Euro 2008: Dorin Goian Of Romania Gets Injured

Romanian defender Dorin Goian injured himself during a training session ahead of Euro 2008 and made himself uncertain for the tournament. He injured a tendon during the practise. He plays for the country's premier club Steaua Bucharest.

Ganguly and Dravid Left Out of Asia Cup

Its totally a young side for India going for Aisa Cup in Bangladesh. Two new faces for the one day squad has been included: Yusuf Pathan and Pragyan Ojha. Sachin Tendulkar has already opted out of the tourament due to injury, but the selectors totally ignored Rahul Dravid and Saurav Ganguly. They have also left Harbhajan Singh out of the team as he has been banned from 5 one day internationals due to slapping of his team mate Sreeshanth.

I just simply can't make out why Dhoni & Co. left out Saurav Ganguly. If they pick a team on the basis of performance, then I would suggest Mr. Dhoni to look at the 2 innngs DADA played in the IPL...one against Deccan Chargers where he made 91 and the other he made 86 not out against Punjan Kings XI. M.S.Dhoni himself did not put up any remarkable performance other than his team is playing in semis.

Mr.Dhoni, I would like to suggest you one thing...You get what you give.

The final Squad of India for the Asia Cup:

M S Dhoni, Yuvraj Singh, Virender Sehwag, Gautam Gambhir, Rohit Sharma, Irfan Pathan, Robin Uthappa, Suresh Raina, S Sreesanth, Yusuf Pathan, Ishant Sharma, Praveen Kumar, RP Singh, Piyush Chawla, Pragyan Ojha.

The Bryan Brothers Too Tough for Indo-Pak Duo

The Indo-Pak duo of Rohan Bopanna and Aisam-ul-Haq Qureshi lost their 1st round French Open clash to the top seeds Bryan brothers.

This is the first time that the Indo-Pak duo made their debut in any Grand Slam tournament. They went down 1-6, 4-6 to Mike and Bob Bryan. The Bryan brothers authority were so huge that the first round went for just 25 minutes.

Ten Cate Follows Avram Grant Out Of Chelsea

Assistant Manager of Chelsea footbal club Henk Ten Cate was sacked yesterday. This is another big news in English football after the sacking of Avram Grant last Saturday.

Chief Executive Peter Kanyon called Ten Cate yesterday to a meeting at which he ws told to leave his job at Chelsea, because all leading candidates to succeed Avram Grant had indicated that they do not want to keep Ten Cate and they would prefer appointing their own staffs.

Turkey Defeats Finland 2-0 in a Warm-up

Ahead of Euro 2008, Turkey displayed some good and impressive football to beat Finland 2-0 in a friendly.

Goals were scored by Tuncay Sanli and Semih Senturk. Semih Senturk is the leading goal scorer in the Turkish Championship, while Tuncay Sanli plays for English side Middlesbrough.

In the previous two friendlies, Turkey defeated Slovakia 1-0 and lost to Uruguay 2-3.

Matthew Hayden Quits West Indies Tour

Matthew Hayden, the Australian opener has quit the West Indies tour due to Achilles tendon injury. He also didn't play the first test. Brad Hodge will replace Mattew Hayden for the rest of the West Indian tour.

Hodge came into the side as a replacement to Michael Clarke and he made to the starting eleven when Hayden withdrew from the first test, which Australia won by 95 runs.

Ricardo Montolivo and Inzaghi Out Of Italy's Euro 2008 Squad

Italy declared their Euro 2008, 23 member squad. Initially coach Roberto Donadoni named 24 palyers to his training camp, but cut Riccardo Montolivo before submitting 23 member squad to the officials.

He was a regular member of Italy's under-21 squad, but made just one appearence for the senior Italy team.

The final Italy squad for Euro 2008:

Goalkeepers: Gianluigi Buffon (Juventus), Marco Amelia (Livorno), Morgan De Sanctis (Sevilla).

