Fútbol – Noticias hoy y resultados de Liga, Champions

One of the mouth watering prospects in store for football fans, when the Premier League returns after an International break, is a Merseyside derby between Everton and Liverpool.

Goodison Park will be the venue of a lunch-time kick off on Sunday in what promises to be an explosive match between two sides looking to prove themselves, after indifferent starts to their Premiership campaigns.

Coincidentally, both teams languishing near the bottom of the table, have six points each after seven matches. With new ownership looming for the Reds, Roy Hodgson will be keen to underline his managerial skills with a win. Especially after fans chanted for his removal in the Reds’ 2-1 home loss to Blackpool.

In some bad news for Liverpool (other than the off-field wrangles at Anfield), Dirk Kuyt is sidelined ahead of Sunday’s game, owing to an injury sustained by the striker in Holland’s Euro qualifier with Sweden on Tuesday, a match that the Dutch won convincingly. It could be a month before Kuyt returns to action.

But Hodgson will take cheer from Torres’ return to the team after the Spanish striker showed signs of recovery from an abductor strain.

Steven Gerrard, as ever, will the key man, and Hodgson will look for an inspired performance from the England midfielder in what is a must-win for the Anfield squad.

Everton on their part have injury worries too, with the sidelining of Victor Anichebe, Steven Pienaar, Louis Saha and Jack Rodwell. Manager David Moyes will hope that home advantage inspires the Blues to bank three points from the game, and move up the points table.

The Toffees will look to Tim Cahill to provide the momentum, even as the Reds are set to miss the services of Daniel Agger, Fabio Aurelio and Paul Konchesky due to injury.

The following players were in Everton starting eleven in their 2-0 win against Birmingham, on October 2: Tim Howard, Phil Neville, Sylvain Distin, Philip Jagielka, Leighton Baines, Seamus Coleman, Marouane Fellaini, Mikel Arteta, Leon Osman, Tim Cahill, Yakubu.

The substitutes for the match were: Barkley, Jermaine Bedford, Diniyar Bilyaletdinov, John Heitinga, Magaye Gueye, Tony Hibbert, Jan Mucha.

Liverpool included the following players in their last league match against Blackpool, a match that the Reds lost 2-1: Jose Manuel (Pepe) Reina, Glen Johnson, Sotiros Kyrgiakos, Martin Skrtel, Jamie Carragher, Christian Poulsen, Raul Meireles, Dirk Kuyt, Steven Gerrard, Joe Cole, Fernando Torres.

The substitutes were: Milan Jovanovic, Lucas, David Ngog, Jay Spearing, Martin Kelly, Maxi Rodriguez, Brad Jones.

Outright Odds: 10/1

Group E Winners: 10/11

Italy are the grand masters of heart-breaking tragedy when it comes to major finals. In all three World Cups held in the 1990s, the Italians bowed out on penalties, including Roberto Baggio’s infamous miss against Brazil in the 1994 final.

They don’t fare a lot better in Europe either. With Euro 2000 in the bag, opponents France equalised four minutes into injury time and went on to win, while Euro 2004 saw Italy bow out in the group stage when Sweden and Denmark drew 2-2, the only result which would send both teams through at the Italians’ expense.

Italy have made failure when it matters the most an art form and are likely to provide plenty of high drama at this summer’s finals. However, they tend to bring it upon themselves more often than not.

In a move that would make wheeler-dealer manager Barry Fry proud, Italy coach Marcelo Lippi used an incredible 36 players in qualifying so it is arguable he has not yet found his best starting eleven. Howeever, after 10 qualifying matches in which no player appeared in more than eight matches, Italy may not have the stability to see them triumph in Germany.

Italy are notorious slow starters in major finals which will not help matters in what is potentially the toughest of all the groups. In qualifying they lost an early match in Slovenia and could come unstuck against unknown quantity Ghana in their opening match.

Following a minor blip in qualifying the Italians remained unbeaten for the rest of the campaign, proving they are solid if not spectacular and topped the group by five points. There is no value in them winning Group E at 10/11 or qualifying from it at heavy odds-on but given their history of being «there or thereabouts» they are likely to secure a spot in the last 16.

Their success will come from a watertight defence marshalled by Fabio Cannavaro, who missed the embarrassing defeat to South Korea in the 2002 finals and Alessandro Nesta.

Lippi also has a headache in who to play in attack. Veterans Alessandro Del Piero and Christian Vieri may give way to AC Milan’s Alberto Gilardino and Luca Toni of Fiorentina, who netted four goals in eight qualifying matches. Real Madrid’s Antonio Cassano is another option.

Recommended Bet:

An unpredictable line-up and a history of doing «just enough» to progress through the tournament rather than winning in style means there is more value in opposing Italy than backing them at odds-on to win the group or qualify from it. Their final match against the Czech Republic could end all square if a point is all that’s required for both sides to make the last 16.

