When it comes across English football, the delicate and snooty LLL is rather like FrasierâÂÂs Niles Crane confronted with an evening of cage fighting â in that it finds it crass, brutish, violent but also a bit of a tingly turn-on. Exposure to Rooney & Co. often necessitates a shower. For several reasons.
LLL hosed itself down again before beddy-bies having spent the evening in the company of Manchester City, apparently the Premier League leaders â or so the blog reads elsewhere in the wonderful pages of FourFourTwo.com.
Well, LLL was blowing raspberries in a northern direction from its Madrid penthouse until 92 minutes into the match against Villarreal, thinking that if thatâÂÂs the best that England has to offer then the Daily Mail are probably due another campaign complaining about the footballing (and moral, of course) crisis at the heart of the English game.
The island nation's finest should easily have picked off Villarreal, a poor side who have only have managed a single league win and taken two Champions League shellackings. Instead, the visitors came 15 seconds from taking a point off Manchester City â insert obligatory comment about their billions â before pesky Kun Agüero popped up far post with a winner in the 2-1 victory.
NEWSLast-gasp Aguero goal sinks Villarreal
The former Atlético Madrid man was at the centre of post-match controversy with a claim from the Spanish camp that Kun was taking the pee out of the vanquished visitors.
âÂÂKun was laughing at our players,â fumed Villarreal VP José Manuel Llanza. âÂÂIn football you have to have class, especially in moments like these,â noted Carlos Marchena. The City striker denied any such accusations on Twitter, meaning that either he or a bunch of people from Villarreal are telling fibs.
The only controversy after Real MadridâÂÂs easy 4-0 win over Lyon was a completely-losing-it Spanish press gurgling furiously over José MourinhoâÂÂs decision to play Karim Benzema instead of the in-form Gonzalo HiguaÃÂn against the French side. âÂÂAnd so the debate goes on,â sighed the weary Madrid manager, who's going to have to get used to this mini-civil war in the Mordor camp until the end of the season.
NEWSReal Madrid march on after mauling Lyon
AS were happy campers in regards to the victory, with editor Alfredo Relaño claiming that âÂÂMadrid had more strength, spirit, football, everything.â That list should also include âÂÂmoneyâÂÂ, which is why the club were able to buy Benzema off Lyon in the first place.
The France striker scored one and set up another to leave Madrid with nine points from nine and not far from winning the group. âÂÂMadrid are destroying Europe like NapoleonâÂÂs first battles,â boasted Tomás Roncero, who will have to hope that the clubâÂÂs Champions League campaign doesnâÂÂt go all Russia 1812.
On Wednesday night Valencia have a make-or-break match at Bayer Leverkusen. After two points from two Champions League games, coach Unai Emery decided to take all 24 squad members to Germany.
LLL suspected that such extravagance might have caused some alarm among the bosses of the cash-strapped club â until the blog read that pretty much all of the board had travelled too in what appears to be a giant German jolly. âÂÂWhat better occasion than the Champions League when we can all be together?â asked Emery rhetorically, having earlier had to field the baffling question of âÂÂis this a final?â ahead of a group-stage match.
Barcelona are expected to wipe the floor with Czech side Viktoria Plzen, despite Pep Guardiola urging caution. Opposing manager Pavel Vrba was more honest, daydreaming that âÂÂif we win, theyâÂÂll build us a statue in Pilsen.âÂÂ
