Village Idiot

FM legend Kennedy Barkisomethinglu actually having a pretty good game for Racing, unlucky not to score tonight.

Meanwhile in La Liga Racing - Hércules isn't turning into a footballing feast. Quelle surprise.

Wonder what they would do if Man City had both Kolarov and Dani Alves on the pitch. That'd essentially be a 2-6-2 formation.

Didn't Balotelli and Boateng already get in a fight during training?

I admit I'm starting to like Everton on the sole basis of thinking Niel is a nice guy. Plus I love Bill Hicks.

Strange as the fans were singing his name during the latter part of the yestedays game. The Madrid press usually follow the fans viewpoint via the club who feed the papers. Other way around actually. Madrid press has always tried to direct fan opinion. They are mostly focusing on his style and the bad reputation he's bringing to the club. Nobody calling for his sack or anything (would be mental even for them).

Madrid press starting to turn on Mou, As and Marca running several editorials against him today. The circus is on.

Spain before 2008. We have never had a crop of players like the current ones though. Not even when we had Puskas, Kubala and Di Stefano all playing for Spain

If they don't screw it up Belgium should be fun to watch in the upcoming WCs/Euros.

I thought so. I often notice this season he seems to be spending a lot of time deep in midfield, often alongside Xavi and Iniesta, and couldn't quite remember if that had happened as much last season. I guess replacing Zlatan with Villa has made that switch easier, Ibra seemed to want to spend time on the ball and do a lot of the work that Messi is at the moment. The system seems to be functioning well at the moment though, rather than relying on Messi for his goals you're having him assist the others and spread the goals around well. It's a beautiful machine right now, even better to watch than the 08/09 team. It certainly is. We did look a one-man team last season from March onwards but right now everybody is chipping in and you feel a goal can come from almost anywhere. The challenge is keeping this up until the business end. We'll see, but so far I'm having the time of my life watching football.

Yes, he plays deeper. Guardiola is deploying him as striker, but he usually tracks back to sit in the hole - dragging the centrebacks with him - while Villa/Pedro make runs into the box. He's playing the role Zlatan was meant to do, actually, with a couple less feet. Striker-playmaker.

He's playing a dangerous game, but he's always been adept at playing everyone around him. As long as he brings results he won't be sacked, but he's making it so if he ever struggles there won't be an eyelid batted. He seems to firmly have all the players not named Canales, Benzema and Pedro León at his side, which I guess it's what matters and why he's doing all this. Completely unrelated, but have you seen this? http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2010%E2%80%9311_La_Liga#cite_note-20 Marca has awared Pepe's goal from earlier in the season to Cristiano Ronaldo, keeping him ahead of Messi for the Pichichi. You'd never guess Marca was a Madrid paper, eh. Yeah, I knew that. Official La Liga records gave it to Pepe, but since Marca awards the pichichi...

He's playing a dangerous game, but he's always been adept at playing everyone around him. As long as he brings results he won't be sacked, but he's making it so if he ever struggles there won't be an eyelid batted. He seems to firmly have all the players not named Canales, Benzema and Pedro León at his side, which I guess it's what matters and why he's doing all this.

"Sport" linking us to Neves Denilson today

Marca speculating that he's trying to oust Jorge Valdano (Madrid's DoF). They are known to despise each other. Real Madrid politics

Benzema looks useless at this point, and if Higuaín ends up being laid off for a couple months they could get in trouble.

Heh, Mou hit out at Florentino in the ensuing press conference. Playing with fire, there. Said he doesn't feel supported enough by the board against "wrong" referee decisions and wants to meet with the president.

Man, Mourinho is a great manager, but managing the club with the highest turnover in the football world isn't in any shape or form his "hardest test". They were just a goal at the Camp Nou away from winning the league last season.

In La Liga the kind of mindgames he practises are pretty unheard of. Most managers are expected to be classy and squeaky clean, so he's drawing quite the attention on himself, and he's even being investigated under the government's antio-violence in sport commission (something that he will undoubtly use to get more 'us against them' rethoric). Never seen Madrid being so badly received in away ground across Spain. But it works for him I guess But if he doesn't get trophies he will be sacked. The Real Madrid board *hates* the kind of PR he's drawing on the club. And Madrid's DoF is known to despise him.

Couple weeks at home. They will have a quite hard finish to the season. All of Valencia, Sevilla and Villareal away inside the last 6 weeks.

Oh yes, he's been doing it all season, fortress mentality.

Got used to it these past two years. I'll be fine.

Yet they won and are still only two points behind. Everything counts the same.

This game is just too funny.

Looks like if we win this, it'll have to be with 100 points.