Moved to WordPress

Hey all,
I've decided to move my blog to wordpress for a number of reasons. Anyways, you can now find it at www.18yards.com

The move will probably take a little while in terms of getting everything set up again but I think it will be worthwhile in the end.

Adriano - The Emperor

Just a quick post with a good Adriano compilation.

He's been out of form for quite a while now and is probably 5th in line at the Inter striker pecking order but this wasn't the case a couple of seasons ago. The tank was one of the top few players in the world for a brief period and I'm sure a lot of Inter and Brazil fans would be ecstatic to see him find that form again! What happened to him, who knows but for now, sit back and enjoy his best!


[Video length 8m26s]

UEFA Champions League Oct 3 wrap

Apart from Liverpool's lackluster match against Marseille, the rest of the fixtures for groups A,B,C and D played out as follows...

Real Madrid and Lazio battled their way to equal points and a 2-2 draw. A brace from Van Nistelrooy took the prolific striker to 56 champions league goals but Pandev had a brace of his own for Madrid. The defensive ability of the great club was brought into question yet again as they were left exposed on various occasions. They were lucky to take any points away from this trip to Italy.

AC Milan traveled to meet Celtic in Glasgow and weren't up to the task of defeating the "hoops" at home. The club with few wins in serie A of late can't even turn to their usually good performances in Europe at the moment as Celtic took all points with a 2-1 win. McManus headed in from a corner to make the score 1-0 and Milan leveled after Kaka' put away a penalty awarded for a foul on Ambrosini. Celtic made it 2-1 at the death after another Dida blunder that allowed the Aussie striker, McDonald, to slot away the rebound.

Olympiacos beat Werder Bremen, 3-1 after an amazing second-half come back to leave the German hosts with a sour taste in their mouths. Almeida was able to put away at least one of his many chances during the night to put Bremen in the lead, 1-0 but it wasn't to last as Olympiacos came back to put 3 goals away in the second half. An amazing second goal from Patsatzoglu found the back of the net with a little help from a deflection.

Schalke defeated Rosenburg 2-0 with goals from Jones and Kuranyi making a successful roadtrip. Shakhtar were also able to upset their hosts, beating Benfica 1-0 in Lisbon. Continuing the tradition of wins on the road, this time it was Benfica's league rivals, Porto, that were able to take 3 points from Besiktas in Turkey. The brilliant Quaresma waited until the 92nd minute to put the only goal of the match away.

Finally it was Chelsea that were also able to defeat their Spanish hosts proving that they're not in crisis just yet after Mourinho's departure. But it was David Villa that opened the scoring for the home side with a bit of luck allowing the ball to fall in a good position for him. Drogba combined well with Malouda, allowing the later to play the ball across the 6-yard line for Joe Cole to tap in and level the scores. Finally Drogba calmly placed a shot towards the far post and allowed Chelsea to go home 2-1 winners over Valencia.


[Video length: 4m11s]

Liverpool vs Marseille (UEFA CL)

Liverpool hosted Marseille in a game where the former failed to deliver. Liverpool seemed to be lacking inspiration and motivation but the same was not true for Marseille. The visitors controlled the match right up until they scored in the 77th minute and it was only then that Liverpool seemed to wake up and tried to pull a goal back and at least grab a point. The goal was scored by Valbuena and was perhaps the goal of the matchday. A perfectly driven strike from outside the area into the top-right corner which bounced off the cross-bar into the net and left Reina as a mere spectator.


[Video length: 1m21s]

UEFA Champions League Oct 2 wrap

As I posted earlier, Manchester United were able to seal another 1-0 result at home against Roma. A Wayne Rooney effort made the difference.

Dynamo Kyiv faced off against Sporting Lisbon with a score that ending 2-1 in favour of Lisbon. The Kyiv goal was quite spectacular with a backheal assist. This left Group F with Manchester United comfortably on top, Roma and Sporting equal on points in 2nd and 3rd respectively (goal difference helping Roma). While Kyiv sit on the bottom with no points at all and a very difficult campaign ahead of them.

Rangers played a spectacular match against Lyon and were able to brush them aside 3-0 in France for some valuable points. Very strange indeed to see Lyon so overwhelmed. Puyol scored the first goal for Barca against Stuttgart after the keeper couldn't hold on to a Ronaldinho header. The match ended 2-0 when the man of the moment, Messi, slammed home a Henry cut-back.

Robin van Persie slotted a nice goal after Adebayor performed a cut-back of his own to show he's learnt a few things from the departed Henry. The final score was 1-0 to Arsenal over Steaua Bucuresti. Sevilla defeated Slavia Praha 4-2 with Fabiano scoring some nice goals (one leaving the keeper for dead). CSKA Moscow and Fenerbahce had to settle for a 2-2 draw.

Inter were able to carry on their good form from earlier in the week where they destroyed Roma in a 4-1 drubbing. More importantly it was the form of Ibrahimovic which continues to win games for Inter, a brace from him sealed the score at 2-0. Check out the highlights for a truly spectacular finish on the second goal.

Most of the highlights through ESPN.

[Video length: 3m59s]

Extended Inter vs PSV Eindhoven goal replays.

