Next summer I’m travelling around Europe by rail during Euro 2012, aiming to see as many matches in as many different countries as possible. The tournament itself is being held in Poland and the Ukraine (as the image above handily illustrates) and I’ll go to a couple of actual matches there – but I want to watch the Croats play whilst in Croatia (with their fans), the Bulgarians whilst in Bulgaria, the Latvians whilst in Latvia, etc. And see the differences, similarities, contrasts and characteristics of the various nations and their fans.

Then, evaluating the sociological, historical, geographic and economic factors and influences, I’m going to write a book about it. A hybrid of history (of football and the countries themselves), travel, and of course the tournament itself.

That’s the plan anyway.

I’m announcing this for two reasons; a) to make me actually do it, and b) to see if anyone can help; anyone who has accommodation, friends, recommendations (for watching games for example) across Europe. I’m aiming to pre-arrange meetings with people in each country I visit, to ‘interview’ them (which will mean chatting to them over several beers then forgetting everything).

If you’re a kind and generous soul, or want to make something up to amuse yourself, please drop me a line on contact@footballsup.com. Likewise, any suggestions, hints, tips, abuse – feel free.

The planning (and writing) starts now – and with a vengeance come December 2nd, when the final qualifier is confirmed.

Being as I barely update this site anymore, here are some more active/useful ones for you to visit. You all know the newspaper sites, Football365, ESPN, etc for news and match reports and stuff, but these you may not have heard of.

Goals/Highlights and Games

101GreatGoals - Updated incessantly with goals from all around the world. I’m unsure of the legality but who care about that? Also have a good iPhone app you can download for free here.

Sopcast – This is software that allows you to watch a variety of illegal streams. I’m not advising you to use it – a Sky subscription is much better. But this is undeniably cheaper.

Justin.tv – A site that allows users to set up their own video streams. Some of which may be live football matches.

What’s On

Where’s the Match – Nice graphical interface of all the live games and where they’re on

Live Football on TV – Doesn’t look as nice but does the same job

Podcasts

Football Weekly – The Guardian’s football podcast is just better than all the others.

The Football Ramble – The best ‘independent’ football podcast going

Fantasy Football

Fantasy Football Scout – An invaluable resource for other FF geeks

Total FPL - You can predict price rises etc on Fantasy Premierleague with this. A bit geeky even for me.

Live FF – You can see live scores being updated here, rather than having to wait for the official ones

News

NewsNow - An aggregator of all football news sites. You can filter by club, topic etc

Football Filter – Love this one. Feeds from newspapers, blogs, podcasts and so on, all nicely displayed and divided.

1. Chris Baird (Stoke v Fulham, December 28, 2010)

2. Gareth Bale (Tottenham v Newcastle, December 28, 2010)

3. Dani Luengo (Extremadura U16 vs Asturias U16, December 28, 2010)

4. Khaleem Hyland (Zulte Waregem v Gent, December 30, 2010) (0.10 secs in)

5. Samir Nasri (Birmingham v Arsenal, January 1, 2011)

6. Andrew Taylor (Watford v Portsmouth, January 1, 2011)

7. James Morrison (West Brom v Manchester United, January 1, 2011)

8. Fernando Torres (Liverpool v Bolton, January 1, 2011)

9. Hassan Ali (Al-Ahli Dubai v AC Milan, January 2, 2011)

10. Christian Stuani (Barcelona v Levante, January 2, 2011)

***

Narrowly missing the list were goals from Andrey Arshavin, Paddy McCourt, Katuku Tshimanga (0.30 secs in), Eduardo Salvio, Omar Hassi and Pedro Rodriguez.

Silva is City’s most important player

David Silva spent most of his debut for Manchester City being buffeted about the pitch by Tottenham’s Tom Huddlestone on the opening day of the season. Then it seemed like City’s big summer signing was not made for English football, where praise from pundits generally centres on a player’s pace, power and drive, rather than his vision or ball skills. We routinely hear Premier League tub-thumpers prattling on about how they would like to see how Lionel Messi would fare against Stoke City, an argument with more holes in it than West Ham’s defence.

This is not something to be proud of and it is, of course, why English players struggle at international level, where possession is key, but in the Premier League, a small, skilful player is often viewed as a wanton luxury and Silva must have wondered what he had let himself in for as 21 headless chickens charged around him while he struggled to dictate play.

