The opening day of Euro 2012 full of drama, excitement & goals...and thankfully no racism!

As expected, Poland put up a great show to open Euro 2012, both in the Opening Ceremony & the opening match of the tournament against Greece.

For the information of the more casual football fans, after the Football World Cup & the Olympics, European Championships reportedly attract the third highest overall sports viewing audience around the world. (although the Indian Cricket League IPL is also very popular these days)

Group A, dubbed the real Group of Death, not for its tough competition but for lack of excitement compared, produced two drama filled matches in the opening day:

Poland controlled Greece in the first half & a Greek defender was harshly sent off. Then in the second half, Greece demonstrated their resilience & if it was not for a penalty miss they could have won the game.
In the other match, as expected Russia crushed a young & transitional Czech Republic side 4-1. The scoreline could have been much worse if not for Russia's wastefulness.

The two matches only confirm my belief further that Russia & Poland are favourites to go through to the quarter finals from Group A

And most importantly there were no sign of the ugly "Football Racism" around. Let's hope that trend continues.

Tomorrow morning the opening matches in arguably the toughest Group in the tournament will be played. Three of the four teams in the group are former winners & Portugal were finalists in 2004.

The problem with this group is that each team needs to get a draw or a win from every match as there are no so called easy matches in this group.

Holland in my view are favourites to top the group & should win their opening match against Denmark reasonably comfortably. With impressive goal scorers such as Huntelaar, Van Persie, Robben & Snjeider at their disposal, Holland are a better team than they were in the World Cup in 2010 when they narrowly lost to Spain.

Germany on the other hand have surprisingly misfired in the last few weeks having conceded 5 goals to Switzerland albeit fielding a much weakened side. Then there is also the daily question in the media & press conferences about whether their 8 Bayern stars have psychologically recovered from their heartbreaking loss to Chelsea in the Champions League final.(all of whom could potentially start against Portugal)

Having said that, I have followed Germany through every single World Cup & European Championship since 1974. They are the tournament team! Die Mannschaft get better & do not hit form too early (Italy are another great example of this, whilst some of the best Brazilian teams of all time were the opposite)

I believe whilst Germany continue to have difficulty with their two central defence positions, they now, for the first time since 1996 possess enough quality players to be considered potential winners. They also have for the first time since they won the 1990 World Cup have enough talent on the bench to change tactics & salvage matches if they fall behind & in players such as Neuer, Lahm, Ozil, Kroos, Schweinsteiger, Goetze, Klose, Podolski & co Germany are once again belong to the cream of world football but need to crown the potential by winning the tournament. (they have reached the semi finals of the last two world Cups & were the finalist in Euro 2008 losing to Spain)

Portugal on the other hand will have to rely too heavily on Ronaldo especially if as reported Nani does not start against Germany. Ronaldo, like Messi is yet to reproduce his club form on the world stage. Their achilles tendon which Germany will target will be Fabio Coentrao who had an awful time playing against Bayern this year for his Club side Real Madrid.

On Monday, the defending Champions & favourites Spain will open their account vs Ireland in a tough Group C contest. I believe Chelsea's tactics vs Barcelona & Bayern Munchen in the Champions League have exposed Spain's weaknesses. With Torres's form still in question & David Villa's long term injury, Spain's attack may be too blunt to deal with a defensive Irish approach. And absence of the ever reliable Carlos Puyol adds to Spain's defensive worries.
Nevertheless, Spain should ultimately account for the Irish & also top the group.

I rate this Italian side as lowly as many including myself rated the woeful French side in the World Cup 2010. To top it all, Italian football is once again (surprise surprise) in the midst of yet another match fixing scandal. Croatia on the other hand, are & have always been a football production line! Whilst they are also going through a mini transitional period, their coach in my view is still one of the most tactically gifted coaches in Europe. Despite the huge loss of Olic to injury last week, I predict Crotia will beat Italy & will go through to the QF alongside Spain.

On Tuesday, the ever disappointing England open their account in Group D. France have now remained unbeaten in 18 matches under the likable former Captain Blanc & should be considered one of the dark horses of the tournament.

This is perhaps the hardest group to predict. I still believe Frank Lampard is the heart & soul of the England team. In his absence, and with Rooney being suspended for the first two group matches, alongside the foolish decision by Hodgson not to recall Rio Ferdinand after Gary Cahill was forced to pull out, England have problems in both defence & attack & the Swede attack led by an in form Zaltan Ibrahimovic can potentially signal the end of England's campaign after the first round.

I predict France & Sweden (or Ukraine with home support) to go through to the quarter finals.

