Footy: Lock, Stock & Barrel

Here are some pictures of footballers when they were young. I want you to identify EACH one of them and CONNECT them to one FINAL answer.

The first picture is the "Innocent Victims" memorial in Harrods

Second is the club mascot - Billy the Badger and Fulham Fc players

Third is Craven Cottage

Fourth is Dodi Al Fayed


The answer is Mohamed Al-Fayed - the owner of Harrods & Fulham F.C and father to Dodi.





Congrats Mr. Mouli for a quick and perfect answer. You are guest blogger for this week! Post away!

1. It has been a season for DEFENDERS. The top 5 clubs share the most number of clean sheets. A whopping 59. (Vidic for PFA)

2. The title race is between 4 clubs and not the usual 2 - Manchester United & Chelsea. Liverpool & Villa entering the foray.

3. The bottom 8 clubs are separated by an average of 2 points.

4. Aston Villa's brilliant run. They have earned 16 points from a maximum of 18. Villa are behind United, who have won the last 6 games.

5. Tim Cahill's "mind blasting" headers

6. Rafa's "crazy" rant/s

7. Hull City's flash in the pan act. Started off brilliant but now have lost the last 6 matches.

8. "The other club" in Manchester's spanking rich owner(s) who have spent close to 80 million pounds in player transfers so far (and had a 100 million pound bid for Kaka rejected)

9. Roman Abramovich losing close to 12 BILLION pounds in the global crisis.

10. Van der Sar & Manutd's clean sheet record.

Prize - guest blogger. Since Ankur & me have exams, we've posted less. However, keep visiting!

Here's the answer for last week's question:

David Beckham's sons' names : Brooklyn, Romeo & Cruz'

The 1st picture is the Brooklyn bridge
The 2nd one is William Shakespeare, the author of Romeo & Juliet
The 3rd is Penelope CRUZ

Slightly absurd question, nonetheless a good one!

The right answer was given by Ankur Johar, who will be guest blogger for a week and will be giving me his inputs.


INJURIES - GOOD NEWS AND BAD NEWS

First, the good news... Sir Alex Ferguson says Anderson could be back in action inside a month after injuring his ankle against Derby County.

"We sent Anderson for a scan and there’s no break," Sir Alex told us today. "But there was some ligament damage. We think he’ll be out for three weeks."

Now, the bad news... ten players will miss the Tottenham match tomorrow.

"The ones who are out [for the Spurs game] are Rio Ferdinand, Anderson, Nani, Rafael, Patrice Evra, Wayne Rooney, Wes Brown, Jonny Evans, Ji-sung Park and Owen Hargreaves. Nani suffered a groin injury and he’ll be out for a week. Jonny Evans [ankle] will be out for three weeks.

"We still have Dimitar Berbatov, Carlos Tevez and Cristiano Ronaldo fit. But we will have to call on some young players. I’ve called in Richard Eckersley and Fabio [da Silva], who could be involved."

Source: manutd.com

Manutd's emphatic win against Derby County (4-2) in the Carling Cup semi-final yesterday came at an expensive price. Injuries to Anderson ( who was stretchered off at the final whistle), Rafael (torn hamstring), and Evans (ankle) has increased the casualty list in the already stretched United squad.
Nani, Gary Neville and Ryan Giggs also failed to complete the 90 minutes but are not thought to have picked up any serious problems.

Praise needs to be extended to the young maestros in the squad, specially Anderson, Rafael and Evans who performed brilliantly yesterday. Neat one-twos, crisp passing and good attacking foray dominated United's game.
United opened the scoring when Nani thumped an unstoppable brilliant 25-yard angled drive past Carroll. The ex-Manutd flop made some good saves and helped Derby from further embarrassment. Manutd dominated the first half with 3 goals on the score sheet. Derby came back fighting in the 2nd half and put up a resilient stance and managed to score 2 goals. United won a penalty at the 87th minute and Ronaldo made no mistake in converting it. The game ended at 4-2 and United move on to the finals where they face either Spurs or Burnley at Wembley. Zoran Tosic who was tipped by Phelan to start, did not make an appearance.


The only (growing) problem for United at the moment seems to be injuries. Rio Ferdinand, Patrice Evra, Wes Brown, Wayne Rooney, Anderson, Rafael, Owen Hargreaves & Evans have all long term injuries. The defence department seems to be hit the most. Fergie will have a tough time choosing his back four. Fletcher could be the make-shift right back and Fabio could make his debut at left back, with O'Shea and Vidic at the centre. Gary Neville is a doubt.

Goal scorers for the Carling Cup semi final :

Manutd : Nani, O'Shea, Tevez & Ronaldo
Derby : Barnes (2)

First quiz of the week

This is essentially a CONNECT. You have to connect the images given below and arrive at one answer. I have only one answer in my mind, however if you have an answer that really makes sense I'll accept it. The winner gets to post whatever he/she likes and will be made guest blogger for a week.

Please leave your answers in the comments. I will post the answer after 2 days and obviously, it is football related! Rack 'em brains!

CONNECT

And please give me an EXPLANATION behind your guess/answer

When you're talking about a 100 million pounds and 500,000 pounds a week, money is really not a problem for the likes of Mansour bin Zayed Al Nahyan

For a man who is worth over 12 billion pounds, 100 million pounds is peanuts. Man City was taken over from this man in September 2008 and look where they stand in the tables - A mere 11th. 10 places above their neighbours and top of the table. Money won't buy anyone laurels, not players, not history.

Kaka is a footballer's footballer. It is the likes of Kaka, Paul Scholes, and Messi that football is not yet a past time investment for obscenely rich people like Abramovich and Sheikh Mansour. Imagine turning down 500, 000 pounds a week? That's 4 crore rupees a WEEK! Anyhow, football is emancipated and Kaka is the Messiah!

Screw you Robinho, Bellamy and Bridge!

Btw, latest news - Kaka has denied a move to Man city. Deal over.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/sport2/hi/football/teams/m/man_city/7838966.stm


For other (great) news :

Monday, 19th Jan
Liverpool were held at Anfield by Everton (1-1) and are sitting at 2nd with United having a cushion of a two goal lead and a game in hand.

Goal scorers - Steven Gerrard (68th min) for Liverpool
Tim Cahill (87th min) for Everton

Benitez must be sweating, what with all the ranting and "mind games" he is playing with SAF. Liverpool haven't won since his outburst, mind you.

To make a few things clear - I'm a die hard Manutd fan and NO I'm not a glory hunter. I've been supporting Manutd for as long as I can remember (around 7 years. EPL wasn't telecast live then!)

A majority of my posts will involve Manutd, but not ALL. I'll try my best and be as unbiased as possible. My other favourite clubs are Real Madrid & A.C.Milan (I'd hate to see Kaka go) My favourite players are Paul Scholes, Wayne Rooney & Steven Gerrard (if only he was not a Scouser) & my favourite players WERE Eric Cantona, Jaap Stam, Peter Schmeichel, Dennis Bergkamp & David Beckham!

I'd like to kick start my footy blog with some brilliant quotes from 2008 :

"It was the 95th minute of their usual seven minutes of injury time."
- Sir Alex Ferguson was not bitter about Arsenal's late-late equaliser against Aston Villa.

"It will be a once-in-a-lifetime experience that doesn't come along that often."
Steve McClaren got a bit over-excited after FC Twente drew Arsenal in the Champions League.

"Aston Villa! What suburb of Rome is Aston Villa from?!"
Actor Tom Hanks revealed he was a Villan at heart.

"I don't know what state of mind his body's in."
Jamie Redknapp's verdict on Stoke's Ricardo Fuller.

"Ashley Cole is getting a good deal of stick, but you would expect that when you're playing away from home."
Match of the Day commentator Steve Wilson during the Pompey-Chelsea game.

"I wouldn't trust some of these people to walk my dog."
Roy Keane has the final word on TV pundits.

"That free-kick was so wide it nearly hit my car."
Paul Merson on Soccer Saturday about Middlesbrough

"Dirk Kuyt is earning himself the reputation as Anfield's Prince Harry - in the frontline for three months and no-one knows anything about it."
Sun journalist Phil Thomas on Liverpool's non-flying Dutchman.

"Charles dreamt I had an affair with Steve Coppell. I said to him, 'Thanks a lot! You might have made it Mourinho!'"
Cooking goddess Nigella Lawson reveals who hubby Charles Saatchi thinks is the man of her dreams.

"I am sure we will see pictures of Sam in his Speedos walking along a beach somewhere. That won't be a pretty sight."
Wigan manager Steve Bruce was keen for Allardyce to get another job asap.

TWO reasons for me making this blog :

1 - Lack of good football blogs that discuss actual football

2 - My fanatacism (don't know if the word exists) for football!

I'll be giving my two cents about football and I'll try and post regular footy quizzes. So, if you have some good articles, videos, pictures, questions to share please mail them to me at bvnl2005@gmail.com or bvnlo@hotmail.com

My first post will follow shortly......