OTWT: UEFA Cup predictions

During its history the UEFA Cup has been the red haired step child to the Champions League, but this year in its final year as the UEFA Cup, it has some interesting match-ups in the the Round of 32. There are a couple of former European Cup winners and even some up and coming clubs.

Here is how I see the round going:

• Paris St Germain v Wolfsburg: PSG, the only top flight club in Paris has shown a rebirth this year after a couple of years battling relegation.
  
• FC Copenhagen v Manchester City: Manchester City, the only question is what will the roster look like after the January transfer window.
  
• NEC Nijmegen v Hamburg: Hamburg.
  
• Sampdoria v Metalist Kharkiv: Sampdoria
  
• Braga v Standard Liège: Standard Liege, could be a team that makes a run deep into the knock of rounds.
  
• Aston Villa v CSKA Moscow:Villa, this might be one of the hardest ties to call. I would not be shocked if the former UEFA Cup champions beat the rising English team.
  
• Lech Poznan v Udinese: Udinese
  
• Olympiakos v St Etienne: Olympiakos
  
• Fiorentina v Ajax: Fiorentia
  
• Aalborg v Deportivo de La Coruña: Aalborg
  
• Werder Bremen v Milan: Milan, maybe Golden Balls will make an appearance in the knock out stages.
  
• Bordeaux v Galatasaray: Galatasaray
  
• Dynamo Kiev v Valencia: Valencia
  
• Zenit St Petersburg v Stuttgart: Stuttgart. Zenit look like a team that could care less to be there.
  
• Marseille v FC Twente: Marseille.
  
• Shakhtar Donetsk v Tottenham: Donetsk. I think that Harry will be more concerned with the Premier League rather then the UEFA Cup.
  

The match ups are really not that bad, some are really interesting.

Need a midfielder head to Standard Liege

During the summer transfer window, Everton was rumored to be going after a couple of different players, but those did not pan out so they turned to Belgium and paid what could turn out to be 15 million pounds to Standard Liege for Marouane Fellaini.

At the time the Toffee fans voiced their pleasure saying it was a complete waste of money for such an unproven player. But as the season has gone on the supporters have fallen in love with the player that has one of the best uni brows in the world. His hard tackling, hard working style have been one of the surprises for Everton.

Fellaini success at Everton has many other EPL teams looking to Belgium for midfield help. Manchester United, Chelski and Arsenal have all been rumored to be in for Standard Liege's Alex Wistel. Wistel is versatile, he can play on the right and the left and can also play in his natural position of defensive midfielder. If teams are going to get in the race for Wistel its going to cost more then Everton paid for Fellani.

A couple of teams have also been rumored to be in for Standard Captain Steven Defour. Defour is know as a play making for midfielder with great vision. He will not come cheap either.

Standard Liege has a developed some great midfielders over the last couple of years and by selling them at the right time has allowed them to rule the rule the Belgium League.