Special and Golden

Thoughts are mainly turning to The Champions League final today with a lot of articles on it.
But first, the other day I suggested that Ronaldo's previous statement on his future was a little equivocal, today he states, without doubt, that he wants to stay, in an interview with the News of The World:

Today, Cristiano Ronaldo nails once and for all the idea that he will conquer Barcelona on Wednesday - and then head off to the Bernabeu.

Sure, we've heard it before. But never this definitive, never this passionate, never this convincing. If he leaves Old Trafford after this proclamation of loyalty, Ronaldo will go down as one of the most insincere, double-dealing football superstars. A man whose word means nothing.

The European and World Player of the Year has chosen the build-up to this week's epic Champions League showdown in Rome as the moment to pledge his heart, body and soul to Manchester United.

Ronaldo declares: "This is my home now. I think even when I say my heart is here, people are still going to speak and make things up. But this is where I want to play.

"We are part of an era that can go down in history for the way we are playing and for the trophies we are winning. The boss believes in this team and so do I. And this is where I want to be. Manchester United is now my house."

You can't argue with that. The fact that the writer still has to have a paragraph saying, "if he doesn't mean it he's really dishonest," is a bit disappointing though - it's not like Ronaldo makes this type of pledge everyday - it's an entirely new kind of statement, with no "but who can tell the future" type hedging of bets.
He also has very kind words for Sir Alex:

"He is two different people and they have both helped me become who I am today. Firstly, he is probably the most knowledgeable football coach in the world. I learn from him every day.

"No matter how good I become, I know he is a man who will always be able to teach me that little bit more. I don't get tired of learning from him because I know every bit of advice he gives me will make me a better player.

"The second person he is, is a father to me. Ever since I joined Manchester United, he has been like a second father to me. And I don't just respect him, I have the affection for him a child has for his father.

"When he gives me advice that is non-football, I listen because it will make me a better person."

And for Rooney:

YOU look at Rooney on the pitch and just one word springs to mind - WINNER. You will never see him have a game where he doesn't give 100 percent.

You can see the pain and frustration on his face when results don't go right. Every team wants players who play with their heart and soul - and he is one of those.

Our understanding on the pitch has even improved from last season. As we get to play with each other more we know where the other one is going to run - it has become like second nature now.

With criticism in certain quarters for the team we'll be fielding against Hull today, I find it interesting that in the papers today all the stories about us concentrate on The Champions League Final, as if the Hull game doesn't matter. Which of course it doesn't, but if the papers can't be bothered with it, I hope we're not going to see gross hypocrisy tomorrow and be reading outraged reports on the game.
There's an interview with Paul Scholes in The Observer, which I can't help reading with a hint of sadness:

"I am starting to feel my age a bit," Scholes says with customary frankness. "I'm starting to think this might be the last time I do this, or that, and on the pitch my game has changed as well. I don't get forward as much as I used to, there are other people to do that now, and that's why I don't get as many scoring chances. I still enjoy playing but I don't want to go on longer than I should do, and I've started to think about what I might do afterwards. I would like to stay in the game if I can. I am going to give coaching a go next year to see if I'm cut out to do that. I don't know about managing, I'll see how the coaching goes first."

His answer to this long set up question is quite funny though:

a solitary figure emerged from the winners' dressing room and climbed aboard the empty team coach.

It was Paul Scholes, and he seemed to want to be alone with his thoughts. Perhaps the emotion of the occasion had been too much for the player who had had to wait nine years for a second chance after missing the 1999 final through suspension. Maybe he wanted to replay the game to himself, savouring every moment so as not to forget anything. Or possibly he just wanted some time and space to look at his medal, the one that completed a full set.

What was that all about, Scholes is asked as he prepares for this week's appointment with Barcelona in Rome. What makes a footballer celebrate the achievement of a lifelong ambition by sitting on his own in a car park? Scholes seems slightly taken aback by the question, as if he has just been asked why he wakes up in the morning or what makes him go to work every day. "Because I wanted to get home," he says, sounding surprised the answer was not obvious. "I always do. What's the point in hanging around?"