Defenders: Christian Panucci (AS Roma), Fabio Grosso (Lyon), Fabio Cannavaro (Real Madrid), Marco Materazzi (Inter Milan), Gianluca Zambrotta (FC Barcelona), Andrea Barzagli (Palermo), Giorgio Chiellini (Juventus).

Midfielders: Gennaro Gattuso (AC Milan), Andrea Pirlo (AC Milan), Massimo Ambrosini (AC Milan), Daniele De Rossi (AS Roma), Simone Perrotta (AS Roma), Mauro Camoranesi (Juventus), Alberto Aquilani (AS Roma).

Forwards: Luca Toni (Bayern Munich), Antonio Di Natale (Udinese), Fabio Quagliarella (Udinese), Alessandro Del Piero (Juventus), Marco Borriello (Genoa), Antonio Cassano (Sampdoria).

No Inzaghi in Italy squad... I think they will hardly cross the league stages.

England 2 USA 0 (John Terry & Gerrard): Video

Hleb Way To Barcelona F.C.

Spanish media are reporting that Alexander Hleb might come to Barcelona FC from Arsenal. Even though Hleb is having a contract with Arsenal, the medias are reporting that both clubs have agreed a deal to be worth approximately 20 million Euros.

England 2 Unites States 0 : John Terry Keeps Capello's Faith

He has kept the faith of England's manager Fabio Capello. Yes...John Terry. He scored the opener against USA from a David Beckham's freekick (Beckham's 101st appearance). The other goal was scored by Steven Gerrard.

John Terry will not be making with the Englans's team for the Trinidad & Tobago match in the Carribeans. Rio Ferdinand and Wayne Bridge will be the 2 most likely probables who will be in the trip to Trinidad & Tobago.

Djibril Cisse dropped from French Euro 2008 squad

French manager Domenech today dropped Djibril Cisse from his 23 member squad for Euro 2008. Domenech also dropped Landreau, Julien Escude, Mexes, Flamini and Ben Arfa from the squad.
The Marseille forward missed a header in the Ecuador friendly, which probably made him out of the squad.
This is the second successive major competition he will have missed after breaking his leg in a friendly on the eve of the 2006 World Cup.

Gerard Pique set for Barcelona

Defender Gerard Pique has been sold by Manchester United to Barcelona. The 21 year old defender has been sold on Tuesday. Pique left Barcelona in 2004 to join the Red Devils.

Pique played for Manchester United 14 matches in the starting eleven and as 9 subsitutes. He scored 2 goals. The Spanish media reported that transfer fee for Pique was US$8 million.




Also reported that Barcelona paid Sevilla 14 million Euros (US$22.1 million) for Seydou Keita (Mali Midfielder) for a 4 year contact.

Renault F1 to debut new suspension at British Grand Prix

Renault F1 to debut new suspension at British Formula One Grand Prix in July. A Spanish newspaper reported that following the major setback for the struggling 2008 Formula1 car at Barcelona, a new suspension, an updated R28 car will be used in British Grand Prix.

Engineers are hoping the change results in a two tenth-per lap advantage, the newspaper added, to help the problem most often identified by Fernando Alonso, the car's general lack of traction.

Chelsea: Avram Grant hires Anthony Julius for better deal

After the controversial sacking, Avram Grant has appointed higly reputed solicitor Anthony Julius to negotiate with Chelsea. The Israeli is unhappy with the payoff offered by Peter Kenyon (Chelsea chief executive). Grant thinks that his payoff contrasted unfavourably with the 12 million pound Jose Mourinho received when he was dismissed in September 2007.

Grant was offered 5.2 million pound as compensation by Chelsea. Grant hired Anthony Julius to help him secure a better deal with Chelsea.

Anthony Julius is the same person who fought in favor of Princess Diana for her divorce against Prince Charles.

Now we will see a real Chelsea fight off the field.

Japan wins KIRIN CUP

Japan drew with Paraguay 0-0, but the results were good enough for Japan to win the 3nation Kirin Cup 2008. Japan beat Ivory Coast 1-0 and Paraguay drew 1-1 with Ivory Coast in the opening match. 1 win 1 draw helped Japan to win the tournament.

John Terry as captain against USA

John Terry of Chelsea was named the captain of England by England's manager Fabio Capello for one match against USA, to be played on Wednesday. Other than John Terry's captaincy, Capello also declared that he will use Rooney as a second striker.

No names were declared as captain for the Saturday match against Trinidad and Tobago.

Bayern Munich bids farewell to Oliver Kahn with a 3-0 win

Adieu Oliver Kahn

Ze Roberto of Bayern Munich in action


Bayern Munich - 3 v/s Mohun Bagan - 0

This match was the formal exit of one of the great goalkeepers of all times-Oliver Kahn. He was replaced by Michael Rensing in 55th minute, signalling the end of a carrer of more than two decades. Kahn's grand exit was witnessed by more than 120,000 spectators in the field. During the break he was gifted a miniature football with 8648 diamonds in it.

Striker Zan Schlaudraff and Ze Roberto scored in the 1st half and again Schlaudraff scored his 2nd and team's third in the 55th minute. 2 red cards was shown in this exhibition match. In the 84th minute Bayern's Breno and Mohun Bagan's Branco was shown the red cards. A 82nd minute shot by Lalkamal Bhowmick of Mohun Bagan hit the bar and went out of play.

Apart from this incident, Kolkatans witnessed a memorable football match and the exit of one of the celebrated golakeepers of the world.

Bayern Munich: Oliver Kahn (Michael Rensing 55); Breno, Christian Lell, Uwe Schlottner, Andreas Ottl, Mark van Bommel, Ze Roberto (Taygun Kuru 77), Jose Ernesto Sosa (Diego Contento 46), Viktor Bopp (Gianluca Simari 68); Toni Kroos, Jan Schlaudraff.

Mohun Bagan: Sangram Mukherjee (Chirodeep Chattopadhyay 89); Habibur Rehman Mondal (Naveen Kumar 70), Anand Vasin, Rakesh Masih, Rahul Kumar; James Singh, Lalkamal Bhowmick, S. James Singh, Ishfaq Ahmed, Henry Gangte (Tapan Maity 59); P.C. Lalawmpuiya (Branco Cardozo 64).

Oliver Kahn's Last "Venue"

Oliver Kahn in Kolkata

Salt Lake Stadium aka Yuva Bharati Krirangan

Kolkata Gears Up For The Final Match of Oliver Kahn

Actually, I am bit lucky to witness Oliver Kahn's last international match. His team Bayern Munich will be playing an exhibition match today in my city, Kolkata (India), starting from 18.50 IST. Apart from Oliver Kahn, Kolkatans will witness the magic and power of European football and see the skills of other players like Van Bommel, Ribery, Ze Roberto to name a few.
The stadium where they will be playing has a capacity of 130,000 and its the world's second largest stadium. Local name of the stadium Yuva Bharati Krirangan. Bayern Munich will be playing against Mohun Bagan, India's National Club, which happens to be my rival club (my football club: Kingfisher East Bengal, which happens to have results against foreign clubs).

Probable Bayern Munich team: Oliver Kahn, Jose Roberto Da Silva (jr), Andreas Ottl, Mark van Bommel, Jan Schlaudraff, Jose Ernesto Sosa, Michael Rensing, Bernd Dreher, Christian Lell, Toni Kroos, Breno Vinicius Borges, Dominik Rohracker, Taygun Kuru, Uwe Schlottner, Viktor, Bopp, Gianluca Simari, Diego Enrique Pizarro Bosio, Diego Contento

Probable Mohun Bagan : Sangram Mukherjee, Habibur Rehman Mondal, Rakesh Mashi, Anand Vasan, Rahul Kumar, James Singh, Henry, Isfaq Ahmed, James Singh (jr), Lalkamal Bhowmick, P.C. Lalawmpuia

Match will start 18.50 today...catch you tomorrow for this and other sports updates.