Champions League Post-Mortem

[07:45] JSpitzberg: guy at work all proud to call ronaldo "cron"

[07:45] JSpitzberg: "see, i'm reading you!"

[07:45] Neal J Thurman: HA

[07:45] Neal J Thurman: so long as he also called him no better than the 4th best player on the pitch yesterday

[07:48] JSpitzberg: fair placement

[07:48] JSpitzberg: manu got it all wrong

[07:48] Neal J Thurman: agreed

[07:48] Neal J Thurman: and finally paid for lack of a midfield

[07:48] JSpitzberg: or at least, they didn't have a plan b when the long balls over the top didn't pressure the 2nd string D

[10:10] Neal J Thurman: so, if you were SAF, what would your shopping list look like for the Summer?

[10:11] JSpitzberg: working on a post, i hope ;-0

[10:11] Neal J Thurman: not yet - just starting to think about it

[10:30] JSpitzberg: how much does it depend on hargreaves' health?

[10:32] Neal J Thurman: good question

[10:33] JSpitzberg: set at GK and D

[10:33] JSpitzberg: fair assumption?

[10:33] Neal J Thurman: not 100% sold on the GK situation but I think SAF is

[10:34] Neal J Thurman: D could use an additional CB but that's engineering at the margins - no starters needed

[10:34] JSpitzberg: rio/vidic

[10:35] JSpitzberg: evans the backup and brown, neville, oshea can all play in the middle

[10:35] JSpitzberg: left back - evra, fabio, de leat (sp?)

[10:35] JSpitzberg: right - neville, rafael, oshea, brown

[10:36] Neal J Thurman: yup - if it were me and i had the money, I'd still buy one additional CB - I like evans but Brown/Neville/OShea is trouble (IMO)

[10:36] JSpitzberg: try convincing the glazers ;-)

[10:37] JSpitzberg: mid - fletcher, carrick, anderson your starting 3?

[10:37] Neal J Thurman: not good times

[10:38] JSpitzberg: scholes, gibson, hargraeves, giggs can also play centrally

[10:38] Neal J Thurman: have to assume scholes is done

[10:38] JSpitzberg: djemba djemba, kleberson

[10:38] Neal J Thurman: lol

[10:39] Neal J Thurman: honestly, I'd try to sell Carrick

[10:39] JSpitzberg: man... the ghost of steve sidwell

[10:39] Neal J Thurman: Giggs has to be treated like Bergy was the last year (we might get something from him but we should consider it a bonus)

[10:39] JSpitzberg: bigger fall from grace in the last 2 years?

[10:39] Neal J Thurman: who? Carrick?

[10:40] JSpitzberg: sidwell.

[10:40] JSpitzberg: best player on a crap team to...

[10:40] JSpitzberg: end of the bench guy on a great team...

[10:40] JSpitzberg: to middle of the bench on a good team

[10:40] JSpitzberg: though if barry leaves...

[10:40] JSpitzberg: "bide your time, steve. your time will come."

[10:41] Neal J Thurman: will be interesting to see what happens to Petrov vs. Sidwell if Barry leaves

[10:41] JSpitzberg: spet just signed a new deal

[10:41] JSpitzberg: all the buzz about how great he's been in a deeper role

[10:41] JSpitzberg: who has fallen further - sidwell or nrc?

[10:42] Neal J Thurman: excellent question

[10:42] Neal J Thurman: I'd have to say NRC because he isn't even in contention for his preferred spot

[10:43] Neal J Thurman: and there isn't even an above average player blocking his path

[10:43] JSpitzberg: sidwell?

[10:44] Neal J Thurman: I meant at right back

[10:44] Neal J Thurman: but I guess the CM answer is that NRC has fallen farther since Sidwell seems to be ahead of him in the midfield pecking order

[10:44] JSpitzberg: but this is a tangent

[10:45] Neal J Thurman: agreed

[10:45] JSpitzberg: is diarra happy at madrid?

[10:45] JSpitzberg: he's been there a couple of months...

[10:45] Neal J Thurman: main question is whether ManYoo has ANY midfielders worth keeping

[10:45] JSpitzberg: that's when he usually moves on

[10:45] Neal J Thurman: lol

[10:45] Neal J Thurman: especially since they won exactly as much as Pompey did this season :-)

[10:46] JSpitzberg: all the talk about wigan losing palacios and heskey...

[10:46] JSpitzberg: no one talks about pompey losing diarra and defoe

[10:47] JSpitzberg: and utaka dying some time last summer

[10:49] Neal J Thurman: well, in truth, he really died in November of 2007

[10:49] Neal J Thurman: was only really alive for about 8 weeks

[10:49] JSpitzberg: lol

[10:50] Neal J Thurman: he was Zaki before being Zaki was cool

[10:51] JSpitzberg: careful, you're talking about the best striker in international football

[10:51] Neal J Thurman: heh

[10:51] Neal J Thurman: Utaka or Zaki?

[10:51] JSpitzberg: the latter.

[10:52] JSpitzberg: Wigan have finally concluded the loan signing of Egypt striker Amr Zaki, currently ranked by Fifa as the best striker in the world.

[10:52] JSpitzberg: 27 goals in 48 games for his country put him at the top of Fifa's player rankings

[10:52] Neal J Thurman: wow - and who knows more about the game than FIFA?

[10:53] Neal J Thurman: wonder where Healy sits on that list :-)

[10:53] JSpitzberg: lol

[10:53] Neal J Thurman: scores by the bucket for Norn Ireland

[11:03] JSpitzberg: @ sun now, right?

[11:07] JSpitzberg: http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/sport/football/premier_league/manchester_united/article6380258.ece