Well it's that time of year when everyone likes to get a little bit retrospective and have a good wistful look back at what has gone on before. I'm sure all of you at this point will be sick and tired of reading reviews of the year, ‘best of' lists, moments that we all remember from 2008 etc. but sorry to disappoint all of you...that's exactly what I am going to be doing here I'm afraid.
European football seasons don't run on an annual basis in terms of the calendar year, with a certain degree of ‘overlapping' going on. Typically the seasons here run September to May, but the end of a year still offers us a useful time to take stock and remember what another incredible year 2008 has been in the world of football. After all, looking back at this point we are able to cast our eyes over those sides that were victorious in the European campaigns of the spring and those who got it badly wrong. We can see just who took the Champions League and Copa Libertadores crowns. Hell, just a couple of days ago we saw the new ‘Club World Champions' crowned.
Looking back at 2008 also means that we have the European Championships from Switzerland and Austria to fondly reminisce about as well as the Olympic Games (football's input here of course) and the African Cup of Nations.
So plenty to talk about and recall I'm sure you will agree. So sit back, pull up a chair, and pour yourself a favourite beverage for a look back at the good, the bad and the ugly from the world of football in 2008...
Around the World in 2008
So what did happen then? Well (deep breath)... at the top of the leagues of Europe we were pretty much ‘Rockin' All Over The World' given that everything nicely confirmed the status quo. Manchester United, Lyon, Real Madrid, Bayern Munich, Inter Milan, Porto and PSV Eindhoven were all *surprisingly* crowned champions of their respective nations as competitiveness in football continued to drop out of the sport.
In England, Chelsea pushed United all the way but these two were leagues ahead of everyone else and pretty much everywhere you'd be hard pressed to find any sort of ‘Cinderella story' going on. In the Champions League (unsurprisingly) money talked again as the Premier League continued to dominate. Moscow saw the historic first ever all English Champions League final as Manchester United once again, just squeezed past Chelsea by the width of Edwin Van Der Saar's left hand post.
United were however, worthy winners of the competition as well as their domestic league, doing so with some wonderfully inventive and creative attacking play. That Ronaldo boy wasn't bad either. Over 40 goals in all competitions saw everyone's favourite winker pick up the Balon d'Or, as Europe's best player to go with those other couple of trinkets he picked up.
Internationally speaking, Ronaldo didn't quite live up to his reputation however as the highly fancied Portugal crashed out of Euro 2008, learning, like we all have to at some point in our lives, ‘not to count out the Germans'. Euro 2008 saw the international game regain some of its lost lustre with a series of captivating games, far removed from the stifling defensive tactics of recent tournaments. Russia, Turkey and Holland all impressed at various stages but it was Spain who were the worthy winners, defeating not just 15 of the other teams but also 50 years worth of being serial choke artists.
Argentina retained their Olympic gold medal with victory in Beijing, once again inspired by the awesome Leo Messi. Both these sides achieving success augers well for those of us who like to enjoy football as a spectacle and not come out of a game with a sore neck from too much staring into the sky. At senior level however, Argentina, like Brazil were struggling in qualification for South Africa in 2010 with both these nations questioning if their style of play was exactly what it needed to be. Argentina it was argued play ‘too much nice football that doesn't go anywhere'. Do they need to start lumping it a bit more? Brazil now play like Norway. I would hope that people don't want to see this anymore. Spain's success this summer should hopefully show both that football can be both beautiful AND effective.
In Africa, Egypt continued their dominance of the Africa Cup of Nations by bringing home their 5th title (a record). The competition continues to receive a negative press in Europe because of it taking place at the beginning of the year, but all these managers who like to complain, mentioning no names...alright Sam Allardyce, that it takes away their players do know this when they sign them. Regardless of the usual amount of Euro-snobbery, the tournament once again provided some fantastic football with a record 99 goals being scored. Hosted by Ghana, the atmosphere was always vibrant and we saw the making of a star in Amir Zaki, now banging them in, a few thousand miles away in sunny Wigan.
