College Football Top 25 Heading into Week 9

Well there wasn’t much change in the top 10 of my Top 25 but TCU jumped up and Oregon joined the party.

1. Florida (1)
2. Alabama (2)
3. Texas (3)
4. Iowa (4)
5. USC (5)
6. TCU (9): The biggest win this weekend in College Football, TCU is forcing the voters to notice that it will likely be them and not Boise State as the Non-AQ school to be in a BCS Bowl.
7. Cincinnati (7)
8. Boise State (6): The Broncos will unfortunately be left out of the BCS this year and the reason is the schedule just isn’t good enough to warrant a BCS berth.
9. Oregon (12)
10. LSU (10)
11. Penn State (13): The Nittany Lions are starting to hit on all cylinders which could get the Big Ten two representatives in the BCS for another season.
12. Georgia Tech (11)
13. Virginia Tech (14)
14. Oklahoma State (15)
15. Pittsburgh (17)
16. Ohio State (22): Terrelle Pryor and the Buckeyes look like they found some offense in the second half against Minnesota, and if they did the stretch run for the Big Ten Title will be very interesting.
17. Arizona (NR): The Wildcats might be the best team no one is talking about.
18. Utah (19)
19. Houston (18)
20. West Virginia (21)
21. Miami (8)
22. Notre Dame (NR): With their 2 losses the Fighting Irish can still make a BCS Bowl much to the chagrin of the millions of fans who hate Charlie Weis and the Irish.
23. South Carolina (23)
24. Idaho (25)
25. California (NR)

Dropping Out: BYU (16), Texas Tech (20), Kansas (24)

A Comprehensive Weekly Look at the Top Teams In European Football

This is the first edition of a Top 25 Poll of European Football Clubs as voted upon by myself (Tom) and Blaine! We hope you enjoy and we hope this further increases your interest in the great spectacle that is European Football.

Rank Team (Nationality) Points
T1. Barcelona (Esp) 49
T1. Chelsea (Eng) 49
Tom: You really cannot go wrong with either team as the choice for number one for this poll. I chose Chelsea as they are number one in the best league in Europe, the English Premier League, and they are perfect in their Champions League group, with wins over Atletico Madrid, FC Porto, and APOEL. On the other hand, Barcelona are the defending Champions of Europe, and flexed that muscle with a beautiful 6-1 win over Real Zaragoza this weekend, vaulting them to top of the table in La Liga with a great 7-1-0 record. The mid-week shock loss to FK Rubin Kazan at home prevented me from putting them at the top of my rankings. Before Manchester United’s 2-0 loss at Anfield to a struggling Liverpool side, they too had a strong case for best in Europe. However, it is a long season and these are sure to be volatile rankings.
3. Manchester United (Eng) 46
4. Real Madrid (Esp) 44
T5. Inter Milan (Ita) 40
T5. Sevilla FC (Esp) 40
7. Arsenal (Eng) 38
8. Bordeaux (Fra) 35
Tom: Bordeaux is atop Ligue 1 with a 7-1-2 record from 10 games and is leading a decent Champions League group consisting of Juventus, Bayern Munich, and Maccabi Haifa. Bordeaux secured a solid away draw at Juventus and beat Bayern Munich 2-1 at home. No matter what my colleague says about the Bundesliga, any time you take down a team of Luca Toni, Franck Ribery, Hamit Altintop, and Miroslav Klose, it is a win to be proud of. Still, they have lost two of their last three domestic matches and have a top of the table clash with AS Monaco this coming Saturday, followed by a mid-week match with in Germany to face Bayern and they will be welcomed back by Lille, who is weak in domestic form this year but still a formidable opponent for the French league. The coming two weeks will tell whether or not the relatively young squad is for real this season.
9. Juventus (Ita) 34
10. Bayer Leverkusen (Ger) 27
11. Tottenham Hotspur (Eng) 23
Blaine: Tottenham “Ham”, “Spurs”, Hotspur: Yes, Spurs do have 3 losses this year in the Barclay’s Premier League. However, one must consider that 2 of these three losses are to Manchester United and Chelsea, the 3rd and 2nd ranked teams on this list, respectively. Spurs’ loss this weekend to Stoke City, while disgraceful, was not enough to knock them off this list, or even out of the top 10. Spurs are a young, talented club led by an experienced manager and a captain who has been playing at the highest level of football since he was 17. Robbie Keane (the aforementioned captain) was a highly regarded footballer for years before a hugely unsuccessful transfer to Liverpool, but since returning to Spurs he has 5 goals in 10 matches, along with 2 assists. I expect Spurs to take this loss to Stoke and use it as motivation, and go on quite the run this season, perhaps finishing around 4-5 in the Premiership.
T12. Fiorentina (Ita) 20
T12. Manchester City (Eng) 20
T14. AC Milan (Ita) 18
Blaine: After having started off the season miserably, AC Milan has seemingly found their form lately. Ronaldinho is allegedly showing up at the San Siro to practice hours before matches and, on non-match days, at an incredibly early hour. Alexandre Pato, the young Brazilian starlet, has been on a brilliant run as of late, culminating in a brace in Milan’s 3-2 win over Real Madrid. That very match is one of the main reasons that Milan is ranked so high on this list, as it was Madrid’s first loss of the season at the Bernabeu all season.
T14. Hamburg SV (Ger) 18
T16. Olympiakos (Gre) 14
T16. Sampdoria (Ita) 14
T18. CSKA Moscow (Rus) 13
T18. Lyon (Fra) 13
20. Schalke 04 (Ger) 12
T21. Benfica (Por) 11
T21. FC Porto (Por) 11
23. Celtic (Sco) 9
24. Rangers (Sco) 8
T25. Dynamo Kiev (Ukr) 7
T25. FK Rubin Kazan (Rus) 7
T25. Werder Bremen (Ger) 7