[Video length 1m54s]

Extended Barca vs Stuttgart highlights.

[Video length 5m56s]

Extended Sevilla vs Slavia Praha highlights.

[Video length 4m25s]

Manchester United vs Roma (UEFA CL)

Manchester united have managed yet another 1-0 victory at home, this time over Roma in matchday 2 of the UEFA champions league competition.

Proving their defensive dominance, Roma was left with few chances to score and they wasted most of these chances anyway. The man of the match was Nani who was popping up everywhere, causing many headaches for Roma and created many opportunities. In fact it was Nani's pass that enabled Rooney to quickly fire a shot into the far post, just outside outside the keeper's reach. Tevez also added a real spark after coming on for Saha who had a less than memorable match.

It wasn't until the goal that Roma woke up and Spaletti started making the right changes (such as bring on Pizzaro). The best chance of the night went to Esposito who blasted what was basically a sitter out wide. A fair result that Roma shouldn't be too disappointed with (especially considering their recent record at old trafford!).

Christiano Ronaldo almost scored one of the goals of the tournament with a cheeky backheel into the back of the net, but was found just offside. He was also the victim of an unintentional elbow that caused his face to spurt out a considerable amount of blood just above his left eye and probably caused thousands of teenage girls (and a few men inclined in a certain way) to faint.

Soccer technology

Ever wondered about the amount of technology that goes into soccer? I've always known that many products have a lot of technology and research involved, from the high quality leathers and synthetics on modern shoes to the latest innovations in ball design and testing. But I decided to have a good look into these technologies starting with soccer balls.

Historically (based on references and legend), early balls ranged from human heads, stitched up cloth, animal and human skulls to pig or cow bladders! Glad that's not the case anymore!!

Before vulcanised rubber, balls were made from inflated pig bladders. This made the shape very irregular so you can imagine how hard it was to curl in a well-placed free-kick. In 1855 the first rubber soccer ball was made and we were on the path to our modern soccer balls.

Even though the English FA created the rules to the game in 1863, it wasn't until 1872 that they agree on a size for the ball and the fact that it had to be spherical! It's interesting to note that a weight was also given and that has basically remained the same until now.

In the late 1800s and early 1900s it was the type of the leather and how well it was sewn that decided the quality of the ball. As time went on, the construction of the panels allowed for a rounder ball but the problem with these leather balls was that they became water-logged and were painful to head due to the stitching. Eventually coatings and paints as well as better valves were introduced to reduce some of these problems.

In the 60s, synthetic balls were introduced but not until the 80s did they fully replace leather balls because initially they were less predictable in flight. In the 86 world cup, the "Azteca" ball was the first polyurethane ball used. It was great in the wet and very resistant to wear. The 90 WC ball was the "Etrvsco" and it introduced the black, internal neoprene foam which kept the ball water-tight.

In 94, the "Questra" had a layer of polystyrene foam that reportedly made it more water-tight, allowed greater acceleration when kicked and allowed better ball control. World cup 98 saw the famous "Tricolore" ball introduced, the first coloured ball (using the french flag's colours). It had a newer type of foam that made it even softer and faster than the Questra. The "Fevernova" was the ball of the 2002 WC finals and was made up of 11 foam layers! Apparently this was to increase the ball's accuracy when in flight. The technology reduced that amount of energy absorbed by the ball, rather it increased the rebound effect for higher velocities. The ball was small and heavy (the lower and upper FIFA limits respectively) as this made it more accurate.

It was a fast ball but was very controversial. Top players like Buffon, Rivaldo, Roberto Carlos and Edmilson criticised it. It was said that it felt too bouncy and light and it soared too far when kicked. Only Beckham has good things to say about it's accuracy but sponsorship by Adidas may have biased his opinion a tad :)

Finally 2006 saw the unveiling of the TeamGeist ball for Germany. The amazing new panel shape was designed to reduce the number of corners and panels (14 panels instead of 32 for the usual buckyball type soccer balls). The ball is rounder as there are less seams and this improves accuracy. A patented Thermal Bonding process makes the new ball almost completely waterproof with identical performance characteristics wet or dry. It's astounding that it only absorbs 0.1% of it's weight in water (compare that to FIFA's guidelines allowing a maximum of 10%!).

All of the information here was summarised from soccerballworld. Check out the site, there's much more info there (especially about the history and about the Teamgeist).

There is also info about the euro 04 ball, the "Roteiro". I found it pretty amusing because it had a statement from Beckham that read as follows...
“The most important thing for me is to know that I can rely on the ball to go exactly where I want it to go. The new Roteiro reacts very well to my foot. When I’ve helped adidas to test the Roteiro in Madrid, I’ve noticed that the accuracy of my corners, my passing and, of course, my free kicks improved from using this ball. When you’re kicking it, it even sounds better. No one has ever seen anything like this before. I think it is great to kick and it’s going to be a great ball to play with. Keepers are going to have a very tough time.”
Should've practised those penalty kicks a bit better hey Dave?

Julio Batista Wondergoal!

Check out the awesome overhead kick that finished up Real Madrid's win over Real Betis. A very cool finish with perfect technique by Julio Baptista.