I take it all back, Rio

It may come as a surprise that Rio Ferdinand has shown sufficient leadership skills on and off the pitch to persuade Fabio Capello to make him captain of England, especially following his role in the organisation of the now infamous 2007 United Christmas Party. Yet he is clearly in the best form of the likely candidates and has steered clear of the off pitch troubles that blighted his second season at the club.

A few years ago now I wrote a piece for When Saturday Comes critising Rio Ferdinand’s dissappointing career at United: the missed drugs test and subsequent ban, the rendez-vous with Peter Kenyon in a London restaurant and the delayed signing of a lucrative 5 year contract.

Published in May 2005 it came at United’s nadir – they were suffering at the hands of a dominant Mourinho, had been knocked out of Europe by a Milan team destined to throw away a 3 goal lead to Liverpool in Istanbul and the Glazers were circling the club – there were protests, a planned mock funeral at the FA Cup final, the glory days looked like they were well and truly over. It was probably the most difficult month for the club since Cantona’s Selhurst Park Karate Kick and Rio symbolised everything that was wrong on and off the pitch.

At the time the licence given to Rio and his apparent dalliance with the dark side further undermined an already battle-weary Alex Ferguson who was commonly thought to have lost the plot. With Chelsea’s money and Liverpool’s success United looked doomed – they couldn’t even keep hold of their best players. Fergie’s claims that Rio Ferdinand is ‘the greatest centre-back in Europe’ were laughable, Gallas, Terry, Carvalho and Carragher all stood higher than United’s £30 million signing. United couldn’t defend a free-kick, and were torn apart by the likes of Norwich and Everton before Chelsea slaughtered us in the first ‘Guard of Honour’ game at the end of the season.

Fast forward the best part of three years and it’s a wonder we were panicking at all. The Glazer regime, as regrettable as it’s debt laden arrival remains, has coincided with a resurgence on the pitch. One league title later and with the acquisition of the likes of Tevez, Nani and Anderson and the pre-eminence of Ronaldo United are looking up while their rivals have gone backwards.

As for Rio, he just seems to get better and better. His contract signed, he finally got the centre-back partner he needed with the arrival in January 2006 of Nemanja Vidic and United haven’t looked back. Last season they defeated Mourinho’s Chelsea in a title chase that showcased the team’s style and consistency. This season, while not quite as impressive going forward, United have been miserly at the back, conceeding just 15 league goals, or less than one every two games. I no longer mind that he drives a luxury sports car and presumably he has stopped hanging around with the likes of Jody Morris, in which case, Rio, I’m sorry – you’ve proved me wrong. 

in the shadows

 

Well Rooney should have had at least a hat-trick and had Ronaldo taken all his chances he’d now be closer to 40 goals for the season than 30 but United did justice to their football in the end on Sunday. Even allowing for the fact that the away team were down to 10 men for half the game, this was about as one sided a United/Liverpool game as I can remember.

Saying that the Liverpool full-backs can feel proud that the Portuguese had a relatively quiet game although he spent most of the second-half attacking the Anfield side’s prevailing weakness in the centre of defence rather than the flanks. With Skrtel and Carragher paired for the first time in this volatile fixture, Benitez presumably hoped for a security not seen in a Liverpool side for nigh on 20 years. As it turned out the willingness of United to exploit this new pairing only exposed the inadequacy of Benitez’s plans for an assault on the Premiership.

At the final whistle the airwaves were filled with the ghosts of Anfield past – Lawrenson, Hansen, even Gary Gillespie. For if Liverpool are to end their 18 year title hoodoo they need to find a reliable centre-back pairing. Sami Hyypia may be popular with the fans but even at his best he was slower than the average milkfloat while Jamie Carragher, as tenacious and as scouse as he is, will never command a championship winning defence in the manner of his illustrious predecessor Gonzo Thompson.

But the problem seems to be endemic. Just as Liverpool struggled to find a top quality goalscorer without spending top dollar on Torres, so they seem to struggle to unearth the commanding centre-half that can lead them to the promised land at the summit of the Premiership.

Torben Piechnik, Glenn Hysen, Neil Ruddock, Marcus Babel – the list of unconvincing Anfield centre-halfs is lengthy and, let’s face it, very funny. Some arrived with high reputations, some had great expectations heaped upon them. Skrtel, signed from Lokomotiv Moscow in January, made a comedy debut against non-leaguers Havant & Waterlooville, and, after a stirring performance against Reading (!) was puffed in the Guardian on Saturday as the Second Coming.

In reality he looked inadequate for the job, failing to deal with Wes Brown for the first goal and, in absentia, forcing Reina to make 6 or 7 point-blank saves before not even bothering to mark Ronaldo for the game clincher late in the game.

Jamie Carragher is not blameless. As well as he defends behind a 5-man midfield he never looks comfortable when there are only four men in front of him and he was all at sea on Sunday and could easily have walked in the opening 10 minutes for a blatant foul when Rooney skinned him for pace.

For all Benitez’s spending on defensive midfielders and failed strikers it is really his (and his predecessors) inablility to solve the Liverpool rearguard conundrum that means that United will almost certainly be the first English team to win 20 titles.

