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2 Sep, 2011 |
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About Me:
A follower of Los Blancos y La Furia Roja for longer than he wants to think about, Aaron finds it just as easy to love on Xabi Alonso's sweet cross field pass to Arbeloa as Redondo's sublime assist to Raúl. He splits his time between writing about post-structural philosophy and Real Madrid football- thankfully you will only find one of those categories here.
http://www.madridismo.org
My reasoning for why Sahin and Altintop aren't top loser: they didn't fall as far. Sahin is still surrounded by optimism, much like Kaka was heading into this season even though he left the previous one in a bad spot. So yes he had a miserable campaign, but it didn't damage him that much. Altintop was never going to be the hope of the team, merely a squad player, so the fact that he busted doesn't hold quite the gravity of Kaka going bottom's up.
As for Ronaldo being a loser: he won La Liga, after what felt like an eternity. Was David Villa a loser in 2010 because he didn't win the golden boot for the World Cup? One more goal and he could have been, but instead he is merely the top scorer of the reigning world champions. Ronaldo is in the same boat, he is merely the top scorer for the champions of the toughest league in the world. Golden Ball is probably a long shot, but who knows if he has a good Euro campaign? It also depends on how he opens next season's campaign, not that it should. Regardless of all that- He Is A Winner.
Yeah Adan probably should have been on the winners list, maybe the only player that can really say they had a good game besides Albiol.
Maybe it is just me being bias, but I think Adan should move on since he is clearly good enough; it is like another Diego Lopez situation. It would be fantastic to have him stay, but besides the CDR, I simply can't see him getting any playing time. He can't wait in iker's shadow forever and I always want to see a fellow keeper achieve success.
Campeones Campeones! Cibeles will be happening tomorrow so keep an eye out for the video feed, unless you happen to be in Madrid and then I am super jealous!
Just to respond to the more interesting talking points:Marcelo's side may have been the weakest, but I blame the cb's for not dealing with the space more effectively. Navas, for the caliber of player he is, had a quiet night attacking our left wing in my opinion.
I agree that di Maria has been poor since returning from his injury, but I am usually overly harsh on him so perhaps I am just trying to take it easy on the lad given he is still in the recovering form period of post-injury. Definitely agree that he could have been the game changer against Bayern otherwise.
Technically we lost to Bayern once within two weeks and lost to us once, Barca has had success against us in the past, but it has been fairly even in most matches against our eternal rivals. Even 5-0 was more a result of them running up the score as we desperately sought a way back into the game then just pure domination. The only reason Guardiola's term had so many Barca wins over Madrid is because of luck... and a little bit of referee manipulation.
I can't think of anything else more fitting than this: HALA MADRID!
I think Mou messed up the psychology of that second half. Granted this is hindsight and all, but our team just shut down in that second half and let Bayern run rampant.
The real unfortunate part is that Bayern has largely given up on their league title hopes, while we, obviously, have a huge match on the weekend. So expect us to enter the second leg drained and them to be energized. That still isn't enough to doom us though, just makes our chances a bit slimmer.
I've got to agree with GamingX here, I don't think any of those players are coming here. Mata has the most possibility, if Kaka leaves and Chelsea's new coach looks to erase some of the mark of AVB, but that's unlikely. Munian really would cost 40+ and given the youth of entire squad I am not sold on needing to buy young at this point. Parejo doesn't really fit into our side honestly and if he does turn into a top class player then I'd rather buy him later and spend a bit more.
Barring any outrageous moves, I think we will be seeing one box-to-box center mid come in and one right fullback. Javi Martinez from Athletico Bilbao is the obvious choice from the former and the later is a bit of a question mark in my mind.
About Guaita and why he didn't make the winners list: 1) I really don't like to single out opposition players for praise on the winners list and 2) Many of his saves were a result of poor shots more than anything. Sometimes a keeper just has a superhuman game and sometimes the opposition conspires to make him seem superhuman- I think things were closer to the latter than the former.
Pepe makes the loser's list because I have a romanticized view of football and that kind of behavior categorically makes someone a loser in my eyes. If all I cared about was winning then I would have been a Barca fan these last couple years. That said, I will agree that I thought Pepe had a good gaming in the sporting sense.
In defense of Benzema, he put up a decent shot and failed to put away a difficult rebound. That is more than you can say about just about everyone else on the team... Keep faith though, remember the midweek clash is against our most dedicated whipping boys; and Atletico is coming off an even worse game than we just had.