Also Receiving Votes: Fenerbahce (Tur) 6, Shakhtar Donetsk (Ukr) 4, Valencia (Esp) 4, Sunderland (Eng) 3, Braga (Por) 2, PSV Eindhoven (Ned) 1, Sporting CP (Por) 1

Here is how the voters voted:

Rank	Tom	Blaine
1	Chelsea	Barcelona
2	Barcelona	Chelsea
3	Manchester United	Manchester United
4	Real Madrid	Real Madrid
5	Inter Milan	Arsenal
6	Sevilla	Sevilla
7	Bordeaux	Inter Milan
8	Hamburg SV	Juventus
9	Arsenal	Tottenham Hotspur
10	Juventus	Bordeaux
11	Bayer Leverkusen	AC Milan
12	Sampdoria	Fiorentina
13	Lyon	CSKA Moscow
14	Schalke 04	Bayer Leverkusen
15	Benfica	FC Porto
16	Manchester City	Manchester City
17	Olympiakos	Celtic
18	Fiorentina	Rangers
19	Werder Bremen	FK Rubin Kazan
20	Tottenham Hotspur	Fenerbahce
21	Dynamo Kiev	Olympiakos
22	Valencia	Shakhtar Donetsk
23	Braga	Sunderland
24	AC Milan	Dynamo Kiev
25	PSV Eindhoven	Sporting CP

Next 5 in for Tom, in order from West to East: Porto, Liverpool, AS Monaco, Fenerbahce, FK Rubin Kazan

Next 5 in for Blaine, in order from East to West: Galatasaray, Panathinaikos, Sampdoria, Anderlecht, Lille

