Football is the most popular game across the world. Every year millions of peoples watched the football matches. The biggest event held in the football is worldcup. The event is held in every 4 year times. 32 national team participate from across from the world to win the major pric.
Ever since I started watching football many years ago now, when it came time for the World Cup, Spain were always considered a dangerous threat by many pundits that they would win the tournament, only to let everyone down time and time again. Spain are likely to have one of the best selling world cup jersey in the tournament, but the best they have finished is 4th place in a World Cup and that was in 1950. Yes, they have won the European Championship twice, in 1964 and 2008, but I don’t think they’ve ever been serious contenders to win a World Cup… that is, until now.
Vicente Del Bosque’s side will have taken a massive confidence boost from their achievements not only in Euro 2008, but the fact that they won every single group game in World Cup Qualification. Those playing in a Spain World Cup jerseymanaged to score 28 goals in 10 games and only conceded 5, which is a fantastic record, in a group that contained teams like Bosnia, Turkey and Belgium.
This current Spanish squad has shown that it is more than just a good team on paper and I honestly believe that it’s the best chance Spain have ever had of winning the World Cup. Obviously, injuries could occur to key players throughout the season and it is impossible to predict which players will make it to the tournament because of that, but as you can see, there is great strength in depth and at the moment, Spain are my favourites to go all the way.
he following list of elite midfield players in the world will exclude the likes of Lionel Messi, Cristiano Ronaldo and Kaka since they sometimes play as forwards or as support strikers depending on the strategy deployed by their team. Kaka has previously played as a second striker during his spell with Milan while both Messi and Ronaldo have played in various attacking positions for their club (mostly on the wing though).
The list below does not comprise all of the world’s best midfielders but focuses on those who have made next summer’s World Cup:
The countdown to South Africa 2010 may have started but there is still plenty of time for surprises to take place in terms of team selections and final squad lists. Coaches may spring a surprise or two and call upon unfamiliar names or perhaps the likes of the erratic Raymond Domenech will pick some unknown players.
Setting aside unforeseen events, injuries, suspensions or lack of form, a considerable number of players are all but guaranteed a spot o their national team’s roster heading to South Africa. It is perhaps early to confirm who has already scored his ticket to the World Cup but a few names will always surface when considering the most likely top scorer of the tournament. The top scorer does not have to be a striker so a number of attacking midfielders and wingers will be included on this potential list as shown below:
It's been a few years since he hung up his boots, but nothing much seems to have changed and even now things like self-censorship have no place in his vocabulary. Without mincing his words Di Canio made it clear what he thinks of defending champions Italy's chances at this year's World Cup in South Africa.Marcelo Lippi's men, in his opinion, are an ageing bunch, who don't have a chance because "the balance is disturbed". "We are the defending champions but at the moment our experienced players are four years older and some of them are close to 35, so it will be difficult to keep the trophy.
Di Canio, 41, feels teams like England, Spain and Brazil will be favourites as they've hit form at the right time. "If you look at the way things are going on at the moment; they are definitely the better teams going into the World Cup. They've done very well in qualification and it's just a matter of keeping that momentum going for the next few months going into the competition.
"[Wayne] Rooney is my favourite player in the world and he will show why he is special at the World Cup and as far as defending is concerned. Then I think the pairing of John Terry and Rio Ferdinand is really great, provided that Terry doesn't go there with his gossip but instead with a good mindset."
Pele has written off England's chances of winning the 2010 World Cup and said: 'Spain are now the best team in the world.'
The legendary Brazilian believes the European champions can also clinch the world crown but warned it will not be easy.
He said: 'Spain are the most prepared team. They have great players, they are playing well and are on a roll. They will be the team to beat in the World Cup for Brazil, Argentina, Italy and England
'But winning the World Cup is very complicated. It is not enough simply to have the best team, you also need to get lucky. At the World Cup you cannot have a bad day and therein lies the secret of success.
'Brazil were the best team in 1982 but we had a bump and Italy won.
Pele thinks that under Diego Maradona, Argentina will struggle despite having the best player in the world - Lionel Messi.
He said: 'As a coach he does not have much experience but Argentina gave him the job. They have great players like Messi but not a great team.
This summer the 2010 World Cup will determine the best team in the world.
Everyone has their opinion on who will win, but it is clear that Brazil and Spain will be very strong teams. Once again Brazil is loaded with some of the world’s most recognizable players. They easily advanced through the qualifier, but the competition is guaranteed to be much stiffer in South Africa this summer. Portugal, the strongest competitor in Brazil’s group, will be sure to give them a challenge.
