General Football Discussion

[Manneken Pis]

Notts County (English 4th division) appear to have just out out bid various clubs, including Ajax for the services of Sol Campbell (34 years ols, 73 international caps)..............

Crazy Days............

From the Telegraph (the £60k/week is wrong though from what I hear):

Sol Campbell turned down offers from the Barclays Premier League and abroad, and
agreed to join Sven Goran Eriksson as player-coach at League Two club Notts
County.

Aston Villa and Ajax both launched late bids for the 34-year-old centre-back,
urging Campbell to delay his decision for another 24 hours, but he went ahead
with the move to County after passing a medical.

The club's new owners are believed to have met Campbell's wage demands for
£60,000-a-week so he could be reunited with his former England boss Eriksson.

AEK Athens were the only other club prepared to pay that much, but Campbell
rejected a move to Greece as well as offers from Hull, Newcastle, Basle and
several clubs in Turkey.

Although Villa and Ajax were also offering him a good package to continue
playing at the highest level, he has dropped down to join the early League Two
leaders.

Villa are weighing up several other options in their search for a centre-back
but feel that Campbell's old Portsmouth teammate Sylvain Distin is overpriced at
£6m.

Meanwhile, County are also trying to persuade Sheffield United's transfer-listed
striker Billy Sharp to drop to League Two.

[Kowalczyk]

Wow, that was 'old skool' at West Ham vs Millwall...

K.

[SE6Ajacied]

Wow, that was 'old skool' at West Ham vs Millwall...

K.

Yeah, it was always likely though, the Police knew that and so did everyone else although perhaps the extent of the trouble caught people by surprise. Theres talk tonight about why away fans were allowed to attend-apparently Millwall and Leeds United for example have a no away fans agreement in place for their league games against each other precisely to avoid this situation and its worked-West Ham are being accused of massive complacency on this issue

[SE6Ajacied]

If anyone other than me wants to listen, the game of the night has to be Blackpool v (Premier League) Wigan Athletic in the League Cup.

Highlights on BBC One later for those in UK (or Netherlands!) but you can listen live here at 19.30hrs UK time.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/playlive/b ... ancashire/

Whoopee, Come on you 'Pool !!!!!

[souras84]

Chelsea make a mamooth bid of 65 million euros for Ribery...

[Blind3]

I read at VI.nl where Witsel , he of the horrific tackle , was banned for ten matches. In other ban news, Arsenal's Eduardo ( I think he is the one Eduardo not linked to us) received a two match "deceiving the officials " ban . If deceiving the officials were called before now , Ronaldo and Suarez may have received lifetime bans . That said , I think a three year old could deceive match officials these days.

[SE6Ajacied]

Beanpole of Hesselink has gone to Hull-will be interesting to see how he does in England after being deemed surplace to requirements at Celtic

[Orange14]

Chelsea were just handed a big fine and reprimanded for inducing a player to break a contract with his parent team. You can read about it here: http://soccernet.espn.go.com/news/story ... nd&cc=5901 I think this is good news and it's about time FIFA started investigating these and prosecuting the guilty offenders. Chelsea are banned from the next two transfer windows (but can appeal).

[Blind3]

Helluva fine handed to Chelsea also. It'll be interesting to see what happens to the club when the 2010 African Cup of Nations hits and they lose players, but have nobody coming in to mitigate the pain of losing the likes of Drogba , Kalou , and Mikel .

[SPL]

Good on FIFA.The big 4 of England have all been stealing kids.FIFA needs to ban transfers for all U18 's worldwide. It is of course going on in most countries.Tapping up of older players has always gone on and will never be stopped but tapping up 15/16 year olds has to stop.

Chelsea and Arsenal have tried to steal our kids and hopefully this may just stop them.There needs to be a uniform system in Europe for youth contracts,. We have been putting kids of 16 under 3 year contracts to stop the English thieves. It appears contracts for youths differ between the countries.

[Orange14]

Good on FIFA.The big 4 of England have all been stealing kids.FIFA needs to ban transfers for all U18 's worldwide. It is of course going on in most countries.Tapping up of older players has always gone on and will never be stopped but tapping up 15/16 year olds has to stop.

Chelsea and Arsenal have tried to steal our kids and hopefully this may just stop them.There needs to be a uniform system in Europe for youth contracts,. We have been putting kids of 16 under 3 year contracts to stop the English thieves. It appears contracts for youths differ between the countries.

I think in Italy they cannot be contracted to the senior team and are at risk of being poached. ManU picked up a promising under-18 striker from Lazio that way.

[Mr_Holte]

Sorry to sound biased for English clubs again but this is my take on things:

I do think England as a country is often picked on by FIFA/UEFA on many occasions because we are an easy target to 'prove a point'. Like Chelsea, this happens at clubs all over europe, and if they wanted to make an example they could quite easily find another club who tap players up, but by pinpointing Chelsea who play in a super rich league they are 'making a point'. Same goes for hooliganism. It happens everyweek in other countries and when it is the English national team, or on the very rare occasions a club team, they are left out hung to dry. And again, with the Eduardo dive. How many examples could we find everyweek of this sort of thing in the rest of europe? But no, they pick on an English club just to show the rest of the world that they mean buisness.