Comments from Blaine: Overall a fairly typical top 25. While going through league tables and European competition results there weren’t too many shockers as to who was apparently quite good and who wasn’t, so this list closely resembles the one that I had in mind before doing some research. As expected, my list is a bit heavy on English football, but frankly for good reason, as the Premiership is pretty much hands down the best league in the world. There are a few interesting differences in mine and Tom’s lists, most noticeably my lack of respect for the Bundesliga, and Tom’s lack of respect for the Scottish Premier League. I’ve never really bought into the fact that the Bundesliga is one of the “major leagues” of Europe. Frankly I think that most of Germany’s football reputation is a result of the glory of a past generation including players such as Oliver Khan and the formerly great Michael Ballack. It is for this reason that only one Bundesliga club appears on this list, and, interestingly enough, that club is not Bayern Munich. Munich is by far the most recognizable German football club, and they have a lot of very good players, but their current 5th place position in the Bundesliga, combined with their relatively poor showing in the Champions League (3rd in their 4 team group), has doomed them to stay the hell off this list. Another interestingly placed club on this list is the Italian club Juventus. Juve is currently 3rd in Serie A and 2nd in their Champions League group, which in theory should not put them as high as they are on this list. However, given their talented roster, and the fact that they have the best keeper in the world, Gianluigi Buffon, I think it’s pretty reasonable to say that they’re at the very least the 8th best club team in Europe. Finally, there’s the inclusion of Shaktar Donetsk, a Ukrainian club that is currently sitting in 2nd place in the Ukrainian premier league. However, when one combines Donetsk’s winning of last year’s UEFA Cup, as well as the fact that they’re currently a perfect 3-0-0 in their Europa league group (with a goal differential of a whopping +10) merits their inclusion in this list. Let the controversy among all 7 readers begin!

Weekend Soccer Preview

Another exciting week in soccer! Click on the league title to see league table.

English Premier League (Home team listed first, all times AM unless otherwise noted)
7:45 ET Saturday
Wolverhampton Wanderers v Aston Villa (ESPN2)
10:00 ET Saturday
Birmingham v Sunderland
Burnley v Wigan Athletic
Hull City v Portsmouth
Tottenham Hotspur v Stoke City
Chelsea v Blackburn Rovers
9:30 ET Sunday
Bolton Wanderers v Everton
10:00 ET Sunday
Liverpool v Manchester United
11:00 ET Sunday
Manchester City v Fulham
12:15 PM ET Sunday
West Ham v Arsenal

Scottish Premier League
10:00 ET Saturday
Rangers v Hibernian
8:30 ET Sunday
Hamilton Academical v Celtic

Spain’s La Liga
15:00 ET (3:00 PM ET) Saturday
Sporting Gijon v Real Madrid
16:00 ET Sunday
Barcelona v Real Zaragoza

Italy’s Serie A
15:45 ET Saturday
Inter Milan v Catania
10:00 ET Sunday
AS Roma v Livorno
Siena v Juventus
15:45 ET Sunday
Chievo Verona v AC Milan

German Bundesliga
9:30 ET Saturday
Bayern Munich v Eintracht Frankfurt

French Ligue 1
Dutch Eredivisie
Russian Premier League

Champions League
With the games of this past week, we are now officially halfway through the group stage of the Champions League. The top two teams from each group will qualify to the knockout round, and the third placed team drops down to the knockout round of the Europa League (Formerly the UEFA Cup). In the group stage, there are 8 groups of four teams each. Each team will play each other team once at home and once away. Here are the tables along with some commentary:

Group A

Team	W	D	L	GD	Pts
Bordeaux	2	1	0	2	7
Juventus	1	2	0	1	5
Bayern Munich	1	1	1	2	4
Maccabi Haifa	0	0	3	-5	0

The only team effectively eliminated at this point is Isreal’s Maccabi Haifa. Bayern and Juventus were the two favorites to make it through to the next round, and that is still a fairly likely occurrence. Bayern still gets Bordeaux and Maccabi Haifa at home, but lost at Bordeaux 2-1 this past match day. Bordeaux got an impressive away draw at Juventus on the first match day.

