2010 Football Round Up

Credit; here



2010 has been a fantastic year for lots of Sporting events, but the football calendar year has had its fair share of success, drama and excitement.

This post takes a look at the past year, and brings some video entries from the more important events.

We start with January, where the first Premier League match of 2010 saw Fulham head to the Britannia to face Stoke City, with the visitors three points ahead of the Potters. It was a taste of what we grow to expect from the Premier League; goals, goals and more goals as you can see below.

There wasn't too much movement in the transfer window, with Niko Kranjcar joining Tottenham Hotspur from a doomed Portsmouth for a nominal fee.

On the manager front, Owen Coyle was appointed as Bolton Wanderers' new manager after leaving Burnley. Brian Laws, who has been sacked this week, replaced him at Turf Moor.

January also saw David's Gold and Sullivan take over at West Ham United after selling Birmingham City.

February usually means one thing in the footballing calendar; League Cup final day, and it wasn't to be a let-down as Manchester United came from behind to beat Aston Villa 2-1 at Wembley. You can watch the goals below, with Wayne Rooney scoring the winner after James Milner had given Villa an early lead.

February saw another change on the ownership front, with Ali Al-Faraq taking over Portsmouth before the club became the first in Premier League history to enter administration.




Pompey hit hard times, on the pitch and financially, only 2 seasons after their FA Cup success at Wembley.

Credit; here

To compile a miserable month for Avram Grant's side, they lost 5-0 to Manchester United, scoring three own goals in the process, although one was later declared as a Michael Carrick strike.

March saw Chelsea head out of the Champions League to the eventual winners, Jose Mourniho's Inter Milan.

United progressed through the last 16, but met Bayern Munich in the semi's, where they lose Wayne Rooney for the rest of the season with an ankle injury.

Arsenal also made it through to the Quarter-finals whilst the FA announced that Fabio Capello's England side would complete their World Cup warm-up with games against Mexico and Japan.

The news that Wayne Rooney might not be fit his national supporters hard, but Bobby Zamora was strengthening his claims for a call up by scoring against Juventus to send Fulham through to the Quarter-finals of the Europa League, alongside Liverpool.




Fernando Torres scored 7 goals in 6 appearances in March as Liverpool found form.


Credit; here

Phil Brown became the next managerial casualty and his 'gardening leave' absence caused confusion before Iain Dowie took over until the end of the season after only five league wins all season and four straight defeats.

April saw the title race hotten up but Arsenal dropped off the pace after a demolition away at Barcelona.




How ironic that this year sees a repeat tie, but only four points from 5 games after the result left the Gunners reeling yet another unsuccessful season.

United were also knocked out of the Champions League at the same stage after Arjen Robben scored this late on at Old Trafford.

Some incredible goals and incredible scenes as Portsmouth were the first team to be relegated from the Premier League.

Despite this, the consolation was that Pompey reached the final of the FA Cup, where they were set to play Chelsea before their pending relegation to the Championship.

May, as usual, brought up its surprises, with Manchester United being pipped to the title by Chelsea, who were crowned Champions by one single point, after scoring a record 103 league goals.

Burnley and Hull both were relegated before the last day of the season and it was confirmed that Newcastle, West Brom and Blackpool would replace both them and Portsmouth in England's top flight.

Portsmouth's FA Cup dreams were smashed by Avram Grant's former employers, Chelsea, who beat them 1-0 at Wembley thanks to this goal from Didier Drogba, who finished top scorer with 37 goals in all competitions.



The Champions League final saw Mourinho top of the pile again, with Inter Milan beating Bayern Munich 2-0 before the coach announced he was leaving for Real Madrid.

Fulham could have counted themselves unlucky to lose in the Europa League final to Atletico Madrid after losing 2-1 to a brace from Diego Forlan, but manager Roy Hogdson was later announced LMA Manager of the Year after taking the side much further than the most hopeful of fans could have hoped.




June saw a brief break in the football before Fabio Capello named his England squad for the World Cup.

Notably, Wayne Rooney was selected, but there was no room for Theo Walcott or Scott Parker, despite the West Ham midfielder making the preliminary 30 man squad.

England, however, took a side seat as South Africa kick-started the tournament with a Siphiwe Tshabalala goal against Mexico, a game which finished 1-1.

Tshabalala scored the first goal of the 2010 World Cup.




Credit; here

The tournament saw some flowing, entertaining attacking football and, although the hosts went out at the first stage, the locals were excited to see the World's best teams excel themselves.

That was until, in July, when Brazil and Argentina were both knocked out, after England had lost 4-1 to Germany in the last 16.

Instead, it left a final of pre-tournament favourites, Spain, and the Netherlands, who has Wesley Sneijder in top form.

Spain went on to win it, but it was Andreas Iniesta who scored the winner, rather than David Villa or Fernando Torres to ensure the European Champions became Champions of the world.



That brought about transfer rumours surrounding Cesc Fabregas leaving for Barcelona, rumours which were proved untrue.

Despite the failure at the World Cup, Fabio Capello was kept on as England manager but the nation was left disappointed with a shambolic performance.

