Families should just shut up

Sometimes athletes keep their families to close to them and with the two biggest sports stories of the summer season that is no different. During the last couple of weeks the families of former Green Bay quarterback Brett Favre and Manchester United's Ronaldo have kept their gums from flapping about both players situations.

Rumors have come out during the last week or so that Favre wants to come back to lead the Packers, while Ronaldo has been rumored to leave the European Champions and want a move to Real Madrid, since the start of the summer.

And during the course of the last couple of days family members of each have had their say.

Scott Favre, Brett's brother, told a local TV station that his brother is ready to return.

"There's no doubt he can play," Scott Favre told WTMJ-TV in Milwaukee. "He's in good shape, he's working out, we know he can still play, he's healthy, so, if he did, it wouldn't surprise me."

Then it was Brett's mother chance to voices her opinion on her son's relationship with his former team.

"He's felt like that for the last couple of years, that the Packers didn't really want him back," Bonita Favre told WITI. "But nothing's been said. You know it's just been bits and pieces throughout the last couple of years, things that would come up, and it just didn't seem like they went out of their way to keep him. It was kind of like, 'You're done.'"

On the other side of the pond, Ronaldo family is also making their voices heard on his possible move to Real Madrid.

"Cristiano wants to keep playing at Manchester United," Ronaldo's sister, Elma Aveiro (pictured right with her brother), told the Sun. "Real Madrid keep making very strong advances for him. There is a lot of speculation in the newspapers all the time about where he will go and what he is doing but we know who he really is and what he is really up to. He wants to stay at United."

It's good to be part of a close family but sometimes families should really just keep their mouths shuts.

2008 -2009 in Jerseys: Manchester United

With Manchester United getting ready to report for preseason training in a couple of days, United have released their kits for the upcoming season. The home one will be a traditional red, which will number change. All of the jerseys will have the EPL winners patch on it.

The away one will be white with blue outlines (below).

United have also introduced a blue third shirt that will honor their win in the Champions League in 1968. Around the club badge it says, “May 29th 1968″ and “40th Anniversary” which commemorates the 1968 European cup win over Benfica.
Overall I think that both new jerseys are not that bad and better then some other premier league jerseys.

UEFA makes another mistakes

While one of the greatest European Championships just wrapped up, UEFA is doing their best to make sure the next couples are a disaster. The executive committees of soccer’s European governing body have decided to expand the field from 16 to 24 teams by the 2018 event. By doing this UEFA is going to water down the tournament. The things that make the tournament great is that there are no lite weights, every game counts. Most of the games in the tournament are between top 10 teams in the world, which is something that the World Cup can not even say.

By increasing the number of teams it will devalue the group stages. No more groups of death like Group C this years and lesser teams that should not be at the big show will be there, like most notably England.

Part of the joy of tournaments like the Euros and the World Cup is the qualification process, during every major tournament there is a major country that does not qualify and by increasing the teams you are limiting that chance. So please Mr. Frog do not increase the teams.

Mascot Madness: Those Crazy Italians

Serie A is a great league, but it might have one of the worst collections of mascots in the world. Just check out the girl one.

Finally, Finally

After spending a week on Holiday in Curacao, it's time to get back to work.

The Spanish showed their true class in their finals win over Germany in Euro 2008. Could this be the win that final gets the red and yellow rolling for good. Believe me they were the best team during the month long tournament.

Here is how the newspapers covered the event.

Diario de Burgos (Spain)

La Vanguardia (Spain)

Malaga Hoy (Spain)

Neue Westfalische (Germany)