Group B

Team	W	D	L	GD	Pts
Manchester United	3	0	0	3	9
Wolfsburg	1	1	1	1	4
CSKA Moscow	1	0	2	-2	3
Besiktas	0	1	2	-2	1

Manchester United are the strong leaders of Group B after 3 successive one goal victories. They have already navigated the difficult mid-week journeys to Russia and Turkey for the matches at CSKA Moscow and Besiktas, so barring a colossal collapse the second half of group play, they should move on to the knockout rounds. Wolfsburg, on the other hand, still has yet to go to Turkey or Russia, and will have a hard time keeping their scant second place lead over CSKA Moscow.

Group C

Team	W	D	L	GD	Pts
Real Madrid	2	0	1	5	6
AC Milan	2	0	1	1	6
Marseille	1	0	2	-3	3
FC Zurich	1	0	2	-3	3

This has been an interesting group so far. FC Zurich has made the long journey through two qualifying rounds to get to this group stage, and proceeded to first lose at home 5-2 to Real Madrid, then shocked AC Milan, getting a 1-0 at the San Siro. Milan then went on to beat Real Madrid 3-2 at Real Madrid, so this group looks like it will shake out as expected, with Real Madrid and AC Milan progressing on. Still, Milan was very close to having only 3 points mid-way through this group stage, and has had a run of poor form to start the year in Serie A, as they are in 9th through 8 games with only 11 points. The fight for 3rd place and a spot in the Europa League will still be an interesting one.

Group D

Team	W	D	L	GD	Pts
Chelsea	3	0	0	6	9
FC Porto	2	0	1	2	6
APOEL Nicosia	0	1	2	-2	1
Atletico Madrid	0	1	2	-6	1

Chelsea and FC Porto have taken full control of their group, with Chelsea already just a draw away from virtually ensuring themselves a spot in the knockout rounds. APOEL Nicosia comes from the unheralded Cypriot First Division and had a solid draw at Atletico Madrid and only narrow losses to Chelsea and FC Porto. Atletico Madrid has been hurt by the severe 4-0 loss at Chelsea and will have to take big points away from matches against the top two if they wish to move onto the knockout stages or even the Europa League. Atletico Madrid is in poor form in the domestic league as well, where they are 15th, with 6 points from 7 games.

Group E

Team	W	D	L	GD	Pts
Lyon	3	0	0	6	9
Fiorentina	2	0	1	2	6
Liverpool	1	0	2	-2	3
Debrecen	0	0	3	-6	0

Injury-plagued Liverpool have had a rough start in Europe to go along with their rough start to the Premiership season. A 2-1 loss at home to Lyon was the ultimate punch to the gut, and Liverpool only has one home match left in the group stages, at home against Fiorentina on the final match day. Debrecen is all but eliminated from all further European competitions barring any shock results, so the battle to stay in the top European competition will be a contentious one among the top three.

Group F

Team	W	D	L	GD	Pts
Barcelona	1	1	1	1	4
Dynamo Kiev	1	1	1	0	4
FK Rubin Kazan	1	1	1	-1	4
Inter Milan	0	3	0	0	3

In the closest and definitely most interesting group going forward, we see four teams that all have the chance to move on to the knockout round or come in last in the group. The big stunner was Rubin Kazan making the trip from Russia to Barcelona and coming back with a win this past Tuesday. As a result, Barcelona is left with a trip to Russia to face Kazan again, a home match against an always tough Inter Milan side, and a trip to Ukraine to face Dynamo Kiev. It is never easy to make a long mid-week trip in the Champions League, and Barcelona will have to navigate two more with success on top of a visit from Inter to make it to the next round. Inter Milan has some work to do to even qualify for the Europa League, as they will have to go to Ukraine to play Dynamo Kiev as well as the previously mentioned trip to Barcelona. Every game in this group will hold massive importance and will hopefully create some genuine European drama until the final match day.

