After an eventful month of World Cup triumphs and upsets, began the pre-season to a majority of sides around the World. Australia's shock triumph comes at the expense of Brazil, Italy and Spain, who Australia defeated.
Australia knocked out the two favourites for the competition, Brazil, in the Group Stages 3-1, and then Italy in the Second Round, 3-2. Spain were then tactically outclassed in the final, 1-0, thanks to a goal from FC Bayern striker Brendan Gan.
As a result of good performances, a number of Australian player received offers and moved clubs during the transfer season. This is visible in the current Australian squad.
Brett Emerton and Mark Bresciano have teamed up and are now both playing at Chelsea in the Premier League. Lucas Neil is now playing for Fulham, Kewell making an attractive move back to England, playing for Manchester United, Jake Bird is now playing for Inter Milan, and Scott Mcdonald for Real Madrid. A number of other players are being looked at by other clubs, however the biggest at the moment, is Socceroo Tim Cahill, with a reported bid of $106 million coming in from Arsenal.
As a result of the World Cup, there have been a number of changes in the World Rankings this month. England, Slovakia and Australia were all big movers this month, with Spain taking out top spot, and Holland taking second spot. Argentina remained as they were, at third position.
Back home, there were some domestic transfer rumors as well. Sydney FC have had a number of transfer stories published of their own, however manager Stephan Johnson has played down anymore additions to the squad. However the biggest A-League transfer story is the transfer of Iceland international Bjorn Tryggvason to the club on a free-contract. The former Valur man has stated that he cannot wait to start playing for his new club.
One of the biggest local news is the intensive Pre-Season for Sydney FC and it's youth Team. After declaring that the Youth season is not up to scratch, he went out and arranged a number of warm-up tournaments and tours, including the youth tour of India and Taiwan.
The Youth side is still in the Middle East completing their tour of the area.
Sydney FC's First Team, however, were not immune to the intensive Pre-Season routine. The squads slightly less intense schedule included a friendly competition with a number of youth sides, the normal friendlies against local clubs, and a tour of New Zealand, which included a shock loss to Auckland City.
There have been a number of changes to the Sydney FC roster this season, including a number of youth signings from the QAS, AIS and NSWIS. However the biggest two signings for the transfer window would have to be former Liverpool front man Robbie Fowler, and former Italian international striker Luca Toni.
In the pre-season, Robbie Fowler played 7 matches (5 starts), scoring 2 goals, 2 assists, and recieved 1 man of the match award. Luca Toni played 8 matches (7 starts) scoring a massive 12 goals, 3 assists, and 2 man of the match awards.
Posts
Tut, tut, tut you've obviously just used that real time editor thats in your task bar to cheat. Tim Cahill $106m? Harry Kewell at Man Utd and worth $57m? lol yeah right.
ReplyDeleteIf thats the way you like to play then cool, thats up to you, but surely you dont get no sense of achievement from just cheating your way through a world cup?
I was shocked when I first seen you won the world cup and I was going to say well done, but then I realised you just cheated and so dont deserve any credit for it.
Shame because this would be a good blog if you played fair.
thats true mate,
ReplyDeletei usually like experimenting with players and editing stadiums.
i havent been blogging lately because im looking for a challenge to start a new game on. I am thinking of playing either one with fake players, or another fully established challenge.
Any ideas you can propose?