The Sunday Times look at Carrick:

His job in Rome will be the same as always, to launch counterattacks with his clean and precisely judged forward passing and to halt opposing forays, seldom through confrontational means but almost always via positioning and interception: chess not chase is the Carrick way. He will also be instructed to stay off fairground rides. Of Barcelona’s passing game, Ferguson says: “They get you on that carousel and can leave you dizzy. Your concentration levels can’t be allowed to falter for a second. But, with the right tactics, their game is containable.” He will ask Carrick to hold position close to Nemanja Vidic and Rio Ferdinand, no matter what kind of merry-go-round is twirling away in front of him.
Carrick adds: “Chelsea are very powerful and with Drogba, and Frank Lampard coming from midfield, they would have been a very different threat. The way Barcelona play, they can have the ball for a long time and you’ve just got to be patient, defend well and concentrate. It’s quite a bit of a mental battle. Against Barcelona you shut up, as Chelsea showed, and then attack them at the right time. You have to respect their strengths and do something about dealing with that, but you have to believe you are there for the same reason and play your game. We believe if we play our best game we’ll win. That’s the challenge, really.”

The Independent on Sunday's preview piece adds nothing new to what's been said up to now, so I won't quote from it.
In The Observer Ruud Gullit has some great insights:

May the best team win. If United are to do it, and become the first to win the Champions League two years in a row, they must have the feeling that it is possible, that they can do it. But they know it will be more difficult this time.

Better is this Observer piece, rounding up quotes with a dollop of opinion included, some class quotes from Evra included, perhaps helping explain Ronaldo's desire to stay:

"When you play in Old Trafford you don't need the sunshine. Every day I just say 'Thank God I play for United' because it is a privilege to put on that shirt and this is why I enjoy my life in England."

He means it too. As with all successful recruits to Sir Alex Ferguson's trophy factory, Evra is consumed by the culture. "In France people maybe say the English are arrogant and in England they say the French are arrogant but I don't see it that way," he says. "I enjoy life here and am happy to be a part of the United story and that's why I say thank you every day." ...

To better understand the "story" he eulogises, arguably the world's best left-back did some research. "Two years ago I started to read a book of the story of Man United and I saw a DVD of the crash at Munich and everything and it made me realise I need to have respect for that shirt because it is a big story and Manchester United is a big family." Evra has 23 siblings and is well qualified to talk of clan loyalty.

"I don't just want to say this to look nice in the papers because it is true –we are a big family here and we have the big story and this why Manchester United is a club apart. It is always hard to put on that shirt because every day when you do you are putting the story on your back."

The Sunday Times looks at Ronaldo v Messi, but instead of looking at we're going to cope with Messi they turn it round:

NOT everybody put their hand up to volunteer to play at left-back in Barcelona’s XI for the Champions League final on Wednesday.

The natural first choice, Eric Abidal, is suspended. The captain, Carles Puyol, who has played there often this season, may be needed to cover other absences in the back four, so when coach Pep Guardiola ran through his somewhat depleted resources, he thought of Seydou Keita, a midfielder. Keita considered the proposition of taking up a post he has only ever filled for short periods during games, in emergencies — and told Guardiola he thought it was not such a good idea.

The idea of Cristiano Ronaldo running at a locum left-back in Rome alarms Barcelona almost as much as anything else. Even the most refined, specialist defenders have found him almost impossible to dispossess, and Barcelona’s tacklers and markers tend to agree that Ronaldo poses a set of challenges that even combating Leo Messi day after day during practice scarcely prepares them for. The pin-up footballers of the 2009 Champions League final have in common their brilliance in the dribble, but their techniques are utterly distinct.

“Ronaldo is more complete,” says Gerard Pique, the Barcelona centre-half who spent last season with Ronaldo at United and this campaign as a colleague of Messi. “He’s good in the air, has a great shot, he’s quick and he’s strong. But Leo, maybe, is a bit more decisive when he’s dribbling. He’s quick and can create chances all on his own. It’s hard to get the ball off both of them, especially when they start their tricks.”