Group G

Team	W	D	L	GD	Pts
Sevilla FC	3	0	0	7	9
Unirea Urziceni	1	1	1	1	4
VfB Stuttgart	0	2	1	-2	2
Rangers	0	1	2	-6	1

Unirea Urziceni are the surprise of this group, and are in second by virtue of a good 1-1 draw at home to Stuttgart and a 4-1 thrashing of Rangers in Glasgow. The game in Glasgow featured two own goals by Rangers and a missed penalty for Rangers, who are flailing in Europe much like their cross-town rivals Celtic, who are in last in their Europa League group. Sevilla is only a win away from progressing to the knockout stages, and they should get it, with home matches against Stuttgart and Rangers left to go with a trip to Romania to visit Unirea Urziceni.

Group H

Team	W	D	L	GD	Pts
Arsenal	2	1	0	3	7
Olympiakos	2	0	1	0	6
AZ Alkmaar	0	2	1	-1	2
Standard Liege	0	1	2	-2	1

In one of the only groups that has gone more or less by the books, Arsenal and Olympiakos are both looking at spots in the knockout stages, while AZ will look to hold off Standard Liege for a place in the Europa League. Olympiakos still has trips to Belgium and Holland to face Standard Liege and AZ respectively, so there could still be a battle for second place in this group

Week 8 College Football Picks

There aren’t many standout games this week so there isn’t much commentary with these picks but with how I performed last week maybe just picking games will change my luck:

#1 Florida over Mississippi State

#2 Alabama over Tennessee

#3 Texas over Missouri

#4 Boise State over Hawaii

#5 Cincinnati over Louisville

#6 Iowa over Michigan State

#7 USC over Oregon State

#16 BYU over #8 TCU: In the marquee game of the week I think BYU pulls it off playing at home.

#9 LSU over Auburn

#10 Miami over Clemson

#11 Oregon over Washington

#12 Georgia Tech over Virginia

#13 Penn State over Michigan

#15 Oklahoma State over Baylor

#17 Houston over S. Methodist

#18 Utah over Air Force

#19 Ohio State over Minnesota

South Florida over #20 Pittsburgh

#22 Arizona over UCLA

#23 West Virginia over Connecticut

#24 South Carolina over Vanderbilt

Oklahoma over #25 Kansas

How Can the UFL Succeed?

Last night there was a really interesting documentary on who was to blame for the USFL folding in the 80’s, and it got my thinking of way that the new UFL could survive and succeed like so many thought the USFL was going to. The way for the UFL to flourish is to quite frankly copy what the USFL did but don’t get too greedy too quickly.

The UFL makes it a point of saying that they are not competing directly with the NFL or College Football for that matter by airing their games on Thursday nights, the problem is that it is still going up in the fall where there is already so much football going on that it’s hard to keep up. The first suggestion is to play the games in the Spring. There’s no secret that ESPN loves football and by playing in the Spring there would be no direct competition with any other football league which in turn could give the UFL more exposure on SportsCenter and other sports outlets. The USFL was successful during this season and ESPN didn’t have the power then that it does now so the possibilities for success seem endless.

The USFL was great at generating publicity by signing the reigning Heisman winners, Herschel Walker, Mike Rozier, and Doug Flutie immediately after they won and kept them from the NFL. They were also able to sign players like Steve Young by throwing a lot of money at them. Now I don’t think the UFL has the resources to throw money out at top college players to get them to pick the UFL over the NFL but there is a rule that they could develop that would lead to a lot of publicity. The USFL was able to get Walker because there was a rule that didn’t allow juniors to enter the NFL, so Walker took the payday that the USFL offered him and became a pro football player. The NFL currently only lets 4-year Juniors and Seniors enter the NFL Draft every April, if the UFL adopts a rule that allows Freshman and Sophomores to enter their league they could really develop a fan base by signing some of the top college players who aren’t old enough to enter the NFL yet. Could you imagine the fan fare if a UFL team signed Tim Tebow the year after he won the Heisman as a sophomore? ESPN would have a crew on that team 24/7 based on how much they love Tebow.

