Me and My Football

Ryan Giggs has been a Manchester United staple for 20 years now. With all the buzz surrounding his two decade engagement with one of the premier football clubs in the United Kingdom, a lot of fans are taking a closer look at what Giggs has brought to the club during his time with them.

Only 37 years old, Giggs began his time with Manchester United at the early age of 17 and has managed to avoid career ending injuries, trades, and anything else that could prematurely end his career for the past 20 years.

Jokingly, when asked about the 20 year anniversary of his arrival and Manchester United, Giggs reveals some of the ways that he has “survived” in the football world. He mostly attributes his success to his ability to side-step a lot of the common pitfalls that younger players get bogged down with. In reality however, it is his drive that has helped him to lead Man-U to the 11 Premier League titles that the club has won during his stint with the club.

In addition to the 11 Premier League titles, Giggs has also been with the club to help them work their way towards 4 UK Football Association Cups, 2 Champions Leagues Cups, and 3 Leagues Cups. Looking back on his exhaustive resume you can see that Giggs not only just “survived” playing with Manchester United, but has done extremely well for himself and his club.

There is no doubt that football in the United Kingdom is sometimes accompanied by bouts of violence from unruly fans either celebrating or lamenting the outcome of their favorite team’s latest match. Even with the acknowledgement of the interesting climate surrounding football in the UK, it is still horrible when innocent football fans are injured or killed when these acts of violence occur.

Today it was announced that 4 Zambian police officers are being charged with murder after an unfortunate incident at a bar in the town of Mazabuka where two patrons were reported watching the latest Chelsea versus Manchester United match. Evidently a number of patrons declined to leave the bar after a request from the police, who then threw in two canisters of tear gas into the bar, inciting a stampede.

Two individuals, a male and female, 23 and 21 years of age respectively, were killed during the stampede. Protestors who had received word of these deaths rioted in the streets of the Zambian capital Lusaka, breaking windows, looting, blocking streets, and causing a lot of damage throughout the capital until it was reported that the officers responsible for inciting the initial stampede were placed under custody and charged with the murders of these two young individuals.

Since English football is so popular in Zambia they do have to deal with a lot of the same issues that UK football fans have to deal with, including the prevalent violence issues surrounding these matches. Even still the loss of these two young football fans is incredibly regrettable.

The UK Football Association is incredibly displeased with the Wales Football Association for forcing 951 football fans to return their tickets to the 2012 Euro qualifier that will be taking place in Cardiff on March 26, 2011. While the fans did receive a full refund for the tickets they purchased, they were obviously incredibly unhappy with the situation. The UK Football Association expressed their displeasure with the Wales FA by saying that they “let down” a significant number of football fans.

The Wales Football Association sold 1,500 tickets to football fans for the match that is to be played later this month at the Millenium Stadium. Evidently allowing the sale of close to 1,000 tickets that were not available was an administrative oversight that eventually led to the refund of those 951 additional tickets to fans that the stadium was not prepared to seat for the match.

It is yet to be determined if the letdown fans will receive additional compensation for the administrative oversight by the Wales Football Association. The UK Football Association released a statement to the press today that echoed the disappointment shared by the close to one thousand football fans who were excited to be able to attend the match in person. In the statement that they released the UK Football Association remarked on their shared disappointment over the unfortunate incident and promises to ensure that everyone affected by this oversight will receive a full refund for the ticket prices as well as any delivery or transactional fees that were also imposed.

Peterborough United fans have recently been granted the option of forking over 15,000 pounds for a season ticket with the club. The incredibly steep price tag comes in as the most expensive season ticket football package in the entire country, but also offers a great deal of amenities and features that will hopefully intrigue some die-hard fans with deep enough pockets to shell out that kind of cash.

Purchasers of the 15,000 pound season ticket package with Peterborough United with receive season ticket seats in the director’s box, which features private access, luxurious padded seats, and complete cover from the elements. In addition to the seats themselves, season ticket holders will receive a three-course meal before each game they attend as well as being able to carry the newly created title of Honorary Director.

The announcement of the availability of this package is met with some skeptics who are not entirely convinced that fans would be willing to shell out that kind of money for season tickets that come with just a few more perks, especially considering the fact that most fans with season tickets are currently only paying a maximum of 450 pounds for their season passes (this price has been frozen at this rate for a few years now).

Fans interested in this “deal” can sign up to shell out some serious cash when 10 of these tickets go on sale in the next week. In addition to this interesting offer, Peterborough United is also giving true fans the option of purchasing season tickets for the next 75 years for a price tag of 12,000 pounds.

Tottenham fans can still hold out for a spot in the Champions League. A lot of fans’ hopes were dashed when Manchester United went down to Chelsea during the game on March 1st, but Les Ferdinand, the Spurs coach, still believes that there is a chance for the Tottenham team to gain a spot in the Champions League this year even with Chelsea now being 4th in the standings.

The coach has been trying to reassure both his team and Tottenham fans in the press today by pointing out that there still is a lot of football yet to be played this year and that it is still entirely possibly for his team to come back into the 4th ranking. His confidence in his team’s winning abilities is a much needed boost to the Tottenham program, and has helped to give fans hope for the remainder of the season. Fans have reacted positively to Les Ferdinand’s statement and believe in both their coach and their team.

Tottenham is hoping to go into the next Milan game strong, coming off of a 10 day stint at a training camp in Dubai. Hopefully the camp will prove to have focused the team to help get them ready to finish out the season strongly, which they will need to do in order to be eligible for a spot in the Champions League. Fans will be able to see how the team comes away from the training camp next Wednesday when their team faces off against AC Milan.

A lot of viewers of the match featuring Manchester United against Wigan were stunned when star footballer, Wayne Rooney, clashed with Jame’s McCarthy in the center circle of the field during the game. McCarthy walked away from the collision after taking Rooney’s elbow to his head. The ref responsible for dealing with the incident was Mark Clattenburg, who opted to not give Rooney a card and awarded Wigan with a free kick.

The incident got a lot of media attention after the game, with a lot of individuals claiming that Rooney should have been awarded a red card and since no such punishment was handed down during the game, he should face some kind of sanctions from the UK Football Association for what some people consider to be a deliberate blow to opponent McCarthy. The Football Association declined to indict a punishment on Rooney after speaking with referee Clattenburg who was adamant that he did view the entire incident and that his ruling on the field was appropriate; in his opinion Rooney did not deserve a stiffer punishment.

The UK Football Association’s decision to not sanction Rooney has been met with a significant amount of resistance from the United Kingdom’s football fans, many of whom believe that Rooney should face a suspension of some sort for his actions. However, according to the rules, since the referee does not believe his ruling was incorrect the Football Association is not allowed to take retrospective punitive actions against players.