Football News: Weekly Football News Roundup

10/30/07

Thuram against DNA tests for immigrants

The French international Lilian Thuram is known for his political and social commitment, notably when the interests of his race are threatened. Barcelona's defender has once again spoken out against a controversial move of his country's government by signing a manifesto against the obligatory DNA analysis that the president Nicolas Sarkozy plans to have imposed on all foreigners wishing to move to France in order to reunite with their families.

Such an obligation would according to Thuram be discriminatory and racist.

Argentina stage a reality show with soccer fans!

An Argentinian television channel is to produce a Big Brother-type show under the name of "Reality Goal". The show will feature 20 guys, each one a fan of one of the 20 teams of the Argentinian First division.

Although the condition for participation is a fanatical support for one of the clubs, the producers hope to convey a message of peaceful coexistence and tolerance among followers of the different clubs.

"We wish to show that even the supporters of rival teams can live together without any violence," said Fabián Olemberg, the creator of the program due to start in February.

Argentina is one of the countries where soccer-related crowd trouble is most prominent, especially when arch rivals are involved like River and Boca in Buenos Aires, Rácing and Independiente in Avellaneda or Newell's and Central in Rosario.

Germany confirms Löw until 2010

Joachim Löw has won a reward for taking Germany through to the European Championship finals in Austria and Switzerland: the German FA has extended his contract until 2010 so the current manager will stay in his seat regardless of his team's showing at Euro 2008.

However, Löw plans to impress the soccer public with his team's prowess at next year's competition.

"Our goal is to play attractive soccer and win the European title, even though I'm aware that each player must work to improve physically and technically," said Löw, whose three assistants, former German internationals Hans-Dieter Flick and Andreas Köpke, and Swiss national Urs Siegenthaler all had their contracts extended.

Cristiano Ronaldo tells Pelé: "I'm better than you think"

Manchester United ace Cristiano Ronaldo says he is a bit offended by Pelé's somewhat unenthusiastic comments regarding his qualities.

"He must show more and keep the quality level high for a longer period of time so that we could consider him the best," said the King of Soccer regarding the Portuguese winger.

"I respect everybody's opinions, but I do not agree with all of them. I know what Pelé thinks of me, but other soccer greats think something else. Whoever saw my play over the past few seasons will agree that Pelé's statement is a bit unjust," said Cristiano, candidate for the two most prestigious awards in soccer: FIFA's Player of the Year and France Football's Golden Ball.

Brasileirao: Sao Paulo virtual champs

With five match days to go, Sao Paulo have practically won the Brazilian title, although mathematically they need a point out of the available 15 to officially call themselves the champions of Brazil.

The leaders have defeated Sport Recife 2-1 and could now only be caught up by Santos or Palmeiras if they lose all their remaining games, and if either of their pursuers win all five matches with astounding score lines.

Sao Paulo have a superior goals difference by 24 with respect to Santos and by 29 in relation to Palmeiras, which makes their loss of the top spot highly unlikely.

In their next game Sao Paulo entertain the bottom-placed, already relegated America when they plan to make their triumph official.

Hacker doctored Ramos' statement: "I am so greedy"

New Tottenham manager Juande Ramos had only a few words to say to his players after he saw his team waste a 1-0 lead to lose by 1-2 to Blackburn at White Hart Lane.

"The hard work starts tomorrow," said the Spaniard who led Sevilla to five trophies in the space of 15 months.

Back in Spain, Sevilla's fans must be fuming over Ramos' abrupt departure from Sánchez Pizjuán so one of them hacked the ADN.es website and doctored the coach's farewell statement to the Spanish public.

"I went because of the financial challenge. God! Seven million euros per season, hahaha. Yes, I'm greedy, what can I do about it? (...) Since my only goal in life is money, I leave this great team because of an amount you cannot imagine. I want my Ferraris," read Ramos' fake statement after the intervention by an unknown hacker.

The sabotage remained on the net only for five minutes but long enough for many media to take note.

Bernd Schuster set up by his son

Real Madrid's coach Bernd Schuster is already thinking of the Barelona-Real clásico due on December 23rd and Lionel Messi has deserved his special attention:

"I am following and thoroughly analyzing Barça's game. Most of all I'm observing Messi since he made my life bitter when I coached Getafe. Now we're not giving him an inch of space. If he turns nasty, I'll put on him my dog's collar to slow him down a bit," said the German on his web page.

Only, these were not Bernd Schuster's words. When the press confronted him with the strange wording, the coach said, "erm, this was my son's doing."

Compiled by Ozren Podnar