Those are just two ideas that came to me while watching that documentary last night on ESPN, they don’t seem too crazy or out of the ordinary but I doubt they ever happen.

Twitter, the Better Post-Game News Conference

“We’re going to take it week by week,” “it’s a marathon, not a sprint,” “we just have to get back to the fundamentals,” and “we have to get better every game” are quotes that have become synonymous with professional athletes in America. The media gets angry when players don’t make themselves available for interviews, but the truth is why bother trying to get that interview when you’re just going to get a vanilla response to a question? In the 21st century the public has been introduced to Twitter and Blogs and many athletes have taken advantage and turned them into ways to promote themselves.

You have Chad Ochocinco and his Twitter account and Chris Cooley of the Washington Redskins with his blog. Both players are great at their respective positions but when their teams start to falter, the media immediately gets on their case that they, as individuals, aren’t spending enough time preparing for each week, because they’re spending too much time “tweeting” or working with their blog. My response to that is so what, the new technology that has been introduced has given fans and the media a better way to get inside the head of professional athletes. While this isn’t necessarily the case with Ochocinco (who shows his personality on the field every Sunday), Twitter and Blogs give the fans the chance to see a personality from these millionaire athletes and gives us a bigger reason to root a certain player or team because fans can actually feel a connection to these players, besides that they just play for their favorite team.

Recently I signed up for a Twitter account and the only people I really follow are members of the Chicago Bears (Jay Cutler, Greg Olsen, Devin Hester, Alex Brown, and Tommie Harris) and then Ochocinco, Shaq, and Mark Sanchez. And after reading the tweets that these guys do you can actually get a sense that these guys prepare real hard all week to put on a great performance each week, but you also get to see a lighter side to them when they are talking trash with each other (see Ochocinco riling up pretty much any Bear with a Twitter), or just tweeting back and forth with different athletes (Cutler and Dwyane Wade). The media can’t have it both ways, they either need to accept the generic responses and look down on Twitter, or just wait for a post game tweet.

College Football Top 25 Heading into Week 8

Here is what I think the Top 25 should look like:

1. Florida(Last Week: #1): They have been ranked #1 all year and the only way they can get bumped to me is if they lose a game. You don’t like it? Have the first rankings come out later.
2. Alabama (2): Impressive, real impressive so far, I understand the argument for them being ranked #1 but Florida has to lose first.
3. Texas (3): The question is how much further can the Colt McCoy-Jordan Shipley offense get the Longhorns?
4. Iowa (5): Another week, another big win for the Hawkeyes. The Big Ten is clearly theirs for the taking as long as the offense continues to build week to week.
5. USC (6): Went into another hostile environment and pulled out another win, a big matchup with Oregon still looms but they’re well on their way to another Rose Bowl appearance or possibly the National Championship.
6. Boise State (7): Had a little bit of a scare against Tulsa this week but the rest of the schedule is a breeze so they should finish undefeated.
7. Cincinnati (11): A big win against South Florida this week moves the Bearcats up in the rankings, it’ll be interesting to see how they manage without dark horse Heisman candidate Tony Pike.
8. Miami (9): Jacory Harris continues to look impressive and they should be right in the mix for the ACC championship.
9. TCU (10): The Horned Frogs took care of business like they were supposed to against Colorado State, the defense continues to impress.
10. LSU (12): Despite not playing the Tigers move up due to Ohio State and Virginia Tech losing.
And rounding out the top 25:
11. Georgia Tech (19)
12. Oregon (13)
13. Penn State (14)
14. Virginia Tech (4)
15. Oklahoma State (17)
16. BYU (18)
17. Pittsburgh (25)
18. Houston (23)
19. Utah (24)
20. Texas Tech (NR)
21. West Virginia (NR)
22. Ohio State (8)
23. South Carolina (21)
24. Kansas (15)
25. Idaho (NR)

Dropping out: Nebraska (16), South Florida (20), Notre Dame (22)