METRO – Gallery: Barclays Premier League’s most frequent goalscorers 2012/13

The 2012/13 football season is coming to a close and Metro Sport takes a look at some of the most prolific goalscorers the Premier League has had to offer.

A news article on 2013-05-14 16:43:00 from: The Metro

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TI – Xabi Alonso can be part of ‘cheap’ Jose Mourinho deal

Chelsea could land Jose Mourinho on the cheap this summer and get the former Liverpool midfielder Xabi Alonso into the bargain if the Real Madrid coach goes back to Stamford Bridge.

A news article on 2013-05-01 21:55:00 from: The Independent

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GUARDIAN – Why Luis Suárez’s bite led to the perfect storm of evil | Simon Burnton

Liverpool striker committed the ultimate sin when he sank his teeth into Chelsea’s defender Branislav Ivanovic

We have all at some stage forgotten to empty the bread bin when we went on holiday, or left a pear in the fruit bowl, and returned to discover a repulsive mass of mould. Fridges help to delay this process by keeping food cold and dry, but imagine instead placing your comestibles in a warm, damp place, deliberately mushing them up and then leaving them to fester. A bacterium could hardly imagine a finer breeding ground. Imagine what vile horrors would swiftly grow within. This is the mouth.

Now imagine a colourless liquid that contains the very essence of you. Not just DNA, but enough information to detect things as varied as diabetes, allergies, recreational drug use and HIV, as well as strong doses of sex hormones and between 10 and 100 million bacteria per millilitre. This is saliva.

It’s not surprising that we find mouths, handy as they are for communicating and consuming, a bit odd. Unpleasant even. Sport has a very British attitude to the mouth. It is to be used for calling the toss, and then closed. You may run and jump, throw and catch, kick and punch, you may even hit things with sticks or shoot them with arrows and bullets, but bare your teeth and you’re in trouble.

Of course greater injury can be inflicted using a booted foot than even the most savage mouth, and very frequently is. But mouth-attacks still carry a particular resonance. As Frank Rijkaard, author of football’s most notorious incident, will attest, they are remembered when the casually cracked fibula is forgotten, and punished with a vigour forgotten when more genuinely harmful assaults are committed.

This year the Irish prop Cian Healy was banned for three convenient weeks for stamping on England’s Dan Cole in the Six Nations match at the Aviva Stadium in an apparently deliberate attempt to cause injury; when the Stade Français halfback Jerome Fillol spat at Bath’s Peter Stringer a few weeks later no injury was possible, but his ban will last for 14 weeks.

Aim a kick or a punch at a rival and you will be criticised for your violence; aim your saliva at them and the backlash will be worse. Two examples from late2004 illustrate the point. In one, Manchester United’s Ruud Van Nistelrooy attacked Arsenal’s Ashley Cole with his studs, in the other Bolton’s El Hadji Diouf spat at Portsmouth’s Arjan de Zeeuw.

Van Nistelrooy got a three-week ban but also the support of his club, and said in a statement that “there was no deliberate attempt to harm”. Diouf got a three-week ban and a two-week fine, was condemned by his manager and said in a statement that “my behaviour showed a lack of moral responsibility”. Arsène Wenger said Van Nistelrooy was “silly”; Gary Speed, who played with Diouf at Bolton at the time, described spitting as “probably the worst thing that can happen to you”.

If attempts to injure are bad and saliva is worse, attempts to injure that involve saliva are the perfect storm of evil. Biting is normally the preserve of morally confused infants, and though footballers are prone to the occasional exhibition of juvenile idiocy, this is a level to which they are normally unwilling to stoop. But no blood was drawn by Luis Suárez on Sunday; Branislav Ivanovic’s immediate reaction seemed to be astonishment, rather than agony.

Already the Uruguayan has been fined, offered anger-management counselling, condemned by his club and forced to issue a public apology, and the FA looks set to act next. When Wigan’s Callum McManaman all-but amputated Massadio Haidara’s leg in March he met none of those fates. Why is it that football’s disciplinarians only bared their teeth after a footballer did the same?

