Archive for February 2009

Bayern on the rampage as Liverpool stun Real

Friday, 27th February 2009 7:19am
Bayern Munich had the highest scoring margin in the UEFA Champions League round of 16 after the Bundesliga team beat Sporting Lisbon 5-0 in Lisbon.

At the same time Liverpool scored a priceless away goal after scoring late in their match against Real Madrid to inflict a rare defeat on Real under coach Juande Ramos.

Whilst on the first day there were three draws it was the opposite on the second day with just one draw and a result being achieved in the other three matches.

In the English/Italian tussle, the English teams finished the first legs on top with all of them not conceding a goal and with both home teams winning.

Only Jose Mourinho's Inter Milan managed to come up with a goalless draw at the San Siro.

Bayern Munich has probably one leg in the quarter-finals after scoring four times in the second half. Bayern led 1-nil at half time.

The remaining seven ties could easily go either way with no other team managing a convincing win.


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Category: Champions League | Comments : 0


Man Utd open seven point gap

Tuesday, 24th February 2009 1:54pm
Manchester United increased its lead at the top of the English Premiership by seven points after Liverpool could only draw at home against Manchester City.

This was Liverpool's sixth draw at home and tenth overall and now Liverpool and Newcastle United are the first teams to reach double figures insofar as draws are concerned.

Chelsea moved to third place after beating Aston Villa at Villa Park in what was a direct exchange of ladder positions.

But Arsenal failed to capitalize on Villa's loss as the Gunners could only get a goalless draw at the Emirates against Sunderland.

Now the Gunners trail Villa by four points with Everton four points back.

Everton could have narrowed the gap to two points but the Toffees were held to a goalless draw at St. James Park.

Elsewhere West Bromwich Albion still prop the ladder with Middlesbrough and Blackburn just a point above them but still in the relegation zone.

Blackburn has a game in hand away to Fulham.

In the last post on the English Premier we took a look at the first half ladder and this time we take a look at the second half ladder. This ladder considers only the result in the second half and is shown below:


Team Played Goal Diff Points
Liverpool 26 16 49
Manchester United 26 18 48
Chelsea 26 13 47
Aston Villa 26 12 45
Everton 26 3 42
Arsenal 26 8 40
West Bromwich Albion 26 -5 38
Newcastle 26 0 37
Wigan 26 1 36
Manchester City 26 3 35
Stoke City 26 -3 35
Sunderland 26 -1 33
Portsmouth 26 -6 31
Hull City 26 -7 30
Tottenham 26 -3 27
Fulham 25 -3 26
West Ham 26 -6 26
Middlesbrough 26 -16 22
Bolton 26 -13 20
Blackburn 25 -11 19


So Liverpool top this ladder ahead of Manchester United.

Surprisingly using just the second half, West Brom jump to tenth place.

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Category: English Premiership | Comments : 0


Victory to face Adelaide in Grand Final

Sunday, 22nd February 2009 11:12pm
Melbourne Victory will face Adelaide United in the Grand Final after Adelaide managed to overcome the Queensland Roar by an odd goal.

The goal was the first to be scored by Adelaide in the final series and it proved decisive.

By reaching the final Adelaide will also play in next season's Asian Champions League campaign alongside Victory.

Adelaide and Melbourne have met five times this year and Adelaide has lost all five times.

In five matches the two teams have met, Adelaide has scored just two goals all in one match and the Victory has scored 11 goals.

So the Victory has maintained four clean sheets in the five meets with Adelaide.

In the final ladder for the just ended season this week we take a look at the draws table showing the number of draws for each team and the number of goals involved in those draws.:


Team Played Goals For Points
Central Coast Mariners 21 12 7
Newcastle Jets 21 9 6
Queensland Roar 21 5 6
Adelaide United FC 21 6 5
Sydney FC 21 5 5
Wellington Phoenix 21 5 5
Perth Glory 21 8 4
Melbourne Victory 21 2 2


The average number of draws per team was five in a season where there were 22 draws out of 84 matches which is 26 percent.

Interestingly, the Victory had just two draws in the whole season and both were away from home.

One was a goalless draw against Sydney FC and the other a 2-all draw against the Mariners.


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Category: A-League | Comments : 0


Victory reaches grand final

Sunday, 15th February 2009 11:04pm
Melbourne Victory will host the A-League final after beating Adelaide United 4-nil at the Telstra Dome in the major semi-final.

Victory will entertain the winner between Adelaide and Queensland Roar after the Roar beat the Central Coast Mariners 2-1 in the second- leg for an overrall 4-1 win.

Adelaide finished second in the league but they still have to find the net after in the finals and will host the Roar who managed to score four goals and had a clean sheet away from home.

The winner between the two teams will automatically get a place in next year's Asian Champions League because Victory already has the other place as minor premiers.

