Iago Aspas, The Future

Iago Aspas hasn't enjoy a great season so far for Liverpool. The former Celta Vigo striker has struggled to adjust to the pace that the Premier League brings and is currently used as a backup or reserve for main strikers Luis Suarez and Daniel Sturridge. Due to this Aspas has gotten very few chances to shine in the spotlight at Liverpool this season.

The Spaniard who joined Liverpool in the summer, found it difficult to fit into the new system of Brendan Rodgers, the recently hired Liverpool manager. He has only made five league starts this season and has yet to score his debut goal. This is rather shocking considering how much Liverpool paid to bring him in.

The 26-year-old also suffered an injury which further made life difficult for him at Anfield. Aspas has however, showed a hint of what he can do, after scoring against Oldham in the FA Cup third round tie.

There were some suggestions about sending him on a loan to Swansea City but Liverpool have rejected such ideas. Recently though, a club from the La Liga in Spain, Valencia, has made a bid to try to bring in Iago Aspas.

While a loan move would be ideal for Aspas as he needs game time under his belt to boost his confidence, its a bit of a loss to Liverpool after they had brought him in expecting much better. Secondly, Daniel Sturridge is fit again and will be in action soon, so, his chances of playing in his preferred position will be limited even more than before.

Having said all this, Liverpool should not entertain such ideas of letting him go out on loan. Liverpool do not possess a huge squad and Rodgers certainly cannot take the risk, if one of his main strikers get injured again, as they have so often done so far this season. He is the only reliable cover for the Reds at present, and it's essential that Liverpool keeps a back up striker.

Will a move to Spain solve his problem? He would need to play in this new league to get adjusted to the condition and system of Spanish Soccer. So, taking all factors considered, it seems highly unlikely, that Liverpool would allow Aspas to join Valencia on loan.

World Cup Draws: Reactions

Just a few weeks ago was a huge day for soccer fans worldwide. People from every stretch of the globe tuned in to see just exactly how the FIFA World Cup group draw would go down in Brazil. The anticipation was high as fans and players a like waited to see just exactly where their country would be placed in the 32 team, 8 group, world tournament. After much festive dancing and celebration, the draw finally kicked off and finished with some surprising results.

Every year in the world cup there are the easy groups and then there are the group/s rightly nicknamed "The Group of Death". These groups are usually comprised of some of the top nations in the world all in one group in the world cup, making for some very interesting games. Lets start by taking a look at where some of the good teams ended up and where these groups of death are at. In group A, the host country Brazil has to play Croatia, Mexico, and Cameroon, and it should make for a pretty easy group. Moving on to group B we have the two finalists from last years world cup in the same group. Holland and Spain accompany Chile and Australia in group B. In group C we have Colombia, Greece, Ivory Coast, and Japan. This group could shape up to be a very difficult one with plenty of teams that could put up a strong fight. In group D we then have our first group of death with England, Uruguay, Italy, and then Costa Rica. England, Uruguay, and Italy are all top 15 teams in the world and that makes this group extremely tough  to get out of. Skipping ahead to group G is where we see the second group of death, where Germany, Ghana, Portugal, and the United States are all paired up in the same group. This is the worst possible group in the entire world cup and it should be a big concern for the United States. The final group of the tournament is group H and this is by far the easiest group in the tournament. The only team that I could see going far in this group is Belgium and they are with Algeria, Russia, and Korea Republic. Belgium pulled an extremely easy group and if they don't go through that would be very disappointing.

Now I've gone through all the teams that are going to be at the world cup and I'm extremely excited to watch this competition. It should be great fun and I can't wait to see which team will be able to call themselves the best in the world!

United's Terrible Season Continues

David Moyes continues to rewrite the record books at Manchester United, and not in a good way, as United lost for the third consecutive time, 2-1 at Sunderland in their League Cup semi-final, first leg. The defeat meant that United have lost three in a row for the first time since 2001.

Ryan Giggs, who had earlier hit the crossbar, gifted Sunderland the lead with an own goal right before halftime, and despite Nemanja Vidic equalizing early in the second half, Fabio Borini’s 65th-minute penalty gave the Premier League‘s bottom club the victory.

Having eliminated Chelsea in the previous round, Sunderland remain on course to reach a first domestic cup final since 1992, when they lost to Liverpool in the FA Cup final. For United manager David Moyes, however, the gloom grows ever darker, with his hopes of claiming a piece of major domestic silverware in his maiden season severely compromised ahead of the second leg on 22 January.

Eager to exploit any uncertainty in the visiting ranks, Sunderland looked to get balls into the box at the earliest opportunity and saw Borini drag an early shot wide from just outside the area. However, emboldened by the purposeful running of Adnan Januzaj, United began to assert control of the game.
Giggs sent a deflected 25-yard shot against the crossbar, while Januzaj had a goal ruled out for offside and Vidic planted a header wide from a corner shortly before half-time. Sunderland emerged unscathed, though, and in first-half stoppage time they exploited defensive inattention from United to go ahead.

