barcelona and Real Madrid, mostly Barca though. After Barcelona's failure last season, the Catalan bought in 2 players whom I consider as superstars. Jordi Alba and Alex Song. Alba will fulfill the left-back of Barcelona's 11 due to Abidal's condition (get well soon, Abi!). Although I have to say that having Abidal as a left-back was one of the factor for Barcelona victory over Real Madrid, I still believe Alba can fulfill both attacking and defending Barcelona play like Abi.

I doubt that Song will start tonight though, he might come as a sub later. This is the first exam for Tito, quite a tough one huh? If Tito's men loses tonight, it still won't prove that Barcelona will fail this season. Madrid lost the 2-legged Super Copa last year, they still won the Liga. But in the same time, this will give you a guide toward Tito's squad management and tactics. So it is still very important.

Honestly I wouldn't really call it an "exam", instead, I would consider it as a "pre-exam". As a manager, this is his first Clasico, so we need to give him a chance. If we lose tonight, then Tito must find new tactics to fight with the White King in the next Clasicos. And that would be his "Real" exam. You can always fail your first test, but you need to learn from your mistakes, and improve your score in the next tests.

Good Luck Barça!