Spain is looking to be very strong, and had a fortunate draw for their group. They also have a star-studded lineup and the people of Spain are expecting them to bring home the world cup. As usual, England will put together a very strong squad full of the usual names. Lampard, Rooney, and Gerrard will be sure to create some magic on the field this summer.
England is expected to advance out of their group, but their performance in the final rounds has always been shaky. One of their more obvious weaknesses is the lack of a strong goalkeeper. Germany will be a strong competitor in England’s group, and their size and strength will be sure to give England a challenge.
Portugal will also be a threat, but their performance during qualifiers was disappointing.
Argentina will be strengthened by the presence of Lionel Messi, but they are a young team and may not have the composure to succeed in the later rounds. This summer should be an excellent test to see how much this team has developed.
Italy is the defending world champion, but there are many doubts that they could repeat the same victory. Many of their skilled players are growing older, and will have trouble keeping up with the younger squads.
Even after the controversy over Henry’s handball, the French will still have a good shot at reaching the later stages this summer. They have a skilled team, but it is unclear whether they will be able to put it all together.
Brazil, who have claimed the trophy a record five times, are the likely winners this summer, with 22pc probability of victory, the Swiss investment bank said.
The UBS Wealth Management team found Spain, the European champions and bookmakers' favourite, to have just a 4pc shot at the title. Fabio Capello's England also have just a 4pc chance, it said.
"Football fans may feel that the European champions and firm fans favourite Spain is under-rated by the UBS model," the bank's global equity research team said in its World Cup 2010research paper on Wednesday.
"And our local UK readers may feel the same about England’s chances. However, both teams have tended to be underachievers when it comes to the World Cup finals themselves. In the last three events, Spain and England were ranked amongst the strongest teams but did not make it beyond the quarter-final stage.
"Brazil has the highest probability [of winning]."
UBS used its "econometric toolbox and quantitative models" to forecast the winner based on factors including historic results and the teams' current "Elo ratings" – which take account of not only recent wins, losses and defeats, but the conditions under which those events occurred. Beating a powerhouse like Brazil or Spain would improve a team’s Elo ranking much more than beating a smaller side like Malta or Andorra.
The bank also believes World Cup hosts South Africa, despite their uninspiring recent form, are all but guaranteed a place in the second round, rating their chances at 78pc.
Brazil are the second most likely to progress with 74pc. The country least likely to progress, with a probability of just 29pc, is Paraguay, UBS said.
England were rated 63pc likely to escape the group stage and 21pc guaranteed to reach the semi-finals.
The UBS model was applauded in 2006 when it selected the winner, Italy. The bankers also correctly predicted 13 of the final 16, six of the final eight, and two of the semi-finalists.
However, when using the model for the 2008 European Championship, the forecast winner did not make it to the second round. "The moral of the story is that one needs to be humble about the predictive power of one’s model," the Wealth Management team said.
One must hope that Fabio Capello, the England manager, is not as suggestible as he has been made to seem, judging by his comments after the win over Mexico. His supposed encouragement of the idea may have been mere politeness and practicality, born from the natural inclination of a coach not to rule out any option.
Anyway, he had just played Gerrard in central midfield for 45 minutes when quizzed on the subject, so would appear foolish if he dismissed the idea as regressive.
Perhaps, like a lot of what we saw against Mexico on Monday, Capello was discussing it only as a possible plan B or C. Plan A, the masterful road map that allowed England to coast the journey to South Africa, defeating Croatia 9-1 on aggregate along the way, was safely tucked in his breast pocket for use when it really mattered, against the United States on June 12.
This would make sense, for Capello is no fool and has already seen what works for England. As for those agitating on Gerrard's behalf, get a grip. One good half of football, against Mexico at home, and it is as if the World Cup qualifying campaign never happened.
All this revisionist talk about Gerrard and the graveyard shift on the left, the resurrection of a hoary debate that went away when Capello demonstrated that Gerrard and Frank Lampard could play in the same team, just not in the same position. Is this really what we need three weeks before the World Cup? It feels as if we have opened a door to the past.
For the last time: Gerrard does play centrally for England, but he starts on the left. When the opposition have the ball, his duty is to close down the right back, if England have possession, he goes where he wants. It is that simple. Nobody is asking him to operate like a teenage Ryan Giggs, nobody wants him to hug the line. Zinedine Zidane started left and came in; so did Ronaldinho; and Gheorghe Hagi. It is no slight. Great players often start wide because the centre is too congested. Lionel Messi and Cristiano Ronaldo may both do so at the World Cup.
A good read by Piers Edwards on the Algerian team, in the same group as USA, England, and Slovenia.
