ita. The Stadio Olimpico was so sparsely attended for tonight's Roma v Fulham clash, that despite being a veggie, I thought about eating Saltimbocca alla Romana in honour of the stayaway fans.When they consider a game meaningless, Italian tifosi vote with their feet. If that had been Old Trafford, Man U fans would have sold it out in seconds. More fool them. No wonder it's cheaper to watch football in Italy than in England, where the gullibles live. I am sure the Fulham fans had a whale of a time in the Eternal City, but though I try to get excited, Europa League group games for me remain style comparisons at best, snooze-athons at worst.
Here's a Roma fan video of the club song rendition before kick-off, with the unsold seats in the background. Bravi ragazzi! Or does it mean they only have 20,000 true followers?
*Within a scatter-gun interview, UEFA boss Michel Platini repeated his desire for national team managers to come from the country they are coaching. So that makes two of us.
*News that The FA have been stalking Werder Bremen ace Aaron Hunt sounds a little desperate, given that the boy in question has already played against England at U21 and that Fabio Capello has made a near-perfect run to the World Cup. Plus a cou
ntry with three times the population of the Netherlands should have no need for foreign imports, ha ha.Hunt, who appears to have once and for all rejected The FA anyway, would hardly have been the first auslander to wear the three lions: More than two dozen men born outside of England have represented the mother country of soccer. I well recall Cyrille Regis from French Guyana, fair-dinkum Aussie Tony Dorigo and the Jamaican twang of John Barnes. More recently, England has profited from two players who spent their formative years in other countries: Michael Owen (Wales) and Owen Hargreaves (Canada & Germany).
*Since I seem to be on a foreign language theme, let's learn Spanish with Diego, besos x
-Sean O'Conor, London
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5 comments:
Bit off topic:
Greg, in your Top 5 Second Leg questions, you mention Chicago being away from home. But the game is at Toyota Park, where they managed to only win a 1/3 of their games this year.
:)
Oh for crying out loud. I don't know how I managed that dunderhead move.
And to think I was happy for picking RSL to beat the Crew...
Sean,
Please write more.
I didnt get a chance to see a game in the Eternal City when I was there last spring...
I would have loved to. Girlfriend can only take so much footy.
England also sounds overly desperate with that kid. If I had the choice between England and Germany, I would choose Germany too. I guess it helps that I'm mostly German to begin with...
Greg--
Still an inspired pick on RSL. I saw RSL beat Colorado while visiting my son in Utah a couple weeks ago, and I secretly agreed with your prediction. Two things--
First, I occasionally wonder what type of advantage a higher-seeded team gains from playing the second leg of an aggregate series at home. If I am Columbus, I would have preferred to set the tone in the first game at home and really build an advantage. But there are people smarter than me making these decisions.
Second, as to Kevin Payne's comments of a couple weeks ago, particularly with respect to RSL's game. I gotta admit that I agree with him after watching RSL in person. They play a lot of direct stuff up to Findley and Espindola. It seems like there is no link in the midfield up to them, and RSL instead primarily attempts to play over the top or long through passes to create an attack. Not sure where I am going with that, other than to assert that it isn't particularly pretty soccer. Also, Will Johnson is underrated-he is very, very talented.
Love the blog Greg. Keep it up!
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