Those who have shown individually in the past 12 months then...Ronaldo (obviously) but at the back Ferdinand and Vidic were just as important for the European Champions. Spain's collective midfield, which proved the old adage that good things do come in small packages – with Xavi, Iniesta, Silva and Fabregas all showing great quality whilst naturalised Brazilian Marcos Senna of Villarreal had an absolute monster of a tournament.
Other men to impress; Iker Casillas (Spain & Real Madrid), Maicon (Brazil & Inter Milan), Sergio Aguero (Argentina & Atletico Madrid) and Franck Ribery (France & Bayern Munich).
The Class of 2008 Awards
I guess no self-respecting review of the year is fully complete however with some awards, so let's try and give that a bash shall we? Bear in mind I am no more an expert than any of you out there reading this (unless you're a deluded Tottenham fan who *actually* believes you support a ‘top 4' club) so I expect much disagreement and consternation. The big prizes out there are voted for by national team managers, respected sports journalists or rather more frighteningly; ‘democratic polls' of fans. These are based on complex scoring systems and allocations of points but the following awards will have none of that effort or criteria I'm afraid. Nope, they'll just be my opinion, and some reasoning of why I made the choice. Agree? Disagree? Comments at the bottom if you please.
So with that rather blustery and longwinded introduction out the way, let's get down to business shall we?
Player of 2008
Cristia...wait, wait...yes we all know that he's been the best player in the world for most of 2008 (well the first half anyway) but I'm going to go with a man who is a fellow union member. The goalkeeping union that is. As someone who plays in that unique position, whereby a mistake pretty much guarantees a goal being scored, I can fully appreciate the fact that they are often overlooked. A world class goalkeeper is hard to come by and can be so vital in games where two top teams are pretty much evenly matched.
So, with that in mind, my 2008 player of the year...Iker Casillas. The man has been awesome for a long, long time now. This was a guy who was thrust into the Real Madrid first team when he was just 18 years of age and he's never looked back. Last season for Madrid he was sensational. Absolutely top class, papering over a lot of the cracks that we are seeing now. Indeed as this season his meticulous standards have dropped a bit, Real have gone into a complete funk, showing just how well he was performing last time out. He was also excellent for Spain in the summer, helping them to be victorious at Euro 2008 where he was calm and measured throughout. His performance last week in the Classico against Barca showed how good he is.
An amazing player who has had an amazing year.
Team of the Year
Now Manchester United deserve all the credit in the world for the 2008 they had. Premier League Champions as well as Champions League winners in an era when many of the top sides have found it difficult to combine success domestically with that on the European stage as well. Mention I think also should go to the team beaten by United in the final of the Club World Cup, LDU Quito who outlasted their more heralded rivals from Brazil and Argentina to become the first Ecuadorian side to win the Copa Libertadores in the competition's 49 year history.
Full marks to Hull City and Hoffenheim as well for taking their respective top flights by storm and refusing to yield to the accepted wisdom that newly promoted sides need to ‘know their place' and bow down, play nice and let the biggest sides roll them over. Hull have confounded all the critics by going out and *gasp* attacking the biggest sides while Hoffenheim, from a village of just a few thousand in Germany are almost reinventing the whole make up of German football in the way a club is run and the style in which the team plays.
With all that being said however, when I thought about it, there was only one choice when it came to team of the year, and that my friends is Spain. Many, many years in the making, Spain's triumph reminded me of why I do love being a football fan. All of the terrible overhyped nonsense that you have to usually put up with as Sky try to sell to you that Bolton vs. Wigan is the pinnacle of world football made watching Spain this summer all the more sweeter. Indeed the whole tournament was fantastic, with great attacking football replacing the dull sterile systems of play which now seem to dominate all too often.
Allow me to be somewhat indulgent and quote myself from the summer; 'The style in which Spain have played, and also the way in which Russia, Holland, Croatia, Turkey and in fact the Germans against Portugal has shown that possession of the football and close and intricate passing can still thrive in a modern game where pace and power are now seen as the only way to play. The majestic way in which Spain kept hold of the ball and worked their openings or the fantastic adventure shown by the Russians, and the speed of the Dutch on the counter attack meant that goals truly were ‘earned', teams were able to find success in trying to score through open play rather than simply play the percentages and hope for a chance from a set piece or a hoof into the box.