Algeria regularly provided exceptional players to France before the independence struggle began in the 1950s. That was when many of the Algerians like Monaco's Mustapha Zitouni and St Etienne's Rachid Mekloufi, considered sure prospects for the 1958 World Cup gave up playing for France to join the FLN, (Front de Liberation National) immortalized in Gilles Pontecorvo's classic "The Battle of Algiers".
More recently, a number of Algerians having risen up through the youth ranks in French clubs have returned to their country of origin with Raymond Domenech filling his squad with players from French overseas territories and West African Francophone countries.
Madjid Bougherra, Nadir Belhadj, Mourad Meghni and Hassan Yebda have strengthened Les Fennecs with Yebda and Meghni even winning the U17 World Cup title representing France.
Antar Yahia, the central defender who was Algeria's hero in the tense battle against Egypt at Khartoum by scoring the only goal became the first beneficiary of FIFA's rule change allowing a player with dual nationality and under the age of 21 years to switch his national allegiance. Yahia a former U18 French international was able to play for Algeria in the 2004 Olympics and scored a goal for a 1-0 win over Ghana.
With Samir Nasri, Karim Benzema, and Hatem Ben Arfa being left out, the nationalists would say that there will be no divided loyalties and no more embarrassing moments when Les Marseillaise is played. However, when opportunities close, others open up elsewhere. Les Fennecs are benefiting from these reverse migrations.
With the World Cup barely two weeks away, Johannesburg has shifted into high gear to get ready. The city's 2010 FIFA World cup page proudly proclaims that a huge amount of effort and money has been spent on cleaning up the city and improving infrastructure. It has spent 1.2 billion rand ($151 million) to revamp Soccer City, a giant stadium where the opening ceremony and final game will be held. Billions have also gone into other stadiums and city infrastructure. But a report by business day news paper has found the city still hasn't finished fixing roads between the main venues, the airport, and the hotel district. It's an open question whether these will be done in time to deal with the huge increase in traffic once the World cup gets started. Another problem is transportation for the fans. The special transport set up between the airport and the fan park won't run at night, forcing people to use public transport.
At least fans will be going to a place that was name in a 2009 survey, and if they don't find the savings being passed onto them, they can always get away from the crowds and visit Mozambique like many South Africans are doing this year.
Today, an interesting comment from 2010 World Cup head organizerDanny Jordaan concerning the selection of Brazil's squad for the tournament.
Jordaan criticized Brazil coach Dunga for leaving AC Milan star Ronaldinho out of Brazil's first-choice squad for the Cup, saying some coaches are "blinded" by a sense of power.
Jordaan said Ronaldinho is a "soccer genius" who had talents "enjoyed by few in the game, both past and present."
Ronaldinho will only play in South Africa if there are injuries to other players after Dunga left the two-time world player of the year out of his 23-man squad yesterday.
Jordaan said it was it was "sad and unfortunate" the tournament would suffer without Ronaldinho and that someone of Dunga's experience should have selected the Milan midfielder as a "matter of course."
Of course, the former Barcelona star isn't the only big star left out of the tournament.
Also missing is Francesco Totti and Luca Toni from Italy, Javier Zanetti and Esteban Cambiasso from Argentina andPatrick Vieira from France, along with many others.
Certainly, the Cup will miss the presence of these great players. But others will fill their shoes and be mentioned in the same breath as these wonderful talents as they display their wares for the world to see come June 11th.
What do you think? Is Jordaan right in his assessment? Should players like Ronaldinho be 'grandfathered' into Cup competitions because of who they are?
Well, I know most of us have tried to block out the France escapade that played out during the Euro 2008 tournament- at least I have. But, humor me for a moment, as we revisit that dark place….and follow the latest twist that may reveal why Nasri was left out of the France squad.
According to Gallas’s biography, there were two incident over the tournament in which he felt Nasri was disrespectful to older members of the France team…
Fight #1
During a training in Switzerland , the players form teams of three to pass the ball to each other. Gallas forms a team with Samir Nasri and another young player. As part of the exercise, Nasri and the other player are suppose to alert Gallas as to when the pass arrives to him- which he and the other young player fail to do. Gallas, tells the young players to “speak, my boys, give me the information [when the ball arrives].” One of the young players makes the smart decision to take the criticism and remain silent- that player was not Nasri. Instead, Nasri decides to give as good as he’s getting and snaps back at Gallas, “You have to know before the ball arrives, you have to know it yourselves when it arrives!” Gallas, being obsessed with deference to age and experience (both of which, obviously, advantage him) does not take kindly to this sass and instead of deescalating the conflict, decides to become even more condescending, “How do you speak to me? Who do you think you are? You’re only a 20-year-old! I am not your friend!” But, of course, this really isn’t much a threat to Nasri, who doesn’t seem to care about having William Gallas as a BFF, and he decides to let him know…”Me neither, I am not your friend!” The shouting apparentl continues (which begs the question why a mature adult from the coaching squad did not intervene) with Nasri continuing to engage Gallas and antagonize him by requesting that he “lower his voice” and “speak less loudly.”
