Tag: Manchester United

We Need Our Christmas Crackers

We Need Our Christmas Crackers

A common remark made after England fail at a major tournament is that the Premier League should adopt the European approach of having a festive break. There have been, and will continue to be, lots of innovations and alterations to the modern game but this is one I’ll never take to. As a fan I love the crowded festive fixture list. I’d hate to see it removed for invalid reasons – let’s face it, one year off wouldn’t prepare the England players any better for a World Cup. Festive football is as seasonal as A Christmas Carol and the Queen’s Speech.

From previous blogs (“The Magic of the Cup”) it’s no secret I’m a bit of a traditionalist. But I’m also a realist, so not living an entirely romanticised version of football events. If lessening the fixture congestion served a purpose that enhanced the overall product then I’d be a fan. The truth is that it won’t, nor will it serve the national team in its efforts. The foreign players that compete in the Premier League seem to cope okay in major tournaments. Those partaking in the African Cup of Nations always appear fresh, or certainly no worse off for the endeavour.

Even if I was to accept – hypothetically speaking now – that the winter period drains players come the end of the season, I’d still rather we kept the set-up as it is. If it’s tiring for the players – apparently a modern professional requires 78 hours between games to make a complete recovery, I’m wondering if these figures have been mixed up with common Christmas hangover periods – it’s more tiring for the fan. I spend Christmas Eve tossing and turning in the hope Santa is bringing me presents. That means I’m up early to check if I have been a good boy (only once in living memory was I deemed bad, that was the year I didn’t get a PlayStation 1 but all my mates did) and in bed late that evening (hopefully) celebrating.

It doesn’t stop there. I rarely sleep due to excitement on Christmas night, too. The prospect of a full Premier League fixture list on Boxing Day is enough to keep me awake. I barely get over that before we head to the normal fixtures that week. All the time the New Year’s games are waiting. If new to football the Christmas period would provide the perfect crash course; for veterans it’s the season to be jolly, for sure.

In what has been a great season for the unpredictable, the games squeezed together at the end of December and the start of January will provide us with a marker of how things are likely to go as the league moves into its second half. Eventually form will be established – good or bad – and determine the fate of the teams. December is the start of that new phase.

The December 21st to 23rd games provide the first examination of how the top could go. Arsenal face Chelsea on Monday the 23rd at the Emirates. The Gunners need a win to prove they are genuine contenders and that they can turnover a top side after two defeats in Manchester, albeit one of those Manchester sides is now a mid-table team. Before that we’ll discover if Manchester City’s away form has steadied when they face a Fulham side starting to show signs of life. At the lower end a nervous Sam Allardyce takes his Hammers to Old Trafford. He’ll tell his players a win is possible, and point to United’s home form as proof, but it’s unthinkable that Moyes will face defeat there again so soon.

The Boxing Day games provide further examination of how genuine each team’s league position is. Everton face a stern test at home to a Sunderland side that has just beaten Chelsea in the League Cup. These are the sort of games a team needs to collect three points from if they are serious about securing European football. The aforementioned West Ham face Arsenal at home, by Boxing Day their predicament could have been worsened, Mr Wenger may well have a belated gift Big Sam doesn’t really want.

The tie of the day sees Liverpool travel to the Etihad. City is scoring for fun there at the moment. During the mauling of Arsenal, one fan in earshot jokingly remarked he was upset if they didn’t score five nowadays. At the time City had “only” managed four but his pains were rewarded with a couple more before the final whistle. Liverpool themselves handed Spurs a defeat that demonstrated they were far from being pretenders this year. It’s a shame we’ve been robbed of watching Aguero and Suarez on the same pitch but there’s enough talent to make this a mouth-watering game. If Liverpool take a point in Manchester it’d show they need to be taken seriously; failing that conceding less than five will do.

December 28th/29th matches will see Man City at home against a Crystal Palace side that, with all due respect, they will feel safe rotating players against. Liverpool face another tough away test at Chelsea. West Ham/West Brom; Hull/Fulham; Cardiff/Sunderland are a trio of ties that pit teams in six pointers in the relegation battle. Everton hosting Southampton gives us insight into two teams fighting it out for a top six spot.