At the other end, Ferdinand and Vidic weren’t tested on Sunday as Torres, even with Gerrard in support for the first half, writhed his way across the Old Trafford turf. Ferdinand has grown up to become the best centre-back in Europe, strong enough to deal with the most physical of centre-forwards and swift enough to hoover up any misjudgements from the occasionally error-prone Vidic. His forthcoming tussles with Drogba and Adebayor will define United’s title challenge over the next 6 weeks. Surely only his bad back can prevent United landing number 17 in May.
 

rebranding easter

Of all the achievements to which Rupert Murdoch can lay claim, few can surely rank quite as high as managing to successfully rebrand a religious holiday.

Grand Slam Sunday may have started as a catchy slogan to define the meeting of the top four both this season and last. Yet the (not so) coincidental timing of two of the biggest fixtures of the season with the most important Christian religious holiday of 2008 will forever be remembered not for reflections on Jesus’ sacrifices but 44 millionaire footballers doing battle for the benefit of the Sky cameras.

The fact that these games invariably fail to live up to the hype, tend to have a minimal bearing on the outcome of the title race and usually swiftly descend into acrimony hasn’t prevented those at Sky HQ from putting the entire weight of the News International machine behind the matches. 

From billboards to newspaper ads to blanket coverage across their stations Grand Slam Sunday has seen the hype hit overdrive. Last season the GSS (Chelsea v Liverpool; United v Arsenal) had little impact on the Premiership with United losing twice to Arsenal yet triumphing in the league.

Of more importance are the fixtures the top three will play against the relegation battlers and local rivals – Spurs’ well-earned point in midweek a case in point.

Nevertheless it is strange that during the first century or more of English league football, the coincidental meeting of the biggest four clubs (whoever they were) was a rare event whereas since the ‘re-branding’ the GSS has become a fulcrum around which Sky have sought to boost subscriptions in collusion with the randomly selected fixtures.

ThUnderscoring all this is the feeling that Sky’s choice of fixtures has lagged behind their rivals at Setanta all season long. While subscribers to the Irish based service have witnessed shock after shock, Sky have frequently dropped the ball – the latest glaring example being their decision to show a moribund 2-0 United victory over Bolton rather than the game of the season at White Hart Lane the same night. 

As they prepared their latest advertising blitz on the British public and in the process turn a much loved public holiday into yet another sales opportunity, there’s a feeling that Sky’s grip on British football is not quite as tight as it used to be.

And finally…

I make no apology for this being the third successive Arsenal post on what purports to be a Manchester United blog, you could accuse me of obsession but this is the last for now, I promise…

There has been a sense of shock that Arsenal, so dominant in the San Siro, should drop points at the JJB. Yet Arsenal’s draw at Wigan underlines the ongoing problem with the Wenger experiment. Imposing continental skills and mentality on the English league was always going to be difficult.

When the pitches turn ’sticky’ and the relegation battlers line-up men behind the ball, Arsenal’s lithe passing style (even when supplemented by the physical attributes of an Adebayor) were always likely to suffer. It seems that although the English game has moved closer to the continent it hasn’t transformed itself sufficiently for Wenger’s experiment to net him a major trophy. There are still times when their players need to stomach a hot-pot supper rather than steamed guinea fowl.

Of late, particularly in comparison to United, Arsenal appear to lack pace. They usually make up for this with speed of thought and precision, both attributes somewhat nullified by the mud and their opponent’s energy. Once this goes their Swiss watch timing also disappears.

Europe remains their best bet but then again there are 3 English teams in it who will press them a lot better than Milan. Barcelona would represent ideal opposition of those remaining and would present a fantastic spectacle but there’s every likelihood Wenger could find himself 4 years into Arsenal mk3 with absolutely nothing to show for it. For all the adulation of press and fans, this is the only stat that really matters. 

Barack Obama and the Champions League

The US electoral process, like the latter stages of the Champions League, is not normally the place for the wide-eyed and innocent. Negative attack ads, like man-to-man marking and penalty shoot-outs, are designed to sort the wheat from the chaff in the cruelest manner. When cynicism takes over, it is generally believed that its better to be rooting for Bush/Cheney or Liverpool Football Club than a black man trying to turn the tide of history or a club with schizophrenic away form.

Yet, just as a substantial number of voters continue to vote Obama despite Hilary Clinton’s repeated accusations of inexperience and ill-preparedness for high level decision making, so Arsene Wenger’s Arsenal confound the critics by producing the performance of the tournament so far by knocking out cup holders AC Milan.

On the surface at least, Arsenal’s victory looks remarkable. A team grateful for a 95th minute equaliser against Aston Villa on Saturday overturning the most consistent team of the decade on their own patch. Some have even gone so far as to claim that we witnessed the passing of the baton between one great team and another – the inference being that this Arsenal side will dominate the tournament to the same extent as a Milan side who won the cup twice this decade and were desperately unlucky (some would say robbed) in 2005.

Arsenal have generally underachieved in Europe under Wenger, yet he has retained the capacity to spring surprises. This wasn’t his first win at the San Siro, a 5-1 demolition of Inter in 2003 ranking as the club’s previous best away performance.

Fortunately they picked a team and a circumstance ready made for young legs. There was little chance that ageing Milan would outbattle them so the game was strictly a footballing contest, just the way wenger likes it. The chances are, though, that they won’t be so lucky next time around.

With four English teams likely to make up the last 8 there’s an even chance of them being paired with either a resurgent Chelsea, a Liverpool team adept at defying lengthy European Cup odds or the United team that humiliated them at Old Trafford last month.

For the time being however hope springs eternal for Arsenal and Obama despite logic dictating impending failure.