Throughout the season we looked at the team performance in each half through the first and second half ladders and this week we look at the first and second half ladders for the 2008/9 season.

The first half ladder is the league table considering just the result from the first half and the same for the second half ladder.

Below is the first half ladder:


Team Played Goal Diff Points
Adelaide United FC 21 8 39
Queensland Roar 21 8 33
Sydney FC 21 4 28
Central Coast Mariners 21 1 27
Newcastle Jets 21 -2 24
Melbourne Victory 21 -2 23
Wellington Phoenix 21 -5 19
Perth Glory 21 -12 19


and below is the second half ladder:


Team Played Goal Diff Points
Melbourne Victory 21 14 41
Adelaide United FC 21 4 32
Queensland Roar 21 3 30
Central Coast Mariners 21 2 29
Perth Glory 21 -1 28
Sydney FC 21 -3 25
Wellington Phoenix 21 -3 23
Newcastle Jets 21 -16 15


So Adelaide had the best first half performance whilst the Victory had the best second half performance.

Interestingly the second half ladder is nearly the same as the actual ladder with the top four places exactly the same.

Below is the actual final ladder:


TeamPlayedWonDrawLostGoal DiffPoints
Melbourne Victory 21 12 27 1238
Adelaide United FC 21 11 55 1238
Queensland Roar 21 10 65 1136
Central Coast Mariners 21 7 77 328
Sydney FC 21 7 59 126
Wellington Phoenix 21 7 59 -826
Perth Glory 21 6 411 -1322
Newcastle Jets 21 4 611 -1818



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Category: A-League | Comments : 0


Scolari's Chelsea reign ends

Tuesday, 10th February 2009 12:36pm
Chelsea have parted ways with their manager Luiz Felipe Scolari in his first season at Stamford Bridge.

This came after Chelsea slipped to fourth place in the league after the draw against Hull City at the weekend after having been second two weeks earlier.

With Arsenal in fifth place, Chelsea looks more like a team fighting for fourth place and a champions league place instead of being a team fighting for the title.

So here is a quick summary of Scolari's record in the league:


Number
Matches 25
Won 14
Drawn 7
Lost 4
Away wins 8
Home wins 6
Goals scored 44
Goals conceded 15
Home goals scored 21
Away goals scored 23


Scolari's results are not that bad and with a bit of luck could have been better.

Chelsea's problem so far has been the home form where they have got 23 points out of a possible 39.

Compare that with current leaders Manchester United who have played 11 games at home but have 31 points dropping just two points.

But recently the away form has been great and Aston Villa and Liverpool now have a better away record than Chelsea.

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Category: English Premiership | Comments : 0


Portsmouth sack Adams

Monday, 9th February 2009 10:53pm
Portsmouth has parted company with Tony Adams after he won just two leagues out of thirteen Premier League matches.

Adams took over from Harry Rednapp who left to join Tottenham Hotspurs.

His team only managed to win one match at home against Blackburn Rovers and also won one match away against Sunderland.

Below is the summary for the 13 Premier League matches Adams was in charge:


Number
Matches 13
Won 2
Drawn 5
Lost 6
Away wins 1
Home wins 1
Goals scored 16
Goals conceded 28
Home goals scored 10
Away goals scored 6

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Category: English Premiership | Comments : 0


Chelsea slips to fourth

Monday, 9th February 2009 10:02pm
Chelsea slipped to fourth place after being held to a goalless draw by Hull City at home and Aston Villa who started the round in fourth won its match away to Blackburn.

That was Chelsea's fifth draw at Stamford Bridge and in just two rounds the team has slipped from second position to fourth.

The battle for fourth place can easily be a battle between Chelsea and Arsenal but there are still 13 matches to go.

Aston Villa's win over relegation threatened Blackburn made sure the midlands outfit opened a two point gap in third place. Villa trail Liverpool in third place by three points.

Manchester United maintained its grip at the top after narrowly beating West Ham United. That match was United's 13th-straight clean sheet in the league.

Once again all the teams in the relegation zone failed to win and in fact the bottom five teams all lost.

Out of the ten matches in round 25, goals were scored in the first half in only three matches with the other seven matches going to half time goalless.

In the match between Liverpool and Portsmouth all the five goals were scored in the second half and this week we take a look at the first half ladder.

This ladder only looks at the scores at half time and is presented below:


Team Played Goal Diff Points
Manchester United 24 15 47
Chelsea 25 16 44
Liverpool 25 9 40
Fulham 23 7 38
West Ham 25 6 38
Aston Villa 25 4 37
Arsenal 25 5 36
Manchester City 24 5 33
Wigan 25 1 33
Everton 25 3 32
Bolton 25 2 30
Middlesbrough 25 -2 28
Sunderland 25 -5 27
Blackburn 24 -3 26
Hull City 25 -9 26
Tottenham 25 -1 25
Portsmouth 24 -8 22
Stoke City 25 -16 22
Newcastle 25 -9 20
West Bromwich Albion 25 -20 17


So Manchester United also tops the first half ladder and West Bromwich Albion prop the ladder.