Since then his rapid rise has been remarkable. If Carlos Tevez has been portrayed as City’s heart, then Silva is the brains. Tevez was missing through suspension against West Ham – and may be on his way out of Eastlands for good – but City did not suffer in his absence. Much was made before the game of City’s inability to win without Tevez, but Silva would be a bigger loss. Indeed, if he maintains this level of performance, Roberto Mancini might not be too disappointed to see Tevez go. While it is true to say Tevez is City’s captain, it is Silva who is their leader.

He was a delight to watch, constantly on the ball, teasing his opponents with his soft, shuffling footwork, keeping City ticking over with the intelligent economy of his movement. He looks like a small woodland creature and plays with the impish mischievous glint of one too. Everything went through Silva. He is the thinking man’s footballer. His assist for Adam Johnson’s goal, an impossibly brilliant through-ball, was outstanding and something no other player on the pitch could have done. Silva’s work has largely gone unnoticed outside of Manchester, but judging by the way he spent the afternoon quietly winning a game of hide-and-seek with Scott Parker, one imagines that’s just the way he likes it.

Never write off a top side

Chelsea are fourth, one point off the league leaders, Arsenal. They have qualified for the knockout stages of the Champions League. Frank Lampard is back and Didier Drogba is scoring again. And this is a crisis? Of course, all that fails to tell the whole story. With a defence leakier than a US diplomat, Chelsea had been appalling for weeks and Tottenham found themselves cast in the unlikely role of favourites yesterday. Favourites against a side that won the Double last season. Initially that feeling was justified after Roman Pavlyuchenko’s clever goal again exposed the flaws in Chelsea’s back four, but in the end, Tottenham were reliant on Heurelho Gomes’s save from Drogba’s stoppage-time penalty to earn them a point.

While only managing to draw the match extended Chelsea’s winless streak to five league games, their performance yesterday hinted at a return to their swashbuckling form at the start of the season. Against a very good side, Chelsea were excellent at times and should have scored more than once. Given their atrocious run, the manner of their comeback after Pavlyuchenko’s goal was highly impressive and reveals a dressing room that is very much united. It was a game reminiscent of Guus Hiddink’s first in charge in February 2009. Chelsea, in turmoil after sacking Luiz Felipe Scolari, travelled to Villa, cocky upstarts in fourth place, with few people expecting them to win. Chelsea swaggered to a 1-0 victory. As Manchester United have already demonstrated this season, it never pays to write off a top side. Even when they have been as bad as Chelsea in recent weeks. In the long run, they will end up proving you wrong.

Hope doesn’t kill you

It might be a famous quote, but Brian Stimpson was off the mark when he said “I can take the despair. It’s the hope I can’t stand.” Sure, on the surface, that makes sense. We can empathise with that. We know what he means. Yet, in reality, it fails to ring true. We need hope. It is what sustains us and without it, there really is no point any more. West Ham were dreadful against City, hopelessly outclassed and outplayed by a team that was able to leave out two strikers who cost £25m each and another who cost £17m; only no one was particularly surprised.

This is not your average relegation West Ham are experiencing: it is an Avram Grant relegation, lifeless, insipid and utterly devoid of personality. Quite simply, West Ham’s supporters are bored. Bored with losing. Bored with the terrible defending. Bored with the awful football. West Ham have won only 10 of their last 55 league games. With a record like that, it is almost an achievement that they are still in the Premier League and it is no wonder the fans are fed up.

In years gone by, such a limp display would have been greeted furiously by the Upton Park crowd. Instead on Saturday, just like their team, they sat back and watched in abject silence as City took them apart with surgical precision. The fight is gone. There were hardly any boos and there haven’t been all season. West Ham are doomed and everybody knows it. They have known it since August. When West Ham were relegated in 2003, they genuinely were too good to go down (they finished on 42 points, still a record in a 20-team league) and it was possible to pin one’s hopes on a player such as Joe Cole. Now they have Carlton Cole. Somewhere along the line, someone appears to have made a terrible mistake.

