Thoughts On The End Of The Season

So, Chelsea win the FA Cup - congratulations. Here interim Chelsea coach Guus Hiddink models what seems to be an amazingly well fitted FA Cup on his head. Everton never looked dangerous after their instant goal in the first minute. Chelsea have had some season. Big Phil screwed their chances at the Premier League title and their chance to go to the Champions League final was outrageously stolen by the ref. My thought here is that had Chelsea had Guus Hiddink from day one and had their second match again Barcelona been fairly officiated, they would have taken the league and the Champions League too.

They have a certain quality that United, for all their amazing wealth of talent, lack. Even after that first minute goal today you just knew they were going to win anyway. And while Barcelona made United look almost average, Chelsea did the same to Barcelona, despite the outcome. While watching their games this year I always got the sense that Hiddink's Chelsea were never out of any match. Chelsea compared to United is in my eyes just like the Boston Red Sox compared to the Yankees. The Yankees and United are better on paper and should generally win based on talent but they lack the certain clutchy, steely, bounce backyness that the Red Sox and Chelsea have in abundance.

So how does United get a bit of steel in their spine? I have a few thoughts, of course. Scholes, Giggs, Nani, and Park should be moved out to pasture. Evra should be reminded that he has to make tackles. Anderson needs to be used more. He completely smothered Leo Messi in the Olympics so he can and should be used to as a roving dangerman snuffer. Have him mark the opposing danger man all match. Tevez and Ronaldo will be gone and so there will be seemingly big gaps up front. Signing Ribery or Valencia or some other such attacking player is not what's needed. Wellbeck, Macheda, and Tosic deserve their chance and I think if they get it they will do very well as a nice addition to Rooney and Berbatov. What's really needed is a world class central midfielder with scads of snarl. A player who will run the farthest to tackle the hardest. A player who will squash locker room problems. A player who can score clutch goals. A hard man who is not to be trifled with. A man like . . .

Yucking It Up With Hitler

So have you seen Downfall, the widely acclaimed film that covers Hitler's last few days in the bunker? It's heavy stuff and there's nothing to laugh at. But some folks realized that if they changed the subtitles (Downfall is in German) of one scene in particular they could turn this bleak, depressing tale of the end of Hitler into a non-stop laugh riot. And behold, a whole wave of Downfall mashups crashed down upon Youtube. Here are the two funniest I have seen. In the first, Hitler finds out that he has become a victim of the housing market collapse.

In the second, Hitler is devastated to find that Cristiano Ronaldo has been sold to Real Madrid and will no longer play for Manchester United.

May I Just Briefly Show You One Of The Greatest Sports Show On Earth?

And there's no better time to share it. Premier League Fan Zone. Two fans call the match, one fan from each team. This past week we were treated - blissfully treated - to the United-Chelsea match. A great compilation clip of this weekend's match can be found here.

This Sporting Weekend

That's certainly more like it United! The good guys thumped West Brom 4-0 on Saturday. Rooney is in supernatural form lately, and it looks like Berbatov might be finding his touch again too. Look out world if Sir Alex has a collectively in form four man front of Rooney, Tevez, Ronaldo, and Berbatov. It's going to be devastating.

Yesterday I had either the greatest fortune or most profound misfortune to have watched Tottenham take on Stoke. It was hard to take your eyes off the TV because it was such a bad match but it really was buckets of fun nonetheless. For instance, Stoke managed to hit two posts and a crossbar in a three second span. A missed penalty that dinged off of one post, dinged off the other - all while not crossing the goalmouth - to come back out into the box, where Rory Delap (he of the insane 40 yard throw ins)

missed an open net and hit the crossbar. OK, he had scored earlier in the match, but that was still a bad miss. This game had 11 minutes of injury time at the end. 11 minutes! Two red cards for Tottenham, who have gone into complete and utter freefall. They are making Everton and Newcastle look like Chelsea and Man Utd. The Tottenham players are saying they're behind their coach, and Berlitz school dropout, Juande Ramos. That's a sure sign he'll be gone shortly. Has there ever been a more talented team to perform so poorly?

Inter thrashed the bejunipers out of Roma yesterday. 4-0 but it wasn't even that close. Inter looks scary this season. So does Ezequiel Lavezzi of Napoli, who lead Napoli to a big win over Juventus. Juve coach Claudio Ranieri will probably be on the unemployment line with Juande Ramos by next week.