Interestingly Fulham seem to be playing well in the first half and therefore they are in fourth place despite being tenth in the actual ladder.

Next week we look at the second half ladder.

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Category: English Premiership | Comments : 0


Advantage Roar, Victory

Sunday, 8th February 2009 10:41pm
Queensland Roar and Melbourne Victory have a huge advantage going into the second legs of their finals' matches after posting 2-nil wins over the Central Coast Mariners and Adelaide respectively.

Its interesting to see that both home teams lost by the same margin and with the away teams all scoring a goal in each half.

The winner between Adelaide and Melbourne will go straight to the grand final and the loser will host the loser in the Roar/Mariners to decide who becomes the second partipicant in the grand final.

We have been looking at home and away leaders throughout the season and so this week we will take a look at the final home and away ladders.

The home ladder considers just the matches played at home with the away ladder considering the matches played away.

Below is the final home ladder:


Team Played Goal Diff Points
Melbourne Victory 11 15 27
Adelaide United FC 11 17 26
Wellington Phoenix 11 5 19
Perth Glory 10 3 18
Central Coast Mariners 11 5 17
Sydney FC 10 7 16
Queensland Roar 10 4 16
Newcastle Jets 10 1 13


and below is the final away ladder:


Team Played Goal Diff Points
Queensland Roar 11 7 20
Adelaide United FC 10 -5 12
Central Coast Mariners 10 -2 11
Melbourne Victory 10 -3 11
Sydney FC 11 -6 10
Wellington Phoenix 10 -13 7
Newcastle Jets 11 -19 5
Perth Glory 11 -16 4


The minor premiers Victory top the home ladder but lie fourth in the away ladder.

The Roar leader the away ladder by 8 points and its the away form that secured them third place.

So for the Roar not hosting the grand final should they get there will not be a major problem for them.

Perth Glory had the worst away form and Newcastle the worst home form.


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Category: A-League | Comments : 0


Liverpool beats Chelsea to regain second place

Monday, 2nd February 2009 10:09pm
The biggest match of round 24 was undoubtedly the battle for second place between Liverpool and Chelsea which Liverpool won to regain second place and move within two points of leaders Manchester United.

Manchester United won its match against Everton but it has also has a game in hand against Fulham.

That is a home game against a team that hasn't won away from Craven Cottage so far.

There was no difference in the gap between Arsenal and Aston Villa as both teams were held at home to goalless draws against West Ham and Wigan respectively.

Despite the loss at Old Trafford, Everton is still in sixth place but its five point cushion has now been reduced to four.

This was the second round so far this season where no away team won a single match. Five matches were all won by home teams.

It is also the second time when there has been five draws in a round. Five draws in a single round is the highest so far.

At the bottom of the table Stoke City moved out of the relegation zone after the win over Manchester City and was replaced in the relegation waters by Blackburn.

Below is a table showing the draw scored and frequency so far:


Scoreline Frequency
0 - 0 24
1 - 1 23
2 - 2 15
3 - 3 0
4 - 4 1
5 - 5 0


So the goalless draw has now become the most popular draw scoreline followed by 1-all.

There has one drawn match at 4-all and that was between Tottenham Hotspurs and Arsenal and the two teams meet again in round 25 in what should be match of the round.

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Category: English Premiership | Comments : 0


Sydney, Kosmina part ways

Sunday, 1st February 2009 10:20pm
Sydney FC is going to look for its fifth coach in four years after parting company with John Kosmina.

Kosmina joined Sydney in October 2007 and his first match was a win against the Central Coast Mariners.

From there Sydney went undefeated for the next six matches and then suffered a 2-4 home loss to Perth Glory.

That loss to the Glory was the only loss Sydney FC suffered under Kosmina in the league in the 2007/8 season.

But Sydney FC still managed to reach the finals where they were knocked out by the Queensland Roar after a 2-0 goal aggregate loss.

However, this season for the first time in the history of the club, Sydney FC failed to reach the finals after winning seven matches, drawing five and losing nine.

The 4-nil win over Newcastle Jets in the last round of this season ensured that the club did not finish the season with a negative goal difference.

So here is the record for Kosmina's 35 matches(33 league and 2 finals):


Number
Won 13
Drawn 11
Lost 11
Away wins 7
Home wins 6
Goals scored 53
Goals conceded 48
Home goals scored 28
Away goals scored 25


So he won more games than he lost during his tenure and despite winning more games away his team scored more goals at home.

The record looks good because the team only lost two matches in the 2007/8 season under Kosmina's guidance but 2008/9 season proved to be the opposite.

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Category: A-League | Comments : 0



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