From Sebastian Larsson’s deep free-kick, Wes Brown stole in behind Michael Carrick to volley the ball back across goal, and in attempting to prevent Phil Bardsley from prodding home, Giggs succeeded only in scoring himself.

The timing of the goal was a sucker-punch, but United regrouped at the interval and equalised within seven minutes of kick-off in the second period. Tom Cleverley curled a left-wing corner to the back post and Vidic outjumped former team-mates Brown and John O’Shea to power a header past Vito Mannone.

For the umpteenth time this season, however, United’s momentum was to desert them. Jonny Evans had to hobble off with an injury, and after Borini had sliced wide and Larsson had drawn a sharp save from visiting goalkeeper David de Gea, Sunderland restored their lead.

Cleverley was adjudged to have impeded Adam Johnson as he tore into the penalty area and after referee Andre Marriner pointed to the spot, Borini calmly lifted the ball past De Gea from 12 yards.
Scorer of a brace on his previous visit to the Stadium of Light, Januzaj carried the fight to Sunderland again, shooting narrowly off target on three occasions, but even their new boy wonder could not rescue United.

As United lose yet another game in their disappointing 2013-2014 campaign, the question rings through everyone's ears. When will we see the departure of David Moyes?

Winter Olympics

I know you probably all have seen the commercials when watching TV. These ads are continuously reminding us that one of the worlds greatest sports events in history is due to start in less than 4 months. This event as you can probably tell from the title is non other than the Winter Olympic games. The games are being held in Sochi, Russia and are scheduled to take place between February 7th and February 24th. As many of you know there are the Summer Olympics and Winter Olympics. Every two years the games switch to the other seasonal games. For the Winter Olympics there are a lot of pretty uncommon sports and I'd say the winter olympics are genuinely less common than the Summer games. Although this may be the case, it doesn't mean to say that the Winter Games are boring. They are quite the opposite in fact. I'm going to try to introduce some of the big olympic sports as well as a few of the other less known ones.

For starters we have the main sports like skiing, snowboarding, ice hockey, skating, and maybe even bob sledding for you enthusiasts out there. These are all fun because they're very action packed sports, except skating, with lots of excitement that really pleases viewers. Skiing is broken into many different categories like cross country, alpine, ski jumping, free style, and even snowboarding falls in this category. Skating is also broken down into different events including figure skating, short track speed skating, and long track speed skating. These events and a few of the others listed above comprise the main events of the Winter Olympic Games. These events are the most popular by far.

Now lets move onto some of the less popular games. These are ones that maybe don't get televised as often or at the normal viewing hours, but nonetheless they still provide very good entertainment for anyone interested. A few of these smaller events are curling, luge, and biathlon. Personally I haven't seen many of these events, but the ones I have seen in my short time watching the Winter Olympics these events have been very exciting to watch. Biathlon is one example. It is a very interesting sport in the fact that it combines rifle shooting with cross country skiing. Now doesn't that sound interesting.

I hope I did well in informing on some of what the Winter Olympic games has to offer and hopefully this convinces you to watch one of the Worlds biggest sporting events!

Early Bloomers in the NBA

The NBA season has finally kicked off and every team in the league has played at least one game. There have already been some fun games to watch as well as big performances in the first games. I'm going to talk about a few of the early risers that could potentially continue there early season form.

The first player that played nicely in his first game of the new season is Tristan Thompson. The power forward for the Cleveland Cavaliers scored 18 points and grabbed 9 rebounds in his first game. He is a avid scorer who will get significant minutes in Cleveland.

The biggest performance of the first games in the NBA has to be given to Michael Carter-Williams of the Philadelphia 76'ers. Not only did his team beat the Miami Heat, but MCW added 22 points, 12 assists, 7 rebounds, and 9 steals. There is no doubt that he will remain as the starting point guard in Philly. Hopefully this promising rookie can continue the amazing performance he had in game 1.

The final big performer of the first games is Alec Burks the point guard from the Utah Jazz. In the season opener he scored 24 points, had 6 assists, and 6 rebounds. He is still a relatively young player in the league and his stock will only continue to rise if he keeps putting up performances like this.

So that concludes a few of my impressive performances from a couple of early risers in the league. At the beginning of any sports season it's always very interesting to see who will be the dark horse and come out of no where to have an amazing year. Who knows maybe one of the guys I mentioned above could be the dark horse of the NBA this season. I guess only time will tell.