Hugh McIlvanney has an interesting look at the final:

Sir Alex Ferguson told me on Friday that the specifics of Guardiola’s reshaping of his defence, especially in relation to centre-half and left-back, will influence the deployment of United’s assault forces. It’s reasonable to assume that whoever is adjudged the weakest link will be exposed to the frightening pace and dismantling techniques of Ronaldo. Patrice Evra, Michael Carrick, Anderson and, above all, the insatiably competitive Wayne Rooney will plainly be other vital weapons and it seems improbable that Ji-Sung Park will be left sidelined, as he was in last year’s triumph in Moscow. What use will be made of Dimitar Berbatov and/or Carlos Tevez isn’t easily predicted but their very availability won’t be a comfort to the opposition. And we should expect the veterans Ryan Giggs and Paul Scholes to figure one way or another. “Something they have done very impressively is to organise their minds towards being substitutes, so that they can come on and have a big impact,” said Ferguson. “When we need to bring order to our play, they do that.” At their best, Manchester United can perform with as much panache as Barcelona and they are capable of more athletic surge, more besieging urgency than the pride of Catalonia. Each of Europe’s three greatest football powers, Spain, Italy and England, has supplied the winners of the continental championship 11 times. As the bookies acknowledge, this is an exceptionally tough final to call, but United are equipped to be the burial party to put that statistical symmetry in the cemetery.

On The Guardian Blog Paul Wilson has a look at Sir Alex, and actually writes on the Hull game, although in a Champions League context:

Take today's game against Hull. Ferguson is not happy about that either. Not because of all the daft speculation about what sort of a team he might send out, as if anyone would seriously expect a title-winning manager with a Champions League final in three days to put his best players at risk, but because it is kicking off at 4pm on a Sunday.

"Why do they do that?" he asks. "There has been an English team in the Champions League final for the last five years, it's not as if it's a huge surprise. That game takes place on a Wednesday night, so why do we have to kick off on a Sunday teatime? Barcelona are playing Saturday. They will get Sunday off. They will all be in their Spanish villas, watching us on television most probably. Whereas we will spend Sunday evening travelling back to Manchester from Hull before flying to Rome on Monday morning."

Ferguson knows perfectly well that the Premier League could not allow United special dispensation to play their game a day early, as it would have left the other relegation candidates knowing exactly what they needed to do. Nor does he remotely imagine the whole set of fixtures would ever be switched to Saturday just to help one team with their preparation for a European final. Here's the best bit, though. Even had he been allowed to play Hull 24 hours early he would still have had no intention of sending out his strongest team. "Of course I wouldn't. I don't have to do that and in some ways it might be the worst possible thing to do. Hull's relegation rivals wouldn't thank me for playing my final team anyway, they would be scared to make a tackle. But I'm still not happy about having to play a day later than Barcelona. They get an extra day off."

It could be pointed out that virtually all United's Champions League starters will get today off too, watching with their feet up at Hull or tuning in on television in their Cheshire villas, but that would be to miss the point. Which is that Ferguson does not want to picture his players relaxing or taking it easy. He would much rather depict them as hard done by, always having to fight the English authorities as well as the cream of Europe.

Evra has a go at Arsenal:

"The bad challenge was from Fabregas when he caught my knee.

"I was very angry. I don't know why the Arsenal players did that.

"Okay I said some things they didn't appreciate after the Champions League game at the Emirates (which United won to make sure of their place in the final against Barcelona in Rome).

"But I don't know why some Arsenal players did that. You might miss the Champions League final because of one stupid tackle."

Finally, in the silly transfer speculation department - we're after Stephen Ireland:

Sir Alex Ferguson has been monitoring Ireland's situation - and is lining up a shock summer swoop.

Fergie has been impressed with the player's form and new-found determination to make the most of his talent over the course of the last season.

He views Ireland as the perfect long- term replacement for veteran Paul Scholes.

The City player has the box-to-box energy and drive Scholes showed during his peak years as well as the same knack for scoring vital goals.