Football Dissected

I'm going out on a hunch here and saying the Rovers will come out victorious. United player Barcelona midweek in the semi-finals of the Champions League and I think that'll play to Mark Hughes advantage. But here's the stats:

This season Blackburn have played 17 games at Ewood Park, winning 7, drawing 6 and losing 4 to take 27 points from a possible 51. They've scored 22 and conceded 17. They're ranked 11th in the league in terms of home form. In terms of recent from, in their last 10 games they've:

• won 3, drawn 4 and lost 3, taking 15 points from a possible 30
• kept 3 clean sheets
• not scored in 3 games
• scored first in 5 games

Meanwhile, in terms of when they score their goals, it seems Blackburn only wake up in the second half. An amazing 66% of their goals have come in the second half. Unfortunately, they seem to either lose concentration or suffer from fatigue in the last 15 minutes as that is when they've conceded most of their goals (28.57% in fact).

At Old Trafford, United have been unstoppable. But away from home, they've been average. They've played 16 games away from home this season, winning 9, drawing 4 and losing 3 to take 31 points from a possible 48. They've scored 29 goals and conceded 12 away from Old Trafford to give them the second best away from this season (only Chelsea have done better by winning 8 more points away from home). In terms of recent form, in their last 10 games they've:

• won 9 and drawn only 1 (their last away match against Middlesbrough), taking 28 points from a possible 30
• kept 8 clean sheets
• scored in every game
• scored first in 9 games

United goals have mostly come in the last 15 minutes of games (just over 29%). And that doesn't look good for Blackburn. But in terms of conceding, United seem to concede most goals in either the first 15 minutes of the second half (just over 22%) or in the last 15 minutes of games (just under 28%). So maybe there is hope for the Rovers after all.

In the last 10 games between United and Blackburn, United have the advantage with 5 wins, 2 draws and just 3 loses. But ominously for the Red Devils, they've only won once at Ewood Park in 7 visits since 1999 and in the last 4 meetings at Ewood Park, Blackburn have won 2, drawn 1 and lost 1.

United will have Barcelona in midweek, but I'm sure Sir Alex will be driving home the message that there's still work to be done if they want to retain their championship. But still I believe Blackburn have the capability to cause a major upset and to set up a thrilling finale to the season.

My Prediction: Blackburn 2 - 1 Manchester United

The U.S. Soccer Federation have taken the initiative finally to set up academies in the US. The only problem is that without relegation and promotion, how will many "soccer" graduates who leave the academies to go and play in the lower leagues like the USL First Division (or A League) and the National Premier Soccer League be able to move up through the ranks to the highest levels like Major League Soccer or even one of Europe's premier leagues?

Also players shouldn't still be in academies when they're 16 or 17. That's the age that they should be breaking through into the first-team of a club. Here's an example: Cesc Fàbregas is now of the one of the best midfielders and passers in world football. He made his debut for Arsenal when he was just player 16 years and 177 days. He's now 20 (soon to be 21 in May). So that's over 4 years of playing first-team football for Arsenal - 4 years of development. Now I know not every youth player is like Fàbregas - he's unique, exceptionally talented and the fact that he was at the Barcelona's famous academy proves what potential he had. But you see the point. 4 years is a long time for development. With the current structure in the US, whereby the majority of professional players have to come through the college system and only start playing professional when they're 21, 22, or even 23, it's no wonder the US hasn't produced a world-class player like Cesc Fàbregas or Lionel Messi.

Academies offer no guarantees of producing players who have the abilities and talents to succeed as a professional, and with the USSF having already set up 63 academies in the past year with more to come, this may seem a huge cost with little rewards. But it is, of course, a step in the right direction.

The US has the potential to have one of the top three leagues in the world, although I don't think they'll ever have the best as I think that distinction will always remain in Europe. And I believe soccer can be the second biggest sport in the country, although I don't think it'll ever supercede the NFL. The US gave us Happy Days and the next 5 to 10 years will tell us if football, sorry, soccer, is going to be singing.

Depth is an important, fundamental concept in football nowadays, especially at the highest level. And the importance of it was highlighted perfectly on Sunday when Arsenal lost to Manchester United. Questions were already been asked about why Wenger didn’t bring in any players during the January transfer window, but, despite the possibility that he didn’t have any funds to play with, bringing in any extra bodies would have helped.

United midfield probably has the most depth and only Chelsea’s come second. They’ve got ever-impressive Cristiano Ronaldo (best in the world?), former West-Ham graduate Michael Carrick, defensive-shield Owen Hargreaves, Park Ji-Sung, Anderson, Nani, plus they’ve got the experience of veterans Paul Scholes and Ryan Giggs to rely on. Chelsea have midfield general Frank Lampard, Nigerian John Obi Mikel, Germany’s finest Michael Ballack, the ever-reliable Claude Makélélé, multi-talented Michael Essien, Shaun Wright-Philips, Florent Malouda and step-over "King" Joe Cole. But Arsenal don’t come anyway near United’s and Chelsea’s levels of depth in midfield. They’ve got Cesc Fàbregas, Alex Hleb, Tomáš Rosický (who’s been out for most of the season), Gilberto Silva, Emmanuel Eboué and Mathieu Flamini. Obviously, they have others like Abou Diaby and Theo Walcott. But neither of them have played regularly this season and in the case of Walcott, he’s been more of an impact player when coming off the bench.

There’s been talk of Ricardo Quaremas coming to Arsenal in the summer, but Porto will definitely want at least £20 million for the Portuguese winger. But will Wenger spend that much on one player, or, more importantly, will he have that much to spend in the summer?