Italy vs Czech Republic draw @ 11/5

Peter Schmeichel was born on November 18, 1963 in Gladsaxe, Denmark. He retired from playing football in April 2003.

Schmeichel is Denmark’s most capped player, with 129, retiring from international football in April 2001. At his peak he was arguably the world’s best goalkeeper. A charismatic keeper with presence and excellent shot-stopping skills, Schmeichel was one of the key members of the Danish national team which won Euro Cup 1992. He also represented his country at Euro Cup 1996, World Cup 1998 and Euro Cup 2000.

Schmeichel’s first played professionally for Hvidovre IF. He subsequently signed for Brondby. Manchester United bought him in 1991 for 550,000 pounds and he played for them for the most part of his career which he enjoyed great success. With United, Schmeichel won 5 FA Premier League titles, 3 FA Cups, the UEFA Champions League, and a League Cup. Well known for frequently shouting at defenders, especially Steve Bruce, although the two remain firm friends till now.

Peter Schmeichel’s finest moment came in 1999, when he won the Treble (the Premier League title, FA Cup and Champions League), while captaining the team in the Champions League final on May 26, 1999 against Bayern Munich, which turns out to be his last game for the club. Schmeichel later moved to Sporting Lisbon, where he won the Portuguese league title in 1999/2000, then returned to the Premiership to Aston Villa in 2001/2. His last season was for Manchester City during the 2002/3 season.

He has a son, Kasper Schmeichel, who also plays as goalkeeper for Manchester City and was called up for the Danish U-19 squad in August 2003. Today Peter has a career working as a pundit for the BBC.

As you probably know, soccer is the most played, watched and televised sport in the history of mankind. According to FIFA (Federation Internationale de Football Association) there are currently 270 million people that are actively involved in the game of football. (That is about 4% of the world population) So why has this sport become such a grand interest for me and people alike? What is the history behind this widely spectated event?

Soccer which is referred as «football association» in Wikipedia is a sport that has roots dating back to the 2nd and 3rd century. The earliest form is said to have originated in China; a game called «cuju». FIFA, the governing body of football, officially stated that China was the birthplace of its game in 2004.

In the latter decades, many other forms of the sport have been spotted in other regions of the world, such as «Harpastum» (Roman), «Kemari» (Japan), and «Knattleikr». (Iceland) These games were of course a lot different from what modern football is all about. It was not until the 19th century that various forms of football became somewhat an organized event played mostly by prestigious public schools in England. There was much improvement in the course of the sport when Thomas Arnold (head of the ‘Rugby School’ helped to establish the first standardized rules of Rugby.

In Rugby, they allowed players to kick opponents legs below the knees (which was banned in the later years), handling the ball was also permitted. Following this development, football and rugby split on December, 1863. The modern game of football was born in England with the formation of the F.A. (Football Association) which is the governing body of football in England. Ebenezer Cobb Morley was a founding member of the Football Association in which he stressed out the importance of a governing body for football. After the F.A. was established he laid down the «Laws of football» that implemented the rules the game is played today. On January 9th, 1864, the first exhibition football game was played at the Battersea Park. In only eight years, the F.A. had 50 member clubs and grew rapidly allowing a competition to emerge in 1972. The F.A. Cup is the first football competition and in England regarded as the most prestigious one. The ‘Wanderers’ were the first team to win the cup, beating the ‘Royal Engineers’ 1-0.

Football popularized slowly in other countries with the help of British influence. It was not until 1889, other countries (Netherlands and Denmark) would embrace this wonderful game. Football started growing rapidly with the following countries; New Zealand (1891), Argentina (1893), Chile, Switzerland, Belgium (1895), Italy (1898), Germany, Uruguay (1900), and Hungary (1901) adopting football associations of their own.

In 1904, FIFA (Federation Internationale de Football Association) was formed in Paris to regulate international fixtures and there were seven founding members (France, Belgium, Denmark, the Netherlands, Spain, Sweden and Switzerland). The first international football competition was introduced at the 1908 London Summer Olympics with Great Britain winning gold, Denmark silver and the Netherlands bronze. The emergence of World War I (1914-1918) and World War II (1939-1945) brought the growing sport to a halt resuming years after the war. By 1950, FIFA had 51 member countries. Before the creation of the World Cup (the most prestigious football competition), FIFA organized a football competition within the Summer Olympics. In 1930, FIFA would manage their own tournament in Uruguay; the host nation to be the first football team to have won the cup that would be the most spectated than any other professional tournament today.

Football today, is a much growing sport with 208 national teams recognized by FIFA, in addition there are thousands of club teams competing with each other in various leagues and cups for global dominance. The sport has become an addiction for many people around the world, helping nations and people get together as they cheer their team away hoping one day, their team will bring home a trophy. The future of football always has room for improvement and hopefully will grow interest in the U.S. as elsewhere. «Fair-play» is the name of the game.