With many things going on in the world of soccer at the moment, some of these things will be of importance to you while others will be trivial. The Uganda Premier League season is nearing its end with the winner just over the horizon. Arsenal have hired Unai Emery to be their new head coach after Arsene Wenger’s departure. Emery made a huge claim saying, “Arsenal will be among the best in Europe.” Napoli have hired Carlo Ancelotti as their new head coach. Soccer veteran, Andres Iniesta, has joined Japan’s Vissel Kobe. Another veteran, Wayne Rooney, has arrived in the US with his new team, DC United. Antoine Griezmann’s future looks to be decided after the World Cup, whether he joins Barcelona or not. Frank Lampard, recently retired player, may be in for the manager role of Derby County. Tottenham head coach, Pochettino is set to commit to the club for five years. The World Cup is closing in and claims such as, “Mexico can beat Germany,” are being made. Manchester United may sign Brazilian midfielder, Fred, very soon. They have also denied swapping Martial to Tottenham for Alderweireld. Hopefully this information was helpful and had at least minor importance. What transfers would you like your club to make?

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This league cup final on Saturday, the 18th of May, was rather slow and most definitely painful to watch for Manchester United fans. A 1-0 loss is never fun to watch unless you’re on the winning side. Into the match, only 20 minutes gone and Chelsea were given a penalty. For me it didn’t look like much contact after watching the replays, but in normal time the referee easily saw what looked like a bad tackle. They do use VAR, Video Assistant Referee, in the FA Cup but there is no way that they would overturn a penalty call. Eden Hazard drew the penalty and scored it with David De Gea guessing the wrong direction of his shot. After this score, Chelsea clearly dropped back a fair bit and predominantly played defense. Manchester United was constantly in their attacking half and had 3 times the shots of Chelsea. Manchester United held 66% possession of the ball, but they were still unable to execute in the final third. This FA Cup was quite disappointing to watch for me, not only because I’m a Manchester United fan, but because scoring was low along with scoring opportunities. How do you think this FA Cup final was? Does this result make Chelsea’s rough season sustainable?

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With the Premier League only holding one game left for all teams, here will be a round-up of how things have finished and look to finish. The difference between position 18 and 17 and relegation to the lower league, the Championship League, is only 3 points. This makes this sound close, however Swansea’s goal differential is 9 goals lower than Southampton who are 1 position above them in the table. This basically makes the bottom 3 all settled, with Swansea, West Brom, and Stoke City being relegated. In the top 4 positions 1st, 2nd, and 3rd are set in stone with Manchester City, Manchester United, and Tottenham respectively at the top. This makes these teams assuredly qualify for the Champions League next season. Battling for the 4th position in the table is Liverpool and Chelsea. Liverpool leads by 2 points and with a better goal differential by 15. Chelsea would qualify for the Champions League if they were to win and Liverpool were to lose. If Liverpool tied, Chelsea would need to win their last game, against Newcastle, 16-0. This basically sums up the bottom and top of the table. Will Chelsea have the miracle they need to qualify for the Champions League?

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The long awaited game is finally here. Most likely the biggest club soccer game of the entire year. Real Madrid vs Liverpool. The Champions League Final hasn’t seen an English club in a fair amount of time, having at least one Spanish side for the past 4 years. The last time an English club made the final was Chelsea in 2011-2012, who went on to win in penalties. This Real Madrid team has a large amount of experience having won the past two Champions League Finals and looking for their third in a row. They have also won 3 in the past 4 Champions League Finals, 2 of the 3 wins being by 3 goals. This Liverpool team is quite new and includes breakout star, Mohamed Salah. They have one of the highest scoring amounts in the Champions League with 3.33 goals per match. Real Madrid has beaten French league winner, PSG, probable Italian league winner, Juventus, and German league winner, Bayern Munich. Liverpool has beaten Porto, English league winner, Manchester City, and Roma. Real Madrid has easily proved themselves worthy, while Liverpool has had some not so challenging matches. Will Liverpool show that they belong in the Champions League Final? Can Real Madrid win 3 Champions Leagues in a row?

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In this Champions League Semi Final, goals seemed to never stop coming. Leg 1 of Liverpool vs Roma, which took place in England didn’t disappoint. Liverpool, the favorites, definitely got the better of Roma, huge underdogs even after defeating Barcelona, and proved they belong in this tournament. Liverpool was 2-0 up after the first half, with both goals being scored by the breakout star, Mohamed Salah. Not long after the intermission, Sadio Mane put in another for Liverpool, followed by two more goals from Roberto Firmino within 10 minutes of each other. This brought Liverpool to a 5-0 lead and many thought this game was in the bag. Eventually, in the 80′ minute Edin Dzeko brought one goal back for Roma, and soon after a penalty was called in favor of Roma, which was scored nicely by Diego Perotti. In the first 20 minutes, to me it looked like this game would end in something close to a draw. The goal scoring began and seemingly never ended until it was 5-2. This result is not a great one for Roma, but it’s much better than 5-0, and knowing they can comeback from 3 goals, as shown in last stage of the Champions League vs Barcelona, hope is not entirely lost for them. Is a comeback a possibility for Roma? What do you think the final score will be?