Bottom line, Euro 2008 saw a reverse of what has become a prevailing trend in both international and club football. Attack became the best form of defence and those sides who believed in their abilities and who tried to win games instead of waiting for their opponents to lose them were generally rewarded. Indeed those countries that sat back like France, Romania, Sweden and Greece were sent packing early while those, with Spain as the vanguard, that came to be adventurous, prospered.'
'Joe Kinnear Memorial award' for the thing that made me want to shout and scream in 2008
Time to sound like a broken record I'm afraid, given that I wrote an entire piece on this back when it happened but I feel it's an issue that needs publicising and one of the true times that football made me very, very angry this year. Coming in top of the things that got my goat – the theft of John Bostock by Tottenham Hotspur. This (for once) is not a dig at Tottenham, they were just playing the system at how it's been designed -
it's more the implications behind the move.To keep it brief, and to not make my blood boil as I type this, John Bostock was a 15 year old central midfield player, who had been raised and developed by the excellent and well respected Crystal Palace academy. Due to the lack of any backbone on the behalf of the footballing authorities to stand up to the ‘big' clubs of this world, Tottenham were able to snatch away one of the most highly regarded young talents in the country for a miserly sum, described at the time by Palace chairman Simon Jordan as a ‘bag of crisps.'
Yes I'm biased, yes I'm a Palace fan, but I'd like to think that supporters of all clubs can relate to this, and I like to think that supporters of all teams who can get over their petty tribal views and see the bigger picture would also get annoyed at a system whereby a club can put all the time and effort not to mention resources into academies, producing home grown talent only to see them stolen away for nothing. It's not just ‘small' clubs getting it in the neck, just ask Barcelona who have regularly seen clubs *coughArsenalcough*come in and steal away their top young talents.
The bottom line, if this system continues then there will no longer be any incentive for clubs to produce their own young talents and then where will the stars of tomorrow come from?
The Jamie Redknapp award for ‘crack punditry in the face of overwhelming ignorance'
Goes to ‘good ol' Richard Keys. Sky Sports Champions League coverage is usually a goldmine for crack punditry, and so it was that everyone's favourite ‘Didier Drogba loving' TV anchor came out with the classic piece of analysis that Alessandro Del Piero must have been copying Cristiano Ronaldo all these years for his free kick technique. Yes Richard, I'm sure he has.
Oh yeah, and let's make mention to Phil Thompson for this stunning piece of pre season punditry; "I've already said it on Sky Sports News but I do think this could be the year that someone breaks that top four. I've been very impressed with Spurs and I know that pre-season doesn't mean everything but Ramos' side has really started to take shape. He probably would have liked to have kept Robbie Keane but Darren Bent looks sharp. He seems to have shaken off what was possibly a bit of a star struck feeling, and with the speculation surrounding Berbatov, has started to enjoy taking on more responsibility.
They've got a good balance and a good system with Modric, who's a fine player and Dos Santos on the left. I think Ramos has actually prepared for Berbatov's departure - we've seen him change tactics in pre-season and play 4-5-1, and it's looked very fluent. I think Arsenal's injuries and departures could mean they're the ones to fall out of the top four."
Now to defend Phil Thompson (much as I am loath to) the fact that Arsenal could drop out of the top four places might not be a bad shout as we enter 2009. However, his assessment of Spurs is very, very funny with the benefit of glorious hindsight.
Hypocrite of the year
Football is full of hypocrites. In fact, I don't think that any other industry in the world suffers more from ‘the pot calling the kettle black'. With that in mind, it's actually, when you think about it a pretty impressive feat to beat out all competition and romp home with this award. So step forward Sir Alex Ferguson and his impassioned criticism of ‘Francoist' Real Madrid for their underhand tactics in the transfer market and their pursuit of Cristiano Ronaldo. What's that old adage about glass houses and stones? Well it seems that Old Trafford might just be the world biggest green house. Let's see the evidence shall we? (Many thanks to the Observer Newspaper for their sterling work at collating these)
Fergie: still got it
Real Madrid's record on tapping-up players is 'obscene', says Fergie. 'Their end game was always Ronaldo. What makes it obscene is that Madrid, General Franco's club, had a history of being able to get whoever and whatever they wanted before democracy came to Spain.'