I don't think Higuain is going to leave, but if he did then Llorente is my choice just because he offers such a fundamentally different tactical ability than our other striking options. I don't think the Bilbao lad is in the same mold as Higuain though; if anything I would say he would be our next Morientes.
I think we are much more likely to see someone new in the midfield or right fullback position come next season.
Well Gaëlle, the thing about Ronaldo and penalties that often gets lost in the shuffle is that he is incredibly consistent in them. In his pre-Madrid days he had some issues, but I believe he might even hold the La Liga record for most consecutive successful penalty kicks... don't quote me there though.
As for the continued discussion of Altintop- he came in to be a utility player and he is supposed to be a competent squad member. Sure he hasn't had a consistent run out in one position, but he is experienced enough to know what to do in a couple different situations. He obviously has some technical skills with the ball at his feet, but he lacks physicality, positioning, and his passing is far from crisp. Mourinho likes him though so he continues to get play time... I just don't understand it.
Well Gaëlle, the thing about Ronaldo and penalties that often gets lost in the shuffle is that he is incredibly consistent in them. In his pre-Madrid days he had some issues, but I believe he might even hold the La Liga record for most consecutive successful penalty kicks... don't quote me there though.
As for the continued discussion of Altintop- he came in to be a utility player and he is supposed to be a competent squad member. Sure he hasn't had a consistent run out in one position, but he is experienced enough to know what to do in a couple different situations. He obviously has some technical skills with the ball at his feet, but he lacks physicality, positioning, and his passing is far from crisp. Mourinho likes him though so he continues to get play time... I just don't understand it.
Awesome stuff! I love the Peña tradition/community and getting to read about one in English is a huge plus. My Spanish isn't terrible, but I always get the sense that I am missing something in the translation so a hearty thank you from one madridista to another!
Fair enough, I have always been upfront that I have the preconceived notion that Hamit is not good enough to push a player like Granero out of the rotation and thus not good enough for this squad. He has had 500 minutes and I can count on one finger the number of times he has impressed. Compare that to Granero and it doesn't look good. Kaka may not be WPOTY anymore (and I am not his biggest fan) but he has at least turned in some positive performances.
Iker has always been a bit of a shouter in my opinion, but I have got no problem with that. Iker is the captain of the side and it is his job to get in everyone's ears when things don't go right. Nothing new there in terms of Iker or football in general. It all boils down to his poor distribution and I hope he pays attention and starts trying to play simpler balls to help our possession.
My girlfriend strongly agrees to the comment re: Arbeloa's abs.
You know I woke up this morning and thought... how crazy would it be if Mou started Sahin.
Poor Albiol, he truly has turned into the invisible man... I still have faith in Raul!
I didn't want to include this in the actual article since I tried to avoid editorializing and just stay as objective as possible; but I do think it is a bit disappointing that Pique was able to avoid any punishment for claiming an official was guilty of conspiring against Barcelona... I could say more but I think I will just leave it at that.
Agent, you shouldn't be too worried about that ever coming to pass. Real Madrid isn't for sale because Madrid is a not for profit owned by no one. Well in a way it is owned, literally, by the supporters, but Real Madrid socios are not stock holders. It is kind of tough to be bought when it is impossible for anyone to sell you or buy you ;).
Quality article. A dangerous pitfall, that must be addressed, is what the infusion of cash into individual clubs does. When a team like Manchester City, PSG, or Chelsea gets the oil money, they go on shopping sprees which helps out smaller clubs in the short run since a lot of the players bought come from feeder teams.
In the long run though, it pushes up the wage bills. Now I have read enough Marx to think that the players like Cristiano that are bringing in euros by the tens of millions deserve a nice piece of the pie, but teams like Zaragoza are spending 70% of their income on wages. That isn't sustainable and teams are going to collapse trying to spend outside their means just to stay in the first division, never mind win anything at all.
I know the main push of this article is about Arab culture getting a positive outlet into the European (and global) attention span, but there is a really interesting financial issue as well. Let me also say that for every Manc City there is a Getafe, that spends modestly and provides the kind of thing that La Liga could really do with more of- steady financial backing.
Of course this all sounds very hypocritical coming from a Real Madrid supporter, but paradoxically a couple big teams in each league don't really exacerbate this issue since it i like a stable ecosystem. It is when you decide that it would be really cool to throw in a pterodactyl that things get thrown out of balance.
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