Pardew is not a bad manager

He’s not the Messiah, he’s a very naughty boy. Newcastle’s supporters made that very clear before their game against Liverpool, when Alan Pardew’s arrival in the dugout was met with a less than positive reaction. Pardew, a man of relentless positivity and an oddly unsettling belief in his own ability, is unlikely to have been fazed by that. Given the circumstances of his arrival and Chris Hughton’s sacking, he would have expected nothing less. A lot has been said about events at Newcastle over the past week, but few things in life are as pointless as trying to comprehend what goes on in Mike Ashley’s head.

Either way, Ashley’s decision to appoint Pardew is not quite as disastrous as is being made out. True, Hughton should never have been sacked and Pardew’s contract until 2016 does have a sniff of being an elaborate hoax. Pardew, though, is not a terrible manager and starting his career on Tyneside with a 3-1 victory over Liverpool is as good as it gets and would suggest that Newcastle’s players have not turned mutinous following Hughton’s dismissal. For some time, the suspicion has lingered that Pardew has unfinished business in the Premier League, after he lost his way with West Ham in 2006. Pardew is well-versed in motivational techniques and even though he has said he knows he will not win the PR battle, he is exactly the sort of manager who is able to tap into a crowd’s mentality. Supporters have been known to take to him. Players too. If he is embraced at Newcastle, he could be brilliant. After all, at the club where reward for beating your local rivals 5-1 is getting the sack, nothing ever tends to make sense.

Moyes needs a fresh start

Another weekend, another game in which Everton have failed to overcome moderate opposition. This has now turned into a genuine problem for David Moyes’s side. We are used to this with Everton – they have always started seasons slowly, gradually building up momentum as they get into their stride and charge up the table. This season something has changed. The charge up the table has not materialised and after a 0-0 home draw with Wigan, they are only two points above the bottom three. Push someone’s buttons for long enough and eventually you’ll end up with a bloody nose and, similarly, eventually a bad start to the season will be impossible to recover from.

It is becoming increasingly apparent that David Moyes, excellent manager though he is, has gone stale at Everton. They have hit the wall under him, in the same way that Martin O’Neill was unable to take Aston Villa into the promised land of the Champions League. There has been no reward for Moyes’s fine work, largely due to Everton not having the financial muscle required to breach the top four. Moyes has hardly done a bad job, quite the opposite in fact, but there is a fatigue enveloping Goodison Park now and the current state of affairs is doing nothing to enhance his reputation. All parties need a fresh start and it would be a surprise to see Moyes still at Everton next season.

Originally from Goal.com – I just like the photos, which I’ve only just found…

Former Brazil, Barcelona and Milan star Rivaldo will make a return to Brazilian football in the 2011 Paulista for tiny club Mogi Mirim, of whom the player is also president.

The 38 year-old has not played competitive football since leaving Uzbekistani outfit Bunyodkor in August, and it has been seven years since he has played for a Brazilian club.

Nevertheless, the attacking midfielder announced on Twitter today that he plans to return with Mogi Mirim, who were one of the first teams he ever played for as a teenager and have had the player as their president since 2008.

“After sorting out a lot of things outside of the country, I have decided to play the Paulista 2011 for Mogi Mirim, of whom I am President,” the ex-international posted on the social network.

The last few years of Rivaldo’s career have seen him change clubs frequently, with spells in Greece with Olympiacos and Uzbekistan bringing domestic success to the clubs involved.

Mogi Mirim, based in the town of the same name 160 km away from Sao Paulo, finished 12th in last year’s first phase of the State Championship, but do not play in the national championship. Rivaldo played for the club for two years in 1992-93, playing 30 times with 10 goals.

Here they are – I assume some sort of Photoshop or cut our wizardry (seems more likely than him existing as two separate entities) – the lack of reflection in the first suggests he is some sort of vampire though.

Last week I had the pleasure of watching the second leg of the New York Red Bulls against the San Jose Earthquakes. Some brief observations on soccer v football…

Firstly, the entire experience is far more pleasant. No tattooed thugs shouting and ranting, no fighting, no racist/obscene chanting, and so on. The better atmosphere was part created and part illustrated by the presence of more women (not in a pervy way) and more children (not in a paedophilic way). It was more a spectacle than a tribalistic show of passion, as football has wont to be in the UK.

The ground is divided into several sections, as per usual, but one of them is ‘Supporters’ – this is a specific (and small) area for the vocal, passionate and I assume more thuggish element, but the rest of the ground was relaxed and chilled out for the most part.