Among the other top football figures who've attacked player tapping in the last few years:
Harry van Raaij , PSV, 2000: 'Who does Ferguson think he is to make this approach to Ruud? He's crossed the line of decency.'
Bob Murray, Sunderland, 2003: 'United's treatment of this club over Bellion is shabby, despicable, disrespectful and arrogant. They've broken every rule in the book.'
Mohamed Fayed, Fulham, 2004: 'I'm fed up with Sir Alex constantly trying to disrupt my club and unsettle my players'.
Harry van Raaij , PSV, 2004: 'Luring Robben in this way is Ferguson's style of doing business. We've seen it before with Jaap and Ruud. A leopard never changes its spots.'
Karl-Heinz Rummenigge, Bayern, 2006: 'Manchester must stop trying to tempt Owen Hargreaves or we will turn to Fifa.'
Jean-Michel Aulas, Lyon, 2008: 'When Ferguson talks publicly about signing Benzema, how is that not destabilisation?'
Daniel Levy, Tottenham, 2008: 'Ferguson's action over Berbatov is one of the worst offences by any manager in the Premier League ever. It's disgraceful: a blatant e
xample of sheer arrogance...'I think the case for the prosecution rests your honour
Phew, and with that special bumper, festive, end of year edition, let's wrap things up with a final thought...
With a continuing disparity between rich and poor and the world's economic climate likely to impact heavily on football and every facet of life in 2009, there appears many a storm cloud on the horizon. However, let's never lose track of the fact that on the pitch we saw some terrific football played in 2008 and the emergence of some wonderful players. Bottom line, football is the greatest sport in the world so continue to show your support for it in the year to come.
Rooney fires United to Club World Cup glory
United became the first British winners of the FIFA tournament following Liverpool's failure in 2005 when they were ambushed by Brazil's Sao Paulo.
The European champions overcame a moment of madness from Nemanja Vidic, who was sent off four minutes into the second half in Yokohama for elbowing LDU striker Claudio Bieler in the face.
"The sending off made it difficult for us," United manager Alex Ferguson told reporters. "Half-an-hour to go is a long road with 10 men but Wayne scored a magnificent goal.
"In 30 years you'll look back and see Manchester United's name on the trophy -- although I won't be around to enjoy it."
Vidic's red card is a major blow to Ferguson as he will miss United's next European Champions League game, away to Inter Milan in February in the first leg of the last 16.
"It's a soft sending-off but he swung an elbow," said Ferguson. "When you do that in front of the referee you've got no chance. He gave the referee no option."
Vidic's ban could be extended to three matches should the incident be deemed violent conduct.
"It depends how FIFA interpret it and how UEFA act in terms of the information," added Ferguson. "Vidic is disappointed but the referee was correct to produce the red card."
BEST TEAM
The Serbian defender's dismissal sparked Ferguson's side into life and Rooney fired the winner with a clinical right-foot shot after a magical flick from Cristiano Ronaldo.
"We're the best team in the world," said Rooney, who was named player of the tournament after scoring twice in United's 5-3 semi-final win over Japan's Gamba Osaka.
"If we hadn't won it would have been difficult going back home. We would probably have been on a downer and it would have had a knock-on effect.
"Now we can go back with lots of confidence. It's been a childhood dream. I just looked at my phone and I had a message saying 'Congratulations -- you're a world champion'.
"To score the winning goal is a great feeling."
Ronaldo, the victim of persistent rough treatment from Libertadores Cup holders LDU, was a constant threat as United dominated a match watched by almost 69,000 fans.
Rooney, Park Ji-sung and Carlos Tevez, who angrily grabbed his tracksuit top and kicked the bench when Ferguson sacrificed him after Vidic's red card, all went close.
United still had to survive late LDU pressure, with goalkeeper Edwin van der Sar forced into an excellent fingertip save from Alejandro Manso's fierce drive in the 89th minute.
"Unbelievable!" said United captain Rio Ferdinand. "We're elated. It's been a hard trip but winning softens any feelings of tiredness."
Ferguson's side won the tournament's forerunner, a one-off match between the champions of Europe and South America, with a 1-0 win over Brazilian side Palmeiras in 1999.
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