I will be posting regular blogs during the tournament.

World Cup Blog: latest news from South Africa, & why FIFA are responsible for ruining our "Beautiful Game"!

The latest news from South Africa:

1. Rio Ferdinand, the England Captain is out of the world Cup due to a knee injury in training. This will undoubtedly throw Fabio Capello's plans into chaos.
2. Ivory Coast sweating over Drogba's broken wrist in a friendly match. It has not yet been confirmed whether Drogba will miss the World Cup as a result.
3. Worrying losses for the 2006 finalists Italy (1-2 to Mexico) & France (0-1 to China). Although, like many others, I believe the Italian squad is an aging & tactically confused team, and Demenech (& France after qualifying with Henry's cheating handball goal) do not even deserve to be in South Africa
4. Impressive 1-0 win by Australia's Socceroos vs Denmark, although the Socceroos frailties were exposed in the 1-3 defeat in warm up match vs USA tonight, highlighting the current Socceroos limited tactical capabilities.
5. Dominant second half display by the youngest ever German World Cup team in the modern era in their 3-1 win vs Bosnia
6. Dark horses Holland smashed Hungary 6-1 & South Africa had a morale boosting 1-0 victory vs Denmark

My Tip for the World Cup: favourites: Spain & Brazil
Contenders: England, Argentina, Germany & Holland
Dangerous outsiders: Chile, Portugal & Serbia

Now for some basic facts that will once again demonstrate the true worldwide popularity of football:



FIFA the world governing body of football currently has 208 members. This membership level can only be fully appreciated when compared to e.g.

a) United Nations: 196 members
b) Rugby Union Board: around 120 members
c) Rugby League (claimed) to have around 50 members although only 20-25 active members


The major difference between FIFA & its world Cup competition compared other football codes however are:


1) 204 national teams took part in 3 years of qualifications (up to 20 matches) in order to qualify for the 31 available spots (South Africa qualified as Host Nation). On the other hand, n Union & in particular League World Cups, the respective international associations struggle to put together 16 competitive teams in order to hold the tournament.


2) Most amazingly, this year's World Cup will have a cumulative viewing audience of 27 billion over the 64 matches! As a result, there are billions of dollars of sponsorship & commerce money involved.

3) Sadly however, this is the exact reason why FIFA is so stubbornly reluctant to address the few major issues plighting the game! The money has made the administrators of the game too numb & too timid! The slogan "FIFA, For the good of the game" (see above) is at times nothing more than a joke in the eyes of fans worldwide!

FIFA administrators are highly skilled executives on very fat pay cheques & nothing more! They are blinded by the huge commercial appeal of football & nothing else. As a result, like many other businesses, they allow low grade cheating & lying by their stars as long as the commercial side of the game remains intact!

Yes! The play acting, cheating & diving can & must be stopped!
Yes! Technology can & must be utilised in support referees' decisions, to make match outcomes fairer & to stop cheating players influencing refereeing decisions
Yes! More of the money can & must be channeled to grass root & youth levels of the game!
Yes, Star players bulging pay packets can & must be curbed!

The above are possible despite FIFA & its executives. Whilst the administration rules over the 208 membership nations are autocratic, the shear number of members means that that FIFA will eventually have to listen to its members or diminish in stature, influence & power. The risk is that FIFA is sadly damaging the reputation of the game alongside its own whilst it remains disinterested in addressing the major issues affecting the "Beautiful Game".

Are other big club Managers jealous of Perez and Real? Will Real's strategy of shuting other big teams out of the transfer market work?

Question: Are the likes of Berlusconi (Milan), Beckenbauer (Bayern), Ferguson (Manchester Utd, Wenger (Arsenal) and Laporta (Barcelona) simply jealous of Perez and Real, or do they have a an important point to make in their criticism of Perez and his outlandish spending this season?

Question: In practical terms, is Perez doing anything different to what Abramovich has attempted to do at Chelsea, or the Arab owners of Manchester City are doing?

Question: Hasn't the practice of assembling the world best players in teh one club been attempted by other clubs as far back as mid 70s (eg Barcelona buying Cruyff and Neeskens in the 70s, and Maradona and many others in the 80s?, or Milan with their Dutch trio and other stars last decade?)

Question: Is all the commotion anything but professional jealousy?

The answer to the above questions is Yes & No!

Yes, this has been attempted many times before, most recently in case of Real in the early 200s with the Galacticos, Chelsea and Manchester City. But whilst professional jealousy certainly plays a part, it is not the only reason many people are worried about the reckless behaviour Perez and Real's Board.