Southhampton Youngster

Southhampton’s reputation as an exceptionally prolific breeding ground for young British talent was accelerated last week when Jay Rodriguez and Adam Llallana earned wholly merited call-ups to join Rickie Lambert in Roy Hodgson’s latest England squad. With the starting right-back berth in the national team perhaps the one that is most up for grabs, there could yet be an opportunity for Saints’ terrific 22 year-old Nathaniel Clyne to stake his claim as a serious alternative to the defensively suspect pair of Glen Johnson and Kyle Walker. Below the main England group, Luke Shaw and James Ward-Prowse will continue their involvement with Gareth Southgate’s under-21 unit. Shaw’s evident ability, and incredible potential, have already lead to his name being discussed as a replacement for Ashley Cole at Chelsea or Patrice Evra at Manchester United. Furthermore, the 18 year-old is widely touted as the man who will succeed Cole in the national set-up and go on to vie with Leighton Baines for the number 3 jersey. Ward-Prowse’s name is one that is gradually making waves, but not at the rate of his more celebrated colleagues. That can, surely, only be a short-term scenario.

When, in August 2012, Southampton returned to the Premier League after a seven year absence with a fixture at then defending champions Manchester City, their manager of the day, Nigel Adkins, trusted Ward-Prose with one of the pivotal deep-lying midfield roles in his team. A fortnight later the teenager excelled in a fierce St Mary’s encounter against Manchester United. A homegrown youngster could conceivably have been disturbed by the removal of the man who had given him his first-team chance – even more so for Adkins’ January replacement being an unknown foreigner, the Argentinian, Mauricio Pochettino. At the back end of last season, with his top-flight playing opportunities coming predominantly from the bench, Ward-Prowse’s belief and ambition were exposed when it became apparent that it was not a situation with which he was content.

His frustration did not negatively impact upon the teenager’s performances for his club’s under-21 side.  Anybody who watched on as the Saints development team played home fixtures on a heavy, trying pitch at Eastleigh’s Silverlake Stadium saw a player with gifts beyond his years. Ward-Prowse was always available and ready to take possession, then able to dictate proceedings with his vision and range of passing. That form and confidence has carried over into this term, and proved enough to persuade Pochettino that his fledgling midfielder was worthy of a place in the Southampton eleven that opened the campaign at West Bromwich Albion. Ward-Prowse hasn’t looked back.  While the mercurial, but more prominent, Gaston Ramirez has been consigned to substitute duties, the Portsmouth born player has forced his way back into being a first-choice after a series of effective second-half cameos.

From his spot on the right of an advanced three, Ward-Prowse has been simply magnificent.  Especially impressive is his consistently outstanding right-foot delivery, either from a dead-ball or during open play.  The vicious, dipping swerving crosses, delivered on a six-pence, and reminiscent in fashion of David Beckham’s famed style of ball striking, have created a catalogue of scoring chances for his colleagues.  Moreover, they are just one facet in the armoury of an assured Englishman who is looking every inch the part in a team that is lying third in the Premier League.

Now 19, and with time on his side, Ward-Prowse might yet become the very best of this latest crop of emerging South-Coast talent.

Life After Suarez

I think it’s fair to say that all of Luis Suarez’s misdeeds over the summer have been forgiven. The Uruguayan basically sold out the fans throughout the transfer window by trying to engineer moves to Arsenal and Real Madrid. When those moves failed to materialize, he was left in a fairly uncomfortable position. He could have chosen to strike. He could have put in weak performances.

Instead, he’s gone all out to prove that he still cares about Liverpool and that he doesn’t do half measures. Every time he steps out onto the pitch, he’s fired up and he brings his ‘A game’. West Brom saw just how fearsome a sight Suarez can be when he’s playing with the handbrake off. Together with Daniel Sturridge, Suarez has converted Liverpool into a team that’s capable of challenging for the title this season. Brendan Rogers will be desperate to keep hold of him during the January transfer window.

It’ll certainly be interesting to see if Arsenal and/or Madrid test the waters with another bid. I’m sure that Rodgers would tell any interested parties that he’s ‘not for sale’, but the truth is that every man has their price. What’s important is that Liverpool have transfer targets in place that they can chase when they know Suarez is on his way out of Anfield.

At the top of any such list of players, I’d like to see AC Milan’s Stephan El Shaarawy. As luck would have it, The Star claims that Liverpool are one of many clubs currently chasing after the youngster. The Italian striker/winger was Milan’s stand-out player last season. He even managed to steer home 19 goals in 46 games. That’s not a bad return for a 20-year-old. His clear ability and promise saw the Guardian list him 52nd in ‘The 100 best footballers in the world’. He’s also started to make an impact in the Italian national side (10 caps).

It’s clear that he’s set for a big future. But his career has hit a stumbling block. He’s currently behind Mario Balotelli in the pecking order at the San Siro and has only made 4 appearances this season. I can’t help but feel that he needs a change in scenery. And wouldn’t it be something is Liverpool were to offer him this? He’s one of world football’s brightest young sparks and could blossom into something very special indeed. We’re talking Luis Suarez levels of special.

If Luis Suarez moves on, Stephan El Shaarawy could go on to replace him. If he stays, then El Shaarawy could be thrust out wide. Whichever way you look at it, this looks like a smart move for Liverpool.

What’s your take? Should Brendan Rodgers join the hunt for this AC Milan star?