There were only small queues for the drink and the food – and they served booze, and you could take it in and drink it at your seat. I mean that alone is enough for me to prefer it. But the fact the fans are ‘trusted’ with that shows how much more respectable they are than their British equivalents.

However, what was gained in convivialness was admittedly lost in the quality of the play. Uniquely in the MLS, some of the players are just-over-the-hill international class footballers – in this game Rafael Marquez, Thierry Henry, and Juan Pablo Angel – whereas some are part-timers on a few hundred dollars a month. Chris Wondolowski, top scorer in the league, also has a part time job as a coach to make ends meet. Which is a little bizarre.

So whilst there was some quality on view, there was some shit as well – particularly at the back. If you’re going to go for a marquee signing it does tend to be an attacker, so the defences are, relatively, poor. Weirdly that doesn’t seem to lead to a proliferation of goals though. Can’t quite explain that.

The American love of stats was on full view – ‘Post Game Season Most Goal Assists’ ‘All time MLS Shut-outs’ ‘All time MLS Shots on Goal’ and so on were beamed on the screens before the game.

The fans seemed no less informed than your average Brit – admittedly in the UK the vocal ones are usually the spastic hooligans who know nothing about the game anyway – but the occasional woop and holler came in about the same level of understanding. They cheered and boo’d at the right times.

It would have been interesting to hear some post match analysis – I doubt it would have been much worse than ‘fuckin’ ‘ell they were fuckin’ shit’ which is the kind of insightful post match reaction you get exiting the County Ground.

Overall, it was an immensely enjoyable experience. San Jose won 3-1, a shock result that gave them a 3-2 aggregate win and passage to the final. Thierry Henry, who was carrying an injury, only played the last ten minutes or so – with no impact – which was the only real downside. It was more an event, a showcase, a spectacle, than the gang warfare that so often constitutes British football.

There were many empty seats in the 25,000 arena which shows that ‘soccer’ still has a long way to go in the US (bearing in mind this was the Eastern Conference Semi-Final featuring the largest city’s only team) – and the away support was minimal – but absolute respect to these San Jose Ultras who made the journey across America:

I happened to read Marcotti in the Times yesterday, he was there too, and contrasted it with his visit to the Red Bulls’ first game – an interesting read, even if he is a fat arrogant cunt. I can’t link it or paste it because of the Times’ stupid paywall. Summary being, American football has come a long way, but still has a long way to go. Which after my visit seems a fair synopsis.

The only worry is that the further it goes, the less enjoyable it will become.

A list of all the transfers and that…

ARSENAL

An up to date list of the Premier League players who will be missing this summer. Click the names for more news on the injury…

John Obi Mikel – knee injury

Didier Drogba – fractured elbow

Rio Ferdinand – left knee ligament damage

Michael Essien – hamstring & knee

Michael Ballack – right ankle ligament damaget

Jozy Altidore – Ankle

Martin Skrtel – Ankle

Valon Behrami – doubtful, Hamstring

Nani – doubtful, Shoulder

Nicklas Bendtner – Thigh

GROUP A FIXTURES

GROUP B FIXTURES

GROUP C FIXTURES

GROUP D FIXTURES

GROUP E FIXTURES

GROUP F FIXTURES

GROUP G FIXTURES

GROUP H FIXTURES

With Barcelona’s triumph Zlatan Ibrahimovic won his seventh consecutive league winner’s medal. That is, he has won the league with whichever club he has played for, for the last seven seasons in a row. Just incredible. The record:

Ajax
Eredivisie:
2003–04

Juventus
Serie A:
2004–05, 2005–06 (pre- Calciopoli )

Internazionale
Serie A:
2006–07, 2007–08, 2008–09

Barcelona
La Liga
2009-2010

Now he has his detractors, and undoubtedly has fallibilities, but you just can’t argue with the consistent level of success. Leading the line for each of those clubs he has won every one of them the league across three different countries. I can’t be sure, but I think he is unique in this – it’s never been done before.

He also scored potentially my favourite ever goal:

And also the other day he responded to a question about his sexuality from a journalist (after this picture):

By answering: ‘Come round to my house and I’ll show you if I’m gay. And bring your sister’.

You may hate him, you may not rate him, but you have to respect that winning record, that goal, and that comeback…