oh maaaaan! real madrid/ man u is going to be EPIC.

valencia/ psg is gonna be worth watching as well i think. and milan/barcelona....

bayern looking good! unless wenger pulls a rabit out of his hat (what rabbit i have no idea, but eh).

dortmund better not fuck up! i wonder about them playing against all those brazilians from ukraine (eg- will the brazilians be cold? hA!)

and a german vs a turkish team? there's gonna be riots in germany.

Yeah Real v Man U is gonna be great. Fergie against Mourinho. I just think MU are leaking too many goals to really stand much of a chance, even if Real aren't in the best of form themselves right now. And I have to assume that Bayern are gonna pulvarise Arsenal over two legs.

I don't expect Juventus to get to the finals but I hope they have a decent run. I've got a real soft spot for them, especially since they've got Buffon and Chiellini.

I am gonna watch teh matches on ESPN on xbox.

i dont think espn3 has been showing the UEFA matches (espn3 has been a disappointment for me this year, so i had to get cable) but you could subscribe to this shit month-to-month:

http://www.foxsoccer2go.com/

horrible domain name, yes, but the beauty of it for me has been that i can watch in my own time and when there are simultaneous matches and you can't see them all you can come back to watch the recording (some times w/ delay, some times not). this was especially cool during the group stage when you'd have something like 4 matches at the same hour.

I heard that ESPN has done a deal with the Prem for next season where it's gonna show live matches for free in the US. I think Fox currently has the rights but they charge a subscription fee, right?

ESPN is a cable channel. FoxSoccer is also a cable channel. You gotta pay for both, though ESPN comes with some forms of basic cable (cheaper) and FoxSoccer requires an additional sports package (which includes GolTV, which shows the Bundesliga).

ESPN3 (now called something else I forget) is the web arm of ESPN. "Free" access to it is weird, because it's not charged to the user but to the ISP. which is the reason i originally got Comcast internet-- it offers ESPN3. Colleges also get it for some reason, but some internet providers don't. i think there's some way that the xbox also gives it away regardless of provider but I don't know the details.

Anyway, ESPN3, which was the free one, dropped bundesliga matches this past year, and shows all manner of random shit. eg, ronaldo y amigos vs. zidane y amigos agaisnt poverty. or german cup but no bundesliga.

Even if ESPN (regular cable) is picking up premiere league matches that doesn't mean they will be available free on their website, which means you'll require at least a basic cable subscription to watch them online.

A confusing clusterfuck I know, but that's the cable/internet industry.

ps- right now the espn3 site offers only a replay of the newcastle/man city game from dec 15-- that's it, no other match.

Sorry, my mistake, it's NBC that've outbid Fox and ESPN to show live Prem games for free from 2013-14 season.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/sport/2012...l-broadcast-us

oh shit! funny thing see, NBC is owned by comcast ("kabletown" if youve ever watched 30rock), so the fuckers better include it in their sports package.... im sure they will. they better!! or else...!!

fox i think uses sky transmissions. will this be the end of the "fuck sucker" channel???

So, Mancini gives Balotelli yet another chance!

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/sport/foo...o-Mancini.html

I actually think Mancini is doing more harm than good not just to Man City but to Mario himself. How is he meant to grow up when he sees that his actions have no real consequences? And by sticking with a player who everyone else can see is a lost cause, Mancini's also compromising his own credibility as a manager. I honestly can't think of a worse man-manager in English football right now - that are still in a job, anyway.

not to dismiss what you're saying but i think balotelli's psychological problems are bigger than mere "learning the consequences." childhood illness, weird adoption, presumed golddigging relatives, that's gotta fuck you up mentally no matter how much talent.

what he needs is not punishment but *cough cough* therapy. i'm serious...

I absolutely agree and I don't see letting him go as punishment so much as an acknowledgement that he's not in a fit state of mind to play football at that level. He's starting to remind me of Michael Jackson and Mike Tyson. But what can you do?

he reminds me of gg allin

anyway, balotelli will always have a place of honor in my football memory for his penalty kick mindfuck vs. weidenfeller. yes, that wasn't enough for man u to qualify, but what a great moment in sports.

he was also great at the euros btw-- unstable, but great

like britney spears "D

Or Whitney.

Yeah, he's an undoubted talent but, moving away from the moral issues, he's too much trouble. He can't be trusted. Have you heard Mourinho's classic Mario story?

In all honesty, though, a lot of it with me is that I'm really starting to get irritated with Mancini. Not just for his poor man management but overall. I'm really starting to think he's a bit of a fraud, despite what he may have achieved elsewhere which, when you look at the circumstances, isn't as good as it looks. So I just take his latest u turn with Mario as another example of how out of his depth he is. To me he's a mid-table manager at best. That's fine but Man City clearly don't have a mid table squad, resources or expectations.

/end of anti-mancini rant #453

If you're interested, a very good Mourinho doc, with lots of big names talking about 'the special one'. Especially good on his obsessive rift with Barcelona. Love him or hate him, he's always fascinating.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2ZKSXoVHyNM

or christian bale!

or nicolas cage!

or mel fucking gibson!

but anyway-- awesome video. i had to re-google it cuz it won't play in my IP range, but -- yeah-- 14 minutes out of the 15--- haaa haaa haaa. good one!

mourinho sounds cool. gonna watch taht video later cuz right now--

Great article about the Dutch linesman who was murdered during a game a few weeks ago. I remember Sunday league when i was a teenager, and the threat of stuff like this was always in the air. The way the Dutch responded to it was fantastic as well.

Wow, what a tragic story. And yeah, the violence at amateur level games makes my wonder how something similar hasn't happened here yet. Assuming it hasn't.

Everton 2 - 1 West Ham

There's something inevitable about WH losing to a team that're without their best player and which previously seemed to only know how to draw and usually can't buy a win in London. Big Sam needs to spend next month cos with injuries piling up, we could start sinking fast. Keep hearing rumours about loan deals for Kalou and (please God no) Chamakh. Also talk of signing Anelka outright.

You could pretty much change West Ham and you've got Everton's situation. A controversial win to be sure, but then we've had a fair few controversial decisions go totally against us. Swings and roundabouts.

Yeah, those kinds of decisions either go your way or they don't. To be fair, Gibson's sending off looked just as dubious but from WH's point of view it came too late to really make a difference. We've been punching above our weight all season and had a fair bit of luck on the way so, as you say, swings and roundabouts. This season was always gonna be just about survival and I'm still confident we'll stay up, although our injury and suspension list is starting to be a worry (injuries being the one area we've had no luck whatsoever).