Bye! Bye! TITI

Any EPL follower, no matter which club he supports, never fails to recgonise the excellent gunner that TiTi was. When henry touches the ball, its a ray of hope for the gunners ot it is a cause for a shiver down the spines of anti-gunners. His immaculate dribbling ability and the aptitude to read the game like no other and his unparallaled finishing abiliy have made him unarguably one of the best strikers in the world.

His role at Arsenal was more than a striker's role. It had too many responsibilties clubbed in it and an Arsenal sans Henry is equivalent to any other not-one-of-the-top-notch french clubs is an open secret. Now that Henry's move to Bacelona is a certainity,lets discuss where will all these latest developments lead to.

Arsenal has consistently been losing experienced players in the past two years, Patrick Viera,Pires,Bergkamp. This had a pronounced effect on Arsenal's fortune s in the league. In the seasons that ensued the best that the gunners could manage was a fourth in the EPL,thanks to Thierry Henry. In europe , in the first season into the post-viera era they made it to the champions league finals. Again thanks to Henry. Last season Arsenal did not perform as their brand name suggested they d perform. Reason : Absence of Henry. By selling Henry, Arsenal have now lost the only bit of expierence that they had. Whoeve comes to replace him will now face an insurmountable task of filling Henry's shoes at Arsenal which is a near impossible task. This could have a serious impact on the gunners performance next season. Having said this, one should also keep in mind the fact that if the young gunners really did show glimpses of what they could actually do last season. So it will al come down to how well the players apply themselves on the field. Wenger makes an excellent scout but not an outstanding tactician. SO the chances of the later happening are very low.

The EPL,in my view will now become a two horse race betwee the two richer clubs. Liverpool, in my view, are never contenders for the EPL. The new owners are just saying that there will be a string of new arrivals but unfortunately Liverpool are still wont to going behind prem failures. Fine, i stop here because we are not even half way through the transfer window. An Arsenal with Henry would very certainly have been Title contenders infact potential winners. But the latest developments all but rules out the above possibility.

In sofar as Spain is concerned, if Barca does not let go of Ronnie or E'too, they will most certainly be on the way to join Madrid and Chelsea as the most ineffective engines of European football by wasting talents by a miraculous technique that no one would dare do to the newl signed superstars "Benching!". If al of them stay then either of Henry,Etoo ronnie r messi will have to sit out. Which, in my view , is a disgrace to the sport.

Henry s move to spain is certain to affect European football and there are no two ways about it. Thank you Henry for giving some of the best moments of EPL and entertaining soccer followers in your own way.

FROM "LA LIGA" TO "L.A GALAXY"

It is very hard these days, being a David Beckham fan. It is even harder to move away from the original GALAXY...the galacticos to a club which is a Galaxy only by of the nomenclature, exactly when the former has stuck form and shown strength to cap what one can call, one of the greatest comeback chapionship wins in the histoy of the sport.

As i said earlier, it is hard defending David Beckham being arguably one of the best footballers, these days. Many people wite him off has an over-rated prick who can be better off as a model or an actor.This constant "over-rated player" allegation has,in my view,made beckham an under-rated player.Many of his individual perfomaces have always been pushed to the second page as the inablilty of the "boys-worth-millions" to play well as a team overshadowed it.

It seemed to many of his critics that Beckham was the inhibitant in Madrid being unable to perform better let alone win trophies season after season. Beckham's arrival did not see Madrid win any major silver.There is no denying it. But one has also to look into the fact that the madrid team was not a constant thing and it had a floating coach,floating stop and what's more floatin squad.Of which only the galaxy form the constant part.If the team is in such a disastrous state, how can you blame an individual for Madrid's failures.

Beckham is not of the calibre of Maradona,Pele,De Stefano Expecting him to play like that is foolish.Beckham does what he does best,create chances from every possible situation.He has been doing it.But the lack of reciprocation fom the other end had cost madrid the silver that the wud have been winners of.

Beckham has been an inevitable member of the Madrid squad and without him madid wud not have acheived as mush is a well hidden truth.This was evident during the months of january which saw Beckham made o sit out,when his departure became imminent, for most of the matches and suffer painstaking defeats. Now finally Becks was able to prove his worth by being one of the most vital reasons for Madrid's triumph by providing for van Nistelrooy who was a benifactor of Beckham's contibution since their days at Man Utd.

So the stage is set.He is moving to the U.S. Where he still will continue to be what he is today,David Beckham.

THE SEARCH HAS SERIOUSLY BEGUN

I am wont to spending excessive amount of time contemplating about things that are never really important but these things really really really bother me. One of those things is fighting competetion. It is natural for any sane human being to have this urge to become the best in the business that he/she takes up.I am no different. But the crux of the whole issue seems to be, in whichever road i decide to tread on, the fact that an alarmin number are also treading on the same road and they are far better than me and still very far behind the leaders deflates my initial entusiasm.That i cannot ever win is all but a fact. Could there possibly be a solution?..

The solution given by people are more or less effort-centric.They seem to say a diligent human being putting in a lot of effort in a particular field is bound to hit the top. Some say find a field in which you are the best....but finding itself is a field in which i have to compete with every individual on this earth!!..what a paradoxical situation....A philosphical quagmire....

A humorist's school of thought....

Mention the word "Reservation" to any Indian student in his college years, the first thing that would come to his mind would be, the drama that is staged by various political partys that is reflective of the igorance of the government to formulate a concrete policy therby hampering the nations progress. Although, I dont much agree with the latter part of the sentence, i came across a very interesting and humorous comment on "New avenues where reservations can be provided."

The author notes that the strongest points that act in favour for providing reservations in India are
1) Equal representation from all the stratas of society.
2) Compromise quality for equality and development of the society.

With this in mind he has an excellent sugestion to make..

He says why not implement the reservation policy on the Indian Cricket team instead of implementing them on Private sector jobs and Central Institutions. He notes that this would be expedient for the government in two ways.

1) The question of quality deterioration does not arise.
2) The people who get reserved would earn more from one match, than what they would earn in a lifetime if they go the governments way.

This rule will be best served only if you implement it on a series to series basis.The BCCI must give everyone who has applied for those reserved posts a chance to play thereby providing for their development .


Cheers,
Misnomer.