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Three of a kind: Roman Abramovich, Sir Alex Ferguson,
Luiz Felipe Scolari
Another EPL season is upon us, and yet another in the long
list of challengers to Sir Alex Ferguson has arrived. Luiz
Felipe Scolari is known universally in the media as Big
Phil. As manager of Brazil in 2002, he won the World Cup. As
manager of
Portugal,
he knocked England out of tournaments in both the 2004 and
2006; a feat he also achieved on his way to that triumph in
2002. To rub salt in the wounds, he turned down the England
job prior to joining
Chelsea
(although Ferguson has claimed not have been asked to manage
England
because, as a Scot, he said he would happily destroy them
from the inside!). In short, he has the attention of the
English football nation.
Now Scolari finds himself up against two of the most
powerful men in English football. One is Sir Alex. The other
is Roman Abramovich, Russian billionaire owner of
Chelsea
and
theoretically Scolari’s new employer. How Big Phil copes
with those two may yet determine the path of his early
tenure at
Stamford
Bridge.
He will hold no fears for Ferguson, however. Ferguson has
already seen off Jose Mourinho, Scolari’s famed and
self-confident predecessor. Even more remarkably, he’s seen
off no less than 16 Real Madrid managers during his reign
(you can read the full list below*), and is currently at war
with the incumbent over Cristiano Ronaldo who seems destined
to have to suffer another year as a ‘slave’ at Old Trafford
on
£100,000-a-week. So
Ferguson,
who’s seen off the best, now awaits the man who’s done
something no previous adversary has – won the World Cup.
If anybody is to threaten the duopoly of Chelsea and
Manchester United, it’s
Liverpool and Arsenal who once again seem best placed.
Arsenal don’t seem to have significantly strengthened
their side since last year, and have in fact lost Alexander
Hleb to
Barcelona and Mathieu Flamini to
Milan.
However, if Arsène Wenger’s young and inexperienced side
continues to mature, results will continue to improve
without huge purchases.
Liverpool have been far busier, adding David Ngog, Emmanuel Mendy,
Diego Cavalieri, Andrea Dossena, Philipp Degen, and
Tottenham’s Robbie Keane for £20.3m. Still, consistency
remains an issue for them and Rafa Benitez may be running
out of time to find it as
Liverpool’s new US
owners become impatient. Gareth Barry may yet still arrive,
although that saga became tedious quite a while ago
Of the remaining sides, pundits usually quote Aston Villa,
Newcastle, Everton, Manchester City and
Tottenham as likely outsiders, but this seems more to do
with their status as the next five biggest clubs, using
resources and tradition as the yardstick. City have a
new manager in Mark Hughes, who arrived from doing a fine
job at
Blackburn. Everton and Villa have managers who have now
been long enough there to shape the club in their own image,
but David Moyes at Everton has as yet added no
players, and uncertainty surrounding a new stadium and the
sudden resignation of chief executive Keith Wyness are not
helping. To add to this, Moyes hasn’t as yet put pen to
paper on his new contract.
Villa have added Team USA keeper Brad Friedel and Chelsea’s
Steve Sidwell but look pretty stable apart from that despite
the uncertainty over Barry’s move to Liverpool. Newcastle
have Kevin Keegan in charge, a recipe for drama, emotion and
good media stories, but not especially good for putting out
a side that can win league matches consistently. Spurs
have spent big, bringing in David Bentley from
Blackburn,
Giovani dos Santos from Barcelona and Croatian international
Luka Modric from Dinamo Zagreb for hefty amounts of money.
Maybe just maybe, they can be the best of the rest this
year.
Of the remainder, for all but FA Cup Winners
Portsmouth, there is little to be confident about. Any of the
remainder could find themselves in relegation trouble with
newcomers
Hull
City, West Bromwich Albion and
Stoke City
starting favourites to make a speedy return.
Next week, we’ll be looking back at Seattle Sounder’s US
Open Cup semi final match against Charleston Battery on
August 12 and hopefully looking forward to the
final.
*(Real Madrid managers while Alex Ferguson has been at Old
Trafford: Leo Beenhakker (twice), John Toshack (twice),
Alfredo di Stefano, Jose Camacho (twice), Radi Antic, Benito
Floro, Vicente Del Bosque (thrice), Jorge Valdano, Arsenio
Iglesias, Juup Heynckes, Guus Hiddink, Carlos Queiroz,
Mariano Remon, Vanderlei Luxemburgo, Fabio Capello (twice),
and Bernd Schuster)
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