Awaits finger pointing

[SE6Ajacied]

Awaits finger pointing

I won't do any excessive finger pointing and everyone is entitled to an opinion but (as a fellow Englishman) I think you are wrong wrong and wrong. Sure other teams in other countries do it but not as blatently or arrogantly as teams like Chelsea which is why they were punished. This isn't the first case either-on my phone so can't post a link but I read earlier that a Swiss team (I think) recieved a similar ban and fine last year. All academic anyway, money talks and this is bound to be overturned on appeal.

[SPL]

Article in the Times today suggests FIFA and UEFA are near to agreement with national FA's to ban all international transfers u18. If there is one thing in soccer I would change it is this and I do hope it comes in asap.

[Orange14]

Article in the Times today suggests FIFA and UEFA are near to agreement with national FA's to ban all international transfers u18. If there is one thing in soccer I would change it is this and I do hope it comes in asap.

Appropriate quote from Ken Bates on this: http://soccernet.espn.go.com/news/story ... nd&cc=5901

[SPL]

Holland has suffered some poaching at 15/16 which clearly were iffy .The 2 worst offenders were Chelsea ,surprise surprise , took Jeffrey Bruma from Fword when he was 15 and Patrick Van Aanholt from PSV at 16 (now on loan at Coventry). Arsenal took Nacer Barazite from NEC aged 16 paying his parents and Ozyakup from Az aged 15 . These probabaly were all child poaching . Man U do not have any Dutch youths and Liverpool have 2 , one an 18 year old from AZ and our old youth Jordy Brouwer now 21 and still lost in their second team.They of course took him when he was nearly 19 and we were still to make him a contract offer . (he played for RKC on loan for a time last season did nothing and will probably end up at Oldham or SE6's Blackpool.)

At least in Holland you can put 16 year olds on 3 year contracts , which is what we have been doing.

[SE6Ajacied]

Jordy Brouwer... will probably end up at SE6's Blackpool

Well, much as the Ajax/Blackpool link w ould be attractive, not sure we'd want him,especially if he can't even cut it at RKC in the Jupiler league-Oldham are welcome though.

[SPL]

Big articles in all the Sundays about child poaching. In the Mail Fontein ,who was our CEO back in 2007 , said ther was nothing Ajax could do when Liverpool came in for Brouwer. Given that he was nearly 19 ,if we thought he was any good surely we would have given him a contract long before Liverpool came in for him. They only came in for him because he was not under a contract just a yearly youth agreement. I think Mr Fontein is whinging over nothing. we have so far lost nil youth talent to England. Before Brouwer the last player to leave our youth and go to England was Quincy Owusi-Abeyie or whatever his name was . We kicked him out of our youths at 16 , way back in about 2001 , he joined Arsenal and was last heard of I think in Russia although I did see a report a couple of weeks ago that he failed to impress at Bristol City.

So 2 players lost in nearly 10 years and both crap so we are very lucky so far.

[Orange14]

So 2 players lost in nearly 10 years and both crap so we are very lucky so far.

It's probably becasue we are signing them onto reasonable contracts when they are with the youth program and this prevents them from leaving. I doubt the EPL teams will go after 14 year olds since it's very difficult to predict whether they will amount to anything (prime example here is Freddy Adu who is now at a 2nd rate Portugese team on loan from Benfica). Still there needs to be a uniform policy in place here and the teams that violate it, heavily punished.

[Orange14]

Any remaining respect (and there was precious little) for Arsene Wenger has now disappeared. How anyone can support child trafficking the way he did is just crap!! http://soccernet.espn.go.com/news/story ... rs&cc=5901 Against a ban on under 18 signings is just plain wrong.

[SPL]

just hope this scum bag of a man keeps away from our youth . He is taking complete crap. His team have been the worst of child stealers.

[aztattooedsean777]

Chelsea make a mamooth bid of 65 million euros for Ribery...

Glad he didn't leave. First, heck with Chelsea. I hope he stays and he continues to team up with Robben as they look good together.

[jamcocteau]

Great blog on BBC just now about a player who plays for Stockport County in League One in England. The player in question Carl Baker lost his brother last week to leukemia. But the reaction of the player himself, the club and the fans makes heartwarming reading in an age when to me football has lost its soul to corporate businessmen and the higher ranked players, including those at our own club, act like spoiled brats and do not realise the priveleged position that they are in.

Would really like it every one could take a few minutes out to read this and tell me that this does not restore your faith in football. Thanks

http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/paulfletcher ... tml#138740

[SE6Ajacied]

Great blog on BBC just now about a player who plays for Stockport County in League One in England. The player in question Carl Baker lost his brother last week to leukemia. But the reaction of the player himself, the club and the fans makes heartwarming reading in an age when to me football has lost its soul to corporate businessmen and the higher ranked players, including those at our own club, act like spoiled brats and do not realise the priveleged position that they are in.

Would really like it every one could take a few minutes out to read this and tell me that this does not restore your faith in football. Thanks

http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/paulfletcher ... tml#138740

Yeah, it's a good article that. You don't see that sort of thing too often in the press but the card from the away fans was a 1st class idea. Reminds anyone who's forgotton that players (at least lower down the leagues) are real people with real problems and real lives too.

[SE6Ajacied]

Is it just me or is it just Ajax who could make a feature out of arguably one of our biggest problems in recent years-young players thinking they've made it just by being on Ajax books? Ajax TV...'and when we come back the Ajax reserves get their brand new Mercedes cars'! Pretty dull TV as well.