Barely one month later, after a summer which saw Rafael Benitez leave Liverpool, Gianfranco Zola sacked by West Ham and former Manchester United forward Mark Hughes take charge at Fulham, the English football season had started again with Manchester United beating Chelsea 3-1 in the Community Shield at Wembley.



Less than a week later, Martin O'Neill resigned from his Villa post after a disagreement with owner Randy Lerner, and was later replaced by Gerard Houllier.

The first game of the Premier League saw Manchester City play out a 0-0 draw with Tottenham Hotspur, who pipped Roberto Mancini's side to a Champions League spot after a 1-0 win at Eastlands in April.

The first goal of the season came from Stewart Downing against West Ham, while Blackpool started their Premier League history off with a 4-0 away win at Wigan, a game rescheduled after development on Bloomfield Road was left incomplete.



Bloomfield Road had to be redeveloped over the summer after Blackpool's surprise promotion.



Credit; here

August also saw the Champions League draw for the group stage, with the hardest task falling to debutants Tottenham Hotspur, who were drawn with FC Twente, Werder Bremen and Inter Milan.

September saw Chelsea sitting pretty at the top of the league after winning their first 5 league games to nil and having scored 6 on two occasions.




Chelsea started the 2010/11 season well.

Credit; here

The month also saw a huge upset in the third round of the league cup, with Northampton Town knocking out Liverpool on penalties at Anfield.

Moving on to October, where the main headline was yet again Tottenham Hotspur, with Rafael van der Vaart, a deadline day signing, showing his worth and Gareth Bale finally finding his potential, scoring all 3 goals as ten man Spurs lost 4-3 to Inter Milan at the San Siro.

Liverpool's much hated owners, George Gillette and Tom Hicks, were finally ousted from the club, with New England Sports Ventures buying the club after the side had beaten Chelsea 2-0 at Anfield.

At the other end of the table, one of the most significant derbies, Newcastle against Sunderland, ended up with a 5-1 demolition in Toon's favour.

Kevin Nolan scored a hat-trick that day and Steve Bruce was hanging on to his job.



November saw Chelsea slip off the gas at the top, after the Blues picked up only 4 points from a possible 15, while United beat Blackburn 7-1 at Old Trafford as they found form.



Berbatov scored 5 as Manchester United ran rout in one of the new Blackburn owners, Venky's, first games at the club.

The month also saw Arsenal slip up to Braga and Shakhtar in the Champions League, while Manchester City began to find form, remaining unbeaten throughout the month.

Bolton Wanderers, under Owen Coyle, began to play some nice football as the Whites fought off their tag of long ball specialists. Their form saw them beat Tottenham, Wolves and Newcastle as they also went unbeaten in November, a run which saw manager Owen Coyle and striker Johan Elmander both receive monthly awards.

December has been an eventful one also, with Sam Allardyce and Chris Hughton both being sacked by their respective clubs. Steve Kean and Alan Pardew took over their reigns.

Hughton and Allardyce were the last managerial casualties of this year.

The Champions League draw saw Tottenham be paired with another Milan, AC, and Arsenal drawn against Barcelona again as we headed into the new year with the final game, a 1-0 win for Wolves at Liverpool to complete a miserable calendar year for the Merseysiders.

All that remains is for me to wish you all the best for the new year!

Forget Russian Linesmen, it's all about the Swedish Ref's!

Arsene Wenger was not happy last night. Makes a change. No-one will know exactly what the Frenchman said to Swedish ref Martin Hansson last night but I don't think he had an invitation to an after party. Not unless it was Porto's and he was guest of honour.
A lot's been said about the second goal and yes, by the rules, it is perfectly legitimate. However, it was more comical than Peter Kay's response to Liam Gallagher's speech at the Brit awards.
Falcao's goal all came from Hansson dropping the ball, after an adjudged backpass, at the feet of Hulk and allowing the quick free kick, despite blocking off Sol Campbell from getting into a covering position. It was quick wit from the Portugese side, but Arsenal have been dne over. Again.
What Hansson should be criticised for is yet another poor performance, one where he didn't have control of the game and failed to give a stone wall penalty to Arsenal at 1-1 when Rosicky was tripped when running clear.
Yes the Gunners will have a chance in the second leg but Mr Wenger will be fuming how he sent France through to the World Cup with a 'cheating goal', but left his French youth team with a disadvantage heading into the crucial second leg.
Perhaps it's a good job that Gallas wasn't playing after scoring Le Bleu's qualifying goal in what was Hansson's last refereeing display.
It was interesting to see how Hansson came over to Wenger straight after the goal and seemed to take a verbal onslought from the man who belives the media twist his words.
Wenger refuses to reconsile when Thierry Henry scored a similar goal for Arsenal against Chelsea a few years ago, about which Premier league ref Graham Poll, told BBC Sport; "As long as the ball is stationary and in the right place then the attacking team can take it as quickly as they like."
After all this, maybe it's just not Arsenal's year; something we've become used to saying at this time of the season.