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The Round of 16 in the Champions League is done. All match results but one, I would say, were expected. The one many people didn’t see coming was Sevilla beating Manchester United. Manchester United came out with what some say was a bad game plan, which led to a 1-2 defeat even with the home field advantage. There were three games that looked won after the first leg and they were. These scores of the first leg, Porto vs Liverpool: 0-5, FC Basel vs Manchester City: 0-4, and Bayern vs Besiktas: 5-0, all showed that they would lead to a poor or boring second leg. Liverpool would go on to win 5-0, Manchester City 5-2, and Bayern Munich 8-1. The final match people weren’t anticipating, was not because of the first leg score but was because of the lack of big names. It was one of the few close games however, and Roma would win 2-2 on away goals after Shakhtar Donetsk lost strength with a red card. As covered in one of my other posts, Real Madrid beat PSG 5-2 with PSG handicapped after they lost their star player, Neymar. Another close one, Tottenham vs Juventus, ended 3-4 with Juventus winning the second leg 1-2 despite playing on the road. Lastly is Barcelona vs Chelsea, which looked to be a promising game, but Barcelona at home was too much to overcome for the English side and Barcelona would go on to win, 4-1 after a 3-0 second leg. In conclusion, the 8 teams that will advance to the quarterfinals are Real Madrid, Liverpool, Juventus, Manchester City, Roma, Sevilla, Bayern Munich, and Barcelona. What matchups are you hoping to see in these quarterfinals? Who is your team you hope to succeed?

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After a 3-1 victory in the 1st leg things looked promising for Real Madrid. It was looking rough for the French team Paris Saint-Germain and it would only get worse when Neymar went down in a regular season match against Marseille. In this game he suffered a sprain of his right ankle and fissure of his fifth metatarsal. When this occurred many expected PSG to be knocked out much more easily by Real Madrid. Despite this game being in Paris, Real Madrid had the upper hand. The game was scoreless through the first half and the first goal came from Cristiano Ronaldo. In the 51′ minute he gave the Spanish side a 0-1 lead. Next came a second yellow card resulting in a red card for Marco Verratti. Although PSG was playing with only 10 men, they found a way to score a goal and it was by Edinson Cavani in the 71′ minute. This would make the leg 1-1 and the overall aggregate 2-4 and give PSG some sort of hope. All hope that they had gained would be crushed however, 9 minutes later when Casemiro scored and brought the aggregate to 2-5 where PSG looked to be done for. Real Madrid would eventually win deservedly and move on to quarterfinals. What matchups do you hope to see in the next round of the Champions League?

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Manchester City ripped Arsenal apart in the Carabao Cup final to get their first trophy under head coach Pep Guardiola. The first goal came in the 18′ minute after Sergio Aguero bumped backs with Arsenal defender Mustafi while the ball flew over them. Mustafi raised his arms waiting for a whistle to be blown but all that he would hear is the cheers in the stadium seconds later as Aguero flicked the ball over the keeper’s head into the corner of the net. The first half ended 0-1 in favor of Man City. The next goal came in the 58′ minute as the returning Man City captain, Vincent Kompany, was able to find the back of the net. Lastly, to put the game away was a goal scored by David Silva in the 65′ minute. The final score was 0-3 with City lifting the trophy. Manchester City was in complete control of this game for almost the entirety of the 90 minutes that were played. Although they played an outstanding game many believe Arsenal gave up mid-game. Does Manchester City have a chance to win the Champions League? Is it time for Arsenal to leave head coach Arsene Wenger?

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This game being at Stamford Bridge, the home field of Chelsea, meant the English club had to come out with a positive result. Heading to Camp Nou in Spain with an aggregate of 1-1 doesn’t hold good odds for Chelsea. This game was fairly even, many shots for both sides. The first half of this match ended scoreless with some shots missing on either end of the field and Barcelona keeping more possession of the ball as per usual. In the second half Willian was finally able to find the back of the net in the 62 minute after hitting both posts of the goal frame earlier in the game. 13 minutes later Lionel Messi scored his first ever goal against Chelsea which was bound to happen eventually. It was the 75 minute and he tied the game back up at 1-1. This result for Barcelona looks promising and many people would most likely bet on them over Chelsea at this point. The second leg will be on March 14. Will Chelsea perform away against Barcelona to advance to the Champions League quarter-finals? Can Chelsea manage their tough schedule that is ahead?

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This match was heavily anticipated for and there was a good reason for that. It came down to the final 10 minutes for some separation to be made between the teams. PSG struck first with a goal scored by Rabiot who came in for the cleanup and put a rebound into the back of the net. Next came a penalty in the closing minutes of the first half won by Kroos when he was seemingly pulled down by the shoulder inside the box. Cristiano Ronaldo was the one who stepped up to the plate and shot it right into the bottom left corner of the net bringing Real Madrid back to an even game at 1-1. There wasn’t another goal until the 83 minute which bounced a bit fortunately right off Ronaldo’s knee after the goalie punched the ball away and went into the net to give Real Madrid a 2-1 lead. Lastly, only 3 minutes after Real Madrid’s second goal, was a goal scored by Marcelo, a very offensive left back. A low cross was hit in by Asensio and Marcelo followed that up with a shot on goal which was deflected by a PSG defender and made its way into the goal. This match was very even with 50% possession for each side. Real Madrid was able to get more shots off mostly due to the final 10 minutes which very much so went Real Madrid’s way. Leg 2 will be on March 6 at PSG.

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