The first game of 2014 sees Man City travel to Swansea and in the last game of the day Man United host Tottenham. In between these games clubs in close proximity to one another face-off – Palace/Norwich and Fulham/West Ham – whilst Arsenal and Liverpool will be expected to win their respective home games against Cardiff and Hull Tigers. The biggest factor may well be the strength in the squads rather than the preferred starting eleven.

At the end of this cycle big teams and strugglers alike will have dropped points. The crazy season may finally have started to settle. The teams then don’t play a league game for ten days. By my calculations that’s a big enough gap to squeeze a 78 hour rest in, especially if you want to skip some cup football.

And they say they need a winter break?

Sporting Confidence

Sporting Confidence
No matter how remarkable professional sportsmen, or women, appear to be they are only human. Their bodies my be finely tuned machines but they are run by one final key component — the brain. The biggest fuel this organ provides is confidence. With confidence people can be propelled to the next level. It separates the average from the good, the good from the greats, the greats from the legends. Obviously without genes on your side confidence is redundant. I can feel confident about my ability as a footballer all day long but I’m never keeping Lionel Messi on the bench.
 
There are good examples of when confidence has had dramatic effects within certain sporting fields. Take Formula One for example. Currently Sebastian Vettel is the man to beat. The youngest double world champion in the history of the sport and shows no signs of surrendering his place at the top any time soon. It could have been so different. In the 2010 season he claimed his first world title but it was no walk-in-the-park. The British Grand Prix that year witnessed an inter-team political feud when Vettel was given teammate Mark Webber’s front wing. Webber went on to win the race and famously said over the team radio, “Not bad for a number two driver.” At the time the outside world saw them as equals trying to assert their personal control as number one. Vettel took the lead of the world championship for the first time after winning the last race of the season.
 
The following season a different Vettel took to the grid. One that was confident he was the best driver in the world. The first nine races of the 2011 season he finished no lower than second. Mark Webber was a changed man. His perception he was Vettel’s equal, if not superior, had been destroyed. Confidence breeds resilience but a lack of it spreads like a cancer damaging belief and ability. 
 
Other men on the F1 grid have buckets of confidence they use in a manner of ways. Alonso rightly stands tall as a man that has won world titles and even challenged for them when his car has been severely lacking. He’s mature and assured in his approach. Whereas Lewis Hamilton has shown he can slip off the rails when his confidence boarders on arrogance. The season Jenson Button outscored him when they shared the same McLaren his inner belief that he was “the man” led to his confidence acting as a poison.
 
Before we leave formula one we should mention Michael Schumacher. A man that during his first run in the sport was seen as arrogant. That he may well have been at times, he’d probably admit it himself nowadays. But he was a class above his opponents when he was in his prime. For him, confidence in his ability was replaced with a simple fact — he was better. In his return to F1 we saw a different Michael. A humbled character that appeared to accept the magic was gone but still enjoyed the theatre of race day. We’ll never know, but I suspect had his Mercedes been the best car on the grid the old Schumacher would have made the odd appearance. What we can take from Schumacher is a lesson to give our children when we say, “It’s not the winning, it’s the taking part.” His legacy is assured, his character reformed.
 
In snooker this year we saw Ronnie O’Sullivan take time away from the regular season. As current World Champion he had the right to defend the title at this year’s event. So he did. And he retained it before disappearing from the scene again. I don’t think anybody would be surprised if Ronnie appeared once a year, won the world title and wasn’t seen again for twelve months, followed by another win. He has the confidence that comes from being the most naturally gifted player that sport has ever seen. If he wants to win, he will.
 
In football a winning mentality is only attainable if team spirit exists. The communal belief of being the best creates a shared confidence. Manchester United’s ability to retain titles with teams that seem to be more than the sum of their parts is down to belief. Winning games in “Fergie Time” is the confidence that they should win. But we also saw how a crack in that confidence can be devastating. With six games to go United led Manchester City by eight points in the 2011/12 season but still lost the title. Doubts must have crept in when they lost a game then followed it up with draws in the final run-in. The 6-1 defeat at the hands of City in the home fixture earlier on in the season may have played on their minds. As for the City players that 6-1 victory must have given them the confidence they should be the champions. That unwavering belief allowed them to clinch the title in injury time. Sergio Aguero striking the winner like he couldn’t miss. The sort of confidence that requires no thought and is most effective.