Time and Practice

A great column by the Daily Mail's Martin Samuel on how it takes time to get to the top of the Champions League. City discover it's a steep climb to Carnegie Hall. They might get there one day, but its going to take time especially in a group that features Napoli, Munich, and Villarreal.

Champions League Predictions

I know the draw came out almost a week ago, but things have been busy around the OTWT home offices. Here are my predictions for the quarterfinals of the Champions League, which should be tasty. The ties will be played April 7/8 and the second legs will be played 14/15.

• Villarreal - Arsenal: Arsenal, they seem to be moving forward and could be a team that shocks the world in Rome.
• Manchester United - Porto: About five years ago this was the tie that introduced England to the Special One and changed English football forever, I think United will have an easy time with this one going through 3-0 on agg.
• Liverpool - Chelsea: Here we go again, I have this feeling that this year the games will be very different then they have been. I go with Liverpool on Pens.
• Barcelona - Bayern: The tie of the round, this has goals written all over it. I have this feeling that its going to be a United Barca final in Rome, so that would have to mean that Barca go through in an exciting tie.
  

A 100 million pounds is not bad

During the summer the soccer world was held hostage by the on going Ronaldo saga, will he go to the Real Madrid or will he stay at United. Now during the winter transfer window, the soccer world will be held hostage by the possibility of Kaka swapping the red and black of AC Milan for the sky blue of Manchester City.

During the course of the last couple of days, City have offered at least a 100 million pounds for the Brazilian play makers, it appears that AC Milan might be in the position to accept it and that would be the best for the future of the club.

Sure Kaka has lead Milan to a ton of trophies during his time at Milan, but at this point with an aging squad a 100 million pounds would go a long way to rebuilding it. That type of money would allow the board to go and get a proven goal scorer like Villarreal striker Giuesseppi Rossi to team up with Pato up from and that would only cost approximately $20 million.

With Kaka gone, Milan could then recall Yoann Gourcuff from Bordeaux to be the play making midfielder. In addition to the recall Milan could then reinvest some of the Kaka money to be a speedy winger like Ryan Babel from Liverpool. Those are a couple of a number of moves that Milan could make to reduce their age and make this a young attacking team.

Its hard to say good bye to a player like Kaka, but in the long run this might be the best move for Milan and their fans cause a 100 million pounds is a ton of money, especially in these economic times.