Fight #2
During training for the tournament, Henry did not travel with the team on a few occasions- and on those occasions Nasri chose to sit in his seat. Well, apparently, no one told Nasri that the team operated like high school with assigned seats- so once Henry returned back to the team, his seat check immediately went into affect. According to Gallas’s biography, Nasri was not respectful enough to honor this unspoken rule, and he just wasn’t going to stand for it (even though it didn’t concern him one bit). So, Gallas takes it upon himself to confront Nasri over this serious breach of decorum – and demands (not asks) that he move so Henry can reclaim his throne on the bus. Now, this time Nasri says nothing in response to Gallas and moves as requested (err, demanded). Which, ironically, Gallas also finds to be disrespectful…
So why is this being brought up again?
Because at the time, Nasri displayed remarkable maturity and didn’t respond to Gallas’s serious breach of confidentiality. Back then, Nasri instead that the ordeal had been completely overblown and that it was unfair to blame his behavior for the on-field fiascos…seeing as though he hardly played, its hard to disagree with that.
But now things have changed. First, Gallas is expected to leave Arsenal on a free transfer so Nasri won’t have to deal with him on a day-to-day basis. Which isn’t really different from how they deal with each now because according to Nasri they two do not speak each other. And Nasri isn’t the only one giving Gallas the silent treatment- apparently 5 other Arsenal players feel the same way. Now, there is no guarantee that those players are French….but this situation could provide us with some interesting insight on why Nasri and potentially other young members of the France squad were not chosen in Domenech’s list of 30 players last week. Nasri has asked Domenech to explain his decision, emphasizing that he respects the coach’s decision, but he “hears” he’s being reproached for behavior….
Pedro RodrÃguez Ledesma, the Barcelona winger who has become the first player in all of footballing history (scandalous, I know) to score in six different competitions in one season. He is completely 100% ambidextrous, has a magnificent long range shot. He is tied with Zlatan Ibrahimovic for the second most goals in the club so far this season. Talk of Ibra’s impotence (to some anyways) or is this the revelation of a player who’s going to storm the contentinal scene for the next decade?
Certainly, this season Pedro has exceeded all expectations. He quickly relegated Thierry Henry to the bench and secured himself a starting position in the Barcelona XI. He has made 32 appearances in La Liga for the club so far, scoring ten goals. A modest return, but he has scored some vitally important goals throughout the season. As just mentioned, he has put up the goods in every competition Barcelona has participated in the past year, a fantastic achievement.
Pedro is adaptable as playing on either wing, and generally likes to cut inside with his runs where he can look to take a shot from anywhere he is on the field. He moves into channels quite well, a staple of the tiki-taka system Barcelona employs. Preferably it seems, Pedro will line up just inside of the opposing teams’ outside back where he has maximum option of taking the ball wide, continuing his run inside or running at the player to beat him. We saw him employ this moderately successfully against Inter’s Maicon.
One of Fabio Capello’s many dilemmas going into this World Cup has been the emergence of some of his younger squad players as potential starters in South Africa. Some situations have been forced on him through injuries to key players but a few of the rookies have shown potential on their own. Joe Hart, Adam Johnson, and Theo Walcott probably merit selection on their own whereas Leighton Baines and Tom Huddlestone got in through the side door as injuries forced a rethink. Capello naturally prefers veteran players so he has some tough decisions to make.Many veteran coaches believe that young players don’t win tournaments, except for Alex Ferguson of course, and so when it comes to crunch time, youngsters usually get to sit on the bench during the important games. Older players usually have more competition experience and especially when pressure mounts, coaches would rather go with tried and trusted talent.However, over the years, many young stars have emerged at World Cups without much prior exposure and have gone on to become world stars. Pele was a raw 17 year old in 1958 in Sweden when he helped his country win the World Cup that year. He was somewhat of a star back home already in Brazil, and probably is an exception rather than the rule. Michael Owen was 18 years old when he set the football world alight in 1998 with that famous goal for England against Argentina.
The 2010 FIFA World Cup will be the 19th FIFA World Cup, the premier international football tournament. It is scheduled to take place between 11 June and 11 July 2010 in South Africa. This will be the first time that the tournament has been hosted by an African nation.
32 teams from around the world will competit the major honour. 32 teams are divided into 8 groupes and in which each groupe consist of 4 teams. Italy was the defending champion. We are looking forward to see who will be the world champion on 11 July 2010
