Safe European Home

The papers seem to have skipped a game and gone straight to the Champions League Final previews today - The Sundays' last edition before the game - its getting close.

The Mail on Sunday have Gary Neville writing about the Final, and his experiences in the past, It's a long and interesting read, looking in depth at each of the Final's he's been involved with.  I won't quote from it much, just go read it, but here's a bit of Gary Neville philosophising:

Success is only a moment in time. You cannot keep it in your head for too long because life is a journey.

They also have a shocking story, something no one could possibly have imagined - If you're rich you've a better chance of getting Champions League Final tickets.  Imagine... Typical Faux-Outrage Mail story to be ignored...

Some thoughts from Sir Alex on the final make all the papers, here from The Telegraph, my favourite quote:

When Busby carried the European Cup away from Wembley, it tugged at a nation’s heart-strings, but Ferguson does not expect similar national unity when his players tackle Pep Guardiola’s team next Saturday.

“1968 is so long ago,” Ferguson said. “The great feat about that was Sir Matt’s re-building of the team and everyone wanting to United to win it.

“The whole country was behind United then. I’m not sure the whole country is behind us now, but we have got our own history to make.”

The Telegraph also have an article looking at the possible tactics in the game:

This is where Ferguson will have to make his big call. Does he go for a five-man midfield or go with the 4-4-1-1 that worked so well against Chelsea in the quarter-finals and since?

Picking five midfielders should allow United to reduce the space that Xavi and Iniesta work in. Ferguson is not short of options: Antonio Valencia will start on the right but the rest can be shuffled. He could play Carrick and Paul Scholes as holding midfielders, with Ryan Giggs given freedom to attack in front of them and Park on the left.

...

The player to be sacrificed in a 4-5-1 would be Javier Hernandez, leaving Wayne Rooney as the lone striker. This creates problems of its own. Without the Mexican’s running into the spaces behind the Barcelona defence, United would be surrendering the initiative to Guardiola’s side.

Good article in The Observer on Sir Alex's love of Europe, quoting Sir Bobby Robson on the attraction:

 "The Champions League is really an extension of international football. In Europe the football feels better, smells better, stretches the mental faculties more.

"In the Premier League most opponents start out with faults and fallibilities that will reveal themselves over the 90 minutes. A manager is paid to spot and expose those frailties. In Europe – in the Champions League – you are testing yourselves against the best teams in each league. There is no soft underbelly."

Again, won't quote too much from it, better read as a whole.

There's an interview with Van der Sar in The Observer:

"It's not for physical reasons that you have to quit or because you can't keep up in training anymore, it's just that at some point you must make a decision," he explains. "Maybe I could carry on, but I'm not really sure whether I want to do a maybe. You reach a stage where you know you can't keep progressing, or even staying at the same level, so I think this is the right moment. I didn't expect to be going on for so long anyway. I have already extended my life as a goalkeeper by a couple of years and really enjoyed my six seasons at United, so let's hope I can go out on a high."

They also report that he had some doubts last week, quoting Sir Alex from the programme notes for Blackpool:

"Edwin decided he wants to go out at the top, though he did have a wobble last week," Ferguson wrote. "He came to see me and told me he was thinking about changing his mind.

"I had to tell him to be quick about it because we are in the middle of concluding a deal for a new keeper. He came back a couple of days later to say he would be sticking with his original decision to go, which I think at his age is the right thing for him to do."

And here we turn to The Mirror - who have that story and that quote with the tag "EXCLUSIVE."  They take something from the match programme, something every other paper has and claim it's an exclusive... Even worse is this, which is at the end of the article:

United are chasing Ajax’s £10m Dutch international Maarten Steklenburg.

So used are they to printing transfer lies, they forgot their own story from the other day about how we're about to sign De Gea.  

Also in The Mirror is the most insane piece ever.  I'm not sure what to make of it.  It feels like Michael Calvin wrote it drunk.  Short enigmatic sentences, hysterically overblown.  Here's some snippets:

I love what football can be. I recognise its beauty, its ­purity as the people’s game.

There is a special place in everyday life for its heroes, and even its heretics.

Saturday’s Champions League Final straddles that thin dividing line.

It is sullied by the naked greed of UEFA.

They ignore online touts charging £12,000 plus a £2160 booking fee for two together in Wembley’s top tier.

Manchester United, ­redefined as an investment vehicle for the Glazers, are slaves to the Yankee dollar.

Barcelona sold their soul, ­compromised basic beliefs, by accepting ­billions of ­Qatari Riyal.

More than 2.5million MUFC credit cards featuring Park ­Ji-Sung are used in Korea alone. But each club has the power of dreams.

His legacy is a total ­footballer’s sense of style, ­captured by his two word team talk on that fabled night: “Enjoy it”.

This final will be shaped by tribal elders, leaders who build for the future with one eye on the past.

Carles Puyol, a captain with a social conscience, ­responds with the intensity of a freedom fighter.

Sir Matt Busby reminded me of my Grandad.

A moment, frozen in time, acquired more meaning when I learned about ­Munich and the ghosts who will be a spectral presence on Saturday.

Yes, I've missed the odd sentence out.  but it really is that odd.

Finally, this piece has the odd stat on the final.  Including this: 

"For the FA Cup final we have 35 camera positions, for the Champions League final there are 90; the number of commentators rises from an average of four to 130, press from 300 to 600, and photographers from 90 to 190.

90 cameras?!