Perhaps we need to rethink where spitting and biting dispassionately deserve to be placed on sport’s crime sheet. Without wishing to exonerate him, Suárez’s actions were neither massively violent nor necessarily evil, and something about his ongoing demonisation sticks in the craw.

His biting certainly seemed extremely weird, but can the same not be said of our approach to the mouth?


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A news article on 2013-04-22 14:23:00 from: The Guardian

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GOAL – Liverpool 2-2 Chelsea: Suarez goes from zero to hero to ruin Rafa’s return

Benitez was on the brink of engineering a crucial win on his Anfield return before the Uruguayan followed up a bite on Ivanovic with a header six minutes into added time

A news article on 2013-04-21 16:59:00 from: Goal

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GOAL – Lampard & Gerrard: England’s golden midfielders near the end of an era

Similarities of position, playing style, career paths and achievements made comparison inevitable between two great midfielders destined to be rivals as well as team-mates

A news article on 2013-04-21 06:15:00 from: Goal

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ESPN – Dalglish hails Benitez’s Liverpool legacy

Kenny Dalglish believes Liverpool manager Brendan Rodgers is reaping the benefits of Rafael Benitez’s time in charge at the club.

A news article on 2013-04-20 10:34:00 from: ESPN

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GUARDIAN – Chelsea captain John Terry back on the bench for Liverpool trip

• Defender to be rotated again despite two-goal midweek display
• David Luiz and Branislav Ivanovic to start in defence

John Terry is expected to drop back to the bench when Chelsea visit Liverpool on Sunday despite the interim manager, Rafael Benítez, insisting all his players are capable of playing three times every week, but with selections determined by form and the qualities of the opposition.

The club captain was omitted, along with Frank Lampard, for last weekend’s FA Cup semi-final against Manchester City but impressed with two headed goals against Fulham in midweek. The 32-year-old subsequently publicly backed Benítez’s policy of rotation, with the game at Anfield the 61st of Chelsea’s season, but suggested he was fit enough to play more than merely alternate games.

That much has been acknowledged by Benítez, who is expected to select Branislav Ivanovic and David Luiz in central defence. “All our players can [play three times a week],” said the interim manager. “They’re all fit. I can guarantee there’s no issue with John. He’s training, is available, and he understands I have to make decisions. He wants to see the team winning games. He’s quite positive in training sessions and he’s supporting the team and his team-mates. He wants to win, and we want to win. Everybody can play, and the priority is the team. My priority is to pick the best team possible for each match.”

Asked if that meant players were selected primarily on form, he added: “Yes. I think only about winning. People said the FA Cup semi-final was big for us, but Fulham [in the Premier League] was a massive game for us. We picked a team with good players on the pitch and other good players on the bench, and we won. This game at Liverpool will be the same.”

The presence of players with pace in Liverpool’s front line – Luis Suárez, Daniel Sturridge and Coutinho are expected to feature – will shape Benítez’s defensive selection, with Terry having appeared comfortable against Dimitar Berbatov in midweek, particularly with the Bulgarian prone to drop deep.

“John understands if I pick another player for the team,” Benítez said. “We agree. If I pick him it’s because I think he’s fine. If not, it’s because I think another team-mate might be better for this or that particular game. It always depends on the particular game.”


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A news article on 2013-04-19 22:00:00 from: The Guardian

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ESPN – England duo back goal-line technology

England midfielders Frank Lampard and Steven Gerrard have backed the Premier League’s introduction of goal-line technology, insisting it will help relieve referees of some pressure.

A news article on 2013-04-12 06:27:00 from: ESPN

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STAR: Steven Gerrard tells Wayne Rooney to keep calm

STEVEN GERRARD last night warned Wayne Rooney that time was running out for the striker.

A news article on 2013-03-26 00:00:00 from: The Daily Star

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STAR: Steven Gerrard warns Wayne Rooney time is running out

STEVEN GERRARD last night warned Wayne Rooney that time was running out for the striker.

A news article on 2013-03-26 00:00:00 from: The Daily Star

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