Of course, every coach, and most fans would love to have the likes of Benzema, Kaka and Ronaldo playing for their team. But that is where the extent of the professional jealousy stops.

Perez is guilty of:
- Taking the "working man's game" to its ultimate breaking point
- If unsuccessful in "Buying" trophies, will once again take Real Madrid to the brink of bankruptcy
- Potentially shifting a huge amount of TV/Merchandising money from other leagues to Real, and starving smaller leagues even more than before of essential funds

What is the fun of watching football when a team "buys" its way to glory? How different is is it to match fixing in practical terms? How competitive are things when even Sir Alex Ferguson admits that Perez and his high spending strategy has made it difficult for the likes of Manchester Utd to stay competitive in the transfer market this season?

But football is a funny game, and coaches like Ferguson are clever tacticians! They will get more out of their players and will beat Real with fewer resources but more discipline.

I predict Real's success rate, considering the huge capital outlay, will in relative terms be no more than Abramovich's Chelsea have achieved so far. When/if my prediction comes true, Perez will go down in history as a typical Spanish "Madman" Club President.

The unfortunate thing is however, that he might take the Club and even the beautiful game down with him! Let's hope the game is stronger than money and the mad businessmen wasting it!

Did Bayern give Klinsman a fair chance?

Bayern sacked their coach after ten months in charge.
Jurgen Klinsman is the legendary former National Manschaft (German National Team) striker, and Germany's coach in the last WC in their home soil. He took them to the semi finals with an attractive and attacking style of play which Germany had failed to show since the early 1990s when they were the World Champions (and Klinsman was one of their main players).

Klinsman had never coached a club prior to his posting at Bayern. The ins and outs of handling a big Football Club, its internal politics and fans' expectations are not an easy task and require amongst other factors past experience in dealing with egotistic stars and impatient fans, full management support and patience and vision by the coach.

Klinsman lacked the first three, and his vision is still subject to question. At the end he lost the support and the patience of both fans and management, and according to press reports, the respect of his stars in the dressing room.

Football Clubs like Bayern are big business. Bayern turns over in excess of $800m Australian dollars a year. (Not sure if the ENTIRE sporting market of all sports in Australia would reach that figure). This makes instant gratification more than just the pleasure of playing the simple game of football. The Club's management (and Bayern is in fact privately owned) become very nervous when results are less than 100% satisfactory! Simply because 10s of millions of dollars of potential revenue are at stake.

But can Klinsman be considered more of a victim of the commercialisation of football than anything else? Given a few more years, could he have been as successful and his reign as long as the likes of Wenger and Ferguson in Arsenal and Man Utd?

Whilst the answer is probably yes, the fact remains that ultimately his inability to get results out of crucial matches in Bundesliga (and the humiliation against Barcelona in the CL) was the main reason he lost his job. Amazingly, he became a national hero at the WC in 2006 because he managed to guide Germany to produce good results in the WC matches where it counted!

During his tenure at Bayern however, the team had many opportunities to go to the top of the table, and each time failed to produce the desired result (except in case of a lucky last minute 2-1 win over Hoffenheim before the winter break and of course some good results in the Champions League (CL). In many instances Bayern naively lost their lead or lost crucial points due to tactical inability to take control of these crucial matches.

Producing results in matches that count is a very crucial component of successful coaching at this level. e.g. it's Chelsea's 0-0 at Nu Camp, or Man Utd wining 1-0 at Porto and going through.

Klinsman in recent weeks had a few of these crucial matches and lost all of them! 4-0 to Barcelona, 5-1 to Wolfsburg, and 1-0 to Schalke in his last match in charge. His record of 8 wins 2 draws and 7 losses in all competitions since the winter break was simply not good enough for a team of Bayern's status. In fact, these heavy and embarrassing losses may have irreversibly damaged the psychological advantage Bayern had established against their rivals in Bundesliga by wining the double three times in the last four years.

It would be very ironic if job of coaching Bayern next goes to the Dutchman Frank Rijkaard, as speculated by the press. Rijkaard spat at Rudy Voller in an elimination match between Germany and Holland in the WC in 1990. The referee showed both players a red card. Klinsman, without his partner Voller, Klinsman scored and single handedly won the match 2-1 for Germans. They went on to win the WC and Klinsman became a superstar!

Rijkaard won the CL and Spanish Premiera League with Barcelona a couple of years ago before falling out with star players and losing his job. He would be a great choice to replace Bayern, but only if the Management shows more support and patience. Otherwise Klinsman's faith will await him too.