La Liga Para Todos Dec 28-Muppets, Ronaldinho leaving and Transfer window

–Any article that begins with ‘Juan Soler is a Muppet‘ really gets my attention. The Valencia Offside does a great job of tracking all of the Che’s moves. With most of their legendary players getting the gate as of late, apparently some are not getting the pink slip, but rather will simply be left out of the lineup.

He held a news conference today at the Mestalla to explain to the world that David Albelda, Santiago Cañizares and Miguel Angulo aren’t sacked, they’re just riding the bench for now.

Uggh … this guy is the leader of the ship? We’re going down faster than the Titanic …

I have to agree with Cesar. When you have a player like Cañizares who has been at La Mesailla since 1998 and has been a driving force in the success of Valencia, you can’t just sit him on the bench. Just cut the strings and say goodbye. Valencia should give him the proper sending off that he deserves.

La Liga Para Todos Sept 10th–Robben training, Aragonés Loves me not, Rijkaard takes it like a man

–Arjen Robben took to the training ground today for the first time with his Real Madrid teammates. Robben, who came over to Madrid for 36 Million Euro in the offseason, has had a knee injury that has kept him out of the lineup thus far. Madrid had a 2.5 hour training session today with all of the players that are remaining in Spain after the calls to international duty, which aren’t many.

—Luis Aragonés aka the oldest coach ever, kept his love-hate relationship with Fernando Torres going strong after subbing out El Niño in the 59th minute in place of Iniesta. It just so happens that ‘el viejo’ finally got something right and Iniesta managed to put in the tying goal on 85 minutes to give spain a draw with Iceland. Torres is the leading scorer for Spain under Aragones, with 13 goals, but is goalless in over a year, with his last tally coming on September 2 2006 vs Lichtenstein. As I simply mentioned before, Aragonés just needs to go, period.

— Frank Rijkaard is taking his part of the blame for Barcleona’s dismal last season.

I’ve always said, when something doesn’t work, I’m the first person to look in the mirror

Rijkaard’s Barça had a sub-par past season, being knocked out in the Champions League by Liverpool, being beat 4-1 by Getafe to be knocked out of the Copa del Rey, and finishing second behind Real Madrid for the La Liga title. He came under fire from president Joan Laporta and some were calling for Rijkaard’s departure in the offseason. Having a stud like Giovani Dos Santos or an offseason signing in TH14, can’t hurt his chances to save some face in La Liga this season.

–Speaking of Dos Santos, he’s played in ONE La Liga game,but the moneybags in the Premiership are looking to cash in on the 18 year old. I’m personally not sold yet, sure he won the Bronze ball in this years U-20 world cup and the silver ball in the 2005 U-17 World Championship, but you have to let the kid show a bit of talent against some veteran competition first. But Manchester United will sign a 9 year old kid to play, so 18 is surely not too young for Man Yoo.

La Palabra del día

Una vaselina–a vaselina is a cheeky chip over a keeper to score.

Vaya vaselina de Messi, joe tío, que crack.

La Liga Para Todos Sept 6th–Tengo un gato en mis pantalones

Well I couldn’t be left out of all the fun that Jeff and Breton are having posting their daily pieces on the MLS and EPL, so I am joining in with my ‘daily’ (note parenthesis) take on all things La Liga. Note that most of my links are in Spanish because I’m an adopted Spaniard, so if you can’t read Spanish, lo siento mucho.

Here is some good Spanish music to start you out right. ‘El Besolla’ by La Excepción (its essentially about a Fútbol Sala team from the singer’s home ‘barrio’ Pan Ben, in Madrid.

Juan Román Riquelme said that he will stay put in Villareal until his contract is up in 2009, despite his well publicized falling out with manager Manuel Pellagrini last season.

Riquelme was essentially told that he ‘doesn’t fit into the plans’ at Villareal and will not play this season. Riquelme is probably glad he didn’t play in the 5-0 thumping by the hands of Real Madrid last week. This is a long way from being nominated for FIFA player of the year in 2005 based on his work at Villareal.

He was shipped off to Boca Juniors last season, where he did net 10 goals in 20 games and helped Juniors win the Copa Libertadores 2007. There was rumor that Boca wanted to sign Riquelme for good, but Boca denied an offer placed by Villareal, thus shipping the Argentinian back to España.

Pellagrini should get his head out of his ass and put Riquelme in as he is a proven goal scorer, but these things happen when coaches act like 12 year old school girls. Boca have said that they want to renegociate in December with Villareal, but we will see what happens. CHI will keep you posted.

Ernesto Chevantón is looking for an exit from Sevilla in December if he can find one. Chevantón has has a hard time fitting into the scheme of things over in Sevilla with the likes of Kanouté and Luis Fabiano upfront. Now with bringing in Kone from PSV Eindhoven, there is even less room in the Sanchez Pizjuan for the Uruguayan.

He is a great player and has amazing pace with the ball. Juande Ramos should look to keep him around, but unfortunately there is no where to effectively put him. He is getting looks from Racing and Galatasary, and wants to be out come the next transfer window.

La Liga has told the Spanish media companies to kiss and make up as Audiovisual and Mediasport still have not come to an agreement on televising La Liga games this season, thus turning Spain into a riot zone if they don’t come to some sort of decision soon. Trust me, you don’t want to take away football from Spaniards, you just don’t.

Miguel Ángel Portugal did a bit of whining in Marca today, saying that they ‘could have had’ Leo Messi, Giovani and Cristiano Ronaldo all on the cusp of signing with Madrid, but they never got them. Pity, it really is.

As my dad always said, close only counts in horseshoes and hand grenades.

La Palabra del día.

‘leche’—-Leche literally means ‘milk’, but it also means fantastic, great, ‘the shit’ As in this sentence.

Joder tío, Capel es la leche.