Tomorrow will be the start of the new English Premier League season. 20 teams in the top division of the English football will be in the contention for the much coveted trophy. (Although in reality, only 4 teams namely Manchester United, Chelsea, Arsenal, and Liverpool that will really be chasing for the title, but technically, there are 20 teams fighting for the title).
The big four have completed many signings and have spent millions of pounds to bolster their already great squad to grab not only the Premier League title, but also the cups available (FA Cup and League Cup, as well as the ultimate prize in European football, if not the world, the UEFA Champions League trophy). Besides the big four, the rest of the teams have purchased many players of their own, and most of them are superstars. This will be explained below.
Looking at the transfers that have been done so far among the Premier League teams, I could see many interesting transfers going on. It is also important to note that during the off-season, there was an influx of superstars from other European top football leagues coming in to the Premier League. Despite the critics who claim that these stars won’t be able to shine in their debut season in the Premier League as they will have to adjust to the physical demand of the “toughest league in the world”, I am certain that these superstars will add another dimension to the already star-studded league. This may also mean that there will be more teams challenging for the title and the competition at the foot of the table to avoid relegation to the lower division will be interesting and entertaining as well due to the fact that the signings of the superstars from other leagues not only done by the top teams, but also the rest of the teams. Such signings include the transfer of Claudio Pizarro and Roque Santa Cruz to Chelsea and Blackburn respectively. (Both of them were from FC Bayern Munich of the German Bundesliga as well as other signings like Florent Malouda from Lyon to Chelsea). There are many others, especially in Manchester City. But there are simply too many of them to be mentioned here and for Manchester City’s signings, it will be explained in the next section.
Besides transfer dealings aforementioned above, another interesting thing that occurred in English Football is of course the acquisitions of clubs by foreign billionaires. These takeovers without a doubt strengthen the teams concerned considerably, most notably in the financial area. The most recent acquisition and perhaps the most interesting one is the takeover of Manchester City by Thaksin Sinawatra, the controversial former prime minister of Thailand. Even the takeover itself was really complicated with many issues such as frozen assets and many others (too detailed to be mentioned here yet again…).
Since the takeover, Manchester City have undergone a lot of changes. (For your information, I have been supporting Manchester City from 2003 as I wanted to deviate from the norm of supporting Manchester United). First and foremost, Sven Goran Eriksson, the very famous former England manager has been installed as the manager of the club. For the players, Manchester City have finally gotten rid of the wasted talent in Joey Barton and they have bought many superstars from overseas. Most notable ones are Elano from Shakhtar Donetsk, Valeri Emilov Bojinov from Juventus, and Rolando Bianchi from Reggina. (One interesting note: These 3 players are really good in Football Manager 2007. It seems that Sven Goran Eriksson signed them based on the game. Hehe).
With the takeover, Manchester City have finally joined the league of giants in the Premier League and let’s hope that the blue side of Manchester will finally rise from the shadows of the red side of Manchester, that is Manchester United. Perhaps, they could even challenge for the title this year! My apologies for being bias, since my other favorite team in the English Premier League is Chelsea. But nevertheless, I am pretty sure that the future of the English football is really BLUE! Onwards Chelsea and Manchester City!
The biased statement aside, let us all hope that the 2007-2008 English Premier League season will be a great one and of course, the season where fair-play dominates the scene hand in hand with the swashbuckling attacking football that all of us football fans yearn every week! Onwards English football!
No comments:
Post a Comment