Starting Eleven European, World Soccer Blog Random Thoughts:

Mr. Tevez married up

Here's another edition of Random Thoughts; no I don't have anything else to write about. Deal with it.

• Um Carlos Tevez, please go away. Go play in Brazil. Go play in Italy. Go play in Argentina. Go play with yourself. You've become tiresome and a punchline. Your wife and kids don't like England, then make a call for chrissakes. Tell them to stay put in Argentina and cash the direct-deposits, or suck it up and move to Europe. Otherwise, I'm pretty much done with your whining. Play ball, score goals, make money and shut up. KTHXBYE.
• And as for you Neymar. Call me when you've done something. Is there a bigger bust in the making than this Brazilian wonder boy? the kid might have all the skills necessary to be Brazil's next No. 10, but his runaway ego and immaturity will retard all progress until he gets his requisite reality check. Get in line next to Mr. Tevez and shut up.
• How hilarious is Mario Balotelli's attempted backheel goal this weekend against the LA Galaxy. Talk about arrogance. Talk about stupidity. Talk about blatant disregard for your opponent and the people in the stands who paid good money to see your team play. And don't tell me he's just 20 and can be forgiven. No way. Roberto Mancini is my new hero for pulling this Rhodes Scholar seconds after this example of the worst kind of grandstanding. Sit down next to Tevez and Neymar and shut up; don't give Mancini lip either. You were wrong. Next.
• Hope Solo is apparently going to win my informal poll--top right--about the Women's World Cup's biggest star. I like Hope. I think Hope is America's best female keeper. But Abby Wambach, who is currently second in the poll, is the best player on that team and delivered when it mattered most. That's what stars do. Abby made her PKs. Abby scored every time the U.S. needed a goal. That's a leader. That's a legend. Hope has some catching up to do.
• Selfish time: Sporting Clube de Portugal has thrown in the towel and abandoned its philosophy of going with home-grown, young talent and has gone out and signed a truckload of foreign players to play for new coach Domingos Pacienca. They've scored a bunch of goals against a bunch of bad teams. They had their way with Juventus Saturday in Toronto. They're a threat for second in Portugal. What? Wait? I said this last year too after they blasted their way through the preseason and won that cockamamie tournament here in the U.S. Fool me once, shame on you, fool me twice, shame on me. Check in with me around Christmas time on just exactly who is the fool.
• I love the summer friendly season here in the U.S.; look at who's on tour right now in the continental 48 and Canada: Real Madrid; Manchester United; Manchester City; Juventus; Sporting; Clube America; CD Guadalajara; and Barcelona. Best part is that these teams are banging out stadiums across the country; big stadiums too. More than 50,000 for Revs-United; Philly-Real Madrid drew huge numbers as did Galaxy-Madrid. Don't tell me there isn't a hardcore soccer audience in America. We'll come for a good product. Listening MLS? Get off the franchise model; build your clubs stadiums; get on the world calendar; get rid of playoffs; integrate all your smaller leagues and create relegation and promotion. Do it.
• In breaking news: FIFA is still corrupt. ...I personally cannot wait for next summer's Euro. It's better than the World Cup, just sayin ... How much is ESPN going to hype Saturday's ManU-Barca friendly as a Champions League rematch, and how much are real football fans going to snicker ...  That said, if I had a ticket, I wouldn't toss it out of bed ...  The U17 World Cup was pretty awesome; I just may have to watch some of the U20 World Cup coming up ... Kinda pissed Copa America wasn't available on my cable network ...  Let's take a run at this: Champions of European leagues for 2011-2012: England - ManU; Spain - Barcelona; Portugal - Porto; Germany - Leverkusen; Italy - Milan. Damn that looks familiar.

Mailbag Meandering on Tevez Ruling,South Africa World Cup, Mourinho and More

I've been rude. Like single dudes who live alone and infrequently receive guests, I don't get many comments on my posts. But to those who do take the time to leave thoughtful--even thoughtless--comments, I should do better to acknowledge them.

So in a shameless attempt to encourage more correspondence with this space, I'm going to open the mailbag this morning and share some of the better comments and attempt to answer each with some analysis, thought and wit.

Here goes:

9lives wrote in response to West Ham, Carlos Tevez Ruling a Dangerous Precedent:

Well written article. I take the viewpoint that the initial ruling was wrong, that a club who broke the rules should have been deducted points. Middlesbrough called off a game about 11 years ago because they had a depleted squad through illness. They were punished with a 3 point deduction that contributed to their relegation. One cannot of course state with any degree of accuracy that a player contributed any more than his potential replacement might have. But that's why rules are there; to maintain an equal playing field and a degree of fairness.
With regards to Atwell's shocking decision last weekend, it's accepted that these decisions even themselves out over the season. All we can do is accept that flawed logic. The Sheffield United case is different - they never had the opportunity to "even" the playing field by recruiting a player who was not entitled to play for them. Cheers.

Reply: Funny how the experts trotted out before Lord Griffiths couldn't manage to keep their own teams afloat as managers; whatcha say Graham Taylor and Frank Clark? As for my writing, me mum was big on penmanship.

Anonymous wrote in response to Unrest Around 2010 World Cup in South Africa Mounts After President Resigns:

The fact is that SA has its fair share of issues to overcome - but the country is about far more than the sum of its problems. SA is still the closest any African country will get, in a comparison to 1st world hosts. The importance of bringing an event like this to Africa is not so much about providing a spectacle for rich countries, but about providing sustained upliftment for a society whose largest problems can all be traced back to poverty. Whatever the cause of that poverty, the fact is that the only way out of it is forward movement, not retrospection and nay-saying.
So you might need to take a little longer to get to your game - but think about the guy who had to drive you there, his family and his children. Think about the fact that he will be earning a living because of you.
Isn't it maybe worthwhile putting the good of a nation, and it's people before your personal schedule? It is easy to stand on the fringe and criticize, rather show your support for a collective effort and commit to attending the event.

Reply: True, this is a character boost for South Africa, and if the tournament goes off without a hitch, likely it would spur a spike in tourism and bump the economy a bit. But let's inject a bit of realism via rhetorical questions here: Is the World Cup going to solve South Africa's poverty crisis? Or crime? No one wants to yank the World Cup away for the sake of doing it; no one! But isn't a just black eye to the country if the infrastructure isn't ready and organization is a shambles?
As for me getting to the games on time, I'll be plopped on my couch watching the matches -- unless of course you're offering to bring me over. I accept...

Jonathan Wallace wrote in response to: Mourinho: Master Manipulator, Master Manager, Masterful

Exactly! Its nice to see someone else appreciate him for what he represents. Unbridled confidence. If more people possessed it, the world would be a better place for it.

Reply: I'll say it again, Mourinho is a manager of men, and not necessarily always his own. He's picking scraps with guys from clubs big and small; Juventus' Claudio Ranieri was his latest target. Apparently, Jose doesn't think Ranieri speaks the English too good. Classic.
And no, Jonathan Wallace is not my brother, father, nor is he my uncle.

And finally, Aravind responds to Starting Eleven Football Blog Roundup:

Pretty impressive collection of blog posts. Well done dude. I'm subscribing.

Reply: Awesome Aravind; consider yourself an army of one. And no, Aravind is not my brother, father, nor is he my uncle.

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West Ham, Carlos Tevez Rulinga Dangerous Precedent

Other things Carlos Tevez is responsible for:

Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac, Goldman Sachs, AIG, cicadas, Hurricane Ike and this nasty scratch on my arm.

If he's the sole reason Sheffield United was relegated, then surely, he's the reason all those oil refineries shut down in the Gulf of Mexico and gasoline hovers near $3.75 a gallon where I live. It's his fault my 401K is shit and why hundreds of bean counters are collecting unemployment today.

Surely it's his fault. Just ask the geniuses who applied the most flawed of change logic models to Sheffield United's arbitration hearing. Sheffield was relegated on the final day of the 2006-07 season as Tevez potted the game-winner at Manchester United to seal Sheffield's fate in the standings. Earlier West Ham had been fined 5.5 million pounds for fielding Tevez and Javier Mascherano who were declared ineligible because of some shady and complicated transfer machinations.

Sheffield officially went down because of Tevez's final-day heroics, but surely there had to be a dozen other games that season where some striker missed a sitter, or some defender blew coverage on a corner that cost the team points. The absurdity of the ruling and the compensation reportedly headed to the club is criminal.

Martin Samuel in the Times of London today brilliantly lays it out with an appropriate dash of sarcasm, wit and biting truth. He shines a dim light on the tribunal led by The Right Honorable The Lord Griffiths that made this decision. It's a must read; here's a taste:

"Yesterday, a tribunal led by Griffiths found that one player - Carlos Tévez - had decided the Premier League relegation issue in 2006-07, as fact. Not as opinion. Not with any vague doubt that the hundreds of other footballers, managers and coaches who were involved might have had some impact, too. Not with any pretence to evaluate their presence. Griffiths said that Sheffield United went down because of Tévez. He, and two friends, then replayed the season in their mighty minds and, despite all of this action taking place in a hypothetical dimension, prepared to hand down a finite punishment, payable in hard cash. Be warned, this is what happens when you invite lawyers to the party."

More importantly, what Samuel lays out later in the piece is that the precedent has been set that relegation could be taken away from being decided on the pitch. Last Sunday's Reading-Watford fiasco where referee Stuart Atwell awarded Reading a phantom goal on a sequence that no more threatened the Watford goal than I did from here 3,000 miles away.

So what happens if Reading keeps another team from promotion to the Premier League by one point, as Samuel asks? Back to the courts we go? What happens if a hard foul costs a club its star player and said club falls 3 points short of the Premiership title? Lawyers on speed dial?

The sheer idiocy of this situation is stunning. Sports is supposed to be self-regulated, and to go outside long-established perimeters is disrespectful to the game, fans and obscene. Shame on Sheffield United for pursuing this in the courts, and shame on the FA for not exerting more pressure to put a halt to this fiasco. The line in the sand has been drawn